page_0004

Waln Brown interviewing Clifford Falatko -2- 8/20/72
Tape 5-1
CF We had lots of Germans here, I'm, telllin' you on this corner here the whole
gosh dam thing you couldn't buy a house here it was all Protestants, lots of
Protestants only one family that was living here across the S----- ---------
Patrushka there were always Greek people living in that house but the rest
of them they were all Dutch and above they were mixed already and down here
there were, how many, quite a few homes all the way down, all Dutch.
WB How come all the Dutch got houses down here?
CF They were mostly bosses and everything else I guess.
WB These were mostly bosses homes so the Dutch were mostly bosses? So they live
in the bottom part of the town here?
CF Mostly, bosses and teachers.
WB And up town was mostly Irish and
CF The Back Street was nothing but Irish, the second street from the breaker up
Protestant homes now, Irish, that was Irish Street they used to call it and down
here, Shanty Street that was
WB That was Dutch too?
CF They were mixed already there was quite a few, now everybody went away right
after the first war they started going.
WB That's when all the young people started to leave I guess?
CF Yeh, well the mine shut down because there was nothin' but mines there, was no
strippins' here the beautiful places down here were swamp, around this way
you could see all the way down around the cemetary you could see all
the way down, now today you can't see because it's all strippin', that's
the way it goes.
WB But say for instance when you were living up on the Back Street did you come
down through this part of the town or would you get in trouble?
CF No we used to come down some times some of the kids would holler this or
throw a stone at you or something, very few, they were mainly because we used
to go to the same school you know, the same teachers, they didn't bother much
WB Was there much trouble like much fighting between the kids like the Greek
kids against the Polish kids?
CF No, no, we got along nice the parents didn't like that too much you know.
WB But the kids got along pretty fine?
CF Yeh.
WB What did a kid do around Eckley besides go to school?
CF Well nothin', in the summer time we went for huckleberries or for coal, that's
all they could do, or work in the garden because everybody had a big garden
and thay all had cows and pigs and everything, they had to help to clean up
the pigs and cows and help the parents.
WB The children had lot of chores?
CF Oh yeh.
WB A lot of work to be done, but they had some play time too didn't they?
CF Oh yeh, they had lots of time they used to go to shows, the movies, walk over
to Freeland, 3 miles over and 3 miles back, we used to pay 3 cents that was
a theatre one time I don't know what we used to call it, I don't think of it,
that used to be a theatre where that A & P, that grocery store, so we used to
go there, 3 cents.
WB Three cents to go to the movies, boy that's cheap.
CF Yeh, and walk over and walk back, well we'd get 10 cents or 15 cents we'd
buy penny bags they used to call them for 2 cents, candy and gum and stuff
like that and way comin' home - chew. But we enjoyed it, but dances, when
we were big already there was lots of dances in Freeland about 3 times a week
WB And you'd walk over to Freeland to the dances?
CF Walk over and back.