Hazel Maupin Oral History
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CHURCHILL COUNTY MUSEUM & ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROJECT
an interview with
HAZEL MAUPIN
September 25, 1993
This interview was conducted by Eleanor Ahern; transcribed by Glenda Price; edited by Norine Arciniega; final by Pat Boden; index by Gracie Viera; supervised by Myrl Nygren, Director of Oral History Project, Churchill County Museum.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this interview are those of the interviewer and interviewee and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Churchill County Museum or any of its employees.
PREFACE
Hazel Maupin was dressed comfortably in jeans, but still portrayed a quiet sense of dignity and elegance. She is a very youthful looking woman at seventy-two. A native of Fallon, Mrs. Maupin recalled her memories of Fallon with humor and fondness.
Interview with Hazel Helen Maupin
AHERN: This is Eleanor Ahern of the Churchill County Museum Oral History Project interviewing Hazel Maupin at her home at 401 Michael Drive, Fallon, Nevada. The date is Saturday, September 25, 1993. The time is 2:00. We are sitting in the living room of Mrs. Maupin's house. Good afternoon, Mrs. Maupin. How are you?
MAUPIN: Just fine.
AHERN: For the record, would you please give me your name?
MAUPIN: Hazel Helen Maupin.
AHERN: What was your maiden name?
MAUPIN: Prudler.
AHERN: Would you give me your birth date, please?
MAUPIN: May 20, 1921.
AHERN: Mrs. Maupin, have you always lived in Fallon?
MAUPIN: Yes. When I was young, we moved up to Virginia City [Nevada]. I was four or five, but we only stayed there for probably two years. I don't remember too well, and we came back and settled in the Harmon District.
AHERN: Where were you born?
MAUPIN: I was born in Stillwater. My father came here as a homesteader under the Newlands Project, and he built the house I was born in which was a real small house. They leveled the land and grew wheat, raised turkeys, and I don't know what happened, but he wasn't too successful at that and moved back up to Virginia City where he was a tailor. He worked as a presser in tailoring.
AHERN: When you say tailoring, did he actually sew clothing?
MAUPIN: Yes, uh-huh.
AHERN: Was it for men or women?
MAUPIN: Men, mainly. Uh-huh. His father was a tailor in Germany before they came over to the United States. He wasn't too well educated, but he did take that as his trade, but he always wanted to farm, so he tried it. Every (laughing) few years it seemed like we moved to a different ranch,
AHERN: Could you tell me something about your parents. Their names. Where they had originally come from before coming to Fallon?
MAUPIN: My father and mother were both born in Germany, and my father came to New York when he was five years old. My mother came when she was fifteen. They both landed at Ellis Island.
AHERN: And their names?
MAUPIN: My mother's name was Anna Bent, and my father's name was Paul Gustav Prudler.
AHERN: Did they come over as immigrants?
MAUPIN: Yes. Uh-huh.
AHERN: Where did your parents live prior to them meeting?
MAUPIN: My mother came to Alameda, California, where she met my father who had come to San Francisco when he was older. He was settled in Nebraska on a farm, and how he came to San Francisco I'm not sure of. They met at a, I think, a Swiss lodge thing, and they were married in 1916, I believe it was.
AHERN: Do you recall the ages of your parents when they were married?
MAUPIN: Think my mother said she was twenty-one, and my father was ten years older which would make him thirty-one.
AHERN: At the time of their marriage, what were their occupations?
MAUPIN: My mother came over from Germany to work for a cousin that had settled in Alameda, California, and she was a sort of a general housekeeper and cook for her cousin. My father was in the tailoring business in San Francisco.
AHERN: Did he have his own business, or he worked for someone else?
MAUPIN: He was a partner with another man.
AHERN: What brought them to Fallon? The farming?
MAUPIN: Uh-huh.
AHERN: How did he hear about the Newlands Project?
MAUPIN: I just don't know for sure, but I imagine they advertised in the paper because they wanted people to settle here for farming, and he always thought the farm life was a great life.
AHERN: You've mentioned your father had built your house. Were you born in that house?
MAUPIN: Yes, uh-huh. I have two older brothers that were born-no, my oldest brother was born in San Francisco before they moved to Stillwater. My mother used to tell of her trip. The train took her to Fallon, and then she went in a horse and buggy to the farm where my father was already there. It looked rather desolate to her because everything in California was green, and she came here in the winter, I believe it was, but she learned to love it here.
AHERN: You said for a while you lived in the Harmon District?
MAUPIN: Yes, after we were up in Virginia City. I was five years old and we moved back to this area. Bought a farm in the Harmon District, and I started first grade at the Harmon School.
AHERN: How did you find school in the Harmon District? Describe the school, please.
MAUPIN: It's still there. Most people know where it is, and they had a reunion for everybody that went to the Harmon School three years ago.
AHERN: Was it a large school?
MAUPIN: Two rooms. They had from first grade to sixth grade in one room and sixth grade through eighth in the other room.
AHERN: After a student completed the eighth grade, where did they go?
MAUPIN: To the Fallon high school. I'm not sure if they had buses then or not because we moved from there to the Soda Lake District. I was in the second grade.
AHERN: When you moved to the Soda Lake District, was that when you had to go to the schools in town?
MAUPIN: Yes, uh-huh. I remember riding the bus, and Charlie Frey was the bus driver. So, I enjoyed the change.
AHERN: How many children were in your family?
MAUPIN: I had three brothers. Two older brothers. Are both deceased.
AHERN: What were their names?
MAUPIN: Paul, Jr. and William. My younger brother is Donald Prudler. He lives in Reno now.
AHERN: How did you find growing up in a family of all boys? Were they very protective of you?
MAUPIN: Uh, yes, (laughing) they were, but I always wished I had a sister. They were busy boys. They had to do a lot of work on the farm. We had the dairy herd. They had to get up early and milk the cows, do the haying. My father continued to work in tailoring most of the time and never did become real successful at the farming, but we always had plenty to eat and a roof over our heads. (laughing) It was the Depression era when I grew up. We didn't have a lot of luxuries, but we had a good time.
AHERN: Did you find yourself somewhat of a tomboy growing up among the boys?
MAUPIN: Yes, I guess so. I used to help herd the cows, ride horses, but I was never too crazy about it. (laughing) I'd rather have lived in town.
AHERN: Why is that?
MAUPIN: I don't know for sure. It just more sociability, I guess, and in the wintertime it was so cold riding the bus to school.
AHERN: Your father was a part-time farmer.
MAUPIN: Yes.
AHERN: Where did he work? In town?
MAUPIN: Yes. He started his own little shop at one time, and then he went in with Joe Tarzyn, who was also from Europe, and he also liked farming. In fact, he had a little farm out where, which is now, they named Tarzyn Lane after him.
AHERN: Did their shop have a name?
MAUPIN: I think just Tarzyn's Tailoring Shop. He was the owner. My dad worked for wages.
AHERN: Since your father was a tailor, did he make the clothes for your brothers?
MAUPIN: No, I don't remember him doing that. He did mostly alterations, I think. A few prominent men in town had their suits tailor-made in those days. We probably couldn't afford the material for the real nice suits, and boys in those days didn't wear nice suits. Maybe at graduation. I don't remember for sure.
AHERN: Were there very many families there in the Harmon District when you lived out there?
MAUPIN: Some of the families are still there. Like the Nygren girls, the Nygren ranch, and many of the people in Stillwater were there when we were. The Weishaupts and the Vieras.
AHERN: So, it wasn't really a sparsely populated area. There were quite a few families there?
MAUPIN: Um-hum. I think, like the Weishaupts settled about the same time and deBragas.
AHERN: Did you find that the families in the Harmon District socialized together more so than those in town?
MAUPIN: Yes, they did have their own little groups. I remember at Stillwater when I was really young my parents going to a dance hall by the old swimming pool, and the people would all gather there and have little parties and dances.
AHERN: Where was this old swimming pool?
MAUPIN: They had a Stillwater store. Well, it's right close to where all the water is next to the mountains.
AHERN: But it was in the general vicinity of the Stillwater store?
MAUPIN: Um-hum. Right across the street. They had a swimming pool. Artesian water, I believe it was, and it was still a going thing till I was in my teens. I remember we used to go swimming out there. That was the only place they had a swimming pool in this area, I think, then.
AHERN: Growing up on the farm, did you learn alongside your mother on how to become a homemaker. Can food and all that?
MAUPIN: I used to help her can. She would can peaches and tomatoes. Everything we raised on the farm. I used to help, but I never did learn to do it too well. I didn't like it that well. I said I would never can when I was growing up (laughing), and I haven't. (laughing)
AHERN: Did you have a lot of time for recreational purposes for fun?
MAUPIN: Oh, I guess we went to movies quite often. They weren't too expensive in those days. I would spend most of my summers with my aunts and my mother's sister. She'd already come to Alameda, too, under the same circumstance, and she married there and had a nice home in Alameda. I enjoyed going there in the summertime. Get away from the . .
AHERN: So, in the summertime, you went down to California to visit your aunt.
MAUPIN: Um-hum. She had children around the same age as I was. I looked forward to that. Sometimes we would take the train from Hazen down to the Bay Area. I thought that was such a thrill.
AHERN: So, most of your summers, then, were spent in California with your relatives.
MAUPIN: Well, maybe for six weeks. I don't know for how many years I did that, and they would come up and stay with my family, and they would enjoy the farm life while they were here.
AHERN: After you finished the school, the eighth grade, in the Harmon District, you said you went into high school.
MAUPIN: I finished the eighth grade in Fallon. I was in second grade, I think, when we moved to Soda Lake District, so I spent the rest of my years with Fallon schools.
AHERN: Did you find any difference in the way of teaching from the Harmon School and Fallon schools? Do you remember?
MAUPIN: Fallon school was from first grade up to fifth grade where the West End School is now. It was a brick, two-story building which was the original high school, and I remember being in the first and second grade on the ground floor. First, second, and third, I guess. In the fourth grade we were upstairs.
AHERN: Oh, I was under the impression that you had attended the school in Harmon District.
MAUPIN: Just for the first grade and part of the second grade.
AHERN: Did you like going to school in town?
MAUPIN: Mmm, yes. There were a lot more children there. Some of them weren't real kind. (laughing) Just like nowadays. The more children there are, the more difference. When we were in Harmon, everybody was the same. We used to ride in a horse-drawn cart to the Harmon school from our farm; tie the horse up. They had a place to tie the horses. Most of the kids either rode horses or came in a cart if there was more than one or two, and the horses would be tied up till school was out, and we'd go back in the cart. And I made friends there, and I felt rather strange when I moved to town school, but made new friends.
AHERN: Do you think you learned quite a bit from your teachers?
MAUPIN: Oh yes, I think I had all good teachers.
AHERN: Is there any particular teacher that stands out in your mind?
MAUPIN: Well, I liked them all. I had Laura Mills in the eighth grade who was quite well known. The park [Mills Park] is named after her. And a lot of them didn't stay here too long.
AHERN: In high school, were you looking forward to getting out school?
MAUPIN: Um, yes. I had in mind to be--I took a commercial course which is shorthand and typing and I always thought that would be fun to be a secretary. No computers in those days.
AHERN: Who was the principal of the high school then?
MAUPIN: Oh, George McCracken.
AHERN: Was he an outstanding principal?
MAUPIN: I think so. He was quite strict, and there weren't as many students in those days, and all the students respected him, I believe.
AHERN: After high school were you able to use your secretarial skills?
MAUPIN: Yes. I started working part-time at the Ford Garage while I was still in school, on Saturday, which was a good experience, and then when I graduated, I don't think they advertised, but I went around town asking for a job, (laughing) and I went down to the Dodge Construction and they were looking for somebody at that time, so that's how I started working.
AHERN: When you started working, was your family still living in the Harmon District?
MAUPIN: No, we were in the Soda Lake District then.
AHERN: How were you getting to and from work?
MAUPIN: Well, my father drove back and forth, and my brother was working at Kent's grocery store soon as he was through school, and then he started working at the bank.
AHERN: Which bank was this?
MAUPIN: I'm not sure whether it was called First National [Bank of Nevada] then, I think. He was a teller, and so we all drove in the same car. If somebody had to work a little later, we would have to wait.
AHERN: Did you drive?
MAUPIN: Yes, I learned to drive when I was probably fourteen. Got a driver's license when I was sixteen.
AHERN: You said that you worked for Dodge Construction. Exactly what were they doing? What kind of jobs were they doing?
MAUPIN: Contracting, building roads. And the War [World War II] started, they built the first runways out at the naval base in 1942 I guess it was. And they had many highway jobs in Nevada.
AHERN: When did you meet your husband?
MAUPIN: When I was working there, he was the boss. (laughing) I married my boss. (laughing)
AHERN: Your husband was the boss of Dodge Construction?
MAUPIN: Manager. It was actually owned by Dodge brothers.
AHERN: Who were the Dodge brothers that owned the construction company?
MAUPIN: Carl Dodge and Bob Dodge. When I first worked there, Bob Dodge had already passed away, but I remember Carl, Sr., and he was in rather poor health at the time, so my husband took over the management of it. Carl, Jr., who still lives here, went into the Navy during the War, and when he got back, he was also part manager of it.
AHERN: Could you tell something about your husband? Where was he originally from?
MAUPIN: He was born in Louisiana, Missouri, and he came to Fallon with his family.
AHERN: What was his full name?
MAUPIN: Ernest Justin Maupin, and he came here as a child. His father had a garage, I think, and he was also a city councilman. When I got to know his family, they were quite elderly,
AHERN: Mr. Maupin's father was a city councilman?
MAUPIN: Yes. I don't know what years it was. It's in the records.
AHERN: How old was your husband and how old were you when you got married?
MAUPIN: Oh, there was quite an age difference. I was twenty-three and he was forty-two.
AHERN: Did that bother your family when you married an older man?
MAUPIN: Well, they thought he was a great man. I never did ask them if it bothered them or not, but he was a very good husband.
AHERN: Did his job require that he do any traveling?
MAUPIN: Lots of traveling. He would make out the bids for all the highway work, and they worked as far as away as Las Vegas, and during the War they went to Inyokern, California. Worked down there. Built roads and runways, I suppose. He was gone quite a bit.
AHERN: Did you travel with him?
MAUPIN: Not much. I stayed home and raised my four children. (laughing)
AHERN: After you married, you no longer worked?
MAUPIN: No. I was just a housewife.
AHERN: You mentioned four children. Could you tell me their names, please.
MAUPIN: My twin girls, Michele Basta now and Michon Mackedon, and they were two years older than my oldest son who was Ernest Justin, III, and six years later I had William Douglass. [End of side A]
AHERN: You mentioned that your daughters were twins. As the mother of twins, did you find it somewhat different in trying to get clothing for them or identical ... ?
MAUPIN: It was quite difficult. I liked to dress them alike, but we managed till they were in college, I guess. They dressed quite a bit alike in high school.
AHERN: I'm sure that people had trouble telling them apart. Did you have that problem telling your daughters apart?
MAUPIN: I have; looking at their pictures now sometimes I'm not sure, but I could usually tell them apart if I would look closely, and their actions were a little bit different.
AHERN: Was Dodge Construction ever involved with any business ventures with the Japanese back then?
MAUPIN: Oh, I guess the iron ore business. They shipped iron ore to Japan that was mined up by Lovelock [Nevada].
AHERN: Dodge Construction owned the iron ore mine?
MAUPIN: They mined it. I'm not sure if they owned it, but I remember him meeting Japanese people in Stockton [California] where they shipped it out.
AHERN: Who met the Japanese representatives?
MAUPIN: He did. My husband. And when Carl Dodge was out of the Navy, I think he took part in that part of it, too. I can't remember what year that was. After the War, anyway.
AHERN: Did the Japanese ever come up to look at the mines?
MAUPIN: Yes, they did. I don't remember them ever being in Fallon. He would meet them down around Stockton area, and they were always bringing gifts to my husband (laughing) for me. I think I did meet them.
AHERN: I was going to ask if you'd ever met them.
MAUPIN: I think that we all met in San Francisco and had dinner together. They were always so nice and generous. I don't know why it ended. Guess they didn't need anymore iron ore.
AHERN: When you were raising your family in Fallon, was it a large place, in your eyes?
MAUPIN: No, no. Always was small town. It's grown quite a lot lately. We used to seem to know everybody when we went in the store, and now you don't know hardly anyone when you go in the stores. It's changed quite a bit, but it's a nice place to raise kids.
AHERN: How old was your husband when he finally left Dodge Construction?
MAUPIN: Sixty-five. The two widows of the Dodge brothers decided that it was fit time to sell the business since my husband was of retirement age, so that's what happened. They sold the whole business. Had a huge auction and that was the end, I guess.
AHERN: After your husband retired, did he begin to pursue his hobbies or other interests?
MAUPIN: He worked part-time as bookkeeper for different places, and he was on the board of directors of the First National Bank which met every month. He enjoyed that, and he did try taking up golf, but he wasn't too crazy about it; didn't have a lot of hobbies.
AHERN: Can you remember all those years living in Fallon if there were any horrible natural disasters that struck Fallon? The Fallon area?
MAUPIN: The worst was the earthquake in . . . what year was that? My girls were still in grammar school.
AHERN: What do you remember of the earthquake?
MAUPIN: My youngest son was about a year old, I guess, so it must have been 1954, and we had a home up at Tahoe. Summer home, and we were all at Tahoe when it struck down here, and I felt it in the two-story house we were in at Tahoe, and I got scared. My husband was down here working. I was alone up there with my children, and I felt the house shake that night, so I packed up everything and came back to Fallon. (laughing) We'd just gotten home and a big aftershock came (laughing), and I was wishing I'd stayed up at the Lake.
AHERN: Did it do much damage to your house?
MAUPIN: Not to our house. But it's scary. I think I stayed a few days and then went back up to Tahoe.
AHERN: I guess that was the only great natural disaster that struck other than the droughts?
MAUPIN: Um-hum. I worried about Lahontan Dam breaking when we'd have an earthquake, but they said it never would be that disastrous if the dam did break, so, luckily, we haven't had any of those for quite a while.
AHERN: Was that the only time an earthquake struck--in the fifties?
MAUPIN: I think we probably had about three of them in a few years, but I didn't remember any before that or any that happened after that, but they say it could happen anytime here.
AHERN: Looking back on your life when you were growing up, do you miss that compared to now? Do you think that life was better or it was worse then?
MAUPIN: Well, I have a much easier life (laughing) than I had growing up in Fallon. That's for sure.
AHERN: When you say when you're growing up in Fallon it was harder, was it because there were no modern conveniences or you just had to work harder?
MAUPIN: Um, yes. We had outdoor plumbing quite a long time out on the farm. My mother had to wash clothes on a scrubbing board when we were in Stillwater. I can remember her doing that. As time went by she did get a washing machine in later years. I always thought it would be easier to live in town than on a farm, and now I can see the advantages of farm life and why people do settle here and have their small acreages. But I did have a good childhood all things considered.
AHERN: Did you ever do anything with your brothers when you were growing up? Activity wise?
MAUPIN: Mmm, no. I tried to stay away from the hard labor that they did. (laughing) They used to take me out to dances. They would have dances in some of the old school buildings on Saturday nights, and we'd go to movies together once in a while. But as far as activities, they were interested more in the farming thing. Their agricultural teacher in high school was Mr. Schank, the father of Cyril Schank who is County Commissioner now, and he would take them on trips to judge cattle, and I'm not sure what they did. Future Farmers of America they called it.
AHERN: Your parents were of German ancestry. Did they ever speak the language?
MAUPIN: Very seldom. I think if they had something they didn't want us children to hear (laughing), they'd speak in German, but very seldom. They wanted us to grow up with the English language, so I never did learn much in German. Learned to count to ten and a few phrases I picked up. My father didn't speak broken English at all. My mother still had a German accent because she was older when she came here. I often wished that I would have learned German. I've saved some of her letters that she got from Germany, and I wish that I could read them.
AHERN: Looking back on your life, do you think you would change anything, or you would want to change it from when you were growing up?
MAUPIN: Not really. I would like to have gotten a better education like my children, but when I graduated from high school, we were quite poor, and I thought if I had an opportunity to make a living on my own that I was lucky. I couldn't think about spending four years in college, leaving home. I sort of wanted to help my folks, and that's the only thing I would do. Wish I had a better education. Other than that I wouldn't change anything.
AHERN: Do you miss the old Fallon of your younger days, would you say?
MAUPIN: Um, not really. I think Fallon is progressed into a nice place to live. We have about everything anyone could want here. Still close to Reno if you want more activity. So I never thought that we should stay where we were.
AHERN: Mrs. Maupin, on behalf of the Churchill County Museum I'd like to thank you for giving us time and allowing us to interview you. Thank you.
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