Motta
This is Daniel Motta.I am interviewing Mr. Bob Hattaway at his business, Adult Toy Storage, in Altamonte Springs.To start, Mr. Hattaway, could you tell me where you were born?
Hattaway
I was born in the city of Altamonte Springs in 1936, which today, the location is on Lake Orienta, which at one time was called Orienta Ferneries, later in years.And the Hattaway family lived on that property for a number of years, probably 30 years, or something.
Motta
So you were born on the property?
Hattaway
I was born on the property, yeah.At that time, when I was born, 1936, a lot of people did not go to hospitals.They couldn’t afford it.So I was born at home.
Motta
And could you tell me a little about the neighborhood, the house, property?
Hattaway
The property, basically—it was 150 acres of property.Thirty acres of the property was into a fernery slat shed growing tropical foliage and plants, mostly asparagus plumosus fern, and then another fern called leatherleaf fern, which came on in a later date, which became very popular in the flower industry.But we were growing plants and flowers and a lot of different products back at that time, to sell.So it was a very rural area.Altamonte Springs had one road leading in and one road leading out, and it was Highway 436 [Florida State Road 436].If you wanted to go shopping, you would get on 436 and travel [US Route] 17-92 to Downtown Orlando, because there were no stores in Altamonte Springs, or Casselberry.You had to go to Orlando to shop.
Motta
And I imagine 436 looked a lot different then.
Hattaway
Yeah, 436 was probably a two-lane road, and going through the middle of Altamonte Springs was a four-lane road divided in the middle by two very large rows of oak trees, from about where the Altamonte Mall is today, all the way to the railroad track in Altamonte Springs.That’s going from west to the east.
Motta
Were any of these paved roads?
Hattaway
It was paved, yeah.Sometimes.But Maitland Avenue also was there, which was a two-lane road itself.But very rural.I mean, there was really nothing out here.
Motta
And you said, on the property, only part of it was ferns?
Hattaway
Yeah.Of the hundred acres, a lot of it, 30-something acres of it was slat shed fern itself, and the other was open fields, and we were growing plumosus or podocarpus, and were using that.We’d grow the podocarpus and cut that as cuttings and ship that to the northern market, to flower shops as well.So, and everything at that time, back when the fern business back in the [19]50s, and [19]60s, most of the freight was moved by rail, and not by truck.So there was a big depot in Altamonte Springs, and the depot itself, the major portion of it, was people like us—Hattaways, Casselberrys, Vaughns, etc.—shipping boxes and boxes and boxes of cut fern to the northern market, to flower shops.
Motta
And that would all take place here, or would it go to Sanford first, and go from there?
Hattaway
No.
Motta
Just directly?
Hattaway
There was a direct stop in Altamonte Springs and a direct stop in Casselberry, and also a direct stop in Longwood and Maitland.So they were little whistle stops, but most of the time they were stopping to pick up a product, like the fern product, and then some passengers.But there were no 7-Elevens, and there was absolutely nothing out here at that particular point in time.Not any tourists as well.
Motta
About how many families lived in this area, you think?
Hattaway
Well, you know, on the Orienta Fernery side, which was known as the Royal Ferneries at one time, there were probably—it was a housing development there, row houses for the migrant workers, or the workers, to live on the premise and work there, and [inaudible] 40-something houses with a church, [inaudible] on Hattaway Drive today, this long, long, long, then gone?.But they provided housing for people, and they were not great to live in and to be able to work.
Motta
And did your father build the houses and the church?
Hattaway
No, those were built back in the—golly.My father went in, they bought from Hibbard Casselberry, 1951.They bought what at that time they called the Royal Ferneries, and they bought that from Hibbard, and Hibbard bought it, I think, in 1946—‘45.And then my father worked for Mr. Casselberry, and my grandfather worked for Mr. Casselberry, and my two uncles, also, worked for Mr. Casselberry. All of them in stooped labor, cutting ferns by hand and taking it to the packinghouses, and then being able to ship the product to the northern market.And there were no Kmarts, and there were no big Walmarts, and those kind of things.Flower shops were flourishing.That was the mainstay of the fern business at that time, corsages and bouquets and things of that nature.
Motta
So what year did you say your father procured the property?
Hattaway
He bought the property from Hibbard in 1951.
Motta
Okay. So, when you were born, he was working in the industry?He just didn’t…
Hattaway
He was working with Mr. Casselberry.Yeah.
Motta
Okay. And what were your experiences like as a child? Did you also have any contact with—did you work in fields at all?
Hattaway
Yes, yes.Oh, yeah[laughs]. Those were wonderful moments.[laughs]
Motta
Could you tell me a little about them?
Hattaway
Out there with stooped labor, working in the—I would work in the summer months when I was out of school, high school and grammar school.I would pull weeds in the fernery.And they would hire a lot of young people like myself at that time—ten, twelve years old.And our job was—the fernery was full of weeds of various kinds, and so we’d line up ten, fifteen, or twenty of us in rows.We’d go down through and pull the weeds out of each row.That was a terrible job.I knew when that was happening I didn’t want to stay in the nursery business, or fern business.I darn sure didn’t want to be a stooped laborer in the field.But that’s where my family came from.I mean, they worked for every Casselberry.And Hibbard brought my grandfather and my father both out of the fernery, out of the field, and put my grandfather in charge of the fernery over[?]—which was the Royal Fernery at that time, Casselberry Ferneries as well—and put my grandfather in charge of that side of the fernery, and then my father went over to the main plant over in the middle of Casselberry, and he became the main foreman over there, in an office, working for Mr. Casselberry.And so Mr. Casselberry brought him out of the field, very little education, and put him in charge of a number of people.At that time, you know, back in the ‘40s and ‘50s, the fern business, it was a big business, and they were employing probably two, three hundred people.So it was a lot of people depending on the Casselberrys and the Foleys[?] in the fern business at that time as well.
Motta
So when you were in the fields doing that work that you loved so much, were you paid for that, or was that just something expected of you?
Hattaway
Oh, yeah.Yeah, we got paid for it.
Motta
Do you remember…
Hattaway
Twenty-five cent an hour.And I was, you know—I’ve always loved to work.That’s been my mainstay, and I’ve got great work habits.And I think most people back then did.I’m not sure what they have today.I know it’s not as good as it was back then.But Mr. Casselberry provided a lot of employment for young people when school was out, that they could work during the summer.And pulling those weeds was part of what you did.And I would get out, and we’d help with the repair of the slat sheds, repairing the irrigation systems, just to keep the fernery back in good repair, so we could grow the fern itself.But it’s hard work.
Motta
I’d imagine.
Hattaway
But, you know, I did that every summer.When I got out of school, the following week I’d be working in the field.
Motta
Could you tell me a little about where you went to school?Did you—high school, or did you go to college after?
Hattaway
Sure.I went to Lyman High School, grades one through twelve.I went to Winter Park High School the 10th grade to the 11th grade, and then came back to Lyman for the 12th grade itself.So I was actually grade one through ten at Lyman High School, the old school.
Motta
It wasn’t called Lyman High School then?
Hattaway
It was called Lyman High School, yeah.
Motta
But it was one through twelve?
Hattaway One through twelve, yeah.There were, when I graduated, in 1954—’55 there were twelve boys and one girl in my class.Thirteen class.And the class behind us, I think, had 25.So it was a very small school back then, and grade one was, you know—all the way through.And I think they stopped that just before—no, it was still going on in 1955.It was still grade one through twelve, I think, at that time.But Lyman today is probably graduating one thousand kids at one whack.And you got Oviedo, and etc., etc.Great changes, but, you know, we had small classes.Probably the max in a class was 20, 25.Teachers were very personal.Teachers knew us all, and it turned out, had a good education.When I graduated from Lyman, I think there was only two people in our class went to college, and the rest of us went into the work field.And I immediately, when I graduated, I started buying real estate, starting my own fernery.
Motta
Graduated from high school?
Hattaway
Yeah, high school.I didn’t go to college. Didn’t go to college.And I was working—I got a job in Winter Garden with Continental Can Company, and they were making small cans to put orange juice into, frozen orange juice, and that was a—you’d put three cups of water with it…
Motta
The concentrate?
Hattaway
Concentrate, and do all those.I worked there at night, the night shift from 3:30 ‘til 12:00 or something of that nature.And then during the day, I bought a piece of property in Oviedo on Chapman Avenue[sic], and built my first nursery under oak trees.And I started my own business back in 1956—I guess ’57, ’58, something like that.
Motta
Where did you say the canning company was?
Hattaway
Continental Can Company.
Motta
Where was that?
Hattaway
In Winter Garden.
Motta
Oh, okay.So those…
Hattaway
It was a big canning company.
Motta
Pretty far from each other, the two?
Hattaway
I’m sorry?
Motta
The two jobs you had were pretty far from each other.
Hattaway
Yeah.Yeah.One was working in the can company, the other was working in the field, in a nursery.And started my own place.I bought an oak tree hammock.And we’d found by that time, in the nursery business, in the fern business, that slat sheds were very expensive, and you couldn’t keep them up because of cost, wood rot, and it became—they were falling down.So, we started…
Motta
How often do you have to replace those?
Hattaway
Oh, you were constantly working on the building, on the fields themselves, and you’re talking about 30 acres of slat shed.Just slats are, you know, four inches wide.And sometimes they would kind of fall down.If you’re tall like I am, you’d run into a slat and hit your head and etc.So we went from the slat sheds into buying oak tree hammocks, and putting fern under the oak tree hammocks.And we also started planting in the ferneries—the old ferneries, oak trees inside of the fernery itself—to grow up through the slat sheds for shade.You were looking for a certain amount of shade.And so we started that, and that’s where the slat sheds kind of disappeared, and everybody, especially Mr. Casselberry, his whole side was nothing but oak trees.
Motta
Oh, really?
Hattaway
The side we had, and my father and grandfather had, over on Orienta Fernery side, they planted orange trees, which was a really, really smart move, because they always had orange trees—they also had the product of fern under that.The problem was, when they planted the orange trees, they budded the orange tree to Valencia, navels, or whatever it’s going to be.When they sprayed the orange tree spray on the fern, to kill worms, etc., it killed the buds on all the orange trees.Ended up with 25 acres of sour orange trees, and there’s not a lot of market for sour orange trees.So it was just a good concept, but it didn’t work.
Motta
So, by that time, there was pretty much the natural solution of replacing the slats with the trees?Like, is that what all the fern owners pretty much moved to?
Hattaway
Yeah.Yeah.Everybody was doing that.Everybody was doing that.
Motta
Okay.
Hattaway
Fern business was big not only here in Central Florida, in the Orlando area, Altamonte Springs, Casselberry, Fern Park, but it was big up in Crescent City and Pierson, which it still is today.
Motta
Yeah.
Hattaway
It’s the mainstay up there as well.
Motta
Was there any kind of rivalry between, like, here and Volusia County?
Hattaway
Oh, yeah.Oh my god.Yeah.Yeah.They would—and I’ve heard my father talk about the stories that the price of the ferns had become very cheap—and so the industry got together and met someplace up in DeLand or something, some little community, with the main growers all meeting at one concept.
Woman
Excuse me, do you need anything before I go to lunch?
Hattaway
No, I’m good.
Unidentified
Okay.
Hattaway
I’m good.They all went back to discuss the pricing, and I guess they were trying to do what you’d call the price fixing.But the typical agriculture business, they all got together, they all decided, shook hands, and this is what we’re gonna charge to the fern.All of them couldn’t wait to run back to the phone and call their customers in Chicago[, Illinois] or New York or where it is, and say, “Hattaway’s going up on the price of his fern by three cent.I’m gonna stay the same price” or “I’m gonna drop the price.”It never worked.And so they cut their throat time and time again.But there was great rivalry, especially, that I’m familiar with, between the Barnetts, the Casselberrys, the Vaughns.And there was a rivalry there because Mr. Casselberry started the tax-free town of Casselberry, and the Barnetts were a big, very wealthy family, had a lot of ferneries in the Fern Park, Casselberry area, and they didn’t like Mr. Casselberry, because he was so aggressive, and he was a new guy in town.And they got into a hell of a rivalry.So it was always a shootout.
Motta
And the Vaughns, you said?
Hattaway
Vaughns.
Motta
They were also in Seminole County already.
Hattaway
That’s right.Yeah.They were up in Casselberry—which you would never say “Casselberry,” you would say “Fern Park”—which today is the location of the Home Depot.
Motta
Near Lake Concord?
Hattaway
On 17-92 and Concord.That area.So yeah, there was a real rivalry going on between the small families with the Casselberrys.And those three, those were the three players.So.
Motta
And this was like the ‘50s, early ‘60s?
Hattaway
Yeah, ‘40s and ‘50s.
Motta
So when did the fern industry kind of start slowing down, in the area?
Hattaway
Oh, god.My father—I read this this morning—and it had so many ups and downs that I wasn’t even aware of—when I read his notes.And the, you know, just the price of fuel became so high, and labor became so expensive, that we really saw it when my father bought the place in 1951 from Hibbard, like 130 acres, Orienta Ferneries.He, within five years, was subdividing the fernery.And he became involved in real estate, which was a really smart move.
Motta
And these, the plots, were they designed for the houses and also, like, partially for ferns?Like, if somebody wanted to grow, like, a little on the side…
Hattaway
No. That was way before that ever happened.
Motta
Oh, okay.
Hattaway
That was a lot of little nurseries that were back in the ‘20s and ‘30s.
Motta
So this was purely real estate?
Hattaway
Yeah. purely real estate.Yeah.He started taking the fernery, which had a hundred and some odd acres, and started selling the land off itself to people that wanted to move.By this time, Altamonte Springs and Casselberry and the community started growing, and so people were starting to migrate, if you want to say that, from Orlando out into the country.And we were selling real estate lots on Lake Orienta—that was a fernery—and we took some of the slat sheds down and were selling real estate lots 100 feet wide, anywhere from 250 to 300 feet deep, for $2,000, for a lot, on paved road.
Motta
Around what year was this?
Hattaway
In the ‘50s—’58, somewhere along there, ’57, ’58.That area where Hattaway Drive is today, that drive that was all Orienta Ferneries, all the property that my father bought from Mr. Casselberry.But he went in like Hibbard.Hibbard went into the real estate business big time.He had a lot of land.And he saw the handwriting on the wall itself.The fern business was just not thriving.There was—and, a lot of artificial stuff coming down the line.People were using podocarpus.People were using [?], using a lot of fillers instead of using the fern.It was cheaper to buy a filler and put inside, in that corsage, for the price.
Motta
Oh.I was about to ask what were some of the reasons it kind of went down.That was pretty much just the artificial—were other parts of the country…
Hattaway
It wasn’t artificial, then.It was just shrubs and things they were cutting that they could stick into a bouquet of flowers.Bouquet of flowers won’t last, you know, a week, four or five days.So they could take sphagnum moss, or they could take a ligustrum, or something that’s leafy and green, and put it in a corsage at a cheaper rate than they could a sprig of fern, or a sprig of leatherleaf fern.
Motta
But if people did want those kind of ferns, were they still dependent on this area, or were there other parts of the country, do you know of?
Hattaway
Not from what I remember.It was mainly this area, plus the Pierson-Crescent City area, that was the mainstays.Later on, it became, everybody started to go off—not everybody.Several of the nurserymen started going off to Costa Rica and islands, and growing fern down there.In fact, one of the largest growers, probably still today, moved from Zellwood.Name was John Marcell.He moved to Costa Rica, and the last I heard, and I haven’t seen John in a long time, he had over 1,000 acres of saran shade cloth, growing leatherleaf fern, and ferns shipping all over the world.Actually, I’ve been told he controls the fern market in Costa Rica.This[?] big.[laughs]
Motta
Was Zellwood into the fern industry, or were they in other agriculture?
Hattaway
And actually Zellwood was—it was a small little town, still today.Marcell was the main grower at that time of leatherleaf fern.Went over to Lockhart, there was another grower over there, name of Joe Wofford, and he had a small fernery, probably ten or fifteen acres.He was growing leatherleaf fern.And Apopka itself had started transitioning over from the fern business—the Ustlers, Mahaffeys—golly, some other families there.But they were more into the tropical foliage business, and growing—building—greenhouses, taking slat sheds and growing tropical plants, which were now becoming very popular.So they shifted from the fern business over to the tropical plant business.And I shifted, also.I saw the handwriting on the wall.The one I built over in Oviedo, myself, it was only small as ten acres.But I sold that to another fernery guy out of Crescent City, took the money of that and started buying property in Altamonte Springs, off Hattaway Drive, and built my first greenhouses.And I went in the greenhouse business.So I shifted from the fern business over to the tropical foliage business.
Motta
More broad[sic].
Hattaway
Yeah. broader opportunity of selling to a greater amount of people.And my first greenhouse I built was out of used lumber, and I took a saw mill myself, and cut the two-by-fours and four-by-fours out of used lumber, and built my first building, which was 30 feet wide and a hundred feet long, which I have pictures of it there.And, gosh, over the years, became a pretty good size.[laughs]
Motta
And where did you say this first one was?
Hattaway
It was over just off of Hattaway Drive there in Altamonte Springs.Small place.
Motta
Okay.So how long were you—your property in Chapman, you said it was on Chapman Road?
Hattaway
Yeah.I was over there—I was in Chapman, probably, I had that nursery probably ten years.A good while, long enough that I’d made enough money working at night.At the Continental Can Company, they were paying me union wages, and I never joined the union.But I was making big bucks, and I was able to buy the land and do the things I’d need to do to get a business going.And it was pretty successful, but when I had the opportunity of selling that property to another person, then take that money and come back over into Altamonte, and go into a different business—although I was still in the agriculture business, it was a good shift.I ended up—well, the fernery there had 20 acres there on Hattaway Drive, and greenhouses—had probably ten acres of greenhouses there.And grew there for a number of years.To build the buildings, [?], build the buildings, I was—to get the lumber for that place—I was going, also to get the used lumber, I was going up and down the railroad tracks.They were taking down power poles and telephone poles, and I would cut the telephone poles and take the arms.At that time, they had arms going out with wires on them, and those were like three-by-fours, and they were like eight feet long, and I would use those for posts, as I gathered used stuff to build my whole nursery.
Motta
Were they just, like, the ones that they left there?
Hattaway
Yeah.
Motta
Was it okay that you took those?[laughs]
Hattaway
Yeah. definitely.They knew I was doing it.They were taking them down.
Motta
And, so, you pretty much built all those house, the original houses, yourself?It sounds like you’re a jack of all trades.
HattawayI am. [laughs]
Motta
Did you enjoy the growing aspect?Like, did you have a green thumb, or was it like…
Hattaway
Oh, yeah.
Motta
Did you enjoy the business?
Hattaway
I enjoyed the business, and I definitely did not have a green thumb.But I enjoyed the business, and I didn’t know anything else.What else could a guy do?There wasno—there was nothing out here.You either worked for the Hattaways, you worked for the Vaughns, you worked for the Casselberrys, or you worked for the Bradshaws in the grove business.This was agriculture community.There was nothing to do.Or, work at the dog track, something like that.So it was, you know—happy as a pig in slop.[laughs] What else can you do?This is what it is.
Motta
This might be going back a little bit, but did your family have any influence on early Altamonte Springs, like developing and like with the government?
Hattaway
No, my father did.He was elected a constable.He worked for Hibbard.And when Hibbard incorporated the City of Casselberry—I’ve heard my mother and father talk about that the night that they did the incorporation, they had a town hall meeting before it was ever incorporated in Mr. Casselberry’s office.There was a—had to have a certain amount of people in the meeting to have a quorum and to be able to appeal to the legislature for incorporation.
Motta
And this—as a town?
Hattaway
As a town.As a town.And they didn’t have four[?] people…
Motta
This was around 1940?
Hattaway
In the room, so my father left the meeting, went home—we lived on Concord Drive—and brought my mother to the meeting, and she voted, and that’s how, that was part of the process of incorporating the City of Casselberry.My father was elected in 1941 as the first constable of the City of Casselberry.And it was a, I guess, kind of a window-dressing job, but he was constable for eleven years in the City of Casselberry.
Motta
And that’s kind of like the police chief of the town?
Hattaway
That’s right.Yeah.He was the police chief.[laughs] I don’t think he even had a badge.[laughs] But that’s old time there.
Yeah.But you know, again, you know, this was small town, U.S.A.Hibbard would have—and I can remember this so well—he would, at Christmas time, he would have a big Christmas party on the front lawn of the offices, and for all the employees that worked for Mr. Casselberry, his entire operation.And he would get every kid a gift at Christmas time.And this was black, white, whatever it was be.He would always throw this big Christmas party.Big deal.You’d either get a knife or get a yo-yo or something like that.[laughs] But, and he was quite a—he was a good man.A lot of people, you know, just—vision, had great vision.And smart, wasn’t hard to talk to.He was a young man at that time.He was just good to us.He was very good for the community.Barnetts won’t tell you that.And the Vaughns won’t tell you that.But the Hattaways damn sure will tell you that real quick.
Motta
Did you know Mr. Casselberry personally, as a young man?
Hattaway
Mm-hm.Yeah.I knew him.He, and especially Leonard [Casselberry]. I don’t know if you’ve interviewed Leonard, Jane [Casselberry]?
Motta
Yeah. about a week or two ago.
Hattaway
Leonard used to come to my mother and father’s house, and Leonard would love to read comic books.[laughs] He—he wasn’t too energetic.[laughs] But he would come in and read the comic books, and Jane—they lived over off of the old race track road [Dog Track Road], at the horse track.He probably told you that’s what they built there, as well.
Motta
Yeah.Was knowing the founder and, I guess, owner at that time of Casselberry, was that like a—in this year, that seems kind of, like, strange, or maybe not strange, but—was it, did it seem like a big deal, or was he just like any normal citizen?
Hattaway
No. It was—to the normal person, it was probably a big deal.But because my father worked for him, and with him, I would go into my father’s office, and Mr. Casselberry’s office was right there.And he had a big picture window that he could look out into my father’s office, and then be able to look out into the grading there.They graded fern—longs, shorts, mediums, whatever you were looking for in the size of fern to ship.And, you know, he was just there all the time.He had a—I can remember so well—he had a big, big tarpon fish mounted in his office in back there.He would go to—my father, in fact, I’ve seen some pictures of him—he would go to the flower shows in Chicago or New York, where they might be, and Martha [Casselberry], his wife at that time—he married three times—Martha would wear, he would wear white riding pants—horses, cows?
Motta
Mm-hm.
Hattaway
And boots, real knee boots up there.With a big coat on.All in white.And a fern spray on this thing.Promoter.
Motta
Yeah. representing his…
Hattaway
Yeah.He was a promoter, as well.Promoted, and he had a knack about doing that, much better than the Vaughns and the Barnetts, as well.But, yeah, he was a good man.I can’t tell you that enough times.
Motta
So you started getting into the nursery, would it be considered nursery business or the greenhouse…
Hattaway
Greenhouses.Yeah.
Motta
How long were you involved with that before you looked more towards retail?
Hattaway
I started in the fern business when I got out of high school, 1954-55.I was in the fern business by 1960, with the fernery over in Chapman Avenue in Oviedo.And then started the first greenhouses and then grew that business.And I went out of the business in 1988, of the foliage business.So I graduated, basically, from the fern business over to the foliage, from the foliage into the foliage business itself.Ended up with this place, which is 500,000 square feet of what was greenhouses.But I built steel structure buildings, I told you.And today it’s now the steel structure buildings that are storing boats, cars, and recreational vehicles.1974-75, I bought a farm in Puerto Rico, and I started out with thirty, three thousand, building 3,000 square feet—300—yeah, 3,000, 30-feet wide and 100-feet long.And I bought a farm in Puerto Rico that was 80 hectares of greenhouses.And I was shipping fern or foliage plants from Puerto Rico, by sea freight, to Europe.So I moved from 33,000 square feet, to a farm here, and a farm in Puerto Rico.And I farmed in Puerto Rico, foliage plants, for twenty years, twenty-two years.
Motta
Did you sell that land, or still…
Hattaway
Yeah, I did.I sold it.I sold it.I wanted to go out of the nursery business.My brother, and then, by then graduated from University of Florida, had a degree in horticulture, and he wanted the nursery in Puerto Rico, so I sold the nursery to him in Puerto Rico.And he farmed in Puerto Rico for, I don’t know, another eight,-nine years.And we had three major hurricanes hitting back to back.First time we had insurance.We rebuilt.Second time, had insurance.Insurance company went belly up, and we rebuilt.And the third time, we said, “That’s it.”And we sold it.And then I was here all the time, and I just started converting all the buildings over to what you see today.
Motta
So about what time did you decide you wanted to get out of that business?
Hattaway
1988.
Motta
Okay.
Hattaway
Yeah.I already had another vision, what you see today.
Motta
Works out for you.
Hattaway
Yeah, it worked out.Yes.Yeah.It really—what was my whole plan at that time, was—I had roughly 30 acres here—was to add on a trailer park in front of me, which today is a public shopping center.And I was trying to buy their property, and I wanted to build a big industrial park, 40-45-acre industrial park.And I couldn’t buy that trailer park, and made them some ridiculous offers.I’m glad they didn’t take it, ‘cause the market went to hell in a handbag.I ended up, you know, basically looking at what they were doing, and I said, “If they will pay $35.00 a month to park a boat outside in an open field, with grass and grasshoppers, what will they pay to put it inside the building?”And from there, you know, it grew from there.So, in 1988, I was in the foliage business.In 2012, I’m now in the storage business.And the place is doing fairly well.
Motta
That sounds like a pretty brilliant idea, just converting the fields to this.Do you know if any other growers have took that...
Hattaway
No, no.They can’t.They all built buildings that were not convertible.They couldn’t do what I did.In fact, I saw Earl Vaughn two weeks ago. Had a funeral up in Apopka, and went over and we were talking—and I know Earl.Great guy.I like Earl.I don’t know if you’ve met him or not.
Motta
No.
Hattaway
You need to meet him.You need to meet Earl Vaughn.
Motta
I would love to.
Hattaway
Vaughn Greenhouses.They’re in the book.He’s no longer in the foliage business, but he has a farm, a foliage place up on [Florida State Road] Highway 46 up in Sanford.And saw him, and I said something, and he said, “Hattaway, what you did is brilliant.”He said, “I’ve been trying to do the same thing, except I can’t get my zoning.I’m in the Wekiva [River] Protection Area.”And so, he can do nothing other than what he’s doing.So, you know, fortunately, when I started building the buildings, I then started working politically to change the zoning on this place.And so I did it back early.If I tried to do it today, I’d probably never get it done.
Motta
Are you still involved in local politics?
Hattaway
I just write checks.[laughs]
Motta
[laughs] Well…
Hattaway
No, I’m still involved.I have a lot of friends in the political scene.I help them.You know, I served eight years in the [Florida] Legislature.Loved it, and had fun with it.Eight years at Orlando International Airport.That’s a full-time, non-paid political job, and did that for eight years.
Motta
And what was your—for the airport, what was your…
Hattaway
I was the—actually, I was chairman for four years, and vice chairman for two years, and on the board for eight.And the governor appointed me.Lawton Chiles appointed me.And so, I served there, and when I went on the board, there was $10 million worth of construction going at the Orlando International Airport.When I left, eight years later—yeah, eight years later it was—it was $500 million worth of construction going.And they had another $500 million committed to build the south terminal, and the new board decided that they didn’t want to do that, and so the new board today is trying to figure out how they can get the money to build the south terminal for international rivals.And, you know, that was a group of Democrats—John Rich, Bill Miller, Howard McNelty, myself—four really strong Democrats.We got in and got aggressive, said, “This place is gonna grow.”And we went from 22 million passengers—eight years later, it was like 31 million passengers.That’s growth.And all we did, we went out and started marketing the Orlando International Airport, as a board, as a group of people, with the mayor of Orlando, Linda Hood, and the county chairman, Linda Chapin.And we were a hell of a team, and we moved around this country, all around this world, basically.And brought airlines in, British Airlines[sic], Southwest [Airlines], Virgin [Atlantic].Those were all new carriers that came in that eight-year period of time.
Motta
Were you involved in the [Orlando-] Sanford [International] Airport or the…
Hattaway
That was my first venture.Back when we did that one, Kay Shoemaker was the chairman, and John—what was the name—Steve, he was the executive director.I can’t think of his last name now.But he came to me, I was a new board member, and he said, “You know, we need to go after international passengers for the Sanford airport.”So we went to Kay Shoemaker and talked Kay into letting us fly, I think it was, Toronto, Canada.And the concept that Steve had—and I was just the baggage, went along with him—that we need to go to Holiday Travel, and talk to them about direct flights from Toronto to Sanford, and not from Toronto to Orlando.And we met with the Holiday Travel, they thought it was a good idea, and he was very much in favor of it, but the issue was that the travel time coming from the Sanford Airport to [Walt] Disney [World], you didn’t have the 414, I think it is, or 4…
Motta
Oh,[State Road] 408, [State Road] 417?
Hattaway
417, yeah, coming across the lake.You didn’t have that segment built, and, so, that was a stopping point.When that segment was built, Holiday Travel and a lot of those guys started flying into Sanford, and bypassing Orlando.Well, in the meantime, I moved from the Sanford Airport board, over to the Orlando Airport.[laughs] So, it was quite a conflict there for a while.[laughs] And Larry Dale—and I don’t know if you know Larry—but Larry Dale and I had some real knockdowns and drag-outs about the airports.He’s the executive director of the Sanford Airport.
Motta
Oh, yeah?
Hattaway
Yeah.Yeah.
Motta
I’m curious how you, how did you even get involved with the airport, like the industry?
Hattaway
The governor.
Motta
Okay.
Hattaway
The governor.Yeah, I—when Lawton was elected—Lawton Chiles—I’d been in the Legislature.I knew him very well, and I worked with him for his election.And he was elected.He appointed me to the lottery commission.I didn’t believe in the lottery.I didn’t like the lottery.When it was approved, I was in the Legislature.I voted against it.And was opposed against it then, and Lawton told me, said, “I want you to be on that board.You’re the first Democrat to be appointed, and I want to get rid of the executive director.”I forget her name.She was really good, too.But he wanted to get rid of her and he wanted to change the entire board.He wanted to make changes.And so, I did that for a couple of years.And I was tired of it, and finally we just got enough Democrats on the board that I went to the governor, said, “I’m out of here.I don’t want to do this anymore.”In the meantime, when that happened, the [Greater Orlando] Aviation Authority thing came up available in Orlando, and I was supporting a Republican, Sue [inaudible] was her name, and Sue wanted to be appointed to the board.And I went to the governor to appoint her from Seminole County, and the governor says, “No, I’m not going to appoint a Republican.But I will appoint you if you want to take the job.”So I said, “Well, okay. I’ll do it.”
Motta
Did you have an interest in air travel?
Hattaway
Yeah, I did, because of Sanford.And I knew that it was a very, very important job.The Orlando International Airport is the economic engine that really runs this community today.And the things they’ve accomplished, and the size of the airport.This is number one around the state of Florida, certainly, that I enjoyed that.But I did, I was able to go into that segment having eight years in Tallahassee being a legislator, that I knew a little bit about politics, and I knew that a lot of my newfound friends that I found in Tallahassee, of eight years, when I was no longer elected, they didn’t know my first name or my last name.And when I was appointed to the Aviation Authority in Orlando, I told my wife, Charlotte, I said, “This is altogether different.We’re going to have a lot of brand new friends, and they’re going to love us for eight years.And when we’re gone, they won’t know our name.So we’re gonna do this different.We’re gonna do what the hell we want to do, and we’re gonna do the things that we think are right, and eight years from now, we’ll be good.”And that’s how we prefaced that.So it was fun.It was, like I said, it was a full-time—as a chairman—non-paid, political job.But would I do that again?Probably not.It was the right time.You know, I’ve been very fortunate that I’ve lived at the right time, when things were just starting to peak or things were really going smoothly, and everybody was getting along.
Motta
It seems like you’ve always been able to do what makes you happy.
Hattaway
I’ve been lucky.You’ll never sit across the table from a more blessed, lucky guy than me.Life has been good.With high school education, I’ve competed with all of them.
Motta
Work ethic.Whistling[?] away[?].
Hattaway
It’s worked out, worked out fine.[laughs] So, and I laugh about. In fact, I’ve brought my report cards in today for some reason, and I looked at those report cards, looking through stuff, and I said, “Man, I was a straight-F student.”[laughs] So, but, it’s been fun.Life’s been good, been good.
Motta
I wanted to ask you, for the Sanford Airport, when did that start becoming—when was it under construction?
Hattaway
It was, you know, it was a naval base [Naval Air Station Sanford], and then they converted over into a commercial airport, and I don’t remember the years.But I was on that board—phew.It wasn’t in the—must have been in the late ‘70s when they started converting it over.Yeah, I can’t remember the dates on that one.
Motta
So, did—it might have been the fern industry—I mean, it might have been kind of already low at that time, but was there any kind of transition?‘Cause you said the railroads, in the early days, that was like the artery.Was there, like, did the airports start to be more of a central thing with transportation?
Hattaway
With ferns, no.No.With the fern business, it became trucks.
Motta
Okay.
Hattaway
Everybody moved from the—we did some air freight, not a lot.Most of it was done by—the whole industry changed from trains and rail over to the trucking industry.So there was a—trucking lines were moving strictly either foliage plants or ferns by truck itself to the destination.The fern business itself—the labor, cost of labor, the cost of materials, the cost of land—all those things just became cost-prohibited to be able to do anything with it.You asked a question earlier about, you know, do I miss it?I loved the plant business.I really enjoyed it, and still today would like to be in the business, except I know I can’t make any money at it.And I’m not gonna fool around with something I can’t make money at as well.But, you know, the guys in Apopka and the guys that been in the fern business, and growing something, you know, a plant or product, I think they all will tell you, you know, it’s just a great place to—it’s a fun thing to do.And it’s really rewarding to put a little plant on a stem into a piece of sphagnum moss, and grow it to a finished product, and ship it.If I had a nickel for every plant that I’ve grown, I’d be a very wealthy man.Rick [Hattaway] enjoyed it.My brother enjoyed it very much.And I kept telling him, “You don’t want to go into the greenhouse business.You want to stay out of it.”My mother told me that as well.But, you know, he followed the family trade and did that as well.But, it’s a good life.It’s a good opportunity.
Motta
That whole watching something grow, that seems almost kind of like a good metaphor for your, all your business [inaudible].
Hattaway
[laughs ] Yeah.Yeah.I read an article today, an old one, gosh, about when I developed that orange grove over there, and it was—Phil [inaudible] was the city manager.It was quoting him about what I was doing over there, and how I environmentally was taking care of Lake Lotus, and all the things I did back then.But, you know, to see the growth, or where we were back in the ‘40s and ‘50s, and where we are today, people have opportunities.There were no opportunities when I was growing up.Either you worked in a fernery or you worked in an orange grove.There wasn’t high school education.People weren’t going to college.
Motta
You had to find your own…
Hattaway
You had to find your own, you had to make your own way at that particular point in time.
Motta
Since you brought that up, I’m curious what you think about how this area—I probably can’t imagine what it was like when you were a kid.What do you think?How do you think it’s progressed?Are you…
Hattaway
I’m for growth.I’m growth.Opportunities.I mean, I had a farm, sold it a couple years ago up in Alabama, little town called Opp, Alabama.And it was heavy agriculture, farming area.And today—Opp, Alabama—you can take a shotgun down the main street and not hit a soul.There’s just nothing to do there.And that’s the way it was here.The growth has been really, really, to me, healthy.It’s been giving good opportunities to people having good jobs.Our way of life—there are no poor people in this community today.You see some not as well off as others, but everybody either has a television, or everybody has food on the table.Everybody has an opportunity to make something of themselves, you see, if they want to take that opportunity.And back then, there was no opportunities.You had to make it yourself.And today there’s many doors open for employment, and it’s not all agriculture.At that time, it was.But am I in favor of growth?Absolutely.Has it been good for this community?Absolutely.Has it been good for this state?Absolutely.
Motta
Is there anything that you see in this community, that you don’t find good about—like, obviously, there’s a lot of good growth brings, but is there anything you lament that has changed, or any nostalgia?
Hattaway
I think the one problem that we have in our community is that we have not been able to keep up with the road—the growth with our road network—and mainly because of the lack of proper leadership from the Legislature.We’ve never had the political voting power to be able to build a road network they have on the south coast, South Florida—they have on the west coast.And our group has been splintered—Democrat, Republican— and many times have not worked together to have the power base in Tallahassee to get the state dollars to build—FDOT [Florida Department of Transportation]—to build our community.So we’ve not done a good job on our roads.And you have one major road going through this entire community, from Daytona Beach into Tampa, and that’s I-4.Other than that, you have very limited roads.If it wasn’t for the East-West Expressway [SR 408], the [Central Florida] Expressway Authority, we wouldn’t have any roads.So that’s been a blessing to us, but I think that’s our biggest problem.Our growth has been handled with zoning—comprehensive land plan—where the commercial’s going to be built, where the residential’s going to be built—all those things, I think, have been handled very well.We have a great water system, sewer system in Central Florida.We have all the things conducive to solid development, except the roads.And you get on these roads, and you know what it’s like.
Motta
Yeah.
Hattaway
Gridlock.
Motta
But I’m kind of surprised to hear that—weren’t a lot of the old, like ‘70s, ‘80s, ‘90s, Florida Republicans, weren’t they kind of pro-growth and infrastructure?Wouldn’t they…
Hattaway
Well, when I was in the Legislature back in the ‘70s, the [Florida] House [of Representatives] and the [Florida] Senate was controlled by the Democrats, and the Republicans were along for the ride.And then, when power shifted chains, we didn’t see a lot of growth coming here.I mean, we’ve had—I don’t want you to write this.
Motta
What’s that?
Hattaway
[laughs] I don’t want you to write this.This is off the record on this one.Yeah.
Morris
It is October 4th, 2011, and I am talking to Arthurene Wilson Cook at the Museum of Seminole County History. I am Joseph Morris, representing the Linda McKnight Batman Oral History Project for the Historical Society of Central Florida. Could you tell us about yourself?
Cook
Well, I was born in Orlando in 1930, and we lived there until I was about eleven years-old, right after Pearl Harbor, so I would say, we moved into Sanford about 1942.
And, um, I have a very clear remembrance of Pearl Harbor, because I remember being out in the yard. And my parents had company, and I went in, and they were all listening to the radio. And they were talking about the Japanese were attacking Pearl Harbor. And the next day when we went to school, they called us into the chapel, and we listened to FDR [Franklin D. Roosevelt] declare war on Japan. So I can remember that very clearly.
We moved to Sanford, and we lived on Celery Avenue. And across the street from us was the Department of Agriculture. Had their, their farm, where they raised the various types of vegetables and things, and they tested them and all that kind of stuff. And my brother and I were absolutely enthused, because right up the road about two blocks—and after our house the blocks became long—they[sic] were farms, and they had all this tilled land where the artesian wells flooded the fields and watered them from beneath, rather than on top. And you could reach down there and the artesian wells flowed all the time. Well, we thought all that sulfur water was wonderful. Then we had to live in a house that had sulfur water, and it was not wonderful. Smelled awful. [laughs] But we thought that this was new. We had never lived in the country. We had lived in town—in Orlando—so we were not used to being out, but we went all up and down the fields and cut onions out of the agriculture people’s farm, and made onion sandwiches, and were just carefree, barefooted kids having a good time.
And, then when we moved to Sanford, I was I think in the fifth grade, and we were here for several years. And then, this is the middle of World War II. And my dad had been in the Army before, and had gotten out when he married my mother in 1927. So, he was drafted. And they were not drafting fathers, but they drafted him. And we did not own a home at that time. We were renting.
And so we went back to Georgia, to Columbus, Georgia, and lived with my grandparents during World War II while he was gone. And, Georgia was—at that time, had graduated in eleven grades. So when the war was over, I was a senior in high school, and my mother and dad and my brother moved back to Daytona [Beach], and I stayed in Georgia and finished high school. So, I came back, and I didn’t want to go to school another year, so I had already finished. So, and at that point, I went—I had gone to a commercial high school, so I had typing, shorthand, bookkeeping, and how to behave like a young lady in an office and all that kind of stuff.
Cook
So I went to work. And Mom and Daddy, at that time, they had moved over to Sanford. My dad was running a furniture store for another man, called Ted Davis Furniture Company. It was right on East First Street, and part of the downtown area now. And as time went on, the man that owned it offered my dad a partnership, which he took, and this took care of—as time went on, and after we were grown and married, my brother and I bought into that, and we owned the Wilson-Maier Furniture Company.
Morris
Okay.
Cook
But, um, I can remember we lived out on the lakefront, which—there’s still a bar out there, but it was down. It was the home of the people that owned the bar, and it was a real nice home, right on the lakefront, going toward DeLand. And when the hurricane came, they were advising people to get out of places that were, you know, dangerous to stay in, because it was coming right that way. So we went down to the store and I can remember, I got up on a stack of mattresses and put something down and went to sleep. So the hurricane went right over me. I had no problem. [laughs] But I remember out West First Street, which is now that main road [State Road] 46, that goes out to the mall. And all the businesses are out there—that was all agriculture, completely, I mean fields and fields and fields of it. And, um…
Morris
What were they growing?
Cook
A lot of celery, and cabbage, and broccoli, and onions, and all that kind of stuff. And a lot of oranges, grapefruit, tangerines. I remember, I was sort of full of myself, riding with my dad one day out West First Street, and I said, you know, “This is a highly agricultural area.” He says, “Yeah, they do a bit of farming, too.” [laughs] So, but, uh, it was just a neat place to grow up in. The class that I would have graduated from—with—in Seminole High School, when I came back, since I had been here for several years with them, they sort of just wrapped me into that class, so that I had to go to all, everything, just like I had gone to school here. So it was a nice place to grow up. And—stop for a minute.
Morris
Sure thing. Please go on, ma’am.
Cook
All right, well after high school, I went to work for my dad in the furniture store, and, um, I was not very businesslike nor did I feel like it was—I just did not do well, so he fired me. [laughs]
Morris
Your father fired you?
Cook
My father fired me. And I went to the employment agency and they sent me to Florida Fashions, which was right there on First Street in the 300 block. And it was a mail-order company for all kinds of clothes, and it was something to where everybody and anybody that could type had a job there. You just sat down and you typed out all—the order and who you will send it to. And it wasn’t much of a job, but anyway, you typed all day and it was downtown, and you know you could—at lunch, you could go downtown and have lunch, and all that kind of stuff. Anyway, I finally went to work for, um, it was the sporting goods people. That was downstairs from Florida Fashions and I was their bookkeeper, and this was right across the street from our store. So, um, I was working and waiting on people when I wasn’t busy doing keeping books, and the owner came in one day and he told me, he said, “Arthurene, I’m going to have to let you go.” And I said, you know—my first thought was, “What have I done?” He said, “There is no fault of yours. I will give you a very good recommendation.” Well, he said, “My brother-in-law has moved down here and I have to give him a job, and I can’t keep both of you.”
So at that, I went back to the employment agency, and I got, they sent me to Family Loan Company. Well, I went up there and they wanted to know if I could take shorthand, and I could, and type and books and wait on the customers there.
And I worked there until my first child was born. And that was about three years later. And, um, I married in 1950, and I had two little boys, David and Dan. And, in the process my husband came home one day and said he wanted a divorce. And, um, so, as time went on—didn’t take very long. Back then if you agreed and he agreed and they were going to do whatever, you could have a divorce in nothing flat. So I had my two little boys, and I had moved home with my mom and daddy.
And I got a job at the courthouse with the tax collector’s office, and I worked there for a number of years. And I always said when I got out of high school that it didn’t matter what kind of job I would get, but just something that didn’t have anything to do with money. So every job I ever had had something to do with money. [laughs]
And, then, a friend of mine whose husband worked for the railroad, I had been best friends with her ever since she had come to town. And I went over and a guy that I knew from high school, just very briefly—matter of fact, I was dating his best friend, and I really didn’t know anything about him, and he asked me out. And I said, “Well, you”—he said, well, you know, like going to the beach or going to the movies, or something. We went out to dinner and all, and I said, “Well yes, I would like to go, but,” I said, “I can’t always get a babysitter. There will be times that I would have to take my two boys with me.” He said, “Well, that’s not a problem. I like children.” So we started going together, and we went to the beach, and he reached over and put his hand on my leg, and I said, “Move your hand.” And he said, “Well, somebody thinks that I was their daddy.” I said, “I don’t care what they think. Move it.” [laughs] Anyway, we went together for a year, and we married in 1955, and we have been married a little more than 56 years. So I think it’s going to take. I think it’s going to. [laughs]
Morris
Crossed fingers?
Cook
Yeah. [laughs] So, but, to go back to our, um, what it was like around here. There was a division of the black and white communities. And there were only three really big companies that people could go to work for, and feel like, that they could probably retire from that. And that was Chase & Company, who—they raised all sorts of things, and vegetables of all kinds, celery being the main crop. And—but they did fruits and all sorts of vegetables, and cabbage, and carrots. You name it. The fields were everywhere. Matter of fact, when we lived out on the lakefront, the field behind us was—well, as far as you could see back toward First Street. Whatever they had was growing there, the man would always—there was some man that he rented the fields out to other people that actually didn’t own a farm. But they would—this was big, you know, large farming, a lot of it. And they would always say to my mother, “Whatever you need out of here, take it.” So if it was green beans, we had green beans. And if it was cabbage, you know, whatever, we had.
And to go back just a little ways, but—probably never get this transcribed. When I was growing up during the [Great] Depression, I was never aware of being poor, or not having anything, because nobody had anything to speak of. People didn’t own—very few people owned their own homes. Everybody worked. And, I mean, like my parents when the Depression came along—they had a thousand dollars in the bank. They got a penny. And, I mean, you know, but, I remember I got a bike, and I knew my daddy had redone a bike, you know, a secondhand bike, but it never bothered me. I got a bike. I didn’t care.
But, it was, after the war, there was a lot of boom going on and building houses and things, so there was lots of work for people. And I know when Walter [Cook] and I got married, we actually bought a house. The Navy was leaving here at that point, or they had gotten—they had built houses in the Wynwood section off 25th street, between there and 46 going toward the east coast. And in that area there, they had two lots of houses that they had built to rent to Navy people. And they quit renting them, redid them, and we bought one of them, where we lived for 31 and a half years. And we built onto it in every direction, but we lived there for a long time. But, you know, the downtown was just about all there was. When you got off as far as French Avenue—that was almost getting in the country.
And like I said about coming from Orlando, you would run into Maitland, and see a sign that said, “Ye Town of Maitland, County of Orange.” And I always thought at—so quaint. I just looked for it every time. And then when you got to Longwood, it was just a crossroads with filling station. I mean, there was nothing out there, absolutely nothing.
Morris
Not even agriculture?
Cook
I don’t remember much in that area, and of course, I didn’t do a whole lot in Longwood at that point. Never did. And you know, whatever shopping we ever did, you went to Orlando to buy it. When I first got out of high school, this friend and I—both of us worked, and we worked Saturday morning, and then the office closed at noon. And we would get on the Greyhound bus and go to Orlando, and do our shopping right there on Orange Avenue, have lunch, and then we’d get on the bus and come back home that night. And didn’t think a thing about it. We even went to Jacksonville one day and visited a friend that had gotten married, and went early on a Saturday morning and came back Saturday night. You know, the bus was the way to go.
But, uh, I was still working at the courthouse when Walter and I got married. And he was working for the railroad, and he worked at night. And back then I worked in the tax collector’s office, because they hired me because I was a fast typist. And I did all the—typed up all the tag numbers and who they belonged to. So then, when all the tax bills were written out—handwritten—the legal descriptions, the whole nine yards was handwritten.
So up when it was time to do like tags for Chase & Company—which they would have hundreds, because those little trucks that go back and forth across the highway, they have to have a special tag that they cross the highway. And we would have boxes full of Chase & Company things, and we did them at night. So we’d go back and we’d type all those and wait ‘til about 10 o’clock, and then I’d go home. And we had to write out all the tax bills.
And for the big companies—when I went to work in the courthouse in 1953, I was, uh—the big books, that had all the tax rolls in them, had Sanlando Springs. They were valued on the tax roll, I will say that. You could—on a tax roll, they were valued at $10 a lot. Why I didn’t buy out there for those lots, or well, uh—Sanlando Springs was a beautiful place to swim when we were growing up and going there. You could go in and they had this wonderful place to swim and you had picnics, and everything for years. And then when it started growing up, the whole place is businesses, and restaurants, and mortgage companies, you know, it’s just solid. And if you get there under I[nterstate]-4 now, prepare to tear out your hair, because traffic is horrendous. [laughs] But back then, that was just uh, right up the road.
But I worked until we paid my daddy off for the furniture we bought for our house, because we bought a house before we got married, and then we came back home and signed the papers on it that we, you know—so it would be in both our names. So it was all furnished and all before we got married, and I worked at the courthouse until about the late part of ’56. And my husband said, “One of us has got to raise the boys, and the other one has got to make a living, and I think I can do better than you.” Well, I knew that he could make better money than I was, because I wasn’t making but $25 a week. [laughs]
Morris
Okay.
Cook
So I went home and stayed home, and in about 18 months, or two years, we had a daughter. So I was very busy being a mother and a wife, and doing a lot of church work. I’ve been a member of First Baptist Church of Sanford since 1947. I’m still there, and I’ve done a little bit of everything there.
But, um, you know, back before [Walt] Disney [World], it was just a whole different thing. When my daughter was in high school, somebody told her that she could—if she was cute she could get a job at Walt Disney World, on the main gate of the Magic Kingdom. So she went down there and applied with a bunch of girls, and she worked there all through high school, and all through college, on every, uh—summers, Christmas, anytime they were off for any period of time, she worked down there. So we got in free, which was wonderful. And we got to see, you know, the Main Street Parade, when the fireworks went off for the Fourth of July, all of that stuff. And, you know, they drove back and forth. I know very few people that work at Disney World anymore, because of the traffic between the two places. It’s just not happening. [laughs]
But, um, I worked at the, um—I went back and forth to the courthouse. Shortly after—before, I had my daughter, they called me in and said they were going to go to—I can’t remember what it was—but what they said we had to do was type the entire tax roll into a metal plate, that they were going to print off this metal plate. And they were going to print tax rolls. So we had to do the legal, the name of who owned it, and all this, on, uh—and we were in the—this was the old courthouse. We were in the basement, and this thing, I mean—you know what metal cutting into metal would be. “Whoom whoom whoom.”
Morris
Yes.
Cook
[laughs] It was really crazy. But, um, I remember Dottie Anthony—who was Dottie von Turbulis[sp] at that time. And she and I spent several—about a month or two working down there. Every time they had something that they needed, they’d call me in. And for years a friend of mine, Louise Austin, and I would go back and we would work when, um—there were twin sisters in one office, and when they left, they had to have somebody cover for them in the clerk’s office. And I worked down there many, many summers until they went to computers. And then I knew nothing about computers, and it was fast. And the [Seminole] County, by then, was growing so fast, they had, uh, you know—two people being out, it was nothing.
Morris
Oh, I understand.
Cook
You know, they, uh—but back when you do it all by hand, it was, it really was something. But, um…
Morris
So these were all jobs after you were married? And you would stay home with the children, but they would call you in occasionally for help?
Cook
Right. Right.
Morris
Okay.
Cook
Yeah, I’ve even—they’ve called and said, “Will you come in and do the docket for us?” I would, you know, go in at one o’clock, sit down and type for four hours, and get up and leave. And they offered me a job and said I could come when I wanted to and leave when I wanted to, if I would just do it. So I told my husband about it, and he didn’t say much. So the first day I left him at home, I told him, “Now, the boys have homework. They need to do the homework. And they need to do it.” Well, he didn’t do anything. And I said, “I don’t know how you could expect me to work if you’re not going to help me.” He said, “I did not ask you to go to work.” He didn’t want me to go to work. [laughs]
But, uh, and then I did many, many years of, uh, when the voting—I was clerk of one of the precincts, the court, the [Sanford] Civic Center. I was down there first as just a helper, and then I was the clerk for a number of years. And that was, it was always a lot of fun, because you got to see everybody in that whole precinct. But by the time I was in my seventies, getting up at 4:30 and working until seven o’clock that night lost a lot of its luster. [laughs]
Morris
Oh, I can imagine.
Cook
But the last election, we did early voting out at the office there on the airport. And I said to the gal—she was, you know, telling—complaining about it. And I said, “I used to work the elections.” “Would you like to work now?” And I said, “No, thank you.” [laughs] But, um, let’s see now who we—well, I’ve covered my job, and my family, and, uh…
Morris
Well, how about your husband’s job? What kind of work did he do?
Cook
Railroad. We didn’t cover the railroad. Uh, he was working for the railroad when I started dating him. And he had—they would call me and say—he’d be off on a run and they would call me and say, “He’s going to have to go straight through to Tampa. Will you have a set of clean clothes and something for him to eat when he comes through?” So you go out, and the train comes in, and you hand him this, and hand him that, and off he goes. And then we had been on train trips where the railroad would do a lot for their employees. And one time they took us all the way on the train to Rainbow Springs, over in—up around the Gainesville area. A day trip. And out to, uh, there was another springs that we went to one time. But, um, it worked a lot better that, you know, that I was at home and him working at night. Because in the beginning, you know, if you’re starting at the bottom, you work whatever. But like he says, they always were on time paying you, and you never had to worry about the check not being any good. It was a busy thing. And not everybody can live railroading. That is a whole different lifestyle, because they are gone probably 75 percent of the time. And you never know day, or if they work the extra board, you don’t know day or night, where they’re going. When the telephone rings, that’s when you go to work. And I know, I guess about the worst thing that ever happened to him on the railroad, was, um, he came home one morning, and he was pretty shook up. And we were eating breakfast, and he told the kids that he had ran over a little girl that ran in front of the train.
Morris
Oh, no.
Cook
And, uh, he had about three different people, that, uh—he was coming out of Tampa one time, and a lady looked up at him and walked right in front of the train. And then, of course they put on emergency brake, you know, you can’t stop a train on a dime.
Morris
No.
Cook
I mean, if you get stopped in a mile, you’re doing good[sic], and that’s with air brakes and the whole business. And he said the woman came up and asked, he said, “What happened?” And he said, “Well, there was a young lady stepped in front of me just as I got to her.” And he said she said, “What was she wearing?” And Walter told her, and she said, “That was my daughter.” And, uh, he had about three of those, and they always—I mean, it’s hard.
It happened to my son, too. When my oldest son, David, became old enough, he worked at the store for my daddy and all of us. And he went out to SCC [Seminole Community College], but he was not a student at all. He wouldn’t even let us pay for his books or anything, he said because, “If I don’t do good[sic], then you won’t say, ‘Well, I paid for all this.’” He said, “I paid for it myself.” [laughs] So every Wednesday when he got off, he would go to the railroad and ask them about a job, and this went on for quite some time, but he got a job and went to Jacksonville. So that happened to him. But when you work on the railroad, that it was one of the things. People, cars, things run out in front of you and there’s no way to stop. And you just never know. But it’s a well-paying job, and the benefits were great, and we just adjusted.
Morris
Okay.
Cook
We just adjusted to the whole thing, and didn’t have any problem. And then when, right before he retired, we, on our 40th wedding anniversary, we took a train from Sanford to Los Angeles[, California], and then we rented a car and went up to Portland, Oregon. And we went space available, which is like half-price if you’re on another railroad. And we stayed there a couple or three days. Portland is a wonderful city to visit. And he got up about three o’clock in the morning, and he said, “I’m going to call and see what they can do about getting us going home.” And he came back in a few minutes, and he said there’s a young lady, she says, “I can get you home, not the way want to go, but I can get you back home.” And he says, “All right, we’ll take it.” And she said, “It’ll take five days.” [laughs] And we had to go back to L.A., and up to Chicago[, Illinois], and over to Philadelphia[, Pennsylvania], to Richmond[, Virginia] to Sanford. [laughs] But we had bedrooms all the way, so that was not too bad.
Morris
Oh, okay.
Cook
But the clothes that I wore on that trip—I don’t think I ever had on again. I was so tired of them. Oh, let’s stop a minute.
Morris
Sure thing, ma’am. Ma’am, would you tell us a little more about your family? I know you mentioned your son in the railroad business briefly.
Cook
Uh, well, there was my husband Walter, and we had the three children. David was born in ’51, and Dan in ’53, and Sherry [Cook] in ’58. And now we have 10 grandchildren, and we have seven great-grandchildren. And just this past spring, in less than two months, we had three little girls born.
Morris
Triplets?
Cook
No. It seems that all of these children had finished college, gotten married, and they were all fairly close between the families, so all of them started having babies all at one time. [laughs]
Morris
Okay.
Cook
So we had four, and then all of a sudden three more. So we don’t have anything to even think about right now. [laughs]
Morris
Rushed up [inaudible] a horde of great-grandchildren.
Cook
Yes. So that has kept us very, very busy. My husband has been retired 16 years. And up until a few years ago, we spent part of every summer in North Carolina. And then we thought, after a while, that we had—well, when we first started going up, you know, there were a lot of people from Sanford, and we had our own little Sanford in North Carolina. And we would spend the summer up there and do all sorts of things, and then, you know, they had to move back home. They might have died, went somewhere else, and all of a sudden none of those people are up there anymore. So it has made a difference.
But my oldest son David lives in The Villages, and that’s a very busy lifestyle and a whole lot of different way of living. Everybody travels in their golf cart, and if you want to be busy, there are a gillion[sic] things you can do. My son Dan died nine years ago, and my daughter Sherry lives in Carey, North Carolina. She works for the State of North Carolina. She spent nine years in the Marine Corps, and in that time married a Marine.
Morris
Oh, okay. She was in the Marines, then.
Cook
Yep. And she says, “Once a Marine, always a Marine.” So she and her husband have four children, and David and his wife had four children, and Dan and his wife had two. So that was our 10 grandchildren, and trying to keep up with all of them wasn’t a problem when I was younger, and the older I get, the harder that is to do.
And back in 2001, I—well, let me go back. Back in ’96, I had a total knee replacement. When I woke up, they told me I had a blip in my blood protein that had to be investigated. Well, I had no idea what a blip in my blood protein could mean to me. So finally, I said, “Well, what do I have to do?” “Well, we’re going to X-ray every bone in your body, and if you have holes in them, we will start treatment today.” I thought, “Wow.” Well, I had the X-ray, and there were no holes in my bones, so they said, “Now you have to have a bone marrow transplant.” No, not—bone marrow biopsy. And if it is clear, you just need to have your blood checked every six months.” Well, I had the biopsy, and I had my bones checked every six months. And they did the blood work, and every time, they said, “If you don’t hear from us, we’ll see you in six months.” This went on for five years. At the end of the fifth year in 2001, they called me back, and they said that they needed to do some testing. And after about the third test, I said, “Is it cancer?” And he said, “Without a doubt.”
Morris
What type of cancer was it, ma’am?
Cook
Multiple myeloma, which is a blood-borne cancer. But if it is let go, it causes the bones to crumble. And so they told me that if you did not treat it, or if it was not diagnosed and, you know, nothing—you had no symptoms or you didn’t go to the doctor for years, you could be walking along and you could break your arm, your leg, your neck, back, whatever. So they told me that I was very fortunate that I had been checked for five years, and so mine had just become to the point where I had to have, uh—take care of it. So I started on the chemo[therapy]. And I lost all my hair, which is always a big shock to women. But, uh, anyway—and then some of the medicines they gave me, years down the road, after you’d been taking them a while—four years—I discovered that one of the medicines had destroyed my jawbone. So I had went to a doctor in Miami. He was the only one in the world—he found out about it, he worked on it. He went in the lab and did the pharmacology and all. And last October, I have a titanium jawbone from my ear to the middle of my chin.
Morris
Titanium?
Cook
Titanium.
Morris
Chewing will never be a problem for you, ma’am.
Cook
[laughs] No. So, I’ve been in remission now about four years.
Morris
Okay.
Cook
And, uh, there’s no cure for multiple myeloma, but I’ll take remission. [laughs] And that’s where my energy went. [laughs]
Morris
Oh. Dealing with all the grandchildren got a little hard after that?
Cook
It got really difficult. So I wrote them a real sweet letter last year, and told them that I loved them all, that I would love to have them visit and all that, but I was going to, uh, I said, at Christmastime, I’ll always do the same thing. But all these birthdays and all, when you’re married, you know—we went from 10 to almost 20 real quick. And then they started having children. So I said, “I’m doing the great-grand[kid]s.” I will do those. And so far, none of them have complained.
But, yeah, I kept asking the nurses when I was first diagnosed, oncology nurses, I said, “When will I get my energy back?” They said, “Some time you never do.” But I have been very blessed, because when I got on the computer and looked at what multiple myeloma was in 2001, I did not expect to be here. So I am very blessed.
Morris
Congratulations, ma’am.
Cook
And, so our family has grown. And Sanford has grown like you wouldn’t believe. And in every community—all the places where the mall is—was all agriculture. And, used to, you would go for miles and miles between Orlando and Sanford and see nothing. And now there’s not as bare space between the two. [laughs] So there has been a lot of change, not all of it for the better, but there’s a lot of blessings too. And I thank you. That was it.
Morris
All right. Thank you very much, ma’am.
Motta
This is Daniel Motta. I’m here at the Museum of Seminole County History. It is July 11th, 2012. I’m talking with Mr. [Harold] Haldeman. Mr. Haldeman, if you could peek in—could you just tell me where and when you were born?
Haldeman
I was born in Tampa, Florida, November 12, 1924.
Motta
All right. And what brought you to Central Florida?
Haldeman
Well, we initially, when I was about six months old, we moved to Maitland, Florida, where I was baptized in the First Presbyterian Church of Maitland. And we were there until 1928, when my father got a job at the Osceola Cypress Company, which was in Osceola, Florida—not to be confused with Osceola County, you know, where Kissimmee is. Okay?
Motta
Yeah.
Haldeman
So we switched to Seminole County.
Motta
So you were brought to Osceola because of your father, you said?
Haldeman
That’s right. And I was about four years old at the time.
Motta
So some of your earlier memories were from the sawmill?
Haldeman
Yes. In other words, generally speaking, you start remembering things when you’re three and a half or four years old, so I have very good memories of, you know, of the actual move. You know, the physical move, and a little bit about some of the people at the time. But most of it would come, like with most people, five or six years old on up.
Motta
Okay.
Haldeman
I wasn’t, naturally, [laughs] I wasn’t out running around much when I was four years old, naturally.
Motta
Yeah. Well, could you describe a little bit about when you actually arrived in Osceola—the memories as being a child? Could you describe just, like, the day-to-day life of the town?
Haldeman
Well, of course. I think the first impression was it was different than Maitland, ‘cause in the case of Maitland, even though the house was literally right on [U.S. Route] 17-92—you know, going through the area—there were just houses around without any other infrastructure. Whereas in this case, as you came into town, you’d see some houses on the left-hand side, and the school, and then the boarding house and the post office. And then on the right-hand side, there might be a train of logs there, you know, fifteen cars long, you know, with a train engine, and then in the distance, a sawmill literally at the end of the street. So the infrastructure was naturally quite different than what I was used to.
Motta
So Osceola actually seemed like more of a bustling town than Maitland, at the time?
Haldeman
Yes, mainly because you were seeing the whole town kind of at one swoop.
Motta
Yeah, kind of condensed.
Haldeman
Whereas the case in Maitland, they had to either go into Winter Park, or inside[?] Maitland itself—as you probably know today [laughs] —still doesn’t have much in the way of business. It’s mostly Winter Park and Orlando.
Motta
Could you describe the house you moved into, and like the street and neighborhood, a little?
Haldeman
Well, the first five houses as you came in, on the left-hand side—and you always could remember that you were into the little town, because there was a cattle guard, because the area was fenced off. So from an early age, I remember going across the cattle guard, ‘cause if you were asleep, as a little kid, you’d wake up going over the cattle guard, and you knew you were home. So the first five houses on the left-hand side, which kind of called it executive[?] row. That might be a misterm today. But the first house had the bookkeeper. The second house the general superintendent. The third house the person in charge of the mill—not the president, but the operational manager. And my father was the sales manager. He was the fourth house. The company doctor was in the fifth house. So the house itself was—for a company house—was a pretty nice, you know, relatively, to speak of, of course today, a pretty nice house. And of course they [inaudible] electricity during the [Great] Depression. They didn’t—but, so the facilities were pretty good. The water, of course, the water was free, but it came strictly out of the St. Johns River, so [laughs], you naturally didn’t drink it, but it was okay to take a bath in. So those were the things that I probably would have noticed that—because in Maitland, you know, you have the normal city water and all that sort of thing. But so the house was larger than the one in Maitland, so that was probably noticeable, you know, from a kid’s standpoint.
Motta
So where did the water that you drank and cooked with—where did that come from?
Haldeman
The water we drank—that was—unfortunately for the area, if you put down a well, you got quite a bit of salt in the waters. So, had they known—had the company known they were gonna be there that long—they would have even gone deeper to get water, or they would have piped it from Geneva, which was five miles away, but they had good water there. So we used bottled water in some cases. We also supplemented it every time we went into Sanford. We’d always have a couple of five-gallon jugs. In those days, the space between the back seat and the front seat was big enough for five-gallon jugs. And we’d fill it in a filling station, so that was part of it. Now, some of the people, particularly coming from the black quarters, would walk down to the depot on [inaudible] railroad, and there was a pump down there—that the water was drinkable. It had a little strange taste. I mean, it wasn’t, you know, natural spring water, but it was suitable, you know, for that type of thing. But you just had to get used to the taste of it.
Motta
Well, you mentioned these utilities there. How self-sufficient, like in itself, was Osceola? Did you have to take frequent trips to Orlando or Sanford or anywhere else, to get things?
Haldeman
Well, the company, they had a company town and they had their company store, which I worked in at a later date, which we’ll cover later. But it was 18 miles into Sanford on the nine-foot road. And so, we generally went into Sanford on Saturdays. That was kind of the custom in those days, particularly people from out of town. And then we got relatively few items from the company store, because [inaudible] was small and didn’t have a lot of buying power. Even though they were pretty honest, the prices were higher there than they would have been at a bigger store in Sanford. And, now, when you get into special holidays or Christmas, we were more apt to go to Orlando, where there was more retail establishments, [inaudible] otherwise. But that was generally the way we got things. Of course, [inaudible], with a catalog, that’s where almost everybody that lived in the countryside got their clothes and a lot of things, ‘cause that was generally cheaper than buying it in most any town.
Motta
You mentioned that your father was the sales manager. What were his duties? Like how were they different from the other managers’?
Haldeman
Well, he was sales manager, but he also handled all the administrative things. Like he was in charge of buying the insurance and making sure they had insurance coverage. He bought all the supplies for the mill, and things of that nature that you might call operational manager duties, from that standpoint, because there was relatively few key people, as you can see, you know, from the houses that I mentioned, ‘cause the rest of them were either in the supervisory level or below that.
Motta
Did…
Haldeman
Actually, in the sales manager part, he didn’t necessarily handle the salespeople in sales. It would be more like a marketing manager, because they sold through their own representative in Florida to the retail lumber industry, and they sold through wholesale lumber companies in the Midwest and the Northeast. And of course, there wasn’t any reason to go over towards Louisiana or other places in the South, because they already had cypress mills, you know, closer to them. So it was kind of a duke’s mixture of a lot of duties, really.
Motta
Okay. And there were two higher level managers, your father and the other. What did you say…
Haldeman
Only one, actually, above him, what would be the president of the company. So you had a very, you know, limited chain of command.
Motta
So the foreman was just—he had…
Haldeman
The foreman would actually be under either the sawmill foreman or the planing mill foreman, or something of that nature. And they generally were lumber inspectors or someone that handled the crew. Or, in the case of the sawmill or the planing mill, you had an engineer around the steam engines, where you used the power plant and that sort of thing.
Motta
Were there any—as you were a child, when you had first got there, do you remember any of the children having any roles in the sawmill business itself, like in any just odd jobs they would do here and there, or like chores they were expected to do by their parents? Was there anything…
Haldeman
You mean for the mill itself, or for outside of the mill?
Motta
Really anything, but were they involved in—really anything.
Haldeman
No, but really not, because there weren’t that many opportunities. There was—it’s not like, you know, going down and working for McDonald’s or something. They would have—including myself—would have loved to have had some opportunities, but there wasn’t even a paper route, you know, to have. So that was very limited, so they generally did things for their folks and, you know, mowed the lawn and all that sort of thing. And in some cases, like in our yard—the yards were fairly large. The yard was a hundred by three hundred, which would be the size of a football field. So you had a lot of grass to cut, and then in the back part you had chickens and a little garden and so forth. So kids in general, like in the country or particularly farm area, have got plenty to do without working at McDonald’s, if you know what I mean.
Motta
You just mentioned chickens. Was there much livestock there, that the families took care of, or was it a…
Haldeman
Well, it depends. It depends on the family. The general superintendent at the time, particularly prior to—well, most of the time—he had a cow, you know, that produced milk for the family. And I don’t remember a garden in this case, but we had a garden in the back. It grew, you know, naturally not all of our needs, but certainly it, you know, helped. And that type of thing. And [inaudible] chickens—I raised chickens not only for the family, but I sold them to the workers and so forth around the mill. I generally had about 75 hens, you know, for laying eggs, and then I had about 300 fryers. Fryers, rather than [inaudible] beyond that. In other words, fryer is good to sell when they’re about six to eight weeks old. And you get about 25 cents a pound live weight. Remarkably, eggs and chickens were—adjusted for the dollar—were a lot more expensive back then than they are today.
Motta
So you were doing this business with your chickens when you were still a child?
Haldeman
Yeah. Yeah, from the time I was about ten years old ‘til about 15 years old.
Motta
Okay.
Haldeman
So, really, ‘til the time we moved away.
Motta
Did you also say that you had a job in the store—the company store—eventually?
Haldeman
Yeah, when I got out of high school—Seminole High School—in 1941. I was barely 16 when I got out of high school. So, I didn’t have money to go to college, so I worked in the company store from, you know, May or early June of ’41 until September of ’42, when I went to the University of Florida one year before I went into the Navy. So that would have been 15 months, and I saved enough money to go to Florida. ‘Cause my year at Florida—at University of Florida—in ’42, ’43, my total expenses, including bus fare to Gainesville, was $490. So it was much cheaper to go [laughs] to college back then, because the tuition—if you want to call it tuition—they were on a semester system at the time. So the two semesters, and each one was $64 a semester, which would be $128 for the whole year, and that included your yearbook, your football tickets, and concerts, and, you know, soup to nuts. So, I wouldn’t exactly call that tuition [laughs]. So the cost, most of the cost of going to school was room and board.
Motta
So…
Haldeman
Compared to today, it’s quite a contrast.
Motta
Yeah. Yes. So you said you went to college in 1942 and ’43?
Haldeman
Yeah. I went ’42 to ’43. Just the one year. And I was supposed to be called to go into the service. I had signed up for a certain thing, but you had to wait ‘til you were called, but for some reason each county is a little different. You could be in one county and be called much earlier than other counties, or much later than other counties, see. And Seminole County just happened to be one that seemed to have not a surplus, but an adequate number. So you might not be called for a while. So actually, when I got out of college that year, I worked at—I went back to work for the company. I worked in the office in the afternoon, and then I ran the light plant. They had their own light plant, and I ran the light plant at night, ‘til 11 o’clock. We didn’t have lights after 11 o’clock. So then I went in the Navy, about the same time that my folks moved down to Port Everglades, or Fort Lauderdale.
Motta
And that was about—that was the time they moved down there because of the sawmill operation closedown?
Haldeman
Oh, yeah. It was the closing down thing. My father was there the longest of anybody, because they liquidated the [inaudible] of the company. Actually, the company that continued was a different ownership, but some of the same people. Not all the same people, but some of them. And it became a wholesale lumber distribution of the West Coast lumber, rather than cypress. And, so, they took over the liquidation of the town, which most of it—where they just didn’t—where it’s nothing, you know. A steel rail that would have been junk, you know, scratch steel and so forth. But as the war progressed—World War II—those items that were junk. They started having value. So that was one thing that got them shortage. So my father was in charge of getting rid of the things. So the houses that normally would have just kind of deteriorated were actually moved to Sanford and other places, as full houses. And the things were too big, people would come out and tear them down piece by piece, take them back to other places in Seminole County and build another house, ‘cause you couldn’t get lumber any other way, because the government took all the production, you know, that was available. So you had to use something that was already there in order to build anything. And so some of the trains were—they generally were sold for scrap, but the steel rail was suitable to use in the mines and other places, either in the U.S. or South America. So they brought a lot more money than they would have as scrap—scrap metal. The rails—they were used in the logging woods, and so they were quite a few miles of rail, and they just had it stacked up, you know, ready to be sold as scrap or something. But most of that was sold as rail. Now, it’s what you call “light rail.” You couldn’t use it on the main railroad. So there might be—a regular railroad has at least 100- to 150-pound rail, which is three feet is 150 pounds, where this might be a 60-pound rail or something like that. So it was limited use, but still had a lot of value, when you couldn’t use it any other way.
Motta
So, why exactly did the sawmill operation move to South Florida?
Haldeman
Well, the mill didn’t move. They just formed a different type of company. In other words, they no longer sold out of Florida, because they wouldn’t have had enough market, because there’s other people doing the same thing, [inaudible]. In other words, cypress was replaced with lumber from Oregon and Washington and British Columbia and places like that. And what you were shooting for wasn’t [inaudible] in the East very much, because they didn’t—perhaps in the Northwest—not the Northwest—but the Midwest, might have used some. But generally the freight part was too great to compete with things in the Eastern part of the U.S. So the complexion changed considerably, from manufacturing completely to wholesale distribution. In other words, buying lumber on the West Coast of the country. And it either came by ship or by rail over to the Southeast, and then it was distributed all over Florida by truck. So you can see it’s a different type.
See, the timber ran out. The last timber they had—well, the first timber when we moved in there—it came from an area between Osteen and New Smyrna, a little town called Maytown, which I guess is still there. And Maytown was kind of a distribution point on the [inaudible] Railroad that went down to Okeechobee. And now—prior to that, it came from the section from Holopaw down to Okeechobee, in the Kissimmee Valley and places like that. But then the latter part of the time, they logged back of Holly Hill and Ormond Beach and that area, which is Tomoka River section and so forth. But that ran out in 1938, so the sawmill shut down for good in ’38, but they still ran the planing mill, and they brought in lumber from the [inaudible] mill. They had a little mill up in Otter Creek, which is west of Gainesville. And then they had their own little [inaudible] mill near Kissimmee. Actually, I guess it would be where [Walt] Disney [World] is now. There used to be some cypress in that area. And, so, but that was a limited amount, and they did that up until about 1943. And then they closed down the planing mill and everything by that time. So, ‘cause even after 1938, they had 25 million [inaudible] of cypress. It was on the drying yard, ‘cause cypress has to be air-dried, compared to chill-dried. So it takes a long time. It takes a year to the inch. If you got a one-inch board, then technically[?] it takes a year to dry it. If it’s two inches, it takes two years. So if you get into bigger stuff, like a tank, it’s four inches, so it can take four years, you know, to dry it. So you got a lot of stock there that takes a number of years to heat it up. In fact, the only thing that speeded it up was—in World War II—was to get into blossom, and the defense part started picking up after 1940. So, that had an effect to pick up the business, and they were able to move it out at a faster rate. That’s the reason that otherwise it might have—the planing mill—might have run for another couple years, had it not been for World War II.
Motta
Now, I know the company was called the Osceola Cypress Company, but did you deal with any other kinds of woods, or was it just cypress exclusively? Or did you…
Haldeman
It was just cypress, cypress exclusively, ‘cause it’s pretty hard, in the first place, with yellow pine, which is all over the state, particularly the northern part of the state, at the time, it can be a fairly large mill, or it can be a small mill. And actually, today, a pine mill, you’ve seen the trucks running around with the logs on them. They look like telephone poles, you know, whereas cypress was a much bigger log. It took them a much bigger mill, much like California redwood requires.
Motta
Yeah.
Haldeman
Well, so in cypress—the difference is you cut for quality, not for quantity. Now, most mills cut for quantity, and not for quality, because the logger doesn’t want a sawyer looking at it ten different times and treating it all kinds of ways to get it the best cut. They just shoot it through and it’s done with a computer. They do it in such a manner, they get the most [inaudible] rather than the most quality, because the quality’s gonna be pretty general anyhow, pretty much on the low end of the spectrum.
Motta
So did most sawmills in the Florida area—did they deal with cypress, or was it like a mixed bag?
Haldeman
No, no, most of them were yellow pine, but the reason there weren’t many cypress was because firstly, there wasn’t that much cypress, but also, you had to have a big mill. Everything about it is big. Then the logging part is very expensive, ‘cause you’re going down in swamps. You build a railroad every mile, and then you have big skinners pulling the log as much as a half-mile in each direction. So that takes a lot of equipment. But on the other hand, the lumber that comes out of it brings a much bigger price. Otherwise, you couldn’t afford anything, ‘cause cypress is not a commercial tree. You can grow a good—pretty good—yellow pine for lumber in 30 years, particularly in Mississippi, where they get a lot of rain. Whereas I don’t think you can even classify cypress, ‘cause usually most of those logs were six or eight hundred years old. Most, to begin with. So 60 years—you get a fencepost, you know. Also, cypress—when you look at cypress around Florida, most of that is what they call “pond cypress,” and it never gets very big. It’s really used for a fencepost and that sort of thing. And for log cabins or something. And it has a lot of sap in it. It has very little heart, so it’ll rot away pretty fast, whereas the bigger logs were heavier heart. Only the last outer inch was sap. So, there’s a big, big difference between the two. Cypress in general was the epitome of the finest in what you call softwoods. Now, and there weren’t too many hardwoods to cut in Florida. They might cut some. I’m sure they would cut some gum and a few things like that, but they did it mainly for their own use, for doing trams[?] going out through the drying yards and that sort of thing. They never did sell it or anything. So 99 percent of the cut was cypress.
Motta
In the pictures you sent us, I noticed that most everything in the town is made out of wood. Was the building material cypress for the homes, or was that…
Haldeman
Yeah. Yeah. And the original mill—I’m not sure what the tree was, but the first mill burned down at some point, and evidently the ownership—the deal was different or more money was poured in—I’m not sure what—but the things that were built after about 1921 seemed to be built much better than the ones prior to that time. And you can tell this by—if you look at the one—the company store, that was a sufficient building, but it was a fairly crude building. And some of the early houses weren’t that great. But then, after that, they were built in a much better way. For example, the boarding house, which was the only two-story building you’ll see in the pictures there, the vertical beams on that—when they tore it down, nobody could believe that they were so far apart [laughs]. In other words, that in fact—the guys that tore it down—they finally had to push it over, ‘cause they were scared to go up on top and take the roofing off, because it’s amazing it stays under that long.
But of course, when you build something for a temporary basis, you never expect it could be there that long. In fact, one interesting thing between the white people that came out and tore things down—and that had to be white people in this case—they didn’t do nearly as good as the blacks did. The blacks would come out with 15 or 20 of their cousins, you know, and they would do it piece by piece, and they could retrieve much more of the house than the white people that did it, because they weren’t quite in as much a rush, and they had the personnel to be more meticulous on tearing it down. And of course, two stories, in all fairness, was a little different ‘cause of the mere fact it was two stories. And the white group that did that did a very stupid thing. They took all the siding off the bottom before they started taking the roof off. Well, once you take the siding off, you’ve lost all the strength of the building. Then nobody would go up on the top to take the roofing part off. And by “roofing,” I don’t mean the shingles. I’m talking about the boards, ‘cause the roof is—what you put over the roof—the roof is the boards themselves. But at any rate, that’s kind of an interesting sidelight of the differences in the people, you know.
Motta
I read that many of the workers at the sawmill were black. Was Osceola pretty much as segregated as any other town in the South at that time, or…
Haldeman
Oh, yeah. The only thing that was probably more democratic, we had two or three black people. In fact, one that—he was kind of a mentor to me, ‘cause I was kind of a little kid following him around. And he—I was always amazed at what he could do with his education and so forth. I will always wonder where he got it from, you know. His wife was a midwife across the river from Sanford, in Enterprise, and she used to bring him out every Monday morning and then pick him up Friday night. And, but he kept up the electrical system, which was the city lights, a 2500-volt system—[inaudible] lighting system—and the light—the engine itself and the generator was in the sawmill and earlier in the planing mill. And they would run only at certain times, because there was no need to run them 24 hours a day.
And then there was another black fellow, I think they worked down in the shop, because they built the lumber cars. They kept up the steam engines and all that sort of thing. It was all in-house help. And so, there really—religion or race didn’t seem to have too much to do with it. But now, by nature of the beast, some of the blacks didn’t have opportunity at an earlier age, and that’s understandable. But they had several that had fairly good jobs.
And, as far as religion—you didn’t know who was Jewish and who wasn’t Jewish, you know. Not many paid much attention. So that was pretty much, you know—I’d say a full democratic system, except for the housing. Housing was separate, and that was the one part that probably could have been better, but of course, the turnover was a little greater than in the [inaudible]. But most of the blacks were in there, if they were fairly long-term, they would tend to fix things up, and of course the company would furnish lumber for them and so forth. And so a lot of things were done in that way, even in the case of my folks’ house. My father did a lot to it to improve it, and of course the company furnished the lumber part, so there wasn’t a great expense to, you know, to make improvements. Like I built all the chicken houses and all that sort of thing, and there was no shortage of lumber, particularly in the depths of the Depression [laughs].
Motta
Since you mentioned the Depression, was there any kind of significant impact on the town at the time? Like in the ‘30s?
Haldeman
Oh, yeah, because the sawmill—the sawmill shut down in 1932 and didn’t start back up until 1936. 1936 was the first start to pull out of the Depression. Unfortunately, by 1937, it was kind of [laughs], like some of our [inaudible] right now, things kind of went backwards for a while in ’37. So it wasn’t until ’39 or ’40 that it started picking back up again. So, but they managed to get through 1937 okay, because some parts of the country were still doing all right. But Florida—Florida really didn’t pick up until, well, really the first part of World War II. The first preparations were done early starting in 1940, but particularly in ’41, when [Franklin D.] Roosevelt figured we were gonna see this thing, you know, whether we like it or not. So, whereas some parts of the country held up better— ‘cause, as I said, they sold through the wholesalers in the Northeast and the Midwest. But it was affected ‘cause naturally all the sawmill workers, I don’t know where they went [?]. Of course, some of them were from Georgia. They went back to their folks’ farm or whatever, you know. Fortunately, in the Depression, so many people went back to the farms, where their parents were or relatives were, and today we don’t have those farms to go back to. It was a little different. But, and then of course, the logging camp naturally shut down, because there was nobody to, you know, get the logs. So there was[sic] four years—and that was probably the worst—also the worst part of Seminole County or anywhere near there, as far as the Depression was concerned, because the banks closed. The [inaudible] Bank closed there for a while, and not too many banks survived it—the Depression— ‘cause you didn’t have the FDIC [Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation] guarantee any deposits or anything. So, so that was a rough period. So I’m sure Sanford, you know, was affected by it just as much as any other part. I think the only—I must say that Orlando, and perhaps Lakeland, and Miami Beach, probably did the best during the Depression. Orlando seemed to go along. They weren’t booming, but they kept building a few houses during the Depression.
Motta
When people started leaving the town, to your knowledge—do you know if anybody stayed or stuck around, or didn’t pretty much…
Haldeman
Well, some of the blacks stayed in Sanford. I know the black that kept the boiler room going, and that was probably one of the more important jobs, ‘cause he was the night boiler man, and so they had to keep it up, keep the steam up—you had to keep the steam up not only to be ready the next day, but also in case of fire. You had to have steam for the steam pumps, for water and so forth. And so you kept it up just enough to keep steam, but not enough, you know, to waste the fuel with excess steam that would blow off if it got to be more than needed. Now, he had quite a family, and a lot of those were either from Sanford or from the back end of Sanford. And as you probably well know, the Sanford[?] district was out east in Sanford, on either Celery Avenue, particularly Geneva Avenue. And then of course the black shopping district was on Sanford Avenue, which was where Gatlin Grocery Store was. In fact, I have an ad in that, 1940 ad of one of their sales in their weekly newspaper thing, kind of interesting to see the price of different things [laughs].
Motta
Yeah, I’d imagine.
Haldeman
So, at any rate, the economic growth—I would suspect that Seminole County was hurt a lot more than Orange County—but maybe not as much as some of the counties in the northern part of Florida. But Jacksonville probably did a little better than some of the others, because that was quite a distribution point for a lot of things, like more so, at that time, relatively speaking, than it is today.
Motta
So you don’t know of anybody that actually stayed around in Osceola after everybody left?
Haldeman
No, there wasn’t any place to stay, really, ‘cause the company owned all the houses and they sold them all. But…
Motta
And they owned the land as well?
Haldeman
And they owned the land. And in fact, we had to, the land stayed with the [inaudible] company at Port Everglades until 1982. And it was leased out for years to Cameron[?] for cattle. In fact, they had their own cattle for a while, which was never very profitable. Then they sold it to—no, beg your pardon—they leased it to Cameron, which was a cattleman there. In fact, I think there’s a Cameron Boulevard off of around State Route 436, somewhere along in there. But anyway, that’s the Cameron family. And the thousand acres, about 400 of that was prairie off of Lake Harney, so that used to flood every year, almost every year. In recent years, I don’t think it has. But [inaudible], ‘cause when the water went down, of course you had tremendous grazing[?] for cows[?]. The rest of it was kind of a scrub pine area. Ironically, there were no cypress trees in the Oviedo area. They were all pine trees, but none of any size, ‘cause a lot of the land had been cleared for the lumber piles around, and so forth. And the only people that lived beyond that, if you go west, then you get to the end of paved road, there’s a dirt road that goes west and then it trails north. And about five miles north of the St. Johns, there was a place called Days[?]Camp, and that was a man and a woman that lived there—gosh, I don’t know how long they’d been there. But they were there even before the mill came there, and then he died and she married the caretaker. They must have been there—well, they were there through, you know, ’44, ’45. I don’t know what ever happened to them. And then later on, a Southern belle out of Orlando had a little camp on the St. Johns, just beyond where the sawmill was.
But for the most part, that area, north until you get to Lemon Bluff, which was near a road going from Orlando—Celery Avenue—and going to Osteen, that part of the river literally was never, never developed, partly because it was low. As you probably know, very little of the St. Johns, from—well, from Palatka to anywhere—almost all of it was low land. Even Sanford would flood when Osceola wouldn’t. They built a sawmill there ‘cause it was one of the few places where they had fairly high land.
Motta
I understand in the area where the current Seminole County landfill is, there was an airfield around World War II?
Haldeman
That’s right, ‘cause that was actually some of the company’s property. It really was more than a thousand acres, maybe 1,200 acres. And that was a satellite deal to the naval air station in Jacksonville, because—I mean, in Sanford. See, every field that had a naval setup, those planes were almost all carrier-type planes, you know, for landing in an aircraft carrier. So it took a lot of trading[?] of land[?] and taking off on short distance. They’d mark off the field as if it were an aircraft carrier. And so, so you had, there was one satellite field over at New Smyrna, which was part of the one at Daytona. So almost every one had at least one satellite field. And, in fact, the one in Fort Lauderdale—the big airport we have here was a naval air station, and it had three satellite fields, and they had the bomber planes that were on the aircraft carriers which trained in this area and up there. So, at any rate, that sat there for years, and people would fly in, and they finally had to put sand dunes on it because the drug people were flying in, ‘cause, you know, you could cut in discreetly, come in there without anybody knowing.
Motta
Yeah.
Haldeman
Now, we had some real trouble with Seminole County, and they were gonna put a full, just plain old dump out there. And I guess they thought we wouldn’t know anything about it. And I was involved with that, because by that time I was the manager. And so we had to, our lawyer had to fight with City Hall—not City Hall—but their County Hall. And at any rate, we won out on it, so they put a full-fledged, you know, bona fide dump that has all the environmental stuff and so forth. We keep [inaudible] on it because then—in order to take the garbage trucks out there—because that’s where most of the garbage for Sanford goes. They redid the road to a 16-foot road, so we [inaudible] the road.
Motta
And when was that?
Haldeman
That would have been about 1970.
Motta
Okay.
Haldeman
And, ‘cause, by that time, the company down here had been sold to a division of [inaudible] Corporation, and they didn’t want the non-operational assets, and so the land up there was something they had no desire to own. So that was spun off as a separate thing, and for years it was on the market. But 18 miles east of Sanford was no-man’s land, you know, at the time. Nobody in particular wanted it. The only value in it was the part that was high land on the St. Johns. And so anyway, at any rate, we finally sold it in 1982, and they broke it up into five-acre plots. The reason for that is to make a lot no smaller than five acres, you can put a septic tank on it. Otherwise, you gotta build a plant. So at any rate, they sold several of the lots right on the St. Johns, and there’s a couple houses down there now—two or three. You can’t see them now, because the trees have grown up so much. And then, I thought they would build some of the land where the lumber even sat, ‘cause that was all cleared and drained pretty well, but they never did, to my knowledge. But they built some right along the, it’d be just east of the [inaudible] right-of-way, ‘cause the railroad’s not there, but the right-of-way’s there. And you can see some along in there, ‘cause the trees have grown up and you can’t[?] see it. But I guess they built them there, because if you look east, and look over 400 acres of prairie toward Lake Harney, and if you went very far east you’d be down in lower land, and I don’t think they would have let you build there because it’s subject to flooding.
Motta
The flood plain.
Haldeman
So it never was developed as much as I think they thought, but I think the guy that bought it did okay, because he got a pretty good price for the stuff on the water and probably got most of his money back on that, and then hoped that the rest would sell at some point. But since that time, there’s been some houses and things between Osceola and Geneva that you can see along the highway there.
Motta
I meant to ask you about Geneva, actually. You said at that time Osceola was about five miles away from the central part of Geneva?
Haldeman
Well, in fact, I think it almost connected five miles to what they call [inaudible] corner. It used to be—and then you’d turn south to go to the end of—until you went about a mile and a half. But those were all Chase & Company orange groves around that whole corner. Later on they built a shortcut that went straight from the Geneva Bridge straight into Geneva. In fact, actually south of Geneva, which is now [State Road] 46. Before 46 used to come toward Osceola and then turn south to get into Geneva. So it was actually about seven and a half miles into where the school was in Geneva. Geneva never was very large. It was strictly a citrus county. It had a lot of orange groves, and they had one packinghouse, and they had, at one time, a little mill to make the orange crates. Almost every packinghouse had some kind of a mill to make the orange crates, ‘cause the orange crates were all wood at that time, but the ones used in the—to bring in the fruit, and also the ones for shipping. And of course, the orange crates used for bringing in fruit were more permanent, and naturally the others were strictly temporary. But it was, as you may well know, even today it’s a very scattered area.
Motta
Yes.
Haldeman
But if you drive through, you’ll think there’s 50 people living there. But if you go back off the road, there’s quite a bit of houses, you know, here and there. But it never has grown like they—I would have thought it would have grown a lot more, because it has, you know, quite a bit going. It’s good high ground. It’s 75 feet higher than Osceola was. And it’s nice. That’s the reason the orange trees were there, ‘cause it was nice sandy soil, whereas Osceola was more of a wet soil.
Motta
You mentioned earlier that between 1932 and ’36, the production at the sawmill stopped?
Haldeman
Yeah, it was shut down completely. Yeah.
Motta
What happened to the residents? Did they, did people move away?
Haldeman
Well, and some probably went back to Georgia. The population there was at least 80 percent black, and so some went to Sanford now[?]. They were beginning to—the celery industry was [inaudible] to get them to move down to Okeechobee, so maybe some of them went down there. You know, it’s amazing, they never really seemed to survive. They just survived very well.
Motta
Yeah.
Haldeman
But there were, you know, we didn’t have Social Security. We didn’t have this, that, and the other then, but people seemed to make out one way or the other. A lot of them went back to their folks or their relatives and so forth. You know, you had a lot more people doing things for each other than you would have today. If we had the same kind of depression that we had in the ‘30s, [laughs] I’m not sure that the country would hold together. Probably blow up ‘cause people just aren’t used to taking care of themselves one way or the other. I don’t mean it’s quite that bad, but you know what I mean.
Motta
Yeah. It would be interesting to see.
Haldeman
Although it’s interesting what people will do if push comes to shove.
Motta
Yeah. I’d like to switch to a little more personal topic, if I could. Do you have a, like a favorite memory that you can share with us, of the town or your time there? Something that most people that didn’t live in the town wouldn’t know of, or…
Haldeman
Well, I think the informality of it. I guess the fact the first four years of school, it was only half a block to the school, so [laughs] you didn’t have very far to walk, you know, to go to school. And then the teacher, you know—as I mentioned one time, I think—when I talked to you, from 1930 to ’32, it was a four—no, I guess it was not until ’34—at any rate, it was a two-room school with two teachers and four grades. And then, as the Depression set in, the school board cut it back to one room, but six grades instead of four. So one teacher taught six grades. So that was an interesting period because you were going to school—I guess people would think that’s a real handicap today, but in the first place, you had top-flight teachers in those days. I mean, you know, really dedicated teachers. Secondly, with only thirteen students, and then they kind of taught each other the [inaudible]. So it’s amazing the education was that good, considering. And then of course the discipline was tight, so I guess what I’m trying to say is—even with that kind of limitation, the education was probably better than it is today, because now, not only is the school class so big, in general the teachers aren’t quite as competent. At least, a lot of people claim they’re not. I don’t mean there’s not hundreds of exceptions. And then they had discipline in those days that they don’t have today.
So [laughs], a little off-story on this thing, when I was on a cruise recently on the Columbia River. There was a couple from Georgia. He’d been a schoolteacher and a principal and later in school administration, and then in his later years, he worked for the prison department. And the first day he was shown around the prison, the warden said to him, “Don’t you feel a little uneasy here, in this prison?” He said, “Oh, no. This is a lot better than being in a high school with a change[?] of classes[?].” [laughs]
Motta
[laughs] Uh-oh.
Haldeman
Yeah, so it kind of reminded me of the differences in the time, you know.
Motta
Yeah.
Haldeman
But anyway, I think of the school system, and then of course, education in Geneva. That was a three-room school, so I went there for the seventh and eighth grade. And actually Geneva was much worse off in the Depression than Osceola, at least those of us that were still in Osceola, and by the time I went there, the sawmill had cranked back up. But Geneva was pretty well-hit right on through. And to make matters worse, of course, as you know, later on, you didn’t need a packinghouse every ten miles away. They consolidated that as trucks came in and so forth, so Geneva was hit quite hard during that period, ‘cause I can remember that not too many kids had shoes, you know.
Motta
Oh yeah?
Haldeman
I’ve got a picture of the school there, and I was just looking at it the other day. I was amazed how many ones there were barefoot, you know.
Motta
Yeah.
Haldeman
So, whereas at least, in Osceola, they had some kind of income. Also, they stopped collecting rent. Of course, electricity, water was free, so even though the salaries and so forth were cut, you didn’t have a lot of extra other expenses that you might have had somewhere else.
Motta
Did you enjoy growing up in that area? Like the geography of the area, more than the town itself, I mean? Like, do you have any memories of going down to the river or Lake Harney?
Haldeman
Oh, yeah, because, and not only, you know, having my own chickens and own things of that nature, because I made little money. I never, you know, got rich on the thing, because—even though I didn’t have too much overhead. And, but I—I built a small boat first, then got one larger. The black person that I mentioned that was kind of a mentor to me, he and I built a really nice boat, and I had a big Johnson motor on it and so forth. I tell you we built it. He was 99 percent and I was one percent, and one of the houses was [inaudible], and we worked at night. He kind of took me as a son, so to speak, because he didn’t have any children, and I mentioned his wife went back to Enterprise during the week, so he didn’t have anything to do at night. So, but I used to follow him around, and I learned a lot from him, not only practical things, but plain old wisdom type of things. But then, later on, you know, I’d think nothing of going down there, getting in the boat, going up to Lemon Bluff or wherever—even Geneva Bridge—without thinking anything about it. If I’d ever broken down, I’d probably still be there, you know, ‘cause [laughs] there were no phones, there were no CB [citizens band] radios, there was no sheriff patrol, you know. There was nothing, you know. In fact, most of the time, nobody even knew I left, you know. They wouldn’t even know where I was. So…
Motta
That sounds a lot different from today.
Haldeman
That’s right. That’s right. Far different, yeah.
Motta
Yeah. Well, we…
Haldeman
Growing up in any country area has a lot of advantages, and a lot of disadvantages, but a lot of advantages.
Motta
We have a little bit of time left. Do you have anything you could share that you think I missed that you think is interesting?
Haldeman
Well, I may have mentioned this either to you or Kim [Nelson], but the, some of the economics is interesting. The houses were—I guess you’d call it executive[?] row—a little unfair to use that term, but that’s about what it amounted to—were $23 a month, and then if you went down to where then you had the schoolhouse and the post office. The post office had the doctor’s office and a little library—at the post office. And that postmistress, of course—that was—I don’t think it was a contract job. I don’t know how it was in those days, but she sold candy and newspapers and other things, because there was only, at the most, 200 people in the town, and half of those didn’t get any mail, so you can see [laughs] it wasn’t that big a post office.
Then you had the boardinghouse and then the company store, and then the office, or between the boardinghouse and the company store, one of the pictures I showed you there, it’s called Pine Street. And that was an extension of the white quarters, and on the left side the houses rented for $15 a month. On the right side they were a little smaller and they were $10 dollars a month. And then the ones down at the end crosswise were $6 dollars a month. Now, even those were—had a little two-bedroom houses. I mean, I don’t know, but maybe eight hundred, nine hundred feet, so they weren’t baby. And then the black quarters was west of that, and they varied all over the place, and usually they could be—they weren’t, you know, anything to write home about, but I can say a lot of times people added onto it or fixed it up or this, that, and the other with it. So I was never down there too much. I could go down there as a kid. In fact, that was the only place you could get a Coca-Cola at night—was to go down there, ‘cause they had their own little juke joint down there, you know. And there’s no place wilder than a black section on Saturday night [laughs].
Motta
Did you play a lot with the black children? Was that—did you guys mingle?
Haldeman
No, no. That was—I guess it was strictly because of the location. I don’t think it had too much to do with race. Young kids, no matter how far back you go, never pay much attention to race. Only older people pay attention to race.
Motta
Yeah.
Haldeman
But I think this had to do with location. But as far as the workers, you know—in fact, the company had some kind of agreement with the sheriff’s department, because they didn’t have any kind of police force at all, but I guess they did have something [inaudible] whatever kind of sheriff department he had. I’m sure it wasn’t that big a deal in Seminole County back then. But they had some kind of agreement with the sheriff at the jail in Sanford. They always kept on the payroll about two people that were on probation and everything had been in jail or whatever. And I remember one that used to—when I didn’t mow the yard—he sometimes would help mowing the yard. And he killed his wife or something or other. They were all, you know, most of the black things[?] in those days had to do with domestic squabbles or something, you know. You know, [laughs] I didn’t think about the fact that he murdered somebody. In those days, you just didn’t give it a second thought.
So those were some of the differences. So there was a little more camaraderie among the adult part than there was the kids’ part. Personally, you know, you rarely saw the kids, to be honest with you, because they pretty well did their own thing. They had their own school. The only thing they didn’t have is a high school, but of course, not every white person went to high school in those days either, for that matter. So. They had the opportunity. I think they—if they went to high school, they stayed with somebody in Sanford or something. I don’t remember. And I really don’t remember that we had hardly any people of that age that I can remember. They were always younger than that. I don’t know what happened to them when they grew up. They probably went to work somewhere else, I guess.
Motta
Well, Mr. Haldeman. Thank you very much for talking with me today.
Haldeman
Okay, and if there’s anything that we missed or there’s, you know, something to expand on or some other part of an outline that got missed, you know, call me anytime. Now, if I don’t answer when you call from the museum, it shows up here as unavailable. Sometimes we don’t catch that right off. If we ever answered unavailable, call…
Barnes
Today is Tuesday, May 6th, 2014. I'm interviewing Jeff[rey Edward] Clark, who served in the United States Navy. My name is Mark Barnes, and with me working the camera is Kendra Hazen. We're interviewing Mr. Clark as part of the UCF [University of Central Florida] Community Veterans History Project, and as research for the creation of the educational wall for the Lone Sailor Memorial [Project]. We are conducting this interview in Maitland, Florida.
Mr. Clark, will you please just begin by telling us your name, where you were born—where and when you were born?
Clark
Sure. my name is Jeffrey Clark, and I am originally from East Hartford, Connecticut. I was born in Hartford, Connecticut, on January 31st, 1968. And in 1983, my family moved to Florida—to Flagler County in Palm Coast, where I attended Flagler Palm Coast High School.
And then I did drop out of high school at the age of 17, and joined the Navy shortly after my 17th birthday, where I went through the Orlando Naval Training Center here.[1] Upon completion of my active duty, I returned to—I did obtain my GED (General Educational Development) while I was in the Navy. And then upon completion of my active duty, I did graduate from DBCC—Daytona Beach Community College—and then transferred and graduated at UCF. Major in economics and a minor in political science.
Barnes
Do you have any brother or sisters or parents you want to tell us about?
Clark
Sure. I have two sisters and both of them still reside here in Flagler County in Florida. And then my parents are still alive and live in Flagler County as well. My father—I come from a military family. sort of on the—Forrest Gump movie, I believe, where Lieutenant Dan has an ancestor that had fought in every major American war back to the colonial period. And I have that same line or lineage as well. Goes back to the Mayflower on my father's side.
My father served in the Navy and went through Bainbridge, Maryland, for his boot camp, and then was aboard an aircraft carrier—the USS Chiwawa CV40. And my grandfather—his father—served in World War II. Uh, he was in the Army and was stationed in the Philippines.
And then on my mother's side—my mother is also from—both my father and my mother are from Connecticut, as well. And my mother's side of the family—they were Italian immigrants. my grandfather immigrated in the 19—well, both my grandparents immigrated from Italy to the U.S. in the 1920s. And then when they were younger, obviously—and my mother was born in 1945 and my father was born in 1939.
Barnes
And did you join the Navy for any particular reason?
Clark
Actually, that was a bit of an interesting story. Now, one time, when I was around eight or nine years old, I filled out this application to inquire about the Navy out of a magazine or something like that. And, obviously, you could tell that a child wrote it. Well my father took it as a joke and mailed it in, and I always wanted to join the Navy for—I don't know, because I enjoyed history and my father was in the Navy. So my father mailed this application form in to send information about joining the Navy, and I received this letter from a captain in the Navy that said, you know, “Sorry,” you know, “but you're too young.” And he gave me a couple posters and some other items to say, “Here's some stuff to help you keep thinking Navy, and when you're old enough,” you know, “please come back." Well, pretty much came back at the minimum age possible, and I always wanted to join the Navy when I was a child. I think it was that TV commercial—“It's not just a job. it's an adventure.”
Barnes
So was the Navy a must for you?
Clark
Pretty much. yeah. [air conditioning unit comes on]
Barnes
So you said you attended boot camp in Orlando?
Clark
In Orlando, at the Naval Training Center.
Barnes
And was that by choice, or did they just tell you where to go?
Clark
Um, I would like to think it was by choice, because when I joined in this February—and having lived in Florida and being accustomed to the warm weather—I told the recruiter that I would go into the Navy now, if I could go to Orlando or San Diego, and not Great Lakes. Because there were three facilities for boot camp in the Navy—Great Lakes, San Diego, and Orlando, at that time. And I remember my father was very anxious. He said, “Well, you're going to go in now,” you know, “take him.” But somehow—luck, I would presume—I went through Orlando.
Barnes
We'll come back to this, but what were you trained to do for the Navy? What was your job? Or your jobs?
Clark
Initially, when I went in, I was a basic seaman recruit to do basic shipboard tasks, such as, you know, chipping paint and painting. and in the boats and bay field, sort of basic deck board duties. However, during the course of the time, I did become a signalman, which was communications and navigation, primarily with Morse code, with flashing lights—semaphore, as well.
Barnes
Semaphore?
Clark
In the flags. And that “A” school by the way. If I had entered the Navy as a signalman instead of a basic seaman recruit, the training for the Signalman School was here in Orlando, as well, at the Naval Training Center.
Barnes
We're going to circle back through your life as a recruit, and then we'll circle back through your life as a sailor. So when you first got to—your first day off the bus, so to speak, you know, what were some of the biggest adjustments you had to make going through?
Clark
Alright. I'm going to take a step back from the bus over to the Orlando Naval Training Center, since we're in the state of Florida. I'll keep us in the state of Florida. So, when you enter the military, you go to your recruiting office and you complete all that, and they, I presume, do the background checks—similar—probably similar to any new employment process, if you're hiring somebody.
So one of the key things after you go through that, you have to go through what they call the “MEPs center”—Military Entrance Processing facility—and that was in Jacksonville. And up there you get an initial physical, and they determine if you're—kind of the final step—if you're worthy enough to go on active duty. So I went through that in Jacksonville, and I remember going through there and, for some reason, I had thought that I was not going to enter the Navy until the summertime. And this one naval chief overheard me say that, and he said, “What did you say?” And I said, “I’m not going on active duty until the summer.” I say, “I get to go home, you know, after I go through the MEPS process today.” and he said, “Oh, no you’re not. You’re going in tomorrow morning, and I’m going to personally see to it.” I guess I was talking out of line.
So anyways[sic], we rode a bus from Jacksonville—and I remember I had to call my parents and say, “I’m not coming home.” [laughs] It was kind of sudden and quick. So we rode a bus from Jacksonville. and of course, we didn’t even take [Interstate] 95 and [Interstate] 4. It was like going on a Greyhound. I think it took about five hours to get there, because, you know, we went down, you know, [U.S. Route] 17, and then through Palatka, and all the back roads through there to get to Orlando. So we made it there, and they drop us off at the bus—at the bus area.
And then you kind of get indoctrinated where you come in and you start to, initially—so the initial shock was like, “Wow. this is for real.” But you still had your civilian clothes and you still had your hair. And so—and then that way you—you got your assignment, you know, where your—what your company you're going to be, what building at the Orlando Naval Training Center would be your home for the course of boot camp. And then the next day was kind of, you know—the first couple days were kind of intrigue, you know—kind of getting indoctrinated. And you go through a health screen, you go through and get your hair cut, and your clothes and all that assigned, then you begin your boot camp.
Barnes
Do you have anything that stands out from your time?
Clark
Oh yes. Yeah. definitely. So, for example—and at this time I obviously had more hair than I do now—but I was very proud of my hair. You know, “pretty boys,” as they would say in the Navy. and when I got my head shaved, I didn't look at myself in a mirror for about five or six weeks. I remember I would feel it and be like, Oh. And luckily they didn't have mirrors or anything in the boot camp berthing area—you know, the living area. So I made a purpose not to look at myself. That was the biggest, biggest shock.
The other shock that I had was I was going to have to learn how to fold clothes, because—kind of like out of a movie, where, you know, my mommy is able to wash, fold, and put my clothes away for me. But that changed, and I had to learn how to fold clothes.
But I was a baseball player in high school and very physically active, so the physical nature of boot camp that everybody thinks about—the physical activity was really not an issue for me. I was already in pretty good shape from playing baseball and other physical activities.
Clark
Do you have any memories from when you graduated? Did your folks come down?
Barnes
Yes. As part of the process, there was a graduation ceremony. And, like, my family, including my father's parents—my grandparents—came down and they went to the graduation ceremony, and they were able to get a tour of the facility. And it’s like a parade ground, and they set up these bench area bleachers. and the families were able to watch us do our Pass and Review and hear the speeches from the—from Captain Nice, who was the Recruit Training Center commanding officer and NCS (National Call to Service) conductor of ceremony. Then afterwards, everybody went home.
But, you know, we were able to meet up and, you know, it was good for my family to be there to see that. And that was, you know, an equivalent of like a high school graduation. I would say very similar, but you know dressed in military and military ceremony.
Barnes
When you graduated from boot camp, what was your next assignment?
Clark
Sure. upon graduating boot camp—boot camp lasted about eight and a half weeks. I actually entered active duty on February 26th, 1985, and then boot camp officially started March 1st. And, as I mentioned, those first couple of days were, you know, getting your hair cut, and getting your clothes, and getting indoctrinated.
And then when I graduated, I started—I continued at the Orlando Naval Training Center. They did have additional training schools there. The one I went to is—when I entered the Navy, I entered the Apprenticeship Training Program. and that was open to individuals who wanted to focus on more of a general—kind of like a liberal arts, if you want to call it that—to compare it to college. So there was a Seaman Apprenticeship, a Firemen Apprenticeship, and an Air Apprenticeship.
And then once you completed that training, then you would get assigned to a permanent duty station. So seamen went in to, you know—were eligible and did a cross-range of duties, such as, in the boatmen mate field, which is the deck duty. And then airmen, you know, went and supported, you know, aircraft either on carriers or as part of a detachment. And firemen kind of could go on ships, because they were the ones who worked down in what we called “the pit”—the boiler room and the engine rooms where the boiler technician rates and the machinist mates ran that. So I went through the Seaman Apprenticeship Training program.
Barnes
Were there certain classes you had to take, or do you know about the classes from the various—from the three places you just—the three schools you just described?
Clark
Yes. So basically how the Orlando Naval Training Center was set up is you kind of had—there were—if I remember—I think there were 10 buildings—10 or 12 buildings. And it was set up very, you know, military-style. On one end, you had sort of—and they were called—I forget what they were called. But there's like Building One, Building Two, etc. So on each end was kind of like the administrative offices, and then in between and in sequential order on each side, I think there was[sic] 12. There was[sic] 2 on the end, and five this way and five that way. And then on one side—and, in the middle, there was a divider, like a road that went through the middle. And on one side was strictly where boot camp was conducted. and on the other side is where the schools were conducted. They were the living quarters basically, or “berthing areas,” as they’re called in the Navy.
And so I went through the Seaman Apprenticeship Training. It was a series of classroom training and on-the-job training. They did the USS Blue Jacket, which was there—which was a training, you know—simulation of a ship and so we would go perform for seamen apprenticeship training. You know, how to tie knots, how to tie up the ship, how to raise flags, and other things associated with the Seamen Apprenticeship. And then the fireman did similar things, where, you know, they went in and simulated what jobs they would do once they went to the fleet. And that apprenticeship training was approximately four weeks for that.
Barnes
How would you describe the relationship between your instructors on that side versus your instructors on...
Clark
Sure.
Barnes
The recruit side?
Clark
On the recruit side, the boot camp, you know, was very strict. Very boot camp. very structured. You know, very military. You know, “controlling” is—I guess, would be a way to describe it. You know, your day was fully planned. You, you know—we woke up at four A.M. We went, you know—we did some initial drills and then we have our set breakfast time. You know, Company 101’s breakfast was from say 5:00 to 5:30.
You came back, you washed up, you know, brushed your teeth—whatever. Then you had set criteria of everyday what you would do. And most of it was practicing marching for your graduation ceremony, as well as other, you know, stuff that was boot camp related. You know, physical activity, swimming, firefighting drills that everybody needs to know for the military, and other basic stuff.
Now this was a little bit more specialized, and it was, like I said, classroom and on-the-job training. I would say that there was a bit more freedom. It was like a 9-to-5 job. You know, you woke up, you started class at eight o'clock, you had lunch from 12 to 1, and you were free to go do what you want.
In addition, I guess the big thing was—you were free on the weekends to go do whatever you wanted. Whereas in boot camp, you know, you were in boot camp and you were not allowed to leave. The only time that we left boot camp was after six weeks, we were granted what they called a “restricted liberty,” where it was kind of like an elementary school field trip. You know, like SeaWorld or [Walt] Disney [World], or somewhere like that. And it was very restricted. And, you know, it was covered.
And then you had an unrestricted liberty, like the week before you graduated, and that’s where you could stay within the city of Orlando, and kind of go anywhere you want and you had to be back at a certain time. And I guess a story for this would be—everybody—all the instructors and the officers—would say South OBT [Orange Blossom Trail] is off limits, because it’s kind of a dodgy area. But of course, where does everybody go? South OBT.[2] So that’s pretty much where unrestricted liberty went.
And then, like I said, during the apprenticeship training you were free to do[sic] on the weekend. and then I used to go home, you know. My mother would come pick me up or my father would come pick me up, and I’d visit my friends on the weekend, and then I had to be back Monday morning by eight o’clock to go to class. So it didn’t really matter, but I’d usually come back Sunday night, because we were still living in our living quarters. I guess the way I’d compare, you know, is boot camp was kind of like, you know, elementary school and high school. Very structured, very strict, limited. And apprenticeship training was more like college, where, “Hey, this is what you got to do,” you know, “Here's your times. the rest of that’s up to you.”
Barnes
Now you had—when you said you were living there, did you guys have apartments almost when you were an apprentice?
Clark
No. It was very—it was the same as what we had in boot camp. You know, the same structure. So basically it was an open area, like a barracks, and it was for enlisted. Now, officers tended to have the equivalent of more like the hotel or a small apartment, and they would usually share that with one other officer, depending on their rank. But general enlisted—and this even continued into the Navy with various living quarters on ships—whether you were enlisted or if you were chief, which was a senior enlisted person—kind of like middle management. Where if you were an officer, different living quarters. So it was an open area, and it had bunk beds and lockers for you to store your stuff. It was the same as in boot camp.
Barnes
Now, outside of the schools—the training schools—the command schools that you went to—do you have any recollection of the other schools that maybe were offered at the base?
Clark
Um, yes. from what I recall, because, as I went—during my time in the Navy, I went on, and—they call it “striking out”—I don't know why they call it that, because it’s actually a win ,you know—but basically, you get to move on from sort of a general, seaman apprenticeship-type role to a more specialized one. And I became a signalman, which was the shipboard flags communications and navigation, as well as communications with flashing lights via Morse code and semaphore. And the Signalman School was here in Orlando.
And also—and then—so basically the school structure was as follows. You had the generalists, the Apprenticeship Training Program that I talked about that I went through. Then you had “A” schools, which was[sic] schools that were for a specific job in the Navy, whether you were a storekeeper, a signalman, or, you know, something like that. Then there were also “C” schools, and “C” schools were for very specialized skills which normally required and extended enlistment period, such as six years active duty.
And so, during that time, people were kind of classified based on what their enlistment was that they signed up for. There were the 3-by-6s, which meant you were three years active and then six years of inactive reserves. Or IRR, right—“Inactive Readiness Reserves” I believe is the military term. There were 4-by-4s—and I was a 4-by-4—which meant four years active, four years inactive. And then there were the 6-by-2s, which were the specialty folks who went to extended training. They were six years active and then two years inactive reserves. Unless, of course, if they re-enlisted on active duty, then they would continue.
And the key thing about “C” school was that, once you completed about a two-year classroom/on-the-job training program, you automatically became an E[nlisted Rank] 4—a petty officer third-class. We used to call those people “boot camp thirds.” Because, like, as you go through, you know, you'll be an E-1, E-2, E-3, and then E-4. whereas these guys automatically got credits, basically like college, you know—you got some free credits. So there were some “C” schools here, including the Nuclear Program was here, and the Signalman School was here, and I think—no. The Storekeeper School was in Mississippi. that wasn’t here. But from what I remember, Apprenticeship Training, Signalman, and there was, like, Fire Control Technicians, Radar Schools.
Barnes
Any other—anything else you think about—life off of base, special to base?
Clark
I guess just kind of life on the base. There was Navy Exchange, so if you were a retired naval person—and Florida accumulated a lot of, you know, a lot of retirees and a lot of military retirees, because of the history with Sanford and Orlando—so the Navy Exchange store was there. So if you were active duty or if you were retired military, you could do your shopping. In certain cases, get things a lot cheaper than out in the regular market.
Other than that, it was pretty much, from what I remember, just a training facility. I remember there was a high school on—right on the outside of the base. Seemed like—sometimes we would joke like we were kind of in prison, you know, and you could see the freedom on the other side. I remember, you know, like we would be marching on the grinder and doing all these drills, and you'd look over and see these high school kids running track and field, or, you know, something like that at the high school, and you're thinking we're in prison, but…
Barnes
When you left Orlando, you boarded a ship?
Clark
Yes. Upon completion of my apprenticeship training course—a little bit more of the story here is I had a chief petty officer. I forget his name, but you received your orders where you went to go, and I was always kind of joking around a little bit with the chief. And sure enough, where I get stationed, but the same ship he had come from to the Orlando Naval Training Center. so I remember he told me it was going to be tough, and that he was gonna—he arranged to have me go to the USS Richard E. Bird TDG-23—guided missile destroyer—ported out of Norfolk, Virginia. And that's where I went. And, interesting enough, this chief I then met years later when I was attending UCF and I was working at NationsBank—now Bank of America. He was a customer in there, and I remember him when he came in. we chatted and caught up, and he was living out by UCF at the time, and he was a customer at the bank.
But I caught my ship and I remember it was in the middle of deployment, towards the tail end of the North Atlantic—NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization] cruise. And I remember I had received my orders and I had to go there, and I had all my airplane tickets. They arranged and all that. And I looked on there and I'm like, Where is this place called Ponta Delgada? And there was no Internet in 1985, so I had to go look in the encyclopedia, and it was in the Azores Islands—Portuguese islands in the Atlantic Ocean. I remember I flew from Orlando to New York, and then caught airport to Lisbon[, Portugal], and had a couple night’s stay in Lisbon overnight, and then caught the flight to Ponta Delgada, where I caught my ship. And I still remember the first people I met, who I'm still in contact with today, on board my ship. Gary Hayne[sp], Kurt Kiesden[sp], and Alan Welch[sp] in particular, because I was assigned to deck division, and I was assigned to them.[3] And then from there, you know, I was assigned to the ship and that became my permanent duty station that I stayed at for the remainder of my term—three years and eight months.
Barnes
So you left the Navy when?
Clark
In February ’89. Four years active duty, and then served in the inactive reserves, which just meant if there's a call up, then you were subject.
Barnes
What did you end up doing when you left the Navy?
Clark
Okay. When I left the Navy, I started attended Daytona Beach Community College, which I think is now Daytona State College or something. and so I stayed in Flagler County and just did kind of odd jobs. I worked in a warehouse, primarily while I went to DBCC. And then I started working in the bank as a bank teller and then a sales and service rep[resentative].
And that actually worked out well, because, at the time, with the state, you could complete your first two years at a community college, then automatically transfer into any of the Florida state university system campuses. So I transferred to Orlando, because I worked at the bank it was quite an easy transfer to move over. So I started UCF in the Fall of ’93, after graduating from DBCC in the Spring of ’93. And then I graduated in Spring of ‘95 from UCF.
And also, I guess, during the—some other good things—when I became a basic seaman apprenticeship and I was assigned to the deck division on board, besides just chipping paint and doing all the deck stuff, the favorite thing—and I still remember it today, and it was one of my favorite things—you know, I barely had my driver's license—but at age 17, I qualified as a helmsman, and I drove the ship. I was at the wheel, and I qualified to run the ship's engines—the lee helm. and I used to stay on lookout watch. So here I was at 17 years old—and I actually saw a video on YouTube, like a Navy video, and it shows, like, the 22-year-old guy says, “Yeah. this is my job.” He says the same thing.
And I still remember to this day how to take the helm. You would go up—if you were to take the helm—let’s just say you’re at the wheel now—now I would walk up to the—well, I would first come to you and say, “Hey, what’s[sic] the coordinates? Where do you steer and where do you check in?”And that’s sort of the numbers from the compass of where—what direction you were going. I’d collect that, I’d go check what the speed was in knots, and then I would go up to the Officers’ Deck and salute, and he would say, “Officer of the deck, request permission to take the helm, steering course 225, checking 222 starboard unit, starboard cable, all engines ahead standard, 17 knot.” And the officer on deck would reply back and say, “Relieve the helm.” Then he would go over and then I would—I would take over. Yeah. it’s cool.
Barnes
Well I was getting ready to ask you, what were some of your favorite memories of the...
Clark
Oh, okay. alright. That’s a great one.
Barnes
Do you have another one there that...
Clark
Oh. Yeah. There’s[sic] plenty of them—and then really anything you tend to do, you know, in your life, it’s really about the people. And, you know, made some great friends. Still in contact with a lot them today. And lessons learned, you know, as a young kid—17 to 21, while I was in the Navy. And there’s a lot of memories, you know, of growing up doing stuff.
And I guess another thing is—I was always kind of a prankster a little bit, and I used to come home on leave for spring break, so I could be with all my friends. And we'd go to Daytona [Beach] and all that. One time I went off-base and I got—the senior chief, Senior Chief Moses, who was in charge of deck division, who I worked for—his plan was, you know, you had to look like a sailor. He was very strict with inspections. Well, one time I was trying to sneak and I went off-base and I got what he would call a “pretty-boy haircut.” So I came back and sure enough someone told on me and he personally walked me down to the ship’s barber and butchered me or whatever.
And so, as a retaliatory, I decided next day, I’m going to go put some red mousse in my hair and go stand inspection in front of him. Big mistake [laughs]. I remember he walked up to me, put his face in my face, and he goes, “Take your hat off, punk.” And he was this Texas—Texan guy. Big Texan guy. I took it off and I was smiling, and I wasn’t smiling much after that. He told me I had exactly two seconds to wash that “expletive” out of my hair or he was going to personally shave my head. [laughs] Let’s just say I jumped down the forward hatch and had the stuff out pretty quickly. [laughs]
Barnes
This kind of ties into this whole project that we’re doing and you mentioned it, but you made a lot of personal friends. You’re still in contact with them?
Clark
Yep. Yeah. Out on Facebook. They're all in on Facebook. We have our ships—we have a page of our ships, and so a lot of us connected through there, but even before that there was like a newsletter and some reunions that go. Because I was on an older ship that was commissioned in the early 60s and then decommissioned shortly after I left in 1990. So, you know, there’s[sic] 30 years of history pretty much with my ship that I was on. So the reunions—you have 30 years of people who served on board. So it’s quite large and extensive.
And then I always try to make the effort to visit some of the folks. I travel extensively for my current job, and if I go to a city where one of those guys are, you know, we always try to meet up. And a lot of them are kind of joking when, you know, I first got connected with them, say on Facebook, and they say, “I can’t believe you’re this corporate guy in a suit. You’re the last guy we would have thought as a corporate guy in a suit.”
Barnes
Is this your first trip—you've been back to Orlando since?
Clark
Oh, yeah. And actually, I guess after I finished the Navy, I graduated from UCF, and then worked locally in Altamonte [Springs] at the Kirchman Corporation, which was a banking software company. And then I worked for Pro Systems in Maitland. and then I went to—on an assignment to Luxemburg in Europe. I was there for a couple years. and then I came back and I was on a project in San Francisco[, California]. And then—then this was 2001.
So basically the time scale goes from exited active duty in ‘89, college until ‘95, Kirchman Corporation and Pro ‘96-‘97, Luxemburg from ‘98 to 2001, and then San Francisco for about a half a year. And then I came back to Maitland, and was working in Maitland and lived in Apopka from 2001 ‘till 2005, when I moved to Atlanta[, Georgia], and I've been in Atlanta since 2005.
Barnes
What do you think about all of the changes of the area that used to be the base?
Clark
You know, it’s kind of somewhat sad. There’s really nothing left there. Karla Novak was a personal friend of mine from when—from UCF days—gave me a tour around the Lone Sailor Foundation and the plans for that. And she showed me where the statue is going to be, you know, we’re kind of—both her and I went through there. So we were thinking this is—and she says, “Well, this is the old grinder.” and she was saying, “Remember we’d go over here and have to do these drills?”
Well, now it’s this open grass area. or over there is the housing where our berthing area—but now Baldwin Park is there. So it’s somewhat sad to think that—and I'm kind of one that—I like to preserve history. I wouldn’t want to say you have to preserve the base as-is, but you know, I think how important and how many lives, you know, were shaped, such as mine, going through boot camp. You know, going from being a kid to being an adult basically. you know, that there’s really not much left there.
Barnes
Well, what do you think the legacy of the base is?
Clark
I would say the legacy of the base is going to be, you know, the individual experiences of the people that really went through there. I mean, there’s not much left to see of, you know—what was left there, what was done. It was, you know, a training facility, classroom, and on-the-job training basically. You know, so there’s not much left as far as what you think of the Navy. You know, ships or aircraft or weapons or anything like that. I really think it’s about personal experience. And everybody had a different experience. You know, what they went through there.
Barnes
As a returning sailor, what would want to see if you returned back to the area to see the memorial? I mean, what would resonate with you?
Clark
I think some pictures, you know, of the facility itself, you know. Kind of like, if you went into a museum, you like to see this was Orlando Naval Training Center was here from 1968 ‘till 1992, or something like that. Here’s the pictures and, you know, kind of what, you know—like for my boot camp book—went there, you know. There’s[sic] pictures in there that show the activities and kind of what went on there, and everything’s changed from, you know—boot camp is probably similar, but there’s a lot of changes, you know.
And I think preserving the history and at least showing that, while we can—would be, you know, a good thing. You know, to show there with the Lone Sailor—the Lone Sailor is a great thing to—to reflect their—well, I think any memorabilia or, you know, pictures that show at one point in time this is what was here and quantify it. You know, x-number of people went through during this time who were the commanding officers, you know, kind of like any similar memorials or stuff like that.
Barnes
That’s about all I have. Is there anything that we missed that you’d like to add or a story you'd like to share?
Clark
I think I pretty much covered everything. You know, that was my time here in Orlando at the Naval Training Center for boot camp and then kind of post activities. So I think we've pretty much covered the full spectrum of your questions there, so.
Barnes
Okay. Well, thank you very much.
Clark
Thank you. I'm glad to help.
Hazen
Today is March 7th, 2014. I am interviewing Mr. Henry "”Hank” [Carl] Okraski, who spent 32 years in government service, 10 of which were working in the Senior Executive Service. He was the Director of Research and Engineering and the Deputy Technical Director for Naval Air Warfare Training Systems Division, or NAWCTSD.
My name is Kendra Hazen and with me is Amanda Hill. We are interviewing Mr. Okraski as a part of the [UCF Community] Veterans History Project, and as research for the Lone Sailor Memorial Project. We are recording the interview at the National Center for Simulation Offices, located in the Partnership III building, um, in UCF’s [University of Central Florida] Research Parkway in Orlando, Florida.
Hazen
Mr. Okraski, will you start us off by telling us when and where you were born?
Okraski
Yes. First off, Kendra, thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you today. You’re really representing a worthwhile cause, and I appreciate the opportunity. I was born in Utica, New York, in 1936—January 22nd, actually.
HazenThank you. Can you tell us a little bit about what your parents did while you were growing up?
Okraski
Yes. Uh, they both worked actually. I was a latchkey child. I think one of the first. And they worked in a florist—a wholesale florist enterprise. My mother cut flowers. My father hauled coal and, uh, manure and all sorts of things like that to keep the, uh, flowers growing.
So I was pretty much on my own. I had, um, the run of the neighborhood, if you will. Actually, I wasn’t born on the “other” side of the tracks. I was born on the tracks, because the railroad cars went right down the street where I lived, right next to my bedroom.
Hazen
I’ll bet that was a little loud.
Okraski
It was. At like two in the morning, they would be bumping the cars back and forth and, uh—and it was, uh—I got used to it after a while.
Hazen
Did you grow up with brothers and sisters?
Okraski
No. I was the only child.
Hazen
Can you tell us a little about your early education?
Okraski
Yes. I was, uh, trained by nuns. I attended the St. Patrick’s Grammar School for eight years, um, where I learned the value of discipline and, uh, how to pay attention in class. And I really experienced the nuns, um, caring for us. They wanted us to get ahead. I was really appreciative for that. So I went to St. Patrick’s School for eight years, and then I went to Utica Free Academy, which is the local high school in Utica, for four years. Graduated from there in 1953. I worked a year thereafter and then when on to Clarkson University which is in Upstate New York—in Potsdam, New York.
Hazen
Um, and during that time, did you have any members of your family who were in any of the [U.S.] Armed Services?
Okraski
I had uncles. Several of my uncles were in, uh, in the service. Um, one of my uncles, uh, John—he was at Guadalcanal[, Solomon Islands]. He was in the 1st Marine Corps Division. earned three Purple Hearts while he was there. He’s still alive. I communicate with him just about every week.
And I had other uncles that were there in the South Pacific and in Europe. Um, some—one was in Normandy[, France]—[the] Normandy invasion. So yes. I’ve come from a family—now, my father was not in the Armed Services. He was working on a farm under the agriculture deferment in those days.
Hazen
Um, what branches were they in? or were they all in the same branch?
Okraski
No. I had one in the [U.S.] Army, one in the [U.S.] Navy and one in the [U.S.] Marine Corps. And I also had another one in the Navy too, who was a deep sea diver. Yeah. with the original bubble heads where they wore the large thing. And, uh, he would repair ships, uh, in Newfoundland[, Canada]. Rather cold, you might say.
Hazen
Um, whatever you were going through Clarkson University, what was your specialty? What was your area of specialty?
Okraski
I majored in Electrical Engineering and I graduated with a Bachelor’s [Degree] in Electrical Engineering.
Hazen
And then from there, what was your first professional experience?
Okraski
Yes. Uh, I was recruited from college to LINK Aviation [Devices, Inc.]. LINK Aviation was located in Binghamton, New York, and they were manufacturers of simulators—primarily flight simulators, at the time. and I always had somewhat of an interest in flight simulators. I might relate to you the first simulator that I ever had?
Hazen
Mmhmm.
Okraski
Okay. Um, I was 11 years old and I would spend summers on a farm. and all we had was radio for entertainment. There was no television, or we didn’t have any movies or anything close by. So radio was the big thing. Every day, I would listen to Jack Armstrong, the All-American Boy. And they had one offering there that if you send, uh—I think it was 15 cents and a box top from Wheaties—they would send you a simulator. So I got the money. I got the Wheaties and I put it together and send it off. And I waited and waited. Every time the rural post delivery man would come by he’d say, “No, sonny. not today.” And nuts. I’d go back. Every day I’d wait for him. Finally, it came and I opened it up and it was a cardboard instrument panel that replicated an aircraft cockpit. It had a control stick. It had a throttle and it had two rudder pedals simulating the aircraft.
So what we did—all of us youngsters, you know, part of the, uh, Jack Armstrong squadron—we would sit on our chairs and set up our cockpits and then listen to the radio. And he would say, “Today we’re going to be flying over the jungles of South America. Look down. You can see the river.” I would look down and I could see that river. You know, because in those days, we said radio was the theatre of the mind. And it really was. We used our imaginations and we could visualize things that weren’t even there. So that was my first simulator. That wetted my appetite. So, then when LINK Aviation recruited me, I was very happy, because I would be working with simulators again.
Hazen
What exactly were your responsibilities when you were at LINK Aviator?
Okraski
Yes. Uh, with LINK, they started us out in, uh, Field Service Organization. So I attended a short course learning how to maintain and operate one of their flight simulators. They called it a “C11” or “Device 2F-2”3 in those days. And it was a basic one seater flight instrument trainer that was used in primary, uh, flight training for the Air Force in my case. And where pilots would learn how to fly instruments. how to do instrument landing. Uh, also how to react to various failures that might occur in the aircraft. So I would help the pilots learn how to go through emergency procedures to save themselves and to save the aircraft. So that was my first job. It entailed traveling throughout the, uh, Southwest, and that was in Oklahoma and Texas—uh, in that area where there are several Air Force bases. And I had an opportunity to visit and work with the various pilots or wannabe pilots in those days. So, that was my first job, Kendra.
Hazen
How long were you there? How long were you with LINK Aviation?
Okraski
Well, I was with LINK Aviation for about four and a half years. Um, what happened was I did a short stint in the Army. I had to go through basic training, um, but I essentially went back to the inactive reserves.[1]
And then LINK transferred me to a number of places, but the most memorable one, I guess, was to Thule [Air Base], Greenland where I spent six months one night. It was dark for the entire period and I was working then on the F-102 aircraft simulator. And so I would help train a pilot, set up all the simulations and train the pilots, um, to do air to air combat maneuvering and air to air intercepts. And it was very, very important, because it was co-located with the ballistic missile early warning site located there at Thule, Greenland, whose antenna was essentially affixed at the Soviet Union at that time, ‘cause we were under, you know, Cold War conditions. So having our pilots trained was very important in the event that anything should happen and they had to scramble. They were in a position to, uh, perform as they were trained.
Hazen
Do you remember what year that was, when you..?
Okraski
Around 1960.
Hazen
Um, and then after your four and a half years with LINK, where did you go next?
Okraski
Yeah. I—I traveled a little bit more with LINK, and I took a job with the Naval Training Device Center, which was located in Port Washington, Long Island[, New York]. And that’s where I took a position as, um, a GS-11 electrical engineer working in the field support of Naval Aviation simulators. It was in a facility that was called a [Gould-]Guggenheim Estate at one time. It was a castle. Actually, it was a castle that was created that was by the Guggenheims and the Gould family years before. So it was quite a thrill to come to work and go into the castle. And, um, it was on an estate that overlooked Long Island Sound and several, several acres. It was beautiful. And our next door neighbor, who—Kendra, you may not recall—was somebody called Perry Como, the singer. So he lived next door—very casual individual and, uh, we would wave as we went on to work in our castle.
Hazen
A castle. Um, what kinds of things were the projects that were being worked on? In addition to what you did, what are some of the different projects that were being worked on there?
Okraski
It was an interesting time, because originally the Naval Training Device Center, which began as the Special Devices Task by Admiral [Luiz] de Florez in 1941, um, expanded its mission to include more than just aviation training. In the beginning, he focused on flight simulators—in the LINK trainer actually grew out of some of the initiatives that were going on there and, uh, Luiz de Florez took the LINK trainer and, uh, modified it for gunnery training. Uh, and other applications that went beyond aviation. They began to get into surface Navy, land warfare, undersea warfare, simulators for all those kinds of things. But the primary thrust was in aviation. So aircrafts such as the P2V [Physical-to Virtual] —oh gosh—the F-3, the A-7, the A-3 intruder. Um, all those aircraft had simulators that were built and being delivered and used by the pilots’ aircrew, uh, to train out in the field.
Hazen
How long were you there in Long Island with them?
Okraski
Yeah. I was there until 1965. 1965. Well, let me back up about six months from there. Earlier, I had bought a house. My wife and I had bought a house out in North Port[, New York], and it was a really, really nice house. It was about all we could afford too. But it was near the water. It was a beautiful place.
Six months later the commanding officer gets on the loud speaker and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, you’re next home will be in Orlando, Florida.” I said, “What? Next home? I already have a home.” But nevertheless, uh, we did move to Orlando, Florida. It was probably the best thing that ever happened to us at the time. We were—it was the beginning of a tremendous growth of simulation and a wonderful career opportunity for me and my friends and co-workers that moved here. And also a wonderful environment for my family to live and grow.
Hazen
Did you know anything about the area before you got down here?
Okraski
No, but they allowed us two visits and at that time in 1965. In 1965, uh, Orlando was a sleepy little town in the orange groves. Uh, we had Gatorland, I think, and, uh, Cypress Gardens.
There was no [Walt] Disney [World]. There was no SeaWorld, Universal [Orlando Resort], etc., etc. It was a sleepy little town. And it was very enjoyable to go out on Sundays and look at homes for sale and, um, take in some of the natural beauties. Some of the—like the Wekiva Springs, uh, which was—was open—open to the public. And there were other springs. Silver Springs [State Park], etc., etc. And the beaches were so close, so it was very, very nice. Very, uh, unspoiled you might say.
Hazen
And when you moved down, um, was it called? It was called the National Center for Simulation yet?
Okraski
No. That’s a whole other outgrowth. Yeah. The Naval Training Device Center changed its name about two or three times.
Hazen
Mmhmm.
Okraski
To where it is today—Naval Air Warfare System—Naval Air Warfare Systems Training System Division. Uh, so we went through an evolution.
Hazen
So when you moved down, what was it?
Okraski
It was still the Naval Training Device Center.
Hazen
Okay.
Okraski
At that time.
Hazen
And what resources was here for them?
Okraski
Nothing.
Hazen
Nothing?
Okraski
Well, the only thing that was here—and this is kind of amusing. You wonder how these things happen. These relocations cause we’re always faced with things like BRAC [Base Realignment and Closure] and justifying movements and what have you. But the truth to be known, a lot of these decisions are totally politically based and what happened was an Air Force activity moved out of the Air Force base here in Orlando. Not McCoy [Air Force Base], but where Baldwin Park is today. Okay. there was an Air Force Reconnaissance Squadron located there. They were relocated and I think part of it was even disestablished. So there was a need to fill the vacuum.
Well, the powers to be—the political powers to be—got together and decided that this little activity up in Port Washington, Long Island, would feel much better if they were located in Florida. So they moved us to Orlando beginning in, uh, 1965. The, uh—many of the buildings were old barracks. Um, they were not air-conditioned. Um, we lived in that kind of a situation where—this was before computers, where you did your own memos and that. So we would draft memos in pen and ink and your sweat would drip on the paper and run as you’re trying to write the memos to, ah, your—your—for business purposes. So it was rather a primitive existence. Although once the Navy got there, they began to refurbish the buildings and we got air conditioning, which worked most of the time. So that made us a lot more comfortable.
But an interesting thing about Orlando too, uh, from a historical stand point, um, when the, um, Normandy invasion was being planned, General [Dwight D.] Eisenhower came to Orlando and actually mocked up the Normandy Beach in one of the orange groves. In other words, he created an—an, uh—an emulation, if you will, of the Normandy Beach head, and he would position ships and whatever on this false floor that essentially was cement looking like the Normandy Beach head. and he would, with his generals, plan their attack moving objects around and developing strategies that they would follow. So that was in Orlando long before the Navy or anybody else got down here to talk about simulation. Can I give you one more historical event?
Hazen
Certainly, yeah.
Okraski
I think it was—the year was 1935 or so. I’d have to verify that, but Luiz De Florez, for whom the building is named out here—the Navy building is the De Florez complex—the Luiz De Florez building. Okay. And as I mentioned earlier, he got simulation off the ground particularly for the Navy beginning in Washington, D.C., but before that, uh, he was involved in the in oil—in oil production. the crack and process and all that. Well, he was honored for his accomplishments—he was a civilian though at that time—uh, by a number of people. one of which was Rollins College here in Winter Park. So he was given an honorary Doctorate degree from Rollins College the same year that Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, who as you well know, is the author of The Yearling, and Cross Creek, and a few other wonderful novels. So that brought simulation down here again back in the [19]30s. If you believe in pre-destiny or something, you begin to wonder if there isn’t some connection. So, those are a couple other historical points relating to the Orlando area having to do with simulation.
Hazen
And kind of the birth of the idea of it being here.
Okraski
Yes. Yeah.
Hazen
Um, you talked a little bit about what was here when you got here, and the buildings. Can you tell us a little bit about those early days? What were kind of your primary responsibilities when you first got down here? What were some of the main projects that were being worked on?
Okraski
Sure. Um, I, uh—when I came down, I was assigned to the Maintenance Engineering Division. It doesn’t have to do with changing light bulbs or anything like that. What we actually had to do was plan for the logistic support of the simulators, because it was very critical to keep the simulators operating when they’re being used by our pilots, aircrew, and other ships crew, etc. So we had to make sure that they were reliable, maintainable, and we provided an adequate logistic support package to go with each and every simulator that went out the door. And our industry was pretty much, uh, on board when they came to designing in reliability, maintainability, and providing a good logistic support package.
So one of my jobs was to develop the criteria for logistic support and I wrote a document called “Bulletin 40-1,” which identified all the logistic support requirements for simulators that stayed in use for probably 20 years or so that people may even use parts of it today. It was important to do that.
Now, in the process of moving down here, a number of people didn’t want to leave Long Island. They were particularly—they were really happy just to stay there. And I, in turn—I was offered a job at the Space program at the time too. But I elected to come to Florida and stay with our parent organization anyway. So when a number of people didn’t come, it left some room at the top. So that gave me some nice promotion opportunities that I took advantage of and so going, you know, then from a division head to a department head to associate director, etc. I think the move down here kind of enabled that progression quite nicely.
So what I did is—I had a division and we worked very closely with the engineers in designing our systems such that they were maintainable and supportable. And we—the program began to grow quite a bit. Word got around that, “Hey, this simulation stuff must be pretty good. It must be saving a lot of lives and it’s not costing as much as putting airplanes in the air or ships at sea or submarines under the sea.” So the Army—well, they had joined us earlier with what was called the “Army Participation Group,” and, uh, the simulation caught on with them and they began to grow very large. Then the Marine Corps—they came on board. Then the Air Force came on board. So what was just a single entity down here in the Navy became pretty much a joint operation. Joint with a small “j” not a large “J,” ‘cause we’re not really a “joint” organization. We’re, uh—we operate jointly though. And it was amazing of the synergy that was achieved by working together. You know, an engineer working on a tank simulator working alongside an engineer working on an air craft simulator could share technology and experiences and know-how, such that the customers were getting more for their money essentially than if an individual service were doing a procurement of a simulator. And that continues today. Maybe even more so today, because of the large number, the large acquisition program we have here, um, at the, uh, what we call now “Team Orlando.”
Hazen
After it was called the Naval Training Device Center here? What was then the next step?
Okraski
Well, it was renamed Naval Training Systems Center, Naval Training Materials Center, uh, and Naval Training Systems Center, and then it went to, um, Naval Air Warfare Center. The reason for that is that, uh, we changed responsibilities on—we changed, uh, the organization that we reported to over the years. In the beginning, you know, it was like the Bureau of Aeronautics, and then it was Chief [of] Naval Research, and then it went to Chief [of] Naval Materials ,and then to the Naval Air Systems Command—so away and back again. So every time it moved, people felt, “Well, we gotta change the name of that.” So that happened, you know, over several years. so the stationary was taking a hitting. You know, in changing our names and who we reported to over the years, but it appears now that we have a very stable organization under the Naval Air Systems Command and our organization continues to grow down here and they’re doing wonderful things. Saving time, lives, and money every day. See, that’s the beauty of really working with an organization like this, because when you go home at night you realize that you touched the lives of every solider, sailor, Marine, and Coast Guard. You know, and through the efforts of what you’re doing here. You can’t beat that for job satisfaction.
Hazen
Can you give us some specific examples of simulations that happen? Like what does it look like? How does that work? What kinds of things do you have to do on the front end to make it possible?
Okraski
Uh, yes. Um, you know [laughs], I’m not gonna do this. You know, it’s all in here. That was commercial.
Hazen
[laughs]
Okraski
No. I actually—kidding aside—it all begins with the requirements. It all begins with the requirements from the, um, the parent system. Like if it’s an aircraft that you want to build a simulator for, uh, you examine the aircraft. you examine the tasks that have to be conducted by the air crew. And given those tasks, then you can select the media—what media is best to teach. Train those particular tasks. There are some that deal with, like, decision making. Others are procedural and each and every media kinda has their own strength, you know, with which each of the tasks that have been identified.
So normally it goes through some form of task analysis of the operational system and then from there you come up with the media. Uh, you identify the behavioral objectives, come up with the media, and then go about writing the specifications and statements of work for the training system that you intend to have procured or built. So our engineers spend a lot of time writing specification statements of work delineating exactly what the simulator has to look like.
Let’s take for example: what would a flight simulator consist of? Okay. First of all, you’ve got the—the enclosure where the pilot would sit. So you’ve got to make sure all the instruments—all the nobs, and controls, whatever—operate just like the real airplane. So you have to make some decisions how you gonna design that and becomes a systems engineering process to do that. So you design that enclosure with the proper configurations. Then you decide, Well, am I gonna have a visual display? So that the pilot can look out the windscreen and see the real world. If so, there are several choices you have as to what kind of visual system you would put on this. So let’s say you narrow it down to the visual system—maybe it’s a widescreen. The pilot looks out, can look 180 degrees perhaps, and see even through the periphery what’s happening in the real world. And this—the intent is to have it move and behave just like it would if you were flying the aircraft.
Okay. what else do we need? Well, we need some computers to make this thing work. So you get a computing system. You go through that whole exercise again. What’s the proper size, speed, etc. for the computer? Then you say, “Well, should we have motion or not? Should we tilt and move this pilot?” We go through that same process to come up with the motion system. Then you have things we call like “control loading,” and then like when the pilot moves the control stick. Does it feel right? Does it feel like the airplane? Is it, uh, hydraulic, or is it force-fed or whatever—make these kinds of decisions depending on what your requirements are.
So what you do is you take all these components and you integrate them together and you come up with a training system that replicates the function, um—the functions and usually the configuration of the system that you’re trying to simulate. I mean, a true testimony to how well we’ve done our job is when a pilot comes out of a simulator and he or she is draped with sweat and they say, “That was god-awful.” And then you know you’ve achieved some realness, because what we’re looking for here. And, uh, I think the amusement people say it very nicely—is we’re suspending disbelief for a little while. Because you know you’re in a simulator, but if you get all engrossed in the task at hand. You can forget that it’s a simulator—you begin to think that it’s real. And that’s what we want, because then you can train people effectively. You can make decisions under stress even though you’ve created the stress artificially. So that’s kinda how you put it—that’s what a flight simulator would look like. Then you have all sorts of other simulators, uh, besides just aviation, submarines, you might want to teach people how to control a submarine. You know, the driving aspects of it or the weapons system piece, fire control, etc., all those have to be integrated into the overall system. There are full-up systems, there are part-task trainers, entire families of training devices. I’m giving you a crash course here in a very short period of time.
Hazen
That’s perfect.
Okraski
Okay.
Hazen
That’s exactly what I was hoping for. Um, I think you touched a little bit on this next question just through some of those examples that you said but what is the mission—the mission statement of NAWCTSD?
Okraski
Well, see, I’ve been out of there now for a while, because I retired in 1994. Um, but the mission is—and I can just sort of paraphrase—I believe it is to be the principle agent for the acquisition research and logistic support of—of training simulators for the, uh—the Navy and the other services as a side. Something to that effect. But it is—they are the principle activity within the Navy for procuring simulators.
Hazen
And, um, can you tell me a little bit about your time at NAWCTSD? What were some of, uh, your major projects?
Okraski
Sure.
Hazen
And what happened on your watch when you were here?
Okraski
Yeah., I’d love to, ‘cause we, uh, you know—we have a road of accomplishment, I think, over those years while I was here that I’m quite proud of the people that were able to make some real breakthroughs in technology and satisfy the war fighter and the warrior in a way, in a manner, that hadn’t been done before.
I’ll give ya one example: Um, the MILES system, which is the Multiple Integrated Laser Engagement System, was essentially developed in our laboratory at NAWCTSD by a team. The team was headed by a gentleman by the name of Al Marshall. Al Marshall had a better idea on how to teach weapon—team—weapons team engagement and that was the use of lasers. Um, eye safe and totally safe lasers, as opposed to using live ammunition out in the field. So he came up with the whole concept of outfitting soldiers with the laser detectors and this was really the first laser tag, if you will, but it was for the military. He was a Navy engineer doing some work for the Army and the Marine Corps went and bought the MILES system also. So it was a tri-service initiative kicked off by one little team, if you will, working in the, uh, in our laboratory under the Office of Naval Research, uh, task.
Some other things that we did, uh, other than the just the technology growth and the improvement in the fidelity of simulation. You know, visual systems have gotten to be really, really good when it comes to realism, uh, as is motion for that matter. Now, while I was there too, we toyed with the idea of developing deployable trainers. You know, we felt, “Gee, why do we always have to bring people into the school house, put them in a simulator, and then they get deployed out to sea?” And by the time they come back, some of the skills have already perished. I mean, they’re perishable skills to some degree. Why not put the trainers out there where they are?
So along came the whole idea of deployable simulators and mission rehearsal simulators that could be deployed, put on board aircraft carriers and other installations that are closer to the squadrons and the people that actually use them. So, uh, the deployable simulators, I thought, was a really neat technology that was like the next—next energy level above what we had been doing in the past. And—and the same is true in so many other areas too, where a level of realism has increased, uh, tremendously too.
For example—his happened after my watch—so the, um, battle stations 21—the simulator up at Great Lakes where they brought together the entertainment world along with the simulation—military simulation world—and they built a training device for recruits—Navy recruits— that essentially forms the part of their graduation. Their last day. It’s sort of like a hell week, but only compressed into one day, where they’re able to simulate fires on board ship, casualties, injured people, leaks in the bulkhead—all simulated—but like with real water and what looks to be like flames. Again, borrowing on the Disney magic and any other theme parks that are here. And it became so—it’s so realistic, in fact, that it’s hard to replicate what they’ve done up there.
Another, uh, thing that we did, way back when—or “back in the day,” as they say today—was pier-side training along the same notion of, you know, why bring people in to a classroom, or why go to sea and train all the time, uh, because that that can be expensive. We came up with the pier-side trainers which essentially are, um—well, they’re trailer-based simulations. More like stimulators than simulators. But anyway, we take these trailers, and we plug them into a ship that’s tied up pier-side, and through cables and running alongside and into the ship. we’re able to generate signals, put them into the ship, so that the people that are at their operating stations see everything as though they’re out at sea. We can create targets in that trailer. You know, create targets and threats and then the people in their battle station. or in their normal working stations, they can look at their radars, their sonars, their fire control, and they see targets like they’re at sea and they give commands and they run through the exercise as though they are out at sea. So that was a family of pier-side trainers that started to be quite successful.
And then the next step was imbedded training where we were able to imbed some training features into the actual parent system, whether it be an aircraft or a ship. I know one particular radar, for example, that when they go out at sea they can generate targets and practice radar movements simulating those targets that are out there. There are no targets in the water, but they—the ship’s crew—think that there is, because we can generate those and they look at their scopes, the water, and they see actual targets that aren’t real. So, you know, tech, and…
This this happened outside of my experience at NAWCTSD, but it began at NAWCTSD, and that’s the whole notion of using virtual reality for training. Um, one of the things that Dr. Hayes—Dr. Bob Hayes—had a project with his team called “V Sub,” to where they simulated the gentlemen in the submarine at the conning tower that was steering a submarine through a canal or channel, say. And they did that through virtual reality. They would put the head-mounted display on the individual and that individual would see the banks of the canal, would see other ships, beacons, markers. and then through a headset communicate with what would’ve been the people steering the submarine when in actuality it was a voice recognition system that was taking action based on the commands being given by the individual. So—and that was a very, very neat, neat program.
And later on, after I retired and I—I worked, uh, with a company General Dynamics—actually Veridian, at the time. Um, I was like a support contractor to them—came up with this notion of maybe we can do something for deaf and hearing-impaired kids using that same technology. At that time Congressman [Ira William “Bill”] McCollum[, Jr.] was very active and interested in what we’re doing, and he was able to get some support money for us to build a virtual reality system for Lake Sybelia Elementary School up in Maitland. There they have a high percentage of deaf and hearing-impaired children, and what initiated this was the principal coming to one of our NCS [National Center for Simulation] meetings.
At the time, I believe I was chairman of the board at NCS and we got all through with our meeting and it was an open meeting. He said, “Yes, sir. I’m, um, a principal of Lake Sybelia Elementary School. What can you do to help us?” “What’s your problem, sir?” He says, “Here’s my problem. We have a large group of deaf and hearing-impaired kids and our teachers spend most of their time with living skills—teaching them how to do very simple things. They don’t have time to get into reading and arithmetic and things they’re supposed to be learning. What can you do to help us?”
So we moved out and we got all the support we could. We put together a team. We got some money and we did build a virtual reality system. and the kids loved it, because they would get immersed in the system. And we simulated, for example, the question of how to cross the street safely. So we would simulate trucks going by, so they could see them and we even had the odor of diesel so they knew it was a truck and a little bit of rumble, because we fixed the seat so it would vibrate. And, uh, so they learned to go to the cross-walk and go through the green light and whatever. We had stranger danger, danger stranger with an intruder coming in the classroom—in the classroom—on the school grounds. and, uh, we taught them what to do if they saw a stranger that didn’t look good. We taught them how to, uh, go to and order in a fast food restaurant.
Many times these kids—they’re not looking for recognition. They’re not looking for attention. so if they order the wrong thing usually they’ll just take it and eat it—whatever it is—or if they get the wrong change back, they’re not gonna make a thing out of it. They just by and large don’t want to be recognized like that. So we taught them how to go to a fast food restaurant and order. We gave them the menu. We told them how to order. They made change and we gave it back to them and whatever. We did that. We did fire in the home. How to get out of the building if it’s on fire, etc. So we taught them all those things using that technology of virtual reality and, to me, that one probably one of the most rewarding projects that I ever got involved with.
Hazen
That’s really cool.
Okraski
Yeah. Yeah. Fun too. Like I tell people, I never worked a day in my life. And that’s true. if you enjoy what you’re doing, you never will work a day in your life.
Hazen
One of my questions is about challenges. In creating the different simulations for—I guess it’s kind of a broad question—what are some kind of reoccurring challenges that you come into when you go to put together one of these simulations?
Okraski
Well, of course, it’s—we always think in terms of cost and schedule and performance, and cost is always an issue. Particularly, if you’re dealing in an area where you cannot define precisely, exactly what you want, and so there’s opportunities there for some, some, uh, you know, movement within that—you know, feasible window of opportunity. So many times cost-growth is an issue—trying to keep the cost within the budget.
And the same is true with time. Technology changes so rapidly, and usually you want the most current technology in your system. So there might be some delays attributed to that and then when you get to new technology, then there’s a learning curve or whatever. So time can be a problem.
And performance, uh, can be an issue too, because you really have to understand what the user wants. And it can be sometimes vaguely stated and our engineers and others—our education specialists and psychologists—will write a specification and it may not be exactly what the, uh, expectations of the eventual user. And then you have turn over personnel. you know, the user has different people coming on board, because of rotation. The new person might say, “That’s nice, but here’s what I really want.” So that can drive cost and schedule a little wacko too.
So those are some challenges and, and the technology itself. You do want to have everything that’s as current as can be, because you’ve got that whole issue of user acceptance to deal with.
Kids today have the latest bells and whistles, and it’s true in the service too. I mean, all the younger people coming in the service usually are familiar with and have used the latest technology. So, if you come along and give them something that’s lesser than that, they’re not going to be happy and chances are they may not even use it. So you’ve got to be very accommodating to the, uh, you know—the generations as they’re coming along to what you deliver.
Um, I can give you a good example of that. Today, gaming—you know, we’re using gaming technology in some of the simulator developments, like in decision making and some of those, uh, training devices. They’re actually using off-the-shelf games, um, or it can be just the gaming engines that are being used in the simulations. S, we have a whole new generation now that are familiar with gaming, but we have others that are not familiar with gaming. So we’ve got to bring the new people in as quickly as we can to make sure that we’re satisfying the generational needs of our—our service people. So keeping up with the technology and incorporating that in our latest devices is going to be a challenge. So, um, there are a few challenges. There are other challenges—I’m sure—but, uh, those are a few.
Hazen
Thank you. Um, and even in that you talked a little bit about this next question—can you tell me about what you think the future looks like for simulation? Specifically here at NAWCTSD. what’s the future look like with what kinds of things they might get into? [00:42:47.25]
Okraski
Yeah. these are exciting times, because every time I think that we’re here now—it just goes off onto another curve. I—I liken this to, um, a growth curves that I—I—I’ve been developed for other things, like tennis rackets. Tennis rackets, you know, started out as wood rackets, and then they went to aluminum rackets. Then they went to composite rackets. And every time they go from one technology to another, you get off a growth curve that looks like it’s saturated onto a new growth curve that begins to get saturated and you continue to do that. And that’s where we are right now in simulation and training.
With—as I mentioned, gaming, for example—it’s opening up a whole new area for us to investigate. An area too that I think is gonna get some attention and that is the fidelity of simulation is determined by brain activity. To be able to measure brain activity in an individual while varying fidelity might give us some indication as to how well we are conveying information to the trainee based on their mental arousal or other, uh, symptoms that would be evident through brain wave measurement. For example, we might take a look at a low fidelity simulator—as opposed to a high fidelity simulator, as opposed to an aircraft and do the same measurement on individuals—and just take a look at what kind of distraction or what kind of concentration takes place in each of those situations.
So I think there’s, you’re gonna see more activity in the brain—brain measurement area. I’m not up to the point yet where they’re gonna put probes into the head and with one throw of the switch you’ve got it. That—that’s maybe for my son or somebody else to pick up on that, but, um, yeah. I think that’s a very, very good area to and people are doing that now to some degree. Not full-scale yet, but they are looking at it.
Um, other areas—I mentioned gaming. Again, I think being able to tell a story better. Being able to tell a story of how a simulator is included in the overall scenario or experience that you’re trying to create. The attractions do that really well. They prepare you for it, you know, on The [Twilight Zone] Tower of Terror. you’re terrorized before anything happens for that matter. Or if you go to the Cape [Canaveral], over here where they have the new [NASA Space Shuttle] Atlantis [Exhibit] and you go through the space mission. they get you all prepped for the mission that you’re going to be involved with. They know how to tell a story, and I think we need to do that too with our training for our military personnel. To be able to integrate what we’re doing more into the overall scenario that we’re trying to establish. Yeah.
Hazen
Thank you.
Okraski
Okay.
Hazen
And one of my last questions is about the changes that have happened in Orlando because of NAWCTSD’s presence. You kind of described for us what it was a little bit like when simulation kind of got started here. Can you tell us a little bit about how it’s changed? How Orlando has changed because of NAWCTSD’s presence here?
Okraski
Yeah. I—I think we need to look at it from a little larger picture first. And that is, when we first came down here, there were no companies that—except for Lockheed Martin—that had anything to do with simulation. But then, as simulation began to grow, all these other companies began to come down and wanted to be close to the acquisition agencies—the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard, to some degree too. They want to be close to it, so they begin to orbit essentially the Team Orlando organization that we’ve been talking about to where Team Orlando now accounts for billions of dollars of acquisition of simulators and this accounts for some 27,000 direct employees working with the [U.S.] Defense Department in modeling and simulation.
Now it’s spread. We’re no longer just defense. We’re into entertainment, homeland security, transportation, medical—all using simulation. And we don’t know how large that piece is, but if the other piece is 27,000, it’s equal to or greater than probably. So what went from a handful of people moving down here in 1965—yeah. We might have 50,000 people now involved in simulation, one way or another.
Tremendous impact on the tax base in Central Florida., the average salary is about 70,000 dollars a year. people working in the simulation industry and the educational system has been totally responsive. The University of Central Florida, what were our community colleges now are four year colleges that have been set up. We can get a Master’s or Doctorate degree in simulation through UCF. Our high schools now—we have a curriculum in modeling and simulation that NCS put together. It’s on our website. It just seems to be no end to this and that’s good. You know where the long pole in the tent is to all this? Teachers. We don’t have teachers than can teach at the K[indergarten] through 12 level modeling and simulation and let the kids know about the careers that are available and why they need to study STEM [Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics]. you know, cause that’s the basis for our business in modeling and simulation is STEM. But it has—it has grown almost exponentially, and I expect it to continue to grow too. In spite of cut backs or other barriers we might see, we’re in a growth, uh—we’re in a growth community right now.
Hazen
Thank you. Um, do you have any other thoughts? Kind of wrapping up our interview. Any final thoughts about simulation and, um, its benefits? How it benefits us?
Okraski
Well, we know about the military. We also know that it’s being infused now into the medical world. Our Lake Nona [Medical City] complex down here—Medical City—has a number of simulations for like endoscopic, other forms of surgery, the Da Vinci simulations, and all. Um, the VA hospital. They all have some form of simulation. so, um, the spectrum has opened up as to the application of simulations. It provides for a wonderful career for individuals that want to get in to a well-paying, yet very, very satisfying career. and we need to really get that information out—get that out to the youngsters so they do they do begin to think of it as a viable career and they can stay in Florida and enjoy what we have here in doing so.
Hazen
Thank you.
Okraski
My pleasure, Kendra. Thank you for taking the time.
Hazen
Thanks.
[1] Individual Ready Reserve (IRR).