Lee Parrett, Veteran & Railroader

Oral History Transcript of Lee Parrett

Interviewers: Aubrey Jaap & Clark Grant
Interview Date: September 11th, 2020
Location: Butte-Silver Bow Public Archives
Transcribed: October 2022 by Adrian Kien

[general setup and chatter until recording begins]

[00:01:47]

Jaap: It's September 11th, 2020. We're here with Lee Parrett. Lee, I would like you to first start and tell me about your parents and grandparents.

Parrett: My what?

Jaap: Your parents and grandparents, their name and a little bit about them.

Parrett: My parents were Walter and Ruth Parrett. My grandparents were Robert and Angie Rand, R-A-N-D.

Jaap: And what'd they do for a living thing?

Parrett: Everything.

Jaap: Everything?

Parrett: I did a little bit of everything.

Julie: Tell them about Walter, your dad. Tell them about Walter, your dad for a bit. What happened to your dad?

Parrett: Oh yes. My dad was in the first world war and he got gassed. He was gassed in the first world war. And he was never right after he come home. He died at 43 years old.

Julie: How many were in your family?

Parrett: It was seven children. When my father died at 43, my oldest sister was 12. My youngest sister was half a year old, six months old.

Jaap: So your mom had to raise seven kids? Your mom had to raise seven kids on her own?

Parrett: Yeah, she raised us all. My mother did. It was a tough go, but we made it.

Jaap: Yeah. What'd she do for work?

Parrett: Took care of seven kids is what she did. No, she wasn't able to work. No, we had a tough go, but she did a wonderful job.

Julie: Tell them about the house you grew up in.

Parrett: Oh, yeah, there was seven of us in a two bedroom house. So it was pretty crowded, but we made it. Everything was tough, but we made it.

Julie: It's a little house that's next to the Hanging Five.

Parrett: The house is still there. You know where the Hanging Five restaurant is?

Jaap: Yeah.

Parrett: Right next door is that.

Jaap: Oh really?

Parrett: My nephew lives there now. And the house is in much better shape now because it's been remodeled and everything. And  I worked for the Texas company right down here, right down the street, out of high school. And then I had four dependents, but I still got drafted and I went to the Korean war. And when I come back, I went back to the Texas Company, but it wasn't very good. I didn't think so. I went on the BAP railroad as a switchman conductor and every good job I had came to an end for one reason or another. So I went from there to a truck driver at the pit, at the Berkeley pit, where I worked for quite a long time doing that. I didn't like it. But then I bossed. I bossed for a couple years out there and I didn't care much for that. No, and that ended because it was a big nine month strike. Well, after the strike we were out of work for a while, but then I got on as a machinist out there at the Berkeley and I worked several years there on the heavy equipment down in the pit, the shovels and the drills for, I don't know, 13, well probably near 20 years, I guess.

Jaap: And how'd you like that?

Parrett: I liked it. But that came to an end when the pit closed. So then for a while I was out of work again. And finally I got on just as a cleaner in the school district and retired from that.

[00:07:03]

Julie: Hey, Dad, go back when you were growing up. And what did you used to do? You worked at the Greyhound track, go back to when you were younger and you had to make some money and talk about the Greyhound track.

Parrett: Oh yeah. At the old Greyhound track out here.  The one that was there by Mackenzie's, dog racing track. Well, I worked there in the summers, cooling the dogs after the races. You had to walk them and I'd work every night for a dollar. I got on as a groom. That's you take the dogs out and put them in the boxes, get them ready for the races. Pick 'em up after. And I also watered the track out there. They didn't have the water trucks, so we hand watered all the way around the track and around where they bet. They put an area there. $4 a day. That's what we got for that.

Julie: How old were you then?

Parrett: I was in high school. Every summer, I'd look forward to it. Now, I think I'm the last one in Butte that ever worked out there. And I have a friend Dan Downey, he's in Eureka, California. He worked with me. He's still alive. And he had a few dogs. But here Butte, I'm the only one left that knows anything about that track out there. So I think I told you most of it. And then they had, they later they closed that one down and they had another one, but I didn't get involved in that. And I see that fellow that writes in the paper, he was telling about the different race tracks. First, they just started up there by east junior high, horse racing and dog racing up there. That was before my time. But then they went out there and then to the other place, the other place, I think, burnt down if I remember right. But the one I'm talking about is out there. It's a big hole now, a great big hole and across the street was Cleveland school. And Ron Davis, you know, Ron?  It would be his uncle. He ran the place. He ran that school out there. They taught, I forget what they taught, but he was just in charge and I used to see Ron's dad. He's dead now.  I used to see him there all the time. Because he'd walk over from the school to the dog track. I didn't know Ron, then he wasn't around.

Julie: What about high school?

Parrett: Oh yeah, I played football for Butte High. In three more years, I'll be a diamond B. That's 75 years ago. That's a long time. Huh?

Jaap: That's amazing. That's really wonderful.

Parrett: Yeah. And then up there you, guys probably don't even know or ever heard of Bo Hunkus day.

Jaap: I do, but it's my job to know.

Parrett: So I was King Bo Hunkus and I'm probably one of the last ones.

Jaap: King Bo Hunkus?

Parrett: I was King Bo Hunkus.

Jaap: How did you get named king? How did that come about? Did they vote for you?

Parrett: The girls voted.

Jaap: The girls voted.

Julie: He was quite the hottie back then.

Parrett: There was a girl that, I went to the Woodier grade school, all the way through the Woodier and up through Butte High, and she was the queen. We were both from the Woodier school. That's kind of odd. So that ended because, it ended in 53, because the class of 52, see they we're trying to get rid of that Bo Hunkus Day, so the class of 52, which my wife was part of, they went on a skip day, senior skip day, and they went to Fairmont Hot Springs out there, the whole bunch of them out there. Well, they caught them and that ended Bo Hunkus day. Right there. They stopped. And so the class of 53, the last king Bo Hunkus was Eddie Hickey, but he's dead. And let's see. Yeah, he's dead. So there might be one other that's still alive, but not in Butte. I think I'm the last one.

[00:13:02]

Jaap: So I know for Bo Hunkus day they'd have a parade. Can you tell me kind of - what would the students do?

Parrett: Oh yeah, there was a parade. It was a big day. Yeah. You paraded uptown. You dressed up in weird costumes and down on the stage there, they had big play, everybody, they danced. They did everything. It was fun. It was a fun day. And like you say, they went uptown. But it all ended there in ‘53. Because the class of ‘52 wrecked it.

Jaap: Did you tell your wife that a lot?

Parrett: No, she didn't skip. She wasn't part of it, but yeah, she's been dead 27 years now. Now let's see. Not much exciting but working on the railroad that was probably one of the best jobs I had. Me and my brother, Frank, now, Frank he worked on the Butte end, like I did here and, but he also worked in Anaconda. He died a year ago. But when they had things going on, they'd interview us about what the railroad down there to the Anselmo. We did it there. In fact, I got some pictures here showing people that come and took pictures of us doing the talk.

Jaap: You know, that's actually how I got your name is someone had seen you do that, Lindsey with the history club. And she said, you just lit up when you talked about the railroad, just that you were up there and that you were just, yeah.

Parrett: Yeah, we both, we liked it real well. See, what's her name here who runs the place?

Jaap: Ellen.

Parrett: Yeah.  You remember Kevin Shannon, well, his daughter, I worked with Kevin on the railroad and another guy by the name of Bazinella. And Kevin was a very good talker and he used to do this, you know, so when Kevin died and that he wanted somebody, because I actually wasn't on the railroad that long, about seven years is all. But at the time, when the Berkeley pit was going big time, the Kelley mine was real active, Steward mine, the Con mine. And the funny thing, I was almost at every mine in Butte on the railroad bringing empty cars in, ore loads out, but I was never down the mine. Never did go down. I'm sorry too, because I wish I would've done it, but I never, I never had the chance and I really didn't want to anyway. I was happy on top, but yeah, I was around. You name the mine on the railroad and we were there and then they put tracks down in the pit or going down by Meaderville, the little town that was down there. Before they had the smelter in Anaconda, along that highway, going into Meaderville, along the edge of the pit, they had little open pit smelters. And gosh, they were smoking. That was killing everything, killed the track, killed the trees on the East Ridge. And it was just bad. And then what really, it was good for us because they went from six days, the old time miners, or switchman went from six days to five. So they needed men to fill in. So that's when me and my brother Frank got hired – ‘55 was a real busy year. The Korean war just got over. The BA&P was the first, 1913 was the first one went from locomotive to electric, GE electric, first in the country, ore haulage. And what more do you wanna know about the railroad? I got it all written down here.

Jaap: Do you? I'd love to make a copy. That'd be great. Yeah.

Parrett: You know Chris Fisk? He wanted this real bad. Well, yeah, one time he was gonna interview me and everything and I didn't give it to him. I could've. [laughter]

[00:18:57]

Julie: Can tell them, remember when you used to work at the pit and they would go on those long strikes. Tell them what you used to do then when they would go on strike.

Parrett: Anything I could. I worked on cement a lot. My brother-in-law was a contractor. So usually when they had a strike, I was lucky. He'd put me on as a hod carrier. So I worked on a lot of cements off and on. Luckily during those big strikes I was able to work.

Julie: And what else did you do? Remember you mastered something at home? You were baking something all the time. Do you remember?

Parrett: I was baking something all the time?

Julie: Remember you learned how to bake pies? You baked pies all the time.

Parrett: Oh yeah. I cooked a lot.

Jaap: Did you say you learned to bake?

Parrett: Yeah, I could bake. I did a lot of cooking because my wife was sick for a long time and I had to learn. So I think I got pretty good at it too. But I was very glad that I did learn. She had cancer for about a year and a half, she lived.

Julie: Tell them how you met mom.

Parrett: I bought a car down here, it was then Murray motor, but it's where the Goldrush Casino is. That was Murray motor. And she worked in there in the office. And I went in there and bought a 1952 Chevy car. And that's where I met her.

Julie: And tell her about Edna and how you got connected with her. Tell her about mom and the picnic, remember? How did you meet her?

Parrett: Oh yeah, my cousin was a good friend of my wife and I happened to mention to her one day that I liked the lady up at Murray Motor that I bought the car from. Well, that was her good friend. And we went on, shortly afterwards was 4th of July, we went on a picnic and surprised me here. They brought her. And met her and went out with her and went out with her from then on, but just from buying a car and then the help of my cousin and her husband. Yeah. We had the two children, Julie and my son, Walter.

Julie: Dad, remember you told me when you were really young and you guys had to be on like food stamps or welfare you'd have to [inaudible] you'd have to have the pants. Like you talked about the pants you'd have to wear and all that.

Parrett: Oh yes. Everybody knew you were on welfare because you used to get clothes. They had what they called a sewing room where they made clothes for us poor folks. And everybody knew you were on welfare because you had the same kind of pants. Funny looking corduroy pants. They were icky.  Oh, not gold, but rust-colored, deep blue and overalls with square pockets, real white  thread. But everybody knew you were on welfare and then you'd get food too occasionally to, like now.  You could pick up stuff and that helped out a lot, you know. And let's see what else. I told you about the dog track.

Jaap: We have some really great photos of that dog track and you can see the little mechanical bunny that they had.

Parrett: The bunny, yeah, mechanical bunny.

Jaap: I wonder if you're in any of those pictures.

Parrett: I don't know. She asked me that. She asked me if I would have any pictures out there. No, I don't.

Julie: She has some pictures and she wondered if you might be in those pictures, working back in the day.

Parrett: Oh, you do?

Julie: She had some pictures.

Jaap: We do.

Parrett: I could. I don't remember of them ever taking pictures. I don't think they had cameras then.

Jaap: They did.

Parrett: They come a long way. I could be though, because this Dan Downey, that friend of mine, his grandpa also worked with us. He was an old timer. He had dogs. So the three of us worked there. The old timer has been gone for years, but the three of us might be there. And one of the last that worked out there died a while ago. Dean Abraham. I don't know if you remember Dean, do you? Yeah, but he's dead now. He ended up working for the post office. I had a chance, a few times to get on with the post office, but they didn't guarantee steady work. So I hated to quit a steady job to work part-time but I found out that's how they all get on. They start, but I didn't know that, or I would've probably finished with the post office. I had about three different times. I could have. I passed the test, you know. I made a lot of mistakes in my life. Yeah. Yeah. There was a teacher at East Junior High and he loved that railroad, but I want to show you something, if you want to see it.

[00:26:08]

Jaap: I'd love to see them.

Parrett: Okay. I'll show you if I can. This here was during the, what did they call that in the summer we had, where they come from all over the world? The festival. They'd have us down at the Anselmo Mine to talk about it. Well, here's one that's six years ago. That's me there at the engine. My brother Frank. Now Tommy Holter, he's locked in for 14 days now. Yeah, he can't. He has to stay in his house. What does that mean? You've been with somebody, I guess. Isn't it?

Jaap: Yeah. Is he okay?

Parrett: Yeah. He ain't sick.

Julie: Were you with him yesterday, Dad?

Jaap: Was he there yesterday?

Parrett: No, no, no. He can't leave his house till the 20th, I guess. Yeah, but that's him there. And then Joe, we'd all do something different. Tommy would tell about, he was an iron worker down in the mine. He could tell you a lot. And this Joe Navarro, he worked underground. And then Frank and I - well, Louis Loushin. You're familiar with Louis. Well, Louis, he usually talked about the engines and all that. He ain't in that picture. But I wanted to show you a picture. He drew this. His name was Mattiola. God, he was a wonderful drawer and he lived up on the by the railroad. The railroad used to go by his house. So he drew that.

Julie: We will let them make copies of all of that, Dad.

Jaap: Yeah. I'll make copies.

Parrett: And he wanted to interview me, always was going to interview me. He just loved that railroad. But he's dead now. We never got together. Yeah. And then we got letters from people that wrote to us after we made the talk down there at the Anselmo. Frank, my brother. And here's some of the pictures down there. If you want to see them. Now these were taken by people that were listening to us. We're talking and they're listening to us, but they took pictures. The guy sent them to us. He was from Great Falls. Oh, that's that cow and calf that's down there at the Anselmo now. That's another thing. That engine that's down there, that was down at the mining museum. It was the Orphan Girl mine. When I first started the railroad that was producing ore for a short time, and then it closed. And anyway that engine was down there. They'd kept it down there. So one day we fixed the tracks and everything, put new switches in and we pulled it with a payloader all the way up to the Anselmo where it's at now. Those other cars, the caboose, and that, Kevin Shannon was with us that day. But that's how it got there. We pulled it with a payloader and they had that little engine that's down there pushing, but we went all the way up there that one day. It was quite a chore, but friend of mine by the name of Doc Jordan, he's actually the one that, he got the track, he was an old railroad switchman too. But he put in switches and he fixed the tracks. So this could happen. So that's how it got there.

Jaap: That's really wonderful.

Julie: We'll let them take copies of all that.

Parrett: Whatever they want. You know, I just brought stuff there that, and this is that thing I wrote about the railroad. It's in my handwriting, but this is what they all wanted.

[00:31:02]

Jaap: So tell me what does it say?

Parrett: Well, it's long it's a book.

Jaap: Is it a book?

Parrett: It's big.

Jaap: Oh, nice. Oh, wow. Are these your memories from the railroad or?

Parrett: Yeah, it's my memory of the railroad while I was on it. My brother, like I say, Frank, he worked on both ends. We lost out. They put the concentrator in. We lost out on the switching because they gave it to the people that were at the concentrator. So we lost a lot of jobs then, but yeah, the conda crews would come in and take them right on down. We had, but they were still mining, a lot of mining up there. The Kelley was a big producer, but I got pictures of, they wanted to know what a yard looked like. Where do you store cars and all that. I drew a picture as best I could of that. Yeah. This whole thing here is how many pages? 17, I think.

Jaap: Wow.

Parrett: Oh, there's a yard I drew.

Jaap: Oh, so we can get copies of that.

Parrett: Yeah. There was three yards in Butte, the area, one at the Kelley mine, one down by the Belmont. You know where the Belmont is. We had a yard there when we brought the cars up from the pit. Well, that's an interesting thing too. When they started going down in the pit, it was quite an incline that you had to come up. Well, they didn't have electric wires. So that's when they got the diesel. They had to put a diesel down there, but we can't seem to remember coming out of the pit. You could only take like 10, I put 10, my brother and them, they thought it was 15 cars at a time. Now, the diesels had sanders. The diesels had sanders under the wheels and as they're there and the wheels started spinning, they'd throw the sand, but still I've seen it where you couldn't make it. You had to back down and what you call double amount, come out twice with them. And that was pretty steep. And I'll tell you where it used to come up was, you know, up there by McGruff park, just up above where they put that new building. They had, it was called Reynolds Wholesale, and that's where the switch used to come up, bring the cars up and then it leveled off. And you went over to the Belmont, brought your cars there, took some empty back. You could put 26 cars down there at the Meaderville place there.

[00:34:37]

But that's how they got the lot of, that's why they had to get more diesels too, because they started, they made, they started working the Alice Mine way up on top there and same thing no electricity. So they had to have the diesel, you know, and they always had droppers. Guys that would shove the door, the loads up above the pressure and the belt. And they'd ride the cars down with the brakes as down as far as they could see. And you bid on those jobs. One guy, he'd be there all day dropping cars, they call it, you'd take 'em down to the derail. And then we took slime. That's that bad old stuff that they put in the Anselmo. We used to take it there. We used to take it, 13 cars into the Mountain Con. I don't even know if you're interested in this.

Jaap: No, this is really interesting. This is great. This is really interesting. Yeah.

Parrett: And with that cow and calf, they had a cement plant up on the hill, bring cement, big cement cars up there and they had a timber yard, Central Timber Yard, right above the Anselmo. In fact, my uncle worked there at night. He was a watchman. And they they used to put all the stoves on that. They had a mill down at Rocker and they'd make all the timber for the mines. We'd haul it up in flatbed trucks. And we used to bring six or seven at a time with that cow and calf. And they had this timber, they had two by sixes, rough cut, holding that in. Car stakes, they called them. Oh boy, everybody wanted car stakes. We'd pick up the empties from in there. And the car stakes, they'd have on the cars. Well, boy, everybody was after them car stakes. A lot of the guys built their garages. They built everything with them. They'd fight over them.

Julie: I wondered why. Yeah.

Parrett: So yeah, they really wanted them bad. And we'd bring that stuff up to the yard at the Kelley. I didn't tell about the yard down in East Butte. Okay. Yep. Yeah, there was Washoe sampler down there. You familiar with that?

Jaap: Can you tell us us a little bit about it?

Parrett: Yeah. And that's where they sampled all the cars. And right around there, they had two mines there. They had the, it's still down there, the Travonia. They were manganese mines. See, there was a big demand for manganese and hardened steel and that. It was a pink manganese, but down there by this yard there on Montana Street, that big yard there, on the right side was a great big building. That was the sampler. And my uncle, he worked there, but anyway, they had the same thing. They'd truck it down and they had a ramp and they had a dropper that they'd push, let's see how many cars, eight, I guess it was. We'd put the empties in there and leave them and the dropper would drop them down and then we'd come later, and pick them up. Everything had to go through the sampler before it went to Anaconda. So we'd take them and run them through the sampler. Same thing up across the street.  You had, what's the other mine there? It was tungsten too. Well, any anyway, it was manganese. And they put a ramp there and the same thing, they trucked it down and they dropped it down as far as they could. We'd come pick them up and had to take them to the sampler, then put them on the line to go to Anaconda.

But anything, when we had big trains coming down from the hill, we used to haul 40 cars coming down that hill. And that's steep. And you could take 60. I did it one time. I was on it when we had 60, but boy that was, that was bad. And actually they had retainers that retained ore, I mean, air going down and we used to have to set a lever on each car to retain air. So actually going down that hill, so it wouldn't run away, you were actually pulling the cars because they had so much air in them. And then we got down to Rocker, we'd have to jump down. When they stopped down there and let them retainers back down, then take them down in the yard, the yard at Rocker, and they'd be ready to go to Anaconda and we'd have 40 more and go back up to the Kelley. The Kelley was just a going thing. And then, of course, some of them would go to the Steward. We did that, the Steward mine, that was the Steward and the Con were real rich ore, where the Kelly was not that rich, you know, so, but those two mines, same thing, except the miners. We push the cars up at the, I forget now, but anyway, the miners would ride them under the bins. And then when they'd fill them, they'd ride them down. Then we'd come pick them up, put them up in the Kelley yard, bring some more down to them at the, I just said the mine, it was right below the Kelley yard. And I can't think much more, but I got a picture there, a yard. But I tell it all there. You'd get better from here because hey, that's a long time ago. I'm trying, I'm trying to remember, you know, and I'm surprised that my memory is that good because I'm almost 89 and that's the only thing good on me is my memory. I mean, I'm blessed that way. People can't get over how I can remember stuff. It surprises me. Except for the mine, I just,  the other tungsten mine, or the other manganese mine . . . in the fifties there, they'd get a call for that. And that those two mines would get the tungsten for a short time. Then they'd quit.

[00:43:05]

I think it's the Emma. The other one down there, but it's just up from the Travonia. They're not too far apart. Yeah. But that's why they got the tungsten because of hardening steel for making munitions and everything. I was at a tungsten mine over in Korea when I was there.

Jaap: Oh, really?

Parrett: 50% of the world's output of tungsten was coming from that mine.

Jaap: Wow.

Parrett: The Japanese had it at one time when they had Korea. Yeah. So I'm familiar with tungsten pretty much. What else do you want to know? Anything?

Jaap: Do you have some questions that you want to ask?

Grant: Yeah, I don't think we asked just when were you born?

Parrett: October 28th, 1931.

Grant: Okay. And you had said earlier growing up, you had a tough go. I was hoping you could elaborate on that.

Parrett: Yeah, it was tough, but you know, in those days everybody helped one another. We had the railroads here coming up the hill. We had railroads Great Northern, the Union Pacific, all of them, but the one used to, I love that that engine is down there at the civic center that used to go up and down that hill there. I used to love that at night, that whistle, but what it brought into town was a lot of  guys that were, you would call them bums now, but there were guys that came from back east that were looking for work that had real tough times. Well, my uncle come from Minnesota that way. He come on the rails. They took them all the way. But they'd come to your house and as tough as we had it, they'd come in and my mother always had something for them to eat, helping them. They were good people, they just were up against hard luck. So three of us sleeping in one bed. Try that. That's hard. Yeah.  It was just, everybody knew you were poor, and, well, but at the same time, most of your neighbors were too. So you really didn't know it because they were under, of course, then you had some that were pretty well fixed, certain parts of town. Now in them days, Floral park was a big place for affluent people. And also down here at row edition by the Milwaukee Tavern. That was for the wealthy people and the east and west side. But down there on, I was on Harvard Avenue, where I was born there. We were on the wrong side of the tracks because Amherst over was Floral Park. So we just missed it. But see a lot of my friends in school though, they were from wealthy families. So here I'm the poor one in the classes and that, and it was tough but we made it, we made it.

[00:47:06]

Julie: What did you used to do when you worked at, or went to school at Whittier? What did you do? You eat breakfast? Did you eat school lunch at school or what did you do?

Parrett: No. Yeah. You know now you got to take a kid to school on a bus if they're a block away. In those days, you know where the Hanging Five restaurant is, where our home is, and the Whittier school, you familiar? Way up there. We used to have to walk in the morning. Oh, I had a paper route. I forgot to tell you about that. I had a paper route later on, or I wouldn't have been able to play sports at Butte High. I wouldn't have been able to play because I made, I had it for five years. I had it when I went into the eighth grade and I had it when I graduated from high school. But in those days above the Whittier school, there was no houses. One house way up there. So I used to walk across the open fields and over there at, we used to call, the prairie, there by the St. Ann's. That was all open. We called that the prairie.

They used to have carnivals come there and circuses come there. And yeah, I had the paper route and we had to walk. You couldn't take your . . . We had a principal. She wouldn't let you take a lunch to school, even in the cold weather. I remember one time it was real, real bad. She let us, the only ones that could eat lunch in school. We had some from the outlying districts out toward the nine mile. They could eat in every day because they brought their lunch. But us around there, no. So after being way up there with the paper route in the morning, then I had to walk all the way back up to school, come home at lunch, go back up and come back at night and eat lunch. Where in the real cold weather, you couldn't eat in there. No way would she let you. I see yesterday that they're talking about brown trout. Did you see that in the paper?

Jaap: I did see that.

Parrett: A doctor, he lives down there in Melrose. He's really into fishing the Big Hole river and he had all about it in there, but I could tell him some stuff about it. He wasn't around. I could tell him, but we won't get into that because I did it. I fished it and I'm very familiar with it. You know, the whole deal.

I had one, I never had a new car. I just, before I went to Korea, my uncle gave me an old 29 Model-A Ford and boy was that fun. Put 50 cents worth of gas in it. Seemed like you went all day. But while I was gone, my brother Frank used it and it broke down. So he gave it away. He had it in the neighbor's garage and they didn't want it in there. So he give my car away. So when I come back, I didn't even have a Model-A. Now I had old junk cars all the time. I had a few good ones, but Volkswagens and trucks, nothing new. Never did, never could afford them. But like I say, we made it, as tough as it was. Yeah. Anything more you can think of?

Julie: He might have questions for you there. Yeah.

Parrett: Maybe they got all they want.

Grant: I have a couple more. I wanted to hear more about your dad if we could. And how did the gas affect him? And did he talk about the war?

Parrett: Well, he couldn't talk to me too much because when he died, I was like five years old.

Grant: Okay.

Parrett: Yeah. When he come back, he spent a lot of time at Fort Harrison and he had pneumonia eight times when he got back, well, seven or eight. And my mother said my dad in his younger day, he was quite a hunter and quite a fisherman and all that. But when he come back, you know, when they got that in the trenches, that gas.

Julie: Tell them about the poppies. What do you remember?

Parrett: Oh yes. You know, the poppies they sell you at Memorial Day and Veteran's Day. My mother always told me you always buy them poppies because when my dad was over at Fort Harrison, they used to make them poppies and they got a little bit of money for doing it. So she always told me, says, whenever they're selling them poppies to be sure you buy them. And he had brothers and sisters, but it wasn't a close family. You know, after my dad died, they never come around much. My mother had a tough go, but she did a great job. She was great woman like my wife, both. But what else you wanna know?

Grant: I was hoping you could tell us a little about the Korean war and being drafted.

Parrett: I didn't think you'd ask about that.

Grant: I didn't know if you'd want to talk about it, but I did want to ask.

Parrett: No, but I'll just show you, she did this. She wrote that based on . . .Says about me over there. I was there during the peace talks, when all the peace talks were going on. I wasn't there at the first. That was terrible. Thank God. I wasn't there at the reservoir and that. I was there later. It was bad enough, but when I first got there, I was 56 days in the machine gun platoon and then they couldn't get the replacements for different jobs, like supply. So they seen where I had worked for Texaco. They took me out of the machine gun platoon, the company commander and made me go in supply with no training whatsoever. And that's eight weeks training, but I had to do it. I did it, and it was tough, but I did it.

Julie: You can make a copy of that too.

Parrett: That shows 50, one of the guys. I never took no pictures. But some of the guys would go on R&R and they could get them developed in Japan. Well, some of the guys give me them pictures. When I got home and then she happened to find them one day in the house there. I never paid any attention. So she wrote that thing.

Jaap: This is beautiful, Julie.

Parrett: And I thought you did a good job on that. And I especially liked the picture in the back. That was my favorite picture. I was just a corporal then.

Grant: I was gonna say sergeant first class.

Parrett: Yeah, I went up, I was lucky.

Jaap: That's really great. We'll make a copy of that if that's okay.

Grant: We spoke with another Korean war vet who described it as the forgotten war.

[00:56:12]

Parrett: Yeah. The forgotten war. Well, when I went, most of the guys, when they seen the war was coming, they had the navy reserve down there and boy, they all joined that or went and joined the air force to keep from getting drafted. Well, here I am home with four dependents, thinking I'm not gonna go. They can't go because I got to take care of the . . . I was working at Texaco then. And never dreamed that I'd get drafted. And they drafted me with all them and they wouldn't defer me six months till my brother got out of school. That's all. I didn't want to get out. I just wanted to be deferred. Wouldn't do it. So I went and then I had friends that went to school that didn't have to go. I was kind of bitter about it for a long time, but I went and I made out. I was lucky, but yeah, I was in a machine gun platoon up online there. And when I first got there, 56 straight days there, but it wasn't like . . . see they had the peace talks going then and they weren't the big pushes, like Chosin Reservoir. See some of them guys, they didn't have the proper clothing or nothing. We had better clothing than that, but it was a lot of mortar artillery, fighting back patrol between there, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. That's like you see in the picture of that trench line in there. That trench line with bunkers went 155 miles across Korea, all dug by G.I.'s.  And then you had a secondary line that you dug too, in case they broke through.

So, and the weather was terrible. I could have went there. She could have taken me. They let you go over there last year. She wanted me to go, the Korean government was paying our way over there. And boy, they showed the people the great, what was it? $400. Yeah. For like $400. They paid for me and her for everything over there, our flight. A lot of guys did it, you know, and they said the Korean people just treated them wonderful. But we didn't find out about it until last year, basically. Well, I was in pretty rough shape. I didn't go, but I would love, but you don't get to go up and see, that's all neutral up there now. I wouldn't see those trench lines because they're way back now. But when I went through Seoul, it was devastating. And then when I saw during the Olympics and how they rebuilt that city. I couldn't believe it. I just couldn't believe it. These great big stadiums and that wasn't that many years, but boy, they always said, "Did Harry Truman do the right thing?" Yes, he did. That's a prosperous country right now. And boy, they love us over there. So I could have went to Korea here again, but I didn't, she wanted to go with me, take me. They'd pay her way too. Somebody, you know, and they had wheelchairs for you. Four or five days. Wasn't it? Yeah. Would've been a good trip, but everybody I talked to, they just couldn't get over how good they treated them.

Grant: Would've been an easier trip, this one, than your first trip there.

Parrett: Well, when I went on the first one, I went on a troop ship. 21 days out in that rough sea, and you slept on cots down in a hole there where they were smoking and oh God, it was bad. And then the weather got bad and more guys were sick. And then coming back, I was on a ship again. I never got to fly except R&R. I got to fly to Japan for my R&R. But no, coming back, I was on a great big, and I had some rank then. So going over, I had KP, I had just like, you're in basic training, but coming back, I had built up that rank. And so it was much better, much better and it only took 17 days, where it took 21, the other, oh my God.

Julie: You said they signed the peace treaty on the way back.

Parrett: Yeah. That's another thing. They signed the peace treaty. When I was on the ship coming home, they finally signed it. They were on the verge of doing it when I left. But nobody even knew you were gone, your family, the kids, the guys, most of the kids at the high school, they never knew where I was gone. I think out of my class of 1300 girls and boys, I think, about two of us were in combat over there.

Grant: Really?

Parrett: Because if you were in the air force or the navy, some of them had tough time. Guys flying and they got shelled occasionally, but nothing like the second and first war where they torpedoed you. They didn't have that over there to no extent anyway. But that it was a forgotten war, but now Harry, Harry did the right thing, I thought. Other people didn't like him, but I did. So anything else there, buddy?

Grant: Yeah, I just had to kind of bring it back to Butte. Did you have favorite places uptown that you would go, bars or stores?

Parrett: I didn't have much money. They used to hang out down at, what was it called? The Victory Club. It's down there on Park street. You went upstairs. That was a big hangout. I always liked to dance. And you could dance there. And I danced later on a lot with my wife. And another lady that I used to take dancing. And you'd go to the store that had the best deals, you know, shopping with clothes and that too, besides food, I always went for the bargain.

Julie: What did you do, dad? When you were a kid and you happened to get a nickel? When you were a kid. Yeah. And you might get a nickel or a dime or something, what did you do? You get some extra?

Parrett: Oh my God, that? If you found the dime, oh God, that was wonderful! Or a nickel. And later on, I worked in the schools. And I see kids throwing quarters away. I'm picking them up. when I was cleaning, but they're throwing them away. I'll tell you another thing. I did work at a gas station too. I didn't tell you that. It was Leipheimer had it down on Harrison Avenue. And in those days you would have the customers come in from California, especially, you know, and tourists and they'd come in there and you give them change, silver dollars. They wouldn't take it.

[01:05:20]

"We don't want that trash. You keep them heavy things." They didn't want silvers. No kidding. They wanted paper money. They didn't want them. They were too heavy. Can you believe that? Boy, I find a dollar there that was really something.

Julie: What would you do? What did you do? Did you ever get to go buy candy anywhere as a kid? Did you go get a pop?

Parrett: Well, yeah, we used to buy a lot of penny candy. You could get penny candy at a lot of the stores. And so you did that. Yeah. And then your folks would, when they go to make candy, you know, and it was really, I did a lot of fishing and stuff. Bell Creek down there at Father Sheehan park. God, I lived down there when I was young, on that creek. Oh yes. And we used to sneak out to the golf course out there and sneak on there. And we only had one club, but we'd play golf till they kicked us off. And then they had the muni, they had the other club, when I went there, it was all sand, there was no grass, it was all sand. And around the greens, they had real fine sand and they had a rake, they'd rake it. And then they made a nice course later out of it when they put the grass in, but that's all it was, was dirt. And then I played on Butte High when it was on the field, when it was all dirt, way back there. Yeah. I forgot to tell you about that.

Jaap: Tell us.

Parrett: Yes, I liked it. I liked the dirt. We had an old coach named Harry Dahlberg, wonderful old guy, good coach. And he, they kept it pretty good. You know, they plowed good and everything and he used to call the rocks, Irish confetti But every Friday had a game and they'd spend all day out there in that dirt, getting it in, putting the markers down and everything, you know? Well, later on after my time, they mixed sawdust in with it, boy, that was good. I walked on it later and that was real good. So those guys that say they played in the dirt? Well, if they played on the real dirt, like I did, you didn't have sawdust in there. And so they put the new field in down there and we have that silver B deal and it got so I couldn't go across that. We go across on the 50 yard line and I wanted to walk on that, because I never was, you know, all I could remember was dirt and so no grass too. They had grass there. I walked on that, but the new stuff, artificial. So last year they had a doing down there at the high school, the Butte High team and the coaches and everything, and they invited me to be there. And they had, you heard last year, Tommy Melott and those real good quarterbacks. They had a wonderful team. I happened to mention that I'd never been on the field. So they took me out on the field, walked me out, right over on the goal line. And it was kind of a funny thing. I had caught a pass there when I was in high school, right where we were standing. And so they asked me all about the dirt and that, and I was telling them about it, but I thought that was pretty nice.

They wouldn't take me over the 50 yard. I couldn't walk that far. So I thought that was pretty nice. But then my brother-in-law's brother, Tom LeProwse, he was a, what do you call it? Diamond B last year, 75. Well, I'll be in three years. I'll be that. One guy from Missoula, he would be this year, but they're not gonna have nothing. What else?

Julie: Well, Dad, tell about your shoulder, your shoulder playing football.

Parrett: Oh yeah.

Julie: Clavicle.

Parrett: Oh, there's a scar.

Jaap: What'd you do?

Parrett: 1949. I broke it. Playing football. Bad break. Well, you can tell how I shrank. This is your clavicle, looking where the scar is. I shrunk that much. Yeah. I had a bad, I had a cast from here to here for three months. Terrible.

Julie: What happened? Tell them what happened. How did it happen?

[01:11:07]

Parrett: At practice, just blocking the guy. I went down on my shoulder and they piled on top of me. The coach come over and looked. He said, "You're going to the hospital." It was a compound. It come right through the skin.

Jaap: Oh God.

Parrett: How many years ago? Long time ago. Yeah, I forgot about that.

Julie: What grade were you? Did that end your football career?

Parrett: Yeah, I was a senior. So I was starter too, I was gonna be a regular. I played the whole year when I was a junior and this was the beginning of my senior year where I had a year's experience already in and it was about after the second game, I think I broke it. Yeah. and another friend of mine, he had a ruptured spleen. We were both in the hospital at the same time, the old Murray clinic over here. Did you ever hear that big player down in Anaconda? His name was Ed . . . Well, you heard of Wayne Estes. He's buried down right by my wife, down at the Sunset Memorial, from Anaconda. No, this was Big Ed.  He held the record for Anaconda for years. He was a big guy and a football player there.  He was a big guy too, but he had the record a long time before Estes. Well, I played against him. Then he played for the, it was the Minneapolis Lakers.

Jaap: Oh, really?

Parrett: Yeah. Later on he played for the Minneapolis Lakers then they went to California. Big Ed Kalifat.  Did you ever hear that? Yeah. Big Ed Kalifat. Yeah, he was quite a guy. I see where he died just a while ago. One of the guys that this morning I played, he played after me. Who did they say it was?  Teacher at Butte High, Pete Sonberg. Did you see that in the paper this morning?

Jaap: No, I didn't see that.

Parrett: Pete died. Oh, he was a coach. He played quarterback for Butte a couple years after me. But then later on, he was quite a lady's track coach, real neat guy. And he died of cancer, in the paper this morning. No, write up yet, but it's in there. So many guys that there's nobody left. There's nobody left.

Grant: How does that feel?

Parrett: I can't believe that I'm almost 89 years old. I just can't believe it. And I've been around the block. But most of the mistakes were my own fault. The things I did wrong. And anything else?

Grant: Well, what advice do you have for us getting old? We're all aging.

Parrett: Well, I'm glad you mentioned that. When I was a young fella, I liked to listen to old folks. There's a lot of wisdom there.

Jaap: Yes, there is.

Parrett: Kids are not that way now. They tell me, like I say, I got a good memory, but I have them all telling me everything. Listen to the old timers because they can teach you something. Maybe you do, but the times are different. You know, everything is different. Yeah. Come on.

Jaap: Bring it on.

Parrett: You got me going though. This is fun. I got my teeth with me but I can't talk with them. They made them for me. Should I tell them about that?

Julie: He's in the middle of getting dentures for the first time. Trying to get them baked in.

Parrett: Should I tell them how I got everything done?

Julie: You mean when your teeth got pulled.

Parrett: That hurt.

Jaap: Yeah, sure. Go for it.

Parrett: I had bad teeth and I was pretty broke, pretty broke. And they made me teeth, pulled my, I had 13 teeth that had to come out and they pulled every one of them in one day. Oh God, that was terrible. And they made teeth for me, free. Wasn't that nice?

Jaap: Oh, nice.

Parrett: You betcha. The dentist here in town. They are darn nice. Well then things started to happen. My dentist that made the teeth, he lost his office. Then he moved to a new one and it flooded, just one thing after another. And then that pandemic where he was closed. So the teeth didn't fit right. And he tried to adjust them and tried to adjust them, but he couldn't get them. Right. So finally here a couple weeks ago, he decided he's gonna make 'em right from scratch, brand new ones. So I'm going to go back to them.  One of 'em was Dr. Fields. Charlie Fields, wonderful guy. And  Kyle McIntosh. He's the one that pulled. Boy, that was terrible. But anyway, before that I fell right on my face and I broke all my teeth. They were broken right at the gum line and everything he had to pull 'em. Oh, geez. It was terrible. But I fell flat on my face, broke the teeth. So there wasn't much for him to pull.

Julie: But you forget the important part, Dad. We live in Illinois. I find out about this later. You don't tell me any of this stuff until later. You don't tell me a lot of this stuff happens until later. You don't like me to know these things.

Parrett: No, I tell you everything.

Jaap: Eventually.

Grant: Well, what about Butte? I'm curious, just the changes you've seen in this town over the years. The changes you've seen in Butte over the years, how do you think this town is doing?

[01:18:47]

Parrett: How the town's doing? I liked it the way it used to be before everything started burning down. Uptown, it was colorful. I mean, something to do. I mean, just to walk the streets at night, or it was such an exciting town, even if you didn't have no money. I mean, it was, I enjoyed it and now it's coming back, you know, especially over here on east side. I see there doing a lot of stuff there.  Oh, I liked it a lot better before all this tearing down because of the pit. They took all the east side down over here.  Finntown, we called it. No, I liked the way it was a long time ago. Much better than now.

Grant: What do you want to see happen in Butte?

Parrett: Oh, I'd like to see good things happen.  Just continue improving uptown here and out there too. It's expanding all over. They're building on the mountain. Everywhere. They're up. They try to see who can get the highest now on the mountains. That Lady of the Rockies is nice. I walked up there when I was 60 some years old. Me and my brother. That's tough walk right up the face of it. They hadn't put the statue up there yet. They had the base there. It was in November. And they later put the statue up there in December, I guess it was. But I would've worked on that statue, but see a lot of the guys that built that statue, when the pit closed, they were able to retire. Well, I couldn't, I had to go to work. That's when I went to work on the schools. So I didn't get to go up there and work like I would've liked to. But later on, I went with my brother-in-law up there. I had been up right up into the head of it. Because my brother-in-law did cement work up there and I went up few times and helped him. And I went way up high on that.

Julie: Dad, tell them your biggest pet peeve. Maybe these folks will be able to get something done one day that you couldn't.

Jaap: I'd love to hear.

Julie: What is your biggest pet peeve about the Lady of the Rockies coming in on the interstate?

Parrett: Oh, my idea about that?

Julie: Yes. You've got an audience.

Parrett: I'll tell you. Here's my take on that. They got that statue up there. They're gonna put that tram in incidentally, because I know Mike [inaudible] you know, that's car driven and they're gonna put the tram there. They got the okay. But they got that big statue up there and coming in the highway out there by Ramsay and that you're looking right at it, for Ramsay and all along there, there's not a sign there that says, look up ahead and see the statue. It costs too much money to put the sign there. So people drive right on by and don't even know what's up there. You gotta let people know. And I saw, I wouldn't say Marco Lucy one time and told him that's a good idea. "We gotta do that. I'm gonna tell the bunch . . ." You see it?

Jaap: I don't see it.

Parrett: Nothing out there, but that's all they'd have to do. "Look ahead." And that would draw people. They'd stop. And yeah, especially with that tram, of course, I think the tram will, but you're still. Let them know that there is a tram to take you up there too. I can't quite remember exactly. I think it's going to be down toward the Hillcrest school, down in that area. I think they finally had different opinions on where to have it. But that was my idea. Put a sign out on the highway and let them know what's going up.

Jaap: What a thought.

[01:23:45]

Julie: [inaudible] legacies to have that sign put up there. So people know to look up there and see it. If nothing else, they know what it is.

Parrett: Every time I go by, I look up at her. Then I told Johnny Shea, Johnny Shea was an old iron worker and you know, Johnny didn't you? Well, he worked with this Tommy Holter here. There were iron workers. They worked right down in the mine. I used to tell Johnny about it. "You know how much that costs?" to put that sign there, takes money to make money, you know, if you want.

Julie: Dad, tell them about that Thursday thing you go to all the time. That Thursday meeting.

Parrett: I don't hear you too good with that mask on Julie.

Julie: That Thursday meeting you go to every week. Your ARCO guys. How many started out? What was that? And now how many are there at that meeting? Yeah, your Thursday donut meeting.

Parrett: That we get together?

Julie: Yeah. Tell them how long and how many there?

[01:24:56]

Parrett: Oh, we have retirement club and we called it the ARCO Retiree. They give so much, and then they quit. British Petroleum wouldn't give us nothing. And anyway, the club started with 450 of 'em. We got a name on a plaque, every name, I think there's 13 of us left.  Kinda gives you an idea. And I had to wait 10 years to retire. Because I was too young to get a pension. So that's why I had to go to work in the schools, but most of those guys were old enough and they got to retire so they could spend all their time up there and down at the Roberts' place, putting that thing together. I'm reading the book at home now that my brother gave me about that. Joe Roberts wrote about the pit. Lee Royal, Lee wrote one. He was the one that made the statue or did all the welding. But that's really interesting reading if you've never read it.

Oh, this is really interesting on that thing. You can find anything on that thing. I had a guy, now listen to this, I had a guy over in Korea who was one of my best friends. He was from Milwaukee. He had played basketball for Marquette and we got to be pretty good friends. And after we went home, we kind of lost contact with each other. But one day I got a letter from a veteran's home in Woodcross, Wisconsin. I remember. And he had got TV and he asked me if I would write a letter to the hospital there and tell them that I had witnessed him coughing, his spitting and everything, tried to help him with his claim, you know, which I did. And I did the best I could. And never heard from him, never heard from him. And we even went back there that one time to Milwaukee and I looked him up and he's a Pollock guy. That phone book is that big. And so many. His name was Lydell. Couldn't find him. Couldn't find him. Well, she got wind, all these years went by and I thought he was dead. She looked him up and he called me on the phone. Can you believe that? I thought he was dead. So we had a nice visit. And it was about a month later, I called him, and he had died. Oh, he died. But another guy, he was an Italian from the Bronx. Right where all the trouble is in New York.

Julie: Brooklyn.

Parrett: Huh? Brooklyn, Brooklyn. He's right from Brooklyn. Puskqually Castegliolo was his name. And he played the guitar and he was a performer before. Well, he was over there. We got to be good friends there too. She got ahold of him after all those years. So I talked to him on the phone now. I thought I'd forgot all about him. [inaudible] all the time. I didn't know you could do that. So he's back there where it's real bad right now.

Julie: And you are interested, it's nothing to do with Butte, but you do have an interest in the Korean war. When he was over there, somebody gave him a camera. A movie camera. So he's probably got about, I have about 30 minutes of footage that he took where he would've been, but you were on the line when he was back, but I can email it to you. It's really cool footage of the Korean war if you'd be interested.

Grant: Absolutely.

Jaap: Definitely. Yeah.

Parrett: Quite a guy. When I get to talk to him,  guys who I thought were gone.  What else?

Grant: Aubrey, do you have anything else?

Jaap: I don't really know if I do have more questions.

Grant: Do you have more questions? Well, I guess I was just curious about, you said you worked for Texaco.

[01:30:23]

Parrett: I worked for Texaco, yes.

Grant: And where was that?

Parrett: Right down there. I worked there. I got out of high school one day and went to work the next. 135 bucks a month. That's what I made. Took home. That's what I was making when they drafted me and with all those dependents. And then after I got back from the war, they had to give you your job back, but they didn't treat me very good. Some guys that weren't even gone had come in and went ahead of me, you know, took the jobs ahead of me. So that's when I went on, you've heard of  Sonny Holland from the Bobcats down there? You always hear him, the great football player. Well, his dad was the head of the BAP railroad here. He's the one that got me on and he coached me at the Whittier school in football years ago. Well, then later on I coached Sonny Holland down there at the Whittier. So I was pretty close with them down there. Although, I like the Bobcats, but I don't like Bozeman.

Grant: Makes three of us.

Parrett: You get the news now, all it is is Bozeman news. I liked that when we used to get the weather from here with the what's his name used to be here, the weatherman, now he's in Bozeman. Everything comes from Bozeman. That's one thing. He asked me things I don't like around here. That's one of them. I wish it would revert back to where it was stationed down there on Montana Street. I liked that.

Grant: When you talk about places in Butte like this gas station or the Murray hospital that are just a parking lot today. Is it painful to drive around uptown or how does that affect you?

Parrett: When I drive around?

Grant: And just so many places you knew that are gone.

Parrett: Well, I'll tell you what, I'm glad you mentioned that when I worked there outta high school, I was just a mail boy. Every noon I used to have to walk up the street here. The hospital was right up here, the Murray. And I used to have to walk over to the post office, get the mail and walk all the way back and in the door there. Then we did all the sorting in the mail and everything. So yeah, I knew it real well then, then I was a ship and clerk downstairs. I did like that, but there was no money in anything you did. You know, I had one friend though that promoted him. He went down to Houston, Texas, and boy, he got, did real well.

Julie: But Dad, how do you feel? How do you feel when you drive by and some of the places are torn down?

Parrett: When I drive by? I have good memories and sad memories of people that I knew there and they're no longer there. When I was at Texaco, I'd be out on the front there, like at lunchtime and Girls' Central was right over here somewhere and they had the Central downtown too. And they'd walk right by me every day. I got to know them, you know, all them people are gone. In fact, I was kind of confused coming here. Wasn't I, Julie?

Julie: Yeah, it's changed.

Parrett: Because I didn't know they had there by the courthouse used to be able to drive through there. Right. And that's what I told her. We got there and you can't do it no more. So things have changed. And the only thing I come up once in a while to the Standard there and the paper's lousy, but I still take it because they want you to pay a whole lot for it, but they don't get it for me. No. Yeah. They, the old timers, they don't wanna lose you. The paper's on its way out. Everything's on its way out, you know that, but I just tell them, you're charging me too much. Now, if you want me to keep me as a customer and I've been with the Standard since the eighth grade at the Whittier school, I go that far back. I'm gonna quit it. Oh, don't quit. Don't quit. So boy, they mark it way down. They do that to a lot of the folks, but you gotta speak up. They don't wanna lose you. So I just don't get up around - you asked me about what I think, I don't get uptown that much anymore. You know? I mean, I don't walk well and what can you do?

[01:35:58]

Julie: But I mean, just think growing up, Dad, where you grew up and now there's Safeway, there's all that stuff where you used to play there and now all the stuff where you, you know, by the house there are Harvard.

Parrett: Well like Father Sheehan park. I can tell you about that. There used to be, let's see, what's there now? On the way out there, there was a greenhouse, a greenhouse where they grew flowers. We used to stop there. They threw the dirt out and we'd dig worms to fish the creek. But that creek at that time, meandered through there like this, from way up by the golf course. It was pretty good fishing. Except you had sewers running into it. Yeah, you did. But we'd swim in it and everything. It was bad, but we'd go down there and we'd cut up sod and dam it up to make little swimming holes and that. Go the next day, they'd be washed away. But yeah, that creek was great. Well, then they come in there one time and they started up at the fence at the country club up there with a big drag line and went straight down toward Harrison avenue and they straightened the creek out. They wrecked it. For a long time there was no fish in it at all. And as kids, I remember when they shut the creek off and let the water go down the new, they had all that water on them. Kids were in their catching the fish with their hands. They got it all muddy. And you know, trout will raise when it's muddy, they'll get to the top and they were scooping them up. And they'd like to take them because they were just gonna die. But that's what I remember. That greenhouse, there was about five greenhouses there and then there was a big bin and there was an little car body down there where there were some good holes where we'd fish and that's what I remember down there.

[01:38:23]

Then we used to go out right there by the seventh hole at the country club. We had a place where we sleighrided and skied with what skies we had. We called it gypsy hill and we'd used to walk out there and that house is there now. Same way out at the nine mile. That whole place out there. I knew that creek kind of, they wrecked all that out there. That creek used to be good fishing, but the willows took over, but then they went out there and started putting their garbage in there. I worked out there one summer putting cables in and everything when I was in, I was in high school then, but yeah, I knew the canyon out there real well. There ain't much around here that I can't remember. I've been everywhere. I can tell you about it, if I can remember, you know. I forget names a lot now, but they'll come back to me. This Tommy Holter here. He can't believe what I can remember. I can tell you who sat next to me in the first grade. Now that's way back. I can. I got just a memory that's unbelievable. The only thing that is any good on me is my mind. Never helped me very much though did it? Well, I enjoyed talking to you guys.

Grant: Likewise.

Parrett: Is there anymore that you want to . . .

Grant: I guess just to finish, I'd love to . . .

Parrett: You might think something else. I hope I'm answering you right.

Grant: Oh, you are.

Parrett: I bounce around so much, you know?

Grant: That's okay. Yeah. We're just talking. To finish up, I just wanted to hear more about your mother. Could you tell us her name again? And just more about her.

Parrett: Oh, about my mother. They were born out, you know where Elk Park is out here. That whole place out there was dairy farms many years ago. Well, my mother and her mother and dad. He had come from, my grandpa, he had come from Scotland, but up there in Canada, the island, Nova Scotia. And she was from  Wisconsin, I think, my grandma. And then she come on wagon train up all the way from there and up through Laramie, Wyoming. And she lived there for a while, but they ended up in Elk Park up there and they had a great big barn of a house, dance floor upstairs. And they sold milk in Butte. They'd come out and get the milk. And that's quite a story. And I could tell you about that too, how they used to do it, but we won't get that. It's a long story, how they used to take the milk all the way down to Butte here. And they'd take some empty bottles and back up to get 'em filled again, but they had the Miner's dairy down there, the Crystal Creamery, but up there all along there, a lot of Italian, Swiss-Italian, and they were up in Brown's Gulch too, but they had dairy farms. That's how they made their living.

A lot of bootlegging too in the mountains. But yeah, they used to have dances. It was a homestead. It was a homestead is what it was, and they used to have dances upstairs where my mother played a piano. My aunt had played a violin. My grandpa played a violin and they used to all come together in the valley and have their dances and get together there. Well, they finally, well, no, when their folks first come, they were in the valley up here, going up to Elk Park and the valley, you know, where the road goes up, the Lady, up in that valley. That's where they first lived and then moved out further. That was their place. But out there, I remember above their house, there was a fox farm. A guy raised foxes up there. I was a kid I used to walk up. They finally, their cattle got diseased and they lost everything they had. They had to give it up. So my uncle had moved in from, I told you, he had come from back east and he had married my aunt out there, but he'd worked the ranch for him. And he'd drive to the mines every day in Butte, all the way into Butte. Well then they, when they lost out, they moved into Butte and he worked in the mine.

But that ended the Elk Park deal. But, yeah, my mother, she taught Sunday school. She was religious. We are Methodist and she taught, loved church. We had some folks that come from West Virginia, no, no, no, from Virginia that had moved to Eastern Montana. Then they come here to work in the mines. They lived right down the street there, you know, where the old Food Basket is? Right across from, what's that place that just closed? That sells the hot dogs and that, they just closed, there on the corner. Well, you know, the Food Basket is there. And well, anyway, we got to be great friends with them and before they moved here, they were real religious. And before they moved here, we didn't go to church, but they got us going to a little church down there and they were real good to us. They had a car and everywhere they went, they'd take the whole family, just wonderful people. Well, a guy broke into their house and he got shot. And he got on here at the Great Northern railroad, but ended up going to Great Falls. But after all those years, we stayed friends with them, just wonderful people. But I can thank them for a lot they did, helping my mom and us. The mother used to cut our hair. I remember that.

Julie: Dad, how did Grandma Ruth meet your dad? How did they meet? Do you remember how Grandma Ruth met?

[01:47:03]

Parrett: I don't remember. I don't remember that. But think of this, I do often, they were married 12 years and had seven kids. If he had lived, there would have been 20 of us, probably. They were married 12 years when my sister, maybe it was a little bit longer, because my sister was 12 when he died. And that sister I said was half a year old she's 84 now. Lives in Portland, she lived here for a while and then went back to Portland. That's where her family is. And I just can't think, I can't believe what my mother was able to do with what, she did get a pension, a little pension from my dad for being in the war, for, what do you call it, disability pension. That helped.

And then I think she got a little welfare. I don't know but then she had the stamps, you needed stamps to get your meat, about everything you needed. But anyway, she had a lot of stamps because there was so many of us kids, so everybody was always bumming her for stamps. She had extras, you know, I got some of those stamps at home, you know, that they had during the war. But yeah, she had quite a few extras and people were always and I think they'd trade her something for stamps if I remember. But we had the stamps, but not enough money to buy to all the meat. We were allowed more because of the kids, you know. But well, she did stuff. I remember she had the house sided. She had a new roof put on. She had some cupboards made. And I saw many years later receipts where she was paying $18 a month to have those cabinets made. That's really something with the little money she had. And it wasn't much, I mean, when they say a disability pension now for a vet's pretty good. Or so they tell me. I don't get up at some. A lot of them will tell you, you know, but it wasn't that much then, but that's how she raised us and did one good job. I'll tell you. Yeah, she was quite a woman.

She could make the best pasties in Butte, Montana. And my wife got good and all my sisters. Everyone of them are excellent pasty makers. You know, who taught my mother how to make pasties? My dad. That's what she told me. That my dad taught her. I'm trying to think more things. She played the piano and she taught Sunday school. She played the piano at Sunday school. She belonged to the old veterans club. You know, the guys from the first world war, they had a club. She belonged, she enjoyed going to that. So darn many years ago.

Julie: Well, she just had a birthday. She would've been 123.

Parrett: She'd been 123. Yep. It just don't seem like I'm that old. I just can't believe it. I hope you make it. I hope you both do.

Jaap: Gosh, I hope.

Parrett: Do you want to?

Jaap: I think so. I think so.

Parrett: If things go good, sure, you do. No, I just love the country around here. I love the mountains. I never wanted to leave the mountains. And I still every chance, like, well, she took me up the Wise River the other day. I loved that country up in there and come through Anaconda. Yeah. That's beautiful. I like that going through Helena, across Elkhorn and down the Wise River. And then go up where the kilns are there at go up there and up Canyon Creek to the dude ranch up there. And then go up over Vipond and come down at Dewey. That's a great ride. A great ride. That was one. We used to backpack into them lakes way back there. Didn't have sleeping bags. We had blankets. You'd freeze, but as a young kid, I never had a sleeping bag. We'd go camping. You'd took a couple blankets and that was it. But it gets cold at night here. And I enjoyed it and I loved it, but I froze most of the time. I did that one time we went up here on the East Ridge in early April, just to go camping. We took a tent. Me and my friends, we went up there. That's winter and we had a tent, but we sat by the fire all night. We were freezing. We shot a rabbit up there and ate it. A snowshoe. Yeah. I bet you guys like the mountains.

Jaap: I do. I do.

Parrett: Have you both been here long?

Jaap: I grew up here. I wasn't born here, but grew up here. But yeah, if I go someplace that's flat, it's really unsettling to me.

Parrett: What's your name again?

Jaap: Aubrey, with a B.

Parrett: Say the last name.

Jaap: Aubrey Jaap.

Parrett: I knew a Jaap.

Jaap: Andy?

Parrett: Andy. I knew Andy Jaap. Yes. What was he to you?

Jaap: I think the Andy you're thinking of would've been my father-in-law's father. Garbage man?

Parrett: It's a long time ago, but I remember Andy Jaap. Yeah. And your name?

Grant: My last name is Grant. I'm from Arkansas.

Parrett: Grant? Last name is Grant, huh?

Grant: And I'm from Arkansas and Oklahoma.

Parrett: Oh, I see. Oh, and you like the mountains?

Grant: Oh yeah.

Parrett: Yeah. How long you been here now?

Grant: I've been in Montana, like 12 years. I've been in Butte six years.

Parrett: Yeah. And where do you work at?

Grant: At a radio station in the Carpenter's Union Hall.

Julie: We just went past there. You talked about that Carpenter's Union Hall.

Parrett: Oh, oh.

Grant: I work over there.

[01:55:15]

Parrett: Carpenter's Union Hall. I remember that. Yeah.

Julie: So where you grew up? Like I said, we've lived in Illinois for 30 some years. So do you have tornadoes, you have all that flat land and all that. Lovely.

Parrett: I've always been a union man. I belong to the Teamsters. I got withdrawals from the Teamsters union, the hod carriers union, the laborers union, the bartenders, the cleaners. That was the worst union I ever belonged to. That one.  What else? Oh, the machinists. The machinists was my last one. No, the second to last, but then down there at Texaco, there was no union. But I always had like I told you before, I always had the cement and that to be able to go back to because of my brother-in-law being a contractor. My nephew is Paul LeProwse. He does all this cement work around town now that's my nephew's boy. Okay. Paul, good kids, Paul and Jason. They got a good business. They do almost everything up at Tech there for that [inaudible]. He's got all the modern stuff. Then he travels too and does that stuff elsewhere. But when my brother-in-law, their grandpa had it, it was more . . . I worked on cement before they had ready mix. I hand shoveled it. Ran the wheel barrel. No, we didn't have ready mix, but you know, here's something that you guys should know.

And a lot of old people should know now. I've told Julie. Years ago when they dug out a basement, you didn't have washed sand and gravel. So they'd take the sand from what they dug out of the basement. They'd use it for cement and plaster. That stuff was all dying out. These old houses are crumbling on the base. Don't buy a real old house. Now I'm telling you. You look.  Right, Julie? My house, in the inside it's partial basement. I had to get down there and nail on chicken wire and stucco. They were crumbling. My brother, Frank, that just died. He ended up as an engineer in the school, but he was also a real cement finisher.  He had a full basement. He had to do his whole basement chicken wire because it was crumbling. There's one down from me. That's bad.

My neighborhood's not good like it used to be. They planted couple small trees in a small space and, God, them things are way up in the air now. Well, them roots went right through the basement. That house is going to fall in. They crumble. The guy next to me, two doors away from me, fixed up the most beautiful old house in Butte down there and put lots and lots of money. And I see the basement over there and I see that. I told 'em, I said, you better get going on that foundation. Don't buy an old house. Now, I hope I'm wrong, but they just didn't use good stuff. But when I did it by hand, by then they had good sand and gravel, which you did it all by hand, you know? So all them homes down there by the Civic Center. I worked on all them. They're duplexes. I worked on every one of them. Those over by St. Ann's, all of them. I worked on them, went over there when there were carnivals and circuses. Good old Butte.

[02:00:39]

Oh and we used to walk out to Timber Butte out there. Oh, I forgot to tell you about that. About the railroad. They had a mill out there, Clark's mill. And they used to ship stuff down there or haul stuff down there and then ship it back east by railroad and then ship to Swansea, Wales to be worked on. But that was the mill out there.

And the old street cars. I knew them real well. I rode on the one that takes you to the gardens. I was really young then. The street cars used to go right by my house. And they had a trolley, they were electric. And I remember as a kid, they'd go by the house and the kids would reach up and pull that trolley down. Stop it. My uncle ran the trolley. Yeah, they'd go out and chase them. Yeah, there were street cars out. I got a picture at home. My brother George, my brother George was principal for years at the Whittier school. They named the place after him down there. And he got pictures of the old Whittier school when  it was the reform school. And what was I talking about now?

Grant: Trolley cars.

Parrett: Oh, the trolley cars. Yeah. They went all the way out by the country club. And Wall Street was the widest street in Butte. And those old tracks are still underneath there. They had tracks going up, tracks going down. Clark's park had a great big pavilion there. It burnt down. Clark's park there, I skated there. I played football there. Well, years ago, Butte High and even, I think, the Grizzlies played up there. They played at the Gardens, I know.

Jaap: They did. Yeah.

Parrett: But yeah, that trolley, that was fun. And then at the Gardens there, every Thursday, you could go out free. You could get on the trolley or on the bus later on. They'd take you out free. They had kids day, they called it. But I was just real young when I rode the trolley.

Jaap: Yeah. Because I think the trolleys only went till about 37 maybe.

Parrett: Yeah. Well, I was born in 31.

Jaap: So, you were little.

Parrett: That's how young I was. But I remember being on it. I'm trying to think of something else.

Julie: Well, dad, I can always get their email address.

Parrett: You probably want to go home.

Jaap: I'm here till five.

Parrett: So I enjoyed talking to you.

Grant: Likewise.

Parrett: I heard Fisk's daughter or something got . . . because he always wanted to interview me on this here. He wanted that bad.

Julie: Do you guys want to make copies?

Parrett: That's what I thought you guys wanted was this here.

Jaap: Can I make a copy of it?

Julie: They're gonna make a copy of it.

Parrett: Oh, there's a lot of pages in my handwriting. I better put my mask back on.

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