GK: [0:00:00] – is just to say your name, and I won’t wear these.

 

MG: [0:00:04] Mae Gove.

 

GK: [0:00:06] And Mae, can you tell me where you grew up?

 

MG: [0:00:10] Stonington.

 

GK: [0:00:12] What was Stonington –? What was the house that you were born in?

 

MG: [0:00:16] It’s still down there.

 

GK: [0:00:18] It’s still down there? Where is it?

 

MG: [0:00:21] Clam City. Indian Point Road.

 

GK: [0:00:25] Do you remember that house?

 

MG: [0:00:27] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:00:28] Can you describe it to me?

 

MG: [0:00:32] It’s just a wooden house.

 

GK: [0:00:40] Was the house –? When you were a little kid, did you have –?

 

MG: [0:00:44] That’s it.

 

GK: [0:00:46] Yeah, what sort of thing –? Did it have electricity and running water? What was it like?

 

MG: [0:00:51] I think so. It’s been a long time.

 

GK: [0:00:55] It has been a long time.

 

MG: [0:00:56] I’m in my eighties now.

 

GK: [0:00:58 Wow. So, what year were you born?

 

MG: [0:01:04] I don’t know.

 

GK: [0:01:05] 1936.

 

MG: [0:01:07] Yep.

 

GK: [0:01:08] Yep. I heard that you worked at the sardine factory.

 

MG: [0:01:16] Yes, then I baited pockets for the fisherman, too.

 

GK: [0:01:23] When did you do that?

 

MG: [0:01:26] In between times. Nice smelly meat.

 

GK: [0:01:38] Nice smelly bait that you would put into bait pockets.

 

MG: [0:01:41] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:01:42] Did you go out on a boat?

 

MG: [0:01:45] Once in a while.

 

GK: [0:01:49] Can you tell me what the cannery was like? I’ve never really heard about it before.

 

MG: [0:01:56] Well, they bring the fish up on a mat-like, and you had to go through it. Anything that’s damaged, you had to just toss it. It had to be real good fish to pack it.

 

GK: [0:02:31] And you would pack it. Could you describe the packing?

 

MG: [0:02:36] Just a sardine can and line the fish in. You got a head here, the next piece would be the tail part, like you go – this would be the head and body. This would be the tail and body, and you go like that until the can got full.

 

GK: [0:03:09] D you remember working? Were there a lot of other people working there with you?

 

MG: [0:03:15] With the old people, so they didn’t bother me.

 

GK: [0:03:20] Oh, how old? You were a lot younger than the others?

 

MG: [0:03:24] Oh, I started work when I was fourteen, fifteen.

 

GK: [0:03:31] And how many years did you work there? Do you know? Did you work there into your twenties, do you think? Or just a couple of years?

 

MG: [0:03:43] No, I had other jobs then. I [inaudible] people’s boats and baited the pockets.

 

GK: [0:04:05] Do you remember the town of Stonington and the boats that were down there? Can you describe some of the sardine carriers that would come in?

 

MG: [0:04:15] No. They’d come in early in the morning.

 

GK: [0:04:19] Oh, so you wouldn’t see them?

 

MG: [0:04:22] You’d see them when they’re leaving.

 

GK: [0:04:27] What was a typical day like for you when you worked at the cannery?

 

MG: [0:04:34] You’d go to work before 6:00 or just about 6:00, and you’d work until 3:00, 4:00, 5:00 o’clock.

 

GK: [0:05:01] That’s a pretty long day, huh?

 

MG: [0:05:03] Yeah.  And all you’d do to wash your hands to eat lunch is salt water.

 

GK: [0:05:18] Just down with the tanks or in the ocean?

 

MG: [0:05:22] They’d bring in a tank.

 

GK: [0:05:24] Oh, wow. Did people cut themselves? Did you have to [inaudible] –?

 

MG: [0:05:32] Oh, yes. Cuts from the tin cans. Don’t get cut too much on knives. It’s the tin cans because they’re sharp around the top where the lid goes back on.

 

GK: [0:05:56] And what kind of people worked there?

 

MG: [0:06:00] Any age.

 

GK: [0:06:01] Any age.

 

MG: [0:06:02] Any age who wanted to work. If it was school kids, there’s special ages. But most of us was grown-ups. Probably in your twenties, thirties on.

 

GK: [0:06:31] Was it mostly women?

 

MG: [0:06:33] Yeah. The men would bring the fish into the room and dump them on the table. That’s when we packed them. Sometimes we packed. Sometimes, we just did them in cans.

 

GK: [0:07:09] What’s the difference? When you say packing, that’s different than putting them in a can?

 

MG: [0:07:15] No.

 

GK: [0:07:16] Oh, that’s the same thing?

 

MG: [0:07:18] Sometimes you’ve got double layers, single layers.

 

GK: [0:07:28] Now, did you work –? Were you there until it shut down?

 

MG: [0:07:34] No. I went baiting pockets and [inaudible] boats.

 

GK: [0:07:41] You were going fishing with folks.

 

MG: [0:07:44] No.

 

GK: [0:07:45] So, describe it to me. Because I know now people go, and they bait pockets on the boat, but that’s not what you were doing?

 

MG: [0:07:53] No. Once in a while, not very often.

 

GK: [0:08:07] So, the pockets you were filling, you would sell them to fishermen before they went out? How did it work?

 

MG: [0:08:15] No, they’d bring their own pockets in, you’d [inaudible] them up, and they’d take them, [inaudible] them up and throw them in their buckets, and then they’d take them with their boat.

 

GK: [0:08:39] Where did you do that?

 

MG: [0:08:42] At wharves, like Colwell’s and [inaudible], the Co-Op. If you did them for your father, you’d do them at your own wharf.

 

GK: [0:09:06] Oh, so did families have their own wharves back then?

 

MG: [0:09:10] Oh, yeah.

 

GK: [0:09:12] That’s different than now.

 

MG: [0:09:15] Oh, they still have their own wharves now, too.

 

GK: [0:09:25] So, your father, where was that wharf?

 

MG: [0:09:28] [inaudible] down Indian Point Road, where the house is. You look off, and you see the boat [inaudible] on the mooring.

 

GK: [0:09:44] Oh, wow. So you could be in your house, and you’d see the boat from your house?

 

MG: [0:09:54] No. My mother’s house you could.

 

GK: [0:09:58] Oh right, the house that you were raised in.

 

MG: [0:10:01] Yeah, but I had a camp up above the road – up next to the road.

 

GK: [0:10:10] How old were you when you moved out of that house?

 

MG: [0:10:15] I don’t know.

 

GK: [0:10:16] But you were out of high school?

 

MG: [0:10:19] No.

 

GK: [0:10:20] No?

 

MG: [0:10:21] No.

 

GK: [0:10:22] Oh, wow.

 

MG: [0:10:23] You’d come home and bait them up. So, when the fishermen come in, the pockets are all baited.

 

GK: [0:10:32] And ready for them to take for the next day. I see … So where did you go to school?

 

MG: [0:10:49] Stonington.

 

GK: [0:10:53] Where was the school building?

 

MG: [0:10:58] All I can describe is you have to go up Russ’s Hill by the opera house. We would call it the opera house hill because you have to go right straight up over.

 

GK: [0:11:12] Was the town different than when you were a kid –

 

MG: [0:11:17] No.

 

GK: [0:11:18] – than it is now?

 

MG: [0:11:19] Well, maybe a little.

 

GK: [0:11:24] In what ways?

 

MG: [0:11:28] Where they tarred it up and did things like that.

 

GK: [0:11:33] They tarred the roads?

 

MG: [0:11:34] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:11:40] What was it like in the summertime in Stonington?

 

MG: [0:11:45] You worked hard. You get one [inaudible] done; you go to the next one.

 

GK: [0:11:57] From an early age, you started doing that?

 

MG: [0:12:01] I started when I was thirteen. When I was twelve or thirteen years old, I started making pockets for the fisherman. And then my father would bring some in the shed, and we’d be in the shed or under the piazza.

 

GK: [0:12:30] Under the piazza, did you say?

 

MG: [0:12:32] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:12:32] Where’s that?

 

MG: [0:12:35] They have a platform nailed to your house where you can go out and sit in the sun. It would go under it and bait.

 

GK: [0:12:54] What were the summers like in terms of visitors coming? Were there visitors then?

 

MG: [0:13:04] Visitors everyday everywhere. You couldn’t step anywhere without stepping on one.

 

GK: [0:13:17] [laughter] That’s still the case today.

 

MG: [0:13:23] Yeah. It’s a hard job. A lot of them don’t want to get their fingers in it.

 

GK: [0:13:40] In the net?

 

MG: [0:13:41] In the bait.

 

GK: [0:13:42] Oh, in the bait. Yeah. What did it do to your fingers?

 

MG: [0:13:47] Just make them smell.

 

GK: [0:13:50] Stinky old stinky bait.

 

MG: [0:13:53] Stinky old fish.

 

GK: [0:13:55] Do you remember what kind of fish it was?

 

MG: [0:14:02] Herring. Herring like sardines.

 

GK: [0:14:10] Yeah … I’m curious. It sounds like you were working most of the time, and you weren’t really playing in the summertime.

 

MG: [0:14:50] No.

 

GK: [0:14:51] No.

 

MG: [0:14:52] You play on Sundays.

 

GK: [0:14:55] What would you do on Sundays?

 

MG: [0:14:57] Oh, read books. Sometimes play games, board games, in the house.

 

GK: [0:15:19] Where were your parents from?

 

MG: [0:15:26] Stonington.

 

GK: [0:15:27] Both of them?

 

MG: [0:15:29] Bear Island. My father came from Bear Island. That’s over in the boondocks.

 

GK: [0:15:44] And his family name?

 

MG: [0:15:47] Hardie.

 

GK: [0:15:53] Do you know how your parents met? No?

 

MG: [0:15:59] They met years before we was thought of.

 

GK: [0:16:03] [laughter] So, you were baiting pockets, and then were you married?

 

MG: [0:16:15] Oh, yes. I baited pockets after I got married, too.

 

GK: [0:16:17] Oh, you did?

 

MG: [0:16:18] Oh, yeah. I had to have my husband’s pockets already for when he come in from haul so he could load them onto the boat. So, they’d be all ready in the morning.

 

GK: [0:16:32] And what was your husband’s name?

 

MG: [0:16:36] Wilbert, but we called him Billy.

 

GK: [0:16:40] Billy?

 

MG: [0:16:41] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:16:42] Billy Gove?

 

MG: [0:16:43] Billy Gove.

 

GK: [0:16:47] And what did Billy Gove do for work?

 

MG: [0:16:50] Lobster fish. Then he set trawls, catch haddock and cod, stuff like that.

 

GK: [0:17:06] Was the fishing different back then?

 

MG: [0:17:11] A lot easier.

 

GK: [0:17:16] What do you mean? How was it easier?

 

MG: [0:17:19] Now you got to work hard on keeping your traps up, your lobster pots. I call them traps. They call them lobster pots.

 

GK: [0:17:42] What did Billy have to do in the off-season to keep up with his equipment?

 

MG: [0:17:47] Oh, he collected – when people had trawls out – nets – and got the bait, they’d go load the bait on the boat, salt it down – bring it home, salt it down, so get ready to bait pockets the next day. Sometimes, that bait was rank.

 

GK: [0:18:27] You had to have a strong stomach for that.

 

MG: [0:18:30] Yeah. But once you’re in it, you don’t mind it. It’s just like getting your hands in anything – baby doo, anything. We even got our kids baiting pockets when they got big enough. Some case, they get a fishbone in their fingers.

 

GK: [0:19:04] Oh, you didn’t want them doing it too young because of the fish bones?

 

MG: [0:19:08] Right. But they wouldn’t think. Kids nowadays wouldn’t think to put their hands in bait.

 

GK: [0:19:23] It was a different time.

 

MG: [0:19:30] It’s not too many that does it now. Some still go [inaudible] boats and bait them when you’re able, which I’m not able anymore to climb down on ladders into the boats. I would if I could.

 

GK: [0:19:57] It’s something you like?

 

MG: [0:19:59] No, it’s just something to do instead of walking through town this way and that way and around the island. People did a lot of that.

 

GK: [0:20:24] Just walking around?

 

MG: [0:20:25] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:20:26] What were they walking toward?

 

MG: [0:20:29] Just to look – see the scenery because a lot of people that saw the scenery were summer people, and they had their nose in everything.

 

GK: [0:20:46] [laughter] Just in your business or what?

 

MG: [0:20:50] Businesses, anything. Whatever they see different that they said.

 

GK: [0:21:03] What do you mean?

 

MG: [0:21:10] Because we had to cut the fish, salt them, put them in cans, put them in little bags, net bags.

 

GK: [0:21:37] How were the bags knitted? Who did that?

 

MG: [0:21:41] With twine.

 

GK: [0:21:43] Twine?

 

MG: [0:21:43] Yeah, nylon.

 

GK: [0:21:45] And who was knitting them?

 

MG: [0:21:47] Anybody that knew how. I didn’t knit too many because it gets your knuckles – your knuckles get blisters where you have to pull them tight.

 

GK: [0:22:11] Sounds like there were a lot more steps to it than now. Now you buy the traps – you can. You can buy the bags.

 

MG: [0:22:20] Yeah. A lot of times, they make up the traps during the months that you don’t fish.

 

GK: [0:22:37] Were you ever worried about your husband being out fishing?

 

MG: [0:22:42] Yeah, on foggy days and late nights, after 3:00 o’clock, after 4:00 o’clock or 5:00. Most of the time, it was 5:00, 6:00 o’clock when they got in.

 

GK: [0:22:59] In the winter?

 

MG: [0:23:00] Yeah, that was scary.

 

GK: [0:23:05]Do you remember if there were ever any big storms?

 

MG: [0:23:09] Oh, yes. We had storms, just like any place that has islands. We have storms year-round some places.

 

GK: [0:23:42] Yeah, some of those winter storms, they were –

 

MG: [0:23:46] Very, very scary.

 

GK: [0:23:48] Yeah. Where did you and Billy live? Where on the island?

 

MG: [0:23:57] Right down Stonington.

 

GK: [0:24:00] Oh, you did?

 

MG: [0:24:01] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:24:05] Right in town.

 

MG: [0:24:08] Yeah. Well, you went out of town just up the hill and down – the Catholic Church. We didn’t go down – the Catholic Church has a road that goes that way, and it got one that goes that way. We went that way.

 

GK: [0:24:33] Down Indian Point Road?

 

MG: [0:24:35] Yes. That’s where we lived.

 

GK: [0:24:40] That’s where you grew up too?

 

MG: [0:24:41] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:24:42] So then you moved with Billy into a house down there, too?

 

MG: [0:24:45] I moved everywhere.

 

GK: [0:24:47] [laughter] All over the Island? Did you ever live anywhere else other than the island?

 

MG: [0:24:54] Sunset, Deer Isle Harbor. Then summers, we went to Bear Island, Scrag Island.

 

GK: [0:25:17] Are those islands off Stonington?

 

MG: [0:25:21] Well, they’re all around.

 

GK: [0:25:27] Yeah, but you’d go out there. Why would you go to those islands? What would you do there?

 

MG: [0:25:33] We would like to go on weekends, take a picnic lunch, go out there, and bait pockets.

 

GK: [0:25:46] You would take your picnic lunch and go out there and bait pockets?

 

MG: [0:25:49] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:25:50] And then would you sell to folks out there?

 

MG: [0:25:54] No, they bring their own bait.

 

GK: [0:25:57] Oh, got it. Were there folks living on those islands?

 

MG: [0:26:03] Sometimes, yeah.

 

GK: [0:26:14] Do you think the islands have changed since you were a kid and a younger person?

 

MG: [0:26:18] Oh yes, yes. It has changed an awful lot, just like up here. This never used to be all [inaudible].

 

GK: [026:33] What was it?

 

MG: [026:34] A lot of green.

 

GK: [026:38] This wasn’t even here.

 

MG: [026:40] No, the trees were.

 

GK: [026:53] There was a lot more land then that wasn’t developed?

 

MG: [026:58] No, they cut trees and stuff and made the land.

 

GK: [0:27:07] How did it look different when you were younger?

 

MG: [0:27:14] I don’t see any difference. You look out the window, and you see trees.

 

GK: [0:27:25] What other ways did it change?

 

MG: [0:27:28] Oh, as the years go on, you grow older. That’s when you started – you work for the fisherman. I used to go over to the boats and bait pockets, go to the dealers and bait pockets. You didn’t smell very nice when you went home. You smelt kind of fishy.

 

GK: [0:28:15] But everybody did.

 

MG: [0:28:16] Yes. Well, a lot of people would rather pay for someone to bait their pockets because they didn’t want to get into it.

 

GK: [0:28:28] So that’s not the case anymore, really.

 

MG: [0:28:39] No. If they get big fish, [inaudible].

 

GK: [0:28:51] And then put them in the trap?

 

MG: [0:28:53] Yeah. And if you got sardines like that, you have to put them in pockets.

 

GK: [0:29:08] Now, did you have children too?

 

MG: [0:29:10] Oh, yeah, I had three daughters. Well, I had a little boy, but he didn’t make it. Had a miscarriage.

 

GK: [0:29:31] Oh. Did your daughters stay here?

 

MG: [0:29:42] My daughters lived right with us until they grew up to go to school, and they went to school from our home. Each family had their own home.

 

GK: [0:30:09] And what did they end up doing when they were adults?

 

MG: [0:30:16] I don’t know.

 

GK: [0:30:17] Your daughters?

 

MG: [0:30:19] My daughters? They baited pockets, the ones that didn’t – didn’t like the smell. [laughter] If the bait smelled, they would not look at it. They wouldn’t put their hands in that.

 

GK: [0:30:49] That’s funny.

 

MG: [0:30:52] If you smelt some of that, you’d think it [inaudible] funny.

 

GK: [0:30:56] It was worse, do you think, than the bait even now? Was it more rank?

 

MG: [0:31:02] Yes. The sun got it.

 

GK: [0:31:10] And then where did they end up? Did they live on the island, too?

 

MG: [0:31:15] Oh, yes. They had houses everywhere.

 

GK: [0:31:20] Your daughters did?

 

MG: [0:31:21 No, my daughters [inaudible] they rented two or three places. Then, sometimes, they lived with us until they got married. Then, they moved on to their own home. It was good and fun when they lived at home because you could [inaudible] a little bit – how they smelled. We all get along.

 

GK: [0:32:22] In your family, you got along?

 

MG: [0:32:24] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:32:27] Do you have a lot of relatives on the island?

 

MG: [0:32:33] I don’t know where any of my relatives are nowadays because I don’t travel. We used to travel because two of our kids drove cars.

 

GK: [0:33:03] Where would you go?

 

MG: [0:33:05] All different parts of town, Deer Isle, Greenhead. We went to the Old Town one time. Bangor, Ellsworth, Bar Harbor – all those places. I’d much rather go on a boat than I would a car.

 

GK: [0:33:40] Why is that?

 

MG: [0:33:42] Because I like the ocean. We used to live on York Island. That’s an island that we rented. He fished out of the ocean.

 

GK: [0:34:02] You lived in York?

 

MG: [0:34:04] And we stayed on the land.

 

GK: [0:34:12] What was that like living on York?

 

MG: [0:34:16] No different than it is here.

 

GK: [0:34:19] Does it look different out there?

 

MG: [0:34:25] You would have all these trees.

 

GK: [0:34:30] It’s a little more wild.

 

MG: [0:34:34] Yeah, more – you can have tents and stuff set up.

 

GK: [0:34:44] And so you lived there? Why did you live on York?

 

MG: [0:34:48] York Island.

 

GK: [0:34:49] Why did you live there?

 

MG: [0:34:51] Because that’s what – they were fishing. We went down there for the summer.

 

GK: [0:34:05] Were there a lot of people out there? Did other families do that, too?

 

MG: [0:35:11] Oh, you’d be surprised if you happened to go down the islands during the summer because they spurt out everywhere. Some built little wooden houses. Some had tents.

 

GK: [0:35:37] What did you live in when you were on York? What were you living in?

 

MG: [0:35:44] A camp that was already there.

 

GK: [0:35:57] So, did it just make it easier because you were closer to where your husband would want to set traps? Is that why you lived out there?

 

MG: [0:36:11] Well, it was easier living on the island while they were fishing than it was if they’d fish, and then they’d have to come home and go back.

 

GK: [0:36:33] So, they were fishing far enough out that it was hard to come back in?

 

MG: [0:36:40] Yes.

 

GK: [0:36:40] Okay, got it. Do you know where they were fishing?

 

MG: [0:36:49] Isle au Haut, Beals Island, Camden, Rockland, anywhere you could set traps.

 

GK: [0:37:03] But that seems farther out than today for some of the guys.

 

MG: [0:37:08] Oh, yeah, but they still – you’d be surprised.

 

GK: [0:37:11] Yeah, they go off.

 

MG: [0:37:12] They still go way out, yeah.

 

GK: [0:37:21] Were there less lobster then?

 

MG: [0:37:25] What?

 

GK: [0:37:25] Were there less lobster in those days?

 

MG: [0:37:30] Well, way back, there were – I don’t know how you’d say it. Sometimes, in the summer, you get less lobsters than you have in the winter. The same thing with the winter. Sometimes, in different spots in the winter, you get plenty of lobster, but then they slack off in the summer.

 

GK: [0:38:13] Just depended on where you were.

 

MG: [0:38:15] Yeah. It all depends on the weather and the [inaudible].

 

GK: [0:38:33] Did you think when you were a girl that you would marry a fisherman?

 

MG: [0:38:41] Not until I met him going home from school.

 

GK: [0:38:46] Yeah. How’d you meet him?

 

MG: [0:38:48] Oh, walked through town and went up Russ’s Hill – Opera House Hill – and you’d see these boats coming in, and then you watch, see where they go. Then, sometimes you chase them. Like I did. I married a lobster fisherman. My father was a fisherman. Then ,my brother ended up a fisherman, but my poor brother’s passed on.

 

GK: [0:39:42] So, you’d go chase the boats? Is that how you met Billy? How did you meet Billy?

 

MG: [0:39:50] Watch the boats come into the wharf, and I’d watch – see where he went to. I’d walk through town, and if I see which way he’s going, I’d go slower.

 

GK: [0:40:10] [laughter]

 

MG: [0:40:16] We were married a long, long time. And now he’s passed on.

 

GK: [0:40:26] How many years were you married before he passed?

 

MG: [0:40:29] Oh, God, I don’t know. My kids are in their fifties.

 

GK: [0:40:41] So, maybe sixty-plus? Sixty-some years?

 

MG: [0:40:46] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:40:51] Did he fish until the very end?

 

MG: [0:40:55] No. He’d fish, and sometimes, he’d go scalloping. That’s different than lobstering. But it brought in the money to pay the bills and eat and for your fuel.

 

GK: [0:41:33] Did Billy fish until he –?

 

MG: [0:41:36] He fished from when he was a kid, and I think he fished right up until he died because he still was a fisherman then. All the fishermen quit and new ones started up.

 

GK: [0:41:13] Did you ever talk about the industry changing and how it had changed over the years?

 

MG: [0:41:20] No. I probably did then, but I can’t remember way back then.

 

GK: [0:42:29] Yeah. Was he involved in fisheries that ended, that got shutdown?

 

MG: [0:42:44] I can’t quite remember any that got shut down, just the ones that were shoplifting. [laughter]

 

GK: [0:42:51] [laughter] What’s that?

 

MG: [0:42:55] Hauling people – other boats hauling people’s pots.

 

GK: [0:43:00] Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, I mean, did he go on gill netting or anything like that because those fisheries stopped?

 

MG: [0:43:10] I can’t remember if he went gill netting. I think he did, but that’s been a long, long time.

 

GK: [0:43:20] Yeah, that’s been a long time. What did you like about living on the island your whole life?

 

MG: [0:43:29] Just that it was all together. We didn’t get all this interference coming in. Like if you’re home, you get this [inaudible] come on your door. They want to sell you something. If you’re down on the island, they can’t do it. We lived on York Island for a while. And then neighbor – Mitchells – they lived on one end because it was island – it was cut in different shapes.

 

GK: [0:44:13] Deer Isle was? Or Stonington? Or York?

 

MG: [0:44:17] No, all islands.

 

GK: [0:44:19] Yeah, yeah. Oh, all islands are different shapes.

 

MG: [0:44:23] Yeah. You don’t know what they’re fishing, handlining, or trawling. A lot of them went trawling.

 

GK: [0:44:43] For herring?

 

MG: [0:44:45] Huh?

 

GK: [0:44:45] For herring mostly? Was that what the trawling was –?

 

MG: [0:44:52] They went seining for that.

 

GK: [0:44:54] Okay, yeah. Purse seining. Were they catching cod and other fish? Whiting and stuff?

 

MG: [0:45:02] Oh, yeah. They caught all kinds of different fish.

 

GK: [0:45:08] What would you eat? Did you eat seafood?

 

MG: [0:45:12] Yeah, I’d eat anything he brought home. All but mussels.

 

GK: [0:45:19] Didn’t like the mussels?

 

MG: [0:45:20] I would not eat a mussel. No. I’d shell them and use them for fish bait. But I would not eat one.

 

GK: [0:45:36] When you were living on York Island, did you have to go get groceries in town?

 

MG: [0:45:42] Oh, yes. Yeah.

 

GK: [0:45:47] And would you do that with –? Was there a ferry, or did you have your own little [inaudible]?

 

MG: [0:45:52] No, we had our own boat. He fished out of a powerboat.

 

GK: [0:45:59] Okay. And did you drive the boats, too?

 

MG: [0:46:06] Oh, yes. It’s [inaudible] get to the island.

 

GK: [0:46:12] So you’d have to take it sometimes.

 

MG: [0:46:14] Oh, I don’t [inaudible].

 

GK: [0:46:16] Never?

 

MG: [0:46:17] He did the sailing. I went as a cook. I’d paint the pot buoys up, knit the pockets – that’s what you chuck your bait in.

 

GK: [0:46:51] Sounds like you were busy.

 

MG: [0:46:53] Oh, yes. It was a busy life growing up. I think I started when I was thirteen/fourteen.

 

GK: [0:47:10] What were the folks at the –? When you were working at the cannery, was there a lot of –? Did they talk and banter? Or what was it like there? What did the women do all day?

 

MG: [0:47:24] I can’t remember way back then. You’re talking ancient times.

 

GK: [0:47:45] The old days.

 

MG: [0:47:46] Yep. You started out when you was young. You’d go out, and you’d get married, have kids [inaudible], and then you’d have to build on from there.

 

GK: [0:48:10] Was it easier to buy property then?

 

MG: [0:48:14] I didn’t do much buying. My husband did all the buying. I did all the upkeep after. He’d buy from his friends. We had nice neighbors. Where we last lived, my husband’s brother lived just up above us.

 

GK: [0:48:58] Oh, wow. Where was that?

 

MG: [0:48:59] Stonington.

 

GK: [0:49:02] And who was his brother?

 

MG: [0:49:04] Andrew.

 

GK: [0:49:05] Andrew Gove?

 

MG: [0:49:06] Yeah.

 

GK: [0:49:07] I’ve been talking with them, too. He’s very nice. And Rose.

 

MG: [0:49:14] Yeah. My eldest daughter was named Jeanette Rose …

 

GK: [0:49:40] Was your eldest daughter named –?

 

MG: [0:49:43] Jeanette?

 

GK: [0:49:44] Where did her name come from?

 

MG: [0:49:46] The next-door neighbor. Jeanette Mitchell. My daughter Jeanette was named for Jeanette Mitchell. My daughter Linda was named for one of Jeanette Mitchell’s kids, Linda. And Luann, I don’t know where I got her name.

 

GK: [0:50:23] Who was Jeanette Mitchell?

 

MG: [0:50:25] My next-door neighbor.

 

GK: [0:50:28] And a friend?

 

MG: [0:50:29] Yeah. Was all like one big family down on the point.

 

GK: [0:50:42] When did you sell your house? Did you sell your house down there on the point?

 

MG: [0:50:48] I don’t know.

 

GK: [0:50:50] You don’t know? You don’t remember?

 

MG: [0:50:53] I don’t know what happened to our house. It was there. I guess it’s still there.

 

GK: [0:51:02] Why did you move?

 

MG: [0:51:05] My husband passed on. I couldn’t keep up with that house. The kids all got married and moved. So, I just gave up. And then we came here. I went and stayed with my kids for a while, staying with Jeanette, my oldest. And then I stayed with Luann for a while, and then my grandson. It’s just one big story, one after another. You must be writing a book.

 

GK: [0:52:10] [laughter] I think I’ll have to. Are there any other stories or thoughts that you had while we were talking that I didn’t ask you about?

 

MG: [0:52:22] Of what?

 

GK: [0:52:23] Just thoughts about your life or stories from your life that I didn’t ask you about.

 

MG: [0:52:28] No, not that I know of. I think you filled it in.

 

GK: [0:52:35] Well, if you think of anything, just tell Harry, and I’ll come back. Okay?

 

MG: [0:52:42] I won’t be thinking. [inaudible]

 

GK: [0:52:50] You’re ready to settle down.

 

MG: [0:52:52] Yeah. I ain’t got nothing to settle down with now. My husband’s gone. Two of my daughters – no, one of my daughters is gone. I lost my son.

 

GK: [0:53:21] Is there folks here that you’ve known for your whole life?

 

MG: [0:53:23] Hmm?

 

GK: [0:53:24] Is there anyone here who you’ve known your whole life?

 

MG: [0:53:27] The Mitchells.

 

GK: [0:53:29] Are at the nursing home? Anyone at the nursing home? Your sister’s here, isn’t she?

 

MG: [0:53:337] Yeah, my sister’s here. Well, I’ve known a lot of them in here. Some nice people. Some pains in the butt, if you know what that means.

 

GK: [0:53:58] [laughter] I do. I get what you’re saying. Yeah, that’s true anywhere, I guess.

 

MG: [0:54:06] Yeah, everywhere.

 

GK: [0:54:09] When you’ve got eighty-seven years of history with people, sometimes you don’t get along.

 

MG: [0:54:19] Well, when my husband died, I had nothing to [inaudible] around here with. I’d just go from place to place. And I hate it. I like to live [inaudible]

 

GK: [0:54:45] Alright. Can I take you back to your room?

 

MG: [0:54:51] No, I can’t go to my room. I can go in there [inaudible].

 

GK: [0:54:56] Oh, that’s convenient. I’m going to find Harry, and he can help me take you over. Anything else you want to say before we stop?

 

MG: [0:55:08] No, I guess not.

 

GK: [0:55:11] Well, Mae, I really enjoyed hearing your story, so thank you. Thanks for sharing that with me.

 

MG: [0:55:18] Well, it’s all true.

 

GK: [0:55:20] [laughter] I can’t believe you lived on York. That was probably so beautiful up there.

 

MG: [0:55:31] I lived on York Island. I lived on Eagle Island.

 

GK: [0:55:38] You lived on Eagle? Did you live there when Andy and Rose lived there?

 

MG: [0:55:45] No, my husband did. He wasn’t my husband then. We was just dating.

 

GK: [0:56:01] And he was on Eagle?

 

MG: [0:56:03] Oh, he was everywhere … He lived everywhere. I never kept track of him. I kept track of him when I see him come into town.

 

GK: [0:56:33] When did he first notice you?

 

MG: [0:56:27] [inaudible] neighborhood.

 

GK: [0:56:50] He knew you were around.

 

MG: [0:56:52] Hmm?

 

GK: [0:56:53] He knew you anyway.

 

MG: [0:56:55] Yep.