1.. Family History

Part I.

September 28, 1993 Interview

The following interview was conducted by Bob Zybach with Charles and Norman Hindes at 530 NW 15th, Corvallis, Oregon on September 28, 1993. Norman, Charles and Bob are looking at maps of Valley Mills before 1929.

1. Family History

Bob Zybach: I'd like to start first by talking about your family history and maybe going back to your grandparents or your great grandparents on either your mother or father's side and bringing them forward in time to figure out why you got to Soap Creek in the first place.

Norman Hindes: [NORMAN] Well, granddad, grandmother came out here (to Oregon) in early 1900. . . They settled near Brownsville out there in the rain and bought that wheat ranch.

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] More nearly Halsey.

Norman Hindes: [NORMAN] Halsey, yes.

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] They originated from a farm near Rockford, Illinois. I think they came out just shortly after the Lewis and Clark exposition in Portland around 1905 to 1907.

Norman Hindes: [NORMAN] And then we settled there on this big ranch and from there on, Chuck, you'll have to carry it on from there.

Bob Zybach: Do, do you remember you're grandfather's, name? In, Illinois?

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] Yes, I do, in fact I was showing Norman some things this morning where my grandfather, my paternal grandfather and maternal grandfather were involved in an oil well exploration near the LaComb area and I have the stock certificate with both of their names on it which predates my mother and father's marriage. Now I don't know whether their joint business venture had any bearing on mother and father getting together but it was dated in 1913 and it was about 1915 before my mother and father were married. But going back to my father's early history; he originated in Wisconsin and in fact, his mother, my grandmother, came from near Madison, Wisconsin. But, after marrying grandfather Hindes, they farmed near Rockford, Illinois. While I was in the service during World War II, I endeavored to look up some of the family in Illinois but was only able to find a couple of business ventures in the Hindes name. One, a florist business and I don't remember what the other one was in and near Rockford. But there was quite a large family, possibly six or seven brothers on my grandfather's side.

Bob Zybach: And then did his wife have children from her previous marriage?

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] I don't think so. I don't think there were any other children involved. I'm in the process of doing some genealogical work but I haven't gotten back that far on grandmother Hindes' side.

Bob Zybach: So, do you know anything about her family, her maiden name or where she came from?

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] No, I don't. My recollection is that she had the name of Johnson. Now, whether that was her married name or maiden name, I couldn't say. I'm in the process of doing some work on that. In fact, my youngest son is assisting with some

Charles Hindes: computerized information. To this point it has been primarily on my mother's side. And, this involved the Wood family who originated in Maine. Do you want to say anything about them, Norman?

Norman Hindes: [NORMAN] Go ahead. You go ahead.

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] Well, I don't want to dominate the conversation. Anytime you want to add something please do. . .

Norman Hindes: [NORMAN] No, no. Go ahead.

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] ... We havea pretty fair documentation, from two aunts. One of them is 84, 85 now and she has documented most of this for Norman and I. Until this came along, we didn't have much contact with my mother's people. My mother died during the flu epidemic of 1919! when I was four months old and, of course, my father remarried and most of the family on my mother's side gravitated back to the east coast again, settling primarily in Florida.

Bob Zybach: Where did your mom die during the flu epidemic?

Charles Hindes: In Albany.

Bob Zybach: Oh, in Albany, Oregon. So, that was right here in Oregon.

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] Right.

Norman Hindes: [NORMAN] 1919, yeah. Flu.

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] And, so, really we didn't have any contact at all with my mother's family until after we had moved to Tillamook and Norman went to . . . What hospital was it?

Norman Hindes: [NORMAN] St. Vincent's Hospital on the hill.

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] St. Vincent's Hospital for an operation and a little candy striper working there discovered his name on the chart and went home and told her folks "that somebody in the hospital with a last name of Hindes, could this be that long lost cousin?"

Norman Hindes: [NORMAN] Excuse me. Let me go back a little bit. She interviewed me. She was the receptionist and when she had taken all my history as they was taking it so it went on into the hospital records, she says "What was your mother's maiden name?" I said Mary Wood. She said "What was the middle name? And I said Mary Crossman Wood. And she looked me the funniest, you know, and went ahead and finished filling all of it out and put me up into bed and she took off for home as soon as her work was done and told her dad and mother that she'd run on to me. And here all of them was peeking through the door at me up in as I was laying in that room. I'd just been operated on.

Bob Zybach: Were they Crossmans or Woods?

Norman Hindes: They were Wood's. Yeah and so that's the way they found Chuck and I and for years we didn't even know where our mother was buried. Well, we knew where she was buried but we've never been to her grave and I guess Chuck never has been yet. Have, ya?

Charles Hindes: [CHUCK] No, not yet.

Bob Zybach: So, then your stepmother [Goldie Hindes] though, was who raised you.

'The flu epidemic began in 1917 and is commonly known as the Flu Epidemic of 1918 (see Neil Vanderburg, Monograph #8 and Velma Carter Rawie, Monograph #10). Charles and Norman's mother, Mary Crossman Wood Hindes, died of influenza in January 1919.