INTERVIEW WITH : . [Voice = Marie Flemi ng~
Celeste K1tchen [Male Voice = Mr . Flem1ng]
DATE : November 1 , 1986
PLACE: Nederland, Texas
INTERVIEWERS: Walter and Janie Sargeant
JS: Celeste, where and when were you born?
K: Mother and Dad came to Nederland about 1901 or '02,
somewhere in there , and married . They met in Nederland .
Dad was from Missouri ; Springfield , Missouri. Mother was from
Marshalltown , Iowa . She had been married before and had one
son and a little girl . The little girl lived nine months .
She had pneumonia from the travel down here and died . She's
buried there in Port Arthur. We don ' t know who built the
house , but they settled in what would be my backyard right
now . They built this house i n ' 26 , 1926, and moved while I
was at school o ne day . I never even moved a dress over here ,
from t he backyard to the frontyard . So I know nothing about
moving. Lived here all my life .
WS : Remarkable.
JS: I notice your German heritage. Did they come from
Germany?
K: Yes . On my Mother ' s side . And Scotch- Irish on Dad ' s
side.
KITCHEN Page 2
JS: Were they the first generation to come? To the United
States?
K: Her mother and father met in Princeton, Illinois. They
were from Germany. Like last Sunday and were married this
Sunday and didn't see each other in between so don't talk
to me about fas t marriages . (laughter)
JS: That was your grandmother and grandfa ther?
K: Uh huh. And they came to Texas eventually and lived with
us and were buried down here at Greenlawn. In Port Arthur.
JS: Were there many other Germans in this area? I wonder
how they ....
K: There were more Dutch people from Holland than from
Germany. There were a few German families. There was not a
settlement around here of Germans. Mother could write and
speak German and use the old German script. But Dad didn't
speak German so I didn't learn the German language . That 's
the only thing I regret that my mother didn't do for me,
teach me her l anguage . Because I could have used it in my
career. I might have taught it.
JS: And you went to school here in Nederland? Your early
school.
K: Yes.
JS : And from Nederland , aft er graduating here, where did
you go?
KITCHEN 3
K: I went to Port Arthur Business College and graduated
from there. And then went to Southpark Junior College. Then
we could go a year to college and then teach a year and go
back. That's what I did , and finished the second year . Then
I received my degree from Southwest State Teachers College in
San Marcos. In fact, Anna, Marie's sister, late sister , and I
were in San Marcos toge ther .
WS : What year were you up there? Just out o f curiosity?
K: Are you huntin ' ?
WS: Well, I went down there , I 'm sure later in the 40's . I
just wondered when you .
K: I was Registrar then at Lamar. I went to Lamar in '39 .
[Voice : ] I te l l you they were there when Lyndon Johnson was
sweepin' t he halls. In San Marcos , yes . And then on top of
that I knew Lyndon at San Marcos. And then he came , when he
was Lieutenant Governor, he came to our Assembly and talked
to the Lamar students. I was standing there , he was passing
by and he stopped. He looked at me . He recognized me . I
said that is a mark for him.
WS : I don ' t know any other marks. (laughter)
JS: How many children were there in your fami ly?
K: I had the one step brother; and then a brother, myself
and a sister. My l ate sister came on my tenth birthday . So
I was a spoiled child. Still am.
KITCHEN 4
JS: What k i nd of business was your father in?
K: He was a rice farmer up until 1915. When the canal went
bankrupt, most of the rice farmers moved north and west of
Beaumont, continuedto raise rice. But mother refused to move
because we had part of the l and paid for. So Dad did high
land farming , dairying, and even ... he was in real estate
at the time of his death .
JS: We'd like to know more about this rice farming.
WS : How did they level the land? I r ealize it was level
but it s eems as though they would have had to . . .
K: We ll , I 'll tell you what . I t was already flat. So they
would go i n and build levees in order to hold water ; you had
to be able to drain the water.
WS : You flood r ice ...
K: Yes. They had what they ca lled a f l oat that they could
go over the plowed land and get the water where it would be
flowing in t he right direction . They had that sense of
direction , which I don ' t have. In fact, the addition right
back of us was known as Alligator Bayou. It was so low that
they couldn ' t drain all the water off . And the water
naturally goes toward the river. So what they ' d do is drain
what they could this direction so it would go to the river .
WS: How often did they have to irrigate? I don't know much
about rice growing at all.
KITCHEN 5
K: Well , we had the canals and they got the fresh water
from the Neches River . And where Pure Oil Refinery is now,
was the old pump station . They would fill the canals with
water and they had ways and means, dam~to get the water
where they wanted it t o go.
WS: You keep rice flooded all the time or ... ?
K: Well, no, you keep to a certain gr owth and then you have
to drain it while it ripens .
WS: I see . And then they harvested it by hand in those days?
K: Oh , sure. With the binders . They had regular . .. what
did they call it?
WS : Not a reaper?
K: No. It was a binder, wher e it goes and cuts the rice.
WS: Put it in sheaves or what?
K: Yeah, it was a machine pulled by mul es. Dad had 40 heads
of mules .
WS : 40 mules!
K: Oh sure . We had a regular mule barn where the mules had
to be taken care of.
JS: Celeste, tel l us how your mother would cook . . .
K: For 40 men, three times a day.
WS: Where did these men come from? Neighbors? or did you
have to . . . .
K: No, it's real strange . You've heard of Looziana.
KITCHEN 6
WS: Where's that? (laughter)
K: Well, it was the outskirts of Texas. (laughter). There
was a group of men that came from Gaydom(?), Louisiana every
harvest season. In fact, my father was killed instantly in
an automobile wreck over here on 365 in 1933. Those men
usually came about every other year to come back to see Mother
and Dad. They came afterwards even and didn't know of his
death.
We had a bunkhouse, a man to take care of the bunkhouse.
They had cots and he took care of their bedding and everything.
In our old home, we had a long screened-in porch. And it had
a table down the middle that could seat 40 men on benches.
And Mother fed them hot cakes for breakfast; cooked that many
hot cakes that would fill the men up and made coffee.
WS: I don't know how she could do it for 40. She must have ...
Voice: I didn't realize it was three meals a day. I was
thinkin' it was just ...
K: No. Three meals a day. And then we didn't have a bakery
and Mother made homemade bread for them every other day.
They bought 100 pounds of flour at a time; a hundred pounds
of sugar, a 50 pound lard can of lard.
WS: How long would they be here? Have you any idea?
K: According t o the weather. If we had a dry season, al l
right. But if you have a wet season , you have to wait for
KITCHEN 7
K: the field to dry to get back in . So it all depended .
And I 'm sure it was from six weeks or more.
WS: Six weeks or more?
K: Uh huh. It was all done by hand . Now they go in with
reapers and just- shhhh ... it ' s over with . But then they
had to ... I know it was a binder ... because the thing would
cut and the men would tie the rice in bundles and stack it .
WS: Where did they go from there?
K: Then they would take a team of mules when it's time t o
thresh and load the wagons with these bundles and take ' em
to the threshing machine.
WS: Was that moved around the country or was that in one
location? Threshing machine?
K: Well, they moved it ... let me say this first ... it was
most inconvenient to do the threshing . Because when you
thresh , you're going to raise rice next year .
WS: Was there any market for the hay?
K: Goodness no. Who would want rice straw?
WS: I mean , did they use it for bedding in some cases?
K: No.
WS: What did you have to do with it? Burn i t?
K: Usually burn it. Some did and some didn ' t. Some
just let it rot in the fields wherever they had a stack . And
Dad threshed not o nly for his rice but he threshed for our
KITCHEN 8
K: ne ighbors , the Wallaces . You heard us talk about they
r i ce- farmed together. Then they went down 365, Dave Smith ' s
mother ... h i s gr andparent s ... the Beau f i cas ( ? ). And the Basses
lived down there . And Dad t hreshed for them , sometimes .
WS : Did this requi re a lot of fertilizer : What they do
these days?
K: No , you don ' t fertilize rice . Now , these days , what
they do is f l y over and t ry to kill the weeds.
WS: What did you people do for insect and disease control ?
K: We didn ' t have ' em then .
WS : You didn ' t have them?
K: No.
WS : Somebody was telling me in t he Valley, when we were
down t here, that the birds were so much more plentiful , they
thought maybe they kept the insect population down .
K: You know , I think there could be something to that because
the rice birds , when the rice was ripe, here would come the
birds . And if it was bad weather and t he men coul dn ' t work ,
the men would go out and kill the birds . You know the black
birds breast could be fried and eaten . Mother would cook
anythi ng they wanted if t hey'd c l ean it . (laughter ) Sometimes
it would be such a rainy season , they ' d get on a mule bareback
or something else and a l most float to get down t here t o shoot
birds . Here in the back .
KITCHEN 9
WS: How do they plant rice? By hand?
K: Oh, they had regular planters. It was a long thing,
the mules pulled, put the rice in it.
WS: Like a drill?
K: Yes. That's what it's called .
WS: I'm from somewhat a rural area in New York, farming;
dairy farming was our ... so I'm not too ...
K: You're a Yankee, too.
WS: No, no. Where was the market for your rice? Where was
it sold and how? Do you remember?
K: This was out of my thinking. All I know they had a
warehouse over here by the railroad track. When they'd sack
the rice, they 'd take it over there. I don't know about the
market. I don't remember. You see, I was just a little girl .
(All this is from memory?)
WS: I see.
K: I remember the equipment and I remember ... I have to
admit that I was the apple of my Dad's eye. When he'd go out
to push leve es , I'd go with him so I could ride. Then I'd get
sunburned and Mama would fuss.
WS: But then the failure of the canal more or less forced
you out of the rice business? Is that it?
K: It went bankrupt. You can't raise rice without water.
WS: That's right.
K: You have to have water.
KITCHEN 1 0
WS: Did they convert right into dairy far ming more or less
or ... ?
K: No, he went into high land farming.
WS: High land. What's that?
K: Like raising sweet potatoes , corn ... At the end, Dad
raised corn. Raised it to sell seed corn . He had a specialty.
And he sold seed corn all over East Texas and into Louisiana.
WS: Did that require any extra work?
K: The only thing is, with corn , raising corn and selling it,
you have to shell it and package it. Anything to make a livin'.
WS: I just wondered, because of our grandsons up in Michigan
are hired by a big seed company; hire schoo l kids to go out
in the school bus and they do some kind of tassel control.
I'm not quite up to i t, but they have to cover, to keep
pollination off .
WS: I don't quite understand. You didn't get in to that
with the seed corn that you know of?
K: In fact , Father Hardy of our Catholic church, he was in
Port Neches and Nederland , he had a farm that he had over
in Louisiana and the mischievous boys that couldn't be control l­ed
, he'd take ' em over there. And he had somewhere around
26 boys at one time. And he worked ' em . And Dad furnish ed
the corn for them . Gave him corn . They grew corn, too.
Did you know that?
Voice: No, I didn't. I'm finding out a lot.
KITCHEN ll
WS: Do you have anymore questions about this rice farming?
Voice: Well, I don ' t know about the rice farming.
K: He asked me if I had any more questions about r ice
farming. Can you think of anything that we need to cover?
JS: After you graduated from college, you came back here .
Did you start t eaching here? I know you were Regi strar at ...
K: I taught out at China, Texas five years . I'd go out
Sunday even ing , come back Friday evening . Spent the weekends
here in civilization (laughter) because 95% of the children
out at China were French and they couldn't speak English.
They had to stay in the first grade two years before they
could even be promoted. Some couldn't even be promoted then;
didn ' t hear the English language at home .
Voice: I didn ' t realize that China was that predominantly
French .
K: This was in the dim, dark ages . Then the summer of
' 34, when I got my degree ... Dad was killed in December ' 33 ...
I got my degree in ' 34, the superintendent of Port Neches
as ked me if I would be interested in coming home to live
and be here. I said, "Well yes , because it would save me
paying room and board ." Mother had the land but the de­pression
, there had to be an income . So I came home and I
taught in Port Neches School District and Nederland School
District before I went to Lamar.
JS: Did you teach t here before you became Registrar?
KITCHEN
K: No.
JS: You went in as Regristrar.
K: I went in as the first Regristrar and left as the
last Regristrar.
JS: Is that right?
12
K: Because now they have a Dean of Admissions and Records .
JS: What year did you start in as Registrar? .
K: '39, 1939.
WS: Was that quite an experience, being the first one?
It must have been ...
K: Well, the Dean of the College called me a round the
first of July ; asked me if I was coming to Beaumont, at
5:30 in the morning! I said, "No , I'm not . Not today."
Next morning, the phone rang at 5:30. "Are you coming to
Beaumont today?" I said, "No, I 'm not ." ~ve ll, the t hird
morning, Mama says, "For gosh sake, go see what he wants ."
JS : Was t hat Dean Boitnott ?
K: Yeah. You know it was. So he offered the job to me .
I said, "Oh Dean I don't know anything about office work."
"Well, you stop and think about i t ." I said, "Well, I'll
let you know in a week's time." Well, two, three days
passed , the phone rang one morning at 5 :3 0 (laughter).
Anyway, I answered the
phone. " I want you to come to Beaumont today ." I said,
"All right, I 'm comin ' ." And on the way goin ' up there I
Kitchen 13
K: thought, good gracious, I don't want that job.
And I didn't.
So I listened t o him, I didn't t alk , I listened. I
sai d , "All right Dean, I'll t ake it. I'l l be a t work i n
the morning. And i f I don 't like it , I'll pick up my
purse and walk straight out and not give you five minutes
notice ." (laughte r) That's fair. I stayed 31 years.
(laughter)
JS : That 's great.
K: Not everybody can ge t a job like that.
WS: I guess not. Most of us have to beg to get one .
K: Fortunately, o r unfortunatel y my year s of expe rience ,
I
I never did apply fo r a job . I don 't have a r esume .
JS : Isn ' t t ha t something!
K: And I ' m not going to work up one now.
Vo i ce : You didn ' t need one .
JS: He knew your background and knew you, probably.
K: But I had a wonderful exp e rience with h i m. Tha t' s
the only thing I miss, the young people .
JS: Is that right?
K: I don't miss the work . They ' ve got comput e r s to do
that. You know, on Friday night , I never knew who was
going t o come to this door. "Come on , Miss Kitchen , go
with us." They'd come get me . It was just rea l interes t-i
ng .
JS: Was it to go with them to a ballgame or soci al?
Kitchen 14
K: Goodness, no. I've gone with them, I'll never
forget this was way back in the thirties, well, 1940,
four of ' em came , two couples . They wanted to go to a
particular lounge that was near Vidor . And they didn' t
want t o go by themselves . They wanted me to go with
them. I ' d never been in a lounge, I didn't know what to
do. And I said, "All right, I'll go with you. " We ya­yaed
all the way over. I listened to thei r things. We
got up to the l ounge and do you know those kids wouldn ' t
get out. They were scared . (laughter)
Voice: I tell you what, I had asked Jack Fleming - we
were in Chicago and I had always wanted to go to a
burlesque show. I said, "Let's go while we 're here." So
by t he time we got down to lower State Street and I saw
all of this , I wouldn 't get out . Jack said, "Well, you
said you wanted to go ." And I said , "But I wanted t o go
t o a nice one."
K: Didn't want t o go down Harlem, did you?
Jack: So we didn't go .
K: Well, I'll just have to admit I kept my face
straight, I came home . Mother s aid , "Well , how was it? "
And I told her and she just died laughing . Mother enjoyed
things just like I did. I guess I'm a chip off my
mother ' s side of the house . I enjoy people.
Kitchen 15
Voice : Celeste had a wonder , wonderful mother . Just
tremendous .
K: There was never a dull moment.
Voice : Celeste, tell them a little about your schooling
days
in Nederland. In the early/- you know.
K: Well, I ' ll tell you what . Of course you know, I'm
big ~ I'm small now to what I used to be. I was a fat
baby. I only got one spanking in school . Old lady
Searcy was the first grade teacher.
WS : How do you spell her name?
K: Searcy, I believe. Of course , we had screwed down
desks. I was literally scared to death . I never heard
a sound of a letter in my life up to that time. And it
was time for s pelling and she gave me the word dog to
spell. I said, "C." And t h at ' s as far as I went .
She said, "Dog . " I said , "C." And she spanked me on
the calves of my l egs . I cried all day . She couldn 't
stop me. Then, we walked to school; later we went back
and forth to school in a horse and buggy from here.
And when I got home , I had a t emperature . I had
cried a l l the way home, too . I was scared to death .
Mother had to take me t o s chool the next morning . I'd
never been spanked in my life . With a ruler! It left
marks on my legs . But I can te l l you this : when she
s aid dog the next time, I could say d-o-g .
Kitchen 16 .
WS : She had to g ive you the moti vation , anyway.
K: It motivated my mot her t oo. You know, really, mother
and dad ... if we did anything wrong, we s a t down and just
talked. Never raised a voice or spanked. I just didn't
know anything about it.
WS: Was there one teacher pe r grade then?
K: Yeah. One t eacher. And two grades per r oom. Don't
forget that. First, second grades. And then t hird and
fourth grade wer e together, t hen fifth and sixth .
WS: Could you skip a grade if you were c ompetent enough?
K: I don't remember that.
WS: We did a little in my school , I know . Some of the
kids ... I didn ' t , but ...
K: Then the seventh , eight h and ninth were all together
in Nederl and . And t enth and eleventh. Then they got it
ninth , tenth, and e l eventh together ; seventh and e i ghth
together.
Voi ce :
you?
You finished high s chool at Nederland , didn't
K: Oh yes. I got me ... I got my ... Now believe it or not ,
this alumni association won ' t believe i t but Le hman and
Ma rjorie Gibson and one other, I' ve forgott e n who , three,
got their high school diplomas in 1917.
Voi ce : Al l right . We have one of those diplomas in
the Windmill. It was Gerka Bruinsma .
Kitchen 17.
K: Gerka, that's who it was ! And that alumni group ,
just the other night we had a meeting, woul dn't believe
that.
Voice : All right , you bring them up there and show ' em.
It ' s in the Windmill Museum.
K: All r i ght . The next group , ther e was a skip there,
' 23. And Margaret Block was with that and Ruth DeLong
and one other.
Voice: And Anna was in that class.
K: And Anna.
Voice: And Paul McNeil.
K: Then there's seven of us that gr aduat ed in 1924.
There are three of us left now .
Voice: Was John in that class?
K: John? Yeah , sure . And Gardette and J. C. Sherman,
Hazel Mae , Lennie Handchik , myself , one more .. . Harold
Morgan . And he ' s deceased . There's just only three of
us left. J.C., Lennie and I . And Lennie is incapacitated.
She lives over at Ridge City with a son . And J . C. and I .
We ' re still go- go.
WS: Did they have a standard for testing or anything , or
did they just ... ?
K: Goodness, no .
WS: How did you get into college? Did you have to t ake
any tests when you got ready t o go to college?
Kitchen 18.
K: No. Just present your high school diploma .
WS: You didn' t have to take any coll ege entrance exam.?
K: No, no, no. They never heard of such a t h i ng.
WS : I just wondered .
K: If you were a high school graduate , and got your
high schoo l record, that's all you had to have.
al l this testing has come up since World War II .
WS: Well, no, not in the upper ...
I n f act,
K: In our area . And it's good. Believe it or not .
WS : One other thing and the n I ' ll shut up . Did you
have excused days for work and stuff? Di d they allow
so many days to be off school?
K: You've had time to have the measles and the mumps ,
chicke n pox (l a ughter ), small pox .. . I'll admit , the
northern schools , like Califo rnia , t heir schools were
way ahead of ours in the lower south .
WS: I had to take a college entra nce course , they
call it .. . We had regents. They were prepar ed at t he
state capitol . They wer e distributed the morning of the
test . The t eacher didn ' t know what was going to be
given . So it was pretty much a standard.
K: Now we have T E C A T (laughter)
JS : Bet you ' re glad you didn't have to take that .
Not that ... I don ' t mean taking it , but being i nvolved
in having to take it .
Kitchen 19.
WS: When you say T E CAT. What is that? You've got
me there.
K: Teachers Education ... it's a test for teachers.
WS: Oh, I know what you're talking about.
K: What is it? Teachers Education Competency ...
Aptitude?
Male Voice: Celeste, one other thing, in connection
with the school. You mentioned that you walked to school.
Did you walk by yourself?
K: No. The Wallaces that lived, our neighbors. There
were four boys. Now get this situation, I had 2 brothers
going. I was the only girl. And I had to keep up with
those boys.
WS: How far was it to school, basically?
K: It's two miles from here.
WS: That's quite a ... you must have had a ...
K: No. It was all right but we had to start out early
to get there. And the weather was so bad sometimes, Dad
would hitch up the wagon and take us all in the wagon if
he had time. This road out here, my f a ther built this
road. There were no roads here at all,when they settled
here. It would be so muddy, that we just couldn't walk
down it. So he'd take us in the wagon.
WS: Was it a covered wagon or just an open ...
Kitchen 20.
K: Just an open wagon. I don't remember the first
time we s t arted using the horse and buggy. But i t got
so aggravati n ' for Dad, the weather being so bad t hat
he had to go, it was easier to get a buggy and horse for
us to go . And after 1950 , the Wallaces moved out to
China so we didn 't have anybody h e r e , just us. And
fin ally when they shelled the 347 road, Dad shelled from
the railroad here. He paid for it . It wasn't given or
the county didn't pay for it.
WS: You mean you left the horse and buggy r ight at
school? You had a place to keep it?
K: Dad built a shed up there for us to put the buggy
in. We had to put the buggy in the shed if it was
rainin '; the horse had to be put in a stall a nd i f it
wasn't , there was a r ope that we staked Dick out s o
that he could eat.
Voice: Cel e ste, I taped Marya last Oct ober when she
was here and she said t hat for a while they lived on the
farm road
rice/ and that they would come and meet youall and you
went to school together. She said she was so glad when
youall g o t t he horse and buggy because youall would pick
her up.
K: Well, Dave Smith's mother and h e r brother George used
to walk down that mud r oad, which is 365, right in fr ont
of Central Mall. I f we ' d see them coming, we would
Kitchen 21.
K: wait f or them so they coul d r ide. And the reason
we loved Syr ian food, we had whi te bread and we woul d
excha nge l unc hes . ( l aughter ) And Mary , Dave ' s mother ,
still remembers that episode . Of course George is d e ­ceased,
her brother is deceased. But it's j ust real
f unny . Now what happened to t he Basses I don't
know. They were Syrians too . They adopted , i t ' s jus t
l ike Dave Smith ' s f a t her , carne from Syria. He had a
name from he r e to the highway and when h e came i n , he
adopted the name of Smith. That is just an adopted
name fo r David .
Voice : Now he is a county commissioner .
K: And he ' s a county commi ssioner .
Voices : I didn ' t know thi s about him .
Mal e Voi ce: I didn' t know t hat either.
K: I registered David at Lamar .
WS: I wonder if i t was quite detai l ed to change your
name i n those days?
K: Then they could j ust c ha nge their name .
WS : You didn ' t have to go anywhere and .. .
K: You take men that worked here in the rice fields for
my father. There were two of them , in particular , ...
they ' re deceased now .. . but they had a bad record somewhere.
One man had kill ed a man and when he came to work for Dad ,
he found o ut he coul d get a job in the rice field , he
Kitchen
K: changed his name . In fact , I can remember his
name. I don 't remember his legal name , but it was
Bol tenhouse , when he got here . I want to tell you ,
Mothe r and Dad , and Al ice Gentry then, and Arthur
Boltenhouse went t o the State Fair a nd somewhere
22 .
around he re I have their picture of Arthur. But that is
not his legal name.
Voice: One of these days, Celeste, we're going to come
over and get in your pictures . I need to have some of
them copied . I had some of them copied but I want to
copy some more of t hem .
K: What pictures?
Voice: The ones you're talking about now .
WS : Who is this p i cture here?
K: That's a friend of mine .
WS . Oh , I see.
Voice : Who were some of your teachers and the ones
that . . . I heard of Mrs. Searcy. I think she's the one
that spanked Anna . She came home one day .
K: She spanked all of us .
Voice: She had blood on her legs where . . .
K: She spanked . .. and she used , you know, the meta l
part of the ruler . She hurt me!
JS: You said your mother didn't like it . Did she go
Kitchen 23.
JS: back to her?
K: She went back next morning to discuss what happened.
I couldn't tell mother. I didn 't know what happened.
JS: You didn't realize that it was because you couldn't
spell dog?
K: I couldn't spell dog. I didn't know my spelling
words. I didn't hear the sounds. I heard 'em though,
time mother got through with me.
JS: Were you afraid of the teacher all year?
K: Oh, I was scared to death. Yes , I was scared of
her from the beginning. We had a Miss Richardson that
was a great teacher in, I think it was around the seventh
and eighth grade. She taught me more grammar than
anybody else had ever taught me. She taught us to
diagram sentences. Did you ever do that? And the parts
of speech and the importance of the parts of speech. She
was just great . And then I had E.W. Jackson; taught me
geometry in High School, was a good teacher . Miss
Hardy, I. C. Hardy was a very good gr ade school teacher.
Voice: What was her f irst name? Did she teach here?
K: Alberta Pogue. She was another excellent teacher.
I had her in the ninth grade. In English, ninth and
tenth.
And I'll tell you another thing that was different
about the schools then and now . We had a playground.
Kitchen 24 .
K: We had recess. And the school was literally
divided. The boys played that side and girl s p l ayed on
this side . You dare not put your foot on the boys '
side because it was dangerous. (laughter) We had outdoor
privies.
WS : How about drinking water? Did you have a fountain?
Ice water fountains?
I
K: Are you kidding? We had an old well and on Halloween
I night, I'll never forget, it happened Halloween night.
Some mischievous boys poured ink in the well and we
didn ' t have any water the next day , to drink . We had to
do without water until they got the well pumped out.
WS: What was this? Just a shallow well?
K: It was a dug well and we had to pump , like we had
to do here . '0e had the same thing here [this must be Miss
Kitchen's house]
WS: What did they have to go for water ... about 30
feet? Something like that?
K: I don ' t know. I do know this out here, Dad had a
well dug and he had cattle too aft er the rice crop ...
and he had a well dug to water the cattle. And the man
who dug i t , it was wide enough two men could go down
in it. And they hit a water vein . If some men had not
Kitchen 25.
K: been at the surface, those men would have drowned
right then . The water came right up. That well
never was pumped dry. No matter what. At that time,
he put in a Delco system and we had our own electric
lights. Got away with the lamps.
WS: This Delco ran off batteries, didn ' t it? Did you
have to have a lot of batteries for this De lco system?
K: Oh yes .
WS: How did you charge your batteries? With a .. . ?
K: Don ' t ask me that .
WS : I just wondered whether they had ...
K: I'm not an electrician.
WS: I thought maybe they had wind chargers.
K: All I know that it was a Delco system. And we h ad
our own electric lights . We even had an electric iron .
Didn't have to wash lamp chimneys and f ill the lamps
with oil. You never did have to do that , did you? You
don ' t know ; you've missed a lot .
Voice: Me and Margaret were lucky. We came along a
little later on.
K: Yes, you were ; you were very fortunate.
Voice: Her sister and I were about the same age . We
were very close.
K: You know, I 'm telling you, the young people don ' t
know what they ' ve missed. The old Aladdin lamp t hat we
h ad over our dining room table ... that ' s where the
Kitchen 26 .
K: studying went o n and the reading and everything .
WS : That was ker osene o r gas? Some of ' em had gas .
K: There was no gas around. It was kerosene . And I
want t o tell you, Mother got a gasoline iron . And when
Mom would iron , Dad wouldn ' t come in the house . He was
scared o f it. He stayed outside unti l s he got through
ironing .
JS : It must have been heavy . Was it?
K: No , it wasn ' t t hat heavy .
Voice : We 'll show it to you .
J S: I suppose it l ifts off ... the heating u nit and then
the ironing ...
K: Oh, this was a little tank right in front .
Voi ce: You young people don ' t know what . ..
K: I had almost forgott en about that .
WS: I lived in a r ural area and we had kerosene lamps .
We had o ne big Al addin , you called it.
K: I ' ll have you know, this was not rural . This was
plain country .
WS : A l ittle different !
K: And I want to tell you something else . I was made a
city s licker over night. There was a meeting somewhere
and they met and decided to take us i n . Over night . I
have a n a rticle , Mother told the reporter, said, she
Kitchen 27 .
K: never moved s o fast in her life, sittin still.
(laughter) And it's true. I don't belong t o Port
Neches, I don't belong t o Nederland, I don ' t bel ong to
Port Arthur, I don't belong to Beaumont. I'm just a
country girl right out here. And you know, half the
students thought I lived in Beaumont. They didn 't
realize I was speedy on the highway .
WS: Did you commute most of the time you were up
there, then? Did you drive back and forth most of the
time you were there ?
K: I had my mother to care for; my sister.
WS: So you commuted all the time?
K: Ye ah .
WS: Did you drive at first or did you ride the train
or trolley whatever it was?
K: When?
WS: When you first started your work up here.
K: No, I had my car.
WS: Oh , you had your car.
K: I bought a Ford car. Now ask me why I got a Ford
car.
JS: Why?
K: I was teaching in China and I rode i nto Beaumont
with the school superintendent to go t o the old
White House while he went to the court house. He got t o
the court house and forgot about me. I stood and I waited
Kitchen 28.
K: and waited 'til about 6 o'clock. And there was a
used car lot right across the way. I walked over
there and I asked the man, I said, "Will you sell me a
car?" He said, "I'd be glad to. 11 "The bank's closed
and what have you. I want a car.'' He said, "Well,
here's a good Ford for $150.00." 1930 model Ford;
2 door. This was 1933 now. You hear that? And that
was a good Ford. That was Thursday evening. The man
let me have it, drive back to China, didn't ever see
me before. Saturday morning I drove it in, got my money,
paid him, and carne horne in it and my Dad pushed the
panic button. "Celeste has a car!" (laughter) And I
bought cars just like that ever since. With no rhyme or
reason.
WS: You weren't going to stay all night there, anyway.
K: I didn't know what to do.
Voice: What did you say to the superintendent?
K: "Oh Celeste!"
Give me some rnoney. 11
I said, 11Yes, you cost me $150.00.
(laughter ) He went out and looked
at it and said I go t a good car.
Thank you O.P."
I said, "Yes I did.
WS: Forced the issue anyway , didn't he?
K: Uh huh. I needed it. It was really a good car . I
cried when I sold it .
Kitchen 29.
JS: How long did you keep it, do you remember?
K: I kept it three years. I got a '35 Ford, model Ford.
JS: I'd like to hear some of your experiences as
Registrar. At Lamar. I know it's hard to pick any one .
How many students did they have when you first started
there? Do you remember?
K: Yes, I registered ... now this is all done by hand,
not by machine. I mean literally. And everybody's
schedule, when we were a junior college up to '5 2 ,
everybody's schedule had to be worked out . First
thing I asked, "Where are you transferring? If you're
going to the University of Texas or if you're going to
Stephen F. Austin or where. What are you going t o be
majoring in? I planned their courses so when they
transferred, they wouldn't lose a credit. All right.
And that was an ordeal because that was all new to me.
Not onl y that, I c ollected the tuition. It was about
300, I guess nearly 400 students the first year.
JS: It was co-ed?
K: Oh yes, yes. Then we didn't have senior citizens.
They were all just out of high school. Remember this:
there was no activities f or them. We didn't have our
gym. We were part of Southpark school system.
There are several instances that are just real funny
Kitchen 30.
K: that happened along the way. Anyway, when I left
there, there was over 10,000 students. And of course,
registration~as different because we were a senior
college. We didn't have to plan for ' em to go s omewhere
else. They met our requirements.
Now if they were going somewhere else, we would plan
for them. They'd have to tell us. We didn't ask 'em.
Now that was the difference. After World War II, a
young man I taught in the second o r third grade out at
China, Texas, came in to see me. He had earned the
Purple Heart. He said, "Miss Kitchen, I want to see my
file." So I buzzed my secretary to get his file . Poor
Robert: He had been suspended by this Dean for one
week because he had wrapped the Dean's car with toilet
paper (laughter) I read it and I gave it to Robert .
He said, "Don't you think I have earned a clean file?"
Wearing the Purple Heart now. I said, "Robert, you
didn't have enough to do did you? " He said , "No." So
I buzzed my secretary, said, "Would you put his record
in a clean file?" And I gave him a file to take home with
him. That's how the Dean punished them . If anything
went wrong with a student, he wrote on their file in
their presence. Best psychology I know of. It made
a record.
Oh I would pull files before I ever went there , things
KITCHEN 31
K: that he would write on th~m. They're still up there . If
they didn't come in like Robert .
Voice: Is Dean D.W. Boitnott the one .•. I don't remembe~
who he had a misunderstanding with but it got part of his ear?
K: Oh that was C.W. Bingman , the superintendent.
Voice: I didn't know which one it was got his ear bitten, part
of it bitten off.
K: A student jumped on his running board, of course his window
was down , and he bit part of his ear off .
END OF TAPE I, Side 1, 45 minutes
Side 2
K: C.W. Bingman was a little bit absent- minded . His wife
would tell him to bring home a l oaf of bread and he ' d stop
by and get a loaf of bread and put it under his lectern . It
might be there a week. He would go out and he couldn't find
his car . You know, young people are real mischievous , too . ,,
They would say , 11Come on , we'll help you find your car and
they would just walk him up and down, knowin' that his car
was parked right there .
And then we played football. tt.Je didn't have a stadium.
We played out in the grass back of Southpark high school.
There were some bleachers. And that's all that we had. One
of the boys brought me a little flower in a little pot. If
blue it would be fair weather, if it was changing colors ,
it would be going to rain. And so they always sent one boy in
KITCHEN 32
K: to check the flower in Miss Ki tchen 's office, seein'
what kind of weather they're going to play football in.
JS: Was it accurate, at all?
K: Oh I don't remember. This is Texas!
JS: Never know.
K: All right , are we going to have a cold spel l ?
WS: Maybe.
K: When? I'm like this , getting ready to go up to A&M
tomorrow. In the morning, in fact . I have to be there tomorrow
afternoon. The weather man said well, it'd come in Sunday
night, then one of them said Monday. So what shall I wear?
JS: That's your problem.
Man's voice: Whatever you do will be wrong.
K: That ' s right.
Voice : Your early recreation, i f any. You know you all a lways
had so many church parties out there. Would you tal k about
f~o~\~
the young~and the church parties?
K: Now let me say this. Remember I said I was big? I was
not included with the social people there. Now the Epworth
League , we would have our little parties but they were
nothing. Get together and play dominoes or something like that .
They're not entertained like they are today . They•re so
entertained that it 1 s unreal.
Voice: Well, it's unchristian.
K: Well, I hate to say it but it's true.
KITCHEN 33
Voice: Oh, I think so. The kids raise money; they raise it
to take trips . They should be out on work missions ; they should
be serving ... It's not building character at all .
K: I think it's degrading.
Voice: I do , too. I don't approve.
K: There was the Epworth League and we •
I was dating a young man from Port Arthur. He was Catholic.
He'd come get me and I'd go to mass in the morning with him
and he could hardly wait to get home so he could go to church
so he could sing. And if I didn't go with him, he ' d come in
the afternoon so he could go to Epworth League so he could sing.
Now the Catholics are singing in their churches.
WS : What kind of a League was this?
K: Epworth League. It was the young people ' s organization of
the Methodist church. It used to be called Epworth League. At
one time it was Sherril Epworth League. I have all those
books. Anyway , it's M.Y .F. now.
Voice: Methodist Youth Fellowship.
WS: Did your parents attend many social functions? Did they
have a monthly •
Voice: Were there any social functions?
K: Let me say this: during watermelon season, Dad had a
watermelon patch, he always had a watermelon party for the
church people . They came out here and ate watermelons and
they'd get in a watermelon fight.
KITCHEN 34
Voice : Your mother was a l ways having the kids from the church .
K: Sunday , mother never knew who she was going to eat the
Sunday meal with. Who would be here because the boys , you take
Ernest Dohmann, Paul McNeill , Asa Spenser, and Earl Spenser,
in fact the whole group would come and they'd go rabbit hunting
back here on a Sunday afternoon. But they couldn't tell t hey
were rabbit hunting because that was sinful.
One time they got in a bumble bee's nest. One stung
Ernest Dohmann, you know his lips were thick. You couldn' t
see his nose.
WS: You had rabbits. Someone else told me you had coyotes.
Did you ever remember those?
K: Yes , I remember the coyotes in the evening time . We could be
out in our yard, there were no houses, just prai r i e , you know,
you could hear ' em in the back by Alligator Bayou . Ri ght straight
back.
WS: How about alligators? Did you ever have any?
K: Well , the rice canals , which used to come to the street
that goes in to this addition right down here where the rice
cana l was, that near us . That 's where we went fishing . And
there was a big drum under the road eventually, about this
big around. Going to schoo l i n the horse and buggy , we'd hear
something slosh , slosh under t here. This was after the canal
went bankrupt. We got a five f oot a lligator and roped it.
KITCHEN 35
K: Earl and somebody else roped i t . We took i t to school
with us to show t he kid~an alligator in the back end of the
buggy . It was dead . That's p l ain country .
WS: That 's right. Were there other animals that you can
think of? Were there any---how about duck and gees e hunting?
They must have done a lot of that around here, didn ' t t hey?
K: Oh yes . Back in this area , the men would go shoot ducks or
geese , whatever they they wanted. Like I said, Mama would cook
anything if they'd clean it .
WS : How about doves? In my San Antonio area , t hey shoot a
lot of doves; they go dove h unting .
K: No. Not around here. I can see the doves inland but not
here. Just a few, even now , but not many. But I think
squirrels are about to take us over.
Voice : I do, t oo .
K: I have the red fox squirrels here in the y a rd , not the
gray. The red fox they call 'em. They are a little bit
larger than the gray squirrels .
J S: Do you notice , or can you tell us of any changes a l ong
Main St reet ; that strikes you as being the most changed?
K: Construction will change anything. And everything. We
used to sit on the front porch and could see t he t raffic light
there at Nederland Avenue. You can't see nothing because of
houses and trees and what have you .
JS : Was there any historical change?
KITCHEN 36
Voice: Celeste, did you ever go t o anything that was held
on fue top floor of the building where McNeil had their store
and earlier • . .
K: The only thing I ever went up there for was to see Dr.
Haizlip .
Voice: I did, too . I have a scar back here to show it . I
didn 't go for myself. I went with my dad . My dad had to go
see Dr . Haizlip now don't ask me what for , and I went
with him.
K: Who owns that building now, Marie?
Voice : Mr . Crawford, James Crawf ord. He has the lunch
counter at Nederland Pharmacy.
K: Oh, is he the one?
Voice: And he has opened up an antique store.
K: I know of the man who opened there , the antique
I 've been wantin' to go there .
Voice: Oh , it's going to be real nice.
JS: Well, Marie, can you think of anything else we should ask?
Voice: Celeste , you can tell us a lot of things. What else
can you tell u s ? Off the top of your head about Nederland?
JS : I don't believe we have on tape, her association with
the students and how they kept coming to you even after gradu-ation
from college. You're still involved with a lot of them
even though you ' re retired.
K: I don't go any place without seein' 'em. The City Manager
of Nederland is an ex-student of mine;~the City Manager o~
ITCHEN 37
K: the City Manager of Groves is an ex-student of mine; four
of the councilmen in Port Neches are ex-students of mine and
t he fifth councilman is on the f aculty at Lamar. Doctors and
lawyers, dentists. In fact my dentist, is the first student
I registered at Lamar ... I registered Jack Brooks (U.S.
Congressman) in the f irst group.
JS : And though you're retired, they still come to see you or
call you.
K: Sure . Four students I r egistered are Registrars and
Admission officers in the State of Texas right now, of colleges.
One is at Sam Houston, the University at Huntsville ; one is
at Tarrant Count y Junior Coll ege at Fort Worth; one i s at Abilene
Christian Col l ege ; and one at Lamar right now. They keep up
with me; I don ' t keep up with them .
It ' s just like that Davi d Rayon . I never know when the
phone rings who is going to be on the o ther end. I just
couldn't bel i eve about David.
JS : Well, Celeste , we could keep on a l l day , I know you ' ve
got so much to tell.
K: I don ' t have much to tell but I sure do enjoy my ex-students.
That ' s t he only thing I miss.
JS : We t hank you for sharing .
K: Well , I just don ' t fee l I ' ve g iven you enough information.
J S : My goodness , it ' s just been great . And again , thank you.
END OF TAPE I , Side 2, 15 minutes
END OF INTERVIEW