17. MAXINE

Donald M. Dickey: Yeah, they were working on the white footed mice on that.

17. MAXINE

Bob Zybach: Then on Camp Adair, when your family moved out, did you talk to any of the families in that neighborhood since that time, did you talk with Gerald McKibbon, or any of those families that stayed in the neighborhood around Camp Adair?

Donald M. Dickey: Which one, McKibbon?

Bob Zybach: Yeah.

Donald M. Dickey: Well, Maxine boarded at McKibbon's when she taught school at Airlie. So we'd see them at the Airlie-Lewisville picnic almost every year.

Bob Zybach: What did the families think about having Adair right next door during the war?

Donald M. Dickey: Well, they didn't seem to resent it that I know of.

Bob Zybach: So, when the families had to move out, they were kind of resigned to it, they weren't bitter or anything?

Donald M. Dickey: I never heard any saying that they resented it. I mean, there was a war going on. And the Japs were crowding the west coast. And we didn't want them.

Bob Zybach: So you were kind of doing your part in a lot of ways.

Donald M. Dickey: Yeah, we would just as soon grab the old 30-30 and sit up on a cliff and pick them off one at a time if we had a chance.

Bob Zybach: So, after the war was over, and you had an opportunity to buy your land back, did.

Donald M. Dickey: I apparently didn't. Mother probably could have, except she didn't want it. I went and asked about buying it and they said no, that the College had already put in for it. So maybe I couldn't, I don't know. Anyway, I would have liked to have the place back, we had it in pretty good shape. It wasn't the best land in the country but it produced pretty good pasture and it had some possibilities out there. One thing, there was good deer hunting out there. And good fishing. On that little creek. If they'd said I could have it for $5,000 I'd have tried to come up with it. I don't know .

Donald M. Dickey: one of the people out there, Gil Innis, didn't sell his property, at least this is what I understand, he kept it and leased it to them. So when they were through with it why he just went back to farming it.

Bob Zybach: You liked that land then pretty much in that area?

Donald M. Dickey: Well, it's not the best land in the country, but it was not the worst either.

Bob Zybach: Were those pretty enjoyable years, the years you lived on Berry Creek?

Donald M. Dickey: I enjoyed them. We had a $210 payment that was due on the place every fall. That was sometimes a worry. And then the taxes was $47 dollars or something like that. And we were getting the place paid for and, oh, we had a good herd of cows, milk, cream, wasn't too bad, and dad raised hogs on the skimmed milk and sold them, except one or two we butchered for ourselves. Mother raised turkeys a year or two. All in all we had a good time up there, I mean it was a rough time all over the country, but the neighbors were all in the same shape we were, and we visited and shared things together like apples that we had that they didn't have. Hunted and fished together, and all in all I'd say it was one of the better times I enjoyed my whole life before I was married.

Maxine Dickey: Thank you for adding that.

Bob Zybach: How did you meet your wife?

Donald M. Dickey: She made a mistake and came down from Portland to teach school at Berry Creek.

Bob Zybach: Do you remember what year?

Donald M. Dickey: 1938.

Bob Zybach: And do you remember when you first met?

Donald M. Dickey: Oh, not too long after she got there. But we didn't do anything about it till the next spring, she came up one night and my mother was cool towards her I think. She came up one night to get something, and I came in from work and she was standing there talking to mother. And she said "Well, I guess I better get going." As I recall, mother invited her to stay for dinner. And I said, "If you want to stay for dinner, I'll take you home afterwards." So I took her home down to Tandy's after we got through with dinner, and when she went back to Portland I didn't know whether she was going to be interested in me or not after that spring. The first thing I knew, I was baching, bucking logs over toward Monmouth. First thing I know here come in the mail a cookbook, how to cook. So she hooked me.

Maxine Dickey: He says he couldn't run fast enough to get away. That's not the way I did it. I have to tell you the story, because he tricked me. When he asked me to marry him, I said "Well, I won't marry you if you're going to be a farmer, because I don't want to live on a farm, I was not raised on a farm, I'm not a farm girl, I don't know how to be a farmer's wife and I don't want to."

Donald M. Dickey: Girl ought to know better than to believe you hadn't she?

Maxine Dickey: And he said, "Oh, i'm not going to be a farmer. No, I'm not gonna be a farmer." Well, we've got a 10 acre farm now. You know, he tricked me.

Donald M. Dickey: But she's still with me. We've been married for 48 years.

Bob Zybach: 48 years.

Donald M. Dickey: Almost 49.

Maxine Dickey: We have three good kids. This one's our middle one. She lives across the mountains at Madras, and her husband is a doctor for the Indians on the Warm Springs Indian Reservation. And that's her oldest son, and then she has a little one besides, who is 8 years old, and is staying with his cousin. And then our oldest daughter lives here, and she's 45 now, is Diane gonna be 45 this year?

Donald M. Dickey: Diane? Yeah, she'll be 45.

Maxine Dickey: Yeah, she was born in '45, so she's gonna be 45 in '90. And that one is 41, I guess, and then the other son, Jim is 38, this last week.

Bob Zybach: In your life, what do you think has been the best part of your life?

Donald M. Dickey: Best part of my life?

Bob Zybach: Yeah.

Donald M. Dickey: The last 48 years.

Bob Zybach: Sounds like good politics and an honest answer, both.

Donald M. Dickey: Well, we've got three wonderful kids and some great grandkids and we're real proud of them. Eric earned $3,000 to go to the scout jamboree back in Virginia last summer. And .

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