SIGRIST:

Good morning this is Paul Sigrist for the National Park Service. Today is Sunday, November 13, 1994. I'm in Saratoga Springs, New York, with Anna Krupa. Mrs. Krupa came from Czechoslovakia in 1922. She was fifteen, had not quite turned sixteen when she arrived here in America. We also have several other people in the room. We have Mrs. Krupa's daughter, Fran Gaba; G-A-B-A. We have a reporter from the Saratogian newspaper, Jillian Hirsch; and that's J-I-L-L-I-A-N (capitol) H-I-R-S-C-H Present also is Ed Burke, photographer for the Saratogian newspaper, that's B-U-R-K-E. And for the sake of the tape you may hear clicking and doors shutting and opening because Ed's going to take pictures and then leave. Anyway, thank you very much for letting me come out.

KRUPA:

You're welcome.

SEAGIRST:

Can we begin Mrs. Krupa by you giving me your birth date?

KRUPA:

Yes. December 8, year 1906.

SIGRIST:

And where exactly were you born?

KRUPA:

I was born in Velke, Kostolany..

SIGRIST:

Can you spell that for me please?

KRUPA:

[superposed] Yeah, well-- where's Franny? Put that down for-- for them.

SIGRIST:

Alright, Fran could you spell it out loud for us-- in a full voice?

GABA:

Yes. It's V-E-L-K-E, K-O-S-T-O-L-A-N-Y. Velke Kostalany.

SIGRIST:

When you born, was that Czechoslovakia?

KRUPA:

No. That was Hungarian.

SIGRIST:

And whereabouts in the country is it? Do you know?

KRUPA:

It's, you could say close to Bratislava. Not close, let's say about four hours to Bratislava That's the head over there, Slovakia now.

SIGRIST:

And was that the main town when you were growing up, was Bratislava? Is that where you went?

KRUPA:

Well, it was there, but I didn't know about it! (laughing)

SIGRIST:

Well, let's begin by you telling me what you remember about the town itself that you grew up in?

KRUPA:

Well, the town that I grow[sic] up, it's all farms. No factories. But now, the atomic, whatever it is factory or what-- it's about three blocks behind my house.

SIGRIST:

Well, what do you remember as a child? What sticks out in your mind about the town when you were growing up in it?

KRUPA:

When I was growing up, well, let's say I just start school, what was I? Eight, seven years old? That when the war start. World War I. That I remember, they used to tell us that we should be careful going to pitch the water, like for cooking and drinking, because there killed that, in Sarajevo, they killed that [in Czechoslovakian], he was supposed to become the president or king.

SIGRIST:

The archduke was killed, yes.

KRUPA:

Yes. That I remember. Everybody was like scared that they gonna poison the drinking water. That I remember. And I remember when they say instead of like we have now, television or you know special something, they come out men from the town hall with the drum. Dadir! And Dadir, should come! Like here you would say to the (Fort Dix) in twenty-four hours everybody got to be there. You know?

SIGRIST:

Excuse me a second. It would be best for the recording...

KRUPA:

[superposed] 1914!

SIGRIST:

-- actually to not talk, unless I ask you specifically. If I do ask you, then make sure that you reply with a full voice,

KRUPA:

[superposed] Yeah.

SEAGIRST:

-- so that it's picked up.

KRUPA:

Yes. So that 1914, and that was in August. I was [ph in Czech?] (laughs). My mother went with my father to the station, that he went to the war. And I had two cows on the tr-- hooked up round the horns on the field; on the pasture. That I remember. I was kinda disappointed that I can't go to the station. But I was there always, like-- I had to do the cows, see? Hold them by the chain. And uh, that I remember good.

SIGRIST:

Can you describe for me the house that you lived in as a child?

KRUPA:

Well, it's a-- it was house with two rooms. Hall between, under-- under one roof. Then there's like the storage room, then there was the horses, then there was the cows. And like on the end there was like a garage where you chopped the wood and things like that. See? But all under one roof.

SIGRIST:

What was the house made out of?

KRUPA:

Uh, homemade bricks. Out of mud. And what would you call it when you thresh the wheat? All that ends?

SIGRIST:

All mushed up?

KRUPA:

Crushed it up. That was supposed to be the big support for the bricks. (laughing heartily)

SIGRIST:

And what kind of roof did the house have on it?

KRUPA:

That time, everybody had it straw.

SIGRIST:

Can you tell me a little bit about how you made a straw roof?

KRUPA:

Yes. I could tell you. Do you-- you have to beat the wheat off it with the, like strong things. Just the wheat. And this gotta be separate, straight. And then, when it's straight, when you need for the roofing, you make it like a bunch to the top. To the top, you tie it tight. Even. Then you take it half of it, and, twist it, that it's really tight. And when you have how much you imagining you needed, you have the two by four on the roof and each one, you take a piece of it, and you tie it. You don't need the nails. You use from what you have on that, what would you call it? Bunches of what?

SIGRIST:

Bunches of thatch. is what it is.

KRUPA:

[superposed] Yeah. And you keep on going. You start it from the bottom with the bottom down. And then the rest of it with the top wheat, you know. That it lays over it. Hangs down. And that's the way you do it.

SIGRIST:

And how often would that have to be replaced?

KRUPA:

Well, it[not understood] lasts good. But when it fire came, house next to house, the town went poof! You know? So not allowed no more. Then they start to make homemade shingles. Well, that's just as bad but it was supposed to be better.

SIGRIST:

Tell me how you heated the house?

KRUPA:

Wood. Wood. Your own wood.

SEAGIRST:

With what?

KRUPA:

--If you have.

SIGRIST:

What did you burn the wood in?

KRUPA:

[superposed] You put it-- you put it in the stove, like coal stove you would call it here. See? And ah, [a]s far as baking bread, they had brick oven. They always used to make homemade bread. So that was the chimney for both. You connected from the coal stove and you have that brick oven, made like – but in the house!

SIGRIST:

How often would they make bread?

KRUPA:

Oh, let's say all depends on how big family is. See? We-- we usually maked[sic] about eight. Eight round bread. Big ones. See? That it lasts. But you eat so much bread there, so, one is just one day.

SIGRIST:

And what kind of bread is this?

KRUPA:

Well, this is rye. And with the barley mixed together. See?

SIGRIST:

So it's a course bread. A heavy bread.

KRUPA:

[superposed] Yes. See you have rye, and then you have the wheat, what you call here, and then you have the barley. Barley, they have lot. They use that for like, like you would say here, farina. But bigger. Like small barley, see?. And you could leave it for big. So all different things you make out of that. And then, when they have enough, they sell it to the town to a beer factory, see? That I remember. And then, for the money, right in the town, they used to buy sugar. It was like a bullet, like a missile, you know? That you chop it off. It wasn't like now, granulated. That was after the World War I. See?

SIGRIST:

Tell me some other foods that you ate on a regular basis when you were a child?

KRUPA:

Well, soup every day.

SIGRIST:

How did they make soup?

KRUPA:

They make soup, whether it's a bean soup, or whether it's a lentil soup, pea soup and potato goes in everything. My grandmother used to say, if you have potato and you have salt, you not hungry. You know? You make everything.

SIGRIST:

Did you eat a lot of meat?

KRUPA:

No. Listen, you don't go buy, because you don't have that much money. I remember my grandmother sent me with the egg to buy vinegar. She didn't have even for the vinegar enough to change to give me to go to buy the vinegar. So, as far as meat, your own pigs, you raise. Geese. Chickens.

SIGRIST:

Did you slaughter you animals?

KRUPA:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Tell me how you slaughtered the animals.

KRUPA:

Well, the pigs, well, they...

SIGRIST:

How did they do it?

KRUPA:

With a knife. You know they stab it, like.

SIGRIST:

Did your family do it, or did you hire someone to do it?

KRUPA:

Yes. And through the war, when there was no men from 18 to 55, even the woman did. So my mother even killed a pig. How she done it, I don't know. But she done it. Geese, chickens doesn't matter. If you 15 years old, you're supposed to know everything. Go and do it! The water is boiling and they chase you through the yard to catch the chicken, kill it and there it goes.

SIGRIST:

Is there a piece of furniture that you remember very vividly from your house in Czechoslovakia?

KRUPA:

Not really. It looks more like, almost homemade. They had dresser, you know, like fancy dresser for the girls when she gets married she gets certain dresser. And so many pillows and sew one big quilt. Feathers. That's why you have the geese. Not so much for the meat, because after you roast the geese, it's not much left. Fat. See, you use the fat. When I was in Europe after we were married, and I had cold and we went to sanitarium in Europe, you know what they gave you afternoon? Slice of rye bread with the cold geese fat. It was supposed to be healthy for you.

SIGRIST:

What other uses did the fat have in the household? How else did you use the fat. You ate it, did you use it for any other...?

KRUPA:

Sure! Pork. Pork fat. And after you have your own butter, if you have cows, you know, so they had butter. But not to use it like fresh butter. They melt it, see, that it keeps. In the dark room. There was no fridgidaire, there was no ice. But it kept. And pork was always smoked good that it lasts.

SIGRIST:

And is that something that the family also did, was smoke their own pork?

KRUPA:

Smoked. Yeah. They made everything. They use everything. Every part of it. (laughing)

SIGRIST:

Let me ask you what your father's name was.

KRUPA:

Steven.

SIGRIST:

What was it in Czechoslovakian?

KRUPA:

Stefan. With the St? But on the "s" is always that "sh", see?

SIGRIST:

And what was his last name, which would be your maiden name?

KRUPA:

Porubsky.

SIGRIST:

And can you spell that please for us? Or Fran can you spell it out loud, please?

KRUPA:

Yeah, yeah.

GABA:

P-O-R-U-B-S-K-Y

KRUPA:

...B-S-K-Y.

SIGRIST:

Tell me what you know about your father's background. His family background.

KRUPA:

Well, my father's background, I only know he works on the farm with the horse, horses. They had quite a bit of the land, like, you know? So that was his steady work. Even some help.

SIGRIST:

Was there a story about his childhood that he used to tell that you can remember?

KRUPA:

Not really. I can't remember anything, you know. Like he was on the field, and--during the war, like I say, he was the first one, I think he was 42 that time. And he was captured in Russia. And he couldn't get home. The war was over, maybe about two years. We thought he's forgotten and gone for good. Then, finally, he said, he couldn't go home because there were so many turnover revolution. He said, he was like on the farm, working. When there was a Red Guard going through,[ph] the owner, the woman, she come out with the red flag. When it was White Guard going, she did the same thing [with a white flag]. So he, in other words, like escape. It wasn't like, he was sent, allowed, anything. He said, he was more under the train, hanging, and when the train stopped behind a straw stack, he was hiding. And he run after. That's how he got home.

SIGRIST:

He literally escaped out of Russia.

KRUPA:

Yes! On account of the trouble it was. It wasn't like settled yet, or something.

SIGRIST:

Tell me about what your father's personality was like.

KRUPA:

Very quiet, you know. I can, I can, never say-- he wasn't a drunk. Just hard working farmer.

SIGRIST:

Was there something your father enjoyed doing for his own entertainment.

KRUPA:

I couldn't really tell you. There was nothing. No card playing, or parties, nothing.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember as a child, and this would be before the war, is there a story about you and your father doing something together perhaps, that comes to your mind? Something he did for you maybe?

KRUPA:

No. Not really. I remember my grandfather, he was 62.

SIGRIST:

Is this your father's father?

KRUPA:

Yeah. He was 62. I think he had diabetes, because he was sitting like outside, like in the garage. And ah, my grandmother, she was brining him like eat. And he was always sitting. I suppose he couldn't breathe. And he just turned over. He was dead. See? And he was 62. That was big funeral because he had five sisters, and all the in-laws. I remember. I thought that was such a big party, big funeral. You know what I mean? So that's a big thing, I know that it was.

SIGRIST:

Can you describe for me how a body was treated after somebody died? What did they do to the body?

KRUPA:

They didn't do nothing. Because he was so swollen up, they had to put like pails under the casket in the, extra room. Like we had two rooms. He was pretty bad.

SIGRIST:

And the body was then laid out in the house?

KRUPA:

In the house. Now they have it in the cemetery. They call it, like for the dead.

SIGRIST:

Like a wake.

KRUPA:

Yeah. But it's not undertaker. It's just a chapel, and they maded [sic] that the body should lay there, in there. Not like it used to be, home. It was home all the time, never any other place.

SIGRIST:

And then what happened after the body was in the house?

KRUPA:

Well, then it's like a procession going wherever you are. The walking with the casket, and praying and singing. And that's it.

SIGRIST:

Were there any superstitions that you remember concerning the dead, and how the dead were to be treated?

KRUPA:

No. No. That I don't know nothing.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember any superstitions or anything like that from the old country? Things people--

KRUPA:

Nothing happened to me. So I don't have anything to tell.

SIGRIST:

Tell me what your mother's name was.

KRUPA:

My mother's name was Julie.

SIGRIST:

And what was her maiden name?

KRUPA:

Čiz. Very short. Like Cheese, in Europe.

SIGRIST:

Can you spell it?

GABA:

It would be Č-I-Z. But you must understand in Czechoslovakian when you have a check mark over a "c" or an "s", it adds an "h". That check mark is in place of an "h".

SIGRIST:

So it's like a "ch" sound.

GABA:

It becomes a "ch".

KRUPA:

"ch" yeah.

SIGRIST:

Did your mother ever tell you anything about your birth? When you were born or when she was carrying you.

KRUPA:

No. No. She didn't say nothing. Well, nothing to tell. There's a midwife. You know what I mean? And the only I remember, in the same room, like I say only two rooms, they have a bed in the corner and special sheet is hanging like in the hospital, and they put the curtains. Because the kids, everybody, is in the same room. So that was the separation for the mother for the day or two.

SIGRIST:

The one concession to privacy.

KRUPA:

Yes. Yes. That's the whole thing. And kids, sh. Don't listen. Not to see it. That's the way it was. (chuckling)

SIGRIST:

Tell me a little bit about your mother's background and where she came from.

KRUPA:

Well, her background, I really don't know much. I know she, she had to do everything herself. Her mother must have died. How early, or how just before she was married, I can't tell you that.

SIGRIST:

What was your mother's personality like?

KRUPA:

It was like strict. She had to be. She had to be as a man, take care of the, the job as a man. And she have to take care of the whole whatever it was, life. Whether it's horses or chicken or thing. And you have to, no pasture at all. Everything is farm that is something growing there. There's no land that the cow could be outside. The cow had to be fed, that you cut the straw, and the clover or something in it. That was have to be cut every day and feed them. They can't be loose. Cause there's no place to let them loose. It would be doing some damage. So that's why I had the cows on the chain, see? Because next street is somebody else. And here we have the wheat cut, it's bare, that the cows could be here. Maybe the clover is starting to grow — growing the wheat. And this guy has a corn here. And beans here growing bushes. Course the cow is looking on that bushes. And I was the one, I get blamed. And my mother would be called to town, how much damage I made, not the cow. And you get it.

SIGRIST:

How did your mother punish you?

KRUPA:

Well, holler like hell and she would tell me what she's gonna do to me, and that hurts. I was imagining what it would do to me. (laughing)

SIGRIST:

Tell me about, did your mother do the laundry?

KRUPA:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

How did people wash clothes back then?

KRUPA:

Yes. I could tell you how they wash the clothes. When they have homemade linen. Homemade linen is, it's growing like wheat. You have to pull it out, and what they were seeds down here's gotta be separate. And then you soak it in the mud that it gets all rotten like, see? And then you wash it in the brook that it's leaking there because it's in the mud on the edge of it. And then you dry it, and you have wooden horse like, and this is all scraped out and you put your thin cross, and you chop it, [un]'til you have space that you could (slaps table) break it into it. Then you have, do you know like they have the hairdresser, where they're selling hair? That comb? That head with the nails in it, that you comb to it? I see that in the store. See? And...

SIGRIST:

This is like a card for combing wool too?

KRUPA:

You get all the woody part out. Shake it out, see? You shake it out. And when it's so fine, shake it out, you have two different kinds. The nice straight like you have, that's for the linen, and the bunches, what it's ah, lumpy, that's to make like the feedbags, let's say. You know what I mean?

SIGRIST:

For rougher--

KRUPA:

Rougher stuff. Yeah, and when you spin it, when you spin it, so you spin so much and they have such a thing to put it – like the skein you call it? The wool. And you count how many threads. And they make so many those skeins, and the people comes who makes the linen. See? But before that thing is sent, you-- when you bake bread, you have wooden things – like you feed the birds, let's say. You put these skeins in here and you take ashes, wood ashes, that's the bleach-- I used to wash my hair in it. You put the ashes on it, and after they bake the bread, that like steam it. After they put-- it's still hot enough, warm enough for that. And that is bleaching. Then they wash it, these skeins, in the river that run through the town, and you dye it. And then the man comes through the town. He's the one who makes the linen. How much, the measurement, whatever .That's how many yards you get. They know how many yards he's supposed to make out of that. And you have the linen. You have, you have for tablecloths. The men used to, years ago, they used to make a shirt even out of it. And embroider it; fancy. So, and ah,-- sheets, everything. And when they wash it, a lot of big wash, they put it in the like ah, big kettle. And they put that ashes on the cloths. Not the ashes but the strain; they put it in a bag. Hot water in it, and over that. That's the bleach. And you'd be surprised how nice it comes out. Just uh-- everything homemade. Like I said, the roof was done, never any nails. And when ah, the post in the barn, you know, like it's holding, standing up, they drill the holes and make nails that time. But after the war, everything is changing. Now, they almost fancier than we are here.

SIGRIST:

Tell me about what you wore for clothing when you lived in Czechoslovakia? What did it look like?

KRUPA:

[superposed] Well, clothing-- everything is like the skirts, and the big aprons, and blouses. Almost like you have jacket. Like this jacket now. That was like everything.

SIGRIST:

What color were these cloths?

KRUPA:

They were always like kind of darker color. And fancy cloths, everything embroidered. A lot of embroidery.

SIGRIST:

When would you wear fancier clothes?

KRUPA:

Sunday. Sunday and special holidays. Every Sunday has a name. One is bigger than the other. Not just the Sunday, so you have to know that.

SIGRIST:

What religion were you?

KRUPA:

Catholic.

SIGRIST:

Describe for me how you celebrated Christmas in Czechoslovakia?

KRUPA:

Well, in Czechoslovakia, well, like before, before Christmas we used to go to church six o'clock in the morning. And that's dark. And of course when it comes to Christmas Eve, that day, you keep on baking and everything, and special meal for that.

SIGRIST:

What is the special meal that was served?

KRUPA:

Well, the special meal is like ah, the soup. They call it like sauerkraut soup. But if you don't like it, they make it a little different. But mushrooms, gotta be mushrooms in it. And they call it, like buns. You bake the things, your own, homemade. You put lekva in it? You know that dark jelly? And you put ground poppy seed. That's the topping. With butter and honey with the boiling water. You know that it makes the thing juicier like. And we have those waffles like from the church. So you, you eat the waffles first. Somebody comes with the Christmas tree, like, and say they're wishing. You know? And they used to send their like youngest from the oldest. The oldest one was last year, so that's what they want it or not. And they want to hear you. You say, [in Czech?]

GABA:

Praise be Jesus Christ.

KRUPA:

And wishing them everything. Good health. And this and that. And to it comes today, amen. But you got to say what everything what goes with it. Then you sit down, and they make their own drink. Like you would say, you have whiskey. You don't drink whiskey, but you brown the sugar, real good, and you pour the whiskey in it, you cooked it together, and they put stick of cinnamon it, you know-- that it has flavor. And it's not so sharp after you do it. So they call it, that's the Jesus drink, see? So you everybody gets a little drink, and you get couple walnuts, and you get apple. Not everyday apples. They have their own orchard but not enough apples to go around all year, that how much you want, see? So, ah...

SIGRIST:

Is there, was there special songs that you sang at Christmas time?

KRUPA:

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Is there a song that you remember in Czechoslovakian?

KRUPA:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Can you sing a little bit of it for us on tape?

KRUPA:

(sings song in Czech) See? (continues in Czech) He was wrapped up in the how you say, diapers, you know? (continues in Czech) She's rocking him. (more in Czech) So that's the song that every kid know it, cause that never goes off the Christmas. It's always the same style, see? And then you go to midnight mass, see? And that's it.

SIGRIST:

So Christmas is a long, drawn-out kind of event.

KRUPA:

Oh! Three days. That's terrible to make that feed for the cows for three days. Oh yes, yes (Maria) [ph]

SIGRIST:

I wanted to ask. You mentioned earlier about a grandmother that was, was this your mother's mother, or father's?

KRUPA:

Father.

SIGRIST:

Did she live with you?

KRUPA:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Tell me-- describe your grandmother?

KRUPA:

Oh, she, she was good. She was always saving, even if it couldn't help. When mother hollers that hurt. She had to. But my grandmother, she used to say, oh, don't be naming everything so terrible, you know, to the kids everything. So (laughing) she always say. And when I was ah, notified that I'm going to the country, you know, here [America], she almost cry. She said, I have five daughters, and they didn't have to go. Why you sending all little kid there? Oh, my mother, she said, that's the best way, let her go. She missed my work, because I was the oldest from the girls. But I got to go. END SIDE A, TAPE ONE BEGIN SIDE B, TAPE ONE

SIGRIST:

Why did you want to go to America?

KRUPA:

I didn't want to go.

SIGRIST:

Okay. Well, how did this happen then? Why?

KRUPA:

Well, I guess, see about 22 girls was right after the World War I. So when it stops, first went the wives, then had been the family, by the time I got, that was already, everybody was going [a]head. I wasn't the first one, see?

SIGRIST:

Did you have relatives in America already?

KRUPA:

Yeah. That was just the cousin. The mother's were sisters see? And there was two girls here. Like the cousins. One in Allentown making the cigars, and this one was in Lansford. She was to be-- is a maid in New York City . But she went to visit a cousin, in there, in Lansford, that's a coal mine, and they made her married[sic], this guy. He had a butcher shop. Oh. That's what you told me.

SEAGIRST:

He had a butcher shop.

KRUPA:

Butcher shop, grocery, and one kid and house. So she was, no matter which way she could welcome me, see? Only thing she was expecting, my mother was very tall. And her mother was very short. I took after her mother, not my mother, so she made me undershirts like the built in shoulders, like the sleeves, out of the sugar bags, you know, they have groceries, they have, the sugar used to be in those kind of bags. So she made me that and she made me some clothes, something else, get it from the neighbors, and I thought that this is the country that I'm going to stay. She says, what's the latest news on there, and how is this, and how is that? I just sat there like a kid, without any trouble, without anything. And she used to send me the crumbs to the back street. That you could see all that black stuff, all that thing goes out of the mine. By the time I got there, this was all sugary cakes and things like that. I ate it. (laughing)

SIGRIST:

When you were growing up in Czechoslovakia, what did you know about America?

KRUPA:

Nothing. I have no idea.

SIGRIST:

Did you ever come in contact with anyone who had been in America?

KRUPA:

Well, one of those cousins was here, she didn't feel good. She just got back from this country just before the World War I. I think she gave a lot of talk to my mother how she should do it, that it's okay, how everything is, and that's it.

SIGRIST:

Did you have brothers and sisters?

KRUPA:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

I didn't ask this before, can you name them all for me?

KRUPA:

I have a brother, Ferdinand, that was after the Hapsburg name. And I had sister older than I am. She died during the war. She was 14.

SIGRIST:

What did she die of?

KRUPA:

TB. [tuberculosis]

SIGRIST:

Can you tell me a little bit about what you remember about that experience?

KRUPA:

Well, that experience all I know that she was sick for a while and there was no medicine for that. Can you imagine, they took her to a doctor and he's supposed to be a really doctor. You know what he gave her for that? Whatever she had? Splash the cold water on her chest. I said, my god. [not understood] Why should we go there, that's the only thing he's gonna recommend? To splash cold water on her chest. Fourteen years old, and she had TB. She died from it, you know.

SIGRIST:

Was that a common problem at that time, tuberculosis?

KRUPA:

I have no idea.

SIGRIST:

Just in your family, she's the only one.

KRUPA:

Just I heard, the lungs. It was the lungs. But, I tell you, the lungs. You have shawl on your head, but you go without the shoes. In October, dig the potatoes out and the beets and everything. The thing is frozen, the ground. She must have got a good cold, 14 years old. Maybe she got her things and everything. Got a cold and never got rid of it. But that treatment was, I'm telling you, so this is it. That's what I remember.

SIGRIST:

How did your mother and father feel about you going to America?

KRUPA:

My father-- my mother must have feel good, and my father, well, what can he say? America, everything is going swell. She's lucky that she could go. How many girls I remember were already going like to Prague. They send them back. One, second time she came. And she had diabetes, you know? And they look at your eyes, and they, I remember my mother saying, they turn her back. Something her eyes. You know? Even when I was coming off the steamer to that Ellis Island, that was the doctor standing between the door. First, he took off my Sunday kerchief and put it over my arm. And this is the whole visit. That was the last visit, see? And you're supposed to have money with you, that by the time you get job, that you support yourself. Not like now. See? That I remember. You got to have the money, so much, with you.

SIGRIST:

Tell me about the process of getting ready to leave Czechoslovakia? Getting your papers and whatever you needed to have before you left.

KRUPA:

I have nothing to say about that, because I guess my mother got the mail. She went to town. If she needed me just to do that big signature (laughing heartily), and I remember I wrote something, I don't know. But it must have been good enough. But what?

SIGRIST:

Who paid for your passage?

KRUPA:

The cousin from Lansford, Pennsylvania.

SIGRIST:

Do you know how much that cost at that time?

KRUPA:

Two hundred five dollars.

SIGRIST:

Two hundred and five dollars.

KRUPA:

Yeah, after I was, she brought me to some people that she was just guessing that there, to leave me there overnight, they should put me to the agency, of course Slovak Agency. And any kind of a job who said they'd take me, $30 a month. I slept in the hall. I had no clothes.

SIGRIST:

This is in America, but we're not in America yet. Don't tell us this yet. So you got all your papers, and this is the summer of 1922, when you were getting ready to leave.

KRUPA:

[superposed] Yeah, yeah

SEAGIRST:

What did you pack? When you left, what did you take with you?

KRUPA:

Whatever my mother put there, not much. (laughing) But I remember I had Sunday clothes. I thought that if I have that Sunday clothes, I'm going to be all dressed up, was I! (laughing heartily)

SIGRIST:

Can you describe what your Sunday clothes looked like?

KRUPA:

Well, it's a dark. It's a dark apron and the skirt was like dark green with ah, you would say like a pencil strip, was like a silver, you know. It was green and that trimming was like on it. And a blouse. And you have like a jacket. See.

SIGRIST:

You mentioned your Sunday kerchief.

KRUPA:

And a kerchief. And I suppose I have for everyday and ah, like Sunday, too, the kerchief.

SIGRIST:

How did you wear your hair back then?

KRUPA:

Oh, braided. You know, to make two. And on the end, I had a little string tie it. That's all, see? And that was a very big problem when they start to come this country. The first place they took you, clean your head. Make sure that you're not buggy. And they were saying, they shave you. Oh! That was terrible. That was terrible. If they're going to do to you that's worse than if they would cut your whole head off. But I pass. Whatever it was, I pass.

SIGRIST:

Did your family give you a goodbye dinner, a little goodbye party?

KRUPA:

Oh, no! No! I don't remember nothing! Just [stage whisper] "she's going. She's going." You know. People would say, how come she's going? The others, she was sent back and they didn't accept her or something like that. I went like a hotcake from one place to another, and she wrote and she sent it and you start to go. Whole month. I thought that it's because it's so far.

SIGRIST:

Did you want to leave?

KRUPA:

No. I have nothing to say. You have nothing to say to your mother or father. I say, when I hear this, how it's going on, I say, they need somebody to hold these kids, or pay for it. If your father have to pay for it, like they would have to pay when I had that cow there, they name how many roots that cow ate. And my mother would pay. My mother (laughing) I think she would rather kill me.

SIGRIST:

Tell me about, the day that you left, tell me about saying goodbye to your parents. Did they go with you to go to...?

KRUPA:

Yes. They took me to the train, station, through the fields. The station is from the other side of the different town. Go to the same station and you're coming from this side.

SIGRIST:

And do you remember what you were carrying? What you had?

KRUPA:

Yeah. My mother sending present to my cousin. A huge pillow. Feathers. European feathers. And you know what that means? European feathers? The kids wintertime, you have to split every feather. Every feather, get the middle out. Because that's gonna stick you through the things. So that's a wintertime job. Embroidering. Feathers. Put a pile of beans, get the dirt out of it. Some kind of a little nuts, stone or something. They give you a job to do it, not matter when, to keep quiet.

SIGRIST:

So you were carrying this large pillow with you.

KRUPA:

Yeah. The pillow. And I had suitcase made, what you call Franny? The tree? The pussy willow things? It's like they have the wine in these baskets?

GABA:

Wicker.

SIGRIST:

Wicker. Like a wicker.

KRUPA:

Yeah, I couldn't think of it. — Yeah, that I had. And my mother, she put a two, sew on it, for I could, on the train, it's so hard to step up, and I'm not big now, I wasn't any bigger at that time. So I could grab the thing to get to the train. I had that on my bag, and the feathers.

SIGRIST:

Lot of things to juggle around. How did you feel when you said goodbye to your parents?

KRUPA:

I guess goodbye. I don't even know whether I said it. I don't remember whether they kiss me, or kiss them. That I don't remember. Because it was such a big thing, just follow everybody. Main thing, they put me on the train and go. That train supposed to tell me where to get off.

SIGRIST:

Now, were you traveling alone or were you traveling with other people?

KRUPA:

There was another girl. Going from the same town.

SIGRIST:

Was she from the same town?

KRUPA:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

So you were with the...

KRUPA:

We were holding together, even on the boat we were together.

SIGRIST:

So you got the train, where did the train go to?

KRUPA:

Slotobodista first. Where they comb the hairs and look for the bugs or whatever the want. And from there to Prague. And the Prague was quite a long time because we were waiting today.

SIGRIST:

How long were you in Prague?

KRUPA:

I can't remember. We must have been a few days, if not week. And then, all that time. So in Le Havre, we were long.

SIGRIST:

So you went from Prague to Le Havre.

KRUPA:

To the Havre, I think. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And you said that you had some examinations of your hair in the first place. What else did they examine? If anything.

KRUPA:

Maybe I had some physical. I know we had it in Prague, you know? And ah--

SIGRIST:

Where did you stay when you were in Prague?

KRUPA:

That's already for these people. You know like, it's a station, but these are the agents. Because you don't know. Why am I here? Where am I going? You don't ask nobody. He comes and he calls your name, so they have it.

SIGRIST:

They have a big facility there, just for people who are immigrating.

KRUPA:

Yeah. Yeah. Like ah, before you buy the ticket for the steamer. They have sections with the name. Which one you go. So I guess, whoever sent the deposit, they already called the name. They send them notice home that they should come. And when you come there, I suppose they wait by the train. How do I know where to go. See, they already know how many people are coming, so he's gathering his people that he has list, and you just follow him. And wherever he takes you , you stay there, whether it's days or just overnight. And then, finally, like you would say for that visa, we're going to the consulate, they say. Everybody who's supposed to get it, or they were giving to these people, but it was just from Czechoslovakia. You just follow it [un]'til you get to the desk where your name is called again. And then he took your bag wherever. I have no idea.

SIGRIST:

So you're totally in the hands of the steamship agent?

KRUPA:

No matter where I went, nobody was that I know who's waiting for me.

SIGRIST:

So you go from Prague, to France, to Le Havre. How long were you there? In France?

KRUPA:

Like I say, they even borrowed the clothes for church what I had. So I must have been there one Sunday for sure. Because I think one Sunday we went away, we were. We want to go to church. God forbid to forget it.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember anything about the trip from Prague over to France?

KRUPA:

No. you just-- I guess you sit in the train, quiet [un]'til the tell you, get off. How do I know where to get off, see?

SIGRIST:

And then did you get on the ship in Le Havre?

KRUPA:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What was the name of the ship?

KRUPA:

Il de France.

SIGRIST:

And tell me what you thought when you saw the ship?

KRUPA:

See, the thing was like this. From home, I don't know how come that this agency they got the name. They sent three hundred crowns deposit. And when we got to the agency that ordered the, you could see him, but I don't know who he is. But there were two people visiting from this country and they were coming back. And they say to us, what line you going? And who is the name of the agency. And we say, we said the name, "Oh my god! You gonna be there forever." You're gonna go like in the bathtub. You know, good for nothing, cheap, cheap. So the older girl, right away, we talk to them. We say, well, we have deposit there. To lose the money. What would my mother say? He say, don't even notify that you're here. Don't pay any attention to him. And then we ask him, well how can we go on another? So they say they're going with this Il de France in five and a half day. So they must know something. So that's how we went there. And we never mentioned that we were there to that guy that I sent deposit. So then I wrote my mother from Landsford, what happened. You know he sent that back, that three hundred crowns?

SIGRIST:

I'm just curious. Do you remember what ship you were supposed to go on?

KRUPA:

No. Only the agency. Čenek Schultz. Čenek Schultz. You know like with the "c" with the thing on it.

SIGRIST:

That's quite a memory, to remember the name of the agent.(laughs)

KRUPA:

Yeah! But how he look, old man or young man, or whether he had somebody already there? You know?

SIGRIST:

Aren't you glad you listened to those people? (laughs) Tell me about the Il de France. Can you describe?

KRUPA:

Oh, that was a big steamer, you know?

SIGRIST:

Was that the first ship you had ever seen?

KRUPA:

That's, I never see even a kid putting a boat on the edge of the thing.

SIGRIST:

Tell me what you thought about when you saw the ship and realized that you're going on to this thing!

KRUPA:

Well, I was imagining it's gotta be big. Get in the morre, morre they used to call it, the ocean, you know, in Europe. So that was fine. We were going up and down the steps, you know.

SIGRIST:

Where did you sleep on the ship?

KRUPA:

We were four in the cabin.

SIGRIST:

Can you describe the cabin for me?

KRUPA:

Ah, dark. I think we had sink, like, between the bed. I don't remember the toilet or anything like that. I know the sink was there. And four girls. And when it was time to eat, you go up – wherever the dining room was. You come down and you stay there. And after you go all out, to go on the top, or did I go with somebody or did they take us that you have to go up a little bit, that I don't remember, so.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember anything that sticks out in your mind that happened while you were on the ship? Some event that might have occurred.

KRUPA:

They were calling their names, and one of the agents he said, oh, these are the ones they all come with the "y" on the end. O-R, O-R, O-R, you know? And everybody was like, like, they didn't say (porupsky) (porupskyor), you know, everybody was like that. So he was making like fun of the names and everybody was like that. For what? Why he was calling the people on the top when they were just sitting around, I don't know. Whether they could do some games or something, I have no idea.

SIGRIST:

Was it a smooth voyage or a rough voyage?

KRUPA:

It was-- oh, it was they were saying that it goes like 28 things up and down. It was couple days, but not much.

SIGRIST:

Did you get sea sick?

KRUPA:

Well, maybe a little bit, but I was going, I was pretty good. I wasn't really doctoring or laying in bed. But you feel like you are sick. So you go third grade, you know that, they don't ask you. That you go according to your money I suppose, you know. That's it. And I didn't have any doctor that I would be seasick. That's all.

SIGRIST:

Did they offer any kind of entertainment for you while you were on the ship?

KRUPA:

No. I don't remember anything. I only know that we went up. You know, on the air, like.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember any other passengers entertaining themselves in any way?

KRUPA:

No. No. No. Sitting around. And you go to the table. I don't remember whether you had your same place to sit, or whether wherever you come sit down, you know? Like everybody together. I know it was a long table that we were sitting, eating.

SIGRIST:

How long were you on the ship itself? I know that you left your town on August 24.

KRUPA:

Well, that five and a half days.

SIGRIST:

That's five and a half days you were on the ship.

KRUPA:

I guess the, the steamers gonna sail today. So if it's already there, you know they got us together and the papers all, you finish. Put the stamp and the examination, otherwise you won't get there. That's gotta be done before that. See?

SIGRIST:

Do you remember seeing the Statue of Liberty when you came into New York Harbor?

KRUPA:

I guess I did. I don't remember, you know? Because Statue of Liberty you could see from the big thing. And you hear, you surprise, you only watch front of yourself, or the people, for they don't leave you. You're scared. See? And after I was inside, we were inside, we were the left to be careful with them. These are the-- we can't let them go. They have nobody to go to yet [un]'til they pick them up.

SIGRIST:

You're talking about at Ellis Island.

KRUPA:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

So the ship comes into New York Harbor, and then what happened once the ship docked?

KRUPA:

When the ship docks, the ferry is there. See? And the porter, the porters were getting the suitcases, who wants help? And whether you want help, I didn't know what he saying I guess. He was talking to me and gave me the number for the suitcase and get it done. And I was holding on to the feathers, can you imagine? No comb, no towel, no toothpaste, no change, what did I sleep in?! As I was! I don't remember that.

SIGRIST:

So the ferry took you over to Ellis Island.

KRUPA:

Yeah. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Yes. And then what happened when you got to Ellis Island?

KRUPA:

Walk with the people!

SIGRIST:

What did it look like?

KRUPA:

It looks like a big station or, or big hall, or whatever you would think. Something big. To me everything was big because I never was anywhere. (laughing hard) To see anything bigger than my house.

SIGRIST:

Were there lots of people there?

KRUPA:

Yeah! And they were coming, even the colored people. Oh that was, I say, my god. They look so big! And I look so small. Because I wasn't big. (laughing)

SIGRIST:

Had you ever seen a black person before?

KRUPA:

No. Yes, I see the chimney sweeper. (laughing, merrily)

SIGRIST:

He was black only accidentally.

KRUPA:

Oh, yeah! He had the thing that for years he's wearing the same thing. You know what I mean? And that thing hanging that he scrape the thing and he stands front of the oven, big oven that he bag. And it's a space, like this, see? This is, you could put your stuff on it here. You cooking summertime. And here you have the thing when they kill the pig that you put the copper, big thing like the cowboys used to cook on the outside. That's a big things are going, cooking when you're doing the butchering. And he stands on it, you know, here you have the wood underneath. He stands here and he put his big broom, made out of the branches you would say. And he stands and he wiggle it up and all that stuff falling down, see. And when there's big girls like teenagers he say, hello! He mocks them. (laughing) And little kids afraid of it. When he goes, he always run. And he's got like a sleeping bag on it, and his foot is all black. And he say, wait! The chimney man is coming and I'm going to give it to you if you don't behave yourself. Oh, that's terrible black man like that. (laughing)

SIGRIST:

Let's get back to Ellis Island.

KRUPA:

Isn't that enough!

SIGRIST:

No. We've got to get you into America yet. [recording malfunction] You're still on Ellis Island. What happened exactly at Ellis Island? Do you remember? What did they do? You mentioned your eyes....

KRUPA:

Well, finally when that cousin got, I guess notice. So her husband that I never seen before, because she got married in this country, see? So I hear the name, and that was like shock to me. That touch me good. So, after they were finished with him, they call me to sit down and talk. Why did I leave the country? I say, we were finished with this kind of work, and my mother say that I guess they don't need me or something. Well, that's it. He had the rest of it already done and what I was supposed to put down it was there. So not much talk.

SIGRIST:

So how long were you at Ellis Island?

KRUPA:

Well, I think we came Friday, and being a Saturday and Sunday, not doing any work, that's why I was there. And what I had came Thursday, I can't be sure. Only it seems awfully long.

SIGRIST:

But you stayed overnight there?

KRUPA:

Oh, couple nights. That's for sure.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember where you slept at Ellis Island?

KRUPA:

Well, on those bunk beds, like bed next to bed. How they have it all the time. Not one room all three. The whole thing lets say from here to the last wall.

SIGRIST:

Did they feed you while you were on Ellis Island?

KRUPA:

Oh, yes. Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

What was that experience like?

KRUPA:

Well, I don't even know what we had for breakfast, but the, whoever it was, she had the stick and she went on the bed. You know, like you would go next to iron fence with a stick and rub it all around. That's the way they, you should know that come on, she was calling you. She didn't call, see? And you follow here and you go dining room. I guess it wasn't far. It was there. So everybody ate together.

SIGRIST:

Did you see anything at Ellis Island that you had never seen before in Europe?

KRUPA:

No. Only the inside. Because I don't think I was inside you know. You were inside, evening we were sitting, they were playing like, maybe records or whatever it was. And they gave us cup of milk before bedtime, like right there in that hall. To everybody. See? And you went to bed.

SIGRIST:

Were there nationalities that you had never been exposed to?

KRUPA:

Sure. From all different countries I suppose they were there, people. You don't know nobody. Only that girl, I know. But she went, because she was older and she was to New York City. So we separate. Once you hit between the door, out of the steamer, and that doctor finish, you go back on the ferry, if you have people there waiting for you, see? And if they're not waiting by the ferry, by the steamer, like the ferry comes from New York City, let's say. These people who went to New York City, so they would go back on the ferry, you know. Whoever was waiting for them. And if you old enough, you have your address, you show them, somebody poke you, take this. And my husband, when he was coming, he went to 14 th Street, and he could go because he was already out from the army, you know.

SIGRIST:

Well, how did you feel when they separated you from this young lady, who was your traveling companion? How did you feel about having to stay there?

KRUPA:

I didn't know when she disappear. Like I say, you go one after another between the door. You're not pushing, you're going to the doctor, I see. They don't let three or four between the door. One after another. One you pass, I didn't know where she disappear. If she went in front of me. If she went behind me. When I was alone, I got to go where they push me, see? That's the way it was.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember if you felt frightened about being there by yourself, or if you really weren't frightened?

KRUPA:

I was frightened only that I had to stay there, and I'm in this country already. I didn't know why. All I was thinking that they're going to send me back. Nobody explained it to me, why, or you gonna go home soon. They're gonna pick you up. Nobody talk to you, see? You're just sitting. You don't know what's gonna happen to you, see?

SIGRIST:

So your cousin's husband came to get you.

KRUPA:

Pick me up. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember what your impressions were of this man?

KRUPA:

Nothing. Not much. I don't think I say, hello or glad to see you. I guess nothing. He just see a kid in front of him, and follow him back to the ferry . And to these people in New York City, I remember the all the way up, and the street was so dark, the houses so close there, you know? So, but that was these people, I didn't question him, nothing, you know. You just keep quiet.

SIGRIST:

Did he speak your language?

KRUPA:

Yeah. Yeah, sure.

SIGRIST:

Did he try to be friendly with you?

KRUPA:

Ah, he's, he wasn't a much talker, you know? Just what he had to. And I stand next to him. You can imagine. High shoes. And the house dress that people gave me. Why don't they leave me my Sunday clothes what I came from. So (laughing) he wanted, they want to change me. They want to be good to, be more like the rest of it. I can imagine the hat with the fruit on it. Next morning the cousin kid, four years old, he was playing football with it. And I feel so bad. I say, I have to bring the clothes back to the people. Oh, don't worry about it. They gave you something that they don't need it any more. (laughing)

SIGRIST:

Tell me how you spent your first night?

KRUPA:

In her house?

SIGRIST:

Right. But tell me what that experience was like. Sleeping in America.

KRUPA:

It was like fancy home. And yet, they had only coal stove. They had cold water running. They didn't even have a bathroom yet. We used to wash up in the tub front of the coal stove in the kitchen. And they had butcher shop, and they had grocery. So afterwards they made ah, they move the house extra room to the outside that it was like porch. You know, made extra room. Then they have steam heat and everything.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember the address of the first apartment that you went to?

KRUPA:

Oh, sure.

SIGRIST:

Where was it in New York?

KRUPA:

To New York?

SIGRIST:

Well, the first night that you stayed at your cousin's house?

KRUPA:

Oh, to my cousin?

SIGRIST:

Yes. Do you remember where she lived?

KRUPA:

It was ah, 6 East Abbott Street, Lansford.

SIGRIST:

Oh, that's in Pennsylvania.

KRUPA:

Pennsylvania.

SIGRIST:

But the first night you stayed in New York?

KRUPA:

Oh, New York. 408 72 nd Street.

SIGRIST:

408 72 nd Street.

KRUPA:

Second Street. That was a little off First Avenue, to the East. Now it's the New York Hospital there.

SIGRIST:

We need to pause because I need to put another tape in the machine. So we're going to just pause for a moment.

KRUPA:

Did anybody talk so much like I do? END SIDE B, TAPE ONE BEGIN SIDE A, TAPE TWO

SIGRIST:

Okay. We are now beginning tape two with Anna Krupa, who came from Czechoslovakia in 1922 when she was 15. And I also want to state that Jillian Hirsch from the Saratogan [recording cut-off] newspaper is present.[Krupa speaks, not understood] Her daughter Fran Gaba is also present and it is Sunday afternoon, November 13. Mrs. Krupa, I want to just backtrack a bit to Czechoslovakia again, and just fill in some details. You were talking about the clothing. Can you describe for me how it was made and what it looked like?

KRUPA:

Yes. Yes. It has lot of pleats there. Apron, and it's dark clothes. Black. And the skirt, another one to it, is all different kind of colors, could be, you know. But it's all mostly like pleated and tied on the waistline.

SIGRIST:

How did you do the pleats?

KRUPA:

Well, you sew them, you get it in like with a needle. Together. And then you, that time, now they have different. You keep on from this pleats, you just keep on following it [un]'til you get to the bottom. And that has lining like the starchy, cheesecloth. That holds the pleat for sure together and then they have certain way to fold it, roll it together that it doesn't, the pleats doesn't give out. That it stay that way. And then, the waistline, or the jacket is made plain, like jacket almost here. Let's say like men's shirt or something like that. All different kind, whatever you, material, like according to your taste. What you want. And you have somebody to sew for it. That time, everything was made to order. They measure you. No pattern to buy the size. They measure your sleeves. They measure your waistline. And the man or woman sews it. Then you pay them just for the work making it. And ah, summertime, everything is big sleeves, wide sleeves and a lot of embroidering. All different kinds. Lot. And special ones were made with gold. Gold sleeves. Embroidered. Just like any embroidering, you do that. And then when it's like a young woman after she's just married, she had even the, what would you call it? Cap?

GABA:

Cap.

KRUPA:

Cap. And gold. And that woman was even on the hundred crowns in Czechoslovakia in money. Her picture. Like here it's George Washington on dollar. So my costume was on that...

GABA:

On the money. The Czechoslovakian money.

KRUPA:

Only it was a married woman.

SIGRIST:

Did you wear stockings?

KRUPA:

Yes. No silk stockings.

SIGRIST:

And were they made at home or were they purchased?

KRUPA:

We purchased them.

SIGRIST:

What did you wear for underwear?

KRUPA:

What for? (laughing)

SIGRIST:

So you didn't wear underwear.

KRUPA:

We didn't wear underwear. We wore supposed to be underwear, that long shirt with the built in shoulders. Not just the string or fancy. Straight down. See? But to keep you warm, skirt on top of the skirt. But if the wind blow you feel it. (laughing) And if you fall on ice, you feel it more. (laughing)

SIGRIST:

How did you iron the clothes?

KRUPA:

Oh, ironing the clothes, that was already machine. You opened the top, and you pick out, like the charcoal when it gets hot. You put couple pieces in that and you swing it to make it hot. (Shwish, Shwish). You know, that keeps it red. That's the way they used to do it. And for fancy clothes, they had smaller one. It was like copper one. They choosed the shape of the iron, you have solid piece and you throw it into the fire to get it red hot. You poke it, it has hole and you slip it in. Like for the lace and for the embroidery. The embroidering's got to be pressed on the wrong side. And on a soft thing, that when you pressing it, for the leave sit on top it, not to be (makes smashing noise with hand) squashed. And make them flat. They gotta like, they grew there. That's why you do it with the fancy, good iron. Carefully more than the regular thing.

SIGRIST:

You mentioned lace. Where did the lace come from?

KRUPA:

Ah, there would be like someplace, another town. There's a woman, she's making different kind of lace. So they buy it.

SIGRIST:

Do you know how they make lace? Do you know how they made it?

KRUPA:

No. That I don't know.

SIGRIST:

But that was purchased?

KRUPA:

Yeah. That was purchased. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What about shoes. Can you describe the shoes you wore?

KRUPA:

Shoes, that time when I was growing up, was always made. Made to order. You go to the shoemaker, he'd measure your foot. See? And whether it's shoes, just a high shoes, lace shoes, or whether it's the boots, see. Boots are made different way. With the hard top. That was the fancy ones. Like for Sunday, see? So always was made. Up to the time that I left, that I was 15, everything was made. There was no going to the store and buy shoes. Now there is. Now they do it differently, see?

SIGRIST:

All right. I want to also touch on, you mentioned earlier in the interview that as a child, you had a lot of responsibilities around the house. Were the children responsible for tending the animals at all?

KRUPA:

Oh, yeah.

SIGRIST:

What were your responsibilities with the animals?

KRUPA:

If I was summertime and it's very busy, my mother would send me earlier home. That I should go to the barn, get that – what would you say? [in Czech] That it's already cut, ready was made, but it's gotta be...

SIGRIST:

The food for the animals.

KRUPA:

But that was ready cut. Not straw or hay, that's why I'm telling you that one was made. So between two cows, you should throw in the feeder, that one bushel. See? And clean up for them and put whatever they drop off, make it like to lay in it. See? That was my job. When the cow step on my foot, I pinch her and everything and she didn't feel it. (laughing) And I cry.

SIGRIST:

Did the cow have a name?

KRUPA:

I don't think so. Moo! Or something.

SIGRIST:

What about with the chickens and geese? Did you have responsibilities?

KRUPA:

Oh, I had geese before the World War I. I had 23 geese, and like I say, it was August. All the beaters, they're cut. So take them on our piece of field that it's, it's no wider than ah, than this block. The next is somebody else's that wide, and maybe land over you would say a block, not even half a block. You know what I mean? So you hold yours -- cows there, to be on the pasture, see? And the geese, they should find the grain, that when they were cutting it, that it drops there, so that shouldn't be waste. But when the geese already have good feathers, wings, because they pull their feathers off, so sometimes ah, they can't fly so good. So the mother goose would go ga,ga,ga,ga,ga (quickly), ga,ga,ga,ga,ga. You want it a little bit over here. When she say that, that means they gonna take off. But I shouldn't let them go. How you gonna let the geese know, not supposed to go because I'm gonna be punished if they fly in someplace else. So that I used to cry for the geese, so many times. I remember she had 23, and they just crawl out of the lake, and that was somebody else's thing. And the watchman, that was a watchman there, he count them and took them to the place that would be, how would I say, like Borden's have so much land and everything. Big guy. They used to be the grofy. In London, they are lords. And we had groves.

SIGRIST:

Can you spell that?

KRUPA:

G-R-O-F.

SIGRIST:

Like a major landowner.

KRUPA:

Oh, he had twenty-- 81 of them. Places like that. People all different kind of clothes. You could tell the different states. They were working there all summer.

SIGRIST:

Did you grow any vegetables?

KRUPA:

Special vegetables in my land is sugar beets. Sugar beets they are so many fields, wide fields, those grofs. So all the poor people, there's no factories, they work there. From spring to snow, see? So that's how, that's how they make living.

SIGRIST:

What vegetables did you grow at your own farm, for your own consumption.

KRUPA:

Well, like I say there, three different wheats, four because I didn't say oats. And then potatoes, corn, beans, peas, lentil, you know. And corn is just mostly for the feed. We don't eat corn like you eat it here. Special on something. When it's young you cook the young one. That's the only one. Their own seed. Whether it's potatoes, and a lot of potatoes. And there sugar beets.

GABA:

[superposed] Pumpkins.

SEAGIRST:

Your daughter mentioned pumpkins.

KRUPA:

Pumpkins.

SIGRIST:

Tell me about your pumpkins.

KRUPA:

The pumpkin is not for holidays, not for nothing. When you have corn, field of corn, they say, oh, we gonna take the seeds and beans and pumpkins go across the things, here and there. After the corn is dry like now, that's still growing. And that's for the feed for the cows. See, horses, clover. And oats. And ah, the clover, yeah. They don't get this kind of thing. They get grain, like, see.

SIGRIST:

And the people didn't eat the pumpkins either?

KRUPA:

We eat the pumpkin when it's green yet. Young. And not different kind. Like here you have zucchini and butternut squash, this. There was only pumpkin because they grow good and ah, big. So, when it's season over, the corn is dry, you have to chop up the sticks. That's for the cows. But I said they have to cut it with the straw and ah, clover, something. Then, you pick up the rest of the stuff, like the beets, and ah, what else. The corn. The corn is gone. First they break it off. And you peel the things, and tie six pieces. And you leave that, what do you call it, the skin, and you make it, when they peel it, you have neighbors coming because you get couple loads. And overnight they peel it. And two men are setting a woman to tie it. You take the things, the six of them, the tops, bend it and you make a tie from the skin. You take the two ends, the thin ones, and you put it like this. Like this, you turn and you do the other side.

SIGRIST:

Twist it.

KRUPA:

That's how they make it when they make the wheat on the field. No string to bind it. You make on your own from the last year one, see? That's the ties. And you should see how they tie the bundle. You can't even stick you fingers, not matter how, underneath. They have that stick and twist it and stick it right under.

SIGRIST:

The one thing I want to ask you before we do get you back into America. You were talking about World War I, your father fought and then ended up in Russia. How was your family, you and your mother and your brothers and sisters affected by World War I?

KRUPA:

My, we were affected, good thing we had old horses. They wasn't accepted to the war. Because they take them. The young ones they were taken. There was no tractors going to the war. Horses. So my grandma say, thank god, we have old horses! One is blind on one eye, and the other one used to get-- be colicky and he throw himself, and my god, when the people, my people went to church, I run next door, to tell the man my horse was doing banging because he the colic-- cramps. So they were saying they wouldn't accept him, but they had to be there. Of course, they didn't take him. He was twelve years old. He had to do like man. Work on it.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember witnessing or experience any fighting in Czechoslovakia at that time?

KRUPA:

No. There wasn't, that was all far away. We just-- because my mother used to read it. She was a, she loved to read, you know? So she had newspaper, whatever they put in, not everything, I guess, with the next house, very old man. Not just for her. Two of them, they were partners. What I hear.

SIGRIST:

All right. Well, let's get you back to America now. You spent your first night in New York.

KRUPA:

I wish they wouldn't do that to old people like they doing that to me. These people are not any better than mine! (laughing)

SIGRIST:

You spent your first night in New York, when you first... The first night in America, you spent in New York. Then where did you go?

KRUPA:

When she brought me here from Pennsylvania...

SIGRIST:

Wait, how did you get to Pennsylvania from New York.

KRUPA:

Ah, central train.

SIGRIST:

And when did you do that?

KRUPA:

On a Sunday, about a month later when I got here.

SIGRIST:

So you were in New York about a month, before you went to Pennsylvania?

KRUPA:

No. After I was month in Pennsylvania from Ellis Island, I went to Pennsylvania, I stayed with her, maybe about month, little over. And she said, well, I gotta got to work. And pay her back, the $205. So she said, thinking, where she would let me stay overnight. So I had couple of names, but the people wasn't home. They had show by the E Street, where there was a circle hall, like the gymnasium they have there, so when we got to the number, that she had the address, you know, nobody was there. Everybody was, it was Sunday there, it was from church, show. So finally, she goes to that, four-oh — front of the 408 72 nd and on E Street, that was the hall. Who's standing there? A guy, taxi driver, and that taxi driver was brother of the 408 where I went. And he told her, stay all in the hall. So she walked with me to the hall, look for them. And she found them. And good thing her husband was working at night. I slept with her. Because he was working at night. And she put me to the office. It was Slovak a guy. And so I had to take, good thing somebody asked for that guy's I guess. Didn't know nothing. Young woman. She had a baby, you know?

SIGRIST:

And what work did you do? What were your responsibilities?

KRUPA:

Can you imagine? I didn't' know how to clean house. We didn't clean houses like that.

SIGRIST:

This was domestic work.

KRUPA:

Yes. And so I tried to clean the kitchen or something, or the bathroom or something, and wash the diapers. You know, and when she was bathing the baby, I guess she was nervous herself, she cried, because she asked me something, I didn't know what she wants. So we cried both of us. See? So I wasn't there too long, then somebody recommended that I, a restaurant. It was a polish Jewish people from Brooklyn. But he had on seventy-- on72nd, he had restaurant. And he came for me. So they thought they had mother from Poland, the Jewish mother, you know she had the wig. She used to go and have it fixed on my day off, which was good because I didn't know how to travel. But I didn't understand, Polish is not easy to understand if you don't really know the people. Slovak is altogether different. So I was there to Christmas. She only want to have me help. She had a baby. She had about twelve years old boy, nine years old girl, and then they had the baby. And the mother just came from Poland. See. So that was it.

SIGRIST:

So what were your responsibilities in that house?

KRUPA:

I guess what they tell me to do. Wipe all this, do this. I didn't know what to do. I wouldn't go touch something. I was afraid to touch things, it's not mine. What am I doing, see?

SIGRIST:

Were there things that you saw that you hadn't seen before in Europe that were in these houses? Different?

KRUPA:

Well, we did different cleaning with the broom, or washing the clothes all together or just a little something. That was, it wasn't regular days or name to it like. Feel, springtime you do this, summertime you do this and to the end. To dig out whatever is growing. That was-- that's the kind. There was no factories, no place round. Cities, like I would say that, oh, I work in the different kind of a work, something. Embroidering. That was your shop. That was your home, you do at home. See? During the war, it was like, for the widows, and ah, somebody else like can go to work, nuns, you know? They were bringing all this embroidery. And that, soon as your five years old – don't you know how to hold a needle? Don't you know how to do this and that? You're supposed to know how to handle that. That's your tool

SIGRIST:

In America when you got the work as the domestic help, were you required to wear a uniform?

KRUPA:

No. Not until when I was here already maybe about five years. It happened to be that 408 had a sister upstairs and she was working on Broadway before she got married, before she got to this number. Her sister was working for these people that they took me. Because they had trouble with the nurse, and they had trouble with the maid. And they used to rent a house in Cedarhurst for summer. You know, from June to September. So ah, I don't know how we got to talk. She said, they would be place maybe where I was working. I'm gonna call them. And they had trouble, with the, like I say, in the country. They went to dinner when they come back, they couldn't get to the house. So they fire both of them and it was time to go back to city apartment. See? So can you imagine then, they had nurse, and they had cook. They have cleaning woman. They live on the 11 th floor on Broadway. He's a lawyer. And I could talk already that time, it was couple years. But how am I gonna cook? I didn't even know how to make mashed potatoes. You know what I mean? Don't worry about it, after they had all the trouble, they'll take anything as long as this woman, while she was working for them 408, she would say that I'm Czechoslovakian, and she's a young girl, she doesn't know how to do things, you know. But that's all. I had $55, they gave me, I think $70. I didn't know what it means. $70 what's the difference for what is that supposed to be. I supposed to know so much. I cook. So she was the cook. She used to live next house, next building, the mother. And whatever I made, even wrong,-- she, one time I called her, she was crying, you know. And her little kid, he was maybe about five or six, he say, yes, but she's only a little girl you said. Like the mother, the little kid said to her, how could she know it. So, and he just sit and he, the husband, the lawyer he just sit and he looks like that. (mumbles) Then she had-- and they had so many companies, even if have to have four extra. It was cook and waitress. I should catch on. Annie, watch her; Annie watch her. So Annie had to watch her, and copy and try to do the best you can.

SIGRIST:

The other people who were doing domestic work in that house, were they also immigrants?

KRUPA:

You mean in these people?

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

KRUPA:

Well, they had old woman that she was maid to the mother. She used to come clean every two weeks. Like the real cleaning.

SIGRIST:

Was she an immigrant also?

KRUPA:

Well, she still was talking like from Germany. You know – "I taut".

SIGRIST:

Can you tell me how you learned English?

KRUPA:

Well, I guess the kids. And you keep on talking to it. When I got married after seven years, you know, from the place, she used to tell me when I, after I was married when I came up to help out when they had parties, just like a waitress, she said to me, Annie, you're talking to much Slovak. You used to speak good English. He said, "I could tell you're not talking English so much." So that's how I learn. No place. I could read now, I never been to school.

SIGRIST:

How did you learn to do this, in English?

KRUPA:

I don't know. I just take it and try it. When they were growing up. Ma? Spelling, this and that. When I say it wrong she come and look at it and tell me.

SIGRIST:

So you were actually learning English over a long period of time.

KRUPA:

By myself, because that was the only thing.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember what the first word that you learned in English was?

KRUPA:

Not really. They were all the same to me. (laughing)

SIGRIST:

Do you remember trying to speak English and making a terrible mistake when you did it?

KRUPA:

No. I don't think so. Only the first place, ah, that she had the baby, that she went out and she called me. And I just kept on saying. Mrs. So and So, she went to buy chicken. You know? Annie, Annie, Annie, you know, this is so and so. So I couldn't talk anything else. But I thought I'm going to explain whoever it is that she went to buy chicken. (laughing) END SIDE A, TAPE TWO BEGIN SIDE B, TAPE TWO

SIGRIST:

Did you find in those early years, when you were first in America, those first couple of years, did you find that anyone ever made fun of you because you were a foreigner? Did you experience any kind of prejudice when you were here?

KRUPA:

In that time, when you were with these people were you working, they're not gonna, they know it. They don't say nothing. And when you went between your own, you talk Slovak, like on your day off. See? So you don't expect anything. Only, like I say, that was in Bronx, but I was trying to tell you before, there's three different trains going on the same track. Westchester, and someplace else, and Bronx Park. Couple times I took the Bronx Park, right. And then I was on my day off, what kind of came, I just walk in. On my day off, going from the place. And you know what it was? Seventh Avenue. I went on Seventh Avenue. On Broadway. Where I was supposed to be on Second Avenue. See? When I see it, I'm going to the tunnel, and but I supposed to be on the top, I got scared. I pull out my, in my pocket book, letter from Europe. And that was that address. 72 nd Street. That 408, my mail used to go there. That man, if it would today talk to man next to you in the subway, they would say, that's terrible. No good. Except he knows I couldn't talk. So I sat next to him and it came to 72 nd , it was subway station. He said, go up. And I go up and they must have tell me, if you need something go to the policeman. On Seventh Avenue, it's like Park Avenue, you know that thing in the middle, car going up and down. I marched right to the policeman. Traffic or not. (laughing) He look at me, he see the things from Europe and he took me and put me behind his back because he was busy. And afterwards when it was time for me, he ask me if I have money. Yeah. I know what it means. So he said, he pointed to a green bus, cross town bus. And he made a big 6, and I remember that, in front of the 408 because they were 408, and it was cold and the bus was standing there. Green bus. When I see that green bus, and he made the 6, all right. So I went to the bus. I sat right behind the driver. Good thing I didn't sit on his lap. I won't let them go. And he went to the left because he turn on the East River by the New York Hospital and then go back. I was the only one left. So when he came to 72 nd or 1 st Avenue, he let me off. Because then he would take me past the number where I went. But I didn't get lost. And ah, that's how I went. Wrong way and right way. Then they told me, I can read. I couldn't read the different things what was which avenue or where it goes wrong way for me. See?

SIGRIST:

So your experience was that people were very helpful to you when you didn't understand.

KRUPA:

Yeah. And nobody say, don't talk to nobody or be careful, and do this. I went.

SIGRIST:

And nobody ever made fun of you for having an accent?

KRUPA:

Not that I seen.

SIGRIST:

(they laugh) Did you miss your parents in Europe?

KRUPA:

I don't know. I cry a lot, because like I say, I couldn't understand. That the kids were banging next door. Next apartment on the wall. They must have heard me crying. And I cry when nobody was home. See? I don't know somebody should hear me that I cry. That's not nice.

SIGRIST:

Were you sending money to your parents?

KRUPA:

Oh, yes!

SIGRIST:

How much money did you send?

KRUPA:

See when you send thirty dollars that was like, three hundred or something like that. That's a lot of money there, see? Dollar was thirty crowns. See? So first pay what you owe for the ticket. So she came to visit me, to that 408, to find out little by little, when she was, she came from Europe, she work in New York City. All the girls work New York City. That's the only job you get easy. And they all want Czechoslovakian girl because they stupid. They work hard. (laughs hard)

SIGRIST:

There's probably a lot of... I'm sure that's what they were thinking at that time, actually. (Krupa laughing) Did your parents ever express any interest in coming to America? Your mother and father?

KRUPA:

No. They never mention it, that good thing or bad.

SIGRIST:

What about your brothers and your sisters?

KRUPA:

They never say anything, that they jealous or they want to go. I never hear anything. Of course, because they were older already. After seven years, when I got married, so by that time they only three, six years between the two, you know one would be three years younger than I am, the other one still three years younger. So they were doing the same thing what I was doing. I gotta show you.

SIGRIST:

Wait, we'll do it after we're done. How long did it take you to pay off your passage?

KRUPA:

Well, thirty dollars a month, two hundred dollars. It took a while. But I was glad when she come, she remind me. Because I didn't put it in the bank. Where did I have it? In the basket, you know? She was afraid maybe I should lose it or something. When she no have all, she didn't know how smart I or how afraid I would be to lose money. Nothing. When she came I was glad to see her, I gave her the money, and that's it.

SIGRIST:

I want to know what you did on your days off?

KRUPA:

Oh, we went to the people that we know that were here. And their sisters were coming, one before me and a couple of them after me, so that was our day off. And that's it.

SIGRIST:

Was there a large Czechoslovakian population in New York?

KRUPA:

Oh it was a section, they called it Czech quarter. All everybody in all the halls, all the dens, all the churches, one section. From 65 th up to 79 th , that's all Slovak and Czechs. And maybe Hungarian. And from 79 up to 86 th , German. So you know where you are. And whether you go walk outside, or whether you go to those halls, that's all, they prepare something was going on so everybody was going there.

SIGRIST:

So for the most part, you were around other Czechoslovakian people.

KRUPA:

Yeah. Yeah. On the day off.

SIGRIST:

On your day off.

KRUPA:

Thursday, or every Sunday. All depends on how you had it made.

SIGRIST:

Did you become a citizen?

KRUPA:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Tell me how you did that?

KRUPA:

(laughs)That was good too.

SIGRIST:

What year did that happen?

KRUPA:

Oh, gee. 1931 or '32.

SIGRIST:

So this is in ten years after you got here.

KRUPA:

Oh, yeah! You know why. Because we were married 1928 and 1929, just before the crash, we went to Europe in June. And we stayed there a year and a half. See? I finally returned. So, and I wasn't citizen. I told you, that ah, I lost European citizen, Czechoslovakian, and I didn't get in the American, because I didn't become a citizen. And before, when the husband became citizen, even the wife. Then they change it. You have to go yourself. So I was practicing reading all the Washington, all the senators, and all the this and that, that I supposed to know it, and I'm going to go in front of the judge with the thing on and everything. Okay. Finally I did. I got break. So when I went for the citizen paper, okay. There were other people just like I say, the way I came. Sit here. The partition between was a little office, and I sit on the bench by myself. He call me. Said he's got a couple books, newspaper in front of him. And he ask me and I had the papers, lady without a country, with all that thing there. And he said, oh, my, my, my and all the ribbons on it. So he said, name this and that. And everything. He ask me, like I'm talking to you. And he said, could you read English? I say, I didn't go to school. I don't know, maybe some things. So he turned the newspaper like this, to me. And I start to read. He said, that's all. That's all. Okay. That's all? That's all. And that was all. That was the judge. I didn't go in front of the judge. And I was waiting the judge. He's gonna question me. But I never did. So whatever I did, the main thing was that I read whatever I was reading. So I'm citizen.

SIGRIST:

How did it feel when you became a citizen?

KRUPA:

That time I got scared, because the way I talk to him like he's nobody, you know what I mean? So it feel good. I didn't have to do that. It's about time that I was here already so many years. And my husband was citizen, and he was kept back. Because by the time my papers that I was nobody, he had to wait for me.

SIGRIST:

You got married in 1928.

KRUPA:

1928.

SIGRIST:

What was the date? Do you remember?

KRUPA:

June 23. I have lot of 23 rd .

SIGRIST:

And what was your husband's name?

KRUPA:

Frank Krupa.

SIGRIST:

And where was he born?

KRUPA:

Czechoslovakia.

SIGRIST:

And when did he come to the United States.

KRUPA:

'23.

SIGRIST:

He came in 1923?

KRUPA:

A year later.

SIGRIST:

How did you meet your husband?

KRUPA:

(laughs merrily) We went, it was summertime from church they have outings you know, in Astoria. And he live on 14 th Street. And I went from 65 th Street all the way. And you know 57 th was changed for Long Island. See, and it was in Long Island there, going on on that Sunday. So he was in the train, for which one I had to change from 65 th Street to [not understood] And it was so crowded, all the Slovak people were going to that church special thing going on. So, and I, I said, who has seat! Should sit down. I have seat, I sit down. And this guy was sitting in the, my husband with his friend. And he heard me talking. Just like you do. (laughing) So, and they were going to the same place. So when they get off the train and going there, they're talking to somebody and my husband asked me to dance. I don't know you. You know, I didn't want to bother. Then, with the bunch that I was with from my hometown, there were so many of them here. So afterwards they start to talking to somebody. And these people that I go to, like Gaba's cousin, his mother's cousin, was getting married. And he talking to that, my husband. But I don't know him, you know. And he said, why don't you dance? Ann, she don't want to dance, he said. Ann, you know him? Yeah. I'm getting married and the friends, they go to the day off to the same house. Well then, I didn't want to insult the people, never mind my husband. So I went to dance with him. And we dance. And coming back I supposed to take the Pennsylvania train, going on my day off because these people that I was working for, they rent a house in Cedarhurst for the summer. So they want to take us to the station. And I didn't want it. I didn't want it. [mumbles] No. So his sister, the people that I go to, they gave him telephone number and everything . So next day he call me, next Sunday he came up whether you want it or not. This was the story. That's the way we met. On the train.

SIGRIST:

How many children did you have?

KRUPA:

This one.

SIGRIST:

That's Fran.

KRUPA:

Fran. And I had Josi in Long Island.

SIGRIST:

Josi.

KRUPA:

Josephine.

SIGRIST:

Two girls.

KRUPA:

Two girls.

SIGRIST:

And I want to ask you, you said you went back to Europe in '31. 1931.

KRUPA:

'29.

SIGRIST:

'29 you went. 1929. Did you go visit your parents?

KRUPA:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

How did it feel when you saw them after being in America for so long.

KRUPA:

Well after a couple years, the kids and my sister, they were all grown up. See? So it was almost you didn't know it. Lot of people die, and went to there, Argentina, to France and to this country. So a lot of people left.

SIGRIST:

Did your parents, your mother and father were both still living?

KRUPA:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Did they look different to you somehow?

KRUPA:

Well, older. Not much different, you know. They were doing the same thing as I left it. My brother was married. My sisters was still single. And they were doing all this work, you know.

SIGRIST:

Did you bring them presents when you went?

KRUPA:

Something, I don't even remember what I bring. You can bring them the things that we wore. Because they had different outfits, different styles already since I left it. So there was nothing. And Jews you don't do it for them. That you bring them watches or rings or something like that. They didn't wear that.

SIGRIST:

Did, when you saw your mother and father and the house that you had grown up in, did you feel more Czechoslovakian then or more American?

KRUPA:

I feel more, I think, more like this country. We were used to it. You know, you're looking at it, but it's not surprising to you whatever you seen, see? Because it was everything the same. Now they're really changing it. Now they have gas, no more wood. And electric. After I left, they had it. They have televisions. They have freezers. We had only dark room. Keep the thing under ground to keep it cool. And smoked.

SIGRIST:

Did your mother and father ever give you any rules to live by?

KRUPA:

No. Only as, while I, was you grown up, for the work. You're grown up. You can do it. Don't you know it then? Think of yourself. You're supposed to go yourself, watch what needs to be done. See? Especially when you're the oldest one. Whether you're just here, or whether you the oldest one.

SIGRIST:

So they instilled in you a sense of working hard. That you had to work.

KRUPA:

Yes. Nobody said, don't do it, that's no work for you. I never heard that.

SIGRIST:

What do you think, now looking back, you're 88 now, what do you think is the most Czechoslovakian about you now?

KRUPA:

That everybody should do a little more than they're doing it, the way it is. Now they're doing it. You mean in Czechoslovakia?

SIGRIST:

Well, no. I mean inside you?

KRUPA:

In me? Why was I always like that? Why was I always supposed to do it and know it without telling me go and do it. See, that's what I mean. That's what hurts you. No matter how young, and you want to smile, or you want to stay in some place, or go the way you want it – where were you? My god! You have this and you have that.

SIGRIST:

So you were expected to do so much, and you couldn't question that.

KRUPA:

Always. They was not into it. If they would say, you gotta be married 16 years old, you're supposed to know like your mother when she's married 50 years old. All the experience, the cooking and where it belongs, and how long it takes, You're supposed to know that. You see me doing it. Do it.

SIGRIST:

What are you the most proud of in your life? What are you the proudest that you've done in your whole life?

KRUPA:

That she send me, stupid kid, and I'm here. And I never got lost, I never owe anything anybody, and I hate it when I see things how other people do it. The cheating way and the wrong way, and no respect. When you were passing the street in Europe, little kid, and there's an older person standing on the street, if you didn't say Jesus Christ – like you tip the hat. That guy didn't hear you. Who is your father? He's going to report me. I didn't say it. I said it, but that don't' mean nothing. He's gonna tell. I suppose to respect him, and know. When you feel that you approaching a priest or the nuns, you gotta go to them, let them know that you going to them. Never mind they coming to me. That you know should respect. And that's what it was all the time. And there be shame if you do something wrong, they would go into town, my god, they think they take everything what they have. That's the way they would feel about it. See? That's the strict. That's, I call that strict because you're supposed to know it. And no answer. There's no answer.

SIGRIST:

Well, Mrs. Krupa, I want to thank you very much. We've gotten you pretty much through your life.

KRUPA:

I hope you don't get any more people like me! (laughing)

SIGRIST:

This is Paul Sigrist signing off with Anna Krupa on Sunday, November 13, 1994 in Saratoga Springs. Thank you very much.

KRUPA:

You're welcome. I'm glad I'm finished. END INTERVIEW