George Johnson | Interview 1 | November 15, 2002

DUNNING: What is your full name?

JOHNSON: George Henry Johnson.

DUNNING: What year were you born?

JOHNSON: I was born on May the first, 1894.

DUNNING: Where were you born?

JOHNSON: In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Doctor Morris was my mother's doctor.

DUNNING: Okay. Do you know where your parents were born?

JOHNSON: My parents were born, my father was born, I think, in Kentucky. I'm not sure. I'm not sure about that. That was way down during Abraham Lincoln's time.

DUNNING: Right. And how about your mother?

JOHNSON: My mother was born, I think in--she was born--lets see--I think around 00:04:00Baltimore. No, she was taken to Baltimore. I think she was born in Sweden. I'm not sure. But anyway, they were married around--in Baltimore.

DUNNING: And do you remember any stories that your parents or grandparents told you about their childhood, or what life was like for them when they were younger?

JOHNSON: None about my mother. About my father, my father claimed he was the offspring of an Indian lady by the name of Lomai in North Carolina. In those days the Indians had--well, of course, now they have what they call "tribes." A lot of people think a tribe of Indians would be half of hundred but sometimes it would only be forty or fifty and they'd call themselves a tribe. And that was a tribe of Indians around North Carolina and my father was the offspring of one of 00:05:00these Indian ladies.

His father, as I always remember him saying it, was ex-president Andrew Johnson. But they called him "Jackson" in those days but his name was Johnson. That's where we got the name Johnson. That was from--when he was ex-president. Not that he was elected, but he and Abraham Lincoln were boys together and they would go hunting and fishing like younger boys would, you know. And when he become president, Abraham Lincoln took Johnson in with him as his vice president, of course not realizing that Abraham Lincoln was going to be shot. And Abraham Lincoln was shot and that was how he became president, Andrew Johnson. Not elected, but appointed. See what I mean?

DUNNING: Okay, well before I go any further tell me again how you are related to 00:06:00Andrew Johnson.

JOHNSON: The only way I'm related is through my father.

DUNNING: Through your father's side.

JOHNSON: My father's side. My father said my mother was a Swede. She was from Baltimore, Maryland. That's where my father and mother were married as I understand it. You're asking me for a lot of stuff now that's hard for me to remember at this age.

DUNNING: I can see why. How many brothers and sisters in your family growing up?

JOHNSON: Well, my immediate family, there was Ed, Charles, Walter, Lavinia, Harry, me, and then Herbert, and then a little daughter by the name of--I can't remember now my youngest sister. Anyway, there was two girls. Altogether it was 00:07:00eight children.

DUNNING: Eight children. And it sounds like from your description you were sort of in the middle or down a little below the middle child?

JOHNSON: Well, yeah let's see there's Walter, Harry, Herbert--Walter, Harry, Lavinia, Herbert--Walter, Harry--Walter--Charles. Charles--wait. Ed, Charles, Walter, Lavinia, Harry, then me.

DUNNING: Okay.

JOHNSON: Then Herbert and Corona. That was the little infant. I remember she passed away by choking to death on a fishbone.

DUNNING: What do remember about your childhood home? Can describe it for me?

JOHNSON: Home? Very, very, very, comfortable. Very comfortable. We were brought up--all of us stayed home until we were well up in the marrying age. And I 00:08:00remember my father saying--sitting at dinner time one time--that he thought that he should be one of the happiest men in the world because with all of the boys and all the boys never give him any trouble, never had any police trouble, never did anything against the law--we always stayed home until we were well up in age and--very comfortable.

My father worked for the railroads--he was a, well, he became a superintendent of one of the division of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and our home was there in Philadelphia and we all lived together until--I remember at nighttime there would be nine of us all together sitting around the table eating dinner. My mother--I often wondered how she cooked dinner--In those days, you know, going back a hundred years or more they didn't have all the mechanical things they have now to use in the home. Everything had to be done by hand, you know.

DUNNING: She had a big job.

JOHNSON: My mother had a lady by the name of Sukey that used to help her. We called her "Sukey," to help her, but she did all the housework. Cooked all the meals and taking care of the house with all ten of us in there at one time. We lived right up until we were of marriageable age.

DUNNING: Okay. Now she sounds like a very busy person--

JOHNSON: Oh my god! I remember sometimes she'd have five or six tubs washing the clothes for all of us, you know. I remember she had the soap water in one tub and bluing water in another tub, starch water in another one--all that sort of stuff. Now all that's done in one washing machine. [laughs]

DUNNING: Now can you describe a typical day for your mother when all the children were living at home?

JOHNSON: Typical what?

DUNNING: A typical day for your mother--things you remember her doing the most? You just mentioned the laundry--

JOHNSON: Just keeping the house--keeping the home and cooking. Cooking mostly. I 00:10:00remember we would have--I was complaining about baked beans. We had baked beans that was home cooked. When I say "home cooked," it was cooked all day. My mother would soak those beans the night before and then the next morning she'd put them all out on a big pan and bake them. All day long with a wood fire. Of course, in those days that's all they had. They had no gas, no electricity.

And I remember her baking those beans all day. Turning them over and over and over at certain times until they got a beautiful brown. Then she would get the bacon. In those days, you could get a whole half of a bacon for a dollar or so. And she'd slice that bacon and put it on the beans and then brown those beans in the oven. And that's the way we ate. And she'd put them in a pan--the pan she had in--to cook those beans in, to serve them on the dining room table was a pan about two feet by two feet and it was three to four inches--

DUNNING: Was it a cast iron pan?

JOHNSON: Oh, yes. Yes, it was cast iron. And she'd take that pan out and keep turning them, as I say, all day long. Even--I remember when she was washing the clothes she'd be cooking those beans and going in the oven and turning them over and over and over until they got a beautiful brown. And I used to tell my wife, "Now you buy these beans and they just have a reddish color and they just smell." They're not cooked at all. Just terrible. Anyway--

DUNNING: So you've never forgotten your mother's baked beans?

JOHNSON: Oh, no. Baked beans--and then she'd cook a whole ham and then slice that ham. In those days, as I see now--you could buy a whole ham for dollar and half, two dollars. And she would slice that ham and then we'd have ham and cabbage. She'd cook that cabbage in a great big pot. She had a great big cast 00:12:00iron pot. All the cooking was done on that stove--it was a wood stove. Wood and coal and no gas--nobody had gas. Wasn't a question of we didn't have the money. We didn't have any--there just wasn't any gas.

We had the very first telephone put in our house in the whole block. We had the whole block from one corner to the other. My father had that because at the railroad he used to do a lot of the office work at the railroad and they depended on him between--he ran a lot of the railroad between Philadelphia and Baltimore, all the way down to Wheeling, West Virginia. Out as far as Chicago, up to New York, North Carolina, South Carolina. And all through Pennsylvania: Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, and all through there. He had charge of all those trains. From the Philadelphia station in Philadelphia, on the sixth floor he had an office up there with five or six ladies helping him to do the office work.

DUNNING: Well, tell me about your father. How would you describe him?

JOHNSON: My father was tall. Very well-built. Tall--he was like me--never had a complaint of sickness in his life that I can remember. Never was sick. Tall and walked very straight. And always sober.

You know, I remember him sitting down at the table at night time and he would sit down to eat his dinner and the telephone would ring and he'd have to get up and answer the telephone because he had to--telephone was--you had to get up and hold on to the thing at the side of the wall with a box to it and everything.

And he would say "Look," he'd say, "boys, you're all struggling, you're going to school to try to do well in your work," he said, "But remember this: if you ever get to--you don't have to get to the top but if you get near the top, it's going to take a lot of your work, a lot of your trouble, a lot of your time, a lot of your life." And I remember him saying many times, "See: I can't sit down and eat my dinner but the telephone don't ring and they want me down at the 00:14:00station."[laughs] And that stayed with me all my life.

DUNNING: So he sounds like a hard working gentleman.

JOHNSON: Huh?

DUNNING: He sounds like a hard working man.

JOHNSON: Well, he didn't do the pick and shovel type. He was what you might say the pen and pencil type. [laughs] He did a lot of that work that way.

And he called the trains, too, you see what I mean. That's how he first got into position: calling the trains. You know, now the railroads--you look up at a monitor there and the railroads have the reading there of when the trains are late or coming in, you know what I mean? They would call that train announcing. But he did that for twenty-eight years. Twenty-eight years before he was appointed where he become superintendent because he knew all about the railroad 00:15:00from Wheeling, West Virginia, to New York, and from Philadelphia to--all the way to Chicago. Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, Wheeling, West Virginia, all those things.

He knew all the--because every time he had any time at all he would go out on the railroad and see and study the railroad. Although he was just what they call an announcer--train announcer, train caller, they called it, you know. But he was so interested in the train that he wanted to see how the trains were run, where they run and all of the different--

DUNNING: Would you ever have an opportunity to go with him?

JOHNSON: Oh, yes! And sometimes my youngest brother, we'd get on the train--we'd go down to--we never realized it at that time but sometimes we'd get on the train--my mother would put us on the train from Philadelphia to Baltimore--that's where the main office was in Baltimore, of the station, of the train, of the railroad. And my father would always say there'd be somebody down 00:16:00there--I remember we was five and seven years old at that time, I remember. My father would always tell us, "Boys, there'll be somebody down there to take care of you."

We'd get down to the station and there'd be a man there he was going, "George, Herbert! Come on." We didn't know he was--we knew he was the man to take care of us, but he was the stationmaster of the station in Baltimore. He would take us and show us around. I remember one time he took us on the train down to Washington and he took us all the way up into the tower of the dome and I often think about that when presidents--.

The last president who was assassinated and had his casket laying there in the dome, you know, in the floor of the dome, and you can go all the way up in that dome--everybody can't do it, but we had the privilege, being with the stationmaster from the station in Baltimore. He took us up, and we went all the way up to the top and you could look down right from the center. And when you 00:17:00looked down on the people walking it looks like their legs are going around the side instead of going forward. It makes the legs look like they're going around this way. [laughs] And that was right up at the top of the dome--there's a little balcony up there. I don't know if anybody goes up there now or not but that was--that's been over maybe a hundred years ago.

DUNNING: Would your father sometimes be gone for several days?

JOHNSON: No, no, no he never was gone for any length of time. He'd always do down--see they had the main station, main office, in Baltimore. But he would go to Baltimore and come back to Philadelphia. That is, I never remember him going away for any length of time. He was always home every night. And I can remember. I never remember him going away, staying any length, any days at a time.

Because he had his office there in Philadelphia. Sixth floor of the Baltimore and Ohio station, and my brother and I--my brother Herbert, my youngest brother. 00:18:00We used to ask my mother if we could carry lunch to my father. My mother used to say, "You don't have to just carry lunch to your father. You can eat right there in the restaurant." We liked to go down to the station. That was our alibi to go take his lunch so we could go down there and see those great big engines or those great big steam engines in those days.

DUNNING: Well, it sounds like kind of a dream for kids.

JOHNSON: Oh it was, it was. My youngest brother and I--Herbert, his name was Herbert. He finally--I got a picture over there now--he finally become superintendent in the post office in Philadelphia.

DUNNING: Oh that's great. Now you've described you father. How would you describe your mother? What did she look like?

JOHNSON: My mother was, oh, I'd say she was about five foot seven and well built, well built. A lot of ability. She had--I remember--two or three different organizations that she belonged to that she used to go to meetings and those 00:19:00sorts of things.

DUNNING: Do you remember what the organizations were?

JOHNSON: No. She used to say ladies' auxiliary of something. I can't remember. I only remember that.

DUNNING: Now, what were some of your mother's good qualities?

JOHNSON: As I can think about it now, she was very, very wonderful. My mother--I never seen her drink, never smoked, none of that sort of thing. That's why I can't understand now so many of these people drinking and smoking and all that sort of stuff. Anyway, my mother never drank. She was taking care of us to the letter, as I would say. She was always on time. Always doing everything she could--even when we went to school. I remember she was fixing--always seeing that my clothes were straight, and my collar, and in the wintertime she'd see that my overcoat was buttoned around.

She'd take us to the school and just take us to the front door of the school. I 00:20:00went to the Southern High School and my brother went to primary school, my youngest brother. But she'd take us to school and leave us at the front door in front. Each school seemed to have a rail around them. Take us to the rail, she'd let us go into the school and that was it. She always seen that we had clothes on and well-dressed and--especially in the wintertime because they have some kind of long winters, cold weather sometimes back there. Five, six days at a time, you know? She would always see that we'd--well dressed and, you know, dressed in the wintertime to go to school.

DUNNING: Do you think there are important things your mother tried to hand down to you, to teach you? You mention it seems like she wanted you all to be well groomed and punctual.

JOHNSON: Yeah. She wanted us to be well groomed and comfortable. And then of 00:21:00course she took us to Sunday school, too. Every Sunday we went to Sunday school with the kids, you know. In the Episcopal seminary we went to.

DUNNING: You went to--you were Episcopalians?

JOHNSON: Episcopalian, yes. She brought us up in the Episcopalians. Reverend Tompkins was Episcopal, the minister.

DUNNING: And was the church--

JOHNSON: Church is at Nineteenth and Wallace. Right on the corner there at Rittenhouse Square, was there. Went all around the front of the church. You know, city park, they call it. Rittenhouse Square took up the whole block. And the church was right on the corner and that was the Episcopal church. They had the Sunday school there, also the church, you know. They had the Sunday school meetings down in the basement of the church.

It was a great big brownstone church. Two stories high. I remember at Christmastime, oh, they'd have Christmas tree there all the way up--in the altar--all the way to the ceiling. All the kids from the different sections of the city, we'd all be there and have a Christmas party there at the church.

DUNNING: Now was your father Episcopalian as well?

JOHNSON: Oh, yes, he was Episcopalian. He was a deacon of the Episcopal church there in Philadelphia as I remember it. As my wife and I came to California, he became the deacon of the church there in Philadelphia. I forget the name of it. I think it was on Wallace Street or somewhere. I can't remember now. I remember him saying that he would have to leave sometime and go to the church. And when he died they had him--buried him, had the funeral from the church. From the Episcopal church.

DUNNING: Was the church an important part of your growing up?

JOHNSON: No it wasn't an important part of ours. After we grew up, my--the church part of it--although, we stayed with the denomination, you know.

My oldest brother, Ed, he played the piano. I don't mean rock and that sort of thing. [laughs] He was a concert piano player. My brother Ed, he studied--oh, I remember looking at the music sometimes and I couldn't understand how he could tell the music with all them little dots on the paper, and he used to ask me sometimes to turn the pages. When he would come to the house sometimes after we got older, he'd ask me to turn the pages and I couldn't understand how he could take music out of just those round dots on that piece of paper.

But he was with--I remember he used to travel with a theatrical--I mean a musical--company by the name of--and the head name was Damrosch. But he played--they were all in those days what they call horn instruments. Horn bands, 00:24:00you know. Brass bands, they called them. He played the piano during the intermission at times, you know. During intermissions he would play the piano or play the piano before the bands started.

And then another bandmaster he played with: a man by the name of John Philip Sousa. He played with John Philip Sousa they would go around to the different towns and all--I remember he'd even go to Italy sometimes and all that sort of thing. That was my oldest brother, Ed.

And then my younger--my other brother, Harry--uh, Charles--he ran a--in those days, they didn't have shirts with collars on them like they have now. They used to have shirts that they had to detach the collar. Collars were made of celluloid and my brother, Charles, he had this factory where they made these celluloid collars. And he would sell those. Can you imagine? All the shirts had to have the hole in the back where they could put the collar button, you know? 00:25:00And all of the collars had to have the hole and you had to buy them separate, of course, but they would last because you could take them off and iron them. I mean wash them and iron them. I mean wash them, not iron them because they were celluloid.

But anyway--and then Walter. There was Ed, Charles, and Walter. Walter, he was my third oldest brother. He went to college in Philadelphia Central. I remember it was Central High School College and I remember him studying surveying or something like that. He became a surveyor. He surveyed. I remember him saying a lot of times that the railroad out here used his surveying marks where he would survey for electric lines. And the railroad would use his surveying and run their train line fifty or a hundred feet from his poles that they would put up 00:26:00with his electric line on it. It looked like he was surveying for the railroad instead of surveying for the electricity. [laughs]

DUNNING: Well, it sounded like your parents must have really encouraged your getting into trades and professions.

JOHNSON: Oh, yeah. My brother Herbert-- That was Walter, Harold. Now Lavinia, she was a great seamstress. Making clothes, you know? She made clothes for--there was a big department store there by the name of John Wanamaker, and then there was Gilmore Brothers, Litt Brothers, and she made clothing for all those stores. Dresses, you know. High-class dresses. High-price dresses, my sister. And then she got--had my mother into it, because my mother had nothing else to do after we got grown up.

DUNNING: Well, I was going to ask you that. Did your mother ever work outside the home when the kids were little?

JOHNSON: Oh, no she never. No, no she never worked outside. But she help my--. We had a big home there in Philadelphia: 923 S. Fifteenth Street it was. A 00:27:00three-story house, and I often think about that house. We had four bedrooms on the top floor and four bedrooms on the middle floor. Then of course, the down floor was the recreation--where the kitchen, dining room and the front room. Anyway--

DUNNING: Did your parents ever take in boarders?

JOHNSON: Boarders? Oh no! We never had enough room.

DUNNING: It seemed like you had enough people as it was, but--

JOHNSON: I was going to say. I can't believe it--this house on Fifteenth Street now had eight bedrooms. Had four bedrooms on the top floor and four bedrooms on the middle floor. But now, my God, a house with eight bedrooms would cost you a million dollars.

DUNNING: Oh! That would be the down payment in California.

JOHNSON: Yeah, yeah. It's a lot. Like people tell me about this place--I can't believe it.

DUNNING: Do you remember having household chores when you were little? Did you 00:28:00have to work inside the house?

JOHNSON: Me? Oh, yeah. My youngest brother and I, we used to get up early in the morning and make up the fire because they had all wood and coal fires. You know, they didn't have any gas and electricity. Not only us, but nobody. They just didn't exist in those days. It existed but on a very, very, very scarce principle. And my youngest brother and I, we used to get up early before we went to school and go down in the cellar. They call them cellars, they're basements, but they call them cellars there, you know. It was all built-in, beautiful cellars and they had the furnace down there and we'd make up the fire, get a good hot fire going. Of course, we had wood and then what they call soft coal. Soft coal because Pennsylvania is a great mining area, you know. That is out around Wilkes-Barre and western Pennsylvania they still have a lot of coal and iron out that way, and oil.

DUNNING: Was keeping the fire going one of your major chores?

JOHNSON: Well, we'd always--we'd make the fire up around 6 o'clock in the morning and get it good and hot, and then we'd kind of what they call bank it, you know: we'd but some more coal and wood on it. And that would last until we came home at noon. Then, yes, my youngest brother and I we'd take care of the fire, you know. Because the house being a large house and well insulated--it was all made of brick--it would keep nice and warm during the real cold weather. And they didn't have steam heat, they had what they call hot air heat. Had the big pipes running all up through the house from the basement. Up through the walls to the rooms. That sent the air up from the furnace.

DUNNING: Now what chores did you sisters do?

JOHNSON: My sister helped my mother sewing. She did a lot of, she did all the sewing.

DUNNING: Sewing for the family, or outside the family?

JOHNSON: Yeah she did. As she grew up, my mother taught how to sew and they had the--. After they started selling so many clothes, my sister took over as she grew up. Around from seven on up, she would make beautiful, beautiful dresses, you know? And I remember in those days they would have--my sister would say, "Mr. So-and-So is coming, Mrs. Robinson is coming, Mr. Morgan is coming, or Mrs. Ford."

Henry Ford and Morgan and all those fellows were very well known around there, and they would come in what we called an open barouche, you know. They use them sometimes now in funerals, with flowers, you know. And the king and queen of England used to usually sit in them when they were on parade, you know? And they sit facing each other. And sometimes the men would--a coachman and a footman would drive up to the house with these ladies to come in to get their dresses 00:31:00made. My mother and sister--

DUNNING: From your mother and sister.

JOHNSON: My mother and sister, yeah, were making them. My mother and sister, upstairs they had this middle room, a great big room and they would come up. I remember sometimes I'd go in there to get something for my lunch and my mother would have them standing up on the floor measuring their clothes. And how they'd be standing up there for a half-hour. I couldn't understand how those women could stand up there that long and have my mother and sister be measuring their clothes from the store and all those kind of places. But that's what my mother and sister did as we grew up to the age where we were, you know, young men and young women. But those people would drive up in automobiles and open barouches with coachmen and footmen to come in and have those dresses made by my mother and sister.

DUNNING: Well, they must have had quite a reputation.

JOHNSON: Oh, they did. But you don't--that's what I tell people--you don't see any of that now. All of that was old stuff. Of course there was no automobiles, you understand. There were no automobiles, and I'm talking about the days before automobiles.

I remember the first automobiles that come out. Kids--if we saw one in the 00:32:00neighborhood any way, trying to crank it to start it, you know. They didn't have the starters on them like they have now. We didn't have automobiles, and all the railroad stations had cabs with horses. They didn't have automobiles to take people to the hotel. They had horse cabs, horse and cabs they called them. It's unbelievable to me to even think that in those days, in my life, they didn't have the automobiles.

And I even think now, coming to California, when we came here there was only five million people in California. You didn't see them. Now they claim there's thirty-five million and still you don't see them when you get out in the country. See what I mean? And that's what I can't understand. And they were giving land away when we came, when my wife and I came. They were giving land away. In California, see? [laughs] But we didn't get any of the gifts. We was 00:33:00able to buy this because it was very cheap at that time. But I told the fellow right next door, he wanted a thousand dollars for seventy-five feet of land there. I said, "A thousand dollars? You never will get that kind of money for that land." Never will get it! Can you imagine that seventy-five foot front that was going for less than a thousand dollars?

DUNNING: Well, I'd like to hear more about your coming to California but I have a few more questions about--

JOHNSON: Yeah. Sorry, I veer often.

DUNNING: No, that's fine you're doing great. I'd like to ask you about your schooling. Do you remember your first school you went to?

JOHNSON: Oh! I went to--I can't remember the teachers. It was just a primary school, but grammar--I went to primary school, grammar school, and then to high school and then I went to--oh, where I studied engineering--it was a subsidiary of the University of Pennsylvania.

DUNNING: Was it the Drexel Institute [of Art, Science, and Industry]?

JOHNSON: Drex--huh?

DUNNING: Drexel Institute?

JOHNSON: There you go! Drexel Institute. You see, that's it. In those days--now 00:34:00like here, if you get to California with a million dollars they want, they can build a building on the land that they have already, you know. But back there, University of Pennsylvania was built right in the middle of Philadelphia almost. You know: the city was built up all around. And if they built the--if they give the University of Pennsylvania a million dollars and they wanted the building, they'd go up and get some building that was vacant, you know, and remodel it, and refurbish it, and call it an institute from the University of Pennsylvania. And that's where I went--this building was given to them and they made a mechanical subsidiary of it. And they called it, "Drexel Institute."

John Philip Sousa--I mean [Anthony Joseph] Drexel, Ford--there was three men. Three--two millionaires; I can't remember their names but I do remember Henry Ford. Henry Ford. Henry Ford sat at my father's office one day just about as far 00:35:00as you from me and said, "Henry," he said, "This is my son George." And Henry said, "George, if you save ten cents out of every dollar you'll be a millionaire someday." I've often wondered where that million dollars went. But anyway--it was a circumstance, I think now, that we went through that was far different from what they go through now. The young kids and young boys get into such certain--get into this thing that they call dope and it seems so easy and it'll get a hold of all of them, but we never--. You could buy a loaf of bread then for five cents. I don't know why the people think they needed so much money. Now the same loaf of bread costs a dollar and forty cents, you know what I mean? And you could buy hamburger--they had a great big butcher shop there. Five or six butchers in it. My mother bought a pound of lamb hamburger for ten cents. I remember it was a great big market and one side that had three or four cutting 00:36:00blocks and on the other side it would have five or six halves of cows hanging there. You know, just fresh killed, hanging. That was a butcher shop and you'd bring it over and cut the meat off--cut a great big steak. My mother would get two or three steaks for all of us for {_____?} cents. Oh boy! It was unbelievable.

DUNNING: When you were in school, when you started school, did you have favorite subjects?

JOHNSON: Favorite subject? No, no. But we went to grammar school, you see, it was just the ordinary--we studied mathematics up to trigonometry and physics. Algebra, trigonometry, and physics, then we stopped there. We stopped there, then we went to high school. But that was in grammar school.

DUNNING: And who did you go to school with in grammar school? What did your class look like?

JOHNSON: Oh, my classmates. I couldn't tell you a single one. We would all--it looked like--I don't understand it. We're all of a different racial, different 00:37:00ethnic background, you know what I mean? And we would go to school--we'd all be in the class together, studying together, but the minute the school let out each one of the different classes, different races would all go to their own home. You never saw them overnight, you know what I mean? We never socialized together outside of school. You know what I mean? And I don't remember any of the boys--I can't remember any of their names.

DUNNING: Well, that's okay. And which group would you hang out with?

JOHNSON: Which group? Well, we never hung out. We never hung out with any particular names group. But there was a--we had a class that we played football with called the [Stentenworth?] that was called the [Stentenworth?] and we used 00:38:00to always play another group from another section of the city called the [Aurion?] and ours was the [Stentenworth?], but that's the only two groups that I knew. As far as hanging out with a bunch of boys in the school--after school, no. We all looked like--as I can remember--at the school all of the children would just separate and go to their own homes. We never saw any of the different kids hanging around the school in groups. You know, as gangs or anything like that. Never--

DUNNING: Now, you mentioned that you were part Indian and part Swedish.

JOHNSON: Part Swedish, yes.

DUNNING: Now how was it to be sort of mixed race at that time?

JOHNSON: How were the mixed races?

DUNNING: Yes, how did people get along?

JOHNSON: Wonderful. Never had any--never heard of anything like, we never heard. In our school there we had mostly what we call "Caucasian" teachers, know what I 00:39:00mean? But all the students were of--it was Jews, what you call Jews and gentiles-- Jews and gentiles and Africans, and Mexicans, Indians. All come to school and get along in the class no trouble at all. Never had any of that kind of what they call "racial trouble" like they have now in places. Never had any--we never knew--we never heard of that sort of thing in those days. As I say, this country was--when I think about it now, I can see this country was very young. Very young in those days. And everybody was out to try to get along, it looked like.

DUNNING: Well, we're talking about the turn of the century, now when you started school.

JOHNSON: Absolutely. Now, it's a different turn all together. But I never heard of any of those conditions at all until--that is racial, you know what I mean, struggles and that sort of thing. They just didn't exist. They had different 00:40:00races of people lived in different sections. Now in Philadelphia there was a lot of Jews and I remember there was a lot of Jews in the school: Einstein, Weinstein, Feinstein. All of those names I remember the teachers would call when the class would start. But they never had any racial trouble amongst them. There was Irish--it was Kane and Kats next door, next to me. Johnson, Kane, and Kats. We three always sat together among--with the Jews and all the other--but we never heard any talk about a different race. Never under any circumstances. We were all together in school.

DUNNING: Now, did you ever start noticing a difference in the way--. When did you first start noticing prejudice? Did you notice at Drexel Institute?

JOHNSON: I have never noticed it in any place that I can remember. I had a lot 00:41:00of jobs, you know, but I can't remember of any job that I had where I was considered different racial prejudice--a different racial strata, you know what I mean? I never remembered. When I came to California--wife and I came here--.

See now I was in the post office at first. That was my first job after I got out of the army. I was in the First World War, you know. And I didn't know it--I was anxious to get out of it, because I wasn't a soldier, but I was drafted. See what I mean? And then after the war--they looked it up here a while back and saw that I was discharged from the army in 1919. Well, my wife and I came to California and--we came to California right after I got out of the army and that 00:42:00was in 1919. I had my mechanical experience, and I remember going in a barbershop in San Francisco to get a haircut and a fellow came in there--and in those days, each barber had five or six barbers and you could get a haircut and a shave for seventy-five cents. A haircut fifty cents, a shave for twenty-five cents. Now, it costs five dollars almost. No, I paid ten dollars for a haircut right over here. Anyway--I was sitting there and a fellow came in and he said they're having a strike. The mechanics down on the ferries--they were running a ferry between here and San Francisco, you know? No bridges, nothing at that time. Everybody went on the ferry. Trains--Interurban [Electric Railway] trains ran down Seventh Street down to what we call the mole down at the end of Seventh 00:43:00Street and everybody had to get on the ferry and go across to San Francisco. And I went down and got a job on the ferry.

DUNNING: Seventh Street in Oakland?

JOHNSON: Seventh Street in Oakland. All the way down to Seventh Street in Oakland, all the way down. And there was a ferry down there. There was trains, Interurban trains, all the way--coming all over the state, you know. All over I mean all over this--they called it the Key System then, see? Most of the BART trains run on the same route that the Key System ran on, only the Key System ran on the ground. But now BART, see they have the elevated roads, most places. But anyway, that's where everybody had to go to get on the ferry to go to San Francisco. And I got a job on the ferry--running on the ferry.

DUNNING: And what was your first job on the ferry?

JOHNSON: My first job--trying to help in the power, in the steam room. I worked there for seven years, and they started building the bridge. The bridge wasn't 00:44:00built then; they started building the bridge. I remember them saying a lot of times when they were building the bridge--

DUNNING: The Bay Bridge.

JOHNSON: That's the Bay Bridge. You can see the wheels up there turning but you never saw a single person on that bridge. Anyway, they went around and conscripted to try to get--and which they did--residents, landowners, on this side to donate a certain amount of their taxes to the purpose of building the bridge. And the bridge was to cost seventy million dollars, which was a lot of money in those days. Seventy million dollars was a lot of money. Seventy million dollars would hardly buy you a cup of coffee now. [laughs] But anyway, we never did get that money back that we contributed, but the bridge had been paid for along by, over fifty years. We were supposed to get that back after the bridge was paid for in fifty years. Well, the bridge has been paid for and instead of 00:45:00us getting it back, they've raised it--and the price of the bridge [toll] when it was built was fifty cents. Now, it's--what is it? Five dollars.

DUNNING: I think the Golden Gate Bridge is five dollars and the Bay Bridge is two dollars.

JOHNSON: I'm talking about the Bay Bridge. All this I'm talking about is the Bay Bridge. I remember they said it woul cost seventy million, and we had a friend who came all the way out from Pennsylvania to work on the bridge and he thought it was a wonderful thing that they brought him all the way out here to work on the bridge at seventy million dollars! Oh, back there they thought that seventy million was enough to buy the world. [laughs] At that time. You know.

DUNNING: And were you afraid that you would lose your job on the ferry with the bridge being--

JOHNSON: Oh no! Oh no! I quit that job long before that. Long before the bridge was built. I quit and went to work for a while on the Baltimore and Ohio, I mean 00:46:00on the Southern Pacific Railroad. Wait a minute. I had several jobs in through there. I worked on the Southern Pacific, went from here to--I can't remember the exact dates, you know.

DUNNING: That's okay. You have a lot of dates!

JOHNSON: It was running from here to Seattle. Running from here to Seattle and I remember I went to see the superintendent. Oh, that was during the Depression! You've heard of the Depression in '29?

DUNNING: Oh, yes!

JOHNSON: The manager--I forget his name--[Klink?], I think, I'm not sure. "Oh no!" he says, "We're not hiring anybody." This is during the Depression. He says, "We haven't hired anybody in two years." So I was sitting there. I just 00:47:00casually said, "Oh, I understand that, but" I said, "my father was a railroad man and I'm not a railroad person, but" I said, "I thought--I'm out of work and I thought I could get a job on the railroad." "Well, what does your father do?" He said, "Is Johnson your father's name?" I said, "Yeah, I'm a Johnson." And I said, "My father was for years, he was kind of a like superintendent on the Baltimore and Ohio." This was George [Klink?] he said, "Your father was Johnson--your father was a superintendent?" I said, "Well, he was superintendent of a division of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad." He said, "Jim? Jim?" Like that to me! You know? He said, "Jim's your father?" I said, "Yeah." "Jim is your father!" I said, "Yeah." "What are you doing in California?" I said, "Well, I'm out here, just like everybody else, trying to make a living." And finally, after we got through talking, he said: "Can you go on a train this afternoon?" I said, 00:48:00"I can go on a train anytime." [laughs] After telling me he hadn't hired anybody for two years! Then he asked me could I go on a train that afternoon. And, he said, "Jim? Jim Johnson is your father?" He just couldn't believe it. He kept saying "Jim? Jim Johnson is your father." He said, "Jim taught me railroading." He says, "Your father taught me railroading. When do you want to go out?" I says, "I'll go out anytime." He said, "All right. Now there'll be a car laying way over on the yard there." He named the car. He says, "You get on that car and tell that fellow on there that you're coming to work. And I got on that job. On that job, we went all the way to Seattle. Two or three trips to Seattle.

DUNNING: And what was your job on the train?

JOHNSON: Just waiting--working-- seeing that the kitchen, dining room was taken care of.

DUNNING: Okay.

JOHNSON: Yup. I was kind of like a, you know, manager, superintendent in the dining room and kitchen.

DUNNING: And how did you like that job?

JOHNSON: Oh I didn't like it at all. I didn't like it at all. I just didn't like it. I told--I made two trips, went all the way up to Seattle and we had to stay 00:49:00up in Seattle all night. See what I mean? And I went there then coming back. Then I made another trip up to Denver and we stayed in Denver all night and come back. And I didn't like that idea of staying away all night overnight! It was just unusual.

DUNNING: Well, you were accustomed to your dad coming home--

JOHNSON: Yeah, that's it. But being a railroad family, you know, I understood how it could just take up a lot of your time.

DUNNING: Tell me a little bit about you wife. You married her in Philadelphia?

JOHNSON: Wife and I, we lived in Philadelphia--

DUNNING: And first, what is her name?

JOHNSON: --we lived on what we call Eighteenth and Montrose and she lived Fifteenth and Fitzwater which was three blocks away. It was two blocks--I lived three blocks away. City blocks, now, you know what I mean. We called it three 00:50:00blocks west and two blocks north of me. But I had to go by her house everyday to go to school. Now, we were about seven years old. Just, you know, just one year away from kindergarten, you know? And my mother would take me up past her house because I had to pass her house to get to the school and then we'd pick her up--my mother would take her and me to school, you know what I mean? Her mother would go to the school and get us and bring us back home. Now that's when we was around six, seven years old.

And then we lived in that neighborhood up until she went to high school and I went to--. School in those days, you see, they didn't have boys and girls going at the same school. Even to kindergarten, they didn't have boys and girls going to the same kindergarten. Boys and girls all went to separate schools. I went to 00:51:00Southern High School. She went to Northeast--Northwest School. Her school was almost a mile away from my school. But anyway, that's when we first started to--every day we'd go and come, go and come, go and come together. Finally, after we got older, for two or three years--then we got socialized with a bunch of girls, all in the same group. We socialized and socialized up until, oh, we were eighteen, nineteen years old. And then we--of course, I went to college, went to war, and I got out, and then finally when I came back we socialized and we were married. And I got my marriage license in that drawer, right in that cabinet right there.

DUNNING: Well, we might take a look at that, there. It would be quite interesting.

JOHNSON: That's right there--see that little cabinet right there as you go inside of the dining room, there. In that top drawer, my marriage license right 00:52:00in there. I think we were married in 1917. Reverend Wallace, I think, was the minister at that time.

Dunning:

So you were about twenty--early--twenty-one?

JOHNSON: Just around in there.

DUNNING: Right around twenty-one. And what is your wife's name?

JOHNSON: Huh? What? My wife was--she was always one year younger than me. Just one year. I used to like to kid her and tell her, "You're always trying to catch up to me." Because I was one year older. And she was like me, she was in good health, just wonderful health. No doctors, no all this foolishness. No taking no medicine, like me, she never took any periodic medicines or anything like that. That's why I don't take them. Don't take nothing like that. I don't want it. I might feel like I might have to take them, but I'm not going to take them yet unless I have to. Sometimes I feel like I should take them on account of a little pain or a little ache, but I just don't do it and it all wears away. You 00:53:00know? Anyway--

DUNNING: Have you been your own doctor? Have you doctored yourself?

JOHNSON: Well, you could say "doctoring it yourself" if you want to, but I don't doctor at all. I don't take anything! I don't take anything whatsoever.

DUNNING: Not an aspirin, not a--

JOHNSON: Not an aspirin, nothing. I don't have--Angie always says that, "George you don't have no medicines laying around." That's why I tell Angie, "Angie"--she wants to know what time that I want her to come--I say, "You come whenever you have the convenience to come and do what's to be done. Straighten out the house, straighten out the kitchen, the bathroom, and the bedroom, and dust whatever you see on this floor. You don't have to worry about the basement or the upper floor, because I don't live on either one of them. And whenever you want to come and can do it, all right." I said, "I don't take any medicines at any particular time, so that leaves you out to come when you want to come." 00:54:00Sometimes, she don't come until six, seven o'clock in the evening. As long as she does whatever needs to be done, it's all right with me. See what I mean? Because she don't have to tend to me personally, you know what I mean? That sort of thing. When you have to minister--like she says, "When I have to administer medicines to some of the patients, then that has to be there." But with me she don't have to be here at any particular time. She likes that, see?

DUNNING: Have you been healthy your whole life?

JOHNSON: All my life. All my life I've never been--I can't say I've been healthy in this sense: I've had two operations, but not anything that would render me being--oh what would you say? Lingering illness, you know what I mean? No lingering illness. When I was married about a year or so I had awful pains on my 00:55:00right side, see what I mean? Of course, in those days I was a young man that's been over a hundred years ago, almost a hundred years ago. Went to university, they operated on me--appendicitis, you know?

DUNNING: And what's your diet?

JOHNSON: Huh?

DUNNING: What has your diet been through life?

JOHNSON: Everything! Right now, my diet [laughs] my diet is getting to the point where it's almost unbelievable. I just get the same thing over and over and over, which I understand.

DUNNING: And what's that?

JOHNSON: Just beef, roast beef, you know, and a couple of vegetables. And a little chicken. But there's no--you know what I mean--. I guess--I say there's no taste in it because it's not flavored in any sense of the word, you know what I mean? The chicken, roast chicken, just don't have any taste. The roast beef just don't have any taste. No taste. And not only that, but it comes in a heavy 00:56:00cake, and when I cut it and I chew it, and if I chew it it's dry, you know what I mean? It's dry and I know why it's dry because it's meat that's been cooked maybe a week ahead, they slice it down, put a little gravy, and heat it up, you know what I mean? Because --

DUNNING: Do you get meals-on-wheels?

JOHNSON: Yes, that's meals-on-wheels, that's it, see? I can't complain about that. If they didn't bring that--do you understand?--I wouldn't have anything. There wouldn't be anybody giving me anything to eat! I can't even--you know what I mean? I have to go out in the kitchen and fix it myself, what I can. What little bit can do, I fix it myself, but I can't go out there and cook. I can't possibly cook, because I can't get to the stove, and I wouldn't get to the stove because an open stove has an open flame, you know? And I wouldn't want to get that. All I do is heat the food with the microwave and the electric oven.

DUNNING: And does Angie help with your grocery shopping?

JOHNSON: No, no, Angie doesn't cook. Angie doesn't touch the food at all.

DUNNING: Who does your grocery shopping?

JOHNSON: She does the grocery shopping.

DUNNING: Oh, okay.

JOHNSON: She does the grocery shopping, and that's all, but she don't cook. She don't hand me a glass of water unless I ask her to hand me one. But I do that--I get up in the morning and I go out there and I cook myself a sausage, fix myself a sausage, a cup of coffee and a piece of toast. She gets waffles, you know? And I get waffles, and then the other day I told her to bring me some potatoes that I could cook them up and make like hash brown potatoes and she--I don't know where she got this, but she brought me this, she said, "This is hash brown potatoes." But it's in a carton, square carton, packaged up just like a package! 00:58:00I didn't know this--I had felt it in the refrigerator for a couple of days, but I didn't know it was the mashed potatoes! She told me yesterday, you know, it was mashed potatoes! It comes all packaged, you know what I mean? In a solid, sealed package! She said, "It's potatoes." That you can mash--you know, make hash browns! [laughs]

DUNNING: Well, I'm sure you've seen a lot of different processing.

JOHNSON: Oh, yeah. Now the sausage, of course that comes in packages of six, you know, in a package.

DUNNING: Now, we're going to pause right now. We're going to turn it off just for a moment because we're at the end of this tape.

JOHNSON: I can't hear what you're saying.

DUNNING: Okay.

JOHNSON: I can't understand what you're saying.

DUNNING: Can you pause it for one moment?

JOHNSON: I met an intelligent man, in a sense, with us. But he told us, he said, "Boys," he said, "Look up in the air. You see those birds flying around there?" And he said--I'll never forget it--he said, "Those are the freest things on the 00:59:00face of this earth. Nobody can tell them where to go, how to go, when to go, or what to go. But they all know what they're doing and what they're going! Believe it or not." So I thought to myself--he said, "If you boys all take care of yourself, stay within the law--. There's nothing outside the law that is worth anything to you. Stay within the la, and take care of yourself. When you get old--not within the next five or six years, but if you live to be old--and you can look back on your life and see that you're absolutely clear," he said, "you will be flying like that bird in your mind. In your mind you'll be just as free as that bird." He said, "Anybody can ask you anything in the world about your life and you'll be glad to tell them, because you'll be free." See what I mean? Your mind will be open. "Never have nothing to hide," he said. Now that's--it's 01:00:00hard to do that, but you can do it. And he says, "Now, I feel like I'm the freest and the happiest man in the world," he said, "because to have four boys like you boys and not a single one of you have caused me any trouble, all of you done right." He says, "It keeps my flying like that bird." [laughs] And you know what I mean? It means a whole lot! That means an awful lot! If you just keep flying like that bird, you have to keep right.

I've had a lot of jobs in my life--I can't go through--I can remember the jobs, but I can't remember the day and date--but not a single one of them have I ever been laid off, or had any trouble with it, or had any confusion whatsoever. I've never had any trouble with the police, under any--nothing at all. Like--I don't know why--my wife and I lived here--I came here on this lot in 1935. I've been 01:01:00here ever since, right on this lot. One person was telling me, he said--I said, "I don't know, outside of during the war, during World War, from the Japanese"--I used to go up to the shipyard, but I said, "The shipyard was on Macdonald Avenue." Above Macdonald Avenue, and since the war I have never been up there. I haven't up as far as Macdonald Avenue in the last ten years. But for what reason? You what I mean? I have no reason. When I used to deliver--take care of myself from the stores right here, and I haven't got any--no reason in the world for me to go up there, I haven't got any job up there. All of my work and everything--my pay--. And I've been with the bank, Bank of America, been there--. My last VERSATEL card, the girl she couldn't believe it--Japanese girl--she wanted to tear it up! Been with the Bank of America since 1919.

DUNNING: They should put you on a TV commercial!

JOHNSON: [Laughs] 1919 on my VERSATEL card on my--[laughs] Went back to--went with Mrs. Demerel, that was the lady that used to--. They wanted to take me back to a gambling joint back in Nevada. What's the name of it? Anyway, someplace that I have--I just don't want to visit because I know it's just a give away.

DUNNING: The casinos?

JOHNSON: Yeah, casinos, the gambling casino out the back of Nevada. What's the name of it?

DUNNING: Well, like Harrah's or one of those?

JOHNSON: No, I forget the name of it. Anyway, we had a girl back there, Mrs. Demerel's daughter, she said, "George, do you want to spend any money?" I said, "I don't want to spend a plugged nickel, but I'll give you some money as a gift and I'll call it a Christmas present." So I said, "Well, here." I said--I give her--I had two cards. One I had gotten recently and one called a Mastercard. I 01:03:00got that back in 1919. It's got on it "Customer since 1919." And I give her the other card so--I forgot the--you know the code number on the other card and I didn't know it. And she said, "George," after she put it in the machine, "I can't get any money with this card." And I said, "Here, take this one." This is the one I got in 1919. That's ****. And she put that in the machine, she pressed down the ****, out come the dollars. [laughs] I can see--that card there is over a hundred years old.

DUNNING: You must be the oldest Bank of America customer in the country!

JOHNSON: I don't know. But here's the thing about it: I tell everybody, they don't know that they are working in the Bank of America on the name, but they don't know they're working for the Bank of Italy. The Bank of Italy. That's the--when I first went there in 1919, it was the Bank of Italy. They changed it 01:04:00to Bank of America. That's the Bank of America is the Bank of Italy. Under Italian rules and regulations.

DUNNING: Now do you remember when that changed?

JOHNSON: Yes, that was changed--that was during the '29 Depression. It was Bank of Italy, and they were down on the corner of Market and Powell Street, great big building. And the banks--oh the banks! Banks were all closed up, during the depression. That was a terrible thing. I don't know whether you was around--you were around but whether you was around here. During the '29, during the World War. And if they don't look out, now , you know what I mean, the way prices are going--I may not live to see it, but the way they're going overboard with prices and the money, if they don't look out, they're subject to have another 1929 depression. Because it's got to stop somewhere, you know what I mean? It's got 01:05:00to stop. Over in San Francisco--I was just listening the other night on the radio--average home for pretty near four hundred thousand dollars! That don't make sense!

DUNNING: That's a fixer-upper, too.

JOHNSON: But who's going to pay that--you know, and you never--the average--the thing of it is, it's getting beyond the average wage. There's nobody in the world can pay four hundred thousand, right now, pay four hundred thousand. They might have maybe a hundred thousand dollars or fifty thousand dollars to put on that house, having a three hundred thousand dollars mortgage, but they're not going to be able to pay that interest on that three hundred thousand with ordinary wages. You know what I mean. It's just--it's just--And then people get to be beyond them, they're going to start rebelling. And that's when you have your revolution and have your depression. But it's got to stop somewhere, this money. Just basing your whole living life on dollars, don't make sense. It 01:06:00doesn't make sense.

DUNNING: You know what? I think we're going to stop for today and then we'll come back the next time.

JOHNSON: Well, I hope I haven't out-tired you with my talk.

DUNNING: No, not at all.

JOHNSON: And I don't know whether you've gotten all you want.

DUNNING: No, in fact we would really like to come back a second time.