Gender, sexuality & culture

Abstract 0997 Addie Weed interviewed by Colleen George, November 2, 1974, Veazie, Maine. Weed talks about her interest in plants and the 500 glad bulbs she plants each year. She describes how holidays were spent during childhood including July 4, Thanksgiving and others; her mother's death in 1926; her first radio and first television; working at the University of Maine starting in 1908; her extensive travel from 1910-1950s; and family background. Text: 28 pp. Tape: 1 hr. w/ brief cat. & trans....

Abstract 1006 Cathy Murray, interviewed by Susan Stewart, November 9, 1975, Augusta, Maine. Murray talks about her childhood in the 1950s and 60s with a working mother and subsequently divorced parents; her job as a speech therapist; movies of the 1970s; her views on women’s liberation and gender roles; her ideal man; recollections of Kennedy’s assassination; view of the Vietnam War; Nixon, the Watergate scandal, and political corruption. Text: 31 pp. transcript plus 4 pp. catalog. Recording: T 1018...

Abstract 1323 Dr. David Smith, interviewed by Mary Poulin, March 11-16, 1980, Orono, Maine. Smith talks about his experiences in the 1950s; the lumber business and the introduction of power saws; use of horses in the lumber business; the value of doing work the old-fashioned way; his support for his professional wife and lack of gender stereotypes; Navy service and concerns that the Korean War would lead to war with the Soviet Union; MacArthur’s dismissal from command; impact of the G.I. Bill of...

Abstract 0998 Dr. Doris Twitchell Allen (1901-2002) interviewed by Maryann Hartman, August 1, 1975 at Trenton-Bayside for IDL 105 Women of Maine. Dr. Allen, a native of Old Town, Maine, was a professor emerita from the University of Cincinnati and would become a Nobel Peace Prize nominee in 1979. Dr. Allen discusses her family history and how her early life influenced her later achievements, one of them being the founder of C.I.S.V., Children's International Summer Villages. Her father was a...

Abstract 1195 Dr. Joyce White, interviewed by Marietta Flagg, April 14 – May 13, 1978, Newport, Maine. White discusses her childhood in the area of Canaan, Maine, in the 1930s and 40s; the sense of disaster during the Great Depression; responsibilities, recreation, and education; sexual mores of the late 1940s/early 1950s; rationing and recycling during WWII, including picking milkweed pods; her personal growth when she returned to college in 1967; regrets over her attempts to raise perfect children;...

Abstract 0874 Elizabeth Savage, interviewed by Tami Rawcliffe, November 11, 1974, Bangor, Maine. Savage talks about her work for various causes through the mid-twentieth century; her “pioneering” decision to attend Trinity College in Washington, D.C. in the early 1900s; two year engagement in order for her fiancé to establish himself; rules for going out at Trinity College; her courtship; involvement in the League of Women Voters 1930-1940; purpose and structure of the League of Women Voters; her...

Abstract 0999 Eunice Young interviewed by Maryann Hartman, August 27, 1975, Lamoine, Maine. Young, age 93, discusses her work in the Lamoine Grange for 75 years and how the first woman to serve as Master of the Grange in the U.S. was from Lamoine in 1887. Young became Master of the Grange in 1928. She discusses working as the Lamoine Town Clerk for 40 years, and as a teacher during her youth; how the status of women has changed during her lifetime; World War II and the capture of two German spies not...

Abstract 0875 Harry Putnam, interviewed by Tami Rawcliffe, December 17, 1974, Hampden, Maine. There are interuption throughout the interview by John, a man living with Mr. Putnam. Putnam talks about the changing role of women in society; his education; gender roles during his childhood and young adulthood; how women of the 1970s had lowered their standards; women earlier in the century earning extra income (“pin money”) by sewing dresses for sale; his neighborhood’s negative reaction to women’s...

Abstract 1004 Stephen E. Sterns interviewed by Colleen Keef on November 2, 1975, Orono, Maine. Stearns, from Biddeford, Maine, discusses his childhood, games, and chores; working during his youth; his parents' gender roles; the assassinations of President Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.; his views of the ideal man and woman; his service in Vietnam; his views on gun control, women's liberation, social hostility, hatred, and the media. Text: 35 pp. w/brief cat. and trans. Recording: T 1016. Approx....

Abstract 1324 Virginia Wolfe, interviewed by Terri Peterson, March 26, 1980, in Orono, Maine. Wolfe discusses growing up poor in a large family during the 1930s and 40s, particularly recreational activities; meals during her childhood and how food and shopping changed since then; raising her children; her parents’ ideas of gender roles; doctors, medicine, and the fear of polio when she was young; her thoughts on women in the military and the draft; and celebration of holidays in her childhood. Text:...