CG Russell Fridley -RF Robert Goff -RG Lila M

Charles A. Graham Narrator

Russell Fridley Robert Goff Lila M. Johnson Interviewers

1968

Charles A. Graham -CG Russell Fridley -RF Robert Goff -RG Lila M. Johnson -LJ

RF: Begin by giving us a little biographical information about yourself. Where you were born and raised?

CG: Yes. I was born in Saint Paul and lived here all my life. I was married in 1924 to [LaFrance Bass]. We have three children; two boys and a girl that are all married. I went to the Rice School grade school and enrolled in Mechanic Arts [St. Paul, Minnesota] for high school education, but my father passed, so I decided to work and earn a living and help support my mother and baby sister. I didn’t get to go to high school like I intended going.

RF: Where did you go to work?

CG: First job was for Armour and Company as a butcher. From there in 1923 I secured a job at the Saint Paul Athletic Club as a door checker. My duties were to know all the members of the club, and they affiliated with Minneapolis, so we had quite a number of members, twenty-five hundred, I think at the time, 1923, when I worked at the club. We had members of the Minneapolis Athletic Club that had interchange with memberships and they also used the club. Many of them worked in Saint Paul but carried a membership in Minneapolis, so I became well- acquainted with the majority of lawyers and doctors and prominent businessmen throughout Saint Paul. It gave me a very good experience by coming into the governor’s office, because I knew so many people in the Cities.

RF: When did you go into government service, Charles?

CG: January 16, 1933.

RF: How did that happen? This was during the Depression, now.

CG: During Depression times they cut salaries at the Athletic Club and I was married and had a family and needed more money. Through some influential people, members of the Athletic Club, I was able to secure a job as a janitor for the state of Minnesota. That was in 1933.

RF: Floyd Olson was governor at that time.

CG: Floyd Olson was the governor of Minnesota.

RF: Was he the man who hired you?

CG: Well, Mr. Spoonmacher, the Director of Public Property, actually hired me, but I had to be recommended to the governor. Just a matter of a little paperwork and then you were hired. We didn’t have civil service in those days. Civil service came in in 1939.

RF: Did you meet Billy Williams [William F. Williams] about that time?

CG: Yes, I met Billy Williams in 1933. When I came up to get the job I was told to go and meet Billy Williams, so that’s where I met Billy in 1933: in the governor’s office.

RF: Maybe we could just pursue that a little bit, Charles, and you could tell us some of the other things you did between the time you went to work for the State and when you finally wound up in the governor’s office sometime later?

CG: I was the supervisor of the night crew in the capitol building and complex, and I knew Judge Devitt [Edward James Devitt] very well. When this opening became available I contacted Judge Devitt; I can give Judge Devitt the credit for getting me the job. Billy Williams told me that there was going to be an opening, so I contacted Judge Devitt because he was a very prominent politician in those days, and with his efforts and Billy Williams’ efforts I was able to secure the job.

RF: In the governor’s office?

CG: As executive aide in the governor’s office.

RF: Before we start talking about Billy and some of the other people maybe you could tell us a little bit about what that job entailed, what it involved, and what it still involves?

CG: Governor’s aide’s duties are to see to it that the governor’s appointments are kept on time and get the people who have appointments in and out of the office. It’s sort of protective for the governor, and as he has these people come in I escort them into the office. When I feel as though time is up I just go in and let them know that his next appointment is ready, so it will give a little inkling that the meeting should break up.

RF: It really takes tact, doesn’t it?

CG: A little diplomacy in doing that so you don’t hurt anyone’s feelings. Sometimes people get in the office they get to talking, get in deep conversation; they don’t realize how much time they’re taking of the governor’s. He has a full-time schedule of appointments, so we have to keep them moving right along during the day so we can finish it.

RF: Now the man that you trained under—

CG: Billy Williams.

RF: Billy Williams—and he goes way back to when? Perhaps you could tell us something about Billy and some of your recollections of him.

CG: Billy Williams became an executive aide to Governor Johnson [John Albert Johnson] in 1905. At that time the building was just being completed and Billy started his work as governor’s aide in the state capitol complex buildings at the present building.

LJ: Was this a new job?

CG: Yes, it was a new job.

LJ: There wasn’t somebody that held it in the old capitol?

CG: Well, from what I can gather, it was a Mr. Beasley that was a messenger to the governors in the old capitol building that was down on the corner of Tenth and Wabasha Street. That building wasn’t torn down until about 1939. That’s when I was a janitor. I used to go down there sometimes and move things around and curate the building.

RF: But Billy really went back all the way to the capitol, or to the beginning of our present capitol building.

CG: Right, yes. Before the building was completed he was in the office.

RF: I think he started with one of the men that was generally recognized as one of the outstanding governors that Minnesota ever had. I wonder if you recall—I know you had many long conversations with Billy over the years about all of these men and events. Do you recall anything that he might have told you about John Johnson and what kind of a man he was and so on?

CG: He said he was one of the greatest men that he ever worked for, and that he was very, very kind to Billy. In those days Billy was a young man, and he played professional baseball. The governor would let Billy take off on weekends and play baseball and earn extra money by playing baseball. Billy said that the governor told him that anytime he wanted to go play ball, play a game, it was perfectly all right. Billy’s never forgotten that.

RF: He died soon after that?

CG: I believe the governor passed away in 1909. Yeah, 1909 he passed. He went to Rochester and had an operation for appendicitis, I believe, and never recovered.

John Johnson, of course, was a Democrat in the tradition of, particularly the job that you hold, being of a kind of a non-partisan nature. I suppose it began then with the new governor, who was a Republican. It was Eberhart, wasn’t it? Adolph Eberhart?

You make such nice contact by the fact that you’re in the office and you’re serving so many people, that they never change the job. Billy was a non-political appointee, and he never played politics. In fact of the matter, he always told me, he says, “If you want to you can have this job as long as you want it as long as you stay out of politics.” I listened to his advice, and it seems as though it’s worked out the same way for me as it did him. As each governor changed, why, they’d automatically keep me on.

RF: Do you recall anything that he might have said about any of these men or any anecdotes? I remember one story you told, Charles, about somebody trying to start a fire in the fireplace.

CG: Yes, the pigeons were so bad in those days that they used to roost up in there, so someone threw a match in there and they started a fire, and so they put the fire out and blocked it up. So they haven’t had a fire in that fireplace now for about fifty years, I believe.

RF: Didn’t someone, some new governor or something, or one of his staff members try to start a fire in there?

CG: In the fireplace. [laughs]

RF: And the flue isn’t open?

CG: That’s right, it was blocked off.

RF: And almost burned the capitol down. Well, then, Billy was the aide to—

CG: Fourteen governors.

RF: To Governor Hammond [Winfield Scott Hammond], Governor Burnquist [Joseph A. A. Burnquist], and all the way through there. Do you recall any anecdotes about any of these men that Billy might have passed on to you, Charles?

CG: Well, not exactly. He had a high praise for all the governors that he’d served and never did go in detail much about any particular governor. They were all very fine to him.

RG: He didn’t ever single out any two or three who really stood out in his mind?

CG: He never singled out anybody but Governor Johnson, I think, because of the fact that Governor Johnson hired him and was such a great man and so good to Billy. I think maybe that was one of his favorites. He didn’t come right out and say it.

LJ: It must be quite a transition to be in a governor’s office with Floyd Olson. Did he ever talk about that?

CG: No, he didn’t, he never made any mention of that.

RF: Charles, you then came into service when Governor Olson was governor of the state already. You weren’t in the office.

CG: That’s right.

RF: Certainly Governor Olson is one of the men that nearly everybody wants to know more about these days. I wonder if you have any impressions of him in particular? Working in state service are there things you remember about him?

CG: When you’d see the governor in the hall, he was always gracious and happy-go-lucky. I remember one year they had a sort of a reception in the governor’s hallway right outside the governor’s office, and they had an orchestra, and they had a buffet set up, lunch and supper, and he was the life of the party. He was dancing and he was in good health, and he had a wonderful time. It was nice to be in the presence of the governor and his party.

RF: Then on to Harold Stassen, when he was governor, he was governor five. Then you really came into the governor’s office under Governor Youngdahl [Luther Wallace Youngdahl].

CG: Yes.

RF: I think you’ve told us how that happened, Charles, that you worked for Judge Devitt. What were some of the things that Billy told you about your job and how you should keep your nose clean and so on?

CG: I had a pretty good idea of the workings of the governor’s office because of the fact that as the door checker down at the Saint Paul Athletic Club I met a lot of people and tried to remember their names and faces, and that’s one of the important parts of the job in the governor’s office is to remember these members of the legislature. Incidentally, when I was working at the Club there was a lot of the members of the legislature that frequented the Saint Paul Athletic Club during the session. I knew quite a few of the members of the legislature and most of the officials of the state at the time that I was appointed to the governor’s office, so it wasn’t very hard.

I can distinctively remember the day that Paul Albright, who was Governor Youngdahl’s secretary, interviewed me for the job, and he asked me a few questions, and I went on to explain to him what the most important thing about the job would be, and my ability would be to keep your mouth shut and your ears open and not repeat what you hear. [laughs] I think that kind of sold Mr. Albright, so he hired me right off. I started work right after the interview in 1950.

In talking with Billy I asked him how he managed to stay on all the years with different governors, and he just said, “Well, if you treat everybody nice that comes in that office; you might not know who might be the next governor; you might be talking a man on the street and he might be the next governor, so if you treat everybody nice, you never get in any trouble.”

RF: What about Governor Youngdahl? Now, he’s another man, and I might add, Charles, that in interviews with Governor Youngdahl he was most complimentary to you and to Billy. You are the kind of invaluable cogs in the machinery over there. What were your impressions of Governor Youngdahl?

CG: Well, I knew Governor Youngdahl when he was a judge in the [Minnesota] Supreme Court. He would come up in that law library where I worked for awhile and he was a very, very honest and nice man. He had a beautiful personality and he would always have something to say to me, so when I was hired in the governor’s office I was no stranger to him. I knew him quite well, so it wasn’t very hard for me to serve him. He sometimes became a little upset during a legislative session. When he couldn’t get his bills through the legislature like he wanted he’d get a little upset, but he was a very fine man.

RF: Then he resigned quite suddenly.

CG: Except the judgeship.

RF: Indicated some health difficulties, and Governor C. Elmer Anderson succeeded him. What were your impressions of C. Elmer, then?

CG: I thought C. Elmer Anderson was a very nice man, but he came into the office and I was told by one of the old-time reporters, Jack McKay, that the governor wanted me to stay on. He didn’t know whether I’d want to stay on or not. Billy was working there at the time; we had the two men, so I thanked the governor for keeping me on. He was very nice; a very quiet man. He didn’t burst out or anything. He was just taking things as they came. Jim Faber was his secretary, and he was sort of the manager of the office then. He and I had more dealings together than C. Elmer Anderson.

LJ: You must have been well-acquainted with him when he was lieutenant governor.

CG: Lieutenant governor, yes. I’d come in contact with him quite a bit.

RF: The next change was, I suppose, one that must have made you a little nervous because now the other party took over: Governor Orville Freeman.

CG: Fact of the matter, I was a bit nervous. I never shall forget the day that Tom Hughes, who was Governor Freeman’s secretary, called me and said he’d like to have a cup of coffee with me. The governor’s office to the cafeteria seemed to me like it was a mile. I didn’t know what he was going to say and didn’t have any idea what the conversation would be, so he readily told me, he says, “Well, we’ll want you to stay on.” That made me feel very good, and incidentally Mr. Hughes and I became very, very fine friends. He was a very capable secretary, I thought. I was happy that I was able to stay on.

RF: He took a good deal of the load off of the governor. As far as I recall in those years, Charles, a lot of the people wound up not liking Tom Hughes, and I think many people recognize today, because he was kind of the hatchet man. He was the one who made the tough decisions.

CG: Yes he did.

RF: There was a lot of activity around those offices in those days.

CG: Yes, there was. Tom was taking quite a bit of the load off of Governor Freeman’s shoulders, but he did make some important decisions and the office was less crowded.

You know, when a new governor takes office everybody’s his friend and everybody worked for him, so they’d all come in the office and they all want jobs, and I’ve seen the time where a man come in the office and he says—I voted for Governor Youngdahl or Governor LeVander [Karl Harold Phillip LeVander] or Governor Freeman. He’d say, “I voted for him; I want a job.”

RG: How long did that last, then?

CG: That doesn’t last too long. That wears off maybe in about two months. We’d get all these people that’d get excited about the change, but then that wears off. Governor LeVander’s administration is beginning to do that now.

RF: What about Governor Freeman? He was quite a different personality than Governor Anderson.

CG: He was an energetic governor. He would go down to the Saint Paul Athletic Club or the Y [Young Men’s Christian Association] and play volleyball and handball and play those games where he would be able to exercise himself and keep himself in shape. He was an athletic-type man, and he was always in mostly good humor. If he felt that he needed a little change he’d go down and play squash or something. He and Judge Larson [Earl Richard Larson] were very good friends. He’d get Larson to come over from Minneapolis—before he was a judge—and he used to play squash quite often.

RG: He was known to explode now and then, though, wasn’t he, Governor Freeman?

CG: Yes, he would. I remember one time his chauffeur was driving him and run out of gas on University Avenue.

RF: Was that Wally?

CG: Yeah, it was Wally. That didn’t set so good. [laughs] Then there’s sometimes when Wally would be somewhere and Tom would ask me if I would go pick the governor up and I’d go out and pick the governor up in my car and he’d be reading the newspaper. I’d put him in the back, and he didn’t say very much; he was always interested in the articles in the morning paper, so he didn’t have much to say, but I’d drive him down there. He’d say thank you.

RF: You never ran out of gas with him, did you? [laughs]

CG: Oh, no. I made sure that I had plenty of gas in the car, yeah.

RF: Well, there are some other interesting people around that administration, too. A very famous, and in many ways kind of a legend around that capitol, came in as attorney general about that time, too.

CG: Miles Welton Lord? Well, I remember Mr. Lord before he’d taken office. He was around the office, he was in the office, he was milling around the hallways and investigating there. He was an up-and-up man. He was always doing something in that attorney general’s office. He was always moving.

RF: There was always a long of commotion wherever Miles Lord went.

CG: That’s right. I remember one time in the governor’s office Billy was telling a group of people, men, that that mahogany table in the governor’s reception room would take six men to lift that table. Miles Lord immediately got under the table and lifted the table up by himself. [laughs] Now that’s the story on Miles Lord. He did it. We were worried maybe he’d pull a muscle and throw his shoulder out of whack or something, but he’s still going strong.

RF: That’s a wild story.

Following Governor Freeman was Governor Elmer L. Anderson, who I am sure you must have known when he was a state senator.

CG: Yes. Here’s one thing I’d like to say before we go into Governor Elmer L. Anderson is that Mr. Stafford King, the state auditor, had been very, very nice to me. Every time we had an election he would call me over in his office and he’d say, “Now, don’t you worry about a thing. I’ll take care of things for you.” And that’s what he’d do. He’d go over there and he’d talk with every one of them, and then he’d come back and tell me that everything was all set. I never shall forget Stafford King. He said—I never asked him about doing any favor, interceding for me, but he did this on his own. So I always appreciate it.

RF: Of course, he was in there since, when, 1928 or something?

CG: I think he came in in ’31.

RF: That was a very good patron to have in state service, was Stafford King. Incidentally, he’s going to be a person we’re going to tape.

CG: Yeah, he was a very fine man. As a matter of fact I owe him back in 1924 because he was very active in the American Legion, and I presented him with a Kissel car. I don’t know if you know what a Kissel car—Bob you might.

RG: No, I don’t.

CG: There used to be a car called a Kissel car. The American Legion presented him this car and I remember witnessing that down at the Saint Paul Athletic Club. Elmer L., you spoke of Elmer L. Anderson, one of the fine gentlemen; I see him often, because he’s in the Legion now. He does come in the office, but I’ve seen him in the hallway before he’d taken office, and he assured me that I’d be on the job with him. I appreciated that, because if you have a little bad feeling—if you don’t know just what the governor thinks—he might not like the looks of you. He might not want you. This job’s not civil service.

Fortunately, I’m in the position now where I could serve or take my retirement in about three years, so I’ll serve this governor out, and then I’ll be in a position that if I don’t want to work, why I could take my pension.

RG: You can be choosy, huh? [laughs] I don’t know of any governor who’d come in that wouldn’t want you in here to help them.

RF: Elmer Anderson lasted the two years, and over hectic years in the governor’s office, I’m sure, Charles. Back in the old two-year-term days, I suppose there was a good deal more campaigning going on.

CG: Yes, the governor really doesn’t get a chance to get his feet wet before he has to get out campaigning. In my judgment, I think Governor Elmer L. Anderson was a wonderful man, a very intelligent guy; a hard-working governor, and very nice to his employees, very thoughtful. He sends apples out every Christmas, and I’m still getting my boxes of apples. He’s very, very nice. Very nice family, very nice wife, very nice son, very intelligent person; wonderful man.

RF: Then he was defeated in the very famous recount election.

CG: Yes. Ninety-one votes.

RF: ’62 by at that time Lieutenant Governor Karl Rolvaag.

LJ: That must have created a lot of confusion. Wasn’t Rolvaag’s office in the basement or something like that?

CG: Yes, it was, down in the basement.

RG: In the broom closet.

CG: Broom closet—that’s what they called it.

RF: What were the internal workings then, Charles? I think this is a very good question, because it’s kind of a unique period of time. It’s one of the few times when the transition of one governor to the other hasn’t been smooth.

CG: It was a very tough move because of the fact that they didn’t know until the last minute that Governor Rolvaag was going to take office, and they had to make this big move in a couple days, so there was a lot of activity around the office, getting their records and moving things out. It was really frantic around there.

RF: Governor Rolvaag came into office, and, of course, four years later—a little less than four years later—was defeated by the present governor. What were your impressions of Governor Rolvaag?

CG: Well, he was a very fine man. He was very, very nice to me. I knew him when he was lieutenant governor, and any time a plane would go to Washington—I had a sister in Washington, D.C., and any time a plane would go to Washington he’d always ask if I wanted to go. He’d take me to many ball games. He was very, very nice to me I remember.

RF: I don’t think we’ll go into your present employer, because that’s a little too new, really, and you’re still involved in it, but maybe we could slide back—

RG: He doesn’t have to if he doesn’t want to, but maybe just say your impression of Governor LeVander at this time?

CG: I think Governor LeVander is a wonderful man. Not longer ago than yesterday he awarded me my honorary merit award, and he praised me very highly. He told me he has a great respect in me, and I think he’s a great governor; very nice to me.

RG: Which of these governors that you’ve worked for do you feel is most successful with the legislature?

CG: As I said before, Governor Youngdahl had a little tough time with his program, his legislature. I think that Governor Freeman had quite a bit of success with his programs in the legislature, because he had quite a number of votes up in the legislature that were liberal. I think that other than the sales tax that Governor LeVander was very successful with his bills, because he had a majority upstairs, I think. I think that makes quite a difference if you have the leader in the house and the leader in the senate on the side that you’re on.

RG: He’s really the only one who’s had both, isn’t he?

CG: That’s right.

RF: Speaking of the legislature, Charles, you’ve seen these men go up, and they were very often the kind of forgotten men in the history of the state, but there have been some very powerful and very interesting characters in that legislature, many of whom, I’m sure you’ve come into contact with. Which ones come to mind, Charles, the ones that have really impressed you over the years?

CG: Well, Rosenmeier, he’s a very smart man. Then there was Dr. Holmquist [Stanley Willard Holmquist] in the Senate. Mr. Duxbury [Lloyd L. Duxbury] in the House—he’s very good. There’re quite a number of outstanding men in the legislature that I’ve seen.

RF: How about some of the ones that are no longer with us? Well, I know one of the men that most governors have feared, who are still up there, is Senator Rice. He seems to be kind of a natural enemy of almost all the governors, no matter what party.

CG: Mr. Donald Rice is a very nice gentleman; when he comes in the office he’s very nice to me, but I guess he’s one of the old standbys up there. He rules with an iron-clad hand. He’s a very nice gentleman, though. You know, you read about these legislators and men in politics, but to actually know them, after you meet them personally, you have a different impression altogether, because they’re just human beings and they’re nice to talk with.

RF: Which governor that you worked under ran the most casual office? Is there much difference here? Each one must kind of set the tone of the office.

CG: Well, I think that Governor C. Elmer Anderson was a casual man; quiet, didn’t get excited about things. He was taking things in his stride. Governor Freeman would get a little hostile, I suppose.

RF: [laughs] Good word for Orville.

CG: He was pretty exact in what he wanted, and he wanted it then and there.

RF: It was a famous episode when, as I recall, it caused a lot of trouble in the office when the Reorganization Bill was found to have an error in it under Governor Freeman?

CG: Yes.

RF: It was passed and after that every bill that came into that office was read by a team of people, that during the legislative session’s last night they have people down there reading the bill.

CG: Yeah. In the past we used to get proofreaders from different departments to help out with our staff, because during the last days of the legislature all these bills come down in bunches. In the past years the attorney general’s office has been taking care of the reading of the bills pertaining to industrial commission workers, then they’d have a lawyer that handles the industrial commission’s work and go over that bill with a fine needle to see that it was all right before it was brought into the governor’s office.

Heretofore, I remember during the Youngdahl administration one advantage is having an executive secretary that’s a lawyer, because he knows the law, and he can read these bills and understand them better than a man who’s not an attorney. So at the present time, Mr. Durenberger, he’s an attorney, but they’d leave these bills up to the attorney general’s office to go through and see that there’re no mistakes. We don’t read the bills in the governor’s office anymore like we used to.

RF: The pace of that office kind of ebbs and flows, doesn’t it, Charles? Depending on whether the legislature is in session when it’s a very, very busy time, and then slows down during the summers. But then you get the school children coming in in the fall.

CG: Yes. During the legislative session we just have streams of legislators coming in, because they all want to know, get the advice of the governor about this bill and that bill. Just come in to pay their respect. As it is now, anytime the legislators are in, the governor invites them to drop in and see the governor, but the governor doesn’t realize that his appointment calendar is so full sometimes that these legislators come down, and there’s just no time to get in. We sort of always reserve time for the legislators during all the season, because they might have important conversations to talk with the governor about.

RG: Which one of these administrations has been the most interesting to you?

CG: I don’t think I could answer that. They’ve all been interesting. With this sales tax bill that passed last session, why that was real interesting. I would say, if I was going to point it out, that that would be the most interesting in my estimation.

RG: Then there were the big reapportionment hassles.

CG: Yes.

RG: Those were under Governor Rolvaag, particularly.

CG: That’s right.

RF: So you must have formed friendships with the wives of governors and their children.

CG: Yes. We usually have a little party or something during the holidays. Each governor has the office force out to his home for a Christmas party. I’d say that Governor Rolvaag had more of the office people in his home than any other governor. Governor Freeman had quite a few parties where his staff was remembered and invited, and he’d have different people there, especially during the holiday season.

RF: I want to pursue that a little bit, Charles. What were some of your impressions of the governors’ families? I think you mentioned Governor Anderson’s wife. What were some of your impressions of some of the families of these men—Governor Youngdahl?

CG: Well, Governor Youngdahl’s family was very fine. In fact of the matter, all the children in the families of the governors were just wonderful to me—all of them. It was a pleasure to be in their company because they were most interesting. I think Governor Youngdahl has a son that’s a minister. Governor LeVander has a son that’s an attorney, and they’re very, very friendly and nice people to talk with. C. Elmer Anderson’s children were quite young when he was governor, but we’d get Christmas cards and correspond and they’d send us pictures of their family, and we’d be just amazed to see how they’ve grown up from little tots.

RG: Which one of the governors’ wives did you see the most often in the office? Which one was the most active?

CG: I think Mrs. Rolvaag would stay within the office more than anybody else. She was quite active, and I will just mention that she used to come down to the office quite a bit and become acquainted with—

RG: It kind of changed, the wives’ role, too.

CG: Yes it did, yes.

LJ: Governor LeVander’s daughter was in the office quite often, I understand.

CG: Yes, she has an office in the capitol building, right below our office there. We have some space downstairs where they do office work, and she’s there most every day. Jean King is her name. She’s there most every day.

LJ: Did you have any other governor’s children come into the office, work in the reception area?

CG: No, no. They never did. She’s the only one that I know of.

LJ: Rolvaag must have had the oldest family, then.

CG: Children, you mean?

LJ: Yes. The other governors had younger children.

CG: Yes. Yeah, with the exception of Governor Youngdahl; when he was in, his children were pretty large, grown. Governor LeVander’s son and daughter, Jean. He has a teenage daughter at home, but the others are grown.

RF: Could we skip back to the 1930s a minute? I’m wondering if you knew Governor Elmer Benson.

CG: I knew, yes.

RF: Harold Stassen?

CG: Yes. I worked in the building while they were in office, yes.

RF: Did you get to know them, or did you ever visit with him?

CG: No, I never visited him, no.

RF: Drifting back to something, it’s really kind of off the subject, like to hear you give us some of your impressions. You are a native Minnesotan?

CG: Yes.

RF: And, I believe, a native Saint Paulite, aren’t you, Charles?

CG: Right, yes.

RF: Something we talked about earlier and, of course, today being the whole civil rights question and everything being very much in the fore and very much discussed. As a member of the Negro community in Saint Paul going back into the early part of the century, what were some of your impressions of growing up as a child in this town, and the types of things you might have run into, and this whole area?

CG: Well, as a boy I was born and reared on the West Side, and there were about four Negro families on the whole West Side. We went to school, and the fact of the matter, I wouldn’t know that I was a colored boy unless I looked in the glass, because there was never any mention of race or creed or anything. We just went to school and everything was fine, and we were respected and we played in baseball and we just got along just wonderful. Any school I ever went to I never had any problem. Just didn’t know the difference. We were just human beings. It was the same way with our brothers and sisters. We never had any trouble.

Fact of the matter, I can remember when I knew practically everybody in Saint Paul when I came along. The population wasn’t so large, but now there’re so many people in the city that come from different parts of the country that I don’t know. So I had never had any problem coming up, going in a school, with race.

RG: Did you feel there was any problem with getting jobs? Was it more difficult for a Negro when you were growing up?

CG: No, I had no difficulty getting a job. At least we didn’t have the education, didn’t have the highest jobs, but for the ordinary job, there was no discrimination. If you were eligible, you’d get the job.

RF: Some of the things apparently have changed, or at least I think are getting a great deal of attention even in Saint Paul. We have, what, eight thousand Negros or something like that in the city, now?

CG: Well, we have better than that. I think we have close to twelve thousand.

RF: Is it close to twelve thousand?

CG: Yeah.

RF: It’s the largest single Negro community in the state, Saint Paul, in Rondo-Dale, that one geographic area. There seems to be a great deal of feeling now, at least, that there is the denial of

14 the black community, I think, with some justification. Do you attribute this to the fact that many of these people have moved in?

CG: Well, I don’t know what it is, but it seems to me like there seems to be more prejudice now in buying homes. In my day Negros lived all over the city. Now there’s some difficulty getting housing in different parts of the city, and the same way with getting jobs in different businesses, and so forth. It seems as though there’s always some excuse that they’re hired, that they have no opening.

In some cases, from what I can understand, they’d run ads in the paper and a Negro would answer the ad and they would say that the job has been filled. In the next instance a non-Negro would go down there and they would get the job. That’s from what I can understand. Of course, in my position, I can’t really get involved. In fact of the matter, of all the years Billy worked there he didn’t belong to any organizations. It’s kind of hard, you belong to an organization because of the fact that you work in the governor’s office. That’s why I kind of stay away from different organizations.

I was a member of the Serra Club, which is a Catholic organization, and that was a very nice organization, but because of the fact that they met at a time when it was inconvenient for me, I had to resign from it, but it’s a very, very fine organization. Race never came up in that meeting, and that meeting group of men was businessmen and lawyers and doctors and high life of the city of Saint Paul.

RF: You’ve lived here all your life, Charles, and you’ve seen this town develop from a kind of a sleepy capital city. Now the tremendous developments in the town—

RG: Now it’s a sleepy large town.

RF: Sleepy large capital city now. [laughs]

CG: Well, Bob, I can remember during the thirties when this was really an up and going city because they had the gangsters in here and night life. You walk up Wabasha Street and you’d just think you were in New York City or something, the way things were booming.

RG: Saint Paul was a sports town then.

CG: Yes, Saint Paul was a sporting town. Much better than Minneapolis. When we had our local baseball team here we would outperform Minneapolis every year practically.

RG: Boxing was a big thing.

CG: Boxing was a big thing. I’ve seen some of the greats fight here. I used to follow boxing quite a bit because I worked at the club. I used to get an annual pass, and I’d take in all the fights. I’ve seen Harry Greb [Edward Henry Greb] and Gene Tunney [James Joseph Tunney] and some of the great fights right down here in the Saint Paul Auditorium. Billy May, Mike Sullivan, and

quite a few others. Saint Paul used to really be a producer of fighters; very good town for fighters.

RG: The O’Dowd boys [Michael Joseph O’Dowd].

CG: Right. Gibbons Brothers [Thomas and Michael Gibbons].

RG: Joe Lesinski?

CG: He was in Saint Paul, yeah.

RF: On this question of people contacting you, this must be one of the things that go with the job.

[pause] Because you worked in the governor’s office, this must happen every so often, doesn’t it?

CG: Oh, yes.

RF: That people come to you and they want you to get something done?

CG: Yeah. There was a young man that was in trouble with the police department, and the fact of the matter, he’s down at the county jail now. He wrote a letter and he mentioned Charles Graham, wanting to get out of jail, because of the fact that he knew my son. He didn’t even know my real name, he had Robert Graham, but they’d taken it for granted it was Charles Graham. When they feel that you’re in the governor’s office they feel as though you can do something for them. As a rule the person that wants a favor, it’s an impossible favor. They just go to other places and they’re refused, then they come to the highest office, and then they expect you to do something about it.

RF: You mentioned your belonging to the Serra Club, and that brings up a question that maybe Bob can shed a light on. Isn’t it true that a rather significant number of Saint Paul Negros are Catholic?

CG: No.

RF: That isn’t true.

CG: No, it isn’t true.

RF: I am under the wrong impression.

CG: I think that the Baptist Church had a larger member of any denomination Negro in Saint Paul. The Catholic Church is about seventy-five to twenty-five percent Negro and white. I’ve gone to Saint Peter Claver [St. Paul, Minnesota], and we have a pretty good number of white that attend our parish.

RF: That used to be, and I think Saint Paul does have a higher percentage of Negro Catholics than you would ordinarily find in the Negro community.

CG: Generally Methodists or Baptists.

RG: More so than Minneapolis.

RF: Is there any reason for this? Or does this go back to Archbishop Ireland?

RG: Peter Claver Church was at one time an all-Negro church, wasn’t it?

CG: Well, it started out as a small church, but when Saint Peter Claver was up on Farrington [Street] and Aurora [Avenue] we had a Negro priest by the name of Father Theobald, and he had his shrine of the Little Flower, and he drew more white than it did Negro. In the fact of the matter, down on Farrington we had more white persons than we did Negros. Now we have many, many converts coming here. The Catholic Church here in Saint Paul is becoming quite full.

LJ: Saint Paul is mostly a Catholic city?

CG: Oh, yeah, Saint Paul is a Catholic city, Irish Catholic town.

RF: You never ran into any potential prejudice as a boy or jobs or anything like that?

CG: No, I didn’t.

LJ: Were your parents from Saint Paul?

CG: No, my dad was born in Beloit, Wisconsin, and my mother was from Lowell, Massachusetts.

RF: I take it you feel there are more problems between the races now than when you were growing up, than when you were a young man.

CG: Yes.

RF: In terms of seeking a job.

CG: Right, right, right. It never entered my mind, anything about race, when I went for a job, because prejudice just didn’t exist at that time, and particularly jobs that I was interested in. We had good public relations all through my boyhood days with the whites. We never had any problems in school or anywhere.

RF: On the West Side in those days was the Latin community over there then, too?

CG: Very few.

RF: Did they move in after that?

CG: Mostly Jewish people.

RF: Oh, is that right?

CG: Oh, yeah. You’d think such Jewish men as Applebaum’s food market, Hy Applebaum, the president of it. He and I were boys together. Such boys as Klein and Lipschultz, very prominent people, came from the West Side. It was mostly a Jewish community.

RF: [unclear] Rosen, was he from the West Side?

CG: Rosen wasn’t from the West Side, no. He was originally from Chicago I think. In his boyhood he probably went to school in Chicago. Many of my boy friends I went to school with are very, very prominent businessmen and attorneys and doctors. Doctor Warren, very prominent physician.

RF: Is it possible that that might account for the fact that you didn’t run into too much in the nature of prejudice? Because you were more of a Jewish community?

CG: That’s possible.

RG: There haven’t been too many studies, but I think Rabbi Plaut and his history of the Jews in Minnesota makes the point that Saint Paul has been freer of prejudice against Jews than Minneapolis.

CG: Is that right.

RG: He attributes it to the fact that families came here quite early. They were coming in during the building of the city.

RF: Well there were, and still are, in Saint Paul many Negro families that go way back to the beginning of Saint Paul? Very old Negro families here.

CG: Well, there aren’t too many. We had our seventy-fifth anniversary and Mrs. Crane would be about eighty-six years old was one of the people there, but most of the old-time Catholics are washed out now. That past belonged to the old Saint Peter Claver Church, as we called it.

RF: Still, there were Negros in Saint Paul since a long, long way back.

CG: Oh, yes.

RF: The Minneapolis Negro community tends to be rather newer.

CG: Oh, yes. Saint Paul, it goes back many, many years for Negros to populate Saint Paul.

RG: Well, we’re living in an old city, now.

CG: Yeah, Saint Paul’s an old community for Negroes.

RG: Charlie, we’d be interested in your comments on this. You know, you hear a lot about the restlessness of the younger generation. Do you feel that this is just as true of the Negro families today? Is there a generation gap here on questions like civil rights and so on? Do you find there are many differences you have with the younger Negroes whom you know?

CG: Well, I don’t come in contact with many youngsters, but it seems to be a little unrest in those younger ones, from what I can gather, especially in Minneapolis. I don’t know what it is, whether the children aren’t getting the proper instructions at home nowadays, but it seems to me, reading the papers, you see thirteen and fourteen-year-olds are going out, mugging the old women, purse snatching and that. When I was a boy we had the curfew and the policemen walked the beat and if nine o’clock you were out, you’d have to do some explaining, but now coming home some night, late in the evening, you see youngsters coming out of shows, twelve, even as small as seven and eight years old. So you wonder, sometime, whether they’re getting discipline from the family or not.

RF: Lila, do you have some things that have occurred to you as we talked here?

LJ: I wanted to ask when you were born.

CG: April 21, 1905. I have a brother that organizes for the AF & L Meat Cutters Union that his home is in Chicago, but he spends most of his time organizing in Georgia, Florida, and the Carolinas. He runs into a lot of prejudice down there as far as getting people organized with his union, so if we are going to talk about race relations between the South and the North I think that it’s worse in the South.

RG: Has he encountered racism within his union?

CG: Yes.

RG: I mean, attitudes toward him?

CG: Oh, no, not him—the people that he’s trying to organize.

RG: To bring into the union?

CG: Bring into the union.

RG: What cities would he be working in? Atlanta?

CG: Not Atlanta. It’s mostly the smaller towns where they have these small plants. This is maybe fifty or sixty miles outside of Atlanta.

RG: Atlanta’s pretty well organized, isn’t it?

CG: Yes. Atlanta’s quite a town.

RF: Charlie, you once told me, and I think certainly anybody who has been close to the governor’s office would agree, that you feel that at some stage of the game someone else ought to be trained into your job to kind of carry on the traditions. From my understanding this kind of thing is really unique in the country, where there is a person who is really more of an institution, where the continuing thread of government goes from one administration to another era, first Billy and then you.

CG: Unfortunately, we would have two men on the job today if it wasn’t that this man that we broke in—I can remember distinctly I was on my vacation and I was painting my home, and this Willard Jones that came by and he said that he wanted to talk to me about going to start work with the governor’s office. In fact of the matter, Tom Hughes told me, “Charlie, until he retires I want you to take his job and have Willard come in and take your job—is it all right?” Well, I had no alternative, I couldn’t say no. I didn’t know the man.

RG: Willard was in Minneapolis, wasn’t he?

CG: Minneapolis, and I said sure, that’s fine. When Willard came by my home for some instructions, I pointed out the fact that he could stay there as long as anybody could stay there if he would stay out of politics and keep his mouth shut and his ears open.

Well, he did just the opposite—he kept his mouth open and his ears closed, so he didn’t last very long. Anyway, he was political, and when the Elmer L. Anderson administration came in, naturally they knew that, and if a man is connected with another party, you can’t let him in on different conversations that might hurt the party. So they were very, very nice; they got him another job within the state, but it was for temporary work and it didn’t last long. Elmer L. Anderson told me that next election, I should look around and pick out a nice young fellow. Elmer Anderson didn’t like him.

RF: That’s something that’s fairly ought to be done. I think very soon.

LJ: It’s not a job that somebody could just to step into.

CG: No, you’d have to be trained a little bit. I once told the manager of the Athletic Club—I was walking downtown one day and I happened to see him on the street, and I thanked him for giving me the job because of the fact that I came in contact with so many intelligent men that I’d picked up a lot of information in the way of handling the public by working at that club. So you just couldn’t go out here and pick anybody off the street and put them in that job and they’d act with the diplomacy that it demands. There’re people coming in there that’re awfully mad with the governor, and they have no right to see the governor, so it’s up to me or someone else in the office to pacify these people and get them off and keep them happy.

RF: Keep them from tearing that beautiful room apart!

CG: So I have sometimes had people come in here and get all excited and wanted to see the governor. I’d say, “Sit down and rest yourself” and they’d go on to some other conversation, and before you’d know it she’d say, “Thanks, I got to go.” She forgot all about the fact that she came in to see the governor.

RF: How’d you do it?

CG: I don’t know just when I’m going to retire because of the fact that pensions are so low. I’d rather go until I reach the age of sixty-five because I’d get more pension than going earlier. Unless something unforeseen happens where you have to retire.

I would like to see a young man come in that office and be trained to handle the public because it’s a tradition. I’d like to see that.

RF: I think everyone would. People in the legislature, as well.

CG: Yeah, all you’d have to do is appropriate the money, but different administrations have different ideas, you know.

RF: What about that room, Charles? I know that you’re very fond of the room in which you work there, and it’s a room that has a great tradition in the state. What are your impressions about the governor’s reception room?

CG: I think it’s a beautiful, ornate room. You have people come in there and talk about how they shouldn’t have some things in there and they should remodel it, but I think they should leave it just as is. They are contemplating getting more space, but I think what they’ll do is knock out that wall and then they’ll put in new carpeting. The carpeting is very raggedy, but there’s no point in putting carpeting down now and then knock out the wall, because you’d just track it all over. I think it’s very beautiful, and we get compliments from people all over the world. It’s one of the most ornate rooms they’ve ever been in. I was in the White House and I’ve seen the blue room and the pink room, and I’d choose the governor’s reception room to those rooms.

RG: Do you hear increasing complaints about the Civil War pictures?

CG: No, it’s not increasing. It has been said maybe a dozen or more times to me.

LJ: If they’re going to enlarge the room, are they going to be able to keep it as nice as it is?

CG: Well, they’ll keep the reception room as nice as it is. What they’ll do is just open up a wall so the girls will have more space to go back into the secretary of state’s office. There’s a door we could close, so that it wouldn’t be noticeable. It just gives the governor’s office more working space.

RF: They’re going to take out that wall on the other side of the room?

CG: Right. They won’t interfere with the governor’s reception room, I’m sure. I wouldn’t think they would. I don’t think that’s in their plans to change.

RF: Lila, what are the other ones do you have?

RG: Lila won’t let them take those pictures out, those Civil War pictures. [laughs]

RF: I think you’re right, Charles. There’s a tradition of service here that really is just kind of unique. You have to have seven or eight years training somebody, and supervise them. As long as Billy had to do to make a gentleman out of you.

RG: If you retire at the age Billy did, how many more years do you have?

CG: At the age of Billy? Oh, I’d have to go about … he retired at seventy-nine. I am sixty-two.

RF: That would be about right. [laughs]

CG: I don’t know. I don’t believe in staying on a job too long. I think you should make room for the younger fellow, and I don’t think that you’re as sharp as you should be when you get up there in age. You might slip a little bit. Now I know personally I used to be able to remember names and companies just like this, [snaps fingers] but now I’m finding it takes some time for it to come. So as you get older you slow up; there’s no question about that. I feel that when people reach a certain age they should retire. Now the state is compelling all state employees to retire at seventy. A lot of fellows don’t want to leave, but I think when you reach seventy years of age you’re entitled to retirement, to take things easy.

RG: That’s true if you’re a man, but not if you’re an institution. You have to stay on, then.

RF: Right, I think Bob has something here. I never thought about it. It’s more than just a job; it’s a tradition.

CG: Yes, it is a tradition.