Signature; Bobbie Ann Mason; Crittenden interview

Iran. Iraq. Can you talk a little bit about how students are different back then the way they are now. Well I've been asked this question a good many times and I guess I have. Had to say that at least when I left the profession regularly I still substitutes. But I would say that the students of the 50 and the period of that general timeframe or about the same academically the ones that I

had closest contact with I have taught history as I said and that was a required course. And so I had I didn't have the entire enrollment of the junior class because there were other history teachers but the juniors that I had they. The general impression that I've received has been that students in the fish war may be a little bit more serious in doing work that was assigned and than some recent students but on the other hand this would not be fair to say that about a lot of individual students that have graduated and it is and and I'm sure and in the 90s some of my very finest students came in the

70s and 80s. But on the other hand if you draw it just on average sort of a median if you could do that I'm not sure you can. You're saying there is such a thing as a typical student. And I would never have been quite convinced of left but I would say that the students certainly were as good in the 50s as they have been more recently. And of course you have these extremes of very good ones and the very poor ones. So. I hardly I hardly know. How to evaluate. In comparison the Mayfield High School has always had a very strong student body.

I noticed in The Messenger last night the Mayfield newspaper that we had been this year this past spring re accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and they were just extremely low Tory with their report about a school with a curriculum back ot the administration. All of it. The plant they said they had seen very few high schools. Twenty three years old as good a shape as our structure. We have been a member of that organization since 1916. So I would I would have to say that that our our school system has been top and it day in the in the community for for a long long time and I think the majority of our students reflect this. So I think there's a lot of pride in the school

and I think that the the fact of it is is just extremely strong and the administration is so. I don't I don't know exactly how to draw any kind of a comparative analysis here between the students of the 50s and the students. More recently the good students are just as good. The poor students probably are no worse. But at any rate leave they all to me. I mean this is why I come across to me and I'm sure that some teachers and. In the city might not question this position but to me at least the students here have been a very very good bunch. I've never had many that I felt really were

not up to par. I got just three or four questions. I try to talk a little of it and I feel strange. Oh yeah. Oh OK. I want to hop back lean forward. What was that like. Oh I'm sorry. That's all part of Iraqis who want to dress nice. Oh Frank you. I knew you all were coming. Politically not nice not how I was I was prepared for that end of it if nothing else but. Well my field of has not grown. Just tremendously since Bob end was here in the 50s. We've had slow growth steady growth I don't I'm sure we haven't lost anything. We have gained some very important industries.

General Tara was here when in the 50s the merit clothing company a big textile company was here is in currently a clothing company was here there and all those street today only the tire company is still around although they Marriott has a I guess you could say a descendant and a Dylan company that we have here doing pretty much the same kind of work textile industry. But I think the downtown area is the part of the city that reflects the. Greatest visible change whereas we had very few vacancies around the square maybe a temporary vacancy for a year or less.

One or two spots we seen in the downtown area. Developed a good many open spaces. And the north side of Our Square which was by the way the the oldest part of the square the first area of business activity all but burned up a few years ago and the only buildings that were left after the far had to be demolished because they were too weak to be used. So the bank building on the corner of Broadway and North seventh Street today is the only one standing on that entire block. On the west side. That's pretty much the same thing except not quite as much. The last flare just one or two spaces are gone due to a fire.

Another far but aside from the. Sort of the clan I guess you could say of the downtown area and by the way there is a concerted effort now being made to find tenants and find the owners for some of those empty buildings around the square downtown. A search is on for locating unique businesses businesses that are rather unusual and are not found in every town this size and so maybe that will bear some fruit in in the future. But while we've seen a decline of business activity downtown. There has been a considerable growth of a major growth business in other parts of town on the edge of town

particularly on the south end of town where there are today about 9 or 10 flash food restaurants for example in a matter of Oh. Maybe a quarter of a mile and not only by fast food restaurants but one or two locally homeowner traditional type restaurants. The business has evidently sort of spread out a little and nearly every so out of Mayfield has a business district accumulated. In it or on it. But that's that's one thing the location of our retail trade is different today from what it was in the 1950s. There is not much difference that I can tell. And the

activities here today from the earlier time I don't know that. Teenagers have quite is many. No we don't. What. Use is liable to go and they do occasionally go well but I said I imagine you all have a wattage that that this system had never run into before right. OK. Now then yeah. How does the tie look. I mean I don't want to make it look like I'm hanging myself here. That's right just hardly leaning hard on the slowest area room. Actually thank you again I work from the

from the books that I have read. I thank all of them. I have I have thoroughly enjoyed. The characterizations that she's made of the people in this area and the research that she's done to nail down facts especially in the last book in Crown feathers and other crowns. It's tough especially especially especially in the last book the the father cry and the portrayal of scenery and the familiarity that she shows with the area in general I think has just been great. I think that her use of

the diction and the speech patterns especially since she's been away from here on a long term basis for quite a while really show her mastery of people not only do but also all the way the talk. And speaking of poking my only negative about any of the books has been the rather strong language that came in particularly in country I felt like it just was not altogether typical of this area. But other than that I think that her work has just been outstanding. I have not had a chance to read very many of her New Yorker articles but I'm sure that they have the same quality

that her novels had. I'm very proud of Bobby and I'm proud of the work that she's done. With regard to country and language Oh it felt right like Jim. Just to keep from being used. I really don't know about that. I don't know whether I don't know whether there is a policy here as there are in some schools. I think Graves County has such a library policy. Mayfield has one I read and never did find out about it. Oh are. Lots of expletives. Well expletive possibly. But I wouldn't want to use some of the terms on this program.

We're in country and and I can I can understand having been in another war. I was over in Korea during that time that troops in the field don't speak with great grace from time to time so I suppose that. There are certain explanations for for the strong language but. That was the only weakness in the book and in the film. But I thoroughly enjoyed the characterizations of the people and the use of the area and all that it was.

It was very good. Yet people in my character. I have read the story. I don't like to talk just like people. That's exactly why I think that. If anything that our colloquialisms and I woke up speech has suffered in the recent years mainly because I guess of television if you'll pardon the use of a negative here for your feel. Having. Our way all the market is less than it used to be.

OK. We're talking about characterizations of people. Being protected today. It was just normal folks who are tired of it. Well as I was saying I think that good writers have the ability to portray and characterize the people that they write about. And if the characters involved in books had fitted the environment of New England or the West Coast or the. Florida Keys. I wouldn't have found it particularly enjoyable if I knew ahead of time beforehand that the place. It was in the book was Graves County

Kentucky or West Kentucky or Kentucky anywhere. In other words I think this is one of the strong positives to me that it's a local color. And as I started to say a moment ago in regard to our speech patterns I sometimes fear that our speech has become kind of homogenized and that in the process that we're losing something. But. In terms of dialect and in terms of pronunciation I don't mean now that we should be under a mouthful. I'm not taking the position that says just speak any way you want to it doesn't make any difference that it's all way you feel. And individually if you think it's OK that makes it OK I I don't mean that at all the rules are rules. But I do think the natural. Tendency to speak in a certain Lashon that

is traditional in that particular place is desirable and I think Bob again captured that perfectly. I think everything that I read in his written gets the idea across about not only the way people live their cultural heritage and cultural style but the speech patterns which of course is part of the culture he said is let's talk first about expression. I have some examples of that. We've got a lot of them around here. Did you start out I don't know but ours are in a different measurably from from yours in Lexington. But I do think that there are some that. Person in this area would recognize. Sooner

than maybe somebody would in an Lexington one time I was talking to Bobby and about U.S. wheat usage. It's not him. We don't know what you're talking about. I'm not sure I'm a leader. Well what I was asking was is Bobby I asked your advice. Oh no question. No we just in a in a casual conversation. I remember one time mentioning Wanda her own old saying pro-Gore Abele expression whatever. Somebody was dressed up last third Monday new now and Mayfield had a third Monday and march back years ago. And the people it had mules to sell or trade hoping to get their very best dollar very best cut the best deal they could would put all the

finer A-list new mules were supposed to have they were dressed to the max and so the expression got started somewhere maybe here maybe some of these other towns around here that had New Day observances dressed up like a third Monday knew it. As I told Bob the hand that might not be too familiar to people in Boston or in Miami but invited been livin and may feel back in those days would know exactly. I'm not sure people today and may feel that some people would recognize it if they've been born since about 1960 or 65 unless they picked it up from their folks because we haven't had a mule day here in I guess 50 years. So these O expressions tend to die out and that's a point that I wanted to make while we go to it.

I'd like to see. Through literary works. When you say as I said a while ago we were not just oh here we are. Ok well as I as I mentioned earlier when I said that we should try to preserve these old sayings that it's really a part of our cultural background and we would be I think well advised to try to keep some of it not to be on grammatical not to butcher the English language is too much of that being done too but to keep in mind what some of these old sayings and expressions that are peculiar to a certain place have been I don't recall too many.

I collected a whole group of them for our club here and I wanted to publish them. But that's been about five years ago and I don't remember whether I ever discussed any of them with Bob in and out but I do distinctly recall this mule day thing. Listener fro. Have you ever heard of a dozer fro. Well a fro was a knife that. If I remember my authority correctly it was to use them to back off the Eagles. You wouldn't find this expression be used extensively outside of the burger belt I guess or The Dark Clark Belt at dinner right at the back country. The role is used to cut the tobacco leaves and so on. Well I don't roll is probably not a very handy. Tool. So people began to reflect on a

person's understanding or his ability to catch on to what was going on. By saying if he didn't really prove to be too sharp that he was pretty dull dull as a fro. And then there's a lot of expressions that are then used through this area that people other places use to. Busy isn't the end. I don't recall. I remember one was that I used to hear a good deal that I no longer hear. I haven't seen you I haven't seen a visitor since heck was a pup. I have no idea what that means. I doubt anybody do it around here that uses it if they ever do but that evidently means a very long time

and I don't know so-and-so from Adams all Fox. Here again Adams all Fox is a simile that escapes me completely. But that in to write things like this that can be preserved. I wouldn't want to just really get worked up about it. But if riders of body and stature can use an occasional simile or metaphor or expression that is a sort of old folk expression bloke saying I think it's good. I think it should be done. We don't all need to talk exactly the same way and use exactly the same expressions to be united people and so I rather admire that.

And Bobby ends work is popular with. Like like other crafts right. Well yeah superstitions. I guess you could say belong in a separate category almost among themselves there are a lot of those around. And this certainly was a problem on Oh I haven't read about it or heard about it in a long time until Bob Van's book was published. But. This this type of writing I think. It means a good bit and sense of educating people to something of their past

that otherwise they may never have any opportunity to find out about. Not to say that folklore and folk sayings and folk superstitions are are intended to be factual. I think people have to keep that in mind as they read the material. But sometimes this kind of writing is is more creative and more interesting than simply referring to the fact I think of Bob Hannan for instance had taken the story of the lion Clarence. Which is the basic theme of the book and simply narrated the story of how in 1896 the first set of law of live Quinn truthless arrived here in Mayfield in the United States the first

state in the United States and had given the factual history of that event. It would have been interesting to a great many people. But I think the way she dealt with the overall story and and and created some very strong plots and very good Siad Barre so to speak. I think that I think it's educational as well as entertain. And I'm I'm really pleased with the way that when I believe that's the first quote unquote His clothes are all novel that she has attempted. But I certainly hope it won't be the last one. I think there's a lot of other stories around here that she could. Use.