Dan: Uhm, for the sake of the record, this is April 6, 2002. It’s about 2-2:30 PM. Uhh, this is Daniel Meade and I’m interviewing Charles Goddard at the Christopher Heights home …. and I guess, uhm. Do you have a phone number here? Where I can reach you?

Charles: Yeah, I do. I still don’t even know what the hell that number is. Well I guess you could find it over here.

(both walk into adjacent room to find phone number, semi-audible conversing about the phone number occurs)

Ok, so, where did you grow up?

I grew up in Oxford. Do you know where that is?

Yeah, it’s like, a town or two over, right?

It’s right next to Worcester, Auburn, then it comes into Oxford. Right in Oxford.

And, uh, who’d you grow up with? Like, who was in your house at the time?

I had just one brother. And he died in `82. My whole family’s all wiped out. He had one son and his son died. So I guess I’m the only one. I’m the only mean one I think. (laughs)

So, I uh, forgot to ask, when’s your birth date?

August 23^rd, and I was born in 1914.

Ok. I’m just gonna take a couple notes, for when I go back and transcribe it. So, you grew up in Oxford, and where you in Oxford during the war?

In Norton, well

Or where you here in Worcester?

Well, I was up in Cambridge up until just about the time of the war. Then I moves back to North Oxford.

Ok.

And, uh, and I, they had me, at Norton Company, so they got me deferments. They got me deferments from the service. And I wasn’t in the service.

Did you start at Norton before or after the war?

That, was uh, that was before the war I think. Before the war I think, my deferments had come up, and they got me more deferments. I never went into the service.

Do remember how long after Pearl Harbor it took Norton to switch into making stuff for the military? Was it right away or did it take a couple, a couple of months?

I think they done that through the big grinding company, the wheel like, y’know?

Yeah

And a different has, I don’t know. And the day I was never placed in one are , I had to go into the service, they stuffed it down the delivery, said I don’t know, ‘I guess they wanted you to stay here’ and I never did get into the service.

Do you wish you had gone overseas?

Well, going back, I think I woulda liked it. I guess sometimes you better off that you didn’t go.

Yeah

So I never got the chance to go into the service. But I had, ah, my kids, and that differed me, and I didn’t get into the service. Yeah, but all during the war I worked at the Norton Company. And when my deferment would come up, they gave me another one, so all during the war I stayed at Norton Company.

At Norton, was everyone really gun-ho about making supplies for the troops? Or did people really just see it as another job?

Well, no, I think it was something for the troops that we were making. We were making different stuff.

Yeah

I think that there was – I think that one thing that stuck in my mind was we used to make laboratory tubes. The tubes that I think if you went into a swamp, I think, you could drink through the tubes there, pacify the

Wow

Whatever there, y’know?

Yeah

Well, I think it was that, but I’m not too sure. They never told you too much about what you were doing there. But I knew they were making ten different kinds of tubes, that you could, ah, I think if was in the jungles or anything like that with poison water, that you could, with the tube, paci-, pacify it and clear it up. Y’know I guess you know the poison come outta

Yeah, that’s pretty important stuff

Yeah

With the guys out there

And that was about as close I came to the war. I was up in New Hampshire most of the time. Almost since the war started, I moved back to Worcester, well not Worcester, North Oxford.

Right

So, I stayed there until I come here. And there I owned my own place there in North Oxford. I don’t know who’s there, nothing’s there now.

No?

I didn’t rent it out or anything. So, I guess that there I will die here. I don’t think I’ll go back home. And my wife has Alzheimer’s, so uh, when I was over there I didn’t realize it, but she would walk, and she would be walking right out onto the highway, just like it was walking right out onto the street, and she didn’t even know it.

Oh wow

So, I’m glad that what happened, and I ended up way up over here. And now she’s across the street from me.

Is she, is she doing ok?

And she’s doing ok, but she doesn’t get out. She wouldn’t know where she would be going. She wouldn’t know where to start or where to go

Right

So, she’s close by. I see her pretty much every day, so

It’s not too bad

It’s better than not having her at all, so

Yeah

So they got it fixed up now that I think that starting Monday, I she will come over here to eat, or that over there she would be eating with me. So, ah,

That’s great

It will be nice

Yeah

I don’t think she knows it yet, but, they kind of briefed me on it, but, ah, it’s a good place to have her for now.

Yeah

My wife just over across the street, I go over to see her over there.

When did, when did you meet her?

When I was only nineteen years old [1933].

So were you guys together during the war?

I’ll be 89 now. That was when the war was going on I rather. Then, uh, when I was nineteen my folks didn’t want us to get married, but we got married just the same.

Yeah

They didn’t like it, but when you meet somebody, and you fall in love with her, nothing’s gonna stop you form marring her.

Nah… What did, what did she do during the war?

She was with Aseated [?] Linen, making towels over there, y’know? And, uh, well, uh, yeah, she was married during the war. We had been married quite a while. So, ah, we got on along, and uh, it was kind of tough going a the start, didn’t have no money.

Yeah

And, uh, ah, back then money was pretty scarce, so, but I used to work for a farmer, my the main highway, in my spare time. They used to like my, and they’d hire me every summer, and I’d get my milk free. And then if I wanted a chicken, or something like that, they’d give it to me free. There was very few dollars they’d pass out

Yeah

You had to take it in trade like, And I had my kids, so the milk come in handy. And then I’d move from Oxford to New Hampshire, and they still left the milk for my daughter.

Oh Wow

So, but then, when I’d come back that when I come back, I’d come back on a weekend, and if it’d be raining, I’d go help them a-hayin’ so I’d go up and help them out. So I used to go help them out up there.

So, they’d still give you the milk and the chickens like, during the war?

Yeah, yeah.

Did that help with the rationing at all? Make it easier?

Well, I didn’t have that, they didn’t give no points on that. They used to have rationing on different stuff. You could buy, you could bear, I didn’t havta give you a chicken or something. They did, they did funny, uh, no money, but you’d take it out in milk.

Yeah

When we wanted a chicken, I’d go over there, and they’d give you a chicken. Ok, but uh, then that was working out in trade (laughs). So, we worked out pretty good. Yeah, but I left here and my family, my wife, with my daughters, stayed over here. With me, they left milk right along. Then when I come back, I was up in New Hampshire working, then when I come back, from New Hampshire they come up and say ‘you’re gonna have a little something,’ so I’d like to repay ya. And they said, ‘if you come back and there’s a storm coming and we’re out a-hayin’, we’d appreciate it if you’d come out and help us.’ So I usta go out and help them a-hayin’ and I’d work kinda hard. They, uh, didn’t, I moved out to New Hampshire because I had my daughters stayin’ in Oxford. They used to leave the milk there. I don’t know how long they left the milk there, but they kept leaving it out there. So, uh, I was pretty lucky. It, they get the milk, have your milk, come to your house, I wasn’t even working for them then, only up in New Hampshire working for them. But when I come back, if I see it was stormy, I’d put in the hay. I musta been good at haying because they liked the way I worked. So they say ‘anytime your around here, we’d be glad to have ya.’ So, I usta go up there and help them allota times, even then they have ya, y’know? So they appreciated, so they’d never send me a bill for milk.

That’s nice.

And I had there, we usta get, oh, two or three quarts a day. And I never paid for a quart of milk. When I’d have spare time, I’d go up and see them, and help out a-hayin’. So it worked out good. I did a little work, and well, I got all my milk free.

Yeah. In your spare time, did you pretty much always go to help them, or do you ever do, go to a like, a USO dance or

Yeah, well, I worked up in New Hampshire, I worked at West Swanby.

Ok

I would ride home on weekends. So when I’d come back on weekends and it was gonna be stormin’, and it’d be stormin’, they would have me go up and help a-hayin’. So I’d go and help them hayin’ and they never give me no money, but then if I wanted the chickens or, they, uh, never refused. Whenever I wanted a chicken, they give me a chicken, I wanted the milk and the milk was coming in.

But I had a daughter that was handi-, that was handicapped, and I left her with come people who were taking care of her. She’s in North Oxford, when I was up in New Hampshire, so they left the milk there just the same.

That was really nice of them.

Well, I don’t know how many years I was up in New Hampshire. She had the milk a long time and they never sent me a bill. So, I was quite lucky.

Do you remember where you were when you heard about Pearl Harbor?

I … think I was up in New Hampshire. I’m not sure, but I think I was up in New Hampshire when the war broke out.

Did you hear about it on the radio or did you hear about it from other people?

Hmm… I think form other people told me about it, y’know? And I thought for sure that I’d be turned into the army, but they never drafted me into the service. Every time my deferment came up, they’d give me another one. And then when we went to war, I was working for Norton Company.

So, Norton … it’s funny, a fellow was there that I was working with, he was working about two years longer than I was, and he had three kids and I only had two kids. They didn’t get him a deferment and they got me one. And oh was he mad. He was mad that he didn’t get the deferment and I did. He said, ‘Here, I’ve got three kids and you’ve only go two.

Yeah

And they get you a deferment and they didn’t get me a deferment.’ I don’t know why they didn’t, but I was glad to get the deferment (laughs).

Yeah

So I didn’t get into the service. But he, he was so mad that he never went back to work with them after.

Nah?

No, when they, ah, he quit that day at noontime. He didn’t tell them he was leavin’ but he left at noontime and never went back to work.

Wow. Did, would a lot of people do that? If they found out that they hadn’t, they couldn’t get deferred?

Nah, when you worked at Norton, you got a deferment on most of them. And I was just a lucky one I guess. Ever time it came up they gave me a deferment. So I didn’t even ask them, and I get a deferment, they wold just tell me, ‘we got you another six month deferment.’ And here it is I’m working with a guy whose been working two years longer than me

Yeah

And they tell him all they could to get him a deferment and they wouldn’t give him a deferment. And here it is I was, he was, working here two years even before any of this started. Right, so I don’t know why they didn’t put me into the service instead him

Yeah

But he went into the service. And they didn’t get him the deferment.

Did Norton pay you well, or was it pretty standard?

Well, they paid pretty good over at Norton Company. And I done that darnest things, and you’d think they’d a put me in the service because the gas and the rationing, but I knew a lot of different truck drivers and they used to give me coupons for gas.

Oh yeah?

So yeah, uh, I had my vacation and went up to Canada. Up with that gas and, uh, I didn’t use their [Norton’s] coupons, the one’s the guys give me, I was using them [the trucker’s]

Right

So they said, ‘We know you went in Canada.’ I said, ‘I didn’t go to Canada, you want your coupons, I have your coupons right here.’ They say, ‘We know you went to Canada, you sent postage cards back’ to the shop where I was working. So I said, ‘Well,’ I said, ‘if I got your coupons here, you gas coupons, I don’t know what you have to squawk about then.’ So I said, ‘If I wen to Canada, I would have used up your coupons’

Right

I said, ‘I didn’t use up your coupons.’

So they tried to get you in trouble, but never, they were never able

They tried to find out how, but I wouldn’t tell them. I said, ‘I didn’t go’. And they said, We know you did, you sent postage cards back from Canada.’ They [the cards] would go though the mail, through the shop, and they got the mail over there and they knew I was in Canada. (laughs) Though, ah, I got away with it. And, ah, I had all the coupons I wanted though. Because the truck drivers, they’d give me their coupons, and so I made trips to Canada. I started up by Niagara Falls, then I made the whole circle up there. (laughs) They said, ‘Where the heck did you get the coupons?’ And I said, We didn’t go through there.’ And they said we did, ‘you mailed some cards back.’

Yeah

So they knew I was up there. I didn’t admit it to tem, I just said I wasn’t there, and I was lying through my teeth (laughs).

Do you think America should have gone into the war?

No, they give me deferments every time

No, ah, what I mean is like, America as a whole. Do you think America should have been fighting Germany, Japan, and Italy?

Well, I think its for an adequate cause I guess, I dunno. I didn’t get mixed up in it, so. I kept my nose clean. (laughs) So, ah, yeah, I don’t know and at the farm I was working with, he had one kid more than I did and they put him in the service, ain’t that funny?

Yeah

They put him in the service, and he’d been working longer than I had over there, and they didn’t get him that deferment. He was mad, but he thought sure, but sure he was going to go into the Merchant Marines. And he thought that I was going to go up there, if they didn’t, ah, if they, if they didn’t accept, if they didn’t get my deferments. Yeah, but I’m working with him, and they tell me, after that they say they’ll me a six month deferment.

Yeah

Boy, was he mad (laughs) Ooohh… I could picture him now today, he said. ‘Here it is, I’ve been working for that company for two years longer than you, and they you a deferment. And they won’t get me a deferment.’ So that day he quit at noontime, and he never went back to work. So, I didn’t know what, how to take it, and look, I says, I was just glad I didn’t go into the service.

Did you like FDR? Do you think he was a good president?

Oh, I think he’s about as good as any of them. I guess they’ve all been good presidents, we never had a bad one. The only one that I know of that made it kind of tough was Hoover.

Yeah

When Hoover was in there, their was bread lines and everything. So, all the other ones I think were good presidents. He was a good president too, I guess, it just didn’t work out for him.

Do you think Roosevelt was a good leader for the country during the war? Like, his speeches, or the way he ran things?

I think he was good, pretty good. He, uh, I think he had been in a war before, the first [World] War I think

Yeah

And, so, he had a lot of experience. I think, he done pretty good by it, I guess.

Do you think he should have dropped the atomic bomb on Japan? … Oh, actually, no, Truman did. Do you think Truman should have dropped it?

Well, I think that’s good because it ended the war. If he didn’t drop it, it had been still going, perhaps, the war.

Yeah

You had to teach them a lesson, I guess. A lot of people died over there, you don’t like to see a lot of people die. But, if they hadn’t done that, I guess that people would have died, more. But I guess they scared them, when they dropped the bomb on them. That was enough to finish the war, they didn’t want to fight no more, so.

Do you remember where you were when you heard that the bomb was dropped?

Yeah, I was in, ah, North Oxford. And, ah, that bomb that killed a lot of people, but, you had to do something to stop it I guess, because it would have been going still yet

Yeah

Because they killed so many Japs and Chines people, that, ah, so that it’s a good thing that we did drop the bomb on them. And if you didn’t drop it, we might be still fighting.

Yeah

They got so many people there, that there’s no limit to the people that they have.

Do you remember the celebrations they had on V-E and V-J Day?

Yeah, there was big celebrations, the whole country was all, well, they made a big day of it. Had parades all over, had big parades

Did you get off from work?

No, I think I was working that day.

You mean they didn’t shut the work down to celebrate?

I was at Norton Company working

Yeah

So, I think I was working, I don’t know for sure. Yeah, but, uh, it was a big day when it was all over.

Yeah

Everybody was celebrating and everything, you’d think the end of the world was coming. (laughs) There was nobody working the day of it, so, it was quite a celebration that they had. Like he big cities you see on TV, all the big parades they had.

The ticker-tape everywhere

Yeah, so it was nice to see, when it was over with, because a lot of people were getting killed.

Yeah

So, the end of the war, that saved a lot of lives. And, ah, every time that my deferment came up, they’d get me deferred. I was lucky, I don’t know how they ever done it

Yeah

But Kazavan there, boy was he mad. When, ah, oh, he was so mad, he worked a long time, but never did see nothing, but never went back to it.

Yeah

He was so mad that they didn’t get him a deferment. They should have, in my idea. Because he had one kid more than I did, so. He’d been working there longer than I had. Oh, but they didn’t get him a deferment. Oh, if he coulda hit those people, he woulda (laughs) he was mad. He, ah, had kind of reddish hair, a light red, and but Christ, his face turned as red as his hair (laughs). And to top it off, he had one more kid than I did. And I worked a with him, I worked a with him. They tell him, they tapped him, they tapped me on the shoulder, he thought I’d be going with him, and they told me, ‘We got your six month deferment.’ (laughs) Jeez, what a slap in the face that was for him

Yeah

You know he worked a long time, and that one time they left him, he never come back to work.

Did they have all the air raid drills in, in Norton? In case of an attack? Or, not really?

We had some kind of drills, that they had, I don’t know, I’m trying to remember. We used to block off the street over there.

Yeah?

And Old Stubarnes Street. And nobody could get through on that street.

Did you ever think that Worcester, and Norton, would be attacked? Or do you that was just a drill to be safe?

Well, they perhaps did I think, because why’d they block the street off, I don’t know. And, but nobody could go through that street. They put signs up there, ‘CLOSED’, and there were no cars that went through there, only the company cars. And the trucks. And, but every time that it come for a deferment, the superintendent come over, and tap me on the shoulder, and tell me, ‘Well, we got you another six month deferment.’ And I could picture this Kazavan (laughs) boy was he mad, and he was still working, thinking that I’d be gone

Yeah

When my deferment run up, I think it was a week after his. So he says he’ll keep working until my deferment come up. Yeah, but when it come up, Joe Stiffey was the name of the manager, he come up to me and said, ‘We got your six month deferment.’ Jeez was he mad (laughs). I don’t blame him though, here he is, he been working longer for them, and longer than I was. But no, they didn’t get him a deferment. They put him into the service.

Were, there, any German or Italian people working with you? If there were, were there any tensions because their nations were at war?

I think there were a few of them that strolled over and they got a job at Norton Company.

So there was no kind of, like, tension? People that looked down on them at all because…

Well, I guess they didn’t want to go into the service, I guess that’s why they skipped.

Yeah

So, they, come over here as real Americans. Because they didn’t want to go over and fight.

Yeah

So, uh, but there were only two of them, two brothers I think it was. That I knew, that got outta their service. They didn’t get into the service. And, but, uh, I had … oh I had three kids. So, that kept me outta it I think, the three kids I had.

Did your brother go overseas?

Well, my brother didn’t, my brother got deferred. But my brother was older than I was, he was six years older than I was. He’s already dead, he died in `92. So, he had only one son, and he died, oh, he died in `94, I think, his son died. And that was the only one he had. So he kind of, my family kinda stopped there on his side. I guess I’m to mean to die, nobody wants me (laughs), so the Good Lord kept me here I guess, make it miserable for the people (laughs).

Do you remember, did you listen to the radio a lot?

No, no. I never put that TV on yet. I got one there and I got one in the other room. I have it since I been here. I haven’t, I think I been here two, three weeks

Oh really?

I think I been here two, three weeks, but my son bought me that radio and bought me that TV in the other room too. This right now, they bought me tow of them, they didn’t want me travelling back and forth, keep going back and forth I guess. ‘You have one in your bed room and you have one over here.’ So, they been pretty good to me, my son has, so to help me get aquatinted here, my son from No-, my son from North Carolina he lives now, he, sleep on that [couch], he stayed with me for the whole week.

Oh wow

When I first come here, he said, ‘Pa, I want you to get aquatinted with it,’ y’know?

Yeah

So he stayed here with me all week. That was his vacation. Wasn’t that an awful vacation? I tried to tell him, ‘Take the vacation.’ ‘Oh, no. I’m gonna be up here with you for the whole week.’ So he stayed for the whole week and he slept on the couch.

That’s really nice of him.

Yeah, yeah, he says, ‘Oh, you’ll be lonesome up here, so I’m gonna stay the whole week.’ So he stayed the whole week. That’s him, the bottom one [picture] over here, on the wall.

Oh, yeah?

And that’s my other son that lives in Dudley, and my daughter lives in Worcester here. There’s two of them, they died, here on this side. That was my oldest son up there, my oldest daughter, the two of us. And my youngest one, this one here, died. That was my youngest one, he died 21 years old. Yeap. So, I had some kids in this world, and loosin’ them

Yeah

It makes you feel bad, but … nothing you can do about it. The Good Lord says he’s takin’ them, so He takes them. He had muscular dystrophy, that’s a house he built over on the side over here.

Oh wow

He done that with Popsicle sticks like with this, and he made the house. So, I, was pretty good to him. He told me he used to like to get outside. I drove him all the way down into as far as Jacksonville, but he didn’t wanna go no more.

Nah?

No, I wanted to take him through Florida, but he never likes it. I wanna go, so we’re in Jacksonville and we’re there for a while and we head back. (wipes tear) Yeah, he was 21 when he died. …. So the Good Lord gives it and the Good Lord takes it. He was a good boy. He used to take, to save postal cards

Yeah

Oh, I don’t know what I had, what I had, over 3,000 postal cards for him.

Wow

People would send him cards from all over. … Yeah. And, I guess I’m too mean, the Good Lord don’t want me, keeping me down here, making it miserable for the people down here.

Do you have any final comments about the War or anything else? Anything you’d like to share?

No, not really, I was just lucky that they gave me deferments throughout the war. I never get into the service, and I never get closer it. Nope, I never get closer, and I worked for Norton Company. But I would come down from New Hampshire, I was livin’ up in New Hampshire, and at, for Swanby. And when the war broke out, I moved back to North Oxford and I figured I would be in the service. But I got a job over in Norton Company, and I get deferments, every time I had to, I had to, they put me in 1-A and they got me deferments. I musta been mean to some majesty, but I was pretty lucky. And I done the damndest things at Norton, I had been on the over side, I think I woulda fired `im. Yeah, but, during the war, I’d keep the coupons

Yeah

But I knew so many people, truck drivers, that let me have the gas oversight, that I had all the gas I wanted, y’know? One year, I thought, I guess I went up to Niagara Falls. I went to Niagara Falls and I was working at Norton Company, and they didn’t give you many coupons, just to drive back and forth to work. And they, uh, they uh, I was stupid enough to keep sending postage cards back (laughs) so they knew I was up in Niagara Falls. Then I left the Niagara Falls and went all the way up, through, up through Old Orchard Main Beach over by that way. Basically, they knew you used that gas, up around there. ‘Where did you get the gas?’ And I said, ‘I didn’t have any gas, it wasn’t yours.’ So I never told them where I got my gas coupons. I had the ones that I had to travel back and forth, they given you. So I still had my coupons there. I said, ‘I didn’t use no gas coupons.’ I said, ‘ I dunno, you got somebody mixed up with me.’ So, they knew I had gone through Niagara Falls, and (laughs) I say, I think if I was on the opposite side, I woulda fired him. Well, go up through Old Orchard Maine, up through there, I sent cards from Old Orchard Maine. They had to go through the shop before they out them in

Yeah

But they flipped over, so that when they’d see the card and know that my name was on it. But they know I send the cards in. They said, ‘Well, you havta have gas to go up there.’ Well I said, ‘I got your coupons, gas coupons here.’ So they said, ‘So how did you get up there?’ I said, ‘I didn’t think I as up there.’ I said, ‘You’re the one’s the telling me that I was up in Canada.’ I said, ‘Good, good, why do you think I went to Canada?’ So, they, ah, I never told them I did go, and they knew it because

Yeah

I was foolish enough to send postage cards back. And then they went right through the whole shop at Norton Company, and when they see it, get a hold of the mail there, and they’d distribute the mail after. So they said, ‘We know you went to Canada up there.’ I said, ‘I got you gas coupons.’ So I had their coupons there, so. But I knew quite a few truck drivers, and I had more gas than I needed. So I was one of the lucky ones. Good thing I knew the truck drives, because they used to have gas. And I’d take them, and fill up my tank full of gas. And everyone said, ‘Where do you get all that gas?’ (laughs) Yeah, and then I would get some more coupons from the Norton Company for travelling back and forth to work.

Right

So they’d give you them, and then I’d have them on hand when they’d tell me they wanted to see them. I’d tell them, ‘I have you coupons on hand. So I didn’t go there, didn’t go out where you’re telling me I’d been.’ I said, ‘Must be somebody else that they

Yeah. I think we’ve pretty much covered everything that I have to really ask you about. So, thank you ver much for talking with me.

Oh, any thing you want to know, I’m glad that I know it.