Oral History Program Kathleen Cribbs Interviewed by Sarah Tooker 3 April 2019 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Kathleen Cribbs Interviewed by Sarah Tooker 3 April 2019 Copyright © 2022 by Weber State University, Stewart Library iii 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. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. The working files, original recording, and archival copies are housed in the University Archives. Project Description The Beyond Suffrage Project was initiated to examine the impact women have had on northern Utah. Weber State University explored and documented women past and present who have influenced the history of the community, the development of education, and are bringing the area forward for the next generation. The project looked at how the 19th Amendment gave women a voice and representation, and was the catalyst for the way women became involved in the progress of the local area. The project examines the 50 years (1870-1920) before the amendment, the decades to follow and how women are making history today. ____________________________________ 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. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management This work is the property of the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Cribbs, Kathleen, an oral history by Sarah Tooker, 3 April 2019, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. Kathleen (left), Her mother Hope (middle), and her daughter Sarah (right) circa 2015 1 Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Kathleen Cribbs, conducted on April 3, 2019, in the Stewart Library, by Sarah Tooker. Kathleen discusses her life, her memories, and the impact of the 19th Amendment. Alyssa Kammerman, the video technician, is also present during this interview. ST: We are here with Kathleen Cribbs. With Sarah Tooker and Alyssa Kammerman. Let’s see the date is April 3, 2019 and this is an oral history interview for the women 2020 project is that good Alyssa? ST: Can you give us your full name? KC: Kathleen Richards Cribbs. ST: And who were your parents? KC: Jack Arthur Richards and Hope Simmons Richards. ST: Are your parents from Utah? KC: My dad was from Utah, but my mom was from Idaho. ST: And where you born? KC: Ogden, I was raised in North Ogden. ST: How many brothers and sisters do you have? KC: Seven. ST: Do they all still live in Utah? KC: No. ST: Did you grow up here as well like in the area or were you just born here? KC: Yes, I grew up in north Ogden. That is in this area. ST: Well tell me about your childhood growing up in North Ogden. 2 KC: Like I say I was one of eight kids. both of my parents were college educated so that’s what they wanted for their kids and that was the main focus of our lives to get ready for college. They had us take music lessons so we all learned how to play the piano and organ, at the very least. They just taught us to be hard workers. My education was in Weber county schools. Then I got my beauty license. Then I had children and went back to college at Weber State. ST: So, when you were growing up were you guys like really well off or poor or in the middle with eight kids in that time period? KC: My parents lead us to believe we were just off the bottom. But we were I would say middle class. Upper middle class but they just kind of kept that a secret. They felt that it wasn’t their children’s business. They wanted us to work make our own way, but we had to of been middle class or higher because every summer we would go on a vacation, go see a national park, go to Disneyland, and I don’t think just everybody can do that with eight children. All eight kids went to college and they not always had a scholarship and you can’t do that with eight kids and not be middle or upper class. But they were never pretentious they never made us think we had a lot of money. You had to cut coupons you, had to shop sales. ST: How did that affect you later in life? With the budgeting and the saving and the couponing. Is that something that transferred over to your adult life? KC: When I was raising my own children yes ST: So, it was a good skill? 3 KC: I think a lot of their teachings transferred over. I want my kids to make their own way I want them to have an education or skill at least that is what is that, lucrative or commercial you know that they can make a living off of. They shouldn’t just rely on a hand out. ST: OK KC: But my parents came from what I would think people would think is poverty. Especially now days. ST: So, the way that your mom grew up and the way you dad grew up you would put that as poverty now days? KC: Absolutely. ST: Why would that be? KC: Because my mom came from a family of thirteen in Burley Idaho that were potato and bean farmers and her mom and dad had not gone even to high school I don’t believe and my grandpa on the other side finished his education at eighth grade and I don’t know that my grandmother his mother, I don’t know that they went to high school. That wasn’t done back then. They were farmers. My dad peddled fruit up on Harrison and he would say they peddled fruit to the rich people. So that generation was not wealthy or very highly educated and maybe that goes hand in hand. ST: So, do you think that maybe was a reason why your parents pushed that on you guys so much? Is because their parents. 4 KC: Oh yes. And their parents pushed it on them to get a college education because they didn’t think that they could ever get out of the poverty without it. And so yes, all my aunts and uncles went to college on both sides of my family. ST: So, you were talking about beauty school before. Is that what you currently do for a job? KC: No. I only did that because I had enough credits to go half a day in high school. And so, I went to beauty college because I thought that would be a great way to make a living. So, I would go half a day to high school and half a day to the cosmetology. But then I never did it as a way to make a living. I got married and had three kids and wanted a career that was more family friendly, so I went into education. ST: So, you did that through Weber State? KC: I did. ST: You say you went into the education field because you wanted some more opportunities and things with your children. What does the education field mean to you? KC: When I first went into education it’s like I say. It’s a family friendly schedule with little kids but I stayed with it because its rewarding. Its an interesting career that is an exchange. I don’t know if that makes it is very clear. You’re a lifetime learner when you’re in education. Probably a lot of professions I know a lot of doctors and attorneys have to keep taking classes it’s a people business that you continue to learn from people that’s why I stayed continued to be a teacher I’ve 5 never tried to be an administrator or anything like that because I like to be on the ground floor so to speak. I don’t see myself in meetings. ST: So, to you its more rewarding to be on the ground floor KC: To me yes. It’s much more rewarding than being a cosmetologist that’s very superficial to me. Plus, I would have never lasted as I aged in the cosmetology because you see you have to stay on your feet a lot and I don’t think that would have worked out for me. The hours just wouldn’t have worked you have to work on Saturdays and after three is when you get a lot of business and I wanted to be home with my kids. ST: Have you been involved in any kind of politics, volunteering any of those kinds of things besides being a teacher? KC: I haven’t. I raised my, I was busy with my family and I haven’t volunteered, and politics isn’t my cup of tea. ST: How do you think women receiving the right to vote shaped or influenced history, your community or you personally? When you were growing up what changes did you see. Because I know this was before you were born but did you notice any changes when you were growing up? KC: Oh ya, it got a lot of women out of the home. It gave them a lot more opportunity they had a lot more say in their government. Where oh yes you could feel it even though it happened a long time before. Well not a long time but, before my time, you could defiantly feel it. Cause my mom and her mom. They were all this is women’s work that kind of thing and this not only did you get the right to vote but it made us more on an equal playing field. And I think they are still fighting that 6 like they said today women still only get eighty percent of what men get paid. Think of what that would be if we didn’t get the right to vote. I can’t even imagine living in a country were women don’t have the rights like we do. But I think it’s just a start. ST: So, you think there is more progress to be made? KC: Oh, havens yes. I still think that women’s opinions are sometime still brushed off when I think that they have as much to contribute as anybody. ST: So, based on your life experience what advice would you give to women today and future generations? KC: You can never learn to much, knowledge its power, be independent, always have a way to feed your own self. Which is probably just exactly what my mom told me, but it holds true you need to be able to stand on your own and think for yourself. And I have been very thankful that I live in this country. I can’t imagine living in a country where you didn’t have a say in what was going on at least the opportunity to have the say. When I read about people even to this day they are not allowed to have books and things that’s just that scares me it gives me the chills because I think people should have a kay you don’t necessarily take advantage of these opportunities, but they should at least be there. The opportunity to learn and express your opinion and the such. That’s why I really like this county. ST: So, do you think a lot of that came about? Do you think there were more changes during your childhood or during your adulthood with those kinds of issues? KC: I don’t understand what you mean. 7 ST: The changes that you saw growing up with women and their rights and their opportunities do you think that there were more of those when you were a kid? KC: No. they are now ST: That the changes happened, that the changes happened more quickly when you were growing up or as you’ve been an adult there’s been the change has been quicker? KC: I think it been quicker as I’ve grown up, I mean as I’ve been an adult because of the media. Because the media has gotten so much more prevalent. Like your yahoo and stuff like that. Social media they can get that, the internet gets it out there. Where it was really slow going I think after we got the vote. It’s just kinda bogged down I still think people have a way to go, we haven’t come as far as we need to. But I think we are going a little faster now like I said because you’ve got the internet and you can really get stuff out there and put the social media out there. And I think that we need to get to the point where it’s not just men and women its everybody has a right to get their intelligence going on you know learn. Everybody has the right to have an opinion and voice that opinion and everybody should be valued no matter who they are and back in the day of the women getting the right to vote it was more of a man and women thing but its everybody needs to have their heads on the same page and all valued. AK: I have a question. You mentioned teaching has been really rewarding for you. Would you mind sharing some stories about why that you felt like you’ve made a difference or way that it has been rewarding in your life? 8 KC: Almost every year I start school cause I tach kids that are very young and they don’t I have a lot of kids who haven’t seen the alphabet or been aware of it and then six to nine months later, and six to nine months is not very long, they will bring up a simple text book to you and say oh I can read this. The way that they, you can see the pride when they own it. That’s a reward to me. When they know they know, that’s rewarding. They have a happy face, they have just a lot of pride and self-worth and you can see it. That’s very rewarding and that happens every year. Or they start saying things like they will start saying the addition or subtraction facts just off hand. That’s their game their playing you know that you’ve made a difference, or you say and this happens like I said all these things happen just about every year. We’re going to have a spring break and they are all, “Oh we don’t want to leave.” Then you know that you’ve that you’re making a difference in these kids lives. I’ve had kids come and tell me that they’ve had drams about me and not nightmares but nice dreams. When they come back, kids come back cause now I’m old they come back, and they’ll say, “remember me you were my kindergarten teacher” and they’re just beaming and then you know they’ve gone off to high school and education is important to them because they haven’t dropped out, which isn’t a good thing to do. I don’t think in this day and age especially. It’s rewarding when I’ve seen teachers that I helped mentor and you see them become successful, they get the teacher of the year or teacher of the month. You can just see them grow and they come back, they come back and thanked me or just watching it. That’s nice. But it’s really rewarding to be able to set someone loose on the world with reading abilities. That’s just kinda 9 cool to me. They’ve had that. Like I say knowledge is power and the ability to read can make all the difference in the world. It happens all the time that’s why I’ve stayed with it for so long. AK: Absolutely. What made you decide to be a kindergarten teacher? KC: Well at the time I was active in a church and I was working with children and people would say “you’re so natural with these kids” and it’s like an out of body experience you don’t realize you’re doing that. But that’s what got me interested in going into the earlier years and then they really deserve, as I got going into college and that I am not the smartest person in the world and they really need sharp math teachers and English teachers and people deserve that. And I know that I could never do that I could never give that to the kids the upper math and the upper English. I think I could probably pull off the English and the reading but that’s why I stuck with third grade and below was mostly the math skills. But see this is why I like the kids being especially women now being told to do science and math because you hear girls are not good at math and you hear that long enough and you start thinking that. Plus, I didn’t have any confidence in it that’s why I stuck with lower grades. Those kids deserve really sharp teachers that understand it so well that they can teach it. AK: That’s an interesting point you feel like growing up hearing that as a girl or as a woman you wouldn’t be good at math do you feel like that affected your ability to learn? 10 KC: Oh absolutely. Because you would still hear those things even when I was growing up. And even if someone didn’t say it directly to you heard, it was just a given. AK: The culture KC: Yes, it was the culture at the time. AK: Did you face any opposition at becoming a teacher? I mean I know that’s kind of a female dominated job. But in college and in your training did you face any opposition as a woman? KC: Not really. The husband I was married to at the time felt very threatened by it and I think that happens a lot. Because of the culture. Men feel threatened by educated women and there’s no need to I don’t think. But no, I think I think your right. I think part of the reason I didn’t is because it’s such a female dominated career. AK: And when were you born just so we have a time line? KC: In nineteen fifty-six AK: Okay thank you KC: I think that even now the higher up in education that you go like if you become a well I think principles, but even principle on up like a superintendent and stuff like that they still kinda pick, they want I don’t know how to say this, men, a man who goes and does and becomes a superintendent is not thought of as maybe as forward and gruff as a female superintendent, you see what I’m saying? Because that’s still thought of as male as a male role even to this day. I think the principle 11 layer has gotten a lot more, a female principle is no big deal anymore. But when I first started most of the principles were men. ST: So, you’ve seen that as a change KC: Absolutely ST: in your career where it’s gone from KC: Absolutely ST: women in the classroom men in the office to KC: To now you’re getting that and their moving up well there used to be all male professors at the universities it was rare. When I started coming to college there were female professors, but you where kind of like thought of as a bully or I don’t know how to say what I’m trying to say, but you were not in the same, it was made for men, you were going into men’s territory and now I think you have about fifty- fifty don’t you now? I haven’t been up to the university. But I’ve defiantly seen principles go from being all male or ninety percent male to a lot of female principles. ST: That’s interesting. AK: No, I think that’s applicable to now with women seeming to gruff if their assertive. KC: Ya, and I don’t know if that’s the word I want, it’s like you know lady stay in your lane. AK: Don’t complain. Interesting. When did you become a teacher? KC: In nineteen ninety-two. So that’s twenty-seven years. AK: Do you have any more questions? ST: Nope 12 AK: I don’t either that was excellent. ST: Thank you AK: Do you have a follow up? Thank you. KC: Absolutely it was my pleasure. .