13. Grandma Carter

Bob Zybach: other elders?

Velma Carter Rawie: I don't know. I don't know.

Bob Zybach: Did you ever hear of the Applegate Trail when you were growing up?

Velma Carter Rawie: No, and I didn't . . . I learned a lot more about history since I have gotten older but I

(End of tape 2, side 2)

13. Grandma Carter

Bob Zybach: We were just talking about histoiy. I was wonderin& you say as you got older you got more interested in history, what do you think history is good for?

Velma Carter Rawie: Well, I don't know quite how to answer that other than I think that the reason that I have become more interested in.. . When you are a kid you're not interested in it, there are other things. Then, as you get older and you have kids of your own and you start to tell them something and you have to stop and think all of a sudden; how did that happen or when did that happen? I think the older I get the more interested I am getting.

Bob Zybach: You've been real helpful with this project and with pictures and eveiythin what is the value you see in helping projects out like this?

Velma Carter Rawie: Well, I think that other people are interested and I think that. . . I am proud of my heritage and I'm proud of the country that I live in and I'm proud of the state of Oregon and whatnot and I'd just like to pass it on to people.

Bob Zybach: So you know that people are interested and you'd like to share it?

Velma Carter Rawie: Yeah, and as I say, I am proud of what my family did to help settle Oregon. I'm proud to be an Oregonian, part of the community, and I think it's just nice to pass it on for other people to know about.

Bob Zybach: So, part of it is providing entertainment for other people and part of it's preselving our heritage?

Velma Carter Rawie: That's right. Uh huh.

Bob Zybach: Other than Hamen Lewis, where you aware of any other people who came across the Oregon Trail?.. . and Grandma Carter of course.

Velma Carter Rawie: Well, of course. Well, basically not really. When I lived out there all of the

Velma Carter Rawie: people up there were related basically. Not really but, Grandma Carter... Everybody knew Grandma Carter she was the...

Bob Zybach: was the focal point of the community?

Velma Carter Rawie: Well yeah, because of her age. She lived so long. Now she really wasn't part of the Wells community because she lived farther away up closer to Palestine. She was known all over the state of Oregon because of her age.

Bob Zybach: And it was stiictly because of her age?

Velma Carter Rawie: Yeah.

Bob Zybach: So she was like one of the oldest people in the state?

Velma Carter Rawie: Yeah, and the older she got the more people that came from all over the country to interview her and to talk. She loved every minute of it!

Bob Zybach: Oh, she liked the attention?

Velma Carter Rawie: Oh yes!

Bob Zybach: Would people in the community see her about other things? Would they go visit her just to.

Velma Carter Rawie: A lot of people went to visit her just because she was a novelty, I mean, because of her age she was different. She had seen a lot. People loved to talk to her and she loved to visit.

Bob Zybach: Was she kind of a character or more matronly or something?

Velma Carter Rawie: She was a lady. She had a wonderful memory and she could tell.. . As I say, when I was a kid and went to see her, I took her for granted. She was just Grandma Carter!

Bob Zybach: Did you like having a famous grandmother?

Velma Carter Rawie: I didn't realize that she was famous when I was a kid. The older I got. . . What's the old saying? . . . I said it about my mother. . . the older I got the smarter my mother got. I mean, it was me that got smarter but that was the same way with Grandma Carter, the older I got the more I realized what a remarkable person she was, but when you are around someone like that, you take them for granted. She was your grandma and...

Bob Zybach: What do you think when you see anicles about her in the paper?

Velma Carter Rawie: Oh, I was thrilled to death. That's what I was hunting for, a scrapbook that has

Velma Carter Rawie: all of these articles about her, about a lot of things. It's in my dad's trunk in there but I just couldn't find it in a huriy. I think now why I'm getting more interested. . . my oldest granddaughter graduates from Crescent Valley High school this year and is going on to college . . . she's going on up to Missoula, Montana [University of Montana at Missoula] if fact, she and her dad are up there now. . . and she is going to major in history. She loves it! Half of her projects in High schools have been writing on family stuff. on her family histoiy? And she is' only in High school? Uh huh, and she just loves it. Now she has a computer of her own and she is putting all of her stuff on her computer.

Bob Zybach: Good for her. Why is she not going to Oregon State?

Velma Carter Rawie: Well, she wanted to go away to school and that is fine. I think that that is good for her and she's a student. Her folks don't have any problems about her going away to school. She's a good student. She could be a lot better student if she she loves to read but she doesn't always read .. . she likes to read novels and stuff like that as well as other things. You could never punish Tonya5 [Tonya Michelle Rawie] by sending her to her room because on her way she'd grab a book and she'd stay there all day!

Bob Zybach: [Laughter]

Velma Carter Rawie: She was tickled to death.

Bob Zybach: It sounds like you have a family historian that you are raising.

Velma Carter Rawie: Yeah, she's really interested. In fact, after I got this letter from this lady that I told you about, you know, the one that called and wanted to know if I was the one that. . . each one of my sons had gotten the same letter. She had gone through the phone directory apparently, and had written to all of the Rawies. But immediately, Tonya had gone out to the cemetery and had taken pictures of all of the tombstones with the Carter names on them and sent them to her.

Bob Zybach: A/i, good

Velma Carter Rawie: That's a picture of us [Pointing to a family photograph]. They wanted their picture taken with their grandmother so we had our picture taken.

5 Tonya's sister is Traci Melinda Rawie.

Bob Zybach: Is she the one to the left?

Velma Carter Rawie: Yeah.