Oral History Program Paulene Mackley Interviewed by Shanna Richelle Seiler 10 February 2005 i Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Paulene Mackley Interviewed by Shanna Richelle Seiler 10 February 2005 Copyright © 2014 by Weber State University, Stewart Library ii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. 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These oral history assignments were created to help Weber State students learn the value and importance of recording public history and to benefit the expansion of the Weber State oral history collections. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. 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It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Mackley, Paulene, an oral history by Shanna Richelle Seiler, 10 February 2005, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Paulene Mackley. The interview was conducted on February 10, 2005, by Shanna Richelle Seiler. Mrs. Mackley discusses her knowledge and personal experiences with the canning industry and practice in Utah. SS: This is Shanna Seiler, today’s date is February 10 2005. I am with Paulene Mackley. Tell me your full name date and place of birth. PP: Paulene Knoll Mackley, I was born in Idaho, Oct. 19 1935. SS: How long have you lived in Utah. PP: We have been in this house for probably 41 years. SS: Did you guys get married in Idaho? PP: Yes. Ss: And then you moved down here? PP: We went to Iowa for four years while my husband went to dental school and then we moved here. SS: Okay, so you grew up in Idaho, did your mother make jam and canned foods? PP: Yes. SS: Is that where you learned it from? PP: Probably some of it. SS: Do you remember doing it with her? 1 PP: I don’t remember doing jam with her but I do remember picking raspberries and we had a big garden I may have helped her but I learned to make my first jam from my mother-in-law up in Idaho. SS: What was her name? PP: Her name was Babna Mackley and we made apricot jam. SS: Tell me about doing that with her, how did it go? PP: Well I thought it was wonderful, I really like it. We were on our way back to Iowa to go to dental school and we stopped there and we made jam. SS: When you guys moved here where did you get your fruits from? PP: Um, when we moved to North Ogden there were all kinds of orchards and I would take my little kids and we would go and pick cherries. There were big cherry orchards and there were apricots everywhere, and we bought our pears down there from Lauren Farr and peaches, I probably went out on the Fruit way until we got our own trees. SS: What do you remember about the fruit way? PP: Well they just always had wonderful fruit all the time, pears and grapes. Concord grapes I bought those out there to. SS: What did you do with them? PP: We made juice and jelly. SS: How, tell me about making jelly, did you do that mostly in the summer? 2 PP: I did it when the fruit cam eon, probably at first that was the only kind of jelly I made was apricot jelly, and grape jelly. That’s probably the only kind of jelly I’ve made. SS: How many bottles did you make? PP: I’d probably do, recently I have not done as much, I probably do 12 of grape and we would do the other jams and make it up that way. SS: Do you still do it? PP: Yes. SS: How much do you usually make now? PP: I just did Raspberry jam and Strawberry jam, oh couple months ago, and the frozen. I think how much I have, some of them are pints and some of them are smaller, I probably had about 20 of each and I made apricot jam this year because we have a tree. SS: Tell me your earliest memory of doing this of making jam or canning fruit or anything like that. PP: Well my mother canned when I was a little girl she, well like I told you we always had a big garden and she would pick the strawberries and I’d pick raspberries with her and we would… SS: Do you know why she canned? PP: Well in those days they had to do a lot of those things themselves so I’m sure that’s why she did it was to have the food. I can remember the strawberry patch, 3 some of our neighbors out on the farm had one and she went out and picked strawberries and brought them home to can them just so we could have fruit and jams to eat because everything is home grow in those days. SS: Why do you continue to do it? PP: Oh I just like canning and making jam and putting it on my counter and carrying it down and putting on the shelves, it just gives me a lot of satisfaction and besides is just tastes better then store bought. SS: How much fruit do you usually put up? PP: Oh last year I probably did at least 24 quarts of peaches and I did pears, probably the same of pears and I did apricots, I did whole apricots and I like to do apricots with pineapple in it I did tomatoes, I used to do a lot more. I used to do pickles and stuff like that but I don’t anymore. Mostly the fruit. SS: Did you ever do relish? PP: Yes. SS: How would you do that? PP: I made Zucchini relish which my husband really like and I used to do pickles, dill pickles and um butter pickles, all kind of pickles, well two or three kinds of pickles. I did a lot more in the earlier days then I do now. SS: Do you ever have any problems doing canning or jamming? PP: Well my husband likes the jams so it’s not set up and I tried to accommodate him this year, oh I call it runny, he doesn’t like it set up hard. 4 SS: Is that the most common problem you have with canning jam? PP: I think so; I haven’t had any trouble with the lids going on or anything like that for a long time. SS: But you have had problems with the lids? PP: Oh once in a while they won’t seal. SS: Have you ever gone down to the cannery and canned? PP: Yes, I was there last week doing beef stew, we did the potatoes we had to cut them. In half on the line, I’ve been there to do peaches, oh what else, I used to go down a lot in the olden day, and we used to do tomatoes. SS: Which one do you go to, the one on seventeenth, what’s that one called? PP: I just call it the welfare cannery. SS: What do they do with the food? PP: My daughter in law for my birthday gave me bottled apple pie filling that she did down there and I have never done anything that was put into bottles, just cans, and they do salsa down there and we have done the beef stew. SS: You do that down there volunteer, or do you bring the cans home? PP: Well we were doing it last week for the welfare service, I have been down to do personal, I have never been down to do canning but I have down the dry pack, dried apples all kids of beans, rice. SS: Did you teach your daughters to do this? PP: Well they helped me at home, some of them can alone and some of them don’t. 5 SS: Tell me about that. How young did they start helping you? PP: 10 or 12, my youngest daughter still cans, lets see my oldest daughter doesn’t can. SS: Um, how did you teach them to do it, was it just by doing it. PP: Yes, having them help me. SS: Where there any special recipes that use that you used? PP: I’ve used the zucchini relish that my mother used. SS: Does your daughter do that also? PP: I don’t think that she does, I think she mostly does the fruits, she lives in Pacen so there’s a lot peaches and apples so I think she mostly does the fruits. I do apple pie filling ‘cause we own our own apple trees, and applesauce and you know that kind of stuff. SS: Do you do canned raspberries? PP: I bottled them. SS: What do you usually put in them? PP: Raspberries to sugar. SS: How much sugar to raspberries? PP: Most fruits takes I don’t know I just follow the book, when I first got married I had a good housekeeping book and that’s the one I use. I’m sure it’s not up to date because they have changed things but that’s what I usually get out and go according to that. 6 SS: You got that when you first got married? PP: Yeah. SS: Who do you usually do your canning and jamming with? PP: I usually do it alone. SS: Have you ever done it in a group? PP: Well when my kids were home I used to do it with them. SS: Do you remember the phrase Victory Garden? PP: Yeah. SS: Can you tell me about a victory garden? PP: Oh I just remember that during the war that’s what I heard them called. SS: Tell me about relief society, are you a member of the relief society, did you ever do any bottling with them. PP: I don’t remember doing any that I remember. My little kids thought that everything I learned I learned at relief society. So if I came home with a new recipe or a new idea about discipline or something they always thought that’s where I got it. They always give a lot of helps and stuff? SS: Did you get a lot of recipes from the relief society? PP: Oh all kinds, the pie filling I used I got from the relief society and I use that all the time they always give lots of recipes. 7 SS: Did you receive the Relief Society Magazine when it was out, did you ever use those recipes? PP: I think I did, I don’t remember any specific one. SS: Was it supported by the relief society to store foods? PP: I think so. SS: Do you know why? PP: Well I think it’s just been one of the church things over the years is for the families to store food incase there is a disaster or in case you loose your job. My daughter’s husband was out of work for a long time and they about lived on food storage. My husband was complaining that we have a whole basement full of old food, old wheat, old this and old that. 8