ORAL HISTORY OF CONNIE JORDAN GREEN
Interviewed by Don Hunnicutt
Filmed by BBB Communications, LLC.
December 7, 2016
1
MR. HUNNICUTT:This interview is for the Center for Oak Ridge Oral History. The date is December 7, 2016. I am Don Hunnicutt, with Connie Green, in the studio of BBB Communications, LLC., 170 Randolph Road, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, to take her oral history about living in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Connie, state your full name, place of birth, and date. Your maiden name, as well.
MRS. GREEN: My full name is Connie Ruth Jordan, Green by marriage. I was born in Grant Town, West Virginia, February 4, 1938.
MR. HUNNICUTT:And, your father's name, and place of birth, if you recall.
MRS. GREEN: Early Addison Jordan. He was born in Pulaski, Virginia, and lived there until he went off to college.
MR. HUNNICUTT:You remember the date?
MRS. GREEN: Oh, yes. November 2, 1911.
MR. HUNNICUTT:And, your mother's maiden name, and place of birth, and date.
MRS. GREEN: Ruth Rebecca Hall. She was born in Kentucky, in a small mining camp, Wolfpit. Her family, later, moved to Weeksbury, Kentucky, which is also a mining camp, and that's where she grew up. She was born February 25, 1915.
MR. HUNNICUTT:And, on your father's side, what was his name, and, if you recall, place of birth, and date, your grandfather on his side?
MRS. GREEN:His name was Glen Thomas Jordan, and I'm pretty sure he was born in Pulaski, Virginia, because there's a home place, a farm there. My great-great grandfather built the house, and my great-grandfather added onto the house, and my dad was born there, his brothers were born there. They all grew up there.
MR. HUNNICUTT:What about your grandmother, on that side.
MRS. GREEN: My paternal grandmother was from Wytheville, Virginia, and her maiden name was Early. She was Janie Early.
MR. HUNNICUTT:How about on the other side of the family?
MRS. GREEN: My mother's parents were from Tennessee, which was sort of strange when we moved back to Tennessee and had relatives all over the place. Her mother was Alice Ashley and she was from some place around Oakdale. My mother's father was Bert Hall, and he was from the Sweetwater area. I have no idea of their birth dates.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Tell me about your father's school history.
MRS. GREEN: He went all through school in Pulaski. He went off to Virginia Tech, which, at that time, was VPI [Virginia Polytechnic Institute]. I think, if I remember correctly, my dad's dream was to be a dentist, which seems strange, in light of the way his life turned out, but the Depression caused him to leave college. He dropped out to go to work, and he ended up working for Kopper Coal Company, which is the company that ran the mining camp where my mother lived. So, that's how they met. My dad was managing the soda fountain at the company store, there. He took one look at my mother, and that was that.
MR. HUNNICUTT:And, where, and, if you remember, what date, did they get married?
MRS. GREEN: Yes. They got married December 26, 1935. And, they got married in Grant Town. My dad was transferred from Weeksbury, to Grant Town, West Virginia. My mother had a sister in that town, and she went to visit her sister during the Christmas break, and she and my dad got married. She stayed there, and my older sister and I were both born there. Then, the family went back to Weeksbury.
MR. HUNNICUTT:To the home place, that you spoke of?
MRS. GREEN: To my mother's home town.
MR. HUNNICUTT:So, what about your mother's school history?
MRS. GREEN: Mother dropped out of school in high school. It was something she never wanted people to know, because she was a very smart person, and she held a lot of responsible jobs, but she dropped out of school to help her family. Her father was a coal miner. She came from a large family. She was right in the middle of the family. She was, by no means, the oldest, but she felt that her younger brother and sister needed to finish their educations, so she dropped out, and went to work at the company store, to help them get through school.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Do you recall your parents talking about the Depression?
MRS. GREEN: Yes, yes. The Depression had a profound effect on both of my parents.
MR. HUNNICUTT:It, it did, mostly, all over the United States.
MRS. GREEN: It did, yeah, it did. You know, one of my mother's goals in life was that we would never be hungry. I think, that came from those years of trying to get through the Depression, with her family, you know, a struggling, coal mining, family. We always had plenty of food.
MR. HUNNICUTT:You, do you think that people, from that era, and their children, that they had afterwards, it, kind of, made them be more thrifty than kids are today?
MRS. GREEN: Oh, there's no doubt about that. (laughs) I think our, my kids, even now, wonder about some of the things that we did, as they were children.Because my husband and I bought a farm, and moved out to the country when our son was just a year and a half old, and our first daughter hadn't yet been born. Of course, we raised our food, and we had beef cattle.We did not go to Europe, we did not, even, go to Florida, except for one time, when they were little. I think they believed they grew up with, maybe, frugal parents, is a good way to put it. Penny-pinching parents, is probably how they think about it.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Do you see any of that in them today?
MRS. GREEN: Not a whole lot, not a whole lot. I wouldn't say that they are spendthrifts, but I would say that they are not as careful with a dollar as my husband and I always were.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Well, while we're talking about them, what's their names, and where are they, and what's their ages?
MRS. GREEN: My oldest is our son, Scott. He's a criminal court judge in Knoxville. He is in his mid-50s.Then, our daughter, Melissa, is the CPA [Certified Public Accountant] for bankruptcy, a Chapter 13 bankruptcy organization, in Knoxville. She is, let's see, she was born in '63. She just turned 53. Then, our youngest daughter is Amanda, and she lives in Loudon County, not too far from my husband and me, about seven miles. She and her husband run a fencing company. She's the office manager. Her degrees are in foreign language, international business, and then, she got a nursing degree later. I tell her if a Frenchman with a broken leg ever needs a fence, she's got him all covered.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Does she ever use her foreign language degree?
MRS. GREEN: Only for fun, you know. I think she still reads, a little bit, in French. And, I think, she tries to get online and listen to French.Of course, if there's an interview with a French person, she understands it, as well as the translators do, so that's kind of nice.
MR. HUNNICUTT:So, while we're talking, where do you live today?
MRS. GREEN: We live on the farm in Loudon County, right near Melton Hill Dam, just, right outside the city limits of Oak Ridge.
MR. HUNNICUTT:You have brothers, and sisters?
MRS. GREEN: I do, I have two sisters, both of whom are still living. My older sister lives in Maryville, and my younger sister is still here, in Oak Ridge.
MR. HUNNICUTT:What are their names?
MRS. GREEN: The older one is Alice Yount. We've always called her, "Kitty," and she goes by "Kitty" primarily.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Could you spell her last name?
MRS. GREEN: Y-O-U-N-T. And, my younger sister is Sue Stansberry.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Did you, you mentioned about your father working in the soda department, at the mining camp, I guess you'd call it. What brought him to Oak Ridge?
MRS. GREEN: The war. My dad worked for the company store.As I told you, he was sent to Grant Town, and sent back to Weeksbury, still in the company store. By that time, my parents had three little girls, and my dad began to realize he was not going to earn enough money to really give us what he wanted to give us. At that time, coal miners were making good money,my dad was a very hard worker. He grew up on a dairy farm. He was accustomed to working from the minute he woke up, 'til the minute he fell asleep. He never slowed down. He decided he could make more money as a coal miner than he could running the store, in management. So, he went into the coal mines. Well, his habits of working hard and going after things full bore were not always very safe, and my mother worried about him. He was involved in one mining accident, injured his back, and wore a brace for many years.Even when I was an adult, he had extreme back problems and would, periodically, be in the hospital for that. But, Mother just felt that he was not safe in the mines. That nobody around him was safe. She just wanted him out of there. The crowning blow was in the spring of '44,there was a real bad flash flood. The school building in Weeksbury had burned the year before, so school was being held in a few deserted storefronts, right on a creek. My sister was in second gradeat that point, and I wasn't really old enough to go to school, but I was allowed to go. I had a desk in the first grade room. Kitty and I were both at school, and a flash flood hit. It came up and into the building, and it was difficult to get all the children out. Everybody did get out safely, but my mother was just absolutely torn up by that experience. So, she said to my dad, "We are leaving. We are getting out." Well, in the meantime, people had been in all the mining communities, interviewing people, trying to get workers for Oak Ridge.My dad had been interviewed and was offered a job, and, I guess, he had not been really determined he was going to take it. But, that flood tipped us over the edge. My dad took the job. He went to work at K-25. He was a technician. The main thing I ever heard him talk about was the fact he rode a bicycle up and down that mile-long building. I don't know what else he did. He like everybody else, of course, was completely closed-lipped about anything that went on at work. Even later, when people talked about there work, Daddy never, really, talked about his job much, except for the bicycles. We knewabout that. But, anyway, he took the job, he accepted the offer, and he came on down.My sister and I finished the school year, and then, housing was so tight, we didn't have a place to come, yet. So, we moved out of our house in Weeksbury, and we went to Virginia, and stayed with my grandparents on the farm for several weeks. Then, we finally had a house, a TDU [temporary dwelling unit] on Waltham Lane, andwe kept thinking our furniture would arrive.We came to Tennessee and stayed with some of my mother's cousins, in Oliver Springs. I guess that was the real nice thing about all of her family being from Tennessee, there were lots of relatives around. We stayed with her cousins, and we would drive to Oak Ridge, sometimes, in the evening, when Daddy was not working the evening shift, but the four to 12 shift.We would all drive into Oak Ridge, we would drive down Waltham Lane, we would look at that house, and there was no furniture, and we would go back to Mother's cousins. One evening, finally, in July, there was Mother's ironing board, propped up in the kitchen window. All of her life, she said that was the only time she was ever happy to see her ironing board. The furniture had arrived, so we moved into the three-bedroom end of the TDU. It was 119 Waltham Lane.
MR. HUNNICUTT:The stove, do you recall what your mother said, when she first came to Ok Ridge? What was her reaction to Oak Ridge?
MRS. GREEN: I don't really remember. I just remember she was so happy when we could all, finally, move into a house and be together again. I don't know that she minded the fact that it was muddy, when it rained, and dusty, when it didn't rain. And it was gravel roads, and boardwalks. She'd grown up in a mining camp, you know. I don't think Oak Ridge offered hardships to my mother.
MR. HUNNICUTT:What was school like, when you first attended school?
MRS. GREEN: I entered first grade in September, at Highland View, and it was school, you know. There were a lot of kids. There were kids on our lane, there were kids there. There were just kids all over the place in Oak Ridge. It was wonderful to be six-years-old and be in the middle of all that. I do remember that we went to school in shifts, and I, I think, that was my first year of, of school. I think, that was the school year of '44, '45. I could be wrong about that, but I think it was that year. Half of us went in the morning, and half went in the afternoon. Then, in the middle of the year, we switched over, and those who'd gone in the morning, got the afternoon shift, and the afternoon shift, got the morning shift. If I'm remembering correctly. Other people may have clearer memories of that. It was a long day for those teachers. I don't know how they managed. But, it was fun for us kids.
MR. HUNNICUTT:There was a lot of kids, so I guess that ... [inaudible].
MRS. GREEN: That's right, a lot of kids. Of course, they were building schools as fast as they could. But, they couldn't keep up with the influx of families.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Did you walk to school?
MRS. GREEN: For the most part.
MR. HUNNICUTT:How far away would you estimate the house was?
MRS. GREEN: Half a mile? I don't know. We were on Waltham Lane, so, of course, Highland View is just a few blocks. We mostly walked through the woods, instead of along the road, anyway. So, who knows how much we travelled going through the woods.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Do you remember who your teacher was?
MRS. GREEN: My first grade teacher was Mrs. Gwinn. I don't remember her first name. My second grade teacher was Mrs. McGeehee. Her husband was principal at one of the schools. Later, I think, he was at Highland View, but I'm not sure where he was that year. In the third grade, I had Mrs. Boyd, for most of the year. Then, in March, my family got a cemesto house, and moved out of the TDU, moved down to 134 Tyson Road. My sisters and I transferred to Elm Grove. My third grade teacher for the rest of my Elm Grove experience was Mrs. Looney.
MR. HUNNICUTT:That's, that's, sitting here thinking, my first grade teacher at Woodland was Mrs. Gwinn. That'd been about 1950, or so.
MRS. GREEN: Really?
MR. HUNNICUTT:And I bet it's the same one.
MRS. GREEN: I bet it was the same one.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Woodland, one year old, was a new school, and you just had to ...
MRS. GREEN: Right.
MR. HUNNICUTT:... over there.
MRS. GREEN: So, they would've moved.
MR. HUNNICUTT:I bet it's the same ...
MRS. GREEN: They would've moved the teachers.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Yeah. Seem like, to me, she was kind of tall ...
MRS. GREEN: Tall and thin.
MR. HUNNICUTT:That's it.
MRS. GREEN: Yes.
MR. HUNNICUTT:I bet it's the same one.
MRS. GREEN: I bet it's the same person.
MR. HUNNICUTT:That's something.
MRS. GREEN: That is interesting, yes, yeah.
MR. HUNNICUTT:What type of house was that, on Tyson Road?
MRS. GREEN: It was a C cemesto.
MR. HUNNICUTT:And, do you remember what it looked like inside?
MRS. GREEN: Oh, yes, yes. You entered, sort of, halfway through the house, and to the left were the bedrooms and bathrooms, three bedrooms. To the right was the living room, dining room combination, and then, the kitchen off that, and the utility room off the kitchen.
MR. HUNNICUTT:When you lived in the TDU, do you recall how it was heated?
MRS. GREEN: I think it was a coal stove, in the living area. It was very small, so, I think, that coal stove heated it amply. I remember the coal bin, out near the street, and the trucks would come and dump the coal in.Then, I expect, my dad carried in buckets of coal, and left them by the stove, for my mother to feed it during the day.
MR. HUNNICUTT:Did your mother have anything to say, when she moved from the TDU to the cemesto?
MRS. GREEN: Well, she was greatly relieved. Mostly, I remember my sisters, and I. We were so happy to be in a bigger house. I can remember us running down the hallway, where the bedrooms were located, and we just thought that was so much space. We would just race up and down that hallway, which, when I think about it now, it couldn't've been more than seven or eight feet or so. It certainly was not a huge amount of space, but it felt palatial to us.