Peg Wheat and Marguerite Coverston Oral Histories
Dublin Core
Title
Peg Wheat and Marguerite Coverston Oral Histories
Description
Peg Wheat and Marguerite Coverston Oral Histories
Creator
Churchill County Museum Association
Publisher
Churchill County Museum Association
Date
May 23, 1984; sometime after 1984
Language
English
Oral History Item Type Metadata
Original Format
Audio Cassette
Duration
27:28
Transcription
Churchill County Oral History Project
an interview with Peg Wheat and Marguerite Coverston
Fallon, Nevada
conducted by Sharon Taylor and Shane (last name unknown).
This interview was transcribed by Marilyn A. Goble.
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.
Q1: Ah! It’s working! This is May 23, 1984. No. Marguerite tell me about this display here. What’s that little yellow glass cart?
Marguerite Coverston: This little yellow glass cart is what I thought was a little candy dish and it has been around for well ever since I was a little girl. But um we found out later that it is not a candy dish but it is a Vaseline glass salt dish and it is probably 70 years old.
Q1: That was a salt dish to put at each persons place with a little bit of salt?
MC: Yes. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Yes. I had thought that it was for candy because I remembered that candy came in oh…little two kind of glass containers of different kinds. So I had always thought it was a candy dish until I found out that it was for individual salt dishes.
Q1: This belonged to you personally then and you brought it into the museum to add to a display.
MC: Yes. Yes, I brought it in. We were looking for old things and I thought “Well it’s awfully small but it’s old so we will just take it in.”
Q1: Well tell me about it. It has, it has quite an interesting history. Tell me about that.
MC: Well, um…my grandparents raised me and um this was in our um…I had this when…um…I lived in Colorado near Linville Colorado which is an old gold mining town in Colorado and uh, we moved from there when I was 12 years old.
Q1: Well tell me about what happened to after it came to the museum.
MC: Well we had it here at the museum and had it on display and one day in the process of doing a bit of dusting and one thing or another um…I noticed that it was gone from the place where we had originally placed it. So um…Mrs. Drumm and I started looking around to see if we could find it but there was no sign of it anyplace that we looked. So we just figured somebody had put it in their pocket and walked off with it.
Q1: The display cases at this time were not locked. Is that right?
MC: Well this…There were locked cases but this happened to be um on an outside shelf of the sort of a bookcase desk thing and we just had it sitting there as a decoration. Breaks the plainness of the desk.
Q1: Mm-hm. Well it disappeared but now we have it back in here. What…how did that happen?
MC: Well um…it was probably four…at least four years later. One day when… I was…when Jess Brown was here and he was away on vacation and I was to take care of the mail and one thing and another. So went to the mailbox and picked up the mail and here was this little tiny box in the mail. So I brought it in and put it on the desk. Took care of the other and I debated whether to open it or whether not to open it. Finally, I decided that I wouldn’t open it so I went back to the work that I was doing but I kept being drawn back to the office to that little box and after making about 3 trips back to the office to look at the box. I finally decided to open it. When I opened the box and pulled back the padding in the box, I thought it was the little salt dish but I didn’t see how it could be and it kind of…kind of startled I guess. So I closed the box up, wrapped it all back up and um went back to my work and then made another trip back and decided that maybe I’d have nerve enough to take it out. And so I did remove it from the box and it was wrapped so nothing could possibly…could have fallen off of uh 50 foot building and I don’t think it would’ve broken. It was wrapped so well. But I still… was a little…had a little funny feeling over the deal because uh…wondered if something was the matter with me if I was dreaming or having some kind of uh nightmare because upon looking at it, I decided it was the little salt dish was returned to the museum.
Q1: Where…do you know where this was mailed from?
MC: Well um…I still have the box. The address on the box and we are I guess fortunate we got it. It says County Museum Fallon Nevada. No zip code, nothing. Let’s see, there is a name on it. But I can’t quite figure out whether the name is E. Hyde or Ed Hyde or whatever and it’s from Boron California and I think that is a Army Station but I’m not sure about that.
Q1: It is.
MC: And um…there is a date 12/05 on it but I don’t know what that means and it has 50cents in…50cents worth of postage, 10cent stamps on the box. So I…
Second Interview Taped Over the First (6:56.0-)
Q2: Oh it talks about that Dr. Fosdick here too.
Shane: This is…Well like I say [?]Shane and Sharon…Taylor speaking with Peg Wheat on…what is today?
Sharon Taylor: March 18th.
Shane: No, it’s not. It’s May 18th, 1984 at the Churchill County Museum.
ST: You asked me. (laughing). I would have thought it was March.
Shane: Oh that’s nice.
Peg Wheat: These are all pictures of the 1985…
Shane: Hm. Taken by whom? Do you know? Your father?
PW: More likely my uncle, Herbert Moran. Help yourself to anything I’ve laid out. This is…is my…
Shane: Water really gushed through it didn’t it?
PW: Yeah.
ST: Yeah, it did.
Shane: And I thought the head trouble last year.
ST: Right. When did you start taking pictures Peggy? Do you remember?
PW: No. No I don’t remember when it was.
ST: Do you know who it was that taught you how to take pictures?
PW: I don’t think that…I don’t think I thought then that there was any requirement.
Shane: It just happened. (laughing)
PW: Yeah. I just was the person who always had a camera. Uh, these are ones that I will want to keep but you can look at them.
Shane: Sure.
ST: Certainly. Yeah, these are Montana here.
PW: Are those Montana?
ST: Yeah, this is Youngs River Montana.
PW: Well I don’t know how I’d ever gotten any Montana pictures. Now what are these?
ST: Those are those 2 newspaper articles, magazine articles.
PW: Oh the…There wasn’t anything you want in there?
ST: No.
Shane: Somebody open their [?-unintelligible]
PW: Let’s see…yeah.
Shane: It’s part of the Newlands Project thing maybe?
PW: What?
Shane: The house building was going on. Or was it like a family thing?
PW: Raise it a bit. This is a cute.
ST: Oh yeah.
PW: You know what it is don’t ya?
ST: Down Maine Street. Isn’t that the courthouse?
PW: That’s the building that they just made over into a drug store or something.
ST: Mm-hm…uh look what…
Shane: Hm.
ST: Somebody having dinner
Shane: Yeah that’s great.
ST: Mm-hm. That’s how they used to do surveying in the old days, load them up on a mule.
Shane: More of the ’08 flood I guess huh.
PW: Yeah.
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: This is your aunt Kat[?]
Shane: Hm.
PW: That’s mine.
Shane: That’s the same of this one here.
PW: Yeah, that’s mine.
Shane: But do you know what’s happening there? With that particular party? You were really young.
PW: Oh I was married and had a couple of kids.
Shane: Yeah, you’re still real young lady there.
PW: Um…I don’t know exactly what…what trip out there that was.
Shane: Uh-huh
PW: Now let’s see what is…
Shane: These are all things that you’re going to keep.
PW: And is there anything in there that you want?
Shane: No I guess not.
ST: No, you’ve already put these over here. I’m gonna have…before we go I’ll have you look through them again to make sure that there…
Shane: Yeah.
ST: You know the ones that you don’t want for sure.
PW: Alright.
ST: Cause we don’t want to take anything or if you have somebody else…if maybe the University wants some things to go to the University anything you want we’ll take care of it for you.
Shane: I don’t know if there is anything in there.
PW: Uh….
Shane: No, these are both empty. Certificate of recognition.
PW: 77
ST: Oh that’s your Wheat coat of arms.
PW: Huh?
ST: This the coat of arm for Wheat.
PW: Oh yeah.
ST: Yeah.
Shane: Tonopah in 19…
PW: Read that.
Shane: This must be the envelope for it from Tonopah 1963
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: Lay it out
Shane: Kay.
PW: Lay it out a little bit cause I…
Shane: Oh okay.
PW: (Phone Ringing) Churchill County Museum…Yes she is.
ST: That’s kind of interesting. Tintype.
PW: Of who.
ST: Let’s see.
Shane: Sharon again…
ST: Would you help Peggy read that letter? It’s real fine.
Shane: But I don’t know what it’s…what it’s…You read it (laughing)
ST: Canned pudding is working here. I have received my darling photograph yet and so expect it Monday…well…well Frans came…Fran came
PW: Yes.
ST: And we had won a glorious political victory. In old… Pennsylvania, I guess that’s what the abbreviation for it is…The democrats feel very sore over their defeat while the Republicans are jubilant. It is a rainy day and I have… enjoyed it…
Shane: Sleeping wish that I could be with my darling today. Won’t that be a happy day when I have you all to myself and only death shall part us. It’s hard to be parted to be parted now, but the meeting is so pleasant that it hardly pays us for the pain of parting. Well darling I close hoping to hear from you tomorrow. It starts, “My Darling Girl, wish that I were with my dear girl as I had last…I was last Sunday but as that can’t be I will write to her. Olive is well satisfied with changing has and while she should be, for she has got a very pleasant home now. If she don’t kill herself by overdoing, she will get along good. Anne Gooding is working here. I’ve received my darlings photograph yet shall expect…I have not received my darlings photograph yet shall expect it Monday.” So maybe that could be the darling.
ST: Mm-hm.
Shane: “Well Francine we have a glorious practical victory in Old Pennsylvania”
ST: Oh that’s just…
Shane: That’s the…
ST: All it is, is the translation of the letter…
Shane: This is the translation of the letter…
ST: Into readable English.
Shane: True.
ST: So this is the photograph?
Shane: First Oliphant?
PW: Yeah, probably.
Shane: Oliphant or is it “ant”.
PW: Is it a place?
Shane: Yeah.
PW: Not a person.
Shane: Oliphant. No, it’s…it’s the postmark.
PW: I don’t know…I don’t know that.
Shane: October 13th, 1872. Who is Francine…
PW: Roe?
Shane: No, Moran
PW: She was my…oh let’s see…she was related like a great-aunt or something.
Shane: Oh okay.
PW: I knew her pretty well.
Shane: Well this…this letter is written to her.
PW: Oh.
Shane: So who would her husband have been? And that’s probably who this…
PW: I didn’t think she was ever married.
Shane: Well this is obviously her boyfriend.
ST: He didn’t make it back from the war.
Shane: That’s…
ST: Or the political war.
Shane: That’s beautiful. I’ve never seen one actually done up to anyone.
ST: Well it’s a tintype. Yeah. I had one in our collection.
Shane: That is really super. And it’s painted the flowers, and his bowtie and his cheeks.
ST: (Laughing).
PW: That’s it. I didn’t know something about… anything about that.
ST: Hm. That paper is in astoundingly good condition
PW: It’s 100%
ST: Yeah, 100% rag it will last longer than stuff being printed now.
Shane: Than that stuff that’s on the…in the envelope with it.
ST: Oh yeah. Oh I’m…find a few crumbs with that.
Shane: Well the tintype is absolutely beautiful, I love it. And I love your mother and father, I think that’s great…I mean I love those cars.
ST: This is a strange looking cantaloupe…tasted bland.
PW: Well, it was… Is this what you read?
ST: No, it was…we put it back in the envelope.
Shane: I put it back in the envelope.
PW: You don’t want this do you?
ST: That would be something for the family, I think…
PW: Yes.
ST: Maybe for your daughter.
PW: This added to it.
ST: Someday she may want to do family history.
PW: Oh, she does…just awful busy right now.
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: This…now…let’s see, that just came, I’m always [?]
Shane: Yeah, those aren’t artifacts. I don’t know what this is here.
PW: That is stuff that I want you to read.
Shane: Oh, okay.
PW: I really hope…what’s that?
Shane: This is um… Willis A.A… Marine uh, uh death notice. Is that your father?
PW: No. I don’t know who this is. Related obviously.
ST: Yeah, let’s see if there is anything here. From Denver! He came from Denver in 1880.
Shane: This looks like the starting of a family tree. It’s got a lot of dates and how many kids each particular person had and all that sort of stuff.
PW: I’ll keep it…
Shane: Again that would probably be good for your daughter.
ST: Yeah, it’s a genealogy.
Shane: And I have no idea what that is. But it is very strange.
PW: I think my name is on that.
Shane: Yes it is as matter of fact.
ST: You have vacation sheet for Journey to Oblivion.
Shane: Yes I read that. Strange.
ST: It’s got to be a photograph. No? Maybe it’s an index of what’s there.
Shane: Okay and this, this Peggy is…this is the scratch paper for this.
PW: Do we put it together?
Shane: Yeah. I would, I would think that it all goes together.
PW: All this is stuff for…
ST: Mm-hm. My great-uncle just sent me a picture of his grandmother and his great-grandmother. And he is 78 now.
PW: Oh boy.
ST: Yeah, well they were really nice. I copied them and sent ‘em back.
Shane: I think that has to do with this too. It has the same names in them.
ST: That’s uh…It’s like uh, it’s like uh…okay we’re good. Oh god, this recorded in master file, there somebody else’s…
Shane: Let’s figure out where these go.
PW: Let’s put them in…
Shane: In a separate file.
PW: Yeah.
Shane: Here let me do it.
PW: Anything that has it..
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: Oh this is…
ST: Genealogy mainly.
PW: Yeah.
ST: Family history.
PW: We’re in genealogy
ST: Mm-hm. I need to get some acid free folders that size. Okay. (Phone rings) It probably saved everybody time if I just got it for now on. Maybe it’s for you this time.
Shane: Okay, you want me to put genealogy under it?
PW: All this is genealogy.
Shane: Oh okay.
PW: How many you know?
ST: Ohhh. It’s Friday. (laughing)
Shane: It must be.
ST: Yeah and that’s your…family picture. That goes with genealogy.
3rd Person in Background: Yes, yes…
ST: Let’s see that real quick.
PW: Yeah.
ST: It looks like it is uh…more family stuff.
PW: Yeah.
ST: The Repp and Radle families. R-E-P-P and R-A-D-L-E, and there is some obituary.
PW: This is a nice little bunch of…five or six papers. There…genealogy is back that far.
ST: Hm. Well that’s something.
PW: I remember this one quite well. I had forgotten about…forgotten he enlisted though.
ST: Yes this is genealogy too. I think almost everything in there is, is that.
PW: Everything that’s left, yes.
ST: Yeah, is in that folder is family history.
PW: There’s all Wheat…well…
ST: You might just keep everything in there, let’s just put a label on it.
PW: Yeah.
ST: It’s all genealogy, do you want to keep it in this folder or you wanna put it in a…
PW: What…what’s this stuff?
ST: Well, this is the stuff that you…you put over here for us to keep later.
PW: Oh right.
ST: Photographs and things. I could put this in here.
PW: Yeah, right.
ST: I can put this in here and then we can…let’s label it genealogy and just put it…
PW: No.
ST: Do you want to keep it in there?
PW: I don’t care.
ST: Help. There we go and that’s the old time. That’s it, okay. Somebody must have just kept the old magazines.
PW: There’s no reason to keep them. Hm…
Shane: Yeah, so see what I mean.
ST: Recipes.
Shane: Alright, alright well…take it easy.
PW: Well, you keep one of these thing and I’ll keep the other one and we’ll ____[?] until later on.
ST: Or you might just keep them together and then later maybe your daughter will look through them and maybe there is a genealogy section in there.
PW: You don’t keep odd magazines.
ST: No, not usually. Cause…you see if this was an old magazine but see this was 1974.
PW: ’74?!
ST: Yeah, it’s a reprint. That’s why I was looking to see if there was something in here about your family.
PW: Yeah.
ST: Might be something in here.
PW: I didn’t even know I had this stuff out in ’74.
ST: Is that letter of reference.
PW: I don’t know. (page rustle) ’75.
ST: Okay, that one looks like it goes back here and put those two away.
PW: What’s that?
ST: Just says from Nellie Decker.
PW: Oh, that’s her address put it in there. Think I know…
3rd Person: (Laughing in the background) Like clockwork. Alrighty, well give me a…
PW: This is Pennsylvania, this time.
ST: Hm…up here. Maybe that would go in your genealogy, isn’t that family. Family reunion?
PW: Kind of…
3rd Person: Alright.
PW: That’s Repp side reunion.
ST: Yeah!
PW: I think I’m in this picture I’m not sure.
ST: But the bottom file is a geology file set up. It’s already in with genealogy.
PW: Oh.
ST: This is ready for you.
Shane: Tuck in the box? This is ready to tuck away too?
ST: Yeah.
PW: Kings, kings cause of…[?] I think this…
ST: Pennsylvania loves bats.
PW: Just put the whole thing over, huh.
Shane: Okay.
PW: You can look at it, through it if you want to. Since it…
Shane: No. Is that where the family is from Peg? Is Pennsylvania?
PW: No, when we left Fallon we went back to Pennsylvania and uh…I had to set up a business back there and this is all Pennsylvania. Digging through that whole…whole thing.
Shane: It’s going to be a real pleasure to some family someday. Isn’t it?
ST: Mm-hm.
Shane: And there they are all listed.
ST: Names, yeah. Mm-hm yeah.
Shane: Real people. Okay, your booking right through these things today.
ST: Going through a box a day, you’ll get all your work done around here.
Shane: (laughing)
PW: Yeah.
Shane: Does this go someplace in particular?
PW: This sits inside here now.
Shane: Oh okay, okay.
PW: Alright…
ST: Well that’s…just bouncing or talking.[?]
PW: This will go faster if you open them up and let me look at them.
Shane: Oh that’s pretty.
ST: Mm-hm.
Shane: Mary, daughter of Yirth something…and here’s his son.
ST: Mm-hm. Yeah, that, that would almost all those would go in a genealogy but you already have it as miscellaneous.
PW: Yeah these are just large pictures.
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: It’s the son…
Shane: There’s Charlie and family.
ST: Debit or DeWitt?
PW: DeWitt, we’re in I think.
Shane: Yeah DeWitt.
ST: Mm-hm. He’s a good looking man. [looking at photos]
Shane: Died in 1926. Born in 1900, was really young.
ST: Mm-hm. [looking a photos] Handsome man.
Shane: Ronnie Baxter, 1877. [?—Unintelligible] It’s just amazing to me that they put all this information down. (chuckle)
ST: I know.
Shane: NOBODY does that.
ST: It’s nice to see that though. When she goes to do her genealogy, she’ll know who’s who.
Shane: That’s true.
ST: Looks like registering to go to uh…these look like cards for registering class…computer cards.
Shane: That’s exactly what they are. (Yawn) It’s computer cards but they’ve got genealogy on them. So we’re talking more genealogy.
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: And this was my cousin who was killed in Italy in the first World War
an interview with Peg Wheat and Marguerite Coverston
Fallon, Nevada
conducted by Sharon Taylor and Shane (last name unknown).
This interview was transcribed by Marilyn A. Goble.
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.
Q1: Ah! It’s working! This is May 23, 1984. No. Marguerite tell me about this display here. What’s that little yellow glass cart?
Marguerite Coverston: This little yellow glass cart is what I thought was a little candy dish and it has been around for well ever since I was a little girl. But um we found out later that it is not a candy dish but it is a Vaseline glass salt dish and it is probably 70 years old.
Q1: That was a salt dish to put at each persons place with a little bit of salt?
MC: Yes. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Yes. I had thought that it was for candy because I remembered that candy came in oh…little two kind of glass containers of different kinds. So I had always thought it was a candy dish until I found out that it was for individual salt dishes.
Q1: This belonged to you personally then and you brought it into the museum to add to a display.
MC: Yes. Yes, I brought it in. We were looking for old things and I thought “Well it’s awfully small but it’s old so we will just take it in.”
Q1: Well tell me about it. It has, it has quite an interesting history. Tell me about that.
MC: Well, um…my grandparents raised me and um this was in our um…I had this when…um…I lived in Colorado near Linville Colorado which is an old gold mining town in Colorado and uh, we moved from there when I was 12 years old.
Q1: Well tell me about what happened to after it came to the museum.
MC: Well we had it here at the museum and had it on display and one day in the process of doing a bit of dusting and one thing or another um…I noticed that it was gone from the place where we had originally placed it. So um…Mrs. Drumm and I started looking around to see if we could find it but there was no sign of it anyplace that we looked. So we just figured somebody had put it in their pocket and walked off with it.
Q1: The display cases at this time were not locked. Is that right?
MC: Well this…There were locked cases but this happened to be um on an outside shelf of the sort of a bookcase desk thing and we just had it sitting there as a decoration. Breaks the plainness of the desk.
Q1: Mm-hm. Well it disappeared but now we have it back in here. What…how did that happen?
MC: Well um…it was probably four…at least four years later. One day when… I was…when Jess Brown was here and he was away on vacation and I was to take care of the mail and one thing and another. So went to the mailbox and picked up the mail and here was this little tiny box in the mail. So I brought it in and put it on the desk. Took care of the other and I debated whether to open it or whether not to open it. Finally, I decided that I wouldn’t open it so I went back to the work that I was doing but I kept being drawn back to the office to that little box and after making about 3 trips back to the office to look at the box. I finally decided to open it. When I opened the box and pulled back the padding in the box, I thought it was the little salt dish but I didn’t see how it could be and it kind of…kind of startled I guess. So I closed the box up, wrapped it all back up and um went back to my work and then made another trip back and decided that maybe I’d have nerve enough to take it out. And so I did remove it from the box and it was wrapped so nothing could possibly…could have fallen off of uh 50 foot building and I don’t think it would’ve broken. It was wrapped so well. But I still… was a little…had a little funny feeling over the deal because uh…wondered if something was the matter with me if I was dreaming or having some kind of uh nightmare because upon looking at it, I decided it was the little salt dish was returned to the museum.
Q1: Where…do you know where this was mailed from?
MC: Well um…I still have the box. The address on the box and we are I guess fortunate we got it. It says County Museum Fallon Nevada. No zip code, nothing. Let’s see, there is a name on it. But I can’t quite figure out whether the name is E. Hyde or Ed Hyde or whatever and it’s from Boron California and I think that is a Army Station but I’m not sure about that.
Q1: It is.
MC: And um…there is a date 12/05 on it but I don’t know what that means and it has 50cents in…50cents worth of postage, 10cent stamps on the box. So I…
Second Interview Taped Over the First (6:56.0-)
Q2: Oh it talks about that Dr. Fosdick here too.
Shane: This is…Well like I say [?]Shane and Sharon…Taylor speaking with Peg Wheat on…what is today?
Sharon Taylor: March 18th.
Shane: No, it’s not. It’s May 18th, 1984 at the Churchill County Museum.
ST: You asked me. (laughing). I would have thought it was March.
Shane: Oh that’s nice.
Peg Wheat: These are all pictures of the 1985…
Shane: Hm. Taken by whom? Do you know? Your father?
PW: More likely my uncle, Herbert Moran. Help yourself to anything I’ve laid out. This is…is my…
Shane: Water really gushed through it didn’t it?
PW: Yeah.
ST: Yeah, it did.
Shane: And I thought the head trouble last year.
ST: Right. When did you start taking pictures Peggy? Do you remember?
PW: No. No I don’t remember when it was.
ST: Do you know who it was that taught you how to take pictures?
PW: I don’t think that…I don’t think I thought then that there was any requirement.
Shane: It just happened. (laughing)
PW: Yeah. I just was the person who always had a camera. Uh, these are ones that I will want to keep but you can look at them.
Shane: Sure.
ST: Certainly. Yeah, these are Montana here.
PW: Are those Montana?
ST: Yeah, this is Youngs River Montana.
PW: Well I don’t know how I’d ever gotten any Montana pictures. Now what are these?
ST: Those are those 2 newspaper articles, magazine articles.
PW: Oh the…There wasn’t anything you want in there?
ST: No.
Shane: Somebody open their [?-unintelligible]
PW: Let’s see…yeah.
Shane: It’s part of the Newlands Project thing maybe?
PW: What?
Shane: The house building was going on. Or was it like a family thing?
PW: Raise it a bit. This is a cute.
ST: Oh yeah.
PW: You know what it is don’t ya?
ST: Down Maine Street. Isn’t that the courthouse?
PW: That’s the building that they just made over into a drug store or something.
ST: Mm-hm…uh look what…
Shane: Hm.
ST: Somebody having dinner
Shane: Yeah that’s great.
ST: Mm-hm. That’s how they used to do surveying in the old days, load them up on a mule.
Shane: More of the ’08 flood I guess huh.
PW: Yeah.
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: This is your aunt Kat[?]
Shane: Hm.
PW: That’s mine.
Shane: That’s the same of this one here.
PW: Yeah, that’s mine.
Shane: But do you know what’s happening there? With that particular party? You were really young.
PW: Oh I was married and had a couple of kids.
Shane: Yeah, you’re still real young lady there.
PW: Um…I don’t know exactly what…what trip out there that was.
Shane: Uh-huh
PW: Now let’s see what is…
Shane: These are all things that you’re going to keep.
PW: And is there anything in there that you want?
Shane: No I guess not.
ST: No, you’ve already put these over here. I’m gonna have…before we go I’ll have you look through them again to make sure that there…
Shane: Yeah.
ST: You know the ones that you don’t want for sure.
PW: Alright.
ST: Cause we don’t want to take anything or if you have somebody else…if maybe the University wants some things to go to the University anything you want we’ll take care of it for you.
Shane: I don’t know if there is anything in there.
PW: Uh….
Shane: No, these are both empty. Certificate of recognition.
PW: 77
ST: Oh that’s your Wheat coat of arms.
PW: Huh?
ST: This the coat of arm for Wheat.
PW: Oh yeah.
ST: Yeah.
Shane: Tonopah in 19…
PW: Read that.
Shane: This must be the envelope for it from Tonopah 1963
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: Lay it out
Shane: Kay.
PW: Lay it out a little bit cause I…
Shane: Oh okay.
PW: (Phone Ringing) Churchill County Museum…Yes she is.
ST: That’s kind of interesting. Tintype.
PW: Of who.
ST: Let’s see.
Shane: Sharon again…
ST: Would you help Peggy read that letter? It’s real fine.
Shane: But I don’t know what it’s…what it’s…You read it (laughing)
ST: Canned pudding is working here. I have received my darling photograph yet and so expect it Monday…well…well Frans came…Fran came
PW: Yes.
ST: And we had won a glorious political victory. In old… Pennsylvania, I guess that’s what the abbreviation for it is…The democrats feel very sore over their defeat while the Republicans are jubilant. It is a rainy day and I have… enjoyed it…
Shane: Sleeping wish that I could be with my darling today. Won’t that be a happy day when I have you all to myself and only death shall part us. It’s hard to be parted to be parted now, but the meeting is so pleasant that it hardly pays us for the pain of parting. Well darling I close hoping to hear from you tomorrow. It starts, “My Darling Girl, wish that I were with my dear girl as I had last…I was last Sunday but as that can’t be I will write to her. Olive is well satisfied with changing has and while she should be, for she has got a very pleasant home now. If she don’t kill herself by overdoing, she will get along good. Anne Gooding is working here. I’ve received my darlings photograph yet shall expect…I have not received my darlings photograph yet shall expect it Monday.” So maybe that could be the darling.
ST: Mm-hm.
Shane: “Well Francine we have a glorious practical victory in Old Pennsylvania”
ST: Oh that’s just…
Shane: That’s the…
ST: All it is, is the translation of the letter…
Shane: This is the translation of the letter…
ST: Into readable English.
Shane: True.
ST: So this is the photograph?
Shane: First Oliphant?
PW: Yeah, probably.
Shane: Oliphant or is it “ant”.
PW: Is it a place?
Shane: Yeah.
PW: Not a person.
Shane: Oliphant. No, it’s…it’s the postmark.
PW: I don’t know…I don’t know that.
Shane: October 13th, 1872. Who is Francine…
PW: Roe?
Shane: No, Moran
PW: She was my…oh let’s see…she was related like a great-aunt or something.
Shane: Oh okay.
PW: I knew her pretty well.
Shane: Well this…this letter is written to her.
PW: Oh.
Shane: So who would her husband have been? And that’s probably who this…
PW: I didn’t think she was ever married.
Shane: Well this is obviously her boyfriend.
ST: He didn’t make it back from the war.
Shane: That’s…
ST: Or the political war.
Shane: That’s beautiful. I’ve never seen one actually done up to anyone.
ST: Well it’s a tintype. Yeah. I had one in our collection.
Shane: That is really super. And it’s painted the flowers, and his bowtie and his cheeks.
ST: (Laughing).
PW: That’s it. I didn’t know something about… anything about that.
ST: Hm. That paper is in astoundingly good condition
PW: It’s 100%
ST: Yeah, 100% rag it will last longer than stuff being printed now.
Shane: Than that stuff that’s on the…in the envelope with it.
ST: Oh yeah. Oh I’m…find a few crumbs with that.
Shane: Well the tintype is absolutely beautiful, I love it. And I love your mother and father, I think that’s great…I mean I love those cars.
ST: This is a strange looking cantaloupe…tasted bland.
PW: Well, it was… Is this what you read?
ST: No, it was…we put it back in the envelope.
Shane: I put it back in the envelope.
PW: You don’t want this do you?
ST: That would be something for the family, I think…
PW: Yes.
ST: Maybe for your daughter.
PW: This added to it.
ST: Someday she may want to do family history.
PW: Oh, she does…just awful busy right now.
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: This…now…let’s see, that just came, I’m always [?]
Shane: Yeah, those aren’t artifacts. I don’t know what this is here.
PW: That is stuff that I want you to read.
Shane: Oh, okay.
PW: I really hope…what’s that?
Shane: This is um… Willis A.A… Marine uh, uh death notice. Is that your father?
PW: No. I don’t know who this is. Related obviously.
ST: Yeah, let’s see if there is anything here. From Denver! He came from Denver in 1880.
Shane: This looks like the starting of a family tree. It’s got a lot of dates and how many kids each particular person had and all that sort of stuff.
PW: I’ll keep it…
Shane: Again that would probably be good for your daughter.
ST: Yeah, it’s a genealogy.
Shane: And I have no idea what that is. But it is very strange.
PW: I think my name is on that.
Shane: Yes it is as matter of fact.
ST: You have vacation sheet for Journey to Oblivion.
Shane: Yes I read that. Strange.
ST: It’s got to be a photograph. No? Maybe it’s an index of what’s there.
Shane: Okay and this, this Peggy is…this is the scratch paper for this.
PW: Do we put it together?
Shane: Yeah. I would, I would think that it all goes together.
PW: All this is stuff for…
ST: Mm-hm. My great-uncle just sent me a picture of his grandmother and his great-grandmother. And he is 78 now.
PW: Oh boy.
ST: Yeah, well they were really nice. I copied them and sent ‘em back.
Shane: I think that has to do with this too. It has the same names in them.
ST: That’s uh…It’s like uh, it’s like uh…okay we’re good. Oh god, this recorded in master file, there somebody else’s…
Shane: Let’s figure out where these go.
PW: Let’s put them in…
Shane: In a separate file.
PW: Yeah.
Shane: Here let me do it.
PW: Anything that has it..
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: Oh this is…
ST: Genealogy mainly.
PW: Yeah.
ST: Family history.
PW: We’re in genealogy
ST: Mm-hm. I need to get some acid free folders that size. Okay. (Phone rings) It probably saved everybody time if I just got it for now on. Maybe it’s for you this time.
Shane: Okay, you want me to put genealogy under it?
PW: All this is genealogy.
Shane: Oh okay.
PW: How many you know?
ST: Ohhh. It’s Friday. (laughing)
Shane: It must be.
ST: Yeah and that’s your…family picture. That goes with genealogy.
3rd Person in Background: Yes, yes…
ST: Let’s see that real quick.
PW: Yeah.
ST: It looks like it is uh…more family stuff.
PW: Yeah.
ST: The Repp and Radle families. R-E-P-P and R-A-D-L-E, and there is some obituary.
PW: This is a nice little bunch of…five or six papers. There…genealogy is back that far.
ST: Hm. Well that’s something.
PW: I remember this one quite well. I had forgotten about…forgotten he enlisted though.
ST: Yes this is genealogy too. I think almost everything in there is, is that.
PW: Everything that’s left, yes.
ST: Yeah, is in that folder is family history.
PW: There’s all Wheat…well…
ST: You might just keep everything in there, let’s just put a label on it.
PW: Yeah.
ST: It’s all genealogy, do you want to keep it in this folder or you wanna put it in a…
PW: What…what’s this stuff?
ST: Well, this is the stuff that you…you put over here for us to keep later.
PW: Oh right.
ST: Photographs and things. I could put this in here.
PW: Yeah, right.
ST: I can put this in here and then we can…let’s label it genealogy and just put it…
PW: No.
ST: Do you want to keep it in there?
PW: I don’t care.
ST: Help. There we go and that’s the old time. That’s it, okay. Somebody must have just kept the old magazines.
PW: There’s no reason to keep them. Hm…
Shane: Yeah, so see what I mean.
ST: Recipes.
Shane: Alright, alright well…take it easy.
PW: Well, you keep one of these thing and I’ll keep the other one and we’ll ____[?] until later on.
ST: Or you might just keep them together and then later maybe your daughter will look through them and maybe there is a genealogy section in there.
PW: You don’t keep odd magazines.
ST: No, not usually. Cause…you see if this was an old magazine but see this was 1974.
PW: ’74?!
ST: Yeah, it’s a reprint. That’s why I was looking to see if there was something in here about your family.
PW: Yeah.
ST: Might be something in here.
PW: I didn’t even know I had this stuff out in ’74.
ST: Is that letter of reference.
PW: I don’t know. (page rustle) ’75.
ST: Okay, that one looks like it goes back here and put those two away.
PW: What’s that?
ST: Just says from Nellie Decker.
PW: Oh, that’s her address put it in there. Think I know…
3rd Person: (Laughing in the background) Like clockwork. Alrighty, well give me a…
PW: This is Pennsylvania, this time.
ST: Hm…up here. Maybe that would go in your genealogy, isn’t that family. Family reunion?
PW: Kind of…
3rd Person: Alright.
PW: That’s Repp side reunion.
ST: Yeah!
PW: I think I’m in this picture I’m not sure.
ST: But the bottom file is a geology file set up. It’s already in with genealogy.
PW: Oh.
ST: This is ready for you.
Shane: Tuck in the box? This is ready to tuck away too?
ST: Yeah.
PW: Kings, kings cause of…[?] I think this…
ST: Pennsylvania loves bats.
PW: Just put the whole thing over, huh.
Shane: Okay.
PW: You can look at it, through it if you want to. Since it…
Shane: No. Is that where the family is from Peg? Is Pennsylvania?
PW: No, when we left Fallon we went back to Pennsylvania and uh…I had to set up a business back there and this is all Pennsylvania. Digging through that whole…whole thing.
Shane: It’s going to be a real pleasure to some family someday. Isn’t it?
ST: Mm-hm.
Shane: And there they are all listed.
ST: Names, yeah. Mm-hm yeah.
Shane: Real people. Okay, your booking right through these things today.
ST: Going through a box a day, you’ll get all your work done around here.
Shane: (laughing)
PW: Yeah.
Shane: Does this go someplace in particular?
PW: This sits inside here now.
Shane: Oh okay, okay.
PW: Alright…
ST: Well that’s…just bouncing or talking.[?]
PW: This will go faster if you open them up and let me look at them.
Shane: Oh that’s pretty.
ST: Mm-hm.
Shane: Mary, daughter of Yirth something…and here’s his son.
ST: Mm-hm. Yeah, that, that would almost all those would go in a genealogy but you already have it as miscellaneous.
PW: Yeah these are just large pictures.
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: It’s the son…
Shane: There’s Charlie and family.
ST: Debit or DeWitt?
PW: DeWitt, we’re in I think.
Shane: Yeah DeWitt.
ST: Mm-hm. He’s a good looking man. [looking at photos]
Shane: Died in 1926. Born in 1900, was really young.
ST: Mm-hm. [looking a photos] Handsome man.
Shane: Ronnie Baxter, 1877. [?—Unintelligible] It’s just amazing to me that they put all this information down. (chuckle)
ST: I know.
Shane: NOBODY does that.
ST: It’s nice to see that though. When she goes to do her genealogy, she’ll know who’s who.
Shane: That’s true.
ST: Looks like registering to go to uh…these look like cards for registering class…computer cards.
Shane: That’s exactly what they are. (Yawn) It’s computer cards but they’ve got genealogy on them. So we’re talking more genealogy.
ST: Mm-hm.
PW: And this was my cousin who was killed in Italy in the first World War
Interviewer
Sharon Taylor and Shane (last name unknown).
Interviewee
Marguerite Coverston and Peg Wheat
Location
1050 S. Maine St, Fallon, NV
Files
Collection
Citation
Churchill County Museum Association, “Peg Wheat and Marguerite Coverston Oral Histories,” Churchill County Museum Digital Archive: Fallon, Nevada, accessed April 18, 2024, https://ccmuseum.omeka.net/items/show/707.
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