Transcript of interview with Kim Bird & Pam Fogliasso by Claytee D. White, February 8, 2013

CT Am inn x- An Interview with Kim Bird & Pam Fogliasso An Oral History Conducted by Claytee D. White The Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project Oral History Research Center at UNLV University Libraries University of Nevada Las Vegas ©The Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project University of Nevada Las Vegas, 2012 Produced by: The Oral History Research Center at UNLV - University Libraries Director: Claytee D. White Editors: Barbara Tabach, Joyce Moore Transcriber: Kristin Hicks Interviewers and Project Assistants: Barbara Tabach and Claytee D. White 2 The recorded interview and transcript have been made possible through the generosity of Dr. Harold Boyer. The Oral History Research Center enables students and staff to work together with community members to generate this selection of first-person narratives. The participants in this project thank the university for the support given that allowed an idea the opportunity to flourish. The transcript received minimal editing that includes the elimination of fragments, false starts, and repetitions in order to enhance the reader’s understanding of the material. All measures have been taken to preserve the style and language of the narrator. In several cases photographic sources accompany the individual interviews. The following interview is part of a series of interviews conducted under the auspices of the Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project. Claytee D. White, Project Director Director, Oral History Research Center University Libraries University Nevada, Las Vegas 3 ORAL HISTORY RESEARCH CENTER AT UNLV Boyer Early Las Vegas Oral History Project Rancho High School Class of(62 Name of Narrator: Name of Interviewer: Use Agreement f id /i I h)/<[Ti IKs J). yiftljgr foGUPrSSO') We, tlic above named, give to i intcrview(s) initiated on c ) / ral History Research Center of UNLV, die recorded JdJ/ LS along witii typed transcripts as an unrestricted gilt, to be used for7 sugh scholarly and educational purposes as shall be determined, and transfer to the University of Nevada Uis Vegas, legal title and all literary property rights including copyright. I bis gift docs not preclude the right of the interviewer, as a representative of UNLV, nor the narrator to use the recordings and related materials for scholarly pursuits. I understand that my interview will be made available to researchers and may be quoted from, published, distributed, placed on the Internet or broadcast in any medium that the Oral History Research Center and UNLV Libraries deem appropriate including future forms of electronic and digital media. There will he no compensation for any interviews. Date Library Special Collections 4505 Maryland Parkway, Box 457010, Las Vegas, Nevada 89154-7070 (702) 895-2222 Preface Kim Bird’s family moved to Las Vegas in 1955 when she was twelve years old. Pam Fogliasso arrived in 1954 with her family in 1954, when she was ten. Kim married and had a son and a daughter; she lives in Las Vegas. Pam married, had two children, and lives in Parumph, Nevada. Though Kim and Pam moved here in the mid-1950s, they had family members who had lived in Southern Nevada and worked on building Hoover Dam - Kim’s grandfather and Pam’s great-uncle. Both women remember growing up in a Las Vegas that was run by the mob and safe for teenagers; meeting friends in local hangouts such as the Blue Onion and attending sock hops, babysitting, and cruising down Fremont Street. They attended high school with black students but were also aware of the segregation that existed on the Strip. This interview focuses on Kim and Pam’s experiences growing up in Las Vegas, and on their teenaged years attending Rancho High School. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------n 2 It is February eighth, 2013. This is Claytee White and I'm in the home of Kim Bird. How are you this morning? I'm fine, thank you. Fantastic. Kim, first thing, could you pronounce and spell your name for me, please. I am Kim Bird, my married name. Bird is B-I-R-D. My maiden name was Kim Pickering. Pickering is P-I-C-K-E-R-I-N-G. Thank you so much. Now Kim, can you tell me a little about your early life, where you grew up, what the family was like? I actually was born in Salt Lake City. We came down here in 1955. Dad was reaching out to get out of the snow; he couldn't do it anymore, so we came down here. How old were you in 1955? I was twelve. So tell me what it was like growing up in Salt Lake City. Salt Lake City was cold. We kind of moved here and there. My last place of residence was Morningside Heights, which is up kind of on the side of the mountains. Really enjoyed it up there. We lived there for about three years. My aunt and uncle lived up on top of the hill and they're the ones that made sure that I got baptized and took me to church and all that fun stuff, which I'm not very good on following. So did you ski? Yes. I tried skiing once. I put some skis on and I went down the hill and I ran into somebody's house. So I probably put my skis away and I found sledding down the mountain was much more fun. And did you have brothers and sisters to go with? 3 I did. I had a wonderful brother, nine years younger than I. I absolutely loved him. I kind of felt like I raised him to a certain degree. He was three when we moved down here. In fact, I still have a lot of family up in Salt Lake. Because of me being a care-giving situation, I can't get Dad up as often as I'd like to; it depends on his health, because I still have dad's baby sister up there and lots of cousins. And his baby sister is eighty-seven. So what is your father's name? My dad's name is Paul Pickering. And he lives here with you. He lives here with me; I am so fortunate on that. He's ninety-three. Right now he's carrying on with a little so-called girlfriend, which he's out with today. Oh, fabulous. I'm not thrilled about it, but he is. She's quite a bit younger, by about thirty years. I hope everybody that's put in a position to have their dad with them can have the joyous time that I've had with my dad because it's phenomenal. Oh, that's wonderful. Tell me who the girlfriend is who's going to join us in a little while. Pam Fogliasso. I met her in grade school. In fact, there's a lot of us that we met in grade school, when we went to Twin Lakes Grade School. We met I believe through one of our classes; I believe it was Mr. Barnes, our fifth grade teacher. In fact, we did some kind of rehashing at our last reunion this year and we actually went to North Ninth School together and Fifth Street together, which is kind of interesting. So we've got pictures of all that. She and I just kind of developed a really close relationship amongst some of our other friends that I'm sure a lot of you guys know and it just kind of has carried on for the whole time. Tell me about going to Fifth Street School. And was that the school that burned down? 4 No. Fifth Street School is on Las Vegas Boulevard. The one that was just rehabbed? It's turned into government buildings. I do believe they had a fire in the gymnasium or something and I believe that was restored. That was kind of an interesting part of our life—or my life because where I lived. I lived on North Ninth Street and there wasn't any bussing, so I either had to walk or take a bus or do whatever I had to do because I was like twelve or thirteen at that time and I had to get to school somehow. So you lived at Ninth and what? It was Ninth and Bonanza, I believe. There was North Ninth Street School, which is right up on the next block. So why did you go to Fifth Street School for a while? Because Mom and Dad had moved here from Salt Lake. We stayed in an apartment until they could find a home to buy. And eventually, in '56 I believe it was, we found a home up in Twin Lakes and we moved up there. You were telling me about Fifth Street School. Fifth Street School was really kind of fun. As a matter of fact, two of my dad's siblings, my aunt and then my uncle, went to Fifth Street during the period that my grandfather was up working on the dam and then the older siblings all went to Vegas High. So it's kind of nostalgic to me to think that my aunt and uncle went to that school. And still in pretty good shape. In fact, I could walk on the campus right now and probably tell you—I know where the music room is. I know where the gym is. I can kind of tell you where different areas was. My forte was I was the tetherball champion. So explain tetherball to me. 5 Tetherball is a pole; it has a ball on a string that comes around and you have to sock the ball everywhere and get it around the pole. So I was the championship of the school for that year. Fantastic. What are your memories of your grandfather? What kinds of stories did he tell you? My grandfather, kind of like my dad, he liked to fabricate a little bit, so you kind of had to read between the lines with him. But he took me down to the dam. He was one of the electricians that helped install all the turbines in the dam. What is his name? His name was George Pickering. And he is in the archives, I believe; my granddaughter looked it up. When he took me through the dam, he took me through all the tunnels or that used to be tunnels and he said I used to go there, there, kind of showed me underneath when we went in the bottom of the dam. And then he showed me the turbines and kind of explained to me what the turbines were, what he did, what a nightmare it was getting them installed and just kind of went through that and the basic construction of the dam. Then we went upstairs and he told me how they made the dam, layer after layer after layer. Then he did tell me—this could be a fabrication—that there was more people actually lost their lives in the dam than what they're saying. And he also said look at that wall over there; a guy lost his hand and it's buried in the cement. I can't guarantee it; I know my grandfather, because he liked to get reactions. I really think he was serious because he was trying to give me some historical points of the dam. And I said, well, Grandpa, I didn't hear that. And he said I don't care what you hear; I know what I saw. And that was kind of what he told me. So at that time when he was working on the dam, where did he live? He actually lived here in Las Vegas and he communicated (sic) I believe it was once a week. I 6 think he stayed in either Henderson or Boulder City and then would communicate (sic) here on the weekends to be here with the family because there was seven kids. So this is back in the 1930s when he was commuting? This was around 1936 and 7 when Grandpa was working on the dam. Okay. So there was no Henderson. Henderson had been started to be developed because of the dam. Was it the dam or Second World War? It was Boulder City that he actually lived in. But I think Henderson was in the prospect of being developed. I think it was Second World War that actually developed that. That's right. The Basic Magnesium plant over there during the war. Exactly, that blew up, Yes. So did he live in the barracks in Boulder City? Grandpa never told me. He just said that he lived there and he would commute and they gave him something like ten cents a week extra to commute from Boulder Dam to Vegas when he came. He made something like thirty-six cents an hour or something like that and he said he made higher wages than a lot of other guys. Because he was one of the skilled people. He had a skill; he was an electrician. And do I believe there were times that he even had to help with those high wires that went over the top. He was a brilliant man. I lost him when he was eighty-two, so he lived to be a good old life. Wonderful. Now, we have just been joined by Pam. Pam, how are you today? Iam fine, thank you. Fantastic. Pam, right there in front of you we have a pen and paper. The first one is an 7 agreement that we'd like for you to read over and sign, and the other one is just a biographical sheet that we're going to use in the archives. You can do your paperwork later. Right now we're just going to talk about your early life. So I just asked Kim about her early life, growing up here and everything. So first, could you give me your full name? Pamela Martin. Pamela, where do you live? Right now in Pahrump. Tell me how that happened. My folks moved to Pahrump in '77-78. My dad had a honey company; he had bees. So they had five acres out there and they moved out on the five acres. Can you tell me what it was like as a young person here in Las Vegas? Did you grow up in Las Vegas? I moved here when I was ten. Where were you born? In Riverside, California. And why did the family decide to move here from Riverside? My dad got a better job. He was working as an electrician. So you were telling me about the family moving from Riverside. Yes, and we moved up here. At first we lived off of Stewart and Ninth. That's where Kim and I went to North Ninth School, but we didn't know it. Then we were there only two months and we found a house and we moved out off the Tonopah Highway. We lived there for about four years, whenever I started high school. So Tonopah and what? 8 The Tonopah Highway and Harrison Lane. Harrison, okay, good. Brothers and sisters? And your father was an electrician. Both of you had electricians for fathers. No. My grandfather was an electrician. Your grandfather; that's correct. I heard her saying something about her grandfather worked on the dam. So did my great uncle; he worked on the dam. What did he do on the dam? I really don't know. He was working in construction; that's all I know. So you never had any family stories about the dam? Not a whole lot; I just know that he worked there. He worked there from the beginning to the end. They lived in Boulder City. My great-grandfather drove a twenty-mule team through Death Valley for Borax. No. What kinds of stories does the family tell about that period? Not a whole lot. My grandfather just said it was a job and it was hot, it didn't pay much, but back then nothing paid much. He did that for a couple of years. But most of my family were farmers in Idaho on my mom's side. My dad's side were kind of farmers and they had orange groves and walnut groves and things like that in Southern California. So they came here because of a job. My dad came because of a job. He workedfor Ousley Electric. So you already had a great-uncle who had been here. Did your father apply for this job? Did you get it through that great-uncle? No. My great-uncle had moved back to Idaho. No. It was a family friend; he worked in sales 9 for some electrical company or something and he knew Mr. Ousley and so he got my dad the job. My dad worked for them for several years. When he was working for them is when they put in all the streetlights and stuff over by where Rancho High School is now. Then he left them in, oh, the late fifties and went to work for what was Consolidated Electric. He worked with them for a long time. Then he became the head electrician at the Las Vegas Convention Center. So what were some of your memories of being a young girl here in Las Vegas? I really liked it. I mean it was safe, a lot safer than now. We had fun. Yes, we had fun. We had a skating rink on Bonanza and Las Vegas Boulevard. Do you remember the name of the skating rink? Where was it? On Las Vegas Boulevard. And Maryland Parkway? No. Las Vegas Boulevard and Bonanza. I think it was called the Bonanza Rink. It might have been because it was up from the icehouse. Yes. So was it near the Biltmore? Do you remember a hotel in that little area named the Biltmore? Boy, I don't. I remember there on Bonanza and Las Vegas Boulevard back in the beginning times they had kind of a dugout and there was—whose bones laid in that forever? Kit Carson's bones because supposedly he had something to do with Las Vegas. So where was this? I believe it was on Las Vegas Boulevard and Bonanza. 10 Yes. Wasn't it like on the corner? Yes, it was kind of on the comer. And then the skating rink was next to it and set back. Yes. And it was right before, oh, the arena down there, Cashman Field. Do you remember Helldorado? Oh, yes. Oh, yes, because it was a lot nicer than it is now. We actually participated in it. Do the two of you talk about it with each other? When we were kids we did. In fact, I think we went. Yes. We used to go to the rodeos. When we were in school we were in the parades. Yes, marching. Marching in the parades down Fremont Street. It was very family oriented. All the hotels in town contributed. They had a big barbeque, Western Days at the Old Frontier and the Silver Slipper. Everybody went. Everybody dressed western. Yes. Even us when we were kids, we wore gun in holster and the boots and a hat. And they don't do that now. I mean Vegas is not— the same. No. They had an old jail set up on Fremont Street. Remember that? And they used to lock you up. How did you get out of jail? It was parents that got in the jails; we never did. It was the older people. I don't know if they got rowdy or drinking or whatever, but I remember that. I think it was to raise money. 11 Probably. What about the beards? Oh, all the guys used to grow beards. My dad did; every year my dad grew a beard for Helldorado. This is the first year my dad ever grew a beard in his life [laughing]. Ninety three...he's growing a beard. I like it. All the guys used to say—I've got pictures somewhere—that my dad looked like Lincoln with his beard. Which parade did you like better? Did they have three parades or two? I only remember one. They only had one Helldorado Parade. And it went down Fifth Street. Fifth and then down Fremont. So did casinos and the school children, everybody were in the same parade? Yes, it was one big parade. Some of the casinos would have floats, things like that. But there was a lot of horses and bands. We always had our sheriffs in it. Yes. And the school bands. The school bands were in it, batons. I think there was even back in our days we even had kids riding trikes and bikes. So you came here in 1955, Kim. She beat me. 12 So you were— Fifty-four. Oh, just one year. Do either of you remember anyone talking about the Moulin Rouge Casino? Yes. My mom and dad used to patronize it. Tell me about that. What kinds of stories did they tell you about it? Mom and Dad really enjoyed it, actually. I was traumatized by it because of the brutality that the Strip showed a person like Sammy Davis Junior. I mean there was a story that went around that Sammy Davis had his child with him at one time, I believe it was the Riviera, and the child stuck his foot or something in the pool and they chastised the boy and they actually changed all the water in the pool because it contaminated it. He had to go in and out of the back door. So they would stay at the Moulin Rouge. A lot of the Rat Pack went down there on occasions. Mom and Dad used to go there and said that it was wonderful. They enjoyed it. They loved it. They loved the people. They socialized with everybody. I don't know if it went broke or if it just wasn't patronized enough; I don't know what happened, but it closed up and eventually it got burned. And people did not tell stories about why it closed? You never remember hearing rumors of why it closed? My dad might be able to tell you that. Unfortunately, he's not here right now. I just heard that it went bankrupt; they just weren't getting the people in there. Because they had changed over and allowed everyone to go in all the other hotels. When they changed that rule, then the Moulin Rouge was sitting off over there by itself and wasn't getting any business. So the Moulin Rouge was 1955. 13 My dad helped build the Moulin Rouge; he did the electrical work there. So the town was not integrated until 1960. So tell me about your father's working on the Moulin Rouge. So that must have been in 1954. In '54 and '55 he worked on the Moulin Rouge. In fact, in a house that we built we had two lights on the side of our fireplace that came from the Moulin Rouge. They had ordered and they weren't the right ones, so my dad bought them from the company. But they matched the ones in there, but they were a little smaller and they were supposed to be the bigger ones. So we had those in our house. I actually have a creamer, silver creamer with the Moulin Rouge on it. Where did you get that? From the Moulin Rouge. We used to go there when I was a kid. They had a coffee shop on one end and a friend of ours worked in the little coffee shop and we would sometimes go there. And then sometimes my folks, like hers, would go to the Moulin Rouge to see things. They usually had some great bands, great entertainment. And Mom and Dad were dancers; they loved to dance. They went for the dancing and the music because they played a lot of the oldies. Wonderful. Where did your parents go out on the Strip, which casinos were the most family friendly to locals? At one time they all were. My parents liked the Rat Pack, of course, which was the Sahara, Riviera. What was the one that burned down? The El Rancho. The El Rancho, they used to go there. They had a little amusement park in the back where you could ride things. I used to love bumper cars. So Mom and Dad would take us down there and I would baby-sit my brother and I'd put him in a bumper car and that’s where we lived [laughing]. That's great. Now, did you also go there? 14 Uh-huh. I saw Shecky Greene at the El Rancho. When I was in high school—or junior high; 1 can't remember. Junior high is when you met Wayne Newton. No. It was grade school we met Wayne Newton. No. Junior high. He didn't move here until we were in junior high. Let's see. Who was it? We used to go to the things. I know I went to the Riviera to see Liberace one year; our class went. What do you remember from that show? Oh, he's fantastic. I have loved him since I was a little kid because I used to watch him. There was a half hour show on television. Fifteen minutes was Harry Ponda, who played an organ, and then the next fifteen minutes was Liberace. I used to get home from school just in time to catch their show because I love piano music. Yes, and so do I. He had the most amazing hands, the way that he could just pick the keys. And my brother was playing piano, so that even made it more so in our house to where we were also piano buffs. Then, of course, the one thing that I'm sure her parents did, we all had to watch Lawrence Welk. We still do. My folks weren't too much on Lawrence Welk, but my grandmother was. If I ever stayed with my grandmother, we never missed Lawrence Welk. And we still don't. Your grandmother lived in Las Vegas? She actually lived in a little town called Perris, California. But she would spend two or three months with us here and then she'd go home for a while and then she'd come back. And my grandmother did the same thing. And she was living? She'd live here three or four times at a— 15 Then go back to Salt Lake? Then she'd go back to Salt Lake and live with my mom's sister, my aunt, or wherever. It depended if she were married or not. I had a very flamboyant grandmother who actually sang in the silent movies, very flamboyant. That's wonderful. We're going to talk about Rancho High School. But at the same time we're talking about Rancho, I'm going to start by having you tell me about the Blue Onion. Oh, my [laughing]. At the same time you can tell me about cruising Fremont Street. Oh, my [laughing]. So just talk to each other about that. Were you with us when I got my driver's license, the first time I took my car out, that old '49 Merk? No. I know Donna was with us. Dad had given me when I was sixteen his work car and it was an old '49 Mercury. Right now it's worth a mint. It was an eyesore, literally. I remember that. I said, Dad, this is really embarrassing. So he took it down, because he was an auto body, talked to his buddies in the paint shop. So they took all the extra cans of paint, put it in one bucket and they painted the car. It was the ugliest grayest mouse-colored thing you ever saw. It was a monster. Then the cloth headliner was falling out. So I went out and I got some paint and then I got some duct tape, the same color as the paint, and I duct-taped the whole headliner back up and I sprayed it. So then I finally took it down on my first little cruise down Fremont Street, went through the Blue Onion, a nervous wreck, had my girlfriends in with me. I pulled in, ordered a 16 cherry coke; that's what I always ordered. Time to go. I couldn't get the car in reverse because Dad had forgot to tell me, well, sometimes the gear slips out and you have to get out and you have to reorganize this. I was so humiliated. I had to ask a couple of policemen that happened to be there, I don't have reverse; could you please push me out? They pushed me out and then I think I was able to get it in first and third at that point and I got it home. That was my first experience. Then Dad told me he fixed it with tin foil, which I'm sure he didn't. But he fixed it with tin foil, so be very gentle on the gears; in other words, don't quick shift; make sure you put your stuff through. Then of course, we'd go to the Blue Onion, go up Fremont Street, go through where the Plaza is now; it used to be the train station. You make the round, come back down. God, by the time you got through with the night, you were so full of cokes that we could blow up. So what did you eat? I usually had cherry cokes, once in a while a hamburger and fries. I used to drive my dad's old pickup. He had a '52 Chevy pickup; that's the first vehicle I took downtown. Then I bought my very first car; it was a'57 Ford Wagon and I bought it from a kid that was going in the service. He had it back in the days when the cars ran on their nose. Yes. They used to jack up the rear. Yes. That's what I drove up and down Fremont Street. It didn't bounce, though; it just went on its nose. Did you work part-time jobs as young women? Yes, I did. I had a full-time baby-sitting job. I took care of the same two kids from 1959 up through 1964, from the time they were babies. The husband and wife, she was a cocktail waitress at the Flamingo and he was a dealer at the New Frontier. 17 There used to be a hotel on the Strip called the Royal Nevada. My dad worked on the Royal Nevada. He worked on the Tropicana. And I have stuff from all the hotels that he worked on. What kind of stuff do you have? From the Royal Nevada I have a shower curtain of all things; don't ask me why. I think I have a piece of silverware, also, from there and I have silverware from the Riviera. And from the Trop, I'm not sure what we had from the Trop. I've got a lot of this stuff in a box. You need to dig it out. That would be fun to go through. My mom worked for what was then Bonanza Airlines. What did she do? She worked with the comptroller of the airline. So she was kind of like a comptroller, financial. She worked for them for a long time. So I have stufffrom there. Fabulous. What kind of part-time job did you have? Like Pam, I baby-sat probably from the age of twelve to maybe fourteen, again the same family. And then I got a job; I believe I was sixteen. I worked at the Flamingo down in the basement. I stuffed mailers that they would mail. So I did all the stuff in there. And I also worked in a hamburger place up right across from where we went to junior high school. Don't ask me the name of it. There used to be a Texaco station there and then a “geedunk” store. I don't remember what it was called, either. White Cross Drugs is there on one side now and then there was a service station. White Cross Drugs then was across the street because they actually changed locations. So it's at Oakey now. No. It's Charleston and 18 1 think that call that Hyde Park now. There's a street called Hyde Park? Because we went to Hyde Park Junior High. Yes. So I worked there. In fact, that's where I met my late husband when I was sixteen. I had to work split shifts and it was really difficult because either Mom or Dad would have to come pick me up. It was kind of a nightmare for them, but they did it. I was grateful, till I got my car. But my late husband came in one time when I was in my late sixteen’s. He had just gone to his sister's wedding and he had a little bit too much to drink and had his mother in the car. He came in and he says I need two cokes, very polite, very cute. He was young, just gotten out of the Navy. I gave him two cokes and then he got them and took his mother home. This is the kind of sense of humor he had. Then an hour later he came back and he ordered another coke and I believe a hamburger or something or fries; I don't remember which. And he came back in and ordered again and he gave me like a dollar and he had change. Well, back in those days I wasn't used to a tip, especially at my age. So I walked out and I said, sir, you forgot your change, and I handed him the change. He looked at me and says something like, you silly girl, don't you know what a tip is? Well, what am I supposed to do with it? He said keep it. So then I said, well, your mother was with you, where is she? He says, oh, I took her home, put her to bed in the bathtub; I came back down to see you. So you like that sense of humor. Oh, he was that way till the day he died. He was a corker, absolutely a corker. You said you worked for the Flamingo mailing center. Did they do mailings out of town, in town? How far did the mailings reach? I don't really remember the addresses. I just remember stuffing them with fliers; that's what they were. I always came home with paper cuts. So Dianne—I don't remember her last name—got 19 me the job. She was the gal that stood up for me in my wedding. She got me the job stuffing fliers. I mean we would do a thousand a day, just stack them in boxes, take them up. You seal them; you don't have any spit left after that. And then they'd mail them out. But I don't remember if there was addresses on them; I can't remember. They were fliers; they were advertising fliers is what they were. So they probably went all over, just advertising. Tell me about your first memories of Rancho High School. Scared. It was a big school. I didn't know what my teachers were going to be. I didn't know what I was getting into and I wanted to be with our friends. About the first couple of weeks I didn't know the dress code. When you go from junior high to high school, it was a big change, kind of scary. As time, you go to your different classes and you meet people and after about the first six weeks you get a little in the groove and then you're fine. But I remember being scared, nervous. I wasn't really excited about it because it was, what, like maybe the second year the school had been open? So they weren't really up to date on what was going on either; everything was up in the air of what was happening and that. Then running from classroom to classroom to classroom— Oh, that was interesting. —none of the classes were in the same hall. This class was here and the next one was clear over there somewhere. And then you get dressed up to go to school so you look halfway decent because by the time you go to high school you're interested in boys, right? So what if you have PE, which Donna always got, first period? Then you go through all day stringy. PE was—I enjoyed some of it; some of it I didn't. It was very frustrating to me. I had Mrs. Hill. You had Mrs. Hill. I had Mrs. Laneer. She was omery and she terrified me. That's because I'm not lazy and I tend to be rather athletic, but I had at the time induced asthma by strenuous ex