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This is Amanda Noel with the Samuel Proctor Oil History Program on July 2nd, 2010. And I'm here with Jim Forbes. And thank you so much, Mr Forbes Air coming here to talk to us today. I'd like to begin just maybe with your early childhood, Some of your family history, anything like that.

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Okay. My father went thio. It was on the way to the Colombian oil fields and after World War one, about 1920 and he stopped off to see a sister and his sister. Actually, his older sister, um, was the wife of U S Army engineer who had worked in Hickam Field in Hawaii, and then it transferred to build Aubert Field on the canal zone.

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And he said he dropped off and stayed for 37 years. I learned from his niece, Uh, that, in fact, he jumped ship. And if his mother, in other words, my father's sister hadn't known a judge, uh, till get him off, he'd have been in jail, but he ended up actually, uh, becoming a police officer for the first six or seven years.

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And then he transferred to a sanitary inspector. Let me get back to that and my mother in 1929. She was from Brad. My father was from Payet, Idaho. My mother was from Bradford, Pennsylvania, and she'd gone to nurses training and got her RN. And this was her first job.

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She was a like to travel. She was quite a lovely lady, and she went to Panama toe work at Gorgas Hospital. And Dad was the blind date the first night that she was in, uh, in Panama, he said, Well, some guy said, Come on or I'll goto Ray, go to school.

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Go, go, go out. No, I don't want to. But he did, and they ended up marrying and living happily ever after. Pretty much, um, and my father, my earliest memories. Um, when he went to the sanitary department, as I must have been 456 years old, No, three or four or five.

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Before I went to school, we lived in Peter McGill or Pedro Miguel. And I remember going out with him dark night, and we drive these little roads out into the deep jungle. All of a sudden, we come on a black man sitting on a stool. Hey, arm exposed and he'd have a little vial that had, uh, chloroform in it.

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And when a mosquito woodland, he'd put the vial over the mosquito and kill it and put it a little bag. And then, um, they collected these all over the isthmus, my dad and other people. And then they take them back to the laboratory and they would find out what mosquitoes were there.

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And if they had an increase in monopolies or in the eighties, Egypt I which you're for yellow fever, they'd go in and they put, uh, diesel oil on the little lakes and ponds and that would kill the larva. When they put their little snouts up, they get, they'd be actually suffocated.

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So I remember that my dad, at the end of his career, he was one of the experts on malaria and mosquito control, uh, in South America, because he'd been at it so long, and they used to have tropical medical medicine conferences, and he'd talk and talk to the people, etcetera.

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But he had no education, Really. I mean, high school, but that that was it. But after he was doing whatever, wherever this wasn't in Peter McGill, he went into bell bow and moved to Balboa. And we lived on a ridge road near the administration building. Golly, well, I left.

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I left for university from from there, they moved to another place. They got better quarters because you had better, uh, seniority overlooking all field. But, um, during World War two, he was in charge of garbage collection. So it had done it ran all the garbage trucks.

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They ran trains out to summit where they had a big incinerator, and he was in charge of that for seven or eight or nine years. But and then, at the last of his career, he worked out of the Panama, a railroad terminus in Panama City itself.

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Uh, in a Senate sanity. Sanitary inspector. My mother, uh, she, um, nursed forbid Gorgas Hospital, and then she stopped to make babies, and she had two of those. And when World War two came along, she went off to work, and she was working out in the in the jungles of construction sites.

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And she did this, uh, 567 years. Both my parents actually compared to many his own ians. Who? I've heard some guys. I've been down here 25 years and don't speak a word of Spanish, and I'm proud of it. But they took Spanish, and we're quite fluent.

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Uh, dad needed it. His business, Uh, but less so than Mother Mother was out worth construction workers and most of them only spoke Spanish. There's a lot of Jamaicans and Barbadians, but they weren't on these jobs. So Mom worked in Spanish for 5678 years. Um, I'll go into more now.

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In the 19 late 19 twenties, my dad invested $10,000 in a coffee thinker up in Chiriqui Province in Cerro Punta and lost his tail because he was too high. It was about 6000 ft, and it was just too cold to grow. A lot of coffee is he'd get a couple of cups of coffee beans, and you probably need 300 cups to make a tree worthwhile.

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So he lost his money. But remember mother saying that they would go up to oh, trying to think of the name. It's north of David, its's, uh, and they would get on the horses and they go for 17 hours on horseback upto Alkon. And apparently, she said, we went through this one area at night.

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I got in at about midnight, and Dad said she had her arms in the flour barrel making biscuits for everybody because she was to do with this lady. But she said, on the way back we saw that it was very narrow path and theme mules or horses, whichever they would be on, probably bounced once before they landed in the Cherokee River.

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But so steep. But anyhow, um, another one of my mother's stories is that there was a fellow was a fugitive from justice of murderer, and he came by to their house when she was by himself up in Cerro, Punta. And he says she didn't know who fed him cough.

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He's the nicest guy in the whole world, but anyhow, all sorts of all sorts of lovely stories way spent a lot of our summers at the, uh, I guess it's about 19, 43 or four because we couldn't go to the States. We went up to a fellow in a public Brackney owned a construction business in Panama, are friends of my parents.

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He had a a a ah farm up in, uh, near Bella, lol con uh, towards the Costa Rican border from Otto, which is the last real town before you get to the Costa Rican border. And we went up there, I think 1943 44. And he gave my father a lot.

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And Dad built a summer home up there. And so we spent a lot of time in up in in Val Con. Of course, we were expected to speak Spanish, and we did pretty well. I mean, we took it in school, etcetera, and I still go back to Mexico and think I've gone home because, you know, it's funny.

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We're down here often there. Lots of Spanish speaking people here in Florida. So, uh, many How? Um, let's see. I'm got to get structure. I was a proffer 31 years and understand structure. Um, so poo. I was born at Gorgas Hospital in December 19th. 1932. Sister was born there July 13th, 1935.

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Yeah, Both of us graduated from Billable High School. I was the class of 50 uh, and my sister, the class of 53. I went up to well, some of my parents friends with Walter and Jesse Lindsay and He was the, um, the chief of the Botanical garden at Summit.

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And my parents hadn't had a college education at both Walter and Jesse had they gone to Washington State College in Pullman, Washington, And, uh, when I was in high school, I'm not sure how I got into it, but it ended up that I was, uh oh, it was a It was associated someone with the Baptist Church that my parents were quite active with Bilbo Heads Baptist Church and there was a missionary radio station.

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I ended up the last year, two years in high school that I would go down and announce on it and pull records and do all the rest of the stuff, um, needed. And it was really great fun. Uh, so I thought I wanted to get into radio speech in Washington State, had both a radio speech program, and I got up there and it wasn't terribly interesting, and I ended switching to agriculture and got a degree in agriculture.

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But the reason I went up there was one that Walter and Jesse Lindsay had graduated, and then Bill Ziemer, who was the our swim coach because I was on the swim team and the band, uh, water polo team. He went up to get a master's degree, and several of us went after myself.

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Don Conner, who was a really good swimmer on De so that we end up because of that reason. I don't think either Don or my parents and then the university, But But let's see what else? Maybe you could tell me a little bit more about what school was like there.

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Okay. Well, okay. My kindergarten teacher, Mrs Onderdonk E forgot the name of the baby. Um um Well, um, when I went thio school, we'd By that time, we moved from Peter McGill into Balboa and we walked to school. And because we walked through the botanical garden and Balboa and walk down to the the elementary school was just the end of the of the walk through botanical garden.

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We walk up to Ridge Road, Um, and so we did that. I went through the sixth grades there and then went to junior high school, and then the available high school still in walking distance. And, uh, no, I I enjoyed. I was in ah, biology class and really enjoyed all of that.

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In fact, my poor mother, she's scared it at the steaks. And one, I think my between my 2nd and 3rd year sophomore and junior year. The biology teacher. Mr Lee, let me bring to Bull considers because home over summer e got to keep him. She didn't think I should have these 8 ft snakes crawling across my back.

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But hell, I mean, they liked it. It was warm. Uh, but she was okay about that. I think my wife would have done it. My wife really doesn't like snakes. So I may have toe choose between this current wife of 47 years and snakes, and I think I go with wife.

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But still, snakes were nice. Um, I think probably they'll here in the oral history. Mr. Uh, Mr. Fisher was a science teacher and everybody We were talking in our reunion room Thio yesterday. Just about what a great teacher he waas as well as Mr Lian Biology would go out on field trips to bear Colorado Island and stay the weekend, you know, go out without howler monkeys.

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And in fact, I was out there one one time we stayed. I think it was only one night, maybe two nights. But there was a fellow down. I think it was from the anthem ology department at Harvard, and I went out with him and he was tracing army ants, and they moved at night time.

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So we were out in the middle of the bloody jungle dark, dark, dark. And he had a headlamp on, you know, tracing where the army ants were going because he was what would happen. He would he would, uh, they looked where they've been. And then they take and take squares of dirt and count the microbes and things in them And where the army and had been there were none.

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And if you go a little bit to the right, you have thousands of them. But it's really interesting to watch them, you know? E don't you know what they are? Army. And then they go and you know, and they eat everything in their path. But that was just great.

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I mean, what what a thrill for a young guy that like science, you know? But you had experiences like that. I mean, the ah, well, I mean, fellow Frank Wilder, the Spanish teacher. I remember learned a lot of Spanish from that way, took Spanish and then, of course, we could practice it.

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And well, when I was coming down on the plane for Vancouver two days ago, three days two days ago we had a book of biographies put together for the 50th reunion of class of 15. The Class 49 I went through and read, and I knew we had good schooling because almost every professor had our school teacher had a master's degree, like from Colombian from one of the universities, some of the best in the world.

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And I didn't realize that this is unique until our kids were going to school, etcetera. But I looked, and I think something like 13 or 15 of the 100 graduate. The 100 graduates in my class of the women got PhDs or D EDS. Well, in 1950 women did not get these high degrees.

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It just was, you know, what do they do? They all they gotta do is make babies. You know, that just shows a the quality of our education, but also the quality of the of of the parents. A lot of these parents property mobile like my parents, they didn't have education, but by God, we were going to have it.

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And you just see it. What happened? I mean the the success ratio out of our 100 students compared to the normal high school, Just unbelievably high. Do you have any idea? You know what caused that? Well, I think a the parents thistles What causes most things?

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You. It's who the stork brings you to. You know, that's one of the lotteries of life you get born to parents that aren't terribly useful. Don't want you. It's not much fun. You get to parents that want you and really look after you. That's a big thing.

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I mean, I taught for 35 years, you know that you can tell this, but in addition to that, I think that plus the quality of the school education was such that you were expected to go to school high school. And it was, I think, someone I want maybe 60 70% of our class, maybe 50% went to on the university and a normal class here in north in the States or in Canada, 2030%.

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You know so much higher incidents and a It's parents, but be It's also, I think, the the encouragement that one got from the from the professor, the teachers, you know, that's the only thing I know. I mean, but a lot of behavioral science because they taught marketing way.

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You look at a lot of this is about the same background and what it does to the Children, and we're just lucky, you know, I got the right store. Life is good. Um, you mentioned earlier that your parents were involved in the Baptist Church in the Canal zone.

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Can you talk a little bit about that church? Well, I think Dad went on sufferings Mother she fell in love with, I think with the preacher's name is B B. I never thought very much of him. Uh, he beat his wife for one thing. She wouldn't believe this, but, you know, it was very much that.

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Okay, Life in the canal zone revolved around a church group often is one of the big ones. And the fraternal groups like the Elks in the Masons, etcetera and so way were close to the Baptist Church My mother had in upbringing, you know, Christian upbringing strong, more stronger than my father.

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But, you know, he went under sufferings, and she e think she made play the piano a bit. I know that my sister, who became a pianist, used to play the organ and when she was in high school for a lot of the services. Uh huh. I'm other than that.

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I mean, I'm, uh as I get older, I get less and less religious and more against religion. So I'm I'm not a good person to talk to us about. I'm, uh and so But you know it a lot of great fun because of the kids that I was within my and my peer group went to the university.

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I mean, went thio church, you know? So, uh, I don't know. I think that's about all that I can remember. Was your father a part of any other groups? Fraternal group. Dad was a mason, but he never participated very much. Oh, well, he had a really love very, very intelligent guy.

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He was the president of the Peter McGill and later the Summit Golf Course. Peter McGill Golf Course. Built on the Peter McGill locks on the far side and right after world War two. I think they were having the canal expansion because they built. And so they moved to summit on.

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Uh, Dad was the president before, and then he shepherded the move to summit. He was the president of golf, scoring seven or eight or 10 years. You scratch golfer. I didn't call until I came to North America. I had was a swimmer. Eso we had other things to dio, but he was He was very involved in that and that took a lot of his time.

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I mean, my my mother was a golf widow on the weekends and having said that, he was a good dad. I mean, he did lots of things, but, you know, he played golf on the weekends a T East on Sunday. I'm not sure what happened on Saturday.

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That's a long time ago, remember, that's 60 beers. Plus, a lot of these memories are fading, but that's what you're doing in oil history. Until we really lose our minds, get a nice record for you guys. Um, can you talk a little bit? Maybe about the war experience for your family?

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E. I remember. And so does David Robles, who's down here. We were talking last night way. Remember December 7th? Because we had some people from the States who lived in Panama young couple or at our house for dinner on the Sunday night. And we heard the news, and my dad quickly took them home.

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Mom gave us a bath, and they turned the lights off because they were afraid the Japanese were going to attack that night. So we had had no electricity until the next morning. Um, and then it was a great place to be during the war because you have all the soldiers we used to go out the camps, you know, And they have little identifying models for the people identifying usedto get those from soldiers.

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And I lived at quarry near Quarry Heights, which is the the control station for all the Panama area. And during the war, I had a paper route on Quarry Heights. So I used Thio deliver papers every day and up there, but and we used tohave. We had them, uh, air raid shelters.

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And every once a couple of times, you were called out to go to the air raid shelters. I don't remember it being terribly frequent, But I remember, I think the battle of the Coral Sea it was the Yorktown or one of them. One of them with aircraft carriers were just decimated.

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Big holes in the sides. And it came in and came into port. Went down, saw it. So all the big holes in the side of the boat lots of people were killed on it. And that was on the way to the east coast of the U.

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S. To get repaired. Remember that happening? I remember hearing about submarine patrols mainly from the Atlantic site into the Caribbean. Also, remember that they used to dio ration runs to Jamaica for the various, uh, officers clubs in there. And what they bring back is ah, 1000 cases of rum e.

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You know why not? What else? Well, um it was scouts, Scouts We would go up to the names were escaping me Rio Acto Air Force Base and have, ah, scout, uh, week up, you know, have a week in camp. But it was on the military base.

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That's about 60 70 80 miles north of Panama. Uh um you had a friend over and Albert Field. I used to go over there all the time and eat and get on the little jitney the bus and go over and see him and come back. Um, I guess that Z although it really so much happening there that the activity was unbelievable.

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And, you know, as kids, we didn't really realize what was happening. Way heard of it. But, you know, you don't realize that people already dying in this type of thing much worse than what we had We had a pretty nice existence. E. On. What did your mother think about going back to work?

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You said she went back to work. Oh, I think she loved it. She is such a people person. People loved her. She went back to work. And then she became. After the war was over, she went to work at the ah Bell Boy dispensary, and she was the dispensary nurse there for seven or eight years.

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And then after I had left to go on to university, she became the school nurse. And from then, until I guess 1955 6 or seven, when they retired, she was a school nurse. So all these people know Mrs Forbes and so she e se. Just a really nice lady.

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Just, uh, never met a stranger came up British Columbia are little kids were, well, both small mother would go out and she said, You know, Mrs Smith has had a hysterectomy. We didn't know who the hell Mr Smith was, but she go down the block, you know?

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But anyhow, everybody liked her, but she's e think she was really happy. I mean, and she loved the work. She liked people a lot, and they liked her. So it was a good meld. You know, they they used the money and no, Can you talk about Did you take vacations to the States?

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What was that like coming being raised in the canal zone and coming back to the United States? That's what one did you know, I didn't, you know? Well, it's cool compared to pound when you get up there and get in New York, you know, and normally would go in the summertime.

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But even then, the difference in temperature was really quite noticeable. Um, some friends of ours following him of of Haider. He was the captain of one of the big dredges. He was from Northern New York state near a town called Perish Ville. And about 1939 I think it was 1940 or 41.

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He talked my parents into going up to, Ah Little Lake called Joe Indian Pond, which is like saying your parish Ville Potsdam, New York, and they had a summer house up there. I think it may have belonged to the family, but anyhow, we went up there and Dad bought a pretty run down, uh, summer house, and then we couldn't go for three or four years because of the year because of the weather.

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But in the interim, they won the lottery, think that three or $4000 and bought a much better place, a sight unseen. But they've seen it before, and so we spent two or three summers up there. I know I came back from Washington State the summer of 51 or 52 or was there, but we've been up there at least one more time.

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Uh, in fact, I went to Harvard Business School in another era, and my wife and I came up there with our two Children in a couple of mates from Harvard. Visit us on the way north to Canada. Teach tennis, you know, But we've had very fond memories of the, uh, Joe Indian Pond.

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It's a lovely spot in eso. When we went up, we would also go to Pennsylvania, where my mother was from and visit relatives there. And that was great meeting my big cousin over 10 or 12 or 14 years old, older than I and I know to have been in the war, been wounded.

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But it was I really liked his pace called Bradford Pennsylvania, and it was really pleasure to go back and see Aunt Sadie and Uncle Art. And Uncle Art was a blacksmith. Have you ever seen Zippel cigarette lighters? He made the first dies for simple things. Cigarette lighters in the late 19 thirties in his forge.

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No little vignettes that don't matter in the scheme of things. Um, but we used that we would try toe, you know. Well, we wouldn't go to CNN. Sadie. Azzawi could. Yes. Hey, so how did uh, traveling in the U. S. Compared toa the summers you spent in Panama?

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I don't understand the question. You said you had a summer house in Panama's Whoa. Yeah, Well, e. I mean, all we do is get in the car and go for eight or nine hours up. Thio, Thio, Alkon. And then we just had a great time in the summer and dad would get a month off, and the difference in temperature was unbelievable.

00:28:10.960 - 00:28:36.120

You know, it's lovely. Some of the nicest climates in the world. The tropical alpine, all the way up to Costa Rica. Guatemala, uh, Mexico, you know, three or four or 5000 ft. Um, the humidity drops. You know, it goes down to what? Not very cold. You know, 50 degrees, Uh, maybe 45 up really high and at night and up to 65.

00:28:36.120 - 00:29:04.950

70 You know, low humidity, uh, magnificent climate. And actually in 19. Yeah, 75. I had a sabbatical, and we took a camper from Vancouver to Panama on back over 10 months. And we took our two youngest Children at the time. They were six and nine all the way down and back, and we stayed in ball con for ah, whole month I rented.

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It's called, uh, three Audubon Society of Florida owned a house, or they used for people go down to stay when they were studying birds. And so we stayed in the why we rented that house for a month and just had a spectacular time. I mean, I just I just love the area and, of course, speaking Spanish.

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It was no problem this way. And we, you know, had a had a nice time all the way down. I mean, it's one of the high plants I think of my wife, and my vacations is doing that. So But let's see if I answered sort of string with Well, once we had the cabin, we didn't do anything else but go there.

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I mean, there's no reason to go other places. Um from inside Think was only two or three different years. We did it before I left. The parents would go up there. But remember, I slaughtered hogs e take me green animal husbandry and I came down. But he has been mined first or second or second or third.

00:30:10.330 - 00:30:26.380

It had to be a second or third or 3rd and 4th year at Washington State, and I've taken a course and meets on help The guy slaughter the hogs and and and butcher the hog is good you know the the mozo the remember his name was Juanele.

00:30:26.380 - 00:30:43.580

Oh, really? Need guy used to travel, travel up in the jungle with them and climb way up near Cerro Punta Going and I'm not sure I was going up there, but I remember going with them. Remember, taking this is nasty to tell. You have had TB had 22.

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You were shooting orchids that were hanging from the trees, shooting them down. Just target practice. But there it goes. E that way. Didn't realize it would ecologically unfriendly. At that time, there were lots of orchids, but, um, way you know, he slaughtered the hawks. That was fun.

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Remember, he walked into way used thio. Either take a horse or walk into a lotto and buy groceries. And there's a word that I've only seen people use it in Panama. It's called suna. SUNA means a little bit you get from the storekeeper if you're buying things for your mother Used to get the soon you give you a little, a little bit of a little piece of gum or something and a great time going into anello, the shop, because my parents let me go off with him.

00:31:36.390 - 00:31:58.610

He and his wife were just lovely people, you know. He was just the local laborer, but nice guy. And I remember two or three summers that when I was up there that I spent a lot of time with yellow and nice people and we went. My wife and I went back in 2000 and we were there for a month or so.

00:31:58.620 - 00:32:17.300

We rented a car and went up. Thio went upto Volcan and then around the book It Day and just had the loveliest time people, the Panamanian people. I just think you're so sweet, so friendly. We just had the loveliest time I went to a place called It's called Shape or Kitrey.

00:32:17.300 - 00:32:36.110

It's out there. There's a peninsula half of the way up there to David and we went out there. It's off the main road, but I'd never been there, so we're going to go out and see it. It's lovely restaurant Overlook outdoors because it doesn't need to be closed and looking down on the town, and this fellow was serving us.

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He's 45 50 years old, and he said, I'm from here, but I went to Panama for 10 or 15 years, and then I come Then I came back. Asparagus is Oh, it's paradise, you know. Well, okay. For him, it was, you know, But, you know, he just so happy to be back on the hometown.

00:32:54.380 - 00:33:13.850

And But we had experiences like that all up and down the the the coast, going up there. We spend, I say, sometime in Volcan, the new rentable Kathy. And the thing I liked in Boquete was the coffee. It ISS so good. We were having five and six cups a day.

00:33:14.340 - 00:33:36.850

I used to use milk and cream. Nothing because it tasted so good. And a Bocchetti coffee five or six weeks ago got the highest price for coffee ever paid in the world. $173 a pound. They paid 68 or 68 or $66,000 for a big bag of coffee.

00:33:36.860 - 00:34:01.490

A Japanese guy, it was It was on the news someplace, You know, uh, awesome. And I can see why this stuff is so good, you know? And I don't know if you know, but coffee is made. The the the high altitude coffees are the ones that have all the bouquet and aromas, but they're very expensive and they mixed them with Robustas that have grown in in the lowland areas like over in Africa or in Brazil, etcetera.

00:34:01.500 - 00:34:19.480

And that's normal. Coffee has its because you can't afford most people wouldn't afford coffee. You can buy it. But but and coffees from the highlands of Panama, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico are world class thing, you know, just like the Kenyan coffees and the ones from Hawaii from Maui.

00:34:19.490 - 00:34:50.760

But same thing, the same class of same level were expensive stuff, but $173 a pound through the Japanese do this just so they can show off. But e don't know all sorts of little thing. Oh, I remember I went up to a scout camp when the The VJ Day It was August 1945 and we were in a scout camp and I remember the sisters in gelato and a big celebration because the war was finally over.

00:34:51.140 - 00:35:07.050

E. We took and walked up into on the volcano on a big hiking mission. I dropped out. I couldn't have my My dad gave me all this weight and I couldn't handle it. But, you know, I used to go up there. We will go up there and shoot pigeons.

00:35:07.060 - 00:35:30.900

They had very large wood pigeons. Just yummy to eat. We shot those, but everybody did. Um what else, Um, are these are these interviews? Always this disjointed little bit. Memories just keep going. That's right. I mean, it comes out of thin air. It's great to hear that way.

00:35:30.910 - 00:35:54.690

Can you talk a little bit about your experience going to college? Was it difficulty going so far away from home? Well, um, mine was made probably less difficult than others, because his fellow Walter Lindsay, who was the head of the botanical garden, and his wife had a sister living in Spokane.

00:35:54.700 - 00:36:22.140

And so, um, well, my transition was my father had one of his sisters. He's one of 11. I think I lived in, um uh, near Boise, Idaho. So I flew up and they met me, and I spent about a week there. Then I flew up to Pullman, and when school started and I had to get a job, I worked in the student union and other things, but then I would go up.

00:36:22.150 - 00:37:06.540

I went up to see, um oh, Mac and successes e. Forget the name. But anyhow, it's the She was the sister of Jesse Lindsay and her husband Lovely, lovely people. And they, you know, I was there, son. But in addition of that, it was relatively easy because my father was from the area, and the first Christmas I went down and stayed with, I called her, Um Oh, e forget the name.

00:37:06.540 - 00:37:27.830

I mean, she's 99 years old and doesn't have much mind left and lives down in Westland Oregon. Um, but, uh, she had her son. Her second son is born five months before I was So we're the same age and the Sun had a girlfriend again within a month or two of his birth.

00:37:27.830 - 00:37:47.240

So I went down to the first Christmas, they took me skiing. I couldn't believe people in their right mind would go out the snow. So I skied twice and then I gave it up. That was enough, but so it was more easier for me. And I don't remember any great pangs of homesickness.

00:37:47.630 - 00:38:07.660

There was a lot to do. We've done a lot of traveling, you know, as Children. More so than most people would do in North America. So we've had a lot of experience traveling. Um, my parents were very supportive, and we're going to university, so I knew that that's what I was supposed to be doing.

00:38:08.520 - 00:38:38.700

I think I found a girlfriend relatively quick, so that helped down, um, And after the first six months, I joined a fraternity. So you had that group as a support group. I don't remember being very difficulty. I mean, it was it was new, but I've been to the States a lot, you know, 567 times over the years.

00:38:38.710 - 00:39:09.960

And so I didn't It didn't. The worst part was, uh, cold. Couldn't believe how cold it was going up to swimming practice of eight in the morning, you know, minus 25 degrees, you know? Well, I end up. We didn't have a scarf, so I ended up taking one of those towels and put it around my head to keep my ears when I mean, this was tough stuff, and I had long johns on, and these guys would laugh at me for having on long time.

00:39:09.960 - 00:39:24.310

So what? You're out of your skull. You're freezing it. There I still use them any when it gets cold, But I have a daughter. Lives where it gets minus 50. Well, she actually died a year and a half ago. When I go up to visit, Sue went up for the funeral.

00:39:24.310 - 00:39:43.410

I had long Johnson, you know, because it's minus 30 s o. But no, it Z, I think was a pretty good, uh, It wasn't a tough transition, I'm sure. I'm sure sometimes I was a little bit homesick, but not a lot. It was good. Did your sister leave?

00:39:43.420 - 00:40:02.730

My sister came up action to Washington State, and she left after a year and went to Denver and, uh, married a fellow in the Air Force there. Got a nar en like my mother had e don't know why she she was homesick or something. I don't know why she went back to Denver, but she did.

00:40:04.010 - 00:40:27.790

E don't know so, but she she came Oppa's well, but actually, we had a number of people. Feldman. Jerry Darden, who was in his dad, was the British consul in Guayaquil, Ecuador, then became the council in Panama. And Jerry was on the swimming team. He's a year or two older than us, and Jerry went up along with John Connor and me.

00:40:27.800 - 00:40:39.950

I think that was the three of us that went up because Bill Zimmer had gone up there to get his masters and Jerry was a good, uh was a good backstroker. And so he went up and he got actually got a master's degree of some sort.

00:40:40.410 - 00:41:00.000

I've been trying to find the last six years and just dropped out of sight, and I've been in contact with his cousin, who is ambassador from Bolivia, to the Netherlands, and she's been looking like I have. We've been trying to find him just no trace because he and I were very good friends.

00:41:00.000 - 00:41:29.250

We did a lot together, both in Panama and then up in in in Pullman's anyway. So there we go. Next. How long did your parents stay down in the canals? Chili retired, and I'm trying to think 53 54 55 something like 56. I'm not quite sure he retired.

00:41:29.260 - 00:42:02.630

He went to Yeah, he went to Arizona and my mother, I say she is the spark plug in the family. When she was there as part of Mission there was a doctor, uh, call Dr Ike, who is a surgeon, and every three or four weeks the two of them would fly over to Sandblast and whole free clinics for the Sandglass Indians.

00:42:03.200 - 00:42:26.040

So when they retired, the parents went to Arizona. But then, Doctor, I could retired and went up and open to practice up in Coalinga, California, which is between Los Angeles and Bakersfield or Fresno. And he enticed my mother to go over for several years and become his nurse.

00:42:26.050 - 00:43:15.390

They were living in a motor home on Airstream motorhome, so they went up and did that. And then, after Ike retired, he went back to actually Sun City, California and my parents went down to him it in their motor home. My dad died in 19, four, 63 or four cancer, and when he was in Hammond, then then my mother moved to Sun City with a her aunt by marriage, have married a fellow that was quite a bit younger than her.

00:43:15.390 - 00:43:33.310

She had quite a money. She'd been through two husbands and and meant this fellow's a stockbroker took great care of her. But he said, coming back toe Bradford and help me because Marie's getting not well and they'd go bound to. They had a place in in ST Petersburg.

00:43:33.320 - 00:43:55.000

So for two years, actually, she was there about 18 months, and Marie died. She was telling everybody how old she was. She died of Harold. I was 85. She end up being 93 or 94. She died and mother stayed with Ellsworth until she died. They paint Cedarburg and then they moved to Sun City, California after that.

00:43:55.010 - 00:44:17.740

And we're there for 21 or two years. And she died and he died about two or three years later. But, you know, they think it is very platonic relationship. We think e mean, if you knew elsewhere, you would be sure it was platonic. Uh, he was sort of a sexual, but he squired all the ladies around my mother and all the ladies, and he just loved driving around places all over Southern California.

00:44:17.750 - 00:44:34.360

But they had a very nice life. I think she lived longer with him that she had with my father 26 years. And with that, it was only 23 or four, but anyhow, eso that's what happened. Thio them you see this all over all the people that live here in Florida.

00:44:34.360 - 00:44:52.240

I mean, there's no longer Panama Canal company that people work for. You know, a lot of them migrated here or to California, Arizona. And that's from my parents wonder Texas. Um, okay. Connection. Was it Was it hard for your parents to leave? Do you think The canal zone?

00:44:57.470 - 00:45:14.320

I don't think so. You know, they've been down there. They had a lot of friends, a lot of family up here, although they didn't seem to be well, actually, when they left when they left the zone, my grandmother, my mother's mother, came to live with them for the force four or five years before she died.

00:45:14.550 - 00:45:31.570

I think that was tough. Dad didn't appreciate as much as I don't think either. I'm liked it, but they couldn't do anything with Angie. So Andy was there and, you know, they would spend the summers up Joe Indian lake up in New York, you know, then thing they go back, I guess Arizona or Florida or something.

00:45:31.570 - 00:45:49.430

I'm tryingto By that time, I was married, had a couple of kids, and, you know, I couldn't keep track of them. I had enough problems getting food and the wife's family and in my family, you know, and trying to keep my head above water. So I think probably going back, I would probably try to trace some of it.

00:45:49.440 - 00:46:17.230

But I'm I'm not sure. Yeah, what happened to that? I know that. I used it in the summer of 56 when I was between the two years at Harvard Business School. I'm not. They weren't up. There was my wife and I and our two young kids and the people that have gotten us up there, the Haider's Mr Haider died.

00:46:17.240 - 00:46:35.290

But Mrs Haider was there, and I actually went up filling them. Barney Barlow was in charge of either the Pacific locks or all the lock. I think specific locks. He was the main control operator and end up being in charge. And he was in charge of opening up the ST Lawrence Seaway.

00:46:35.380 - 00:46:54.010

In between my two years at Harvard, I went up and I worked in the office or Barney Barlow something Thio Keep us eating. E. Remember, we got up from Harvard. We got there and I had no money, so I went to Mrs Hydrant borrowed 10 bucks until I got my first check from the from the ST Lawrence Seaway Authority.

00:46:54.180 - 00:47:14.130

And I put the first boat to the ST Lawrence Seaway simply because I was there at night and someone needed to take a line when they were just starting to fill it. But that was lots of fun, you know? But it is like a woman. And actually, last last November, my wife and I took a trip from Fort Lauderdale to L.

00:47:14.130 - 00:47:26.330

A. On a ship. It's the first time I transited the canal. We've been out there, we'd go down. We've been down there twice and we go out to the locks and we're going to stay an hour and three hours later, we're still standing there just so fascinating.

00:47:26.340 - 00:47:41.180

And this time we got to go through the lock. And it was just one of I think it was about nine or 10, 12 hours and we weigh on. Lee went down for lunch. We stayed out the whole time was just so fascinating. I'd like to go and do it again, actually.

00:47:41.280 - 00:48:02.160

And the new canals being built, you're seeing all of that happening. It was, and I knew so much about it. I mean, Mr Captain Haider's dredge was over there. We saw it the big Hercules Crane. And you know what those are? It's one of the largest cranes in the world, and it was still there, and I'd seen that, you know, And actually, the one that was there was when they bought from Germany after the war.

00:48:02.160 - 00:48:26.590

But it looked a lot like the Hercules. Or maybe there were two of them anyhow. I mean, this is this is massive engineering and, you know, living there and I just read There's a seminal book on the Panama Canal written 1980 1990. If you ask anybody, they'll know what it is.

00:48:26.590 - 00:48:44.900

And I read it before I went down. No, no. My wife bought it for me on the boat and I read it after, but I known about the feats of engineering that here you have these 100 ton lock gates, they literally float. They were designed about 1912 or 13 and they still work.

00:48:45.370 - 00:49:05.080

They do maintenance on them, but it's unbelievable how good the engineers were that thought this through. I'll tell you one of the when we went down there in 2000, 1 of the things that I found very interesting, because when you were there I became a Canadian, and I'm not a big fan of America in many respects anymore.

00:49:05.770 - 00:49:20.390

But I went down there in the United States, had done everything. Weren't they great? What they fail to tell you Over 50% of the Earth that had to be moved was moved by the French Canal company before they went bus. Now they did a lot of very positive things.

00:49:20.400 - 00:49:38.420

But if you were down there, the French had done nothing. They'd all died from yellow fever. Yet if you read the rial history and this is written by an American is a beautiful history of all the things that had happened when Dallas Epps Institute of the Canal And this is a very interesting thing.

00:49:38.420 - 00:50:01.760

You know? I hear some of my some of the people that I went to school or just complain about Panama on how bad they are, blah, blah, blah, blah said we stole it from a fair and square. Because in fact, Teddy Roosevelt sent gunboats in the Cologne harbor because the government of Colombia wouldn't agreed to the treaty they wanted to do so.

00:50:01.760 - 00:50:19.300

They end up taking it away from them. So they got it back. But I mean on and I was one of things. I'm surprised going back there after the transition and it was turned over to Panama. Heard these dire predictions from all the rednecks, Whatever. It's better.

00:50:19.310 - 00:50:34.510

It's better for tourists than ever before because they've made it a tourist venue so you could get and see what's happening. It seemed running very, very well, you know, it didn't die. And I, you know, I just think they've done a great job. God love them, you know.

00:50:34.520 - 00:50:59.760

Here's another one. Yeah, the When I was doing this radio station H O X O in Panama and in high school we were just across fourth of July Avenue into Panama from the zone on. I remember one night I meant, ah, young fellow older than me, but I ended up he'd gotten degree in architecture from Tulane.

00:50:59.770 - 00:51:22.350

He came back to Panama and tried to get a job because it was Panamanian. It would hire him as a colored worker. He'd get $600 a month, compared toa 2500 or $3000 a month if you've been in America. Same Well, actually, one of his classmates. He This guy was second or third this class, This is the guy down the middle or lower.

00:51:22.360 - 00:51:39.080

He got hired, and this fellow wouldn't accept that the price. And so he went into private practice and architectures in Panama was doing quite fine. But, you know, he saw how unfair this waas, you know, But this is this is before we had the civil rights movement, all the rest of it was okay.

00:51:39.090 - 00:51:57.200

But, you know, at the time I thought that's not fair because my parents were, I think, quite liberal. So they didn't even know this. They wouldn't admit to it, but they really were. I mean, the types of values that they gave to me and passed on relatively liberal, surely not read them on were lots of those.

00:51:57.560 - 00:52:26.710

Can you expand? Maybe on some of the prejudice that you saw there, um, from canal Zone workers, people who lived there. And also maybe you have more interaction with the Panamanians, and I don't know if you experienced some of their feelings towards Americans trying to structure the answer.

00:52:26.940 - 00:52:53.620

The Yeah, I always thought when you went to LA Boca or Oh, Barrasso or there's a one red tank. He's role black communities. You went by that? I mean, they were nowhere. Aziz. Well, Thea's we were It was, you know, you look at it. I'd think I felt sorry.

00:52:53.620 - 00:53:18.930

I mean, um and I don't know if the whole idea of racism if I knew the word at the time when I was experiencing it. But you see these people, for example, my mother had a black man who was the dresser. He do all the dressings and stuff in the dispensary e trying to think of his name.

00:53:18.940 - 00:53:40.460

Just absolutely lovely guy. His son he sent to the States and he became a physician, and he was murdered in New York out of racism. Here's a kid that Dad had put through university. Okay. I mean, I just just heartbroken for this fellow. And he's one of the nicest people.

00:53:40.470 - 00:54:03.510

Just, you know, Mother just thought he was He said that we could dress better than any white man I've ever seen. He's very, very tender, gentle fellow. And, um, but, um Well, you lived with and you saw it there. And you. I didn't think it was fair, but I didn't do much about it, you know?

00:54:03.510 - 00:54:16.050

What could I do? I was a kid. I know. It was looked down on one as, uh I guess it was still in grade school the first year of high school. I'd go down to the bell boa railroad station and shine shoes and white guys weren't supposed to do that.

00:54:16.060 - 00:54:44.980

Hell, I've made 25 cents. I didn't care, you know, But this type of thing, um and I guess, looking back, I'm really impressed with how well the black people who discriminate against took it. Maybe they just assumed that was their role in life. Although I'm sure that's not true.

00:54:45.210 - 00:55:02.600

But, I mean, I used I was for 56 years. I was a lifeguard of elbow and the three or four black ladies and a couple of gentleman's of work there. We're just the nicest people. I mean, just their family, you know, And it's, um and I just thought that was normal.

00:55:02.600 - 00:55:15.620

They would be nice to me. I was nice to them, But, you know, I wasn't thinking about their station in life was a hell of a lot worse than mine. And I don't know how much I perceive this until afterwards when I look back on it.

00:55:15.630 - 00:55:46.140

But at the time, that was the way it waas. Um, let me tell you a nice story at the I think the end of World War Two, my parents hired a maid. Everybody had means this made name was Delfino. Munoz and Delfina worked for the family for 20 years and war until she died.

00:55:46.140 - 00:56:21.530

She became a member of the family. She was a single mother, had a daughter by the name of Anna and Anna and my mother Court. Once Mother left the zone Mother and on a correspondent till Anna died in 2000 shows you kept this relationship going. Mother told us you watch the Atlanta Olympics in 1996 because on his daughter Eileen is going to carry the Panamanian flag.

00:56:25.130 - 00:56:52.440

She was a 50 m freestyle swimmer and there she was. Okay, well, I knew that one. And she, because of this Auburn University gave her a scholarship to swim for Auburn. And she has a sister who's two years younger and the sister came up. And both this I learned since both got degrees.

00:56:52.440 - 00:57:14.380

I knew that she was going there. We went down to Panama on this trip last year. And Delphine is grandson who's 60 and his wife met us when we got off the tenders from the tour boat in Fort Amador. Jimmy, because we visited them in 1975.

00:57:14.380 - 00:57:39.760

We stayed. We we came down in the in the camper from Canada. We're staying out of Tocumen Airport. I called Anna. Oh, Jimmy, Jimmy, Jimmy. So literally Within half a now, er 40 minutes. She and Pedro, her husband were there. Come, come. So we came and we parked in their parking lot in their driveway in Panama City and stayed with them for the rest of the two or three months.

00:57:39.760 - 00:58:06.620

We were there two or three weeks. We were there. And, um so we meant the sons the sons were at the two sons and a daughter were at the point of getting married. And one son, Pedro, um, went Thio University. I think his brother did. Oh, no.

00:58:06.630 - 00:58:35.130

All three of their Children went to university. Z o Mara is the daughter now lives in Washington, D. C. But there, uh, Pedro and and Luke had two daughters, usually the ones that went to Auburn. Um, Rolando had three daughters, all those three of graduated engineers and zero Motta's Children are 18 19.

00:58:35.140 - 00:58:50.260

They're just about ready to go to school someplace in Washington, D. C. So And I think that one of the reasons these kids have all done well because my parents influence I don't know if they help much monetarily, I don't think so. But, you know, you could do it.

00:58:50.270 - 00:59:13.830

You will, and they did. And it's just such a lovely success story and coming back around. When we went down to Panama last year, Andi I made so we'd see Pedro and Pedrito and Lupe. Um, they met us and I says, How's Pedro? The father, he says he's fine.

00:59:13.830 - 00:59:32.240

He had his 92nd birthday two days ago, and he doesn't know you're coming. We're going to surprise him, and we did had tears in his eyes. It was having tears in my eyes. It was just lovely. And so I mean this this. Anyhow, we learned that Eileen had moved to Seattle.

00:59:32.250 - 00:59:54.210

She married a fellow from Michigan, and they were both working for actually a cellphone type company in distribution. So the ninth of January, we took she and drew out to lunch in on Lake Washington, come to find out she'd gone to the Atlanta Olympics. She'd been in a Sydney Olympics, and the last Olympics was in Athens.

00:59:55.240 - 01:00:13.790

Lovely guy. Just Oh, another little point. David Roadblocks, who's one of my classmates way, had dinner last night, he says. Oh, no, it was his wife, Sylvia said. Oh, um, Eileen Copa Ropa. What a lovely person. She's been appointing some sort of an ambassador by Panama.

01:00:13.800 - 01:00:35.140

She's 28 or 9, 30 years old, 32 years old. And they all knew Eileen because she comes back. And she's all very, very helpful and all sorts of things relating to, uh, education with Children etcetera. You know, it's a very, very nice story. And so it's nice to know that you related to them.

01:00:36.710 - 01:00:56.860

E No, you had already left for school, and your parents left in the sixties. A swell, but do you think that the American civil rights movements going on, you know, on American territory affected the canals you. I'm sure it did. I mean, they're no longer golden colored.

01:00:56.870 - 01:01:12.800

I didn't know if if they'd stop that before the turnover. Do you know, I just don't have a clue? I don't know. I'm sure it had, in fact, because then people started doing Ah, this is not fair. You know, I I wasn't there. I don't perceive there's a lot of conflict.

01:01:12.800 - 01:01:36.440

Remember, we were going 40 years before that happened, so it continued for a while. I just don't know. Okay. Okay, um, let's see. What was your opinion on the turn over to the Panamanian control over the zone. I love Jimmy. What's his face it for doing?

01:01:36.440 - 01:01:52.320

What's his name card? I mean, and look at that. He wasn't the world's best president, but boy, he's done so much since he's been out. He's rial one of the better parts of American foreign policy. That lad. You know, I thought it was fine. I mean, give it back to them, dammit.

01:01:52.320 - 01:02:09.060

We took it away. And it's just the three imperialism of the U. S. But they're no different than the English were the Germans of the Dutch, you know, But still, it's there and I thought it was just fine. Of course, A lot of my cohorts. I was terrible.

01:02:10.000 - 01:02:29.090

Okay, that's what we have is a nice to live in a free country. We can have differences of opinion. Yeah, I don't think it mattered. Actually, in the scheme of things, uh, Doug? Yeah, sure. Well, I'm not sure if there's anything else that you would like to cover.

01:02:29.150 - 01:02:56.880

Way had enough time. With what? My goodness. E can't read this. We've got about a little over an hour. Yeah. Really? Is there anything else? I don't think I don't know. Let me quit. Our house was not air conditioned. Nobody's waas e used to hate to go down to Panama where they had air conditioning in the in the movie theaters.

01:02:56.880 - 01:03:24.430

That because so bloody cold way went back there in 75. Once when we took the camper down And then in 2000 and I didn't like the air conditioning. I don't like it here, but, you know I don't wanna live without it. So there you go. This'll is something that I just didn't know.

01:03:24.430 - 01:03:46.200

They insert Thio in the canal zone. Did people vote in US elections my parents didn't I don't think I don't think they were allowed Thio. One of the reasons we begin Canadians Way didn't go. I went up there from U C L A. When I got my doctorate on one of the reasons we became Canadians is because they want us to lie, to be able to vote in California elections.

01:03:46.200 - 01:04:07.820

We had to tell them we were coming back to the States and I didn't know we were, and I was disenfranchised. And then I started looking. I went there once I got there, I recognize is really a Canadian at heart. It's a nicer society. Do you think that American politics played a large role in the canal zone or were people pretty separated from it?

01:04:08.300 - 01:04:19.560

E don't need paid a lot of role because you were working for something. It hadn't. You know, it affected in a bit, but not a lot of my dad. During the Depression, you get along fine. You know, they cut their wages 25%. But look at what happened.

01:04:19.560 - 01:04:36.010

All the unemployed. I mean, I think they came out just fine and I think they thought this I e I think I wasn't terribly aware of politics. I don't see it playing a lot of role. No. Yes. Are we done? Thank you, Amanda. There was lots of fun.

01:04:36.020 - 01:04:39.620

Thank you so much for your time. Old people reminisce.