Audio
Laura Lopes
Transcript
Drayton: It's November 28, 1988. This is Karana Harrison Drayton and I'm going to be interviewing Mrs. Laura Lopes, regarding her family's history and ranching dairying history of the Tennessee Valley for the National Park Service.
Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3. Testing. It's working. As I know you know, this is an interview for the National Park Service. What we are interested in doing is knowing, collecting, a history and information about dairy ranching in the Tennessee Valley. This interview will help us compile a history for the rangers for programs and things like that. That's the intended use of the material.
I want to ask you now if it's okay to tape this interview?
Lopes: Oh, sure.
Drayton: Good. I always like to do that on tape.
Lopes: It's okay. I'm honest. [Laughter]
Drayton: Well, we are too. That's the nice thing about the Park Service, you know you're dealing with people that are hopefully good. First, just tell me a little bit about yourself, Mrs. Lopes, and your family, and what brought you to the Tennessee Valley.
Lopes: Well, we moved from, we sold the ranch, we were in Arcata, up in Humboldt.
Drayton: Oh, way up there.
Lopes: Yeah, we were up there and they sold the ranch, so we had no place to go. So my brother-in-law, Rapozo was married to my husband's sister. We had to leave after 30 days. We had to leave the ranch.
Drayton: So you didn't own that ranch. You were tenants?
Lopes: I haven't owned any property ever. So, we left up there and talked to his brother-in-law. His brother-in-law says well, why don't you come down here? You'll be closer to us and then you can start, you know, go ahead with your business. So we brought 23 cows, two horses, and our equipment, and we moved up to the ... Bayview Dairy. It's way up on the hill there from the valley.
Drayton: Okay.
Lopes: They tore the barns down. They had the 4-H horse ranch in there for a while. And we were in there for six years.
Drayton: This would be what year? Just so I have some sense of time. Even around what year?
Lopes: Got junk mail ... put together ... we moved here in 1941 because the place up there was too small.
Drayton: So you went to Bayview about 1935 or so?
Lopes: '37.
Drayton: '37. And then you came, okay.
Lopes: And then we came down here in '41. Then we had a lease for the Sequoia Ranch, which is the ranch down below. We had a lease there for five years, and then they sold the ranch. We had to move. So we didn't have any place to go. They only gave us 90 days. So this place was all rundown.
Drayton: This place here?
Lopes: Right, this here was all run down.
Drayton: This had been the Cunha's?
Lopes: Yeah, the Cunha’s ranch.
Drayton: And how did they spell that name, just so-
Lopes: C-U-N-H-A.
Drayton: Okay.
Lopes: [Cough] Excuse me. So then my brother-in-law Rapozo, had bought this place during the war because he was a rancher with the dairy and they took that property over for a munition gun during the war. So he had to sell. So he didn't have any place to take the cows after, when he had left, he didn't know where to go. So he came and he got in touch with the owners, I guess, whoever had this place, and he bought the ranch for $25,000. And it was 392 acres. So then he told my husband he says ... we didn't have any place to go because the place had been sold and they only gave us 90 days to get out. Where are we gonna go? So my brother-in-law says well, I'll rebuild, I'll build you a barn, and we'll build the place up so you can live and sell milk in the city. If you want, but you'll have to help to pay me for so much, it was $400 a month to rent. So I can help to pay the expenses.
So we went to work and started remodeling this place. And my husband says, well, I don't want this damn house down there underneath those trees. There's a corner down there and a piece of cement. The house was down there. And it was only the four rooms: the two bedrooms, the kitchen and the dining room, and then the back there was a bathroom. And then a porch and then this pantry. So at that time, we had five children. No, we had four. Mary, Gloria, Rosie, Sonny. And yeah, it was four that we had. Because I had the other one after I was here.
So we started building up this place. So he built that barn, that walkthrough barn, for the cows.
Drayton: The one that's now used for boarding ... the Miwok Stables?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: That's a large barn. That's a fairly large-
Lopes: Not the great big barn. Just the small ones down below.
Drayton: Got it.
Lopes: It took 12 cows on each side. And then we had a big milk tank in there. The milk went into this big tank. At first it went into cans, and we used to take the cans out to the station. Then they decided they wanted the milk in the tank, so we had to buy a tank …
Drayton: Yeah, and we'll talk about the whole process of dairying later. But your maiden name is what?
Lopes: My maiden name is Laura Pedro.
Drayton: Pedro. Is your family Portuguese then? And then Mr. Lopes was also Portuguese?
Lopes: Yes.
Drayton: And then tell me just a little bit about both your families. They came from the Azores or-
Lopes: Oh yes. My mother and father came from the Azores.
Drayton: And what island? Do you remember?
Lopes: Yeah, they came from, my father was from North Grande [Norte Grande on São Jorge Island] and my mother was from [inaudible] which is St. George [São Jorge Island]. And they both came here. They met here and they got married in 1909. I was born 1909. They got married in 1907 because it was about three years before I was born. And they stayed over in Pleasanton and Tassajara, Concord, over in that neck of the woods.
And then my uncle was up in Eureka, my mother's brother, so then they went up there. And my father didn't have any work. So he went back to the old country and he stayed back there for three months. But he left me and my mother in Eureka. Then he came back. He went across to Samoa-
Drayton: Samoa?
Lopes: Samoa, yeah.
Drayton: How interesting.
Lopes: And there was a little dairy there. I think it was 16 or 18 cows.
Drayton: Samoa is a little town in California. You don't mean the island of Samoa?
Lopes: Oh, no. Samoa across from Eureka. They have a lumber company.
Drayton: Oh that's right. Sure.
Lopes: So he started the dairy there. He took over the dairy from this man. And then afterwards, he bought the cows, and then afterwards he bought the property. Until he went on and passed on. My mother couldn't run the business that well, so she let it go, you know, and built a home in Samoa. But my father used to deliver the milk for the different people that worked in Samoa, a big … Hammond Lumber Company mill. And he was [inaudible] and that’s where he made his living.
Drayton: So dairying has obviously been in your family and in your blood.
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: Were your parents or your dad, was he a dairyer in the Azores or is that a trade he learned here?
Lopes: A trade that he learned here. Because there they have one or two cows [crosstalk] no.
Drayton: Not a big dairy ranch.
Lopes: No, the island is not that big.
Drayton: And why did they leave? Did they ever talk about that?
Lopes: Well, there was no work. Nothing to do. And no money. And you have a family, and they have to eat. And you can't just live on fish and raise a pig once a year for lard and for meat. It was a poor country so they came to California when the Gold Rush was on.
Drayton: The first Portuguese.
Lopes: My father-in-law came to this country during ... he was up in Forbestown up there by Marysville someplace, I don't know if there's a Forbestown up there. And that's where my father-in-law, he was a night watchman for the gold mines. Then he came out here and he went back and married my mother-in-law and brought her here. And she was the only daughter. He brought her here and she had a baby and the baby died. And then she had my husband. But she was always homesick and always heartbroken and cried her eyes out and didn't eat and nothing. Went to the doctor, the doctor says well, if you want your wife to live, you have to go back to her home.
Drayton: How interesting. She was dying of heartbreak.
Lopes: My husband was six-years-old then. So they headed back to the Azores. They stayed there all the time. My father-in-law never came back. But when my husband was 18, my father-in-law pushed him over the boat in a big barrel and shipped him out. When he gets out on the ocean, they get him out. They paid him to get him out of the country. Because when they're 18 years old, they have to go for service [Mandatory conscription in Portugal until 2004].
Drayton: That's right, that's right.
Lopes: They have to go to service, and my husband didn't want to. Said he was born here and-
Drayton: He was an American citizen, technically.
Lopes: Yeah. He was. So he wanted to come back to the United States, so he came back to the United States and married me.
Drayton: That's fascinating. And his first name is?
Lopes: Manuel.
Drayton: Manuel. And so then from the Azores at 18, he came back to California then?
Lopes: Yeah. He came back to California.
Drayton: To this area or-
Lopes: No, he came to Marysville where his aunt was. His father's sister. It kinda came at that time, there was a lot of gold mines up there in that neck of the woods. So they went up in there. They went up there and then his aunt's husband died. And then they came down to Crows Landing and bought a little dairy down there. And they started a dairy, and my husband was there then. And he went into business for himself with his uncle, who also had come in from the old country. And then finally he went and worked in Sacramento for ... Mr. Sosa had a dairy there, [inaudible] through the cows. And then I don't know what happened, I think they foreclosed him or something, and they started to travel. It was my husband and this man and his wife and two kids and a cousin. They all went up, Redding and Weed, way up in that country to see if they could find someplace to buy out or rent a place to start a dairy. They couldn't find anything.
So, then they came to Arcata. And my father happened to be sitting in the coffee shop, and my husband came in, and he said he was looking for work. And at that time, I guess my father didn't have any men or this man was ready to go away, so then my father hired him. He went to work for us. Then after he worked for us, I don't know, about a year, then we got married.
Drayton: He was the milker, then?
Lopes: Yeah, he was a milker. He used to milk the cows, and then my father would deliver the milk into Samoa.
Drayton: You must have stayed up there for a few years, then, before you came down here?
Lopes: Yeah, we stayed up there for, I don't know, at least four or five years.
Drayton: Working on your family's dairy, then?
Lopes: No, we started a little dairy of our own in Arcata. Because my father owed us $500 for back pay … back wages. And then he gave us three cows for that $500. We went and started a dairy. We used to raise calves and trade three calves for a little cow that was ready to have a calf. That's the way we started our dairy. So we had to raise three cows when we left up there.
Drayton: And there are a lot of Portuguese up there as I recall. In that area. Because I know I've seen Portuguese halls. And what kind of cows did you have up there?
Lopes: We had mixed cows. We had mostly Jerseys because they give a lot of butter. And there, when you send your milk to the creamery, you have to have butter fat. And the Holsteins, their milk is watery. There's not much fat in it.
Drayton: But they give a lot of milk or something.
Lopes: Yeah, they give a lot of milk, but it doesn't help. Because the Jerseys is what they want for the butter fat. So we had mostly Jerseys and Guernseys. And we came here, then we started shipping to Marin Dell.
Drayton: And so you came down, let me see, about '37 you said, bought a piece of property up there. Then came to this piece of property in '41. But you were co-owning or tenants in a sense for your uncle, is that right?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: And tell me a little bit about the Cunhas. Had the Cunhas left by then? Were they the original property owners here or were [crosstalk]
Lopes: His parents were the ones that were here before.
Drayton: Right. And they were Portuguese, you said that. Was there anybody that went back before them that you can remember them talking about, or were the Cunhas the first property owners right here, other than-
Lopes: I don't know. I came from up there, it's kinda hard to know what was ... but I know that the Lewises and Jones were the first ones down at the end of the road there.
Drayton: So let me get a sense of the property owners. This is just sort of a rough ... let's just say 1941 because of course, things are constantly changing. Here you guys are, okay. And you pronounce your name Lopes or lopes?
Lopes: Lopes.
Drayton: Lopes.
Lopes: But they spell it with a Z half of the time. Doesn't make any difference.
Drayton: This is so ironic, but my checker at my local market in Petaluma is, and I'm gonna say her name wrong, Marine, is her first name, Giacomini?
Lopes: Giacomini.
Drayton: Giacomini. They live in Petaluma and have, I guess, have a little dairy in Penngrove or some kind of ranch.
Lopes: You’re talking about [“George Gianecchini”? inaudible]
Drayton: Yeah, it's just kind of a hard name. But anyway, they used to live down there.
Lopes: Yeah, they used to be down there and then they were here with the Sables later.
Drayton: Yeah, and I'm gonna talk to him, hopefully, this week. Okay, here's Tennessee Valley Road. I don't have a real good sense of geography here, but where were people? I know there's a ranch down here and this was, there's a big ranch, now it's the park office. Who lived there in the '40s when you first came here? There, that direction, as you walk down the road, there's still a big place on the left. I'm gonna say it's a sort of Spanish-style house-
Lopes: Oh, that's Bettencourts.
Drayton: The Bettencourts. Okay. And then I know that there were two places down here. Do you know where the Oswalds live? [crosstalk]
Lopes: The Borges were down there.
Drayton: Were they kind of across from each other? There were two dairies across from each other, there were the Lewises and the Martins or something like that?
Lopes: No, there were just Lewis and Martin down below, down this other way. But this is down this way, where the school is, that used to be a dairy in there. That used to be the Pimentel's dairy.
Drayton: And then the Silvas were that way.
Lopes: Yeah. Well, the Silvas, that new house, is it blue?
Drayton: Yes, it's a beautiful blue house. Is that where the Silvas live, in that house?
Lopes: No, it was [inaudible] back further, they built another house back further. But that house was their mother and father's house. And then the dairy was across the road, down over towards the school.
Drayton: And that's been torn down or-
Lopes: And after the Pimentels left, the Borges took over. And they had a dairy in there. They sold milk. I think it was a Jersey dairy milk that they sold. And then a few Oak Valley, I don't know who-
Drayton: But let's just think about Tennessee Valley for a minute, because I know that's specifically Park Service. The Martins were down here, where Bill Oswald is? Whose house or dairy ranch was it where Bill Oswald is, the park ranger that lives down there?
Lopes: That was Lewises and Jones and then-
Drayton: Three of them owned it together?
Lopes: Lewises and Jones. They had a big wholesale house in San Francisco.
Drayton: Oh, so it wasn't like a family-owned dairy.
Lopes: No, no.
Drayton: Okay.
Lopes: And then they used to bring in whiskey and stuff to the valley there through-
Drayton: During Prohibition?
Lopes: Yeah. And then the Martins moved in. The Martins and Bettencourts lived there. And they were in there for quite a few-
Drayton: Oh, the Bettencourts moved up here too-
Lopes: Yeah, they weren't relatives.
Drayton: Oh, another Bettencourt. That's interesting.
Lopes: In fact, the boy just died here a week ago. The Bettencourt boy that was way down at the end. He was ... they lived in that house where the ranger is.
Drayton: Right. That's what I was trying to get at. And then there's a place across from the ranger, Bill, that's burned down. Part tore down, or something.
Lopes: No, it's burned down because that was where the Martins lived. Martins lived in that house and then Bettencourts lived [crosstalk]
Drayton: Got it. And then were there any other ranches or farms?
Lopes: No.
Drayton: That was just four places in the Tennessee Valley. And then the Pimentels up here, let's say. And was there another did you say ... well, the Silvas bought out the Pimentels. She's a Pimentel.
Lopes: She's a Pimentel. So it was her father and mother that had the dairy there.
Drayton: Okay, well that gives me sort of a lay of the land. And tell me, before we talk about dairying, tell me a little bit about the Portuguese traditions. Because, you know, you were brought up probably speaking Portuguese, I would think.
Lopes: Oh, yeah, I speak it, write it, and read it. In fact, I got Portuguese papers coming in every week.
Drayton: So then you must have gone to some kind of Portuguese school, like they often have Saturdays. How did you learn to read in Portuguese?
Lopes: Well, I just learned.
Drayton: Just did?
Lopes: Just picked it up. My mother didn't know how to read or write. So, she'd get letters and then I'd try to study them, from one to the other, and I picked up quite a bit. And then my husband and I went together, he didn't know how to write in American either.
Drayton: That's right, because of course he grew up in the school in the Azores...
Lopes: Yeah, he only had a couple years of school that was all. He didn't have that much schooling. He's a very poor writer anyway, and reader.
Drayton: You became the scholar of the family?
Lopes: Well, not necessarily, but I was the oldest one of eight children.
Drayton: Eight children in your family.
Lopes: Yeah. So you know, the oldest one always gets a little more attention than the other ones. The other ones don't care. But I was always close to my mother and father and always tried to, you know, to go along. And we talked in Portuguese all the time at home. In fact, when I went to school, I didn't know how to speak a bit of English.
Drayton: School up there in Arcata? Right.
Lopes: Mm-hmm [Affirmative] I went in Samoa. Samoa school.
Drayton: There were probably a lot of other children in that situation. A lot of other Portuguese children.
Lopes: Yeah, there were.
Drayton: So what kinds of traditions were retained? That's always an interesting question in immigration. What part of the homeland or the culture is sort of left behind and what's brought with you? For example, I know that you had festas [Festivals] and you had [inaudible] and things. And I'm just wondering, both up in Arcata and down here, what Portuguese traditions were kept up?
Lopes: They're all kept up. Wherever there's Portuguese, it's kept up. Seven Sundays after Easter is the Holy Ghost celebration.
Drayton: For every community? Or just certain communities? Because I know they have Holy Ghost parades at different times in California.
Lopes: I know they do, but that one day is the real one.
Drayton: Okay.
Lopes: In fact, the Fado [Urban Portuguese folk music gathering] in Sausalito, had it on the same day. And it was kind of rough because some wanted to be here and some wanted to be there. So they finally got together and then one [inaudible] Sunday and the other one takes the other Sunday. So, they used to have a big parade there in Sausalito with the cattle, and then they had a slaughterhouse in east Sausalito there. And they bring in the cattle on Thursday and then kill them on Friday. So then Saturday they would cut them and then cook them for Sunday. They have the auction on Saturday.
Drayton: What happens at the auction? I've heard about that. Is that where they're auctioning the bread or are they auctioning food or ...
Lopes: No, they just auction the cattle that they're given. Whatever's given.
Drayton: To raise money for The Hall [Portuguese cultural center]?
Lopes: For The Hall, for the Holy Ghost.
Drayton: And you all here in Tennessee Valley, you would go to Sausalito?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: But you might go to Novato? [crosstalk]
Lopes: Oh yeah, we went to Novato. Of course, when it was both the same day, we would go to Sausalito. We wouldn't go to Novato. But then when they started changing, then the queen [Chosen girls were crowned queen during the Holy Ghost festival to honor Queen Isabel] from Sausalito would go to Novato. Then the Novato [Queen] would come to Sausalito. And they still do. They still come back and forth. And they go around, oh I don't know, started around March. They go around to the different dairies, and whatever you want to donate, you donate. You want to donate money, some donate cows, some donate the goat, some sheep, whatever they want. They donate to that and then, just before the auction which is on a Saturday, maybe a week before the fiesta, they have the auction and they bring all that cattle in. Not anymore, because now with all this promotion of all the people living here, now they’ll really bring just one calf, or two calves and put them in the corral. You bid on it, and then you give it back. Sometimes a calf will bring $3,000.
Drayton: Because the whole point is you're raising money for the event. I mean, a calf-
Lopes: You're donating to the event.
Drayton: Is it considered high prestige or good luck or whatever to be in a position to be able to donate and-
Lopes: Yes, it is.
Drayton: It probably looks good or it's just a good thing for you?
Lopes: Well my husband ... you'll think this is crazy, but this is what happened. We were always been short of water in this valley. It's been a mess, this valley. Since [inaudible] came in and put those ponds in, it helped. It helped some of the dairies. But we had to buy water from Sausalito to feed our cows. It was so dry. But my husband had a cow. She had in her bag … she had a blue bag. The bag, half of it fell off. She was up in the pasture, he had her way back over on the other side of the hill there, almost into Oak Valley. And there was a spring up there. And he says, we'll put this cow up there, and if I get enough water, if the spring gets enough water for the cows to drink, he says I'll go donate it to the Holy Ghost. And I'll be darned if it didn't. In time. It took maybe a month or so, and there was plenty of water after that. So he donated that cow to the Holy Ghost.
And there's stuff like that. You make a promise and then give whatever you promise.
Drayton: I've heard many interesting and nice anecdotes like that from the Portuguese families that live in Olema Valley. Talk about somebody being saved and promising animals and things like that.
Tell me just a little bit about what's going on in the Holy Ghost. It's commemorating Queen Isabella?
Lopes: Yes, it's Queen Isabel.
Drayton: And she gave food to the poor or something?
Lopes: Yes, she gave the poor and she was going with an apron full of bread and the king says, what you got in there? She said, I have roses. And she opened it up and it was roses. So you know, it's miracles. Younger people don't believe those things. But us older people, we do. It's okay.
Drayton: Those are important beliefs and traditions to keep up. Were any of your girls ever chosen to be the queen?
Lopes: Yes.
Drayton: They were? And you do it here by draw, too?
Lopes: Yes. Rose was queen. She was queen and it was on Mother's Day, and it was her eighteenth birthday. All at once.
Drayton: I bet you were proud.
Lopes: And then there was another, younger girl. The one that was down here with the daughter. She was a little queen.
Drayton: So they have a queen and then a-
Lopes: Little queen.
Drayton: A little queen. And what do they call that in Portuguese? Is there a word for it?
Lopes: [foreign language]
Drayton: Okay. And the father of the queen, as the king, he goes in front of the procession or something?
Lopes: They do. But it's the one that draws the name. Like my husband didn't draw the name, it was another man that was here with us. He was milking cows for us. He got the crown, but he didn't have any kids, so he gave it to my husband, and my husband took Rosie and Lorraine, the small queen. It was quite a big deal because we couldn't hardly afford it, but we never missed that money.
Drayton: What kind of money do you have to put out? Does the queen's-
Lopes: You have to put up for the dress-
Drayton: You have to buy a dress or make it or-
Lopes: Or have it made. And then the cape has to be, also. Either rented or borrowed or made up. Most of the people make their own capes. But I borrowed mine from Mrs. Diaz. And Rosie wore that crown. And then for Lorraine, I had to have a cape made for her.
Drayton: But then they'll keep these things.
Lopes: Yeah, they'll keep it or send it back to the old country. They need it back there because they're poor. So, we send it back there.
Drayton: Oh, how nice. So then the queen leads the procession down the street? Is that it? To the church?
Lopes: To the church. And back down again to The Hall. And then when she gets to The Hall, she lets the pigeon go.
Drayton: The pigeon? Oh, I don't know about that. What does that mean?
Lopes: The dove. The dove.
Drayton: Is it like the dove of peace, or [crosstalk]
Lopes: They let it go. And keep it. I guess they put it in a nylon stocking, so she won't move or flutter or anything. And she goes free. Goes to church, [inaudible] church, and then when they get to The Hall, they let her go.
Drayton: The queen lets the dove go? The queen has been carrying the dove, then.
Lopes: Well, one of the maids carries it.
Drayton: Oh, that's interesting. What a lovely tradition. And then there's a big feast on that Sunday? And food is given away, isn't that right?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: Or at least it used to be. Sopas?
Lopes: Well, I make the sopas and the meat for- [Recording cuts out]
Drayton: Real quickly. Was that a real honor for your family, then, that year?
Lopes: It was.
Drayton: Was that the only time your girls were ever in the Holy Ghost-
Lopes: Well, they were in the parades a lot of the times.
Drayton: As attendants or something.
Lopes: Yes, as attendants. That was all.
Drayton: Now, in this little valley with four families or so, and then families up there that were Portuguese, was there a strong sense of sort of a community tradition here? Did you think of yourselves as kind of a community here in Tennessee Valley, or did you...
Lopes: Well, we were all friends. We saw each other. We would talk or as far as visiting and running back and forth to each other’s houses, we never did. But Dorothy, she was born and raised in that valley there, and she was very close to Mrs. Cunha. Younger Cunha, not the older one. The older one was more high class or something. I don't know. But then when the son and daughter-in-law came along, they use to communicate quite a bit, and visit all the time. Mrs. Cunha and Dorothy and her family.
Drayton: I was wondering if there were kind of in the old tradition, like work parties or barn raisings. Did you regularly go over to your neighbors to help them in any way?
Lopes: Not here, but up in Humboldt we did. We helped each other out. When it was hay season, my husband would go [inaudible] and get rid of all the hay in the barns. But down here, no, because all the hay was brought in trailers and trucks. They didn't really [inaudible] at all. They did before we ever came. They used to hay down there.
Drayton: The Cunhas did, I think. Yeah.
Lopes: And Martins did too because they had that hay-press field up in there.
Drayton: Hay-press means what? That that's where it was pressed together, baled?
Lopes: Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Drayton: Okay.
Lopes: Yeah, they had a hay-press come in and bale the hay. But the valley was always so full of fog that the hay was always wet and cold and used to get moldy.
Drayton: What was it like to be a dairy farmer here? I'm almost getting a sense that it was pretty marginal, pretty difficult. You weren't able to raise your own hay.
Lopes: No.
Drayton: And you had to buy water for a while. It seems like it was probably-
Lopes: It was very hard going.
Drayton: Unlike say the Olema Valley or along the coast, which is pretty rich land and they have all that nice pasture. How did you feed your cows, then? Did they pasture at all?
Lopes: Yeah, they pastured.
Drayton: And did you have green chop [Machine-harvested feed]?
Lopes: No, we just had … the cows would go out in the morning and go out at night. And we got [inaudible] We could pasture maybe for two months, and that was all.
Drayton: Two months.
Lopes: The rest had to be all boughten hay.
Drayton: So that's expensive.
Lopes: Yes, it is.
Drayton: Very expensive. And so then what other kinds of ... this was a Grade A dairy here. You were selling your milk to Marin Dell [Marin Dairymen’s Milk Co.]
Lopes: Yeah, and then after Marin Dell we went to Borden's. Of course Borden's needed us to sell out because they wouldn't come after the milk any more.
Drayton: So they used to come in ... in the earlier days, you would take your milk out to the highway in cans or something?
Lopes: Yeah, in cans. [crosstalk] They had a station there. Get these 10-gallon cans, fill it with milk, and leave them up there. Leave them there and then take the empty ones back. Because a truck would bring the empty ones and put them there, then take our full cans, and we brought our empty cans back to fill for the next day.
Drayton: So in the early '40s, what was like a typical day here at this dairy ranch?
Lopes: It was very hard because-
Drayton: You got up at ... was your first milking at 4:00 [AM] for example?
Lopes: No, we used to start at 2:00 in the morning. 2:00 in the morning and 2:00 in the afternoon.
Drayton: Oh my goodness.
Lopes: To take the milk, we had to have it out there by 6:00 at night.
Drayton: Oh my goodness. Whew.
Lopes: And when the truck came in, it also had to be ready by 7:00. We always had it before that, so it got a chance to cool.
Drayton: That's even worse. I mean, 4:00 a.m., you can sort of sleep at night.
Lopes: Well, you get used to it. It doesn't mean that much.
Drayton: Now, did you get up at that time too, or did you have hired hands, hired milkers?
Lopes: Well, at first, we didn’t have any hired ... We had one hired milker, that was all, and then my husband did the other man's work. And then of course, I would wash up the equipment, and if I had to go out and get the cows, bring the cows in. In the springtime, you have to go way up in the hills to gather them up.
Drayton: So you would be out there with a lantern.
Lopes: Yeah-
Drayton: In the middle of the night.
Lopes: We take the truck and drive up in there [crosstalk] I used to get up sometimes at 2:00 [AM] and go milk.
Drayton: Now, you were already using ... you weren't hand-milking anymore by then.
Lopes: No, when we moved from down there, we had the machines then.
Drayton: Did you hand-milk up here at Bayview?
Lopes: Yes, we did.
Drayton: Hand milked. And you milked yourself, then.
Lopes: Yeah. I milked and my husband milked. We had one hired man too.
Drayton: And then how many cows did you have down here, when you had your ranch here?
Lopes: Here, we had 93. But down there, we only had, I think it was 53.
Drayton: Isn't that partly the difference between hand-milking and machine-milking? Because there's only so much you can do by hand.
Lopes: Well, when you milk by hand, a man is supposed to milk 30 cows.
Drayton: That's a lot. That is a lot. That's more than I thought. So if you had two or three extra hands, you could milk-
Lopes: Yeah, you could milk them. A lot of times the damn electricity would go out and we'd have to-
Drayton: Go back to the old...
Lopes: Had to milk them.
Drayton: And here, you had Jerseys and Holsteins?
Lopes: We had mostly Holsteins because here, they want the milk to be just a certain level. It gets up past four and five, they don't want the milk.
Drayton: Four and five buttermilk content?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: See, I don't [crosstalk]
Lopes: They don't want it that strong. They want it down, you know, lower test on the milk. Because they have to break it down if it gets too high. So then we had maybe a third of them were Jerseys and Guernseys. The others were all Holsteins.
Drayton: So you would mix the milk? You wouldn't keep it separate.
Lopes: Oh, no. It just all goes in to the tank. That big tank that we had out there.
Drayton: And so it was drawn off into the tank, and did the tank-
Lopes: Came down off of the cooler into the tank, and then the truck would come in and pump it out of the tank into their tank and take it away.
Drayton: And how was your barn set up? I probably could figure it out by looking at it, but were you milking head-to-head or tail-to-tail?
Lopes: It was tail-to-tail.
Drayton: Tail-to-tail. Okay.
Lopes: You came in like this and faced that way.
Drayton: And would the milkers be on the same level? I guess there's something called a California milk barn where the milkers were up-
Lopes: No, that's after we got rid of dairy, then they started making those platform dairies.
Drayton: Regulation and stuff?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: That's a newer tradition.
Lopes: Yeah. That's newer stuff. Ours was just a flat barn. And we kept the machines, and then you turn the cows, every two cows, plug it in, the milk one cow on one side and the other cow on the other side. Go back and get the other two cows.
Drayton: Did you, in the old tradition, did you name your cows? Did you continue to have names for cows?
Lopes: No, because there were so many of them. My husband gave the kids each a cow. And they named them. One was [inaudible] and the other was Betty, and you know, I don't know. Whatever. It was really something else. But my two oldest girls always liked to milk, but then Rose never liked to milk. She finished school, she went on to San Francisco and worked at the telephone company. That was the way [inaudible] and my son, he didn't want any part of the dairy either. But he took care of the calves and the hospital barn, stuff like that.
Drayton: So that reminds me of a question. You have a house here that used to be down further, and then your husband moved it up here. Then you had your milking barn, you had your tank house, did you call it that? The little … where the tank was, was that just part of the barn or-
Lopes: It's that room that's next to the barn there.
Drayton: Yeah. Right. And then what other outbuildings did you have?
Lopes: We had … the calf shed was over on this side, which they have horses in now. Called that the calf shed, we kept the calves in there. Raised the calves there.
Drayton: But those would be just the female calves, right? The male calves, did you take them to auction, or ...
Lopes: We'd raise one or two calves for ourselves. My husband would castrate them and raise them for us. As steers.
Drayton: As bulls.
Lopes: Yeah. And we had the horses in this one barn that's still standing right here.
Drayton: Oh, you had your own horses.
Lopes: Yeah, we had three horses. My husband had one horse that he, only him, rode. And then we had another one the hired man could ride. And then we had one that was a plow horse, plow the garden. And then pick a sled up, to fix all the fences because those fences all had to be fixed because Sam Silva had property next to us, which goes down into that … Cronkhite [Fort]… [inaudible] could be dairy in there. And his cattle would come over sometimes.
Drayton: Break through your fence.
Lopes: Break through our fence. And ours went over there too. And when we had cattle, we had this range across the street that belonged to the Borges, and then Allen Olds bought it. And then he sold it, I guess to the government, I don't know. We had a bull, a white-faced bull we used to put with the heifers in the springtime. And that bull was over the Wheelwright's property. Way over there, Green Gulch. And we didn't know where the bull was. We looked for him, finally found him. They had pitchforked him with these awful sores. You know, pitchfork, tried to chase him away, I guess.
Drayton: Yeah. Because they weren't tagged in any way? They didn't know whose it was?
Lopes: One ear was split and the other ear had a V in it. We had brands, but I don't know, they were kind of weird people.
Drayton: Oh, so they weren't really helpful in trying to...
Lopes: No, they weren't helpful at all.
Drayton: That's too bad.
Lopes: None of these dairymen were thoughtful in any way at all.
Drayton: That's interesting. Why? Was it particular to this area, or is that just the way dairies ...
Lopes: I guess that's the way they were. They just didn't care to be sociable with anybody.
Drayton: You know, that's interesting to me because I heard the same thing over in the Olema Valley. You see, the little I know about farming or even coal mining is that people work together, help each other out. But this very nice family over in the Olema Valley were saying that it wasn't that they didn't like their neighbors, their world was just on their ranch.
Lopes: On the ranch, yes.
Drayton: And it was partly because of the schedule of dairying. They milk at 4:00 [AM] and 4:00 [PM]. And they would see their neighbors at church and [crosstalk]
Lopes: The Tiexeiras over there.
Drayton: Yes, the Tiexeiras.
Lopes: My oldest daughter married a Tiexeira.
Drayton: Texeira [?] or Tiexeira? Because it's two separate families.
Lopes: Not the one that's in trouble now. It's the other Tiexeira. They spell their name different.
Drayton: With a T-
Lopes: T-I-E-X. That's the one my daughter married, the oldest. Married one of the boys. He got killed in an automobile accident. Yeah, I know-
Drayton: So in terms of this valley, that's the way it was? People just kind of stuck to themselves?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: That's interesting. And did you ever wonder about that? Did you ever think these people weren't very friendly, or was it just ...
Lopes: We just didn't pay any attention to it. Just figured, well, that's the way they want to be, forget it.
Drayton: But was that the way it was up in Arcata?
Lopes: No. Up there, we get together quite a bit and have parties.
Drayton: What changed? What's the reason for that?
Lopes: I don't know. People are very kind or have a different attitude to life than up there in the country.
Drayton: I'm just trying to think if there's some explanation. Like what kind of parties would you have up there? Were you talking about chamaritas [Type of Portuguese music and dance]?
Lopes: Well, if it's a birthday party we'd get together and make sandwiches and call and have the sandwiches and coffee and you know, play violin and mandolin, and dance.
Drayton: And that's of course, it's ... oh dear. Let's see, the mandolin is called, I should know this, a guitarra? Am I saying that right?
Lopes: No, the guitarra is the viola.
Drayton: And then the viola … beautiful music. [crosstalk]
Lopes: And the mandolin is very pretty too.
Drayton: But those sorts of traditions didn't go on here, like you didn't have house or kitchen dances or chamaritas down here?
Lopes: No, we didn't have any of that.
Drayton: Too bad. [Chuckles]
Lopes: We missed it.
Drayton: Three Kings Day? Did you do a procession of some kind? Did that tradition hang on?
Lopes: Not with the Portuguese people.
Drayton: The Three Kings wasn't celebrated?
Lopes: Not for the...
Drayton: El Dia de los Reyes? No?
Lopes: You were thinking about January the fifth, that's-
Drayton: Epiphany?
Lopes: Yeah. Up there, they used to go from door-to-door singing. Down here, they never did.
Drayton: So in terms of Portuguese traditions, what held on in this area was Holy Ghost.
Lopes: And that was it.
Drayton: That was it. That's interesting.
So did you name your fields here, as dairy farmers often do? No? You called this a ranch, too, didn't you. And did your ranch have a name, other than Lopes Ranch?
Lopes: No, the Cunha Ranch. It's always been the Cunha Ranch.
Drayton: Cunha Ranch.
Lopes: It's always been the Cunha Ranch. Rapozo came in, but then [inaudible]
Drayton: Did your children all work as milkers? Did they help out?
Lopes: They helped out, yes. They cleaned the corrals on Saturdays and Sundays. Cleaned corrals and helped with the hay and everything.
Drayton: But they didn't have to, like children from a slightly earlier time, they didn't have to get up and milk before they went to school.
Lopes: Oh, no.
Drayton: That's lucky.
Lopes: They used to have to clean the barns and stuff like that before they did anything else. My son had to go out and feed the calves before he went to school. The bus used to come down and get him. He had to be ready.
Drayton: You know, you said earlier you walked down to the Tennessee Valley. And do you remember stories about the land here? Did people still talk about the wreck of the Tennessee at all? Was that a story that kind of-
Lopes: Nobody talked about it.
Drayton: Did you even know what it was? Could you see the ruins out there?
Lopes: No.
Drayton: No. Oh.
Lopes: Because Mr. Martin, I don't know what he had in his mind. He wouldn't let anybody go down the beach. He thought they were stealing his wood. And there was a bridge there across ... there was no roads here before the war, there was no roads here-
Drayton: There was no road down the Tennessee Valley.
Lopes: There was a road, but in the winter time, you got stuck three or four times before you got out of the valley. And a lot of times, we went to take the milk and we had to have the tow car come and pull us out of the mud. But there was a bridge down there and he had put some kind of a lock over the top of it, but you couldn't get over it unless the lock was taken off.
Ben Hartville was the cop, and he wanted to go down to the beach. So he drove down. But this was after the war already. Drove down there and when he went to come out, it was locked. He couldn't come out.
Drayton: Oh, he had his car down there.
Lopes: He had his car down there. So he was getting ready to shoot the padlock because he was a cop. Then finally Mr. Martin came and let him go by. And, my kids couldn't go down the beach unless Rosemary Martin or one of the kids were with her.
Drayton: That was their property?
Lopes: I don't know. They had rent of that property, the house was there, and they thought it was theirs, I don't know.
Drayton: So you never did go down to the beach on regular outings.
Lopes: No, the kids did. They went a couple times because they went with one of the Martins and [inaudible] In fact, I never did go down the beach before the Martins. This has only been since they put the Park Service in there is the only times I've been down there.
Drayton: Interesting. Gosh.
Lopes: And I used to go down once in a while and visit Mrs. Martin's mother because she was pretty old. I'd go down there once in a while and visit her.
Drayton: And she was Portuguese?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: And you'd talk about [crosstalk] You'd never been to Portugal yourself.
Lopes: Oh, no.
Drayton: To the Azores.
Lopes: My daughter's been there. Three years ago, she went to the Azores. I've never been there. I have no desire to go.
Drayton: Well, your life has been here. As ranchers in the '40s, what was it like living next to an active army base during the height of the war?
Lopes: It was okay. They had soldiers down there at the beach during the war.
Drayton: Doing what? Drills or just guard duty?
Lopes: Guard duty, I think. Because they have that big cyclone fence along the top of the area. Kept them on the inside. But they had a lot of soldiers down there during the war. We were down in the other ranch there, and we had to put sheets over the top of the window so they couldn't see the light.
Drayton: Yeah, blackout.
Lopes: During the war. Blackout. And then they had a place up here on the hill where they used to stay and used to come down, come to our house sometimes. And of course the kids, they enjoyed the soldiers. You felt sorry for them.
Drayton: They were just young kids themselves probably.
Lopes: Yeah. And then my husband used to give them wine to drink. [Chuckles] It was really nice. Kids enjoyed the soldiers.
Drayton: So there was never any tensions about or fears that you were gonna be bombed or anything like that?
Lopes: No, we always felt safe.
Drayton: Safer being next to them rather than ... and the Silvas, was there still ranching going on in the Gerbode Valley? Even when Fort Cronkhite was there? What were the ranchers over there?
Lopes: It was just Sam Silva. He was the only one that had the ranch in there. Had it in there for many, many years.
Drayton: And is that Silva related at all to Manuel Silva? No? Just a different...
Lopes: Well, there's a lot of Silvas.
Drayton: Yeah, it's sort of like Smith, I guess, for English or something.
And you said you had a truck garden. You raised your own produce?
Lopes: Yeah. Raised our potatoes and peas and fava beans and kale, cabbage. Where the paddies [Paddocks] are.
Drayton: Yeah, that's why it looked sort of like a garden still. It looked, I guess it's just that ...
Lopes: When we took over the stables then, this has only been, I think, since the Park Service zoned is when they put these paddocks in here. My brother-in-law, [inaudible] I have two acres and this house to live in-
Drayton: As part of your agreement with the Park Service?
Lopes: Yeah. So, my brother-in-law, I have to pay rent to my brother-in-law. So when he rented the barn ... at first, he rent just the barn, and then they asked if they could rent to make paddocks out here, and they had paddocks along here too.
Drayton: Boy, you'd be surrounded.
Lopes: Yeah. I've been surrounded by horses since they started in this area, I mean, started in here. But it doesn't bother me.
Drayton: The flies or whatever-
Lopes: Well the flies, I keep the windows closed and doors closed. Yesterday morning, my sister was here and there was one fly and she chased it all over. [Chuckle] Finally, they killed the damn thing.
Drayton: If you only have one fly, that's not too bad. But living next to any kind of animal, especially if you grew up on a dairy, you're used to certain [crosstalk]
So as both a young girl and as a wife yourself, did you continue the Portuguese food traditions?
Lopes: I cooked down at The Hall for about 14 years.
Drayton: For the festa?
Lopes: I helped cook. I didn't cook, but I helped.
Drayton: You call that a fiesta or festa?
Lopes: Festa in Portuguese. Fiesta is Mexican or Spanish or whatever.
Drayton: But in terms of the sorts of food you were brought up eating, what would be a typical breakfast for the farm family that was Portuguese?
Lopes: Eggs and pancakes and cereal and beans. Once in a while, we'd have bacon. But I had to cook for the men here. We had three men at the time.
Drayton: So you'd have to cook at 2:00 a.m. or would they go milk first-
Lopes: No, they'd go milk first and then come in at 8:00 and have breakfast at 8:00 and then 12:00 and then 7:00 at night. So one morning I'd have pancakes, the next morning I'd have cereal. And then I've always had beans. And then for lunch, we'd have a soup. And then meat. And at night we'd have dried fish with a gravy and potatoes.
Drayton: So that's the old Portuguese style of food.
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: And cooking.
Lopes: That's the way I was brought up.
Drayton: So your big meal was in the middle of the day.
Lopes: Yeah. Meat and potatoes and soup. And beans, of course. A lot of them liked the beans three times a day, but others didn't like them. We always had a pot of beans on the stove. If you think about it. [Chuckle]
Drayton: That's a kind of food that's geared towards heavy farm work, for one thing. It really sustains you. And then when you're not doing that kind of work, then gravy and things like that don't seem quite as necessary. Did your husband or your kids or farmers in this valley go hunting? Did they use hunting as a way to supplement meals at all? Go hunting for deer-
Lopes: My husband didn't. But the ones down below, they did. [inaudible] Martin went hunting, up to Alaska one year. I don't know, he brought home meat, and Mr. Martin told my husband, he says it cost him $3000 a pound for the meat, counting the money that he spent to go on that trip. My husband never did hunt.
Drayton: So you folks didn't hunt quail or pheasant, obviously.
Lopes: No, we didn't.
Drayton: I'm just wondering if over this 40, 50 years that you've been in this valley, if you've seen significant changes at all in the landscape, in the way the land looks or the wildflowers, the native plants, native animals. More cougars now, no cougars. That sort of thing.
Lopes: No. I started working at the Meadow Club [Golf course]. I worked up there for 20 years.
Drayton: The where?
Lopes: Meadow Club.
Drayton: Meadow Club.
Lopes: In Fairfax. And then my husband died in 1965. Then I started working at the Ross Hospital full time.
Drayton: So you were commuting quite a while. And was somebody else running the dairy then? Your brother-in-law?
Lopes: Well, when I was working at the Meadow Club, I used to come home and help get cows in, in the afternoon, because I had a switch shift, lunch and then dinner. I come in and make sure that the cows were all here for the [inaudible] My husband was already quite sick. Heart trouble and stuff like that. So I made sure that we had something to eat and the cows were all here. Because the men would go out and get a few cows, but if there were 10 or 12 left out there, they wouldn't get milked.
Drayton: The cows didn't come in ... you know, you often see cows following a lead cow, a belled cow. They didn't come in on their own?
Lopes: No, not when they're out in the pasture like that.
Drayton: You'd think they'd want to be milked.
Lopes: And then those flies. They bite them and they get in the brush. And you get them out of the brush, and you turn around, and they're back in it again. Take off and go back in.
Drayton: So did you herd them or did you use ropes? How did you get them to come on down?
Lopes: We had dogs. Cow dogs.
Drayton: And what's a good cow dog? Any particular breed?
Lopes: The Australian Shepherd is the best breed for cattle. So we always had those.
Drayton: And they would round them up for you.
Lopes: Yeah, kind of round them up, bite them in the heels. [Chuckle]
Drayton: I always get this image of this orderly procession because I see this in Petaluma, I see the cows coming in apparently on their own, where the lead cow and all the cows are following along a trail.
Lopes: They're not out in a big pasture, they're just close by there. Here, they're out in the pasture, we had to chase them and bring them in.
Drayton: So that's a whole lot of work in and of itself.
Lopes: But then when we're just feeding hay, it's a different story because they were right here.
Drayton: But even when you fed them on hay, you had to supplement it with some kind of feed.
Lopes: Yeah, we fed them feed too.
Drayton: But you had to buy all of that.
Lopes: Mm-hmm [Affirmative]
Drayton: That would have been very expensive. It just seems like the toughest way to ranch.
Lopes: To show you, we never made enough to pay for the hay that the cows ate this year and draw in for the next year. Went and borrowed money from the bank in Mill Valley and he says well, I see that you're losing money and you're not making it. If I were you, I'd sell the cows, and then when things picked up, go back and buy them again. My husband says, well screw you, I don't need your money. So he went someplace back in Marin and borrowed money.
But the last year that we bought hay, my brother-in-law had to co-sign for the note to pay for the hay because we were back in bills. You know, raising six kids is not funny.
Drayton: No, I'm very sympathetic. Because just the little I know about dairying, if you have to buy all your feed other than the pasture, because you had 300 and such acres here. But that was basically not used for anything.
Lopes: Just a couple months, and that was it.
Drayton: Gosh. And there's no way to grow any kind of sorghum or ... not sorghum, but ...
Lopes: Couldn't even have chickens.
Drayton: Why?
Lopes: Because the chickens would get around the barn and that's not sanitary.
Drayton: Oh, I see. I see, in terms of regulations. Did you have other animals? You had your horses, you said. Did you have pigs?
Lopes: No.
Drayton: Sheep?
Lopes: We had pigs down at the other ranch.
Drayton: Now when you say the other ranch, you're pointing that way. [crosstalk] Were you further down in the valley earlier?
Lopes: Yeah, we lived down there where that Spanish-style house is.
Drayton: Oh, I didn't understand that. And that's where the Bettencourts-
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: You lived there before the Bettencourts? [crosstalk] Oh that's right, I'm sorry, you said that. You were down there for a couple of years-
Lopes: Six years.
Drayton: So now I'm getting myself confused. You were up there, Bayview, in '37. You moved down there in '41. And then you moved here about 1947. Around then?
Lopes: [inaudible] We moved to Tennessee Valley, February 1941 with a lease of five years. And then November 8th of '47, we moved to Rapozo’s [Cunha] Ranch.
Drayton: Okay. And Rapozo’s Ranch was here. In '48, oh.
Lopes: '47.
Drayton: '47.
Drayton: You're the person that doing most of the talking. I just wanna make sure I don't wear you out, wear out my welcome.
Lopes: I'm okay.
Drayton: That lady, she kept me talking forever and ever. Okay, so down there ... so we have the straight, the place that became the [Betancourt's 00:00:26] they moved in after you did. They bought it ... did the Pozos own? [00:00:30] No, who owned that land? Because you didn't own the-
Lopes: [Sequeras 00:00:33]
Drayton: Sequeras, okay.
Lopes: Yeah, and they bought it.
Drayton: And you were just their tenants? Or were they also down there?
Lopes: No, we had to move up because the father-in-law built that Spanish style house, and then we had to move out of the other house that was next door to it.
Drayton: Is that house still down there then?
Lopes: No, they've torn it down.
Drayton: And what kind of barn did you have down there, milking barn?
Lopes: Well they had a barn that, [00:01:00] I think it took 30 cows.
Drayton: 30. 15 and 15? Tail to tail again?
Lopes: No, they were head to head.
Drayton: Head to head, okay.
Lopes: See all those buildings that are down there now, they're all new buildings. He would've built after he bought the place down below.
Drayton: Now is there a preference for milking tail to tail or head to head? Did your family have a preference for the way you milked? Is there an easier way?
Lopes: No.
Drayton: Okay. Well because this, [00:01:30] I think you said that this barn up here was tail to tail.
Lopes: Yeah, and the other one was head to head.
Drayton: So six of one and half a dozen of the other?
Lopes: Yeah, because the other one was an older building you know, that's the way they had built it.
Drayton: Right. And those buildings down there, like the barn was built about what year? Did you have any idea?
Lopes: Well they would have built ... I have no idea.
Drayton: When did Dean Witter come in? This is something I should know and I don't know.
Lopes: Well I don't know when he came in, I'm sorry.
Drayton: That was the insurance company and [00:02:00] they bought up some of the land?
Lopes: They bought all that property below, mm-hmm (affirmative). That caretaker, or the ranger.
Drayton: Yeah, Bill, right. Where the Martins and Betancourt-
Lopes: Used to be.
Drayton: Right.
Lopes: They used to be great big barns in there and they tore those all out. Dean Witter did that all.
Drayton: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Lopes: Then he put that really big pond way down there at the end of the road, he put that [00:02:30] in and he put one up in the [inaudible 00:02:33] field.
Drayton: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Lopes: And I don't know if there's another one back in the valley there, above the ranch there where they have the office, and that is a big valley back up in through there, I think they built another.
Drayton: Is there a name to that valley?
Lopes: I don't think so.
Drayton: Okay, I was wondering if you had local names for things.
Lopes: No, we [00:03:00] didn't. This Oak Valley, I didn't know it was Oak Valley til the government took over.
Drayton: Did you call this the Tennessee Valley? Did you refer to this?
Lopes: I always called it Tennessee.
Drayton: And did you ever hear the term Indian Cove? I guess Gene was thinking that long, long ago, probably before the record of Tennessee that was called Indian Cove and then it became Tennessee Cove.
Lopes: Yeah. It was a pirate cove over [00:03:30] the hill there someplace, all the way there. I don't know anything about it. See, we didn't go down there.
Drayton: Well that's just it, I'm getting the sense that ... partly because of your neighbors but also probably just the rigors of your schedule. I mean you didn't hae much spare time it sounds like.
Lopes: Everybody was kinda pushed away from each other. Not social.
Drayton: That's so-
Lopes: Well you'll find that to be, you go anywhere and nobody's sociable, everybody's [00:04:00] to themselves.
Drayton: That's true. That's certainly, I have even seen that in my life. When I was a kid you went calling on Sundays. I mean, calling and much more visiting back and forth. Now we all have our TVs and videos and just sort of ...
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: You know, [inaudible 00:04:19] is that how you say it?
Lopes: [Marincello 00:04:22]
Drayton: Marincello came in and they were right across the street from you I guess. You were obviously here at that time, what was that like? To have this [00:04:30] potential bedroom community, whole new suburban community possibly going in across the street?
Lopes: Well this is a picture of the town that he was gonna build over the hill.
Drayton: Uh-huh.
Did you guys try to fight that?
Lopes: Well some people came and tried to fight it. We didn't care as far as ... and this was in 1985, [00:05:00] my husband died in '86. So at that time already, the stables were already here. But they were privately owned then.
Drayton: Mm-hmm (affirmative). So there was not brouhaha from local ranchers about Marincello going in?
Lopes: They were trying to fight it, you know, they were very upset with my brother-in-law because he had sold the property.
Drayton: Oh, it was your brother-in-law's property?
Lopes: Yeah, and he had [00:05:30] sold it. Because he wanted, Marincello wanted to come in through that tunnel they have over there in Cronkite, and they said no, if it's going to come over the highway, the 101, forget it. So then we decided to come in through Tennessee Valley and go up the hill and build his city up there. Then he made great big pillars down here at the end of the road. I haven't got any pictures of it.
Drayton: Yeah, I've seen pictures of that. In fact, I guess the park service tore them down?
Lopes: [00:06:00] Yeah, they [crosstalk 00:06:01]
Drayton: Because actually that was probably a mistake. They should've been left up as sort of a memory or a historic marker.
Lopes: You can see where he had put a lot of cement along there and-
Drayton: Flowers and things like that, kind of a traditional gateway. And how were they as neighbors? Did you have dealings with them? Did you ever feel that was gonna close down your-
Lopes: No. No, because they never gave us any trouble at all. Of course, [00:06:30] it didn't last too long because then the park started taking it over.
Drayton: Now did the park service come in and take your land through condemnation? Of course you didn't own it, it was your brother-in-law's.
Lopes: No, I don't think the park wanted any property from my brother-in-law, I think ... [inaudible 00:06:49] is the one that bought all the property.
Drayton: Excuse me, who?
Lopes: Frugue, Frogue, Frogue or Fridge, whatever, the guy that was gonna build us.
Drayton: Oh, so they bought out Marincello then?
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: So in [00:07:00] terms of the parks coming in, how did that change your life, or impact your life?
Lopes: We always thought maybe that they would make us move, that's all that worried us. They would chase us out. But then my brother-in-law, you know, he's pretty well, shrewd, a shrewd operator and he has attorneys in San Rafael, [inaudible 00:07:22] was the attorney for him. I don't know, they made [00:07:30] the agreement that if I want to stay here that he would rent it back. And then there wasn't anyone was said. So I haven't had any problems so far.
Drayton: Mm-hmm (affirmative). So he directly sold the land.
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: He didn't have to have his land condemned or anything like that.
Lopes: No, no. No, he sold. In fact, Oak Valley down there at the bottom, you know, you see where that flat is as you come over [00:08:00] that little bridge.
Drayton: Right.
Lopes: He sold that property for three thousand dollars. I think it was 20 acres. And [Bagshaw 00:08:10] was the one that bought it and then he couldn't pay for it so he took it at, but he had sold already all of the topsoil off of it.
Drayton: Hmm. He was doing that just because he needed the money? Just didn't-
Lopes: To make money I guess.
Drayton: Because to sell your topsoil obviously implies [00:08:30] you're not gonna try to ranch it or farm it. Well, you could run cattle I guess.
Lopes: So topsoil from there. To make money of course.
Drayton: Now when you look back over your 47 years in this Valley, how do you sort of sum up your life here in Tennessee Valley? Have they been good years?
Lopes: They've [00:09:00] been good and bad.
Drayton: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Lopes: You know, it's been very foggy and cold in here. It always is foggy and cold in this valley. Probably down to the door, you go out to the end of the road, the Sun's shining bright. But you get used to it. I'm very happy here.
Drayton: You know, I'm surprised if there's so much fog that it didn't keep the pasture up.
Lopes: Well they claim that this is the, the best place for cattle [00:09:30] is here.
Drayton: But you only pastured two months a year, whereas over in [Lima 00:09:34] they do ...
Lopes: Well here, we had to feed the cows so they would give the milk, while over there if they gave milk, okay, if they didn't, it's okay because they only ship for creating milk, or for cheese. So if they had milk, okay, if they didn't have it ... we had to have a certain amount of milk every day. So we had to feed the cows, good feed and good hay.
Drayton: To keep up your production. And what [00:10:00] would a normal cow produce? What would be an average of gallons that a cow would give out?
Lopes: They average about five gallons.
Drayton: Each cow?
Lopes: A piece, yeah.
Drayton: Mm-hmm (affirmative). And production I guess has gone up, I guess that's one of the good things I guess about new feeds and new techniques and stuff is they're able to get-
Lopes: Yeah, a lot of purebreds come in and they've been [semenizing 00:10:26] the cows too with [00:10:30] extra strong bulls. So they can have more milk.
Drayton: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Lopes: We just went along the best we could. We'd have so many cows milking all the time.
Drayton: Right, you'd have dry and wet cows.
Lopes: Well we had some dry and some milking.
Drayton: What would be your percentage of dry to wet cows?
Lopes: Well we had 125 head of young stock that would come in as we bred them.
Drayton: And about 90 you said [00:11:00] were in production.
Lopes: 93.
Drayton: That's a pretty good sized dairy ranch, particularly for 30, 40 years ago. Whereas now that would be a little smaller I guess.
Lopes: I don't think anybody with that small dairy would survive anymore, unless they're trying to raise some animals or something and sell them. Because the animals are really a big price now.
Drayton: [00:11:30] Well I guess standards have also gone up in terms of safety and cleanliness and things like that. You were able to use the water here on your property?
Lopes: Yeah, we had to keep the swings going.
Drayton: To clean out your barns and sterilize and things like that.
Lopes: I was able to wash the barns because of the water, we had water for the cows.
Drayton: I know, dairy just demands a lot of water. Was there more water towards the middle [00:12:00] or the end of the valley? Or was it-
Lopes: Everybody had the same problem, hardly no water at all.
Drayton: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Lopes: We used to work days and days unplugging the pipes. I'll go show you what the water in this valley does to the-
Drayton: And I guess, I'm thinking, I'm looking over my list here, and of course we could talk more about various things but ... oh, your family was Catholic, obviously. What church would they have gone to?
Lopes: Sausalito.
Drayton: Sausalito, okay.
Lopes: Everybody on this side of the road belongs to Sausalito.
Drayton: Oh, I [00:12:30] see. They sort of have to, that's the parish?
Lopes: No it's ... even the schools. Anybody that lives on this side of the road belongs to Sausalito. If you live on the other side then you can go to Mill Valley schools. That's the way they have it fixed.
Drayton: Okay. I'm just thinking if there's anything, I'm looking through my list here. Well one question I think I should ask you is just that you grew up in a time when you hand milked and you said that even after you moved here [00:13:00] the electricity would go out and you'd have to hand milk. I'm wondering if there was a noticeable different between the old way of hand milking, the old traditional way and the kind of life after electricity and milking machines and whatever came in.
Lopes: Well we milked more cows.
Drayton: You milked more cows.
Lopes: Yeah.
Drayton: But was there a different pace or rhythm to life?
Lopes: No it was the same thing.
Drayton: Same hard work.
Lopes: Cows had to be fed and the barns had to be cleaned. [00:13:30] Same thing, whatever.
Drayton: I'm wondering if there's anything that I haven't asked you that you want to mention or stress about what life was like here in the Tennessee Valley?
Lopes: All I can say is that.
Drayton: Okay, well that is very, very helpful and I thank you very much.
Lopes: Can i give you some more cheese or something?
Drayton: You know what-
Description
Laura Lopes discuss California dairy ranching in Tennesse Valley during the 1930's
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