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Excerpt from Oral History Interview with Mary Price Adamson, April 19, 1976. Interview G-0001. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) See Entire Interview >>

Adamson's aunt runs her family

Though Adamson does not believe that education made her mother more independent, she does see ways that it benefited her aunt who married a man who did not support his family. Instead of remaining in the situation, her aunt moved with her children to Idaho for a job.

Citing this Excerpt

Oral History Interview with Mary Price Adamson, April 19, 1976. Interview G-0001. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

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But Aunt Mary was a very lively person. She had this great drove of children, and her husband, Uncle Jim Wall, his name was, was-I don't know, there was sort of the implication that Uncle Jim-was not as energetic as he might have been. Anyhow, Aunt Mary went to Greensboro and started running a boarding house and brought up her large brood of children. Then when the children were at least teenage, they read somewhere about Idaho-that it was the land of opportunity, that people could go out there and they could get land, and there was an open opportunity.Then the railroad had been through, so it was possible to get to Idaho. So Aunt Mary packed up a lunch sufficient to last eight days for her and however many children there were, at least half a dozen, and they managed to get money enough to buy their train tickets. They got on the train and went to Idaho, leaving Uncle Jim in Greensboro. He apparently didn't think it was such a good idea to go to Idaho. So they went out and just how they managed to get along, I don't know. But after they had become established, I suppose Aunt Mary ran a boarding house again, and whether it was Boise or Twin Falls, I don't know. After they were established there, Uncle Jim heard about it and he went out there too. He got himself on the train and went out to join up with them. He was not a skilled worker, so that what he did was he established a garbage collection business and managed so well at it that when he died before long, he left Aunt Mary enough money so that her last days were spent in ease, not luxury, but in ease as compared to her long years of hard work.
MARY FREDERICKSON:
Do you remember people in the family talking about them leaving? What was the reaction to her scooting off to Idaho with all these children?
MARY PRICE ADAMSON:
I was very young, and so my memories are vague; but anyhow, I'm telling you these stories,I got the impression from the way that they were told. I would not verify their being factually correct, but it's my childish memory of what I heard about them.