Mary Keniston interviewed by Richard Ade - January 19, 2001

• Keniston, Mary C. (Mary Clough), 1921-2012

Richard Ade Interviews

CAN YOU STATE YOUR FULL NAME PLEASE?

Yes, I’m Mary Clough Rice Keniston

TODAY’S DATE IS JANUARY 19, 2001 AND WE ARE AT THE BETHEL HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 

WHERE WERE YOU BORN?

I was born just down the hill here, on March 11, 1921.

HOW MANY PEOPLE WERE IN YOUR FAMILY?

In all, there were four of us.

WHAT WAS YOUR FATHER’S OCCUPATION?

He was a painter and wallpaperer in Bethel.

YOUR MOTHER’S?

She was just a housewife.

WHAT WAS LIFE LIKE AT HOME? 

Well, course it’s a lot different than it is now.  Um, we were a very happy family.  We all went to school and Sunday school.  We did a lot of fun things as a child.  I had a brother I was very fond of.  We were very close.  We were the two middle children and we used to fish a lot with my father in the winter time and the summer time up in Albany.  It was a lot of fun to go fishing.  To catch them in the morning and clean them and eat them on the brook and then catch them to bring home.  We had a lot of neighbors so we had kids to play with.  We didn’t have the things to do then that they do now, but we always seemed to find things to do.  We had favorite times of the year.  Fourth of July was always the favorite for me and all of us because my father would take us, the three younger children and we would come up here to the hardware store on Main Street and pick out our fireworks for the fourth of July.  We all looked forward to it.  We always had a big watermelon and many other nice good things to eat.  But, we’d sit on the front steps of the house (we had a big front lawn) and my father would get things all ready and in the evening before dark he’d fire off all these things and they would shoot off over in back of the Gould Academy field and there were things that we could hold but a lot of things he had to do himself because we were not allowed to touch them.  That was such a fun time.  After I got married and I had my little ones, I think they went to one or two of them and then they stopped letting people do things like that.  My kids don’t remember it at all and I feel bad about that.  We all went to school here and we all went to Gould because we had to go if we went to high school because that was our high school then.  I enjoyed school.  I took the commercial course in school under Wilbur Myers.  He was an excellent business course teacher.  Course, then they had those things available and manual arts for the boys.  Well, that’s getting away from home.  I can’t think of anything else right now. 

WHAT WERE YOUR EARLIEST MEMORIES?

The three of us, the youngest ones, were born on Mell Hill…there’s a house down the hill from us on the opposite side of the road…a big, big, white farm house.  There was a man and his wife who bought the house and she was a nurse and she opened up a home for people…for mother’s to have babies there.  She worked with the local doctor and that’s where I was born.  And then my brother after that and then my little sister.  What I remember then was running away from home down the hill and sitting on the front steps because I missed my mother and I wanted to see my new sister.  I remember sitting there…I remember it today. 

I remember the fishing trips we used to take with my father.  They meant a lot to me.  We loved to fish, my brother and I.  I remember teasing my little sister a lot, seems as though we were always in trouble over it.  Cause she was the youngest then and she…I don’t know why she was always with us, but sometimes we didn’t want her with us, you know.  But, we never hurt her in anyway, we’d just try to run away from her or something.  But, my brother had his own friends that he would play with and he was a caddy on the golf course.  That’s another thing I remembered…in the evening, after the caddys got done, he used to let me go with him on the golf course because otherwise I wasn’t supposed to.  But, we could go down below the house (the golf course is in back of our house) and play golf with my brother and his friends.  I remember how they used to sneak down there and used to take cucumbers and things from my father’s garden and how he’d chase them.

I remember our Christmas times.  They were fun too.  Christmas time, course we believed in Santa for so long, and we, my brother would have to put hay out in the yard for the reindeer and my father would help him and then we would all write letters to Santa and we’d leave cookies and things out on the table for him…and how exciting it was and when it came to the evening time for us to go to bed, my father (course I know this now, I didn’t then) had a big set of chains, because we always had horses, cows, chickens, hens and pigs and everything and he had a big string of what we call sleigh bells and he would go out in the barn when we would get half way up the stairs and ring those bells and I can remember running and jumping into bed and covering our heads up because we thought Santa was coming.  Then, in the morning you’d find the cookies half gone and the milk half gone and out on the hay pile in the door yard were footprints that the reindeer left.  Well, of course my father used to kill off the cows and everything and he used to save the legs to make footprints….course, we know all that now but at that time it was real and how much fun it was! 

What else do I remember?  Those were some of my best memories.

I remember my sister being very sick when she was little.  Another thing I remember when she came home after I’d been down there waiting for her when she came home from down there, they had her in a basket in the first little bedroom off our living room and I was so curious, I wanted to see that little girl so bad but they were trying to keep her quiet and everything and they kept telling us that sometime I could hold her.  But, I sneaked in there, my Grandfather Brown, my mother’s father lived with us, I was so fond of him, he was so good to us….I sneaked in there and tried to pull the basket down so I could see her and I upset the whole thing.  She went all over the floor…course I screached my head off and I can remember running out and my Grandfather grabbing me and asking me what the matter was…and I said “Oh, I”ve done something to Ida”.  Well, they all went and looked and of course, Ida was alright but it scared me to death.  I can remember doing that.

Oh dear, so many things, but those are my earliest things, I guess.

WHAT WERE YOUR MOST IMPORTANT EARLY INFLUENCES?

Well, I remember the Universalist Church…we started Sunday School there.  But, I don’t remember…I think…I don’t know Thurston was one of the earlier teachers.  But that closed down not long after that and I went to the Congo Church to Sunday School.  I can remember some of the teachers we had.  We had Mrs. Lyon from the park and they were all very kind people and very good to us as children. 

My grandfather meant a lot to me and he was always talking seriously to us about doing the right thing and being good boys and girls.  Course, my mother meant a lot.  My sister was 11 years older than I was.  I was the second child and she became the local teacher in town…one of the teachers so she was always influential.  As a girl, you know, she helped me with a lot of things. 

I can’t remember too many teachers in school who were very influential to me.  I don’t know why.  Until I got into the upper grades and I had Mrs. Wehrby and Mr. Bean and I was older then but they meant a lot to me and they were very good teachers.  I don’t remember when I was younger of anyone that was…there was one teacher that I had in the third grade and then again in the fifth grade…I didn’t care for her,  but I’m not going to mention any names.  I didn’t care for her very much and didn’t get along with her and I wasn’t a child that caused any problems, but it seemed as though I was always doing the wrong thing or saying the wrong thing.  So, I wasn’t very happy with her.  Then, Mr. Myers in school was very influential in my life and I had teachers at Gould that I was very fond of.  Can’t remember anyone else right off hand.

WHAT DID YOU LIKE MOST ABOUT GROWING UP?

Well, I don’t know what I liked most.  I guess it was exciting to get into Gould Academy, you know, and be grown up, but ….

WHAT WAS GOULD LIKE?

Gould? Well, of course it was very strict.  We had a night at 7:00 pm when we had to be in off the streets.  They controlled us.  Course, they had dormitory students, too, but at 7:00 pm if you were found out, you were punished, you know, and there were always teachers out walking around trying to catch you.  We had to be in, it was just that curfew for the whole town.  Of course, they had students from Lockes Mills and other places that came here to school as day students so they were all under those restrictions.  That was kind of hard, but we didn’t know anything different from the beginning that was the way it was.  So, later on, they used to have half-hour dances, three nights a week, I think Monday, Wednesday and Friday when you could go down, like at 6:00 pm but you had to be home at 7:00.  Well, my gosh.  I can remember coming out of the Gould building and running like the dickens home, because I was afraid somebody was going to catch me.  If I was two or three minutes late, my mother was meeting me on the hill to be sure I was coming home.  But, we all went to those things and enjoyed them. 

I liked my commercial course with Mr. Myers.  I had him practically all four years.  He was an excellent teacher and I learned so much from him in the business field.  Girls went to work right out of high school because of what they learned from him and I guess I remember those things the most.

WHERE DID YOU FIRST WORK?

After I got out of high school that summer, in 1939, I worked that summer up here at the Bethel Inn in the kitchen doing glasses and silver.  They had a dishwasher but they did the plates and things like that.  They did the glass and silver special..they liked them to be done separately.  I worked there.  My sister was a waitress there and had been there for quite a few years and they were making plans for me to go into the dining room in the fall when some of the summer workers left.  But, I got a…Dr. Brown, who had an office right down in this corner building, he was a dentist and he was looking for an office girl.  And, I went and applied and got the job.  So, in September I went to work for him and he taught me a lot of things about being a hygenist…He wanted me to go to school for it but really, it was too expensive and I really hadn’t taken the right courses in high school.  I ‘d have to go back then and pick up some more courses and I couldn’t do that.  I did work for him for about a year and a half and then I had a girlfriend who was going to go to business school…The Auburn Maine School of Commerce in Auburn and she wanted me to go with her.  I guess I thought I wanted to go. I wanted to get out of Bethel and so I did.  I had to write to Mr. Bingham to borrow some money to go.  My older sister went two years to normal school but, anyway, I didn’t so Mr. Bingham gave me enough money to go for one year.  I came home that next summer and got married.  After that, it was the married life for a while.  I had three children.  The oldest is a boy and then twins, a boy and a girl.  I was a mother and housewife.  At that time, people mostly stayed home, you know, and took care of their children.  But, by the time they were nine and ten years old, I had a chance to go to work at the lumber company down here in the office, sort of part time, working with the other girl, L.E. Davis Lumber Company.  So, we had quite a decision to make, whether I could do that.  My children were in school and it wouldn’t be but maybe a couple of days a week.  My husband was a lumber grader for a lumber company out of Bridgeport, CT and he had the Maine and New Hampshire states and they’d send him around to mill yards where they had found lumber that they wanted to buy.  But, they’d send him there to grade the lumber to value it.  So, he’d have to go and grade it and then type it up and make a report, type of thing.  Well, so, I kept my practice right there doing all those reports for him. But, anyway, I did go to work down to Davis’s and worked there a year or two and then I got a chance to …well, we went down to live with my mother.  She became very ill and my older children….I had another child after that…and my older children had graduated from Gould and gone away and so we sold our house that we were living in and went down to live with my father and mother.  She needed somebody to take care of her.  We were there for a while.  And, then after she died, in the 1960’s, I went part time to work for the Town School Department..that’s what it was called then, not SAD 44.  I worked in the office that summer and into the winter.  I liked it very much.  Sometime, in the spring the insurance man came into visit.  His name was Elmer Bennett and he..his wife worked in the local commercial banking in the Casco Bank and Trust Company.  He asked me how long I was going to stay there because they had a regular office girl at the school and I was really just filling in there part time and I expected that with a new superintendent or something I might lose my job, I didn’t know.  So, he told me they were looking for somebody in the bank and I’d better go apply for it, well, I didn’t know what to do.  I liked where I was but nobody had said anything to me about staying on so I did.  I went and applied for the bank job and got it. So, I have my notice to the Superintendent but he was having problems with the School Board and he didn’t report that I was getting done.  But, I didn’t think that I was that important because I  was only a part-timer.  But, I’ll be darn, the night before I went to go work at the bank, the Chairman of the Board called me and told me that they needed to hire a new girl…a regular time girl and would I consider coming to work full time.  I said well, I’ve already hired out to go to work at the bank.  Well, how come we didn’t know.  And I said, well, I did tell the superintendent, Mr. Bailey, but as I say, they were having trouble, so he never reported it of course.  Well, anyway, I went to work at the bank, Casco Bank and I worked from 1965 to 1984 and retired in April of 1984 and worked all that time in the bank.  In the meantime, in 1969, January, in fact, my husband died very suddenly of a heart attack and the local doctor in town was in Massachusetts for health reasons and we didn’t have any doctor in town that night and I couldn’t get anybody.  We didn’t have ambulances or such then and before we got him into the hospital he got very bad and he died as we drove into the hospital.  So, there I was alone with my father.  And, we got along fine then.  I became more interested in my job and got promoted and became assistant manager after a fashion and enjoyed all of that work and probably you might say I worked from the bottom up but in a small bank course there isn’t all that many sides to fill.  You start as a teller…at the first bank I worked for I was a bookkeeper and ran the bookkeeping machine and from there I went on to be a teller.  Then, there was a new bank way down the street where the Key Bank is now and we moved down there and I was a teller there for a while and then they promoted me to secretary to Roger, the manager.  I did a lot of different things then, like opened accounts and that kept progressing there until I became assistant manager.  But, anyway, I guess that’s the last time I’ve worked full time.  I did retire and until Stanley approached me to be the bookkeeper here part time.  So, I do, I work here part time two mornings a week.  I have for six or seven years and it’s probably my last job, I think. 

WHAT DO YOU REMEMBER OF SOME GREAT EVENTS OF THE 20^th CENTURY? 

Well, guess that was probably my lifetime, wasn’t it?  Maybe I’ve told you most of them.  I did get married again.  I guess in my life my first husband, my marriage, my children.  Those were the highlights, I guess.  Then, I remarried again in 1973 and he lives with me down in my family’s house.  We’ve had some fun times.  His daughter, he has one daughter and they live in South Carolina and so we’ve gone to visit them.  That’s been exciting because I never get out of the state very much.  We did go to Florida one winter to go visit my brother.  I like to travel.  I like to do those things.  We used to go by automobile and drive but we stopped doing that so we used to fly.  We had a good time.  I wished he’d do more, but he’s ready to settle in, being an ole Maniac, he won’t go anywhere.  But, anyway.  Let’s see if I can remember other things.

WHAT DO YOU REMEMBER ABOUT WORLD WAR II?

I remember that winter, December 7, 1941, was it?  And we were living up here in a little house up here on Mel Hill.  That particular day, it seems it was a Sunday.  I remember being down at my mother’s on a Sunday, in the afternoon, to have supper with her and the radio was on.  I remember sitting there and listening to that terrible thing that was happening.  It was awful.  You don’t know how scary it was, even for us.  But, anyway, my husband went in.  My brother went first, I guess.  And then my husband.  They began calling fathers, I guess in 1944, I think it was.  But, he wasn’t gone very long.  It was while he was in that the Japanese bombed Japan and the war ended.  My husband now, Lefty, he was over in Europe at that time.  He was wounded over there.  He came home fine and I remember how scary that all was that summer listening to it.  Because all we had were radios back then to listen to it.  But, I do remember it.  And the men who were from our town that died…it was a loss…they were friends.  One fellow was a classmate.  It was sad and it was sad for the families, you know, who lost people in the war.  It was such a terrible thing.

WHAT DO YOU REMEMBER ABOUT THE GREAT DEPRESSION?

You know, I don’t really remember much about that.  That was in the lower 30’s.  We never seemed to want for anything.  We probably lived a very humble life.  My father had hens, so we had our eggs.  We had a cow, so we had milk and cream and of course with a pig and everything we had a lot of food.  I don’t remember ever wanting for anything.  I can remember some of the clothes that we had to wear…some of those I didn’t like very well.  But, that was because it was to keep warm because we always walked to school.  But, I don’t remember that it ever bothered me in any way.  I was only like five or six years old, so I don’t remember much about it.  I don’t remember that we were needing in any way. 

WHO WAS YOUR FAVORITE U.S. PRESIDENT?

Hmm…Of course, my family all were Democrats.  So, I think I remember President Roosevelt in the 30’s.  He was …was he the President during the depression….I remember that.  I remember most all of them.  I guess maybe the one I thought the most of and felt so bad about was President Kennedy.

WHO WAS YOUR LEAST FAVORITE PRESIDENT?

I don’t know if I had anybody who was my least favorite.  I can think of most of them but …no, I don’t know of any that I felt I really didn’t like.

WHAT WERE SOME OF THE MOST IMPORTANT CHANGES YOU HAVE SEEN IN YOUR LIFETIME?

Well, I lost my mother.  That was very sad.  I was taking care of her and so that was quite a change for me to have her gone.  Then, of course, getting married and losing my husband.  Then I lost a daughter and um,…..

WHAT DO YOU CONSIDER THE MOST UNFORTUNATE EVENT IN YOUR LIFETIME? 

Well, I don’t know.  Course, losing your husband at such a young age upsets the whole family terribly.  And, then my daughter too.  I can’t remember every being ill…seriously ill. 

WHAT DO YOU LIKE MOST ABOUT BETHEL? 

Well, it’s always been my home and I know so many people and so many things I remember about it.  It’s such a small town and I don’t know any other town to like any better.  I always said if I was going to leave Bethel, I’d rather go to South Carolina because it’s so pretty down there, rather than Florida.  But, I don’t expect I ever will.  I will always be here in Bethel.

WHO WAS THE MOST UNFORGETTABLE CHARACTER YOU MET IN YOUR LIFETIME?

Oh,….um, I think Mr. Crowse was a character and we had a man down on Mel Hill who was not a very nice man around children so he was always chasing somebody…he never hurt anybody, but we’d always run and screech and holler and our folks would come to the rescue.  He never did any harm.  He just didn’t know any better.  But, I don’t remember anybody special. 

WHAT COMMUNITY SERVICE/ACTIVITIES ARE YOU INVOLVED IN?

Well, I’ve been involved in just about everything, I guess.  I belong to the Congregational Church and I guess I’ve held about every position from Treasurer (for about 10 or 11 years) to a Deacon to a Trustee, Finance Committee.  I have been treasurer of the Woodland Cemetary.  I’ve been secretary of the Songo Cemetary.  I have been involved with the historical….secretary and treasurer there and served on various committees.  I was involved in the early youth baseball league that they had here.  I was Treasurer and I think Secretary because of course, my two boys played.  My brother was a manager, so that’s why we were involved.  We loved baseball.  I’ve been involved with Gould Academy been a class agent for my class I don’t know how many years.  I was down there the other night doing a phone-a-thon.  I’ve been on the alumni board for six years, I think.  I’ve been involved with the Democratic Party in Bethel.  I was treasurer of that.  Was, I’m not any more.  That’s not a very active organization right now in Bethel.  Can’t find many people to serve.  I did go to one of their conventions in Portland.  I enjoy politics.  I enjoy listening to it but I don’t want to be involved in it.  I don’t know.  I know there are other things but I think that’s enough.

WHAT DO YOU CONSIDER SOME OF YOUR MOST IMPORTANT DECISIONS?

Well, I guess when I got married the first time.  My folks objected to it so I had to elope, although they knew I was going to get married, we just ran away together, that’s all. Everything was fine after we got home.  We had a happy life and….other decisions…I think one of the decisions was to go to work after I had been home with my children all those years and to stop being a home mom, you know, go off to work and wonder if you were doing the right thing.  That was a hard decision.  Both my husband and I were involved in it.  But, I guess I’ve never regretted it.  It was good for me to finally get out and get busy and keep busy.  It was such a hard decision to get married again because I didn’t plan to…I didn’t know about those things.  He was a widow.  He lost his wife.  That’s it I guess. 

WHAT DO YOU THINK THE MOST IMPORTANT ADVICE IS TO GIVE A YOUNG PERSON?

Well, of course I believe they should try and get through school.  That’s most important.  Especially high school.  If they can go on with something they are interested in doing that really helps them, they should.  But, if they can’t, just find work or find something to do that keeps them busy.  If they have to get married, I hope they are ready for it …to be a good parent.  Get involved with town things.  It’s important to have friends and meet things and find the challenges to keep your town going, organizations, etc.  It’s good for you and good for your mind. Stanley will tell you that.  He thinks I should work until I’m 90 just to keep my mind improved.  I guess that would be the best thing to tell them. 

WHAT DO YOU THINK WILL HAPPEN IN THE FUTURE OF THE 21^ST CENTURY?

Oh dear.  Well, we’re going to have a new president tomorrow.  He’s going to be inaugurated and I’m anxious to watch the activities tomorrow.  I don’t know, really.  I think world peace is important and I hope we can succeed in that, but I don’t know if we are going to.  There is always going to be a war somewhere, I guess.  I think it’s scary to think what they might do to us.  I hope it doesn’t happen.  I don’t know.  I probably won’t live that much into this century but…I hope I do.  But, I’ve never stopped to think about it so its hard for me to commit myself. 

DO YOU SEE GREAT FUTURE FOR BETHEL?

Yes, I do.  They’re really advancing fast.  I hope it doesn’t grow into a big ski town, as it has already.  I don’t mind the skiing and everything…I think it’s wonderful.  I hate to see it spread out.  I don’t know if it’s going to do that or not.  I think people have been controlling it pretty well but it is a very active little town.  The historical society is just advancing so much and growing and doing so many good things….Gould is and my church…all the churches are very active.  We have a lot of members and the children are participating.  So, I think it will do okay.

WHAT WAS YOUR FUNNIEST EXPERIENCE?

Oh dear.  I’m sure I had some in school.  I guess I can’t remember them too well.  I guess they didn’t stay with me very will.  I think with Mr. Myers we girls ..a bunch of us that took his courses…we were always playing tricks on him.  I don’t think I’d want to get into that…I know we laughed a lot and made a lot of fun…he was really angry at us at times.  I don’t know.  I remember when I was going to the Maine School of Commerce with Duffy Brooks and we roomed at the women’s group, there, in Auburn and we had a lot of fun and laugh.  We would try to go over to the first movie and we’d walk over to Lewiston, across the bridge.  One night we went so that we could be back by eight or after to do our studying.  One night we got in there and there was this man who kept moving from one bunch of people to the other.  And, being interested in the movie, I didn’t even realize that he ended up beside me.  And, he had his hand way down in back of me here…well, before I’d come to…I thought he was after my pocketbook….I remember beginning to holler and he ran like the dickens.  Well, of course, Duffy and I laughed and laughed.  I’ve always remembered it.  She’s gone now.  I remember it so well.  When we walked home that night we were so scared.  If somebody had come down the street and we were afraid of them, we’d get to laughing and we’d run.  Here we were in our 20’s acting foolish like that. 

I’ve had fun with my kids.  I don’t know.  I can’t think of anything else.  I know there are some.

ARE THERE ANY OTHER COMMENTS YOU’D LIKE TO MAKE?

No, I don’t thing so… Maybe selling my house on Mel Hill.  It’s been there since 1850 and the Bethel Inn is maybe interested in it maybe because they’re going to put condos down there.  I don’t know how far it will go.  I do think it’s time for us to move out.  It’s an old house and more than we can take care of right now with all the rooms in it.  I hate to say that I can’t take care of it anymore, but I can’t.  So, that’s what might be happening to me down the road.  I don’t know what we’re going to do or where we’re going to go if we move, but I’m not going to worry about it.  Just trying to keep warm now and enjoy ourselves in the winter time.