Theresa Thomas interview, March 13, 1995: transcript

An O r a l History Interview with Therese Courture Thomas 1535 # 3^3/ 3 7 P h o t o g r a p h s following page 1. Therese Courture's birthplace in Thistle, Utah 1 2. Therese Courture, ca. 1920-22 3. Ernest Ambrose Courture, ca. 1938 2 4. Cyril, Millie, and Nina June Courture, ca. 1941 2 5. Therese Courture and Carl Deere, 1938 12 6. Therese Courture's ballroom dancing class at Boulder City's Civilian Conservation Corps camp, ca. 1938 13 7. Therese Courture's first Boulder City dance class, 1935 15 8. Cast members of Therese Courture's Baby Broadcast of 1937 15 9. Cast of Therese Courture's 1939 Spring Recital 15 10. Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, 1938 16 11. Therese Courture, 1938 19 12. Therese Courture with her first accordion, 1934-35 19 13. Bob Sahagian and Therese Courture, ca. 1945-46 28 14. Therese Courture and Carl Zeller, ca. 1943-44 30 15. Therese Courture in the Esquire Lounge and Bar, Las Vegas, 1948 32 16. Gil Cooper Trio, ca. 1951 34 17. Dorothy Dillon and Therese Courture, ca. 1949 34 18. The Desert Drifters at KENO Radio, 1941 35 19. Grand Canyon-Boulder Dam Tours, Inc. [GCBDT] tour boat, ca. 1938 39 20. GCBDT tour map, ca. 1938-39 39 21. Therese Courture in her GCBDT hostess uniform, ca. 1941 42 22. GCBDT tour boat interior with Therese Courture, ca. 1940-41 42 23. Sims Ely's letter of permission for Therese Courture to teach dancing in Boulder City, 1935 44 24. Therese Courture and Charles Guy at the Katherine Center, 1995 47 * * * * ii Boulder City Library Oral History Project Interview with Therese Courture Thomas conducted by Dennis McBride March 13, This is Dennis McBride and Therese Courture Thomas, talking about all kinds of interesting things, Boulder City and music, at Therese's home at 3017 Turquoise Street, in the Twin Lakes section of Las Vegas. This is Monday, March 13,1995. Tell me when you were born, and where, and about your family. I was born in Thistle, Utah, which is no more. Thistle is that little town up in Spanish Fork Canyon that the mountain slid down and blocked off two rivers and made a lake where the town was.l Was it an earthquake? No. The thing that happened, I guess, was there were natural springs in the mountains, and when they made the new roads they dynamited and disturbed the natural waters. And they had a place called Castilla Springs that was seltzer water, bath, [a] place where people used to go take hot baths.2 A resort? Top Photograph Hand-written caption on album page reads, "My Birthplace." [Thistle, Utah J [photo courtesy of Therese Oourture Thomas. negative In the possession of Dennis McBride] oottom Photographs Baby Therese Courture in Thistle, Utah, ca. 1920 - IS [photographs courtesy of Therese Courtu M°cB°lratlVeS the P°S~ ° f 2 Yeah. It just all messed the whole thing up. So the whole town is gone now. When were you born there? 1917. July 5. I had a brother, Cyril, and sister Nina June. We were all born in Thistle. 1 hen we moved to Provo, Utah. I was about six years old when we moved there. WJuit did your dad do for a living? My dad, evidently, worked for the railroad while we lived in Thistle, because I think that's about all there was there. My mother's family were railroad [people]. Then when he went to Provo, the steel plant is the first place I remember him working. Columbia Steel, I think it was called, and it was out near Springville. Springville seems to have gone into being an herb town. All the herbs come from there.3 What was your dad's name and your mother's name? My dad's name was [Ernest Ambrose] Courture. And my mother was Millie. How long did you live in Provo? Until I was 15,1 think, when we went to Boulder City. Then your dad was working up there when the stock market crashed. In the meantime, after he stopped working at the steel plant, he went into a contracting business with a fellow. And, of course, when the Crash came they lost everything. He was building homes and stores and businesses and things. I remember he built one of them up on University Avenue. Is it still standing? I imagine so. A big brick house. I can remember that. Top Photograph l-r Cyril Courture, Millie Courture, Nina June C'nurture ca. 1941 [photo courtesy of Therese Thomas: negative In the possession of Dennis hdcBride] Bottom Photograph Ernest Ambrose Courture, cn. 1938 [photo courtesy of Therese Thomas: negative In the possession of Dennis hhcBrlde] 3 And I used to walk all the way up there, almost to the BYU.4 Then he decided to come to the [Hoover] dam construction because everybody in the United States was trying to get jobs here. Was he out of work [in Provo] very long before he came down here to Hoover Dam? No, not really. I think right after they knew they'd lost their business and everything was gone, he just took the car and came to Las Vegas. Everybody had to come to Vegas to get work on the dam. You couldn't go out [to Boulder City ] unless you were already hired. Do yon remember your dad, your mother, discussing, just before they came down here, the loss of their business and what they were going to do next? Or did they share that with you ? 1 don't think they talked too much about that around us. But I remember that in order to eat we had a grocery man that let us charge groceries. For how long, I don't know, but he got paid eventually. And we used to eat a lot of liver because liver was only ten cents a pound. Nobody ate liver in those days. Did your dad come down ahead of his family to see what he could come up with? Yes. 1 don't remember how long he was here before Mother came to visit him. What job did he take when he came down here ? He was a laborer, just plain laborer. He put his name in like everybody else did, two or three different ways, and, of course, the wrong one came up. Under an assumed name? I've heard that story, that the workers did that. They drew Courtney, and that's [the name] he worked under for quite some time. Instead of Courture, he had Courtney You and your mother and your brother and sister came down after he was established here? After he'd been working quite awhile. My mother came first. I remember she came in the spring because 1 was going to graduate from the eighth grade. She brought me my graduation dress back from here, she bought it in Las Vegas. Then we went back down with her that summer. In the summer you got here? Hot! It wasn't quite hot yet. It hadn't turned too hot by then. But we didn't stay. We went back to Provo because Dad didn't have a place for us to live. I remember when we moved here, which was a little later, and Tommy Nelson^ drove us down. You knew Tommy Nelson that long ago? Yeah. How did you know him ? I guess my mother or my dad, somebody met him, and he was going to come to Utah, and he drove our car back. That's all I remember. And he picked up your family? Yeah. And we had a trailer on the back of the car with mattresses. We looked like Okies. When you did finally move down here, do you remember what year that was? '31,1 think. The fall of '31. What did you think of this landscape? It wasn't anything you were used to. No. But Boulder Cty was nice. We lived in Las Vegas. It's hard for me to emember back that far, really. We lived in Las Vegas in a little house behind mother house when we got here. And my dad had rented it, and he was still in loulder City. But he came back home. But then he didn't come home. I can't emember if it was the first night we were here, or just a few nights later. He lidn't come home because he got hurt on the dam. They had a cave-in in the liversion tunnels and he got injured.7 I guess he had some broken ribs, and he vas 'n hospital in Boulder City. They got word to mother about it. So how long that went on, I can't remember. You know, when you're a kid like hat, you don't remember all that stuff. It doesn't really sink in. Finally, a man that had a home he'd built [in Boulder City]—his wife had left lim because she didn t want to live in Nevada any longer—and he had three children. And my mother was going to take care of the meals and take care of the children while he worked, and he let us have the house. That's how we got to move over to Boulder City. So your mother essentially worked doing that and was paid by getting the house? Yes, we got to use the house for her taking care of the kids and fixing the meals. 1 don't know what the arrangements were on the food. Did you all Irve in that same house? No, he lived in a little house in the back. But do you know I can't remember whether his children stayed in the house? I can't remember that part, either. You went to school in Boulder City? Yes, I went to school in the red building.® What is it now? It's the city hall now. That was the beginning of school [for me in Boulder City]. Eighth and ninth grade, if I remember. I started out there in the ninth grade. Do you remember any of your teachers? 6 I remember Miss Tilley.9 I've heard of Miss Tilley. The red-headed teacher. Tell me about her. She dyed her hair red and she was a little whiz, I'll tell you! You had to behave yourself. She had a temper to go with the hair. Did you ever get in trouble in school? No. I was a good kid! What did she used to do to the kids ivho got in trouble? Just yell at them, as I remember. Do you remember what kind of courses you studied? Oh, 1 had a French teacher, and I can't remember her name. I took French. And I had a math teacher. Do you remember Elton Garrett?^® Yes, I've known Elton for a long time, but I think he was just a teacher when I knew him. My sister, who is five years younger than me, she was more in his time. You later went on to teach dance. Did you take part in any kind of programs or plays or dances when you were in school in Boulder City in ninth grade? Your interest in the subject—did it come that early? How I got started in dancing [was] before we left Utah. I was taking dancing from a lady before my dad lost his business. She didn't have anybody to play the piano for her, so I played the piano. Even then, like I was twelve years old, I [could] play by ear. You never had lessons? I had a few lessons when I was eight years old and nine years old. I didn't really learn a lot except how to read the top line. I didn't know how to read the bottom line on music, because they are different. The treble and the bass scale are different. They're one space different. I played the Pagan Love Song and things like that for them to do the waltz clog, and East Side, West Side, and things like that. And by watching her while she taught lessons, I got the idea how to teach. And I guess it just came to me that way. What kind of opportunities did you have for playing after you got to Boulder City? Did you play in the church ? I used to help the church with their programs. I used to help the school with their programs after I came over to Las Vegas. I don't remember doing too much of that in Boulder City because I don't think there was too much of that they did. I don't remember the school having any assemblies or things like that. Was it the LDS church you helped at? Yes. What kind of programs did they used to have, that you remember, that you might have been involved in? Usually if there was somebody going to sing. We had little programs at night sometimes. They'd put on a little skit or a little funny thing. Like Mrs. Manning, Catherine Manning, used to always put on funny things. She was a comedienne. One time I played the piano for my brother to sing like a chicken [clucks]. Little silly things like that. And then as „me wen, along, when they had a dance or something rd play for them ,o have a dance. When , go, married, , played for my own Ldm for people to have then dance! My husband played guitar Did evyeoru play for any of the dances they had in the American Legion ?H No, that's before I got into music like that. When you mere a kid in Boulder City, ahat did you do for fun? Wte kind of games did you play, what kind of gang did you run around with? When 1 got to be sixteen, 1 went with church boys, boys that were in the Mormon church. Now, some of the boys worked in the mess hall. 12 Some of the boys worked on the dam. Some of the kids I went down to the lake to go swimming with were kids 1 went to school with, and some of them workers on the dam. Did you date a lot? Were you popular? I dated a lot later, when 1 got past sixteen. I didn't do too much of any going with boys before I was sixteen. Tell me about some of your dating later on when you got past sixteen. I always used to have fun about it. When I tell about it now, I say I had one [boyfriend] for the swing shift, one for the day shift, and one for the night shift. I got to see a lot of Boulder Dam being built by going with these men that worked on the dam. They'd take you down there, and they knew so-and-so that was the foreman of the shift, and you could go up in the tunnels. I got to ride on the skips that went across [the canyon]. 13 it was a little breezy when you got out on there, hanging over the dam. Did it scare you ? No, 1 don't think kids get scared of things like that. mere duidse d toy goou on dates, besides on the dam? do That's mostly what we did, was ride down to the dam. Or if it was a day date we go down to the lake and p,ay in the sand as the lake was being formed, tlw sandy beaches that were there. It was the CCC boys who put the sand in down there. Yeah, but that was on the big main beach, though. Before the lake came up there was all kinds of roads you could go on. Like the road you could go down to where Murl Emery had his ferry.M There was a lot of places down there where the water was just coming up. We used to go down and have goobers. I hey always look goobers and the boys took beer, and they had Coca-Cola and stuff for the girls if they wanted it. But I never did drink then, ever. What's a goober? A peanut! And then we'd have weenie roasts. We had all kinds of things to do. Did you ever get into Vegas? Yeah, I'd come into Vegas with my folks, usually, in the beginning. Then after I started going to school here, of course, I was here every day. But I didn't go anywhere but school, most of the time. Talk about going to school in Las Vegas, to high school. Boulder City didn't have a high school thenA$ It had up to the ninth grade, I think, and you had to come in [to Las Vegas] to go to the tenth grade. How did you get back and forth? They had the big red buses, big red tin buses. I don't know how they ever managed to keep those things running. They have such beautiful school buses now. Were there a lot of high school kids in Boulder then who had to take the buses into Vegas? Yeah, we had two buses. There was ninety seniors in the class the year I graduated. Boulder City and Las Vegas both. Did you have much chance to be involved in school activities in Las Vegas? I was involved in quite a bit, but not as much as I could have been. I could have come over to more games and things like that, but I didn't care to. I was more interested in what went on in Boulder City. Did you get to places like Lorenzi Park or Ladd's springs?16 Oh, yeah. Ladd's. Where was Ladd's? Laid s would be down on / Fremont Street], out in that area. It was a swimming hole. Ladd's, I think you're talking about the swimming pool that was there on Fremont, or just off of Fremont. I used to go there. I can remember what it looked like. It wasn't very lovely, believe me. How about Lorenzi Park?^ I remember we used to have to walk out to Lorenzi unless someone had a car. It was a dirt road out here. And they had two lakes. I went to school with Pauline Lorenzi. 18 ] went to school with the girls whose father had a drug store. Ferron.19 They had a gazebo out in the middle of one of the lakes. I think they had band concerts and things in the daytime. But, see, I was living in Boulder City, so I didn't go to things like that. Let's talk a little bit about the CCC. They came to Boulder City in 1935, the first bunch of them. Do you remember when they came to town, or remember seeing the boys around town in their uniforms? we were kind of half scared of then, We girls, a, firs,. How come? :::::zzrrr in-for °ne ,hing- ^ ^. > was. to them dayS' " t00k a 1Wle WMe f°r US '° warm UP 1 had read that often when the CCC boys came to town, the people in town didn't get along w,th them, or really didn't welcome them at first. Was that the same case in Boulder? I on t remember if Boulder City was like that. Most of what I remember about the C C Cs is that they were in those barracks down there in the front part of town 2U Kind of close to where we used to have our dances. Wasn't that building kind of near there? Yes- lt u'as behind the American Legion Hall ,21 down in there. The officerS22 had certain days they'd invite the people to come and have dinner over there on Sunday. And then as the boys got acquainted with different people, they would allow them to bring guests to come and eat over at the barracks. And the same thing was when the mess hal|23 was there. The CCCs came after the mess hall and all that was gone. We used to go over in the mess hall and eat on special days. And if someone had a guest they wanted to bring, they could. Do you remembei- the Anderson Brothers Mess Hall? Do you remember eating in there? What was it like? Lots of food, oh boy! They really did, and good food, as I remember it. They used to make coconut macaroon cookies that I loved! Did you have Thanksgiving there, Christmas dinner? Yeah, 1 have eaten both places i when they invited us. sSlvmg and Christmas, the CCC camp I think the people in Boulder City were very good about the CCC boy, Did local girls and CCC boys date much? Yeah. I married one of them. Tell me how you met this guy. What was his name? His name was Carl Deere and he was from Mansfield, Ohio. He had a buddy named Charlie Guy, who's still here. In fact, Charlie and I play music at the Katherine Center every Friday morning, for the seniors up there.24 I guess Dusty-his nickname was Dusty-he was going with a girl over in Las Vegas. Now, the CC C boys, some of them, come over to Las Vegas. I don't think they had a CCC camp over here. Yes.25 He was going with a girl over [there] at the time I met him. Hcnv did you meet him? I can't just remember how come I met him. I think probably because he played a guitar. At that time I was kind of in to the music and I had been playing with a man that played banjo, and another man that played guitar, and learning to play other chords besides in the key of C which is what I first knew. When I first started playing, everything was in the key of C. And I think that's how I met [Carl] is because he played guitar. Do you remember what year you met him? 1 can't remember even how long I knew him before we got married. I probably met him in '38 because we got married in '39, then he didn't want me to teach dancing. I was teaching dancing at that time when I met him. Therese Courture and Car! Deere in Boulder City before their marriage, 1938. [photo courtesy of Therese Courture Thomas: negative in the possession of Dennis hhcBrldeJ Besides his playing the guitar, was it that attracted youw thoa ht im? He wasn t a bad-look.ng critter. He had blond curly hair. And he sang. That's what brought us together, really, was playing somehow. Isn't that something? I never have thought of that. I'll have to ask Charlie [Guy] how [Carl and I] met. Were you down at the camp very muchC? CYCo u taught ballroom dancing to these boys. We used the VFVV hall26 and I gave those boys their lessons for ballroom so they could learn how to dance and go to the dances and participate in them. So many of them said they didn't know how to dance. I don't remember if I even charged them for that. And the girls that came to be their partners were volunteer girls from the Boulder City young teenage set. Did any of them get romantically involved with the boys they were helping dance? Boy, I don't know. I wasn't that nosy. I didn't try to find out. Were the boys good dancers, or were they pretty clumsy at first? They caught on pretty good. The way I taught was very simple. I had had experience teaching for a ballroom ... in San Diego one time. I used to go every summer and study dancing. I never did teach [in Boulder City] in the summer because it was too hot. And I'd go study. So I had applied for a job as a ballroom teacher and I saw how they taught ballroom dancing, so I used that when I was teaching the boys at the CCC camp. There was quite a few came to the first turnout, but they didn't all hang on and keep coming. I don't remember how long we had the lessons, how long I did it. Quite a while I think. When you were teaching them ballroom dancing, was that quite a while before you met the CCC boy that you married? I think I already knew Dusty then, but it was before we got married. ^sssssssstxrjg-. Do you remember any of the work that the CCC hn, an the lake? JS dld around Boulder City or down at The main work that I remember thpm ^ • - « —- « •-- The boyC:C, pCu t together programs, too. Singing programs. Yeah, but I don't remember that I ever played over there. Do you ever renumber seeing one or going to one of their programs? No, sure don't. They had them at the I Boulder] Theatre as well. Now that could have been where I met [Carl]. Earl Brothers.28 j don.t remember if he was doing those amateur programs at that time or not. But that could have been how I met [Carl]. I know I played for one CCC boy to sing, Alfred Langley. He came and got on the program, I auditioned the people. Then I had to play for them, whatever little thing they did, if it needed music. These were special things put on by Earl Brothers? Veah. It was called Amateur Night. They had singers and dancers, and comedians, and people that did magic tricks. All kinds of different things. Do you recall any in particular that might have impressed you as being very good or very bad or very unusual? There's a lawyer here in town that I played for, and I can't think of his name now. All these names aren't available anymore. He sang. He's a Mormon fellow. Rex [Jarrett]. I played for him. He had a very good voice. I see him every once in awhile. When I go to the Mormon church, they have programs and I go play for them, and he always says, "This k fV,Q • , , was just a young kid then. Rex is quite ^ '° Si"8! ^ Ke Tell me about your dancing studio in Boulder Cih/ u , , ty. How did you come to establish it? I, for one thing, danced two or three timpc our programs were at the church because the ^ M°St °f have here in Vegas now. r taught ° have things like they the amateur program she won midT^ she danced on don't you have a dancing studio? Wo I,. ' y dy was sa>'m& "Why 1 had us, a tew the f,T'eaZ1 ^ ^ ^ S° ' « a basemen,. Did the Mormon chu h T 7" ' ^ 3 S,Ud'° in the studio was in the Mmm™ch^I^ ',T ^ ^ available. Things like ,ha, weren't ,00 availaWe mllll^'you 'kJw WhlnTgolTbi'3868 T'r 'ibrarieS and a" """ S,uff like ,hey do here nowy t l o 88 S neX* year" 1 S^ted out into the ... seems to me, like Mr. Garehime, he was the man who had the music store over there he ad a budding he wasn't using anymore where he'd had his music [store] 29 Bu, on e other side of ,t was a mortuary. I don't think the mortuary was even open en I had my studio there. So my dad built the barres in the walls for the kids and I had my studio over there. ' I have to put this little bit in. Do you remember when they found that Indian up in the mountains? Queho? 30 >eah, Queho. Guess where they put his bones? In the rest room of my dance studio! It was the rest room that went to the mortuary and my dance studio. My students went in there when they come to dancing lesson that day, and came running back in. Terry, there's a skeleton in there!" And there he was, laying out on the sink. So after I had the studio in the Garehime building, I decided to see about getting a bigger one because my class kept growing. I went over to the basement of the church across from where our house was on the corner of Utah and Arizona [Streets].31 Which church did you say that is? 1 Top Photograph Therese Courture's first dnnce class, held in the Mormon Church in Boulder City, 1935 [photo courtesy of Therese Thomas, negative In the possession of Dennis hhcBride] Middle Photograph W37 members of the Baln> Broadcast of [photo courtesy of Therese Thomas Srifaf ThereSe Courtur«"s 7939 Spring McBHde] P°ssess'°n of Dennis Episcopal? Episcopal. The bishop rented me the „f ,he church for ,hose ^ a week needed o use , So , had my dad p„, in nice barres, and I had a pLo d,i own rtphi ere,t and jm ats for the acrobatics • JT instt Whadi .a reguli ar race dancing studio there. I hen I graduated over here to T vPfme u» r x, 6 nere ™ Las Ve§as because I thought maybe I could keep a dance studio up over here 32 r A\A it fnr, . . . J , , P 1 dld " ,or two years, but it was too much to come back and forth for the amount of students I had. Do ryeomu ember wlmtyear it wasthat you started your studio first in Boulder City? I think it was before I got out of school, the first teaching I did. It was only on Saturday. How much did xjou charge a student? Fifty cents a lesson. And then $3.75 a month. I don't think I ever charged any more than $3.75 a month. That was my price all the time. They had their class lesson, and then if they wanted to come and take a private lesson to help them get ahead a little more, they could do that. Some of them did and some of them didn't. Tell me about some of the programs that you put together with your dance classes out in Boulder City. Usually 1 had a recital in the spring, just about the time school would let out. My most well-known one was Stioiv White and the Seven Dwarves.33 Which my mother helped me with. She did the play part of that. The play part? Yeah. We had the little stage play with Snow White and the dwarves, and the whole story of Snow White. I used what I called the prelude, which was in the beginning, telling about how the Queen Mother was spinning and it was snowing and she pricked her finger with the needle and the blood fell on the snow, and she said she'd like to have a little girl with skin as white as snow and 'tysMormon Church on April 22 nmi 2 - |u ;s lips as red as the blood, or whatever Ar>A *, T, , , ,.WI ' wnatever- And that was the way we put the play on. It was a real cute little play. F y Your mother wrote that part? No, I wrote it all. At that time Good Housekeeping [magazine] had started to have the story of the play as Disney was doing it. This is at the same time Disney was making his Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. So I had those pictures to go by for the costumes, too. Who made the costumes, who designed the stage sets? 1 designed the costumes and usually ended up making the majority of them. A lot of the mothers sewed, but a lot of them didn't. And the set design and flats? The set designs were done by my father and several other people. Doris Kelly helped with the art work, and several other people that cooperated. Everybody worked together. Do you remember that opening night of your Snow White recital? Were you tieivous? I was nervous, sure. I was always nervous because I had to remember all the dances and be there to prompt them. I did have a lady played piano for me for that one, though. Usually I played piano for my own classes. Did you do the choreography, too? Urn, hmm. Where did you learn to do this? I don't know, Dennis. It just came to me. I used to go to the movies. Mr. Brothers would let me in. After I paid one time to see the movie he'd let me in as many times as I wanted to because I'd sit there and copy the steps down in a notebook. Eleanor Powell and Fred Astaire and G" do them on the film. Some of them I didn't get rilhT' T** W°Uld proceed to the ideas how to put things together ' y°U w' but gave me -4™L:.th-rr,r::r—- IAntiy'o,uS b ad. It was jus"t something you brought with you. "" 1™ •* *•>*•»•—- Were either your brother or sister talented in that way? My brother played guitar and sang, and my sister played boogie-woogie. I taught her to play the p.ano boogie-woogie. But neither one of them followed. My brother was a dentist and my sister was a secretary to a bank president. It's just like my kids: neither one of them did it, either. I guess it ends here! Yotialso did the Baby lake a Bow program at the [Boulder] Theatre? Yeah. That was, I forget which year. About '36 or '37. It was called Babi/ Broadcast.34 Tell me about putting that together with all these little, little kids. They were so small. Were they easy to work with ? °h, yeah, most of them. How did you teach children that small? Well, I think the smallest I had was like, three and four. Usually they were four. But the majority of them were five and six. They just looked little because I had them dressed up in long dresses and things like that. I don't know how I did it. I wonder myself now how I did it. That was held at the Boulder Thneeaattrree , ttoono . Dn;iad Earl; BD rothers rent you that space? No, he always just let me use it. He was a wonderful man. Do yj ou remember him veraj zwoeeull ? Wvvhnaatt hkinwd oncf man was hi e? I,fr you could describe his character. He was very interested in children, I think, a lot. I know it was because of him my brother finished school. My brother was going to be a drop out, and Earl Brothers said he'd give him $20 or something if he'd go ahead and finish and graduate. And he did. And he ended up going to college. Do you remember Mrs. Brothers, the first Mrs. Brothers, Gladys?35 Wlmt do you remember about her? I've heard almost nothing about her. I taught Earl Brothers' daughter dancing. And that's about all the association I had with Mrs. Brothers. She was a very kind person as far as I can remember. I don't remember having too much to do with where she was around. I think she was more a business-type of woman. That's the appearance she gave. You mentioned that you never stayed in Boulder during the summers? I did after a while. You mentioned going to California to study dancing, or to work around dancing? 1 usually would go down there for just a short time, though. Like a six-week course or something. Where did you go down there? As a rule I would get a job in a dance studio. I got a job in one in Long Beach °ne time playing piano for dance classes. And then I got my dance classes, instead of getting a salary. I'd get a job in somebody's home doing their housework, and helping around the house, with them knowing that I had to be Top Photograph Hand-written caption on back reads, "Therese in Boulder City, D Street, about 19 yrs." fca. 1938] [photo courtesy of Therese Oourture Thomas', negative in the possession of Dennis McBrlde] Bottom Photograph Hand-written caption on back reads, "Me, Therese, at Utah St., B. C., Nev. 1934 (?). First accordion 1 played at the first Helldorado." [Las Vegas s first Helldorado was celebrated in April 1935.] [photo courtesy of Therese Oourture Thomas; negative in the possession of Dennis McBride] Top Photograph Hand-written caption on back reads, "Therese in Boulder City, D Street, about 19 yrs." |ca. 1938| [photo courtesy of Therese Courture Thomos, negative in the possession of Dennis McBride] Hand-written caption on back reads, "Me, Therese, at Utah St. B. C, Nev. 1934 (?). First accordion I played at the first Helldorado." [Las egasE, first Helldorado was celebrated in April 1935.] [photo courtesy af Therese Dourture Thomas,: negative in "hi possession of Dennis McBride] gone for certain hours ,o go the studio. And ^ wou]d room. Then I d go to work in the studio piaying for my dancing lessons. a, you remember any of the st,.Cos in particular, or any of the teachers mho taught you, that you worked with down in California? 1 remember one in Long Beach was a very well-known one. Then one in Los Angeles was one 1 played for the lessons there. It wasn't a very fruitful thing. I got took. I didn't get what I went there for. But then you d come back to Boulder City with what you'd learned down there? The one in Long Beach really helped me a lot because I was