Betty Hardison | Interview 1 | July 14, 2010

Interview 1: July 14, 2010

SELVIDGE: This is Sarah Selvidge with Betty Hardison, and it's July 14, and we're in El Cerrito, California. So for this interview, I wanted to begin way back. Just if you could talk a little bit about your childhood and where you were born, just to get us started. Maybe a little bit about your family, your family life.

HARDISON: Okay. Well, I was born almost ninety years ago. My birthday is in a couple of weeks. That's scary, that term. I'm not willing to quite accept that yet. But I was born in Vallejo, California, at which time my father worked for 00:01:00the Navy on Mare Island Naval Shipyard. And we lived in the community for about a year when my grandmother passed away. And those grandparents lived in Calistoga, which is the far end of Napa Valley. My grandfather had just built a new home, and so when his wife passed away, it was his wish that my mother be the one to help care for him, because she was the only one--out of a family of six girls and a boy--who had had a child.

HARDISON: We had moved to Calistoga and moved into the big house to take care of 00:02:00my grandfather. I had a brother, who came along in 1925. And so I grew up in that community; went to the grammar school, high school. I was really active in high school. I think that's the beauty of a small community, where everybody--

SELVIDGE: Yeah. And Calistoga, at that time, was quite a small town.

HARDISON: It was small. It was about a thousand population.

HARDISON: And everybody knows everybody. But it was a really full experience. Lots of sports. So I was a basketball player, but I ended up being more of a tennis player. And I'm paying for it now. And then I was a musician. I played 00:03:00the piano and ended up having to accompany everything and everybody-- [laughter] And they had a very active band. First I played drums, because I had the rhythm from the piano. And then I wanted to try an instrument, so I tried a French horn. And that didn't work too well, and so I moved on to a clarinet. And I really liked that. So I had great experiences in high school. And I was secretary, usually, of the class. And so I usually had a leadership role, which I enjoyed. And then even at the end of my high school, I ended up playing in a 00:04:00symphony, in nearby Santa Rosa. And then when it was time to go off to school, I sold my clarinet and I went to Armstrong Business College in Berkeley.

SELVIDGE: In Berkeley?

HARDISON: Right. It no longer exists, but it was a very prominent business school at the time. I took secretarial and all phases of business. But at that time, then, the world was beginning to be topsy-turvy. That was around 1939, when Hitler was not being very friendly.

SELVIDGE: That was when you came to the Bay Area, from Calistoga.

HARDISON: Yes. Yeah, well, I came. I lived in Berkeley. I worked for my room and 00:05:00board, as what we call a nanny now, but I hadn't even thought of the term then. I worked taking care of a child for a family, for my room and board. And so then I walked to Armstrong from there. So in a way, I experienced part of Berkeley. Journalism was a strong goal. I had been editor of the yearbook and things like that, so I thought that I wanted to go to the university and take journalism. But then with the world being turned upside-down, I went for my first job. And that was at Mare Island. I moved back then to Vallejo, where my folks had moved from Calistoga and had built a home.

SELVIDGE: After Calistoga your parents moved again?

HARDISON: After Calistoga. When I went off to school they moved back to Vallejo.

SELVIDGE: I have a couple questions about that moment, actually. I'm curious to know in high school, what were the traditions or expectations or habits of the other girls that you graduated from high school with? Did a lot of them anticipate going to college?

HARDISON: That was always a goal.

SELVIDGE: That was always the goal--

HARDISON: Oh, yes.

SELVIDGE: --for a lot of the girls?

HARDISON: Definitely. Definitely. Yeah. We all took the college prep courses, Latin and--Latin really didn't appeal to me, but I did know that it was a basis, and so that's what I had to take. And that was a requirement then. I can't 00:07:00recall what other foreign languages were taught at that time. Now it's Spanish.

SELVIDGE: I'm also just curious; this must have been around the time that some of the first bath houses were opening in Calistoga. Is that right?

HARDISON: Oh, they were open much earlier.

SELVIDGE: Earlier than that?

HARDISON: Yeah.

SELVIDGE: In the teens and twenties, is that right?

HARDISON: Okay, you're taking me back.

SELVIDGE: I'm just curious--

HARDISON: That's fine.

SELVIDGE: --because I grew up in San Francisco, so I grew up going to those places.

HARDISON: Yeah. Okay, well, there were always mud baths. And yes, I did have a mud bath, but only once.

SELVIDGE: Only once?

HARDISON: And actually, that was kind of funny. I was very blonde. And so I was always a good contrast for pictures. So National Geographic wanted some 00:08:00pictures, and I was the one elected to be in the mud bath. I'm not so proud of all that, but--I don't even have a picture of it. But I really hated the thought of getting into this hot, sticky mud. But yes, Calistoga was famous for its spas.

And it's wine country. And I should add then that my maternal grandfather was a wine maker from Germany. He came to Napa Valley around 1880 and met my grandmother there, and they were married in the Presbyterian church in Calistoga. Grandmother was also from Germany He had come from Alsace-Lorraine in 00:09:00Germany, from a devout Catholic family. And as I remember being told, he was being groomed to be an altar boy and all of this kind of thing, and he ran away. He left Germany and came to the US, Cincinnati, when he was about sixteen. And so it was interesting that he would pick the Presbyterian church. And it turns out that we have been Presbyterians all our lives.

Both my mom and Dad were born in Calistoga. Dad was in World War I, and they married in Calistoga. Interesting. And let's see. My father worked as an electrician and wired much of the upper Napa Valley, as well as Lake County.

SELVIDGE: Oh, wow. Can you tell me a little bit about that, when he was doing that?

HARDISON: Well, when we first moved up--

SELVIDGE: When you first moved back.

HARDISON: --when I was one year old. And then he had an electrical office or a shop, and sold some electrical appliances. I can remember playing in the shop. So he was a busy guy, in addition to being a volunteer fire chief. His little electrical shop was next door to the firehouse. So it was very convenient for him to be fire chief. That part of my childhood is kind of scary. I can remember so many times when the town river would blow, and when he had to leave in the middle of the night. They had a lot of forest fires. And he'd be gone for days, 00:11:00and I always worried about that.

SELVIDGE: Would you hear news of what was happening while he was gone?

HARDISON: Oh, not a whole lot, no.

SELVIDGE: Not really.

HARDISON: Could you turn that off for a minute?

SELVIDGE: Sure. [audiofile stops, re-starts]

HARDISON: Where were we?

SELVIDGE: You were saying it was a scary time because your father was--

HARDISON: Yeah. It's heavily wooded, that part of the valley. And they still have volunteer fire departments. Very interesting. So he did that for years. And then, of course, we lived there during the Depression. So we lived in a very large house, maybe six or eight bedrooms. And that house succeeded a ranch 00:12:00house, where my grandfather and grandmother raised these six girls and one boy, on a hillside, a vineyard hillside. And so then he built this large house. The location of the house was where Leland Stanford had a summer home. Because at one time, Stanford thought he might like to build his campus in that community. So my grandfather bought the property and tore the house down--it was just a small little--

SELVIDGE: Oh, the house of Stanford.

HARDISON: -- a little vacation house of Stanford--and then built this larger house.

SELVIDGE: And was it in town?

HARDISON: Yes. It's right as you enter town. And interestingly enough, it's now 00:13:00a bed and breakfast. But the Depression came along, and my dad kept working as an electrician. My grandfather retired as a vintner. But my mother felt that they had to bring in some extra money, and so she rented to school teachers, in the various bedrooms. And cooked--it was room and board.

SELVIDGE: So she took on boarders.

HARDISON: Boarders, roomers. And then to do extra work, she raised flowers. She had a green thumb and could just plant anything. She raised beautiful flowers 00:14:00and then made floral arrangements for different funerals. So that was a real going thing. And then a third thing she did, she became famous for her lemon pies. So she used to make and sell lemon pies. So I think it was very creative of her.

SELVIDGE: She sounds like she was very capable and resourceful.

HARDISON: Yes. Yeah.

SELVIDGE: And is this because--I guess your grandfather retired, so there was less income there.

HARDISON: He did, right. It was the middle of the Great Depression.

SELVIDGE: And your father had less steady work, I'm guessing.

HARDISON: Oh, he was pretty steady.

SELVIDGE: He was able to keep working.

HARDISON: Yeah.

SELVIDGE: Can you tell me a little bit what you remember? I'm curious about what you knew about the work that your father was doing, because I imagine some of the appliances and these things were really new, if not to everybody, at least 00:15:00to some people.

HARDISON: Right. But he understood what each new piece of equipment was that came along. Also, when he worked at Mare Island, he worked for the power plant, so he had that electrical background.

SELVIDGE: He had experience in the area.

HARDISON: Right. But then in addition to his electrical store where he sold appliances, he would go out and he wired the whole part of the county. I can remember him climbing poles in heavily wooded areas.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. To put electrical lines in.

HARDISON: Put those electrical lines, that probably are still there.

SELVIDGE: Probably so. Do you remember anything about the sort of novelty of this sort of thing or these appliances? Was it exciting for people to get a new thing?

HARDISON: My dad had first a Model T Ford, and later a Model A Ford. I remember lots of picnics and excursions. And I remember the telephone we had. It was just a wall-hung thing. And a party line sort of thing. And then I should tell you that I had other grandparents who lived in the community. So my dad's parents came across the plains from Kansas and Missouri. Missouri, mostly. And that grandfather was a stagecoach driver. And he drove the stagecoach from Calistoga to Lake County. And he was robbed a couple times by Black Bart. Those kind of stories that kids love to hear. My grandmother was very resourceful. She was a 00:17:00seamstress and taught me how to sew. But she also took in alterations and that kind of work, so that she had a lot to do, as well. That family had--let's see, I think they had about five boys and three girls. So both were large families. Except my mother was the only one who had children in her family.

SELVIDGE: That seems so strange--

HARDISON: Yeah. Well, there was one other sister who lost a child early on, after being hit by a bicycle. But there were never any other children.

SELVIDGE: It's pretty uncommon for the time.

HARDISON: Very. Very uncommon.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. Or even now, to have so many aunts and uncles and so few cousins.

HARDISON: But I have several cousins on my dad's side. Yeah. And I remember my mother's stories about--my mother was really kind of resentful of having to work so hard as a child. Since there was only one boy, the girls had to work, as well, in the vineyard.

SELVIDGE: Oh, doing what?

HARDISON: Picking grapes and hauling grapes--

SELVIDGE: It's a really hard job, yeah.

HARDISON: --and cleaning out wine vats and-- [chuckles] My mother was never able to tolerate any wine. A thimbleful was too much for my mother. She really just resented how she had to work. That grandfather, when he first started his wine 00:19:00business, walked from Calistoga to St. Helena every day--that's about seven miles--where he was a cooper. And he was a cooper for Beringer Brothers, Krug Winery, and the third one, which is now the Napa Valley Culinary School. It was--oh, I can't remember the name. I'll think of it. But there were three wineries that he was the cooper for. And then he had his own little business.

SELVIDGE: And then he started his own business.

HARDISON: Yeah. And one interesting sidelight of that is that-- You may have heard of the dread of wineries, of vintners, is phylloxera. I don't know how you 00:20:00spell it and I'm not even sure I'm saying it correctly; but it is a deadly disease of the vineyards. Well, that comes along periodically. And that happened-- I don't know whether it was just before Prohibition. But every vineyard in France had that the dreaded disease. And so my grandfather exported wine from his little endeavor to France. And I don't think that he ever experienced that disease locally, but it has occurred. I remember it happening. It almost wipes out the vineyards. And now I think they have ways of combating that.

SELVIDGE: But it must've have been devastating for the industry when it happened.

HARDISON: It was, it was. But I thought it was interesting and resourceful of him to do that. So you're really going back in my history. I haven't thought about--

SELVIDGE: I know, we are going back. Actually, I'm glad you mentioned Prohibition because I didn't even think to ask about that, but of course--

HARDISON: I remember. I remember that. That shut down everything.

SELVIDGE: Yeah, how did things change around Calistoga?

HARDISON: Oh, I can remember a lot of local people that were hit by that. And then I can remember a lot of sneaky stuff going on, too. But they overcame that.

SELVIDGE: Did a lot of families close their businesses during that time?

HARDISON: Well, yeah. They were largely vineyards. And they were growing their crops for cooperatives, I'm sure. There weren't very many single wineries then. 00:22:00I can remember a few, but mostly the larger ones, like I mentioned Beringer and those ones. Greystone was the name of the other one I was mentioning before.

SELVIDGE: Do you remember what people did instead, when they weren't able to sell the grapes anymore?

HARDISON: No. But that was Depression, too.

SELVIDGE: That was the Depression, too, right. Just one thing led to the next.

HARDISON: So everybody was scrounging, doing their best.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. Yeah. I just have one other question about Calistoga during that time. I'm interested to know about tourism during that time. Do you remember, were there sort of locals and tourists? Or where did tourists come from?

HARDISON: Yes. Yeah. And we dreaded the summer, because so many sloppy-looking 00:23:00tourists would come to town. And it's just like anyplace that has to cater to tourism. And they still do.

SELVIDGE: They certainly do.

HARDISON: But I think the nature of the tourist is much higher now than it--I don't know, it seemed to be an invitation to just not act as they would at home.

SELVIDGE: Do you remember where people came from to visit?

HARDISON: Largely San Francisco.

SELVIDGE: And people would drive--?

HARDISON: Yes.

SELVIDGE: Was the train still operating then?

HARDISON: The train ended there. But it was no longer operating when I was growing up; it had stopped. People were driving up. So that brings up another 00:24:00thing that I did as a teenager or younger. I had an aunt and uncle who had a resort there. And they catered mostly to German tourists. It was small cabins. And I remember my aunt cooking the meals. And they also had a prune orchard and a vineyard. And as a youngster, I had to go help pick prunes. And oh, I hated that job. [they laugh] Just to get down on my hands and knees and be dirty. A girl [laughs] doesn't want to be dirty. But so I picked prunes. And then when I became a teenager, I was hired by my aunt to be a waitress. And I hated that job.

SELVIDGE: You hated that one, too?

HARDISON: I was teased unmercifully.

SELVIDGE: Really? By?

HARDISON: By the customers.

SELVIDGE: What did they tease you about?

HARDISON: Oh, I was a tall lanky blonde, and they just knew I was very self-conscious, and they liked to pick on me. So I didn't like that job. And one job that I ended up having that I liked, I worked for the bank as a--I didn't work as a teller, but I worked in the back as a clerk. And that was good experience for me. That was prior to going to business college.

SELVIDGE: And was that one of the things that made you interested in business college specifically?

HARDISON: No, actually, all through high school I took both college prep and 00:26:00business. So I did typing and shorthand and entered a lot of the contests. That's what small schools do.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. Yeah, it sounds like you had a small but very active high school.

HARDISON: Very, very thorough, yeah. And I wish I could've raised my own family in a small town. At the time, I could hardly wait to get away from there. But I can see the merits of it.

SELVIDGE: Looking back, you can see it. So let's go then to this time when you're graduating from high school and you're anxious to leave the small town.

HARDISON: Right. So then I went off to--

SELVIDGE: How did you find out about the school in Berkeley?

HARDISON: Armstrong's. Well, actually, I had a cousin that had also gone there. And she worked for the same family that I did.

SELVIDGE: So you followed in your cousin's footsteps.

HARDISON: Yeah, right. And the school had a sorority, which I belonged to, but I didn't particularly like sorority life. And while I was going to school Treasure Island had opened. And a lot was happening there.

SELVIDGE: Did you go to the World's Fair that year?

HARDISON: Well, I did get to go a couple of times. But the people with whom I 00:28:00lived, the husband was great at photography. So they were going to the fair all the time. And you know where I was? I was home with the little kid. So I did not get to do that very much. And I didn't get to date very much, either, while I was at school.

SELVIDGE: Had you dated boys in high school?

HARDISON: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Ran the gamut.

SELVIDGE: Ran the gamut?

HARDISON: Right. And actually, I dated a lot of fellows from St. Helena, which was sort of our rival school.

SELVIDGE: Right, one town over.

HARDISON: Yes, it was close, nearby. So mostly I dated fellows from St. Helena. I can't explain why, but--sports, I think. I went with a lot of sports players.

SELVIDGE: What kinds of dates would you go on in high school?

HARDISON: Movies. Movies were big then. And we did a lot of school dates. Schools had a lot of activities.

SELVIDGE: Oh, like dances?

HARDISON: Yeah. Yeah.

SELVIDGE: So there were dances. Were there other things too that I'm not thinking of, that would be a part of the school?

HARDISON: Mostly dances. Or plays. If we were in a play, then we were involved; but if we weren't, our friends were. So yeah, it was a very closely-knit thing between the two communities. So that was fun.

SELVIDGE: So you had less, sort of, of a social time when you were in Berkeley, because of your job?

HARDISON: Right.

SELVIDGE: With taking care of a child.

HARDISON: Yeah. But that was only for two years. And it wasn't all that boring 00:30:00or that bad. I did get out some. And then when I graduated from Armstrong--I took the two-year course--my best girlfriend from high school also went there. And so then the two of us had an apartment on Dwight Way for a while. I had a job, a brief job, working in Emeryville as a secretary. But then after just a few months of that, Mare Island looked much more appealing. And so that's when I--

SELVIDGE: And your parents had moved back there.

HARDISON: They had moved. They built a home in Vallejo. And I moved back there. So then the job I had on Mare Island was essentially the same, secretarial.

SELVIDGE: And did you move back to your parents' house?

HARDISON: Yes, yes.

SELVIDGE: Was that much of a transition, after you had sort of lived on your own with a girlfriend in Berkeley?

HARDISON: Well, it was a time of--it was hard for a lot of people around then. I had an aunt who also worked at Mare Island and needed a place to stay, so she moved in with my folks as well. Everybody was kind of helping everyone else. Things were a little tough then still. And the war had not occurred here yet. When I first worked at Mare Island, I was assigned to a personnel kind of 00:32:00office. And I guess I worked at that for about a year. Then I was transferred to the shop superintendent's office, which was the department responsible for all of the crafts that were used to build the ships. And so I was the secretary to the captain that headed that office. And I was at that office for about two or three years.

Somewhere along there, I met Don. And that was kind of strange. I had dated a 00:33:00lot prior to meeting him. Lots of Navy ensigns and lieutenants were around, and so I had an opportunity to really play the field. And then a phone call came at my folks' home one night, from this person asking for Elizabeth. And my dad said, "There's nobody here by that name," and hung up. And so a few days later, the call came again, and it was Don, asking for Betty this time. He had seen me walking across the street, and he was in a commute car. He had his own car. He was living in Berkeley, and he was commuting with a carload of guys. And every 00:34:00time I went across the street, they wondered, who is that blonde, I guess. So they found out my name and called, and boldly, wanted to come and meet me and the family. So that's how I met Don, the love of my life.

SELVIDGE: So your father agreed to the request.

HARDISON: Yeah. But my father and my mother and my aunt all sat there when Don came to call. He worked upstairs, above me, in the drafting department, as a naval architect. He had taken architecture at Cal, but there wasn't much use for architects then. And so I'm sure his oral history told about the various paths 00:35:00that he took that led him to Mare Island. And then I clearly remember the day of Pearl Harbor. We had both gone to church and were on our way home and--

SELVIDGE: Is this after you got married?

HARDISON: No.

SELVIDGE: You're dating.

HARDISON: We just were dating. And we were on our way home, and Don always turns the radio on. And we hear about Pearl Harbor. Well, that really shakes you up. You don't really know what you're going to be doing from then on. And the office I worked in really became a beehive. Ships that had been bombed in Pearl Harbor, that weren't totally destroyed, were able to limp home or be towed to Mare 00:36:00Island. And so we were experiencing all of the repairs.

SELVIDGE: So you even saw the damage firsthand.

HARDISON: Oh, well, it was just heartbreaking. Yeah, just half a ship, in some cases. But it was the responsibility of our office to repair those ships.

SELVIDGE: Were there sailors who came back, as well? Or was it more just the equipment?

HARDISON: More just the ship. But my job became a confidential one. It was a very--it was a trying time. We experienced all of the blackouts that had to occur. We couldn't drive at night; we had to walk. It wasn't terribly far, and I 00:37:00only had to work at night a couple times. Don had to work a lot at night, and he had to walk.

SELVIDGE: Well, he couldn't have walked from Berkeley.

HARDISON: No. [laughs] You're very sharp. He rented a room in Vallejo then. And he had to walk across the causeway. And it was nighttime. No lights, no cars. And another interesting element was my folks' house was built on the edge of a golf course. And the golf course was acquired then by the Army. And a platoon of 00:38:00anti-aircraft things. They were like balloons, but they were more shaped like a zeppelin.

SELVIDGE: Like a dirigible or something?

HARDISON: Yeah. And a whole collection of them that were at different heights. And they were anti-aircraft. They were there, designed to intercept anything--

SELVIDGE: So they were sort of stationed on the base?

HARDISON: Yeah. And we looked out at that every day.

SELVIDGE: So did it really have the feeling, then, to the people working there, that this is a target?

HARDISON: Oh, yes.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. Every day, I guess.

HARDISON: Every day, yeah. Very definitely. But we felt kind of secure being 00:39:00right with the anti-aircraft things. So let's see, what else about that part?

SELVIDGE: Were there a lot more people coming to work on the base, sort of an influx of new people?

HARDISON: Well, I don't know about people coming. No, I think the community itself.

SELVIDGE: People living in Vallejo.

HARDISON: Right. Were used more.

SELVIDGE: So more and more people surrounding the base started to work on the base.

HARDISON: Yes, yes. And what was I going to say about--well, let's see. We became engaged. We met in September of '41. And then Pearl Harbor was December. And we became engaged in April, and we were married in June. Our wedding was at 00:40:00the Vallejo Presbyterian church. And we had lots of guests there that were Army. There was an Army contingent stationed in the church, and so they were part of it. We couldn't have our reception there because of them. So the reception was at our home.

SELVIDGE: Oh, because there were too many people?

HARDISON: Too many soldiers. [laughs] So we had a reception at home. And we took a few days to go to Lake Tahoe. And the family all pitched in with ration stamps for gas and tires.

SELVIDGE: To be able to take a little driving trip.

HARDISON: Right. Don's little Studebaker Champion needed tires. Actually, they 00:41:00were stolen off of his car.

SELVIDGE: Oh, no. I guess they were quite valuable.

HARDISON: They were. They were all stolen. So that's when the family chipped in so that we could get away for a few days. When we came back, we came directly to Richmond. And Don had been lured away from the Navy by Kaiser, in March, 1942. And he was given a supervisor's position. He headed a drafting room of about seventy draftsmen, to lay out ships and that sort of thing. We were fortunate to be able to live in a housing project that had been built--it was not built for 00:42:00war; it was built for the community. But then the war happened, and so there had been a lot of misconceptions about that particular housing project, because--

SELVIDGE: And this is Atchison Village that you're talking about.

HARDISON: Right.

SELVIDGE: Oh, so you mean people thinking that it's built as wartime housing, where in fact, it was used as wartime housing.

HARDISON: Right. And why were there some certain people, like ourselves, that had an apartment? What made up the community? Our immediate neighbor was a local fireman. Another neighbor was an acquaintance, a friend that we had known before 00:43:00we were married, in Berkeley. Actually, it's where Don boarded, previously.

SELVIDGE: Oh, no kidding.

HARDISON: While he lived in Berkeley, he met Bob and Bobbie Trouton. And they were married a week before we were. And neither of us knew where the other was going to be going, and we end up in the same building after we're married. So we got our apartment with the help of our best man's father, who was part owner of the newspaper. And on the Richard-Housing Authority. So he was able to give us a little push, and we were one of the first people to move in Atchison Village.

SELVIDGE: So how did that work, then, in general? I understand your connection--

HARDISON: Well, they're assigned through the housing authority.

SELVIDGE: So to live in Atchison Village people had to apply to the housing authority?

HARDISON: Right. And these were community people. But also a lot of Kaiser ended up there. Also it was the early days of Kaiser.

SELVIDGE: When they were just starting.

HARDISON: Right. And so it was the supervisors that they needed to house, so they can get going.

SELVIDGE: Right. So the first people to come were the ones living there. So the housing authority was part of the city government.

HARDISON: Yes. Yes.

SELVIDGE: So people would apply to the housing authority to get an apartment there.

HARDISON: Right.

SELVIDGE: And then was the city involved in administering or running the apartments, directly?

HARDISON: Yes. Yes. They were responsible for their own landscaping and they kept the lawn going. We could do our own thing in the backyard. A lot of us 00:45:00tried a little Victory garden.

SELVIDGE: I guess you didn't plant plums, though.

HARDISON: No prunes, no prunes. [laughs]

SELVIDGE: Or no prunes, right, prunes. No prunes.

HARDISON: But Don grew up on a ranch, so he should have been a good gardener. But he worked two shifts a day. And my mother was the one that grew flowers. But I have two purple thumbs. So I wasn't a gardener.

HARDISON: But our immediate neighbor on the other side was a ship fitter, and he and his family had a terrific garden, and they kept all of us supplied.

SELVIDGE: Oh, that's great. So it seems like there was a good sense of community then.

HARDISON: Yes, very much so.

SELVIDGE: I'd like to hear more about that, but I have one question going back a 00:46:00little bit. Just about the housing authority. You paid rent, I guess, right? For this apartment.

HARDISON: Yes.

SELVIDGE: You didn't own it. And did you pay rent to the housing authority? Do you remember?

HARDISON: No, I think we paid it to Atchison Village.

SELVIDGE: So there was some kind of sort of village governance--

HARDISON: Right.

SELVIDGE: --that was sort of between the housing authority and the tenants.

HARDISON: That's right. Yes.

SELVIDGE: Do you remember anything about how that worked? Were people involved with that?

HARDISON: Well, there was a recreation center and a little office. And we didn't get together very often with a lot of the people that were there; we were all so busy.

SELVIDGE: So it was mostly your immediate neighbors that were people that you really saw on a regular basis and helped each other out and things like that.

HARDISON: Yes, right. Our immediate neighborhood had an occasional potluck. And our friends were the first ones to have a child, at the other end of the building. And then they were the first ones to move out when the war was over. We stayed. The war was over in 1945. Our son was born in 1945. And we stayed until about 1949. '48, maybe, maybe 1948. And then we moved to another place in Richmond.

SELVIDGE: I'd like to hear a little more about--

HARDISON: More about Atchison Village?

SELVIDGE: Yeah, what it was like and what the apartment itself was like, too.

HARDISON: Yeah. We had a one-bedroom, small kitchen with a little pantry, and a nice little living room. We bought--our first furniture was a sofa bed. And then family helped scrounge up bedroom furniture, like a bed and a chest of drawers and that sort of thing. I did the wash on a washboard, which was new for me. My father being an electrician at home; we had a washing machine. But I did the laundry on a washboard. We had a nice little clothesline out back. And after 00:49:00several months of that, we started searching in the newspaper and found a washing machine. That was a gold medal day. It was an antique that I would give anything to have kept. I should have. It was such an oldie that even my dad was shocked at what we bought. But it was a copper barrel, and somebody added a wringer onto it. And I would pull that out of the pantry, over to the sink, and that was my laundry.

SELVIDGE: Wow. And so you were working at this time?

HARDISON: I was working.

SELVIDGE: In a clerical job?

HARDISON: I went to work immediately after we moved. Don started out at Yard 1, 00:50:00when he was brought down from Mare Island.

HARDISON: He went to Yard 1 first. And then about the time we were married, he was transferred to Yard 3, which had just been completed, building a different ship, with more groundwork that needed to be done in their building. And so I went to work immediately and was assigned to the design department. And so we 00:51:00went to work together.

SELVIDGE: Oh, that's nice.

HARDISON: For about six months, until somebody decided that husbands and wives should not work together. So I was transferred out. I actually did not work for Don or with Don; we were in the same mold loft design department, but I worked for the engineer. And the engineer was very upset when I was transferred out. Of course, I was unhappy, too, but rules are rules. And I was assigned to the housing office. And that was a little building just inside the gate of Yard 3. And the office shared the building with the first aid department. I had two 00:52:00bosses, who were in a glassed-in area, where they could interview people. I took their dictation and sometimes took applications afterwards. We had applicants then by the thousands.

SELVIDGE: So these were people working at the shipyards, looking for housing?

HARDISON: They were just coming on, from all parts of the country, and needed housing. Many of them, when they first got jobs, they brought all their families in. That was a big problem. But those who waited were patient. We did not assign the units, we took the applications. But we also had to help explain why they 00:53:00weren't getting housing.

SELVIDGE: So you processed the applications and then passed them along?

HARDISON: We'd process them and then send them to the federal office, which was uptown Richmond.

SELVIDGE: So just to make sure I understand, your office was part of the Kaiser operation?

HARDISON: Yes.

SELVIDGE: And then you would process applications--

HARDISON: Right.

SELVIDGE: --and send those to the federal office--

HARDISON: Right.

SELVIDGE: --which was part of the military?

HARDISON: No.

SELVIDGE: Or no. Just the federal housing--

HARDISON: No, it was just the federal housing--

SELVIDGE: Wartime housing?

HARDISON: It was Federal Housing Administration.

SELVIDGE: Oh, the Federal Housing Administration.

HARDISON: So they're the ones that did the assignments. But in the meantime, we would have people that were desperate. So we were sometimes able to refer them on the side to homes, if people were willing to give up a bedroom to someone 00:54:00temporarily or whatever. Like Don lived in a home with a family for a while before we were married.

SELVIDGE: Right. And were you aware even of people sharing rooms and sleeping in shifts?

HARDISON: Oh, sharing beds. Absolutely. And sleeping in movie theaters. People were desperate. And it was hard for us to explain that, explain the process and why they didn't have a place right now.

SELVIDGE: And so people were frustrated.

HARDISON: Oh, terribly, yeah. So I went from a very interesting job to one of a little bit of tension. But we did the best we could.

SELVIDGE: Other than the kind of general frustration, were there specific 00:55:00aspects that caused tension between the people looking for housing?

HARDISON: No, people were all really quite understanding. They knew their own hardships, but they also knew of others' as well. And generally, everybody was trying to be helpful. Then there was one other clerk that worked in the same office I did, so there were two women and two bosses.

SELVIDGE: We're getting towards the end of the first tape here, but maybe I'll just ask one more question about the housing office.

HARDISON: Well, I could even tell you a little more about how I shopped.

SELVIDGE: Oh, that would be great. Well, let me ask one more question and then we'll switch the tapes and we can sort of keep going. I just wonder if there was 00:56:00any difference between the male employees and the female employees, women that were coming to work at the shipyards.

HARDISON: Well, everybody was the same.

SELVIDGE: If it was just sort of everyone was looking for the same kinds of things.

HARDISON: Everybody was the same. Had to admire those gals. I was a little envious, in a way. Because I kind of thought, "Here I am; I'm able to wear my regular clothes to work." I thought that it was pretty gutsy of those ladies to get out there and do their welding and stuff. I really never considered myself a Rosie. I thought I was more like a Sally the Secretary or something else.

SELVIDGE: Well, it's so interesting that you were working already at a Navy facility, even before the war.

HARDISON: Oh, yes. I was doing exactly the same kind of work.

SELVIDGE: So you had that exposure beforehand.

HARDISON: Right.

SELVIDGE: I imagine some of these women, though, were single women, right, 00:57:00coming to work? Or they mostly were from families?

HARDISON: You know, I don't know. I've never thought of that. I think most of them might've been husband and wives.

SELVIDGE: Where both were working?

HARDISON: Yes.

SELVIDGE: Or perhaps even some women, where the husbands were overseas, is possible too.

HARDISON: Yeah, I guess you're right.

SELVIDGE: But I guess that wasn't something that was really an issue in the housing office necessarily.

HARDISON: No, no.

SELVIDGE: Okay. Well, let me just stop this tape here.

SELVIDGE: This is our second tape. Sarah Selvidge with Betty Hardison, on July 14. Okay, now the floor is yours.

HARDISON: Well, back when we were in Atchison Village. I did not drive yet. I 00:58:00tried to learn on our honeymoon, and that's not the time to learn to drive. So I wasn't driving. So I walked from Atchison Village up about eight to ten blocks and did my shopping at a little Greek grocery story on Macdonald Avenue. And that was fun. I got acquainted with the owner of the grocery, and he was very nice. And for recreation, all we had were our neighbors or our church. And the First Presbyterian Church had a young couples club, so we became part of that, 00:59:00and that was our whole social life. We did crazy things together, skits and potlucks, and I have more old-fashioned casserole recipes that we exchanged. Or we would go to each other's houses. Certain couples we became more acquainted with. We'd single out and get together separately. But it was always just a "you go to my house and I'll go to yours" kind of thing.

SELVIDGE: So it wasn't so much like theaters or entertainment venues in Richmond.

HARDISON: We did not do movies much, no. They were too full of people sleeping. And Don worked a lot at night, so most of our activity was at church on the 01:00:00weekend or whatever. But I was always interested in the arts and crafts of some kind, so I found an art center. And I must've done it on Saturday. I was thinking the other day, I'm sure it wasn't a weekday that I went, and I don't think I went alone at night, so I must've gone on a Saturday. It was upstairs above a store, where a group were teaching different crafts. And I took ceramics, and met the lady that inspired all of it, Hanjel Salmi. And then it 01:01:00became the Richmond Art Center. I don't know if you've heard of the Richmond Art Center--

SELVIDGE: I have.

HARDISON: --but it is now a well known place.

SELVIDGE: Yeah, absolutely. So those were its early days.

HARDISON: I was there in the early days. And the very first ceramics teacher was my teacher. And so I learned the different methods of making pots. Most all of them are all broken and gone now. But through that relationship, I met this nice lady that was so determined to bring an art center to the community. And Don being an architectural graduate, she learned, she thought, "Ah-ha." She had an 01:02:00opportunity then to have someone help layout her dream. And so Don, when he could, worked a little bit with her and laid out a scheme that she liked. And that's what became the Richmond Art Center.

SELVIDGE: Wow. And was that something that they did during the war, or they didn't start actually building till afterwards?

HARDISON: It became part of the bond issue where they were building a new city hall. And so it's part of the city hall complex. If you're not familiar with it, it is on Barrett Avenue and about 25th Street. But it operated in this storefront upstairs for all of the years of inception, while city hall was being 01:03:00built and all of that. So I think that complex became complete about 1956 or thereabouts. So it was a good ten years, ten years in becoming what it is today. But it was fun to be in on the ground floor. So I did that until Steve came along.

SELVIDGE: That's your son, I guess.

HARDISON: Yeah.

SELVIDGE: I'd like to hear about the changes when your son was born. But I'm also curious, even before then, did you find it challenging to have a full-time job and also do the laundry and the shopping and all the things around the house?

HARDISON: Oh, it wasn't a challenge; it was just--it was there. It had to be 01:04:00done. No, it was part of life. And I can't think of any other little things that might be of interest, unless you ask.

SELVIDGE: Well, I'd like to hear about, since you were one of the first couples to move into Atchison Village, it seems like there's sort of a long way from that to this experience you're talking about of people sleeping in movie theaters and all this sort of craziness. Or was that--?

HARDISON: Oh, that was almost immediate. Yeah. Yeah, people were being recruited during all that period. And until housing became available--which it didn't for 01:05:00another year or so; it was more like 1943 before other units began to be built--that people had to find homes or had to commute quite a ways to other communities. The ferry brought a lot of people. Trains, they had trains that brought people from other areas.

SELVIDGE: I'm curious what it was like. You said you've met a lot of people through church, and also you've been talking about your neighbors. And we were talking as well about you and your husband both being natives of California. So I'm wondering, was it different to meet people from different places? Or what 01:06:00was that like?

HARDISON: Oh, absolutely. And some of these couples that we met through the church were from other parts of the country. I remember one couple from South Carolina that we became very close with. And he worked in the powder plant. That was out at a community near us. It was called Giant. I don't know giant what, but Giant was the name of the community. But it was a powder facility. And he worked in that. The other neighbor at the other end of our building worked for Standard Oil. A lot of people worked for Standard Oil that were in that complex. And the fireman next door. Let's see, there was another couple that worked for 01:07:00the city--some kind of job, I don't recall.

SELVIDGE: Did it seem, though, like people were sort of different from the type of people that you had grown up with, or just--?

HARDISON: No, not at all. No. They were all professional people. And they all had the same college background and interests.

SELVIDGE: So it was sort of easy to get along.

HARDISON: It was. Yeah.

SELVIDGE: Were there things that were surprising to them about California or Richmond, that you remember?

HARDISON: I think a lot of them liked it so much they ended up staying. And we decided to stay in the community. Because we had no idea what we'd be doing after the war. Don, with an architectural degree, had worked for several 01:08:00architects individually, just after school. But then he suddenly stopped naval architecture to turn to architecture--actually, so there were some people that worked in his department that ended up starting their own design practice with Don. So many people ended up staying in our community that we thought there was a lot of potential for us. And so that's where Don opened his practice, shortly after the war. Then he got his license. You have to have an architectural 01:09:00license to practice; but you have to have a certain amount of experience first, which he managed to acquire, working with other architects.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. So since we're in the right chronology, why don't we then go to what you were going to tell me about when your son was born?

HARDISON: Oh, okay.

SELVIDGE: Which is right around the same time, in 1945, right?

HARDISON: Right. And let's see. When was Hiroshima?

SELVIDGE: Oh, what month?

HARDISON: The bomb. The Japanese. I remember being pregnant, and that was such a turn of events, but also such a scary thing. We still didn't know what was going 01:10:00to happen, whether that would be the end of the war or whether it was just creating more. And so it was an uneasy time. And we weren't ready to move yet.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. What was it like to be pregnant at that time and expecting a child in such a scary time?

HARDISON: Yeah, it was right at the end of the war. And we had had some miscarriages before that, so we could've had more children by then. Which everybody was doing. That was life; start your family when you're first married. So it was an uneasy time, but it worked. I was always confident in Don. He 01:11:00seemed to know the right things to do. He was a leader. And I think that made it a lot easier for me.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. So your son was born in 1945.

HARDISON: Yeah. And then when Don started his practice, then I worked for him.

SELVIDGE: And did you stop your job once you were expecting?

HARDISON: Oh, I did. Once the war was over.

SELVIDGE: Once the war was over.

HARDISON: Right. Right.

SELVIDGE: Which coincided with--

HARDISON: Coincided with Steve's birth. And I guess I would've had to quit, if the war hadn't stopped then. But that all worked out very well. And then I went to work for Don. I 01:12:00helped establish his office, the office part. And that was interesting.

SELVIDGE: And so you decided to stay in Richmond. You thought, "We like this community; we're happy."

HARDISON: Very much. Yeah, very much.

SELVIDGE: And you stayed in the one-bedroom in Atchison.

HARDISON: We did, until about 1948--well, at that time houses, places were not available. But we found an unfinished house on 34th St. Apparently, a couple had started to build it and their marriage didn't last. So we picked up on it and finished it, and lived there for, oh, maybe six or eight years. And started 01:13:00dreaming of this, our current home. So in the meantime, Don had a couple of different locations for his office in Richmond. And he started out with two partners that had worked for him at the shipyard, as well. And most all of those were either architects or landscape architects. They were all in the field. So that was kind of a natural for him, to tie in with somebody that he liked that he could work with. So the first partnership had three, Don and two partners. And we had a little storefront for an office. It was a little grocery store with 01:14:00a little winery in the back, I think but we cleaned that up, cleaned that office up and made it work.

SELVIDGE: And so you worked in the office.

HARDISON: In 1949 we were blessed with a dear baby girl, Janet. We were so fortunate to have a boy and a girl. Yes. And I had a babysitter. Those days, it was easy to get a babysitter, people that you could really trust. And so I worked at the offices, along with volunteering. We both felt a commitment to the community. We felt that we owed the community something. And so we became volunteers in many different areas. I went as a volunteer for the YWCA. And I ended up being on the board. And then I was in other nonprofits that raised 01:15:00money to help different causes in the community. So I ended up being president of most all those that I worked in. And all the time, I was also working at the Art Center as well.

And so I ended up being secretary of the Richmond Art Center board. And early on, right after the move into the Civic Center complex. And I've remained on that board. I've served on the board now, I can't remember whether it's three or four times. You can serve on the board a three-year term and then a six-year term, and you have to get off after six years. So I've gotten on and off several 01:16:00times. And I've been president of the board a couple of times. And it's been a life that we both have enjoyed and felt a commitment to. Both of us have enjoyed the art background. And Don has even served on the board, but a different time. And both of our children grew up at the Art Center.

SELVIDGE: Oh, that's great.

HARDISON: And then our grandchildren.

SELVIDGE: Can you tell me a little bit about things changed after the war ended, just around town in Richmond and what happened?

HARDISON: Well, yeah. There were musical groups. They were usually membership kind of things; you'd pay a membership and then there would be concerts that we 01:17:00could attend, series. We enjoyed doing that. And there were dance groups. Those were fun. We met a lot more people from the community that way. What else did we do? We were not golfers, even though we live on a golf course. We tried, but we seem to be more work oriented or volunteer oriented than golf-interested. We both enjoy theater, going to theater productions. And we enjoy going to San Francisco for those kinds of things, as well as locally. We enjoy the symphony. 01:18:00The symphony partly because, I guess, we were both instrumentalists back in our youth, and we just happen to like that kind of music.

SELVIDGE: I'm curious, just going back a little bit to the time, I guess sort of late forties, early fifties, and the time that you were still in Atchison and then in the house in Richmond, before you moved here to El Cerrito. You mentioned that a lot of your neighbors liked California and didn't want to go back to where they came from. But I'm just sort of curious about how many people stayed in Richmond, or if people kind of left as quickly as they had come in, or what that was like.

HARDISON: Among our friends?

SELVIDGE: Sure. Among your friends or within the town, either way.

HARDISON: Well, our friends mostly stayed. Or were originally from here, and maybe we were the newcomer.

SELVIDGE: Right. So there was a good bit of stability for you, socially.

HARDISON: Very much so. Very much so. Like in our church group, was our dentist and our doctor and our--

SELVIDGE: And all those stayed the same?

HARDISON: Yes. Yes. And as far as the general public, a lot of them stayed. The community grew from 27,000 to--it became 125,000. And I think that's what it still is, about that.

SELVIDGE: But of course the jobs didn't all stay.

HARDISON: No. And that's really interesting because the job that I had, where I 01:20:00had to find housing for so many people, I really absorbed the names of these people. And it's interesting then how, through the years, in the newspaper or wherever, I might be--I'd hear some of these same names--

SELVIDGE: Oh, wow. And you would recognize them.

HARDISON: --that I ended up having had some connection with somewhere along the line. It's kind of funny. But people, I think, really liked the community. The community was very accepting. There are differences of opinion there. I've heard that some are countering that kind of a notion. But I think generally, people were very accepting. They had to be. They had to learn to work together, live 01:21:00together and play together.

SELVIDGE: Is there anything that sort of sticks out in your mind, examples of that kind of openness in the community?

HARDISON: Well, yeah, all the activities that worked around--like the church. The church was really dominant. Also the other churches, not just ours. All of them were an activity or were a second home for a lot of people. And it was a comfort zone. And local people belonged to those churches and it made us feel welcome. There are a lot of areas where people feel that diversity was not 01:22:00welcome. But the shipyards, in our opinion, did not become very diverse until around 1943 and '44, when they began bringing people from the Deep South in. And then I think there were areas of unrest. Some people felt that civil rights were being abused at that point. But somehow people bring those things with them, in some ways. So we didn't experience that.

SELVIDGE: Throughout that time, then, you did continue in the same job, right? 01:23:00And like you said, it's around the same time that you're saying, '43, that housing started becoming more available, as well.

HARDISON: Right, the housing projects. There were different projects, three or four throughout the town, and maybe--I can't remember the numbers, but maybe a hundred here, a hundred there or whatever. So that began to take off the load.

SELVIDGE: So things sort of eased up a little bit after that point?

HARDISON: Right. Right.

SELVIDGE: Like you said, there was sort of an influx of people, a new influx of people.

HARDISON: Well, the influx was when we came ourselves.

SELVIDGE: You came in the first big wave, right. And then there was another sort of later moment.

HARDISON: Right. Yeah. And then, of course, we had a local link that made us feel comfortable. Our best man's father was local and helped us get into the 01:24:00community. So that I think we had a more privileged introduction, which may not be fair in some people's eyes. But that's just the way the world works.

SELVIDGE: That just makes me think, did you find that as your friends and neighbors who might not have been from the area were having children, that it really made a difference for them, not having family around? Did they have different relationships with their neighbors because of that?

HARDISON: Oh, I think we all became their family. In fact, Vallejo, you'd think, would be close enough so that we would have our family in Vallejo; but it wasn't 01:25:00that easy for us to go home all that often, to them. And Don's family in Southern California, we saw them rarely. And so we were sort of all in the same work situation.

SELVIDGE: So you all sort of had that feeling of helping each other out, in the 01:26:00ways that families would.

HARDISON: Absolutely. Right. Well, took care of each other's kids. I took care of neighbors' kids before I had any. And then when I had mine, they helped us. And that's a happy growth situation.

SELVIDGE: I guess maybe we can jump forward a little bit. You've talked some about the new--after the war, Don's practice, the new--

HARDISON: The new community.

SELVIDGE: The new community.

HARDISON: Yeah. Don was responsible then for--or I guess fortunate enough to be assigned a lot of commissions to build new housing for purchase, for people to buy. And so we were fortunate that those kind of commissions came his way. And schools had to be built--he designed several schools--and community centers, all 01:27:00of those kind of things that help strengthen a community. And so that was heavy involvement.

SELVIDGE: I wonder if you could tell me a little, as well, about people you knew looking for new places to settle and new houses. As you said, you started thinking about this location and I'm sure a lot of other people also must've moved from places like Atchison to houses, perhaps--

HARDISON: Exactly.

SELVIDGE: --in the suburbs and things like that.

HARDISON: Yeah, it was. In the suburbs, either to find a house that was already built, which some did; our neighbors did that. And we started looking at property. We were certain we were going to stay in this area, so we started looking at different properties. And it was a while before we found this. And 01:28:00then it took us a while to build it. But others--a lot of the shipyard workers that were working class, the workers--the ship fitters, the pipe fitters, the welders--were the people that needed the housing. And those were the kind of houses that Don designed. A developer did it, but Don worked for the developer. And they were small houses that they could afford. And so that has been really 01:29:00the core of Richmond, where the craftsmen have been provided housing, and stayed.

SELVIDGE: So a lot of your friends and neighbors sort of stayed in the general vicinity.

HARDISON: Yes.

SELVIDGE: Did any of them move around here, as well?

HARDISON: Yes, our dentist moved down below us, and our doctor is a ways down. We were very close friends. Our children grew up together.

SELVIDGE: So you were able to maintain a lot of the friendships.

HARDISON: Yes, very definitely. And those were all people we met at church. 01:30:00First off. That's where we went in the beginning, and that's where--a lot of those people had just come, as well; some were here already. Some were native of Richmond and helped orient us and helped make us welcome. So we became part of their community. It wasn't hard. [chuckles] It was really easy to do.

SELVIDGE: It sounds like you had a really good community life.

HARDISON: Yeah, we had such a very nice relationship. And as I said, we felt we needed to give to the community, as well. And so in addition to my volunteering, Don headed up several different things for the community. One was a Festival of the Arts. And the Chamber of Commerce. And we just became involved.

SELVIDGE: This might seem like a sort of silly detail, but I realized that you mentioned this, and I never heard the other side of the story. I always like to hear when people learn to drive. You mentioned that you didn't know how to drive and you would walk to the Greek store.

HARDISON: Yeah, and how come I didn't drive? And what happened?

SELVIDGE: I'd like to know--I'm assuming you later then did learn to drive.

HARDISON: Oh, yes, I did.

SELVIDGE: It's just fun to hear the stories.

HARDISON: Well, after my kids were born and I got over my little snit, Don tried to teach me to drive on our honeymoon and--

SELVIDGE: It didn't work out?

HARDISON: --that's not a time to learn to drive. On the road from Tahoe to Reno. That's not the place to learn.

SELVIDGE: It's a pretty curvy road, too, yeah.

HARDISON: That's not the place to learn to drive. And so no, I just didn't after that.

SELVIDGE: So you put it off for a while, but once you had the kids, then it seemed more--

HARDISON: Once I had the kids, and--yeah. I had to.

SELVIDGE: So that changed the way that you wanted to be able to have--?

HARDISON: Oh, it changed the way we lived. Yeah, I didn't have to walk to the grocery store anymore. [laughs] No, we lived in our next house when I learned to drive. And of course, when you do that, then you need the car. And that introduces new problems. You need both cars. That's life.

SELVIDGE: I guess it was easier to get something like a car, once the war was over, as well.

HARDISON: Oh, sure. And we were working and able to afford it.

SELVIDGE: I don't know if there's more, other topics you want to touch on.

HARDISON: No, I've already touched on the Art Center being a major part of our life. That requires a lot of volunteerism. Have you been there?

SELVIDGE: I haven't been, no. I've been to the City Hall area.

HARDISON: Okay. Well, it's right next door.

SELVIDGE: I've seen it next door, but I haven't been.

HARDISON: Well, there's a nice exhibition right now. And I enjoyed working at the Art Center because I took various classes. I didn't just take ceramics; I took basket weaving and everything except painting. I don't think I'm a painter; I've never tried. Maybe I could be Grandma Moses at this point or something, 01:34:00but--the crafts interest me. And weaving, tapestries and fabrics, screen printing--I've done all of those, and it's fascinating. And it fits in with Don's architecture, too, as well. But I've done everything at the Art Center, from helping the curator install an exhibition and--

SELVIDGE: That's great.

HARDISON: We had a rental gallery for a long time, and I was involved with artists. So I've just enjoyed that aspect of making it work. It's a city 01:35:00building and we receive city sponsorship, to a point. So we're fortunate to be able to keep it going.

SELVIDGE: And the Center offers classes to people in the community.

HARDISON: But mostly, we provide art in the schools. We provide art in the communities, in the neighborhoods, for underprivileged kids. And we bring them into the Art Center. And so it's not just adult classes. We do have children's classes and work hard to try and have scholarships so that we can provide that kind of incentive, because so many young people don't experience that. So that's 01:36:00been a goal of ours, is to try and make things work there that help provide that.

SELVIDGE: And it's become such a vital institution, over so many years.

HARDISON: It's really--seventy-five years, we're going to celebrate this year. So it's been fun to be part of that and hang in there.

SELVIDGE: You have to hang in there these days, with anything like that. It's always threatened by--

HARDISON: It is threatened.

SELVIDGE: --lack of priorities.

HARDISON: Membership is an important element. And that's something that's hard to do and hard to keep going. And yet it's the core, it's the backbone of an organization that makes something work. So that's the area that I've tried to focus on. It's getting harder. I can't do this forever. But it's nice to have an 01:37:00interest like that.

SELVIDGE: And to contribute something so important.

HARDISON: Yeah. Most of the other nonprofits that I did so much volunteer work for have more or less gone by the wayside. People went back to work. I didn't work full-time, but from time to time, I worked. Always at Don's office; I didn't work anywhere else. Except as a volunteer, I worked other places. I worked as a volunteer at Rosie the Riveter Memorial Park. But basically, I would work at Don's office. And he's had three or four moves and locations, and that's made it interesting.

SELVIDGE: No more rules against husbands and wives working together.

HARDISON: No, right. We did our own thing. That was kind of funny. And I suppose maybe it might still be the case in some situations. So that was okay. I just moved from one kind of situation to another. And it worked.

SELVIDGE: Great.

HARDISON: So you were basically interested in the war years.

SELVIDGE: Yeah. That's sort of the focus of the project, is the changes and the--

HARDISON: Well, it's interesting how many people are contacting us, or Don, especially, now. We've become the historians. [laughs]

SELVIDGE: Well, it's really important.

HARDISON: And it's interesting to dip back and remember.

SELVIDGE: Absolutely. It's interesting for me, too. I really enjoy it.

HARDISON: Well, I hope so.

SELVIDGE: Great. Okay, well, I think we'll stop there.

HARDISON: Okay, unless you have any more questions. And I can't think of any.

SELVIDGE: I can't think of any right now, so that should do it.

[End of interview]