BENJAMIN AGINIGA INTERVIEW

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Today's date is October 23, 1996, and the time is eleven o'clock. This is Delia Ceballos Munoz, and I'm introducing Ben Aginiga, at 3704 Pinal Drive.

Aginiga: And we're all friends. (laughs)

Munoz: And we're all friends. Okay, I'm going to start with asking you to tell me where and when you were born.

Aginiga: From the beginning?

Munoz: From the beginning.

Aginiga: I was born here in Flagstaff _________ [very low volume, soft voice, difficult to decipher (Tr.)] in 19____. As a matter of fact, I've got birthday presents....

Munoz: Tomorrow?

Aginiga: No, it's the twenty-eighth, so it'd be next [week?]. I've lived here all my life with the exception of going into the service, _______________, but mostly I've lived here. All our family has lived in Flagstaff, except for the time when they went off to other places to carry on their lives.

Munoz: And who were your parents, and how did they get here?

Aginiga: Ah! That's the beginning. We are getting to the beginning. Okay, my Dad's name was Leonardo, but everybody called him Leon for short. And he was born in Mexico in the State of Guanajuato, and he was around the city of ________________. There were a lot of small towns within the large city_-on the outskirts of the larger city of ___________. He was born _________. As a matter of fact, the small town that he was born in was Poplos Armin [phonetic spelling], that's what he used to call it. But he's from, you know, Guanajuato, Mexico. And my mom was born in Estado_-in the State of Michoacán_-and that's also in Mexico. Now, the largest city where she was born is Numarán [phonetic spelling], but actually, she was born just outside the larger city in a smaller village. I forget what the name of that village was. But anyway, she was born there in Mexico.

Now, my dad, and now we want to bring him to Flagstaff.

Munoz: Now we're coming to Flagstaff.

Aginiga: Now we're bringing him to Flagstaff. Okay, my dad left Mexico when he was seventeen years old, and he arrived in Flagstaff in 1906. And I remember him telling me one time when he arrived here in town, that it was snowing solid_-I mean, it was really snowing in Flagstaff, because it was in the month of December, as I recall. He decided it was too cold to stop here (laughter) and he wanted to continue going, so he went on through to California. But then in a matter of weeks, why, he decided that he wanted to come back. So he came back to Flagstaff. So on that last move, since then, he had resided in here until he passed away.

Munoz: Did he ever say what brought him back to Flagstaff?

Aginiga: Well, to tell you the truth, I think for some reason, why, he decided that this small town, which is a small town_-you know, Flagstaff was very small at that particular time_-that he wanted to see if he could find a job here. Besides, he had some friends here. Usually that's what brings people together, you know. If somebody lives down the railroad, why, he wants to stop where he knows somebody, or who knows about the area. At that time, the people that he knew here in Flagstaff were some friends that he had met in Mexico. The family was Morgana [phonetic spelling], which is an old family here, which I think at some time or another they asked the family if they could use some of the background in Flagstaff, [without their telling me?]. But as I can recall about Victor Morgana was the people that he wanted to see here. So he felt that he could stay with friends here. He was only seventeen years old, and he did, so that's where he settled down, here in Flagstaff. I think plus the fact that he knew so many [here].

Munoz: So as he was growing up, what type of job did he find to support himself?

Aginiga: When he first came to Flagstaff, Flagstaff at that particular time was_-at that part of Flagstaff_-and, as a matter of fact, all of Flagstaff, was [multiple tracks?]. There was the Old Town, towards the west, you go alongside the tracks there, near that spring, _____________. Then there were a few houses on the north side of the railroad tracks, and then following the railroad all around. And then there was some stables, ______ a few hotels, a few bars, in the town. But as I can recall, at the time he came, there was nothing south of the tracks, which was in 1906. Now, I'm not sure on what day or what year the Normal School was located south of the tracks in Flagstaff, but it might have been there, or he probably didn't mention it to me at the time. But as I can recall, he said there was nothing south of the tracks_-just a pasture for cows, you know. And that's ________ all that was there.

So the place where he started working at the time was at the sawmill. The sawmill that he started working at was over in Cliffs [phonetic spelling, maybe Clints Well].

Munoz: And where is that located?

Aginiga: Well, Cliffs was a small town east of Flagstaff. There was a small mill there that was owned by the Greenlaws [phonetic spelling], the same family that started that subdivision in Flagstaff, the Greenlaw Subdivision. Well, the old folks tell the younger people that they're going to develop this area. They own that sawmill in Cliffs. And so he started working in the sawmill there. In some of the sawmills. There was a sawmill there, and I think there was one here in Flagstaff, but I forget the location of that sawmill in Flagstaff. It could have been where Southwest Forest Industries was, and you know _______ in there, where I'd like to see a civic center developed. (laughs) Right in that area where they removed the old sawmill. And he worked primarily in the sawmills at the time, and that's how _______ he got to meet my grandfather __________.

So, well, I'll tell you how my maternal grandfather __________. My maternal grandfather in Mexico was primarily a blacksmith. But in those days in Mexico, your blacksmiths [made now with washer?], but they were more talented, more of a craftsman. He used to make sabres and swords_-and not only plowshares, but he could work with silver and work with gold in his blacksmith's shop. He could work with silver, he could make silverware and he sold it. So he was very talented, an artist.

Munoz: So he had a business going.

Aginiga: He had a business going. So for some reason, I suppose he decided that there was greener pastures elsewhere, and so he left Mexico and came here. Now, as close as I could figure, the year that he came, the first time that he came to Flagstaff was in 1900, or it could have been a little before 1900, the first time. And so he had made the trip to Flagstaff before, and he was here a while, and then he went back to Mexico. While he was back in Mexico and working over there, that's when my mother was born. She was born in 1906 in Mexico.

Well, he made another trip from Mexico_-later on, he came back to Flagstaff_-and he was here a few years. He left his family in Mexico. He left three daughters and a son, which _________. And he left them in Mexico while he was working here. So in later years, that's when my dad and my grandpa got to meet each other, was working in the sawmill, because that's when my grandfather_-his name was Esteban Mendez_-when he came to Flagstaff, he found work in the sawmills.

Munoz: Would that be in the Cliffs?

Aginiga: Well, at one time I know he was working with Cliffs, but he also at one time worked in the railroad, which is the Santa Fe Railroad. At that particular time, when they had, I don't know, ___________________, but they had railroad cars where they had sleeping quarters for the workers, and they moved large crews of railroad workers up and down the railroad. They used to work from San Bernardino on west on the Santa Fe Railroad, on through. They had a train, and then they had all the ____ people, which were a lot of people. And they worked the railroad back and forth_-I imagine to improve it or even maybe establish a second line of track. But he worked on the railroad, and then also he worked at the sawmill, and that's where he made the acquaintance of my dad. So that's how they both got to Flagstaff.

Munoz: Okay. Now, let's move to your growing up here in Flagstaff, your reminiscing now of what you remember Flagstaff like as you were growing up.

Aginiga: Well, let's see.... As I remember, of course, some of my early recollection of Flagstaff was small town, lots of snow (chuckles) during the winter, and lots of rain during the summer. (chuckles) But a small town, you know, with most of the people of Hispanic origin, and the people that worked at the University_-which was a college at the time, Arizona Teachers College_-lived south of town. We had some faculty from Arizona Teachers College that lived on Beaver [phonetic spelling] Street, you know, and there were some that lived _________ in various parts of town, on the south side of the tracks. Then we also had, of course, a lot of people that lived up on the north side of the tracks up there. And in a small town, it was primarily a town where everybody could walk and do their shopping by walking to town. So as I can recall, the shopping center of Flagstaff was downtown. So everybody that shopped went to Babbitts downtown for most of their groceries_-or one of the two stores there. Of course the main store, then the small store, Joe's Place. Later on they had a store. But mostly those two stores. Babbitts had a very large _____ store. He sold clothing, shoes, groceries_-almost everything. And on the back of his store there, they had a packing house where they rendered fat and canned [crane tree?] lard from the packing house there, and they made their hamburger there at the packing house. They smoked their hams there in the back of the packing house. And they quartered the meat there, and they brought it forward to the meat department at Babbitts. And they also had, at that time, as I recall when I was a small boy, they had a slaughterhouse there towards the east of town. It was way out there out of town. The closest that I can tell you where that slaughterhouse was, was where Babbitts Hardware is_-between Babbitts Hardware and.... Well, it's another establishment now. I understand Babbitts sold out. But where the Babbitts Hardware was, and in between there and the warehouse where they had the larger warehouse stock_-Babbitts_-that's where the slaughterhouse was. And some of the corrals where they brought_-there was a railroad coming on into the slaughterhouse where they brought all of the herds that were going to be slaughtered there at the slaughterhouse. They slaughtered beef, and they had hogs and sheep that they slaughtered there at their slaughterhouse, and they brought all of that down to the railroad. And of course a lot of their stock now, the hides, ____________. Their hides that they got off the beef, they stored them in the basement, and some of us kids would go out there and stretch 'em out and throw salt on 'em, and stack 'em up, you know, so they won't spoil. And then when they had large quantities of hides, they'd take 'em out and load 'em in railroad cars and send 'em out of town.

Munoz: So was that a job, when you were a young boy, doing that for Babbitt?

Aginiga: No. When you're young_-and in those days, because of Prohibition_-you know, there was Prohibition here at the time_-they were hard times. And if your breadwinner, your dad, happened to be out of work, why, then the younger children and the older ones went out and they looked for jobs and scrounged around wherever they could. That's what we used to do. We'd go out there and work almost anyplace in town at that particular time.

The school, Harms [phonetic spelling] School, where I went when I started kindergarten, was Granite School.

Munoz: Where Murdock is now?

Aginiga: Well, no, Murdock was separate. There's some apartments over there where Brannen [phonetic spelling] School used to be. I think at that time.... _______.

Munoz: _______________.

Aginiga: The original building was an old Catholic church, and Brannen, one of the pioneers of Flagstaff, their name was Brannen. I didn't get to know the gentleman at all. I think he had passed away. And they named the school after the church somehow moved out and went somewhere else, the Catholic church. The building was converted to a school, and they named the school Brannen School. But it was an old church _____. And incidentally, the old gentleman that they named the school after, was buried in the cemetery right on the.... Let's see.... It's on a little hill overlooking NAU. It's not where the present location of the cemetery is. It was on that little hill up there.

Munoz: On Murray?

Aginiga: Yes, that we called Calavera.

Munoz: Yes, I've heard that.

Aginiga: (chuckles) And the reason why_-you know calavera means "skull."

Munoz: Right.

Aginiga: And the reason why we call it Calavera, was because of that old cemetery that was up on that hillside. So then some of the homesites there were being sold at La Calavera, because that was the old cemetery.

Munoz: How far was that cemetery?

Aginiga: Well, it was within, oh, within a short distance of some of the homes that were starting to be built there. And, you know, the first homes that started to be built were coming up from the bottom of the hill, alongside the River de Flag, and they were being built up the hill. So when somebody was building a house or lived in and around that area, [we] said, "Oh, you're from La Calavera." That's how it got started.

Anyway, before all of that housing was there, all that housing, there was that cemetery. And the outskirts of Flagstaff was, oh, just a few houses on this side of River de Flag_-as a matter of fact, very few houses. There was the adobe houses, which were the closest to [Yuma?]. And then a few homes on the north side of River de Flag, that I can recall. And about three or four homes on the south near La Calavera, down below, on the west slope of the hill, which la Villa Gomez lived, and _______________ that beside there, they raised a large family, the Villa Gomez.

Munoz: I remember _____________.

Aginiga: Verdad! And your family lived_-your grandpa and your grandma_-lived one block further on down towards town. And they lived right on the edge of a large empty lot, and all that area toward the south and east was open country. There was a stand of pines right next to River de Flag, and a family, the Nervades [phonetic spelling] ___________ Nervades? Or you don't recall?

Munoz: I don't recall them.

Aginiga: Well, mira, José Nervades was an old pioneer of Flagstaff and he had two sons and one daughter. Those trees there, the old gentleman and his sons used to_-they had horses_-they went out of town, out into the woods, and they cut cordwood and hauled it and stacked it right there alongside those trees and along the River de Flag, and from there they sold it to the light plant for Flagstaff, for the electric light company there in Flagstaff_-which was the only light source at the time. So they sold a lot of their cordwood to the electric company, and it was by horses, you know. They loaded up their wagon, and then they'd haul several cords of wood and could sell it to the light company and they _________. I think at that time, maybe by weight, or by the cord, I forget. But that was their source of income. And they also had a ranch out towards Lake ______ on the east side. I think they had an old homestead, and they farmed up there and they grew beans_-which everybody planted beans. They planted beans and then they harvested and they sold 'em by the sack to various people.

Munoz: Where exactly did you live when you were growing up in Flagstaff?

Aginiga: In South Agazi [phonetic spelling]. I was born there on South Agazi. As a matter of fact, there's about two or three of [us] were born there. ________________.

Munoz: Does that house still stand?

Aginiga: I'm not sure, I haven't been there in years. I'm not sure if it's still there.

Munoz: What was the neighborhood like then, as you remember growing up?

Aginiga: Well, everybody knew everybody, and it was pleasant living there. You know, when you're a kid, why, all your friends [are living in the neighborhood?].

Munoz: So who were your neighbors, who were your friends that you used to hang around with?

Aginiga: Let me see. There's Johnny Rodriguez. You know him?

Munoz: I know him.

Aginiga: Then your family, your uncle was one of the young men. And I seem to forget his name. What was his name?

Munoz: Sanchez or Robertson?

Aginiga: Robertson. Robert Sanchez, which is your uncle. Now, he was one of the youngsters around in the area. There was Juan Rodriguez, the Vasquez, the children of _________ Vasquez. Felipe Lopez lived right across [from] us, Vince Lopez's grandparents. I think so. Grandparents? Yes, I think his grandparents lived right across the street from us. And then there was the Dia Gomez families, and Navares, José Navares. Losano.

Munoz: __________.

Aginiga: (Spanish) And Tomas Vegas. And let's see.... Johnny Cerna, Juan Cerna [phonetic spelling]. He lived over there in the adobe houses, the last houses on San Francisco Street going south. Those last houses were made out of adobe. Juan Cerna lived there. Barreras [phonetic spelling], they lived right across on the street there. Los Juarez.

Munoz: As growing up, ______________, did you guys have all kinds of entertainment?

Aginiga: Oh yes! Yes, we did. Well, I'll tell you (laughs) when we were children, the only entertainment that we had, that I can recall, we'd built bonfires at somebody's area there around their home. Usually around where I lived, we'd built a bonfire. We'd go out there and get some old tires (laughter) and we'd light up an old tire because it lasted a long time. Of course, you know, that smoke coming off of it.

Munoz: Right.

Aginiga: And we had bonfires, and the games that we played were "Run, Sheep, Run." And we'd go out and hide just like "Hide and Seek." For some of the games. And then some of the kids would bring something for the other kids to eat around the bonfires there at night. One of the things that most of us kids ate in those days were sugar cane_-we loved sugar cane. We couldn't afford candy. So one of the kids would say, "Hey, I've got two cents," or something. So he'd go out and buy a stalk of sugar cane from one of the neighboring stores and bring it and then he'd cut it up into pieces and we'd all chew sugar cane. So most of the kids around my age that couldn't afford to eat candy, still had their treat. (laughter) Providing that they're alive. But that was one of the things that we enjoyed. And then we also played "Kick the Can," which is another game. We'd set up a can up there, where you could see it in the....

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Munoz: [Sugar cane], that's all you could afford.

Aginiga: Well, yeah. (aside about tape) The idea of kicking the can was to kick it and then hit it as far as you could, and then everybody'd go hide. And then whoever was the best of the players would come in, and when whoever was it was looking down around the house or somewhere, trying to find somebody, and then tag them and say, "You're It!" and run to the can and touch it, why, the other person had to retrieve the can and, you know, go around.

But anyway, we couldn't afford anything like candy or nothing like that, so we ate a lot of sugarcane. We loved it. So when we didn't have sugar cane, maybe somebody within the kids over there, maybe their dad bled some corn. We'd go out there and we'd take the cornstalks bleeding, you know, we'd take all the husk off and chew on some of those cornstalks _________.

Some of the other games that we ran, "Run, Sheep, Run." And that was all over when we'd go out into a group, two groups, and they'd chose sides, and then we'd run all over town, to see if we could locate one of the others, and we'd run. And if you could catch one of the members of the other teams, and they lost. So all the kids, we ran up and down, all over town. We'd run all the way to the springs up there, and then all the way to the sawmill up here. And I mean, we ran and ran. I think that probably has origins way back into (laughs) antiquity. But anyway, that was the object of the game, was to capture one of the kids from one of the gangs of the others.

Munoz: That's probably some of your early childhood memories that you recall as you were growing up. When you were going to school, do you remember any discrimination, or did you detect that?

Aginiga: When you're a child, when you're small, you don't pick those things up.

Munoz: No.

Aginiga: But one of the things that I do remember when I was going to school is, that as I told you about Brannen School, all the Hispanics were in Brannen School. And then if there's any Anglo children living within the area, they sent them to school to Anderson, or they sent them to what we called Normal School, Normal School at the College.

Munoz: This is as you were getting older?

Aginiga: Yeah. All the kids_-well, kindergarten, first grade, second grade, and third grade, and fourth grade were there at Brannen School. So when I was going to school, I went through all the grades there. And so when I got promoted to the fifth grade, I had to go to Emerson School. So I went to Emerson School in the fifth grade, one year, and then that second year they built us a school. They gave us brand new school. (laughter)

Munoz: Which is?

Aginiga: Beaver.

Munoz: South Beaver.

Aginiga: Yeah, they built us a school there. Let me see whether it was_-no, it wasn't ______________. Must have been the sixth grade. I don't recall. But anyway, when we were in school up in Emerson, they said, "Okay, okay, you kids, you're going back to your own neighborhood. We built you a brand new school over there. You kids are lucky." So we loaded up all the books that we had, and we carried 'em, all the kids walked up from Emerson School and came over to our new school one day. As I can recall there, that was only to the sixth grade. So here they had given us a new school. At that time I think Brannen School was abandoned because of the new Beaver School. So the new Beaver School started at kindergarten and on up through the sixth grade. So I only had maybe a year there at Beaver School, so here again I go to Emerson School. And I went to Emerson School for my seventh grade, and then they still _______ the Hispanic kids were still in a single classroom. However, there was a population explosion. (laughter) And so they had too many kids in the class where they had mostly Hispanics in there. So they decided that. I think we were in the neighborhood_-for just that one classroom, as I can recall_-we were in the neighborhood of forty-eight or forty-nine students in that one class. I mean, there wasn't even room to walk in between the desks. I mean, we were crowded in there. And so the powers that be_-Miss Kinsey [phonetic spelling] was the principal there. She was a very nice lady. She was the principal there. She had as her right-hand assistant was Mr. Whitesell [phonetic spelling], and he was the disciplinarian. Mr. Whitesell was real handy with....

Munoz: Paddle board.

Aginiga: With a paddle. Then we had Miss Noon and Der Schwelmo Mr. Brooksby, and later on Miss Rooso ____________. Miss Noon. [all phonetic spellings]

Munoz: And then you go up into high school after?

Aginiga: Then went through seventh grade. Oh, I was going to tell you, because of that class being so crowded, they decided they're gonna pick a few of the better kids from that class and move them into an Anglo classroom. So they picked out, I think, about four or six of us, and they moved us into the other classroom. And I can recall some of the kids there, some of the families were well-to-do, some of the Murphys, McCulloughs, [phonetic spellings], and some of the better families were in that classroom.

Munoz: (inaudible)

Aginiga: Yeah, they somehow got_-they, in turn, got shifted to a little better classroom. (laughter) Some of the farmers and the outlying bus people were in another classroom. But we got in there and we [supplied?] with the_-I think they picked the better students, because we started giving ____________. I mean, we competed with the other kids. We managed to make_-all of us kids_-there was ________________ because I think _______________________. Then there was Alice Lopez, she was ___________. She was a very good student. And she was _______ in my class. Bernard Avaro [phonetic spelling] ________, and myself. I think there was only the two of us, that I can recall. It could have been, I don't recall whether _________________. But anyway, went into the seventh and eighth grade ___________.

But what I was going to tell you, some of the things that I can recall_-and these are during hard times _______. They had, NAU_-well, Arizona Teachers College at that time_-they had a large herd of dairy cows, and they had a dairy way back ____ in the back part of the meadow, way out beyond the college. Anyway, it was all meadows at one time. And there was this open area. They had all these herd cows that they kept over there. The teachers college used the dairy products and the milk for their use, for their people there, the students. I think the numbers ________ in those days was around _______, if that many_-maybe four or five hundred. Then we had _________________. So I remember that they were very_-anyway, they were compassionate to some of the poor people. And the reason I say that is because we heard through the grapevine that if you took a little bucket to the dairy in the mornings and late in the evenings, that they'd give you free milk. So word got around in our neighborhood, and you could see all kinds of people coming along, walking out of town, going through that long meadow and plain there, up to that grassy, with all their little buckets_-little kids, I mean five or six-year-olds, and those little Babbitt lard cans, four-pound cans, some with eight-pound cans of lard, you know, and some with larger buckets. And everybody was heading on out towards the dairy that they had. Sure enough, they filled your little bucket full of fresh milk, and all the kids got milk that way. They hauled it back home. And I think they did that twice. I thought it was in the morning. And I know for sure in the evening. So that was one of the things that helped the neighborhood around there. But those were hard days during the Depression. It's empty now.

And you asked me about the jobs, you know. And the reason I was telling you this, because my brother and I used to go all over town to work in the gardens and chop wood and haul it, stacking it. In the wintertime we shoveled everybody's sidewalks, providing that they paid us, you know. We only charged ten, fifteen cents, or a quarter to shovel their sidewalks. We earned all over town. So in those days, why, in those hard days, it made us feel good to bring a couple of dollars back home, you know, and change. And that kind of helped the family. ___________. But it was very tough ________ in those days. The bootleggers were making ___________. (laughs)

Munoz: Oh, yes, I was going to ask you about that. What do you remember about during that time?

Aginiga: Oh, I tell you, they made very good money in Prohibition days, as I can recall. We were little kids. Children know all the time_-at least when we were kids, we were always looking for some way to make money. You know, ______ doing chores for people. And one of the things that I liked best, and my brother liked best, is when we were children, if there was a dance Saturday night, we knew that there was money to be made the next morning, because people usually went to dances in those days, during Prohibition, they'd go out there and get some kind of liquor somewhere and there was always a place where somebody had some. And our part of the equation was that we'd go the next morning, early in the morning and look for bottles. Now, bottles in those days were premium. I mean, any kind of bottle_-especially whiskey bottles. You know, we'd go around in the area where the dance was held, around the [(Spanish) Feliz Angeles?].

Munoz: Where would that be?

Aginiga: (chuckles) That was on South San Francisco. There was three dance halls in South San Francisco: Saragosa_-you don't remember.

Munoz: You know, I think I've heard it vaguely.

Aginiga: The Saragosa, and there's the Feliz Angeles, and there's the Chin Chun Chan.

Munoz: Okay, I've heard of that one, yes.

Aginiga: Well, any one of those three halls, if there was a dance there, why, we made sure that we went around the whole area. My brother and I used to look for those pints. In those days, they were quarts. So for a full pint, we could take that bottle and go to any one of the bootleggers that we knew existed in town_-we knew all of them. We'd go out there and turn that bottle in, and for a full pint they'd give us fifty cents. And fifty cents in those days, that was a lot of money. You know, people working in the sawmill, your dad, your grandfather, working in a sawmill, they were only making ten cents an hour, and they were stacking green lumber for ten cents an hour.

Munoz: Hard work.

Aginiga: And they worked ten hours a day, they made one whole dollar. And here we were, we went up there and found a bottle, and we could turn that in to a bootlegger for fifty cents. Can you imagine? Now, the flasks, the bottles that were flasks, those are narrower. There's a flask that they had in those days that were half a pint, a pint, flasks in those days. They didn't hold a full pint. And the bootleggers liked that, because they could make money by just filling a flask and selling it as half a pint. For a pint flask, we got a whole dollar.

Munoz: Oh, my goodness!

Aginiga: And that was big money.

Munoz: Big money, yeah.

Munoz: Or for a gallon, now a gallon jug, we got a dollar for a gallon jug from the bootlegger. One bootlegger lived on the other side of the railroad tracks, right there in the city hall_-where the city hall is now. And as you go walk toward the tracks, right alongside the tracks there was a small home there, and there was a bootlegger there that we used to sell most of the bottles to. His name was George. Now, I don't remember his last name, which is a good thing. (Munoz chuckles) But anyway, why, his name was George, and he was a gentleman that had a limp. And we went to George and the first thing that came to our mind, he was the one that gave us the best prices for our bottles, so we went to him, George, and turned in our bottles. We found two gallon jugs, that was two dollars. Imagine ___________ two dollars, when a man was making ten cents an hour, he worked ten hours a day, six days a week. ______________, what is it, sixty hours? Six dollars a week.

Munoz: Were there many women working then too? Or do you remember or recall that women worked also?

Aginiga: No.

Munoz: They were just home?

Aginiga: The only people that worked_-I mean, when we're talking about women_-the only women that I can recall that worked anyplace were in the offices or in the stores. And, of course, in the laundry. You're talking about Hispanics now?

Munoz: Uh-huh, Hispanics. Did they work also?

Aginiga: Okay, now, there were some Hispanics that worked in the laundry. A lot of them were maids to some of the people that had more money, north of the tracks. They worked as maids. As a matter of fact, one of my sisters, my eldest sister, worked as a maid. She worked as a maid for a dentist. But that's another story. As I can recall, one other Hispanic worked at Babbitts, _______________. And there was one other that worked at J.C. Penney's_-the old J.C. Penney's, you know, that was where that furniture store....

Munoz: McMannus [phonetic spelling].

Aginiga: McMannus, yeah, __________. And then the manager of the Orpheum Theater was a Hispanic_-the manager. My dad told me, he said, "You know why Maximillian"_-I think was his name_-"Do you know how Maximillian got his job as a manager of the theater?" And I said, "No." "Well, I'll tell you. When he came to Flagstaff he had a fiddle, a fifty_dollar violin. And he said he knew how to play the violin, so he got a job playing the violin during the silent movies, you know. And he played the violin for the theater, and later on he got to be the manager." Maximillian.

Munoz: Interesting, yeah.

Aginiga: Yeah, I recall his name because my brother and I used to go out there and chop wood and haul it, and the little house that he had where the bank is, National Bank, on Birch and Leroux [phonetic spelling], right in the corner of Birch and Leroux. The was the small house there and a big, empty lot, and that's where Maximillian lived.

Munoz: Other than those three dance halls, where you used to go pick up those bottles, what other type of fiestas or entertainment was there?

Aginiga: Entertainment was a big deal in Flagstaff _______ in those days was Diez y Seis de Septiembre, Cinco de Mayo, which are Mexican national holidays. In Flagstaff they used to have speeches, you know, and a small parade down [Christmas?] street, and decorated a few of the stores, you know, with bunting, you know, with red, white, and green, and then red, white, and blue. And they decorated the halls where it was in the Saragosa, or the Feliz Angeles, or the Chin Chun Chan, wherever the festivities were going to be held. They decorated the hall and ___________, and they had patriotic speeches. There was a parade, and then after the parade, why, they sold food, you know, in booths around the area. And then they had speeches in the afternoon. And then on toward the evening they had speeches. And then after the speeches in the evening, there was a dance. And that was about the size of it. Williams was way ahead of us on the festivities for those particular holidays. They had a lot more people involved over there. What we did, we didn't have a big show here, we went to Williams. And then when we had a big show here for the Sixteenth of September or Cinco de Mayo, they came from over there, and they had all their speakers up here, and their girls. And I remember that's where I first saw my wife as a little girl. She was about ten years old when she came to one of those festivities over there. But that's the way it usually went. But they had parades over there, and then a bigger show over there, well, we went over there. And when we had a big one, they came here.

Munoz: At a big festivity like that, you know, when you have weddings, were they big also? Church weddings and baptismals?

Aginiga: Weddings? Well, let me get back to the dances _________. Things have changed, as I was telling Bob before we started the interview. I was talking that things have changed. In those days, and as I can recall, even as growing up, anytime there was a dance, it was a formal dance. Any time you had a public dance at the Feliz Angeles, the Saragosa, or the Chin Chun Chan, it was formal. In other words, all the young ladies had long formal gowns, and all the young men, we wore suits and a tie. That was for all the dances. And that was even before the start of the Second World War. We wore what they called a zoot suit. Which reminds me of your uncle.

Munoz: Oh, Robert, yes.

Aginiga: Oh, he loved his suits!

Munoz: Oh, yes he did! Up to now, I think he still does. (laughs)

Aginiga: And he'd dress very well. I mean, anytime that Robert was going to go to a dance_-I don't think he'd mind me saying that_-because he was going to a dance, and I think he dressed well. And so did the rest of us that could get the clothes. Of course (chuckles) not all of us could afford them. But whenever a dance was held in those days, it was a formal dance. And even after some of us veterans came out after the Second World War, a lot of the dances were still formal. And then later on, people just lost it, and then it was nothing. (laughter) They weren't formal anymore.

Munoz: Were just casual, huh?

Aginiga: More casual. But in the older days, all of the dances were formal. In other words, if a young lady wanted to go to a dance and she didn't have a formal, she didn't go to the dance.

Munoz: Sure has changed, hasn't it?

Aginiga: Yeah.

Munoz: And I was directing that question to weddings and baptismals and funerals. What were they like, that you can remember?

Aginiga: Have we got time?

Munoz: Yeah, we can start with that.

Aginiga: We can start with that the next time.

Munoz: Okay, sounds good.

[END TAPE 2, SIDE A; SIDE B IS BLANK; BEGIN TAPE 3, SIDE A]

Aginiga: _________ from there and became a county nurse, after that episode, or after that job at Santa Monica Hospital. And while she was a county nurse, she founded a clinic there in Southern California. Then of course she got the medical help from there, to donate their time, different doctors. And after she founded that clinic, Governor Brown, which was the governor of California at the time, he appointed her to the Medical Board of California. She became a board member and was active as a Medical Board member of the State of California. And then she continued as a county nurse until she retired. Now, she passed away this last spring, as a matter of fact. And in honor of her service to the community and to the State of California, they set up a nursing scholarship fund in her name on one of the universities there in California. So her daughter_-she had three daughters and some grandchildren, so in case they get to see this tape, why, they'll know that the credit is being given here, because she well deserved it.

Now, another one of the notes that I have here on recapping what we had spoken before, and I mentioned to you that the University, or the Arizona Teachers College at the time, had a dairy on the south end of the campus at that time. I mean, it was really way out there. And they had a herd of Holstein dairy cows there, and I told you that some of their extra milk they gave to the neighborhood, and that the families would go to the dairy and pick up their milk there, which was appreciated, because it was during the Depression.

And so one of the things that I forgot to tell you, also_-and this has to do with the Mexican-American experience, as far as Arizona State College is concerned, which is now NAU, that a lot of families in those days were also cutting cordwood for the electric plant there at NAU. NAU had their own separate electric plant from the City of Flagstaff.

Munoz: Oh, they did?!

Aginiga: So a lot of families sold cordwood both to the City of Flagstaff electric plant, and also to the college electric plant there at NAU. Now, that was one of the notes there.

Also, the college also benefitted (chuckles) from us, you know, from the Mexican-American neighborhood there, in that the college students would usually abscond with the neighborhood outhouses (both chuckle) and some of the fences they could rip off. And they'd go out and they'd take all of these and then go out and set a big pile up there of outhouses and fences, or whatever would burn, and they'd set up these big, big piles of fuel for their homecoming bonfire. (laughter) You remember seeing any of those?

Munoz: (laughing) No.

Aginiga: Oh, that was before your time. Anyway, they set up a huge pile of outhouses and fences that they could rip all around the neighborhood. And I was just thinking of how humorous that little piece of work was, because they didn't ask us for our outhouses. They would go at night, and they'd get, oh, I'd say a whole group of college students. I imagine some of them were [pledges?] you know, and easily and quietly at night, and if they saw a likely candidate out there, one of these outhouses up there, they'd physically pick it up and carted it all the way to the grounds over at the college. You know, sometimes, they'd carry those things for about half a mile or more. You know, these outhouses weren't all that clean, and a lot of accidents happened while they were trying to abscond with [them] and run out with the outhouses.

Munoz: That's how they have their good times.

Aginiga: We knew it when it was coming, because they usually, the week before homecoming was the week that they were out scavenging around to see what they were going to pick up. So if you wanted to protect your outhouse, say, that you had just built, a brand new one_-and this happened. My dad, we had one, just a new one out there, and my dad sat up there with a shotgun, all night, sitting out there, watching that. (laughter) Of course he wouldn't shoot anybody, but all he had to do is just fire up in the air, and the kids were scattered. Now that has been such a long time ago, that some of those youngsters that were running off with those outhouses and making these big bonfires_-would you believe that they're now in their 80s and 90s?! Eighty-year-old grandpas or great-grandpas.

Anyway, that was one of the notes that I had there, concerning that little part of the talk that we had, and I also had this one here on the cordwood. Was there anything else that you wanted to ask me about that last tape that we had?

Munoz: I don't remember if I asked you what church you attended, or what church ________.

Aginiga: Oh yeah. Well, as you know, most Hispanics now are categorized into different nationalities, but as you know, most Hispanics are Catholic_-Roman Catholic, most of them. And that comes back from the old country. So they brought, most immigrants that came to this country, whether they came from Europe or wherever, they usually brought their customs and they brought their religion and their way of life, the way they lived over there. And so it was the same here in Flagstaff, a lot of these families that came here. Some of the early families, I would say, ______, they came from Mexico for one reason or another. A lot of the older folks that came here, like my grandfather and my dad, they came around the turn of the century. In those particular times, things were different in Mexico. They're different than what they are now, you know how it's changed. But the type of life and the type of customs that they had at that particular time, they brought here. So with that, they brought their religion.

Now, I was going to say how this ties into Flagstaff, the socio-economic part of how these people contributed to Flagstaff. Well, some of the people that came to Flagstaff brought some of their skills and some of their skills they had before coming to Flagstaff. So the story is that in the early days during the Depression, Flagstaff, as I understand, needed a new church, and they were thinking of building a new church, which turned out to be Nativity Church, which we're proud of. You know, it's a beautiful church, and it's one of the outstanding landmarks in Flagstaff. A lot of people just go out there to take a picture of it, because it's kind of unique, because of the malapai rock [mal pais, volcanic rock? (Tr.)] and the pink stones. Well, the story behind that church is that there was a lot of people that got involved in there, and a lot of people donated whatever they could to the building of the church. I'm sure some of the more well-to-do families here donated to the building of the Nativity Church. However, a lot of people don't know that the Mexican-Americans donated to that church in turn. Now, I'll tell you how they donated.

Munoz: Okay.

Aginiga: First of all, of course, it was from collections from the church, you know, and whatever anybody within the community would want to donate out of their pocket. Well, at that particular time that they were collecting this money to build the Nativity Church, my dad, which is a logcutter, and a logcutter in those days was a lumberjack, which NAU called themselves the Lumberjacks. A lumberjack in those days was a sawyer, and he was the one that used the old crosscut whip, which I did too, later on. And he cut logs with that hand saw. There were outlying logging camps out of Flagstaff, and mostly that's where he was working, either outside of Flagstaff or towards Williams, wherever they were logging at the time. Well, in the early days before trucks were used to haul the logs, they had these railroads running out of the sawmill over there. You've seen the old railroad grades.

Munoz: Yes, I have.

Aginiga: Well, all of those grades and railroads that they had were built out toward the woods in order to bring the logs into the mill. And that was the way they brought the saw logs into the mill. Well, my dad was a worker in one of those logging camps, and that was when I was a small child. There were logging camps and the families lived over there. And the logging company provided shacks.

Munoz: Would that be in Happy Jack?

Aginiga: No, this was way before Happy Jack. The logging perimeter at that particular time, the virgin timber, as I recall, they were cutting_-when I was a small boy_-they were cutting around Newman [phonetic spelling] Park, on I-17, as you're going to Phoenix.

Munoz: Off to the right, uh-huh.

Aginiga: Well, there's Newman Park. Well, at that particular time, Newman Park and all that area was virgin timber. And I remember those beautiful stands of yellow pine, and big open parks of big standing, the trees of yellow pine. And the reason they call it yellow pine because it was a beautiful sight, the color of those trees was kind of like a light yellow-orange. And that was all virgin timber. Well, my dad was working on those logging camps when I was a little boy.

The logging superintendent of that particular logging camp that was feeding logs to the sawmill here in town, his name was Pat Murphy [phonetic spelling], a good Irishman. And he was a good Catholic, old Pat Murphy, and boy, he was everything for the church, you know. A lot of Irish people take pride in their religion. Some of us do too. So Pat Murphy was the logging superintendent. And the people that he had working for him in that logging camp at the time, he had a lot of Mexican-Americans_-a lot of Mexicans that had come to this country from Mexico. And also besides the Mexicans and the Mexicans that they had the Mexican-Americans, there was a large influx of Norwegians and Swedes. And there was also some Poles, that in the old country, that's what they used to do, logging. They just got logs ______ back from the old country. So when they came to this country, they settled in logging camps where they knew the work, and they enjoyed doing that type of work. Well, we had a lot of Swedes and Poles and Norwegians, and to us, you know, because they were all_-and they spoke their native tongues most of the time, you know, and some English, and also their names were either Johnson or Olie_-there were a lot of Olies and Johnsons and Andersens. Some of the gentlemen, __________________ some of their names. Well, we had a good mix there in the logging camps. We also had a small percentage of people that at that time were coming from Tennessee, Arkansas, and Oklahoma in the early days_-not too many, but we did have some.

So getting back to the building of the church, Pat Murphy was visited by Father Alboy [phonetic spelling]. You already have a little bit of story on Father Alboy. He was here as a priest in Flagstaff for a long period of time. As a matter of fact, I had my first communion with Father Alboy, and so did a lot of other people: your dad probably, and some of the great-grandpas that are now ________, they did at the same time. Anyway, he used to visit the logging camps. He'd get a ride on his [go car?]. I think he had his own car, which in those days, they were rare, and there were few roads into that country. But there were a few roads, you know, all muddy roads and around every stump. And he used to go to the logging camps up there, and some Sundays, maybe once a month or thereabouts, and he'd give mass over there, hold church services over there. And at the same time, why, he had some people up there working with the children, working with catechism, you know, so they would make their first communion. Well, that was all done with the approval of Pat Murphy, and Pat Murphy was willing to do all of this. He was a good churchman.

So when they started collecting funds for Nativity Church, Pat Murphy told all his workers up there that they were going to be contributing members of society to build the church. (chuckles)

Munoz: Oh, gee!

Aginiga: He didn't ask them, he told them. He said, "You are now going to contribute to that church." Well, what he did, in those days was before you got your paycheck, Pat Murphy had already made a donation for you.

Munoz: Is that right?!

Aginiga: He'd take it out of every paycheck. And I understand that whether you were Catholic or not, I mean, you got to donate to the church, for the building of that church. That's how my dad got to donate funds for the church, and so did a lot of people. And I mean, for a long period of time, I have no idea how long this went on, but to make sure that the donations were coming in, Pat Murphy made sure that that money was taken out of your paycheck and you got what Pat Murphy decided that you needed. (both chuckle) But first it went first to the church, and that's how we donated to the church.

Munoz: So you contributed to the church.

Aginiga: Contributed to the church, and so did a lot of other people. And I'm sure a lot of people didn't know that.

But here's another fact about building that church. Here's how some people, Mexican-Americans, donated to the building of that beautiful church there. I know a gentleman in the neighborhood, and I'm not sure you remember him, but I'm sure your dad knew that gentleman. His name was Ponciano Montoya [phonetic spelling], and he lived right next to the river there on DuPont.

Munoz: Yes, I know where it is. Right at the corner.

Aginiga: Right there. Well, that gentleman I did know, and of course I knew him for a long period of time, but we used to go all over the neighborhood and we knew everybody. Well, it so happens that while I was a young kid and I was selling The Coconino Sun, he was one of my subscribers, and I used to deliver the paper to him_-the weekly. I mean, in those days, The Coconino Sun was a weekly. And he was one of my best customers, and I got to know the gentleman and his wife very well. Sometimes I'd go out there and see what he was doing, and in his yard he had these molds. I never had seen any, but he had molds made of different materials, you know. And he had stacks and stacks and stacks. And then one day I got to talk to him up there in the back, and I said, "What are all these things?" And he said, "Oh, these are molds. These are for pouring cement and making moldings of whatever you want to make." And I said, "Well, there's quite a variety of molds here. I haven't seen you build very many things. What did you build with these things?" And he said, "These are the ones that I used to make a lot of sculpture and molded pieces that went to the Church of the Nativity."

Munoz: Would that be the stones on the outside?

Aginiga: Most of the stones that are shaped, that you see, they're pink concrete, he made. He was the gentleman that donated_-or, I imagine he got paid for his work, I'm not sure, or whether he donated all his work. But all of the molds, he told me that he made a good, substantial part of the molds that that church has, that pink concrete blocks that are interspersed in there with the malapai blocks. So there you can see a little bit of input that our neighborhood had for the building of that church. I understand early on, according to the cornerstone that I see on Guadalupe Church over there, it said 1924, which is exactly the year that I was born. So apparently, this church was built before Nativity. So I don't even know, maybe they collected funds_-maybe Pat Murphy collected funds for this church here too. I don't know, I'm not sure.

Munoz: That would be Our Lady of Guadalupe?

Aginiga: That would be Our Lady of Guadalupe.

Munoz: What type of_-in baptismals or weddings, were they outstanding celebrations where there were baptismals?

Aginiga: Oh, yes! Now, like I said, you know, they brought their customs from the old country. Well, this is the way my dad would explain it, and this is the way he told me. He said, "When we baptized your sister, we killed twenty-four chickens, we killed four turkeys, and we had so many people preparing for her baptism." And I said, "That many chickens and that many turkeys?! Well, how many people went to the baptism?" He said, "Everybody was welcome."

Munoz: From the neighborhood?

Aginiga: Well, when you prepare that much food, Delia, Good Lord, you could feed a whole neighborhood! I mean, half the town. I mean, that's a lot of chickens. Well, here's what they made. You know, when you have a baptism, or when you have a wedding, there's always chicken, molé, arroz_-you know, rice_-and what else?

Munoz: Well, there's gotta be tortillas.

Aginiga: I'm sure. Or tortillas de maiz. Either of flour or corn, you know. But the main thing, the first thing that people say, "We killed so many chickens."

Munoz: Well, that would be the first thing, right?

Aginiga: Oh, yeah.

Munoz: That's a traditional dish from Mexico.

Aginiga: Oh, that's a traditional dish from Mexico. And so when they baptized, they.... And so he'd say, "Well, when your brother was baptized, we killed_-well, we didn't kill that many chickens, but we killed a lot more turkeys," or "we had a hog," or "somebody donated a hog," or something. But that was, you know, in those days, when they had a baptism, they also had a little dance. So they got one or two guitars, or maybe somebody with an accordion and a violin or something like that. So they got a small_-friends, you know, they could play a guitar or play the accordion or something_-they got together and they made a little dance. So because the houses were small in those days, before the festivities, they took off whatever furniture, whatever wasn't tied down (laughter), whatever wasn't bolted in that small house, they'd bring everything out and stack it up in the yard. I remember that. (laughter) So they'd take out the beds_-everything, you know, everything came out.

Munoz: Just to have the space.

Aginiga: So they'd have the space for dancing. Now, in those days, those small homes_-anyway, our small homes, either a one or a two-bedroom with a kitchen, and that was it, you know. If you had three bedrooms and a kitchen and a living room, that was a big house. Anyway, almost, in those days, linoleums were real popular, and so almost every house had linoleum. That we didn't pick up. Usually the linoleum stayed on there. However, some people that wanted to save the linoleums, and of course all the wooden floors, they'd say, "Well, we prefer the wooden floor to the linoleum," they rolled up the linoleum and took it out the door!" (laughter)

Munoz: Just to dance!

Aginiga: [The closer (?)], now, these were not formal. Remember I told you on the last tape that public dances where you went and you paid and they had these_-well, some of those semi-professional bands that played_-the public dances that were held in the ballrooms or in town, that they were formal, most all of them were formal. But in the houses, when they had these small dances celebrating a baptism, or a small wedding_-they did the same thing with weddings_-it was a "come as you are" thing. But most of the people, you know, they put something on, a tie. But that was the type of celebrations that we had in the old days. And mostly it was within the neighborhood. In those days, because of the small amount of children that were being born, there was a lot of mortality in children in those days, that some of the families, because they didn't have any children to baptize, they'd go out there and become compadres by baptizing a saint.

Munoz: Oh, I didn't know that.

Aginiga: And so my dad had compadres, you know, and I would ask him, I said, "Dad, how is it that that's your compadre and that's your comadre over there? How is it that you became compadres? Did they baptize any of us?" "No," he said, "this was before I got married. This was before." And I would say, "Did they have children?" "No." And I'd say, "Well, how did you become compadres?" And he would say, "The santos." And so saints, you know. They'd hold some kind of ceremony and they became compadres. This was a social thing, and it was very, very, shall we say, very close. I don't suppose that you could get closer to any family, in those days, unless you made them a compadre to you. It was almost like being family. And in those days, because a lot of the people in here didn't have many relations within the neighborhood_-say that they came from Mexico, and they didn't have any family here at all_-in order to get closer to other families, they became compadres. So my dad baptized a whole bunch of people, and so did a lot of people, came out and baptized us. And so we became compadres, and what it did is kind of unite the neighborhood and unite the people a lot closer socially.

Munoz: So a close-knit....

Aginiga: And it became a closer-knit neighborhood, and then the people became closer to each other, because they'd greet each other, "Compadre!"

[END TAPE 3, SIDE A; SIDE B IS BLANK; BEING TAPE 4, SIDE A]

Aginiga: ... but with a larder. Most of the families, at least in those days, in order to help with the larder, we all had gardens. Everybody had a garden, everybody planted a garden. And almost everybody had chickens. Some of us not only had chickens, but we had rabbits, we raised rabbits. In our house, we raised pigeons, we raised rabbits, we had chickens. We even raised a few turkeys. And then we'd raise a couple of hogs. Some other families close by, you know, the family right across [from] us, they had chickens. They also raised a few hogs, and maybe they had a goat or two. And so with the gardens that we had at the time, and then the few animals that we raised there, we sold some of them to our neighbors, or bartered. And I remember one of our neighbors coming over to buy some of our rabbits. I remember the folks selling_-the kids took care of most of the feeding of the rabbits and the hogs and watering of the gardens and everything_-and I remember selling those. Mom used to sell the rabbits for twenty-five cents a piece. They were good-sized rabbits, you know. We also had, in our garden we grew cabbage. Got lovely [blue?] heads of cabbage that big. And I remember my mom selling them to the neighbor across the road over there. Our neighbor would come out and she said, "Well, would you sell me a cabbage?" and Mom said, "Sure." And she'd sell her a cabbage for five cents. Big cabbage like that. So in order to help with the feeding of the family, like I said, because there was no unemployment office in those days.

Munoz: Right. How about stores, little grocery stores?

Aginiga: Little grocery stores, oh yeah.

Munoz: In the neighborhood?

Aginiga: Yeah, there was. Luis Chatto [phonetic spelling] (laughs) had a small store down on San Francisco Street.

Munoz: You're laughing, why?

Aginiga: Because there's a big story behind the little stores in here. And it had deeper ramifications with Flagstaff_-I mean, those little stores_-and I'll tell you why.

Munoz: Okay.

Aginiga: Luis_-we called him Luis Chatto_-and his first name was Luis. He was a bachelor. He had a small store on the corner of what used to be Clay and San Francisco_-a small store right there. He had a large garden, he was proud of his garden. Anyway, he had a small store and we used to go buy a lot of small things from him: eggs or a loaf of bread or something like that, something that we needed immediately. It was a neighborhood store. If you wanted to buy groceries on a larger scale, you went to Babbitts, or you went to Midgeleys [phonetic spelling]. Usually either Babbitts or Midgeleys is where you bought your groceries. Now, Babbitts, they were the trading people up north in Arizona, Flagstaff. They had the slaughterhouse. Remember I told you about the slaughterhouse? They had the packing house, they had the warehouses, they had the railroad coming in. They had most of the property in Flagstaff. They acquired all the property early in the 1800s when the Babbitt brothers came to Flagstaff. They bought a lot of property, and then they subdivided it and sold. So almost every lot in Flagstaff someway or another, when you buy title, there's Babbitts, or Normal School 1_-Normal School, because of that subdivision south of the tracks. Anything south of the tracks was Normal School, or Development 1 or whatever.

And so coming back to Luis, he would sell whatever he could get from Babbitts. So he got all of his commodities, produce or anything that he wanted to sell, he got it from Babbitts. So when we went to buy from Luis over there, we had to pay his price. If Babbitts sold him a dozen eggs for ten cents, he'd charge twelve or fifteen cents.

Munoz: Had to make a profit.

Aginiga: And in that way, Babbitts would be selling their eggs over there for less than what he was. They probably charged twelve cents over there. So they made sure he never competed with them as far as the selling of anything_-canned goods, especially, you know_-anything that had to do with it. Babbitts had the warehouse, and from there they serviced all of northern Arizona, and they were holding off to the wholesale business, and that was a big part of their business. Beans would come in from the bean farmers up east of Flagstaff, and they would sell all their beans to Babbitts, and Babbitts would pack out and sack their beans and load 'em on railroad cars and then ship 'em from [red one labels?]. That came after the potatoes_-potatoes came first_-and then when they got a blight, so everybody quit planting potatoes and they went to beans. Anyway, well, that's a short story.

But anyway, they had the meat, they had the warehouse, and they had the wherewithal, and from there they_-that's why they called it a trading company, because they sold to everybody. They had the herds, they had the cattle, they had the trading post. They pretty well had the whole thing.

Well, they made sure that when we went to buy our cans over [from] Luis, why, we had to pay a premium price. When you went to Babbitts, they undersold Luis over here, his little store. And it happens_-well, it even happens right now. But anyway, Babbitts had a real good thing going. Now, most of the families, the Mexican-Americans, that were working, were all working people. There were no professionals in the lot at all. Some were tradespeople, but mostly they weren't. Most of them were just working labor. I imagine Tom told you about that. But Babbitts had a real good deal for us_-in other words, not only for the Mexican-American families, but for anybody. They had a system where you could borrow money from them. Say that, for instance, we needed groceries, and my dad wasn't working; or he was working and he wasn't going to get paid until maybe some other time, but we needed groceries right now. So my mom said, "We're gonna go to Babbitts, we're gonna go buy some groceries." And we head over for Babbitts. It was walking distance then, in those days. Everybody walked, nobody drove to do any shopping_-everybody walked. So everybody was within walking distance of going downtown. So we all walked, and we walked down to Babbitts over there and Mom said, "Well, we're gonna go get a coupon book." And you say, "Well, what is a coupon book?" Well, when you went upstairs and _____ set up there and they'd say, "Well, we want a loan. We want to borrow some money." "Well, how much would you like to borrow?" In those days, ten dollars, twenty dollars was a lot of money, you know, during the Depression. And they'd say, "Well, how much you need? And where does your husband work?" and all that. "Is he getting a paycheck? How much does he make?" Okay, so "yes, we can loan you twenty dollars." And so they give you a twenty-dollar coupon book. That coupon book, the little stamps in there, it's just like the food stamp books that they have now. In those days they were a coupon book and it had "Babbitts" on the front part of the coupon book. And then it specified there how much was the amount of that coupon book_-whether it was a twenty-dollar coupon book, or a ten-dollar coupon book, or a five-dollar coupon book. So we had a twenty-dollar coupon book. I think that was the highest, I'm not sure. Anyway, we never got anything beyond twenty dollars. So they had those stamps in there, the first line of stamps in there, maybe five were for a dollar a piece or whatever, and then the others were fifty cents, and then the others were twenty-five cent stamps, and the others were ten-cent stamps, and the others were five-cent stamps. Anyway, you got your coupon book. However, you couldn't use that coupon book anywhere else. You'd have to buy from Babbitts. So we bought clothes, we bought food, we bought produce, gloves, shoes_-everything we bought at Babbitts. I mean, it was real good business, as far as they're concerned, because you couldn't buy anywhere else. So it worked real good! (laughs)

Munoz: Yes, it did! (laughs)

Aginiga: Well, at least we got the loan, you see. So here's another thing about history. They were not entirely, shall we say.... It wasn't entirely detrimental to the well-being of the Mexican-Americans, because it was good. At least they loaned the money and you could buy what you needed. Their prices were fair. I mean, they weren't exceedingly high. But you got to buy what you needed.

Now, when you went and bought groceries over there, say that you bought a whole ten dollars' worth of groceries, which is a lot of money, you couldn't carry all those groceries home, because you walked over there, see.

Munoz: Right.

Aginiga: So they had a program there to where they had a delivery truck. They had delivery trucks, and they hired these people that would deliver groceries for Babbitt. It was a Babbitt truck, and what these gentlemen used to do, I was thinking one of your uncles, as a matter of fact, used to work for Babbitts, delivering groceries.

Munoz: Is that right?

Aginiga: Absolutely. And what they would do is, they'd take Babbitts truck and they would drive that all day, and then back up into the warehouse, and they had your order. When you ordered your groceries up there, they wrote down everything that you wanted, how many, et cetera, et cetera, and they gave you a list, an invoice, of what you bought, and then the total there, and you paid them. And they in turn got a copy of that invoice and then these people with assistance of some of the clerks at the grocery store went out and filled the orders and put 'em in boxes, then they put your name on 'em. It was a whole entirely_-it was honest, you know. What's to say that somebody wouldn't go out there and fill another box of groceries and go dump it somewhere? Anyway, they put your name on it. In our case, when Mom went out and bought ten dollars' worth of groceries, which is a lot of groceries, they put "Aginiga" on it, and then they put down the address, whatever it was you had. And then those young men that were driving those trucks would drive all over town delivering to various families within, I think within the whole town, because I think everybody used to order that way. Anyway, they delivered groceries in here. I remember some of 'em even went out of town to deliver groceries that they bought at Babbitts. Not only did they deliver the groceries, but say that they bought other dry goods_-you know, clothes or whatever, and maybe they didn't want to carry them. They'd delivered that to them. Wasn't that nice?

Munoz: Yes, it was nice, yes it was.

I believe we covered Prohibition on the last tape where you mentioned that you'd [pick] up the bottles and sell 'em for fifty cents.

Aginiga: Ah, yes, to the bootleggers. We knew the bootleggers.

Munoz: You did. What was life like then during the Depression, that you can remember?

Aginiga: Well, it was very hard, Delia. And the reason I say it was very hard, because there was no unemployment. I mean, there were no unemployment offices. They didn't have unemployment checks that people get nowadays. And it was especially tough for some of our families, the Mexican-American families. And the reason why it was exceptionally tough, because if there were a few jobs, you usually didn't get 'em. Somebody else got 'em. And if there was a job to be had, say, at the University or something like that, there was other select groups that got the job. So here are families that didn't have any work at all, and they're trying to exist some way or another. So a lot of them became bootleggers. Not only did they sell it, but a lot of them were very skilled in making bootleg whiskey.

Munoz: What were the ingredients?

Aginiga: I know, for one thing, that they used to go to Babbitts Warehouse and load trucks up with sugar. In those days, I don't know, but I'm sure that whoever was selling the sugar knew that, Good Lord, that family can't eat all this sugar. I forget what the grain was, whether they used corn_-and I'm almost sure that they used corn_-but a lot of sugar and corn and whatever ingredients they used to put in those days. But I remember one family in particular, and would you believe it, that it was a Mexican-American_-well, it's a Mexican family. The old gentleman that came from Mexico, he was the best brewer in Northern Arizona.

Munoz: Is that right?!

Aginiga: And whatever he made was very good, and everybody bought from him. You know, almost everybody in town that got the good stuff, came from his still. As I remember, they had a still up there in West Fork Canyon. You know where that is? Oak Creek, upper Oak Creek. He had a still there, and they'd move it occasionally from place to place so that they didn't get caught. They had a still there, and then one time they had one up there towards Mormon Canyon, over here on this side, and towards Walnut Canyon. You know, they moved their still from place to place. But they made a very good business and they employed a lot of people, because when he sold, he sold in l