Interview with Peggy L. Bostian, June 28, 2004

Nevada Test Site Oral History Project University of Nevada, Las Vegas Interview with Peggy Bostian June 28, 2004 Las Vegas, Nevada Interview Conducted By Shannon Applegate © 2007 by UNLV Libraries Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews conducted by an interviewer/ researcher with an interviewee/ narrator who possesses firsthand knowledge of historically significant events. The goal is to create an archive which adds relevant material to the existing historical record. Oral history recordings and transcripts are primary source material and do not represent the final, verified, or complete narrative of the events under discussion. Rather, oral history is a spoken remembrance or dialogue, reflecting the interviewee’s memories, points of view and personal opinions about events in response to the interviewer’s specific questions. Oral history interviews document each interviewee’s personal engagement with the history in question. They are unique records, reflecting the particular meaning the interviewee draws from her/ his individual life experience. Produced by: The Nevada Test Site Oral History Project Departments of History and Sociology University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 89154- 5020 Director and Editor Mary Palevsky Principal Investigators Robert Futrell, Dept. of Sociology Andrew Kirk, Dept. of History The material in the Nevada Test Site Oral History Project archive is based upon work supported by the U. S. Dept. of Energy under award number DEFG52- 03NV99203 and the U. S. Dept. of Education under award number P116Z040093. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in these recordings and transcripts are those of project participants— oral history interviewees and/ or oral history interviewers— and do not necessarily reflect the views of the U. S. Department of Energy or the U. S. Department of Education. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 1 Interview with Peggy Bostian June 28, 2004 Conducted by Shannon Applegate Table of Contents Introduction: birth, family background, move from Washington to Las Vegas, NV, education, work for REECo at the NTS 1 Observation of Sedan and other above- ground tests, familiarization with NTS and atomic testing through local high school programs, 2 Works for Claude Cook in REECo in Construction Department, life and sense of community in Mercury, NV ( NTS) 6 College and university education, marriage, works for CER Geonuclear Corporation in Plowshare program 9 Work and family life for women at the NTS 11 Details position as executive secretary for CER Geonuclear Corporation 13 Professional and personal relationship with Herb Grier, president of CER Geonuclear Corporation, and his wife Dorothy Grier 16 Discusses pay and benefits earned while working for REECo and CER 27 Becomes Vice- President of Corporate Administration for CER, 28 Talks about change of focus and culture in CER after Herb Grier leaves 30 Memories of Herb and Dorothy Grier 31 Encounters with protesters while working on Plowshare in Colorado, work on Rio Blanco and Rulison 32 Conclusion: thoughts on atmospheric testing and peaceful uses of nuclear energy 34 UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 1 Interview with Peggy Bostian June 28, 2004 in Las Vegas, NV Conducted by Shannon Applegate Shannon Applegate: So if you want to go ahead and start with your background. Peggy Bostian: I moved here with my family. I was born in Washington state, in a beautiful, green trees Washington state. When I was fourteen years old, my family came to Las Vegas, this dry, flat, not green desert. And as we were driving— there were four kids in the family— I think it was through Salt Lake, we came down where you see Las Vegas, I thought, what have my parents done? This is a terrible place. It was in September so I immediately enrolled at Las Vegas High School, which at that time was the only public high school. Gorman, the Catholic high school, was just built, and so that was the only high school there was to go to. And once I got into meeting friends and so forth, Las Vegas became home. And so I graduated from high school in 1958. As a summer job, I worked at REECo, Reynolds Electrical and Engineering Company, as I think, a clerk- typist in purchasing, typing purchase orders. And I worked out at the test site on a temporary basis the following summer. During the school year, I’d gone to Woodbury College in Los Angeles. Worked out at the [ Nevada] test site as a secretary to the head of personnel, and from there went to sort of working my way up. I went to work for the head of construction, which was a very interesting job. The most interesting was to work for Dr. Clinton S. Maupin, who’s the father— just learned a few months ago— of one of our supreme court justices, Bill Maupin. Dr. Maupin was the head of health medicine and safety. RAD- SAFE, radiation safety department, was under Dr. Maupin. And he was always a member of the test panel, which every time there was a shot he’d go out to UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 2 the control point, as was Troy [ Wade] a member. We have some pictures of Troy Wade looking up at the instruments and so forth. And I remember one day Dr. Maupin— we were young secretaries and we would sort of pester him and say, We would like to go to a shot. And this was in about 1961, 1962, 1963. He’d sort of just brush us off and so forth. And then one day we all came to work and he said, Tomorrow we’ll all go to see a shot. We have a little shot tomorrow. We said, Oh good. So we went out to the control point and that shot was Sedan, which was a phenomenal shot to see. Have you been out to the test site? Yes. The big crater? The enormous crater. He waited until we had a significant shot to see, and that was very, very thrilling. But he told you it was a little— Yes, OK, girls. And then you could call girls “ girls,” you know. We were girls, practically, so it wasn’t politically incorrect to say. We’re going to go out to the-- OK. And I’ve been so glad that I was able to be there and see that shot. Now did it cave in after? What it did, it raised up and sunk. It’s what they call an excavation shot. And this was all part of the Plowshare program, the idea that you could build canals, the small power of a nuclear explosive could make these huge subsidence craters. So that was a big thrill. Now where were you standing when you saw that? How far away were you? [ 00: 05: 00] Very, very, very close. We were in a visitor trailer, as I recall, and, oh, probably, let me see, here we are on Flamingo Road. Probably at Kinko’s [ 2- 3 blocks]. So pretty close. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 3 Yes, or maybe McCormick and Schmick, the restaurant. Yes, quite close. And did the earth shake? Did you feel that? Oh yes. And it made a noise. Oh really. Yes. Somewhere there might even be— I’m sure there’s videos but there might be audio as well. And I think that shot did what it was supposed to do. And the power that is so evident is pretty overwhelming. Really. Yes. So when you left, you felt overwhelmed by seeing that? It was very profound sense of what the power of a nuclear explosive can do. And it’s interesting because Troy Wade assembled the device for that shot, and the device is what they called it instead of a bomb. But he did the assembly of that particular shot. And was he in there with you when—? No, because he would be one of the ones at the Control Point panel literally controlling the setting- off, controlling the countdown and so forth, so they were in a more important and closer area than we were. Did you feel safe when the bomb went off? Yes, because we had been so familiar with test site activity, simply being residents of Las Vegas, even though I was very young, Well, that’s the test site. They test bombs out there. And then you would see things in the paper and maybe your class would have a speaker come and talk about how safe everything was. Oh really? You had somebody come in when you were in high school? UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 4 I went to school from 1954 to 1958, so I recall that somebody, maybe from AEC [ Atomic Energy Commission] or something, would come; this little booklet here [ showing booklet] was handed out. I had lost mine but one of my guy friends from school remembered that he had one of those little booklets and brought it to me. And one of our local citizens, prominent citizens in Nevada, particularly Las Vegas, her name is here, Thalia Dondero. She has just donated a bunch of these for us to sell in the [ Atomic Testing Museum] bookstore. [ Atomic Tests in Nevada, 1957, United States Atomic Energy Commission]. So you were exposed to this in high school. Yes, even though it wasn’t like we studied it in great depth because it also was very, very, very classified. But we got used to it. And somebody’s parents would work out at the test site, so it just became something we were familiar with. We didn’t understand it all particularly; we were interested more in high school things than what was going on out there. Did you have drills at all? No. But a lot of my friends who were born here, who are a little older than I am, remember the duck- and- cover things and hiding under the desks. And I remember going out right after we moved here, going out six o’clock in the morning or something and staring up north and you’d see a flash of light and so forth. Now how did that impress you at that time? Without wholly understanding and being new to Nevada— it certainly wasn’t as profound, even though it might— as seeing Sedan when I was a little older. But it was— and we didn’t understand the real scientific significance or political. I was fourteen or fifteen years old. But it was something that I look back now and I’m so glad that my parents [ 00: 10: 00] made us get up and watch. Some of my friends’ parents would pile them in the car and drive up to somewhere UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 5 up closer to the test site. I think one of my friends said they would go up and park at Angel’s Peak or something so they could really see. But you saw the flash of light and— Yes, I remember that, and I think after the first couple of times that we saw one of the shots we said, OK, well, we’ve seen those. We don’t need to see them anymore. I have to go to school now. So it was blasé? Yes. And here’s someone like you, didn’t know about the test site. And that was just— I don’t remember the figures but I remember, if it’s correct, that EG& G [ Edgerton, Germeshausen, and Grier] and the test site activities, they were, next to gaming, the biggest employer in Nevada. But I should check that fact before I say it. No, that’s— yes, that is right. Is that right? Yes. And now it’s changed so much, it’s hard to believe, but everybody knew somebody who worked at the test site. Well, and that’s something that we’re experiencing too, that as we’re going out in the community talking to people, they’re [ saying] oh yes, my cousin, or my father [ worked at the test site]. You bump into somebody that had some exposure to the test site who worked there. Exactly. That’s exactly right. But new people, new residents that are coming in, don’t even know that that’s out there, hardly. Yes. Exactly. And it is becoming now more visible to the community because of the new activities that are going on out there, like antiterrorist training and so forth. Now you had said that you had worked for the construction department? UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 6 Yes, when I worked for Reynolds Electric I worked for Claude Cook . He’s a member of our foundation [ Nevada Test Site Historical Foundation]. In fact, he sent me a letter— I had written him a letter and he sent me a letter back and sent a picture of us at his farewell party from 1962. You weren’t even born then, were you? No, I wasn’t. My parents didn’t even know each other then. Oh no! Oh dear! Now you said that it was interesting to work there. Why was that an interesting job? Well, from the time you got picked up by your carpool— everybody carpooled and it was a two- lane highway then. I think there were a couple of buses but everyone I knew carpooled. And I’d get picked up at my house something like six o’clock in the morning and drive hell- bent for the test site, go through security. It was a small town. You’ve been out there? Yes. OK. So the town of Mercury was sort of a hustling, bustling town. It wasn’t a town of skyscrapers. It was a town of buildings, sort of plain buildings, trailers, but it was a community. And so that’s what made it interesting to work for the construction, was that you were seeing this community being built or—? Well, the construction really was focused on the outer areas. It wasn’t like building Mercury, the town of Mercury. He, Mr. Cook, was in charge of the construction that was out in the areas where testing was being conducted. But I remember we would dress up like we were going to the office. I mean this [ referring to her clothes] is very casual because I don’t meet with the outer world very much. But we would dress up like we were going to the office in a bank. And it would be very much like we’re working here [ NTS Historical Foundation/ Atomic Testing Museum], only it might be in a trailer, a big trailer. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 7 Did you have air conditioning? Yes, we did, thank goodness. I’ll never forget, my parents worked a lot and one summer our air conditioning went out. My father never got around to fixing it— he wasn’t very good at [ 00: 15: 00] fixing things anyway— it wasn’t though we would call somebody from the air conditioning company to fix it because that would cost a lot of money. I remember that was a very hot summer. But yes, air conditioning out there. And as you’ve probably learned, there were sports teams, there were movies, there was a steakhouse— There were sports teams? Yes. In fact, in the last News Nob, our newsletter, there’s an article about the director of the sports program, Bill Durkee. And there was a big swimming pool. I’ll get you a copy of that News Nob. Yes, that would be great. Now, I didn’t stay all night out there. I commuted back and forth, back and forth, every day, as did many people. But many people would stay out there all week, and they were really the ones that had the sense of community and got involved in the sports teams. It was very much like they were living a life here, only it was sixty- five miles out in Mercury, Nevada. And then they might come in over the weekend. But my parents would not allow me to spend the night out there, so I had to come back and forth, back and forth, but that was just fine with me. So you would get up at six in the morning, do that hour or so commute, and then when would you leave, when would your day—? About five. As I recall, it was about five. Now how did that wear on you? Was that difficult? UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 8 When you’re young, healthy and energetic— I remember I wish sometimes I could’ve gotten a little more sleep, but it was fine. Yes, it was fine. Now were you in a trailer near Mercury or were you out more—? In Mercury. You were in Mercury. OK. Yes. And I think the construction department was a building, not a fancy building, a very plain building and so forth. You’ll see down in the museum a typical office, typical engineer’s office, we’re calling it. Not fancy but perfectly suitable. Perfectly serviceable. And you would go down to the cafeteria for lunch and—? Cafeteria for lunch, and I think it would cost a dollar. And again, it’s sort of like being in a city, only it was kind of a plain place and out in the middle of the desert. And did you know everybody? Did you get to where you recognized—? Just like here, you know people over in the DRI [ Desert Research Institute] building and you come to know the people in your environment, and the longer you work out there, of course, the more people you know. And because I didn’t stay out there during the week like a lot of people did— I think Nick Aquilina— would stay out there. They got to know more in the Mercury community than I did because I commuted. Now what types of things did you do in the construction office? I was a typical secretary. My boss— there was a lot of, manual— no, not manual typewriters, by then they were electric typewriters. Taking dictation. Forms that were necessary because it was government work. What I remember mostly was interacting with the people down the line, and correspondence, memorandum, correspondence to the people in the department. And as I recall there was a lot of communication among the other different departments within REECo, UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 9 including the downtown office of REECo. But it was certainly not dull. It was always very busy. And it’s interesting because it was not shrouded in mystery but you did have a sense that you heard a lot, Well, that’s classified. And so you just learned [ 00: 20: 00] to work in that environment and learned what you could about what wasn’t classified and do the best job that you could. How was the wage? Well, let me see. I made a dollar an hour when I was in high school. I think I made maybe four dollars an hour, three dollars an hour, when I worked out there, plus five dollars a day per diem. Oh, you got a per diem? And then it went to $ 7.50 a day. Oh, that’s great! Yes, we thought it was fabulous. So that was really the place to work, I would imagine. Yes. That’s interesting. I would be curious myself how much— and I know those facts are around— how much I made. Now how did you get that job again? Was that just—? I worked in downtown purchasing, and I just applied. I know, a friend who is still here in town, Frankie Rhodes, asked me— she worked in personnel out there and she suggested that I apply for the job of a woman who was pregnant who was leaving. So I did. So that’s how I came to work out there. Now were you going to go to college, because you said you went to that—? I went to Woodbury College for a year, and hated working in downtown Los Angeles. And so I came home after a year, did the summer, went to BYU [ Brigham Young University]. I’m not UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 10 LDS [ Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- day Saints] but lots of my friends are. I went to BYU, and then came back, went another semester— worked a summer, then I went to school another semester and thought, I need to save some more money. So I thought, I will sit out a semester and work out at the test site. And that’s when I met my husband- to- be, and I didn’t go back [ to school]. What did he do at the test site? He and two other men, boys, had driven out from North Carolina to go to work at the test site. And he worked in accounting, then he became the budget officer for REECo, and had been in the financial end for a long time. Then he went to work with REECo for a long time. Actually at one time Troy Wade was his boss in Idaho. And we were divorced in I think 1978 or something. But you were married for a long time. Yes, fifteen years. Now the amount of time that I worked at the test site was not very long. It was maybe three years, and then I transferred to the Las Vegas office, and then was approached by one of the founders of CER Corporation. Have you heard of CER Geonuclear Corporation? No. One of the founders asked me to come to work and I did, at this company that was— the “ C” was Continental Oil Company, the “ E” was EG& G [ Edgerton, Germeshausen, and Grier], and the “ R” was REECo. Those three companies formed CER Geonuclear Corporation, which was totally focused on the Plowshare program, peaceful uses of nuclear explosives. The idea being that Continental Oil Company was an oil company, gas and oil company: REECo had all the skills to be a contractor such as they were out at the test site: EG& G had all the technological expertise. Those three companies could combine to use the big power of a tiny nuclear explosive to stimulate oil and gas reserves that were not conducive to being productive by [ 00: 25: 00] UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 11 conventional means. The idea being you put this down in the ground and it makes all these fractures and gas or oil would flow down and you pump it out. We conducted two shots in Colorado, Project Rulison and Project Rio Blanco, but politically and environmentally it was very, very, very controversial and eventually the Plowshare program basically died. Now why did you transfer from the test site to the Las Vegas office? Because I had a baby. By that time, I had had two little girls and I wanted to be able to spend more time being a mom. Now you didn’t have to leave your job when you were pregnant. No. I had talked to a lady in the 1950s that had to leave her job. Really! With the AEC. Yes, she got pregnant and they said, Sorry, you’re going to have to [ leave]. Yes. So by now, this is what, early 1960s? Yes. Did you have maternity leave and all that or—? I think so, yes. I worked until— in fact, my daughter— I worked until the day before I had her, but it wasn’t planned that way. Did you really? Yes, she was very small. So I didn’t get any sense of discouragement about going to work as long as I wanted. Really. Yes. Who was that person? Norma Cox. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 12 Oh, that sounds very familiar. Yes, she was the first person hired at the AEC in 1951. Really neat lady. Great lady. So when you were pregnant, were your bosses in your office understanding that you had small children and— Yes. I didn’t get any sense that if something came up and the babysitter wasn’t available or something, I never got a sense that I was going to be in trouble if I had to take off if my children were sick. And I always felt if you work, the most important thing is your children have good care; if they were sick. I believe we were able to use sick leave, our own sick leave, if I needed to stay home because one of my girls was ill or something. So I didn’t get any sense— but 1951, that was like day one, as you said, so they were probably just forming policies and so forth. And I think too that a lot of things changed from the 1950s to the early 1960s. I think it was a real dramatic shift. Yes. Absolutely. But that’s interesting that there was no— you didn’t feel any kind of push or anything. No. Not at all. Well, that’s really interesting. So now you start working at the Las Vegas office because you’re not having to do that long commute. Right. And then from there where did you go to—? Then I was approached by Hal Aronson, he’s a member of our foundation, about going to work at CER Corporation, and Herb Grier was the president. He was the EG& G part. So I talked it over with my husband. It was going to be in Las Vegas, which was continuing to work in Las Vegas, and a new venture with exciting possibilities out there. And so I was one of the original five people. That was 1965. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 13 And what was your position? I was executive secretary to the two vice presidents. And then Jan Lusk who had worked for Herb for many years before, she was Herb Grier’s assistant. We didn’t call them assistants then; we called them secretaries and executive secretaries. And if you worked really hard, you could make your way up to be an administrative assistant. Oh really? That’s interesting. So what were your duties when you started working for this other—? Again, it was— oh, another piece of this CER Geonuclear Corporation was bringing in an industrial client like an oil company. The first one we worked with was called Austral Oil Company from Houston, Texas. They were the client. They had the property that they wanted developed. And so my job was as support to the two vice presidents who were working in bringing business in, coordinating with the AEC to get this project in Colorado off the ground. We would be working with officials in Colorado at the state, county and city level near where this project was going to be accomplished. And I don’t know what to compare it to in the office today except if you’ve been an executive secretary, it’s sort of the same. The only difference is this was so unique and challenging and exciting. It was a job I enjoyed really very, very much. Was it due to the fact that there were new things coming up all the time? Well, it was more— that this was such a profound— it had such profound possibilities. Nobody had ever— I mean the Plowshare program had been in place for a while. There was a Project Gasbuggy, I think that was in New Mexico, and the experiments were for peaceful uses of nuclear explosives. And at that time, we hadn’t been discouraged by the political aspects or the environmental aspects, reactions we were getting from the citizens of Colorado. It was all new and had great prospects. In fact, that feeling about working, not all jobs have that. Not all jobs UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 14 give the feeling that we’re doing great things, we’re going to be accomplishing things that will help the whole country, and I have missed that element. When that element isn’t there and when you have that kind of a job early on, it spoils you for other kinds of work. And so that was a very good feeling for me to have at such a young age. Was it difficult to leave government work and the test site to move on to this new venture where—? No, because the crux of that whole company really was connected with the site, because that’s where REECo was, that’s where EG& G— it was all so intertwined, it really didn’t end. Because we partnered with the AEC, it really didn’t seem that much different, because we still had the same interaction, although this was being formed as it went along because it was a totally new venture. But no, it was very much the same. I remained on REECo’s payroll. Then when EG& G bought REECo, I think that was in 1968, that was just a continuation of the same group of companies. So it was like you were still in the same organization and the same galaxy. Yes. But you were moving on to a different planet, if that— Yes. Exactly. And our offices were up here on Flamingo Road. It was an office building. The MGM Hotel was not there, which is now Bally’s, that was all desert. We had this three- story office building that now is not the Barbary Coast but it’s one of those little [ 00: 35: 00] casinos there. Our offices were on the third floor of that building. And there were five of us that started. And we had very nice offices because we were having people from industry coming in to see us, and people in government and so forth. And so it was very groundbreaking, really. Very exciting. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 15 And how would you characterize your relationship with the two vice presidents? How would you see that working relationship? Well, it was quite, I guess I could use the word “ formal.” It was always “ Mister” and it was much more formal than here. And I would say they were very distinctively different men. Oh really? Yes. How so? One of them, Hal Aronson, was very orderly, very organized, documented everything, as you should, like trip reports. The other Continental Oil Company representative was a Ph. D. and scientific guy and was just the opposite. Sort of a brainy scientific guy, and you’ve heard that some of them have their own way of working and don’t follow any rules, and so that was interesting. And somewhere along the way, there would be conflict between them. And when I look back, I mean it worked pretty well for me, working [ for] both them for as long as I did. But— Why did it work well for you? I was able to stay out of the fray during the few periods of times when Hal would get very frustrated because Hank had been like six months behind in his trip reports. When I look back now it’s pretty funny, and Hal and I have talked about this. And I think it’s no different today than in offices where a lot of personalities, different personalities, have to work together. But it sounds like you had to be very flexible to be able to work with both of these guys, and then it also sounds like you kind of held it together. Yes. Well, I don’t know if I did that or not. I know I was in- between there, and trying to give each the amount of attention that they deserved, and be fair. And then eventually I elected to go UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 16 to work for— when our company began to grow and we had a very, very fine, brilliant man who became the general counsel— John Berlinger, who has since passed away. And I wanted to learn about the legal angle, the legal aspects and the way the board of directors was formed and how it governed what we did and so forth. So I transferred and went to work for John and really enjoyed that. Were you almost like a paralegal? I don’t know if I was at that level— but the thing that I wanted to [ do]— because there wasn’t all that much legal research that needed to be done. However, one thing I really enjoyed was working closely with the board. And I remember on the list of officers, the very bottom officer was assistant secretary and that was who I was. I was so proud of that. I mean there’s chairman of the board and president and so on, and down at the very bottom, that’s where I was. But I really enjoyed it because you could be in on the really important stuff that was going on, and that was the board meetings. Oh, so you sat in on all the board meetings? Yes, and learned how to take minutes. And it sounds very simple and so forth. But John was a great, great teacher and a brilliant guy, and he was a very, very close friend of Herb’s. Yes, really a wonderful man. [ 00: 40: 00] And is this how you came in contact with Herb Grier? Well, Herb being one of the original five. The two vice presidents, Herb, Jan, and myself, we were there in between this suite of offices, and I got to know him simply— he was Mr. Grier and this famous person, and so I was sort of like, Ooh, there goes Mr. Grier. And that’s how I got to know him. So he had notoriety. UNLV Nevada Test Site Oral History Project 17 Yes. I mean he was very in the community here and out in the world at large. In this realm of business, yes, he was a very highly respected guy. And then you started working for him, correct? Yes. His secretary, very long- time secretary, executive secretary, Jan, got married and moved away. And by that time, I worked for John Berlinger, for the general counsel. He told John— Jan wanted me to replace her. But my husband Bob— at this time Herb was also president of REECo— was budget officer for REECo. So he felt it was a conflict— my husband having that position, I shouldn’t be working directly for him. He hired somebody from the outside and that did not work out. So when they had a new president, that’s when he asked me to come to work for him. Why didn’t the other work out, do you recall? [ Recording stopped for off the record remarks and then resumed]. It’s interesting because people either in school hated shorthand and didn’t get it or got it. I wasn’t a straight- A student but shorthand was sort of fun because it was highly competitive in that you had to go faster and faster and faster. My teacher, Mrs. Carruth, was very good at [ it]— it was almost like being in a race. Then she’d post all the grades up and they’re like, well, I’m the best in the class. But I’ve kept that all through the years, not nearly as fast as I used to be. It’s so funny that sometime I’ll be jotting something down automatically, without even thinking of it, and somebody’ll say, What is that? Is that Chinese? [ And I’ll say] No, it’s shorthand. [ And they’ll say] What’s shorthand? Yes, it’s pretty funny. How many words a minute can you type? Oh, you know I forget what even the [ standard is]— I remember a hundred and twenty words a minute in shorthand was really good. In shorthand. But I don’t know. I’m very, very fast, but no