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So you are...
Joseph O'Donnell, and this is my brother, Charles
and we are descended of Edward Edgar O'Donnell
who was a son of Peter Anthony O'Donnell
who was the son of Anthony O'Donnell,
who originally came from Ireland in
1851. Right?
Yeah
1851. And there were 5 and a half years before
this island was known to them because it was the
center of King Strang's Operation. When it was known
that a place in the United States
that would remind him of Ireland,
particularly Arranmore,
they were ecstatic. Absolutely ecstatic.
And when they got here
it was, it really was "Tir na n-Og"
which was the Irish view of paradise going back
to pre-Christian time. That is, paradise was in the West
where the sun sets, and this was truly paradise
for them. Because, first coming
to this country, or to the West, they landed in Quebec.
Their time here would have been much better
than it had been in Ireland. There was food here,
but tremendous persecution,
tremendous problems of people coming in.
They'd be mostly
very unskilled as far as any trades, very limited
English, many of them wouldn't speak any English at all
trying to support and raise a family on very very limited
income. And they found the discrimination here
was just about
as bad here as it had been in Ireland,
with the employers, and that's the
problem resulting, see, there were no unions,
nothing like this to protect the workers.
Very, very little concern, if an Irishman died working,
you'd just get another Irishman.
So the problems that they would have encountered
before coming here would have been just about
as bad as Ireland, with the exception
they would have some food. And they would have had
relations here, or part of the Irish community that
could help them if they got into
trouble, fortunately. That didn't exist in Ireland
because nobody had anything, really.
In fact, when Anthony O'Donnell left,
the poverty in Ireland was
so much, this was even before the famine, that in
1837 a survey was made in the town of Quedor
which was the mainland just a little bit
up the coast from Arranmore
but the economic conditions would have been
exactly the same in Ireland
There were 9,000 people in the area.
A total of ten beds
for 9,000 people. There were 93 chairs.
This was the physical things in the home.
Now can you imagine
a home, the homes didn't even have tables or chairs.
They sat on the floor, they ate on the floor. They slept
in the corner of the homes, which were
very very small, the whole family
on nothing but a bunch of straw all huddled together.
That's poverty, let me tell you.
So that was the reason for the name of our booklet,
"Tir na n-Og," the paradise.
This really was a paradise for them, because here,
when they came, by God, the Mormons were vacating.
They found houses already built,
completely furnished.
Land - wow, you could have a hundred acre
share if they wanted. No price, no landlord.
Oh God, it really was heaven to these poor people.
Do you know where Anthony
settled when he first emigrated to Beaver?
Yes, he settled,
they landed in Quebec. Now, the reason
for coming to Quebec
was that the passage from Ireland was about a pound
cheaper, and a pound was a lot of money then.
The passage would be something like 5 pounds
to Quebec. This was being paid by the landlord,
and the reason for him paying this is
the English government figured that the poverty
in Ireland should be
financed by the landlords, so if any person
on his estate
were to go to the poorhouse, the landlord
was taxed for that expense. Well, after a
short time he had had more than 5 pounds
passage to the States.
Now, Mr. Charlie, who had just bought the island
as a venture, he was gambling, the price was low
because things were so bad. He knew
that the only way he could make a
financial successful venture out of
Arranmore was to get rid of half the people, and that
was the starting of this mass eviction. Providential,
but very difficult on the people. So when
Anthony left in 1851,
Ireland, it was near the end of the famine
but not the end of the poverty. He left
with his wife and his small child, who was
just 6 weeks old
Now the reason they had to leave so disastrously
was that when people were evicted,
their homes were just crashed. No place to go back to.
This was the landlord's effort to cut down
the number of people on his estate so that
there'd be less people to
go to the poorhouse. Really, that's what it amounted
to. It was a business venture, that's all.
Now, let's see.
They made it to Quebec.
They landed in Quebec, and were 5 and a half years
traveling between Quebec, Johnstown, Pennsylvania,
and different points in Pennsylvania.
This wasn't only Anthony, this was the whole group.
See, they were looking for
employment. If somebody was digging a ditch
somewhere, that's where they went.
Which means you dragged your family along,
and you lived in any hovel you could find.
And in the process, let's see, in the early days,
5 and a half years, I believe there he lost
4 children, if I'm not mistaken.
Young children, babies dying.
And the total amount of children that died,
he had 13 children
and only 6 of them survived to adults.
Quite astounding, but that was very very common.
Particularly among the Irish community,
because where they were living, in the tenements
or the little hovels, they were literally crowded in,
something like they were in Ireland.
See, they were used to nothing. If you had to
sleep on the floor, you slept on the floor.
And those are ideal conditions, see, for
typhus and cholera and
everything, no sanitation. You just,
you couldn't help diseases.
So these people were dying, just with no control.
And no, really no medical assistance
to amount to anything. From there, in 1856
when King James Strang
was shot by his own people, Johnny O'Donnell,
who was Johnny the Rat,
was in business with a John Bonner, as I recall.
They had a small sailing, trading ship on the lakes.
They'd fish some and trade some.
And Johnny was Sufiah O'Donnell's sister.
Sufiah was the wife of Anthony. So he's the one
that discovered Beaver Island.
The Indians came and told him that King Strang
had been shot. Well, naturally, King Strang was shot,
the Mormon community became extremely fearful
that they were going to be driven off the island,
did a full scale Mormon breakout. Because they had
been discriminating against the Irish
and also the Indians, they didn't really want anybody
on this island.
They,
They really came, I suppose there would have been
a battle had the Mormons not left. So
it was really, these homes were just left, the
people left in a big hurry.
King of sad in a way, really, the Mormons were
good people. It was just that this
King Strang was a very difficult person and very, very,
very, very much overpowering. So much so
that his own community
was left almost helpless. See, he'd made all
the decisions for them, even to the point
of the type of clothing that they would wear.
In fact, that aggravated some of the women.
They didn't like the extremely long chute dresses
and big old fashioned high boots
for women, but that was minor.
At any rate, the community was left leaderless,
and they panicked and left.
So, let's see...
So, by 1855-56
Anthony was on his way to Beaver Island then?
Absolutely, right away.
And ecstatic. Those, you could see, receive the
message, some place would remind you of
Arranmore. Now it's hard
to see offhand why, they had extreme poverty in
Ireland, why he would be attracted to a place that
would remind him of Arranmore. On Arranmore,
at least, when they had food, before the potato fell,
even before they had nothing,
very very low material things, no prospect
of bettering their lives,
they had probably more than maybe we have today.
They had an awful strong family cohesion.
Tremendous love of the family. Tremendous concern
for each other. Not only your immediate family,
but anybody on the island. See, if you're going back
far enough, and you don't have to go back far,
we're all related. It is as it is here today.
You start doing the genealogy and you realize,
my God, that person's my cousin, or second cousin
or whatever. See, it's just like
yourself. You're related to us, you're as much
an O'Donnell as either of us.
But you don't have the name because you're
a descendant of Bridget, who
was the eldest child of Anthony, who was brought to
here as a 6 week old baby. That is, when
she left Ireland.
Can you imagine caring for a young child like that on
the boat trips? And the boat trips were just atrocious.
The quarters were hardly ever clean, if ever clean.
The people were just
stuffed in little cubbyholes. Some of them were
converted slave ships, and that's what the berths
they were sleeping in. Just stuffed in little cubby holes.
And you'd have maybe a space 6 foot long for 4 adults,
and just that much space.
I mean, this was it. And oftentimes they wouldn't let
you on deck if there was any contagion, you spent
those 6 weeks or so below deck, trapped in with
tremendous stench because there's no sanitary
conditions. So...
Getting back to
when they reached Beaver Island, do you know
where they lived? Where they set up a homestead?
Yes, we do know. We haven't seen the cabin, it was just
a little ways out of town. Later on, his son built a home
right on the main street here. It was since burned down
A fine, fine home for his family. But also, let's see...
I think it's pretty close to where the old Malloy's meat
market, just right across the street from that.
You know what year that burned down?
Let's see, the exact year I don't know. But it was when
the family was in Detroit. So let's see,
I would say about 1930.
That is an indication that employment was, see,
diminishing here. The fishing was
getting less, the lumber was almost all gone, and
anybody wanting any permanent employment
had to migrate. They had no choice. So our part
of the family headed for Detroit.
Some other families headed for Chicago, that's the
reason for the big, big community in Chicago.
It wasn't that they wanted to go, they had to go.
But at least they were going to more jobs,
which was tremendous. Now Mamie O'Donnell, she also
followed her children here. That's Mary Ann O'Donnell,
Maloney O'Donnell.
Because she wanted to be with her kids. So my dad did,
when he was 19 years old, designed and built a fine
home for her. Tremendous thing
for a young person to do.
A home in Detroit?
The home in Detroit, yes,
for the family. But, nevertheless, her heart was
always on Beaver Island. You can look at, listen,
read some of her old poems, and they almost cry.
This is where her heart was, see, this was her home.
She was kind of like
a displaced person in Detroit, even though
she wasn't hungry and everything.
But this is what she longed for. And she would have
come back, come home, they rented it
out while they were gone.
I see, and Anthony's son, Peter, who would have been
you grandfather, what did he...
Big Anthony?
Excuse me, I mean Peter.
Oh, Peter was our grandfather, right,
and Anthony's the great-grandfather.
So Peter worked at what here on the island?
Peter worked for the lumber people,
the lumber interests, as a, I suppose you'd
say carpenter. Mostly building the railroad cars
and repairing railroad cars, that is a good part of
the wood in those days.
Later, when the lumber started deteriorating, he went
to work for the lumber interests just outside
of Manastee and he worked there a number of years
but would come back and forth, back and forth,
you know, because lumber was
a bit seasonal there, too. And he died,
though, quite young, let's see, the exact date
I don't have in my head. I'd have to look in my book.
But his children were all very young, which means then
that his wife, Mamie, then had the responsibility
of raising 5 children,
young children, and supporting them, quite a task.
But by God, she was up to it.
And how did she support them, how did she manage?
She opened her home as a boarding house,
took in lots and lots of boarders.
She also taught school some of that time, and she
opened a small store in front of her house.
A Candy store, is that right?
Yes, a candy store. And I strongly
suspect that the islanders helped, too, but helped in
very, very clever ways. Now, for example, my dad who
was just a very young boy, I mean, a young boy,
would work, for example the Shing family,
when they were putting up ice in the winter.
And he was paid a good wage for that.
You know, it was quite seasonal, it wouldn't last
that long. Doing things that kids could do,
like running up the ramps and bringing the clasps down
to grab a new block of ice. The kids were fast at
that, an adult couldn't keep up with that.
But my goodness, for a day's work they'd pay him
like a day's wages. Quite remarkable. But that's just a
clever way of supporting the family. Without giving
the appearance of, okay, this is a handout.
So this was a good place to be poor in, let me tell you.
But as a result of that,
growing up here, with the influence of a community
that cares about people,
one strong thing that was always evident
in my dad was tremendous compassion for anybody
that was hurting. I mean, really, just
if he could help in any way, he just helped.
Just, that was it. No decision, nothing big, no
matter what he had, he helped. And so many of
the people here are like that. So hardships,
while they can be difficult on you, can be a great
learning experience, too. And that's part of the
same community, too. You know, maybe I could
mention, too, as a small boy I came with my dad
to the island a number of times,
because he was back and forth, back and forth. And he
would introduce me to so many people. "This is my
relative, this is your cousin, and this..." God, the names
were so hopelessly intertwined! I mean,
you wouldn't know up for down,
and for a little guy about 8 years old you just
give up in despair. I mean,
there's no way you could make sense of it. So as
a result of that, I figured when I was old enough I
would do something along the genealogical line. That
is, to try to make sense out of all this. Well, when I was
in my early 20s I tried. Spent the longest while at it,
with all the old letters that Charlie Anthony had left.
I finally gave up in
hopeless despair. I mean, how could you know, one
person was mentioned her and the next place it
was Nick Damman, it was the same guy. You'd have to
be an islander to do that. That's why I was so
impressed with the work that Jim Sumpkeys and the
others had done,
they were able to ferret out this information and make
sense out of it. Which, when you start it's a
nightmare, let me tell you. You have to try it to see. So
when I started doing the research on the genealogy,
it finally came to me that these good people had done
the work, they had done the hard work.
So all I had to supply was some history, particularly
history of early Donegal.
So that people would understand, when they see the
qualities that the Irish
people had, that wasn't strange. That was something
they always had. Their helpfulness,
their concern for one another. The fact that in old
Ireland, nobody ever went hungry, nobody.
It's impossible. If anybody needed medical care they
got it, and they had good medical care
in ancient Ireland. If they needed legal help,
they got legal help.
Just a tremendous, tremendous culture. They grew
up with centuries of that really goodness.
So much so that when St. Patrick come to Ireland as a
slave, understand, he's a slave, he was still
impressed with the Irish.
That's what made him want to come back. See, he
knew that there was a goodness here that just,
with Christianity, see, it would blossom.
And it did blossom. And maybe I should get
sidetracked just to say the big difference that
St. Patrick made coming to Ireland. Before St. Patrick
came, the Irish were like many, many early cultures -
extremely warlike, gah!
Inter-tribal warfare all the time, raiding neighboring
communities, raiding England, raiding Scotland, they
even had a good section of France under their control.
That was under a chieftain called Neil of the
Nine Hostages who was in our immediate lineage,
incidentally. Neil had an Irish, had an Ireland that
included Scotland, a good part of England, and part
of Brittany. In fact, that's
where Neil was killed, by an Irishman incidentally.
Anytime you have an occasion to warfare, you're going
to make a lot of enemies. One of his enemies killed
him in France. Well, to get back to my train of thought,
You were talking about Irish culture and how its
traditions carried on through...
Anyway, St. Patrick was so impressed with the Irish,
even as a slave,
he wanted to come back. Of course, he supposedly had
visions when he was finally, he just walked away from
slavery. And at that time if you walked away from a
slave, you were identifiable by what clothing you had.
They knew who you were. And he walked about
200 miles to get to the shore and he made it. See,
God's hand was with him, that's all.
So at any rate, due to St. Patrick's
influence, inter-tribal warfare stopped.
Not completely, but greatly diminished, greatly.
Just amazing what happened.
And there was almost like massive conversions
in Ireland, it was the hand of God.
God wanted this to happen for a reason. And maybe
this might be an interesting note, too. It's going back
but it's our family's involvement with St. Patrick.
Now this is something I just learned. St. Patrick...
Do you want me to carry on a little bit
about St. Patrick?
I'd actually like to get closer to Beaver Island history.
As fascinating as it is.
You talked about Peter dying young,
and your grandmother raising the kids
and being a schoolteacher.
And is it true that she taught school on Garden
Island as well?
Yeah, she taught school for several years on Garden
Island, and my dad went there.
Of course, he was just a kid, I mean he was probably
first or second grade, but he went.
He and his younger brother, Walter,
went with her because she couldn't leave them at
home, they were far too young.
And on Garden Island it was an Indian school,
strictly Indians. There were no other white children
there. And as a result, my dad learned to speak Indian.
And sing, God, when were
kids, he'd sing the nicest Indian songs.
You know, children's songs. And, in fact, they were
good. It's too bad I can't remember the names.
Simple nature songs, they had bouncy little tunes,
and catchy phrases for kids. Granted, just like kids
the world over, you know.
And then later in life he was a volunteer
at one of our veteran's hospitals, Allen Park
Veteran's Hospital, and occasionally when they had
an Indian that needed advanced medical
treatment they would ship him to this hospital because
it was big. And he'd usually be able
to ferret those Indians out as they were
coming in, and he would greet them in Indian and talk
to them in Indian. Simple conversations, understand,
but they were go from a fear situation to, "OK, I got
somebody I can talk to here."
So your father remembered that language...
Oh, yeah, all his life. Enough for simple conversation.
And his time in coming here,
the Indians, they always had a tremendous relationship
Because he went to school with some of them, and at
school bonds when you are kids... When the Indians on
Garden Island were later brought or moved here,
because, there weren't many people there, you know all
them kids. So, God, when he'd come back he visited
the Indians as much as he visited his own relatives.
They just expected it.
An interesting thing about Mamie Maloney,
they Indians, not all the Indians
the Irish would do the same thing, they would get into
some pretty wicked routs sometimes,
I mean really, quite life-threatening
brawls. The Indians, over an argument they might
get in a fight with axes, if they were chopping wood
and somebody insulted the other person.
These were violent things. And being that the
Indian community wasn't far from where Mamie
O'Donnell's home was, somebody would immediately
run and get Mamie, and she would come and stop
the fight. Well, she was the only one that could
stop it, I suppose. That's the kind of strong person she
was. She'd come within earshot of the Indians and
called out their names, like a schoolmaster could
only do, and they would just freeze.
Just like they were little children all over again.
And that would stop the fight. Isn't that interesting?
But she was up to it, I'd tell you,
if they didn't stop, she'd wade right into it. She was a
strong lady. you'd have to be strong, to raise 4 wild
boys. Most of them were wild, except our dad.
No, he was the one of the wildest!
Now, you were about 12 when your grandmother
passed away. So you have personal memories of her.
Yes, yes, very, very, very, well. An extremely
organized lady.
Extremely centered on what she, I mean, if she had a
goal, this was it. later in life her health wasn't that
good, so she might give the impression of being a bit
stern. But see, that comes from being a schoolmistress
at that time. I mean, if you're being one person school,
you better be a disciplinarian or you're gonna go crazy
And as a result of having 4 boys to raise,
they were just like
most boys, maybe a little more on the wild side,
except Patrick, the oldest one.
They were just natural boys.
And then, too, this is something I want to investigate
a little further because this is something my dad told
me. Mamie Maloney's people were from Mayo
and most of the islanders here
were from Donegal, and he says there was a vast
difference between the two.
The Mayo people
were much more straight laced, much more centered.
Much more, they were more serious in life.
So they undoubtedly looked down on the people
from Donegal, because the people from Donegal,
their minds were very irresponsible.
They were just kind of live for today people.
If you had enough money to live today,
you were doing well.
They might spend it all, you know, but a total
contrast from the people of Mayo. It's
still kind of like that in Donegal today too, I'd say.
More freedom.
You can almost see it on the people's faces. I mean,
it's just like they're set free.
Whether that's good or bad, I don't know, but there was quite a difference.
So that I want to investigate a little bit more.
And your grandmother's family, there were more,
there were a couple teachers, correct?
Your grandmother's brother, John came along, he was
a teacher as well, wasn't he?
They did have a very strong educational bend, but
understand, then you could be a teacher with 8 grades
in school. But they still
had the educational bend. Even my dad, he only went
to school for 8 grades, but invariably
people would ask him what university he attended.
Isn't that something?
It's because he read all his life. He just had
that, oh God, he read all his spare time.
And what an inspiration for kids growing up!
Because he'd get so excited when he was reading, you
had to pay attention to him, I mean you just had no
choice. And some of it was really great stuff. So his
interests were wide, and he had tremendous memory.
He could recite
battles, and recite the
movement of troops, and animated all the time.
And then he might break into a song. He was
tremendously entertaining. Just gifted, but with
only 8 grades in school.
So the teachers here deserve an awful lot of credit,
just outstanding. They've done a super job.
Did he receive 8 grades of schooling on
Garden, or here, or both?
Well, there would be about 2 on Garden Island,
the rest were with the nuns on Beaver Island.
At the McKinley School?
Yes, although when he left school
the nuns knew why. See, he was
going to help bring in some money for the family,
which was a necessity.
They did give him permission to come and take
any books out of the library whenever
he wanted to. You see, that was quite a nice thing to
do. But it wasn't long after that he arrived in Detroit,
when he was about 16,
to find employment.
Is your father the one that ended up founding the
machine shop, or manufacturing...?
Yeah, he had a small machine shop doing
quite intricate work, really. He was a very very
gifted person, really.
Now he did, in addition to his schooling, he did go,
he was in the first class, at Highland Park, of the Henry
Ford Trade School, which was super. Now, they were
just strictly organized on trade.
Mathematics and the skills of running machines and
that type of thing. But he picked
up things like a magnet, he was just, he got to be a
very skilled machinist. And a good why, there were
many innovations and that type of thing. So his
business was quite successful, really.
And did he employ other islanders there?
Yes, he did.
Robert Bonner was one,
when Robert was going to school at the time in Detroit.
Let's see, but many islanders would come in. They
wouldn't necessarily be employed.
Stanley Burns, who incidentally was a relative, I think
he was half brothers or something like that of Robert
Bonner. Oh God, it seemed like an endless track
of islanders coming in. But yet, they had that old
Irish characteristic.
If an islander come in, work stopped.
It just stopped. So much so when I was
young, I just wondered how they could
get anything done. It just, because they might take a
whole day off just visiting with someone, and we had
loads of work to do.
And that didn't bother them at all, the people were
more important. That's going back to that idea of
family. Family, family, family.
Yeah, and people certainly, I suppose they received
such a good welcome that, "We're coming back!"
So you got to meet and
maintain friendships with several islanders in Detroit
Oh, many, many. The ones that were
for example, the *** on the lakes. They often
would dock in Detroit. Well, as soon as they docked,
our room was where they headed for.
So we had seen many, many, many islander people
when we were growing up as young kids.
Who do you remember
from those that worked on the lakes?
Bill Green,
there was a Left, offhand
I don't remember his name. Bill Green would just
come very often.
Now, he was related to the Greens, he was
related to us through Bridget,
Anthony's oldest daughter.
She married a Green, White Dana Greene. So the Greens
were all, I guess it was all one big family, really.
And I do remember Bill Green coming to our house,
he was great with kids but just terrorized us
unmercifully. He'd give you a quarter
and then take it back from you, and then give it to my
sister, little sister, and then take it back from her
and give it to Pete. Now, that would go on for
a long time. But at the end of the day, each of us would
wind up with a quarter. Now, a quarter would buy an
awful lot of candy in those days, let me tell you.
It was a lot of money for a kid, something like maybe
five dollars today, maybe more.
It was just heaven. So
he was good in spite of his, I don't know what you'd
call it, kind of a streak. He just liked to terrorize kids.
How young were you when you first visited the island
as children?
How young? Maybe about
6 years old, first, because my dad came quite often
How old were you, Charlie?
Probably about 10 or 12
And you'd come in the summers?
He'd come any time of the year, any time of the year.
What's your first memory of the island, of seeing it
as a child when you visited?
Quite interesting. I would get
from my dad's idea
I couldn't quite understand his enthusiasm.
The place was nice, and it was loaded with relatives,
but I couldn't make any sense out of who they were.
Although, some of them were awful nice.
Just leave you terribly confused.
But being a kid,
about 8 years old, you don't fully understand what he's
seeing in the people. Because his idea of the island,
that no place in the world existed like Beaver Island.
See, his heart was always here.
A place where you're secure, where people accept you.
See, that was beyond my understanding at the time.
And his idea of the people, they looked like
ordinary people to me, but to him they
were just perfect.
I mean, if you ask him, "Now, what could that person
do to change?" He couldn't
find anything. I mean, they were just perfect. Now
my dad, something interesting,
it's been many years since I've been to Beaver Island,
because I've had a lot of opportunities to go to Ireland
which I did. I've spent a lot of time in Ireland.
And what attracted me about Ireland were the people,
particularly in Donegal
and Arranmore and on Torry, that you
were accepted right away. In fact,
oftentimes they'd ask you, particularly when
I was younger, "How long
are you home for?" A very warm experience.
Now, something that I noticed on Beaver Island
this time, my God,
the people here have the same spirit. You see just kind
of a freedom on their faces. That doesn't mean they
don't have problems. They do, like anybody.
An acceptance, an openness. God, you can't walk
down the street if you don't wave.
I mean, everybody's waving at you. They don't
know who you are, but
they're waving. And you can feel that complete
acceptance. Now, quite an amazing thing, really.
I was only here 2 days with our function.
Sunday morning I went to the breakfast
in the church hall,
and for some reason
I just assumed I was in Ireland.
I seen some fellow with an American flag on it, on his
back, and I says, "By God, he come a long way." I just
assumed like I was back in Arranmore. Strange.
In other words, the people haven't
lost that sparkle, that attractiveness, the helpfulness.
And I've witnessed that same thing here today,
or this time. So you can bet I'll be back many times.
In fact, it's hard for me to leave. Being retired now,
it's quite a temptation to stay.
Now, that's a very deep thing you won't find in the city.
That, if you ever, well, I know everybody's had an
experience in the city. You're lost in the crowd.
Here, you can't get lost in the crowd.
For example, and too, we
built a big bonfire on the bank there.
Now, it's a swimming area for kids, and unfortunately
we used, somebody brought a whole
raft of pallets to burn. Well, those things are loaded
with staples and nails.
Well, I'm alarmed afterwards. You don't think of that
in advance, well,
we had fire clearances and everything was safe
that way. But hell, all
those staples in the sand, so I mentioned my concern
to one of the islanders, to Roland Cull, when I went
to breakfast. And he kept telling me, "Don't worry
about it, don't worry about it."
But I was worried about it. And by God,
he brought a crew in the afternoon with magnets and
metal detectors and cleaned up, not only our section,
but the whole beach. So the whole beach
is in better shape now than it was before. Now
I asked him, "Roland, can I help financially with this?"
And he said, "Absolutely not." You see, that's the spirit.
That's something you'd never find in the city.
Never, never, never. That's why, gah, you feel
like this is home. So that's
getting sidetracked a bit, but it's worth mentioning.
Sure. What are some of the memories
from your childhood visits here that might stand out?
Okay, I remember specifically
visiting old relatives, and also we visited an old man.
You know, when my dad came, I don't think he
missed hardly an islander in his visits.
This was almost like a moral responsibility to him,
particularly the old people that were living alone. One
old man we visited, to show you kind of the bend of
faith, and the simple faith, but solemn faith, this old
man reluctantly showed us, well not really reluctantly,
but he had been getting
some criticism for what he had done. It was a family's
practice on Easter Sunday morning to get a bottle of
water from their well.
Now, maybe you've heard something of this tradition.
He'd take that bottle of water and cork it up, and then
a day or two after Easter he'd
get another bottle. And always the bottle
collected Easter Sunday morning was crystal clear,
and the bottle collected
a day or two after was cloudy, which
water will do if you, it's got organisms in it.
So, to this old man, this was Holy Water.
And somebody had criticized him for this,
the old guy, that's why he was a bit reluctant.
But he knew my dad would be open.
So he asked the priest if it was Holy Water.
The priest assured him it was Holy Water.
What else could it be? It was the man's deep
faith on Easter. So it was a simple faith
that impressed me. Just the simple, we say almost
childlike, but see, that's when miracles happen, with
that simplicity, see, and complete trust. To him
it was Holy Water,
and by golly, it was as holy as any water you could get.
So the people criticized him, some of the islanders
said, "That's not Holy Water!"
You know, they were out on the step, that's all.
Let's see, what else, maybe... the openness and
the goodness of people as a boy. I remember stopping
at Joe Frose
Sanderburg and his wife,
Bid, made at the time what I thought,
and still think, was the finest meal I ever had
in my life. She asked us if we had eaten. Well, my dad,
he wouldn't be too, I mean he's visiting people, I
mean, he's just dragging me along.
Whether he ate or not, it didn't make much difference
to him. He could go a long ways.
I'm getting kind of hungry about 11, 11:30. I says,
"No, we haven't eaten anything." And she made toast.
Just plain toast, and put a can of whole
tomatoes on it. Gah, I kept asking her for more and
more and more. To me, that was just gourmet food
deluxe, and it really was. But I think
part of it was Bid's attitude, see. The caring,
the concern, see. Just a lovingness
come out. So let's see, any other people
I know specifically.
That made a big impression on me, let me tell you.
The importance, see, of being open to people
and being concerned about their welfare and all that.
Offhand I don't recall anything
that was more than anything out of the ordinary,
meeting people and getting confused with names.
He can make a lineage.
But rattle off and, like you'd probably find now,
if somebody rattles of 3 or 4 generations, you're gone.
So how long did you continue to visit here?
Up until I was about 20. Yeah, quite
a number of times. Now, Charlie's visited too.
Well, I remember staying at Bid Sandberg's house
with Joe, and I really had an enjoyable time.
And she was such a gracious person. She was a
wonderful cook. And she'd not only make you one pie,
she'd make you, sometimes 2 or 3 pies. So, I mean,
I picked up some weight here. But I was intrigued
a lot, with the stories that you would hear, different
stories. Like one where the, I don't
know what year this took place, but a German
priest, sent out West to a German settlement
and asked for volunteers in order to come to
Beaver Island to show
the Irish how to farm. Because he couldn't stand the
Irish being nonproductive when they weren't fishing,
because they were party people. So anyway, I guess
the first generation German children, you know,
watching the Irish children, jumped the fence.
Of course, the ground here, the soil's
not that productive.
A lot of stone to clear and that kind of thing. And
so it wasn't long before the German kids were
partying with the Irish kids. And I thought
that was a good story. And another one, being a kid
I was intrigued with stories about Indians. So here I
can meet Indians, and a fellow that chugged around
or worked with Joe McFro, and Joe McFro had a
little fishing business going, was Big William
Wazakeezik. And Big William had stories too.
And he was a very nice fellow but would talk more
if he had a jumbo of beer.
If he had a jumbo, he would do good. And the same
way with McFro. And McFro was always kidding around
and joking, and one of the things, McFro, he
wouldn't go to Mass, you know.
And so there was another guy with me who stayed
there a bit because I was due for a while.
And he was always trying to convert
McFro and tell him that advantages
of going to church, and McFro would tell him, "Well,
I can listen to it on the radio." And this kid was just
exasperated. And, but another story that
fascinated me when I was a kid that my dad related,
was my grandmother ran that boardinghouse,
and there was an Indian lady that married a fellow,
I believe, from New York City, and they settled on
over on Garden Island.
And the fellow went a little crazy
during the winter, and probably a real lot of cabin fever
and he tried to kill her. And she was suspicious
of him, so she, in the meantime he shot her I think
2 or 3 times, and anyway...
She knifed him,
she killed him. And she came walking across the ice
and went to my grandmother's house and told her
the story.
Well, my grandmother sat her down at the kitchen table
and fed her, you know,
put on a feed for her.
And my dad said it was a fascinating thing just
to watch her eat, because you could see this hole,
big hole right there.
You have any more of these stories?
I thought, you know, the hardship
of the people, you know, I mean, to be alive. I was just
a kid, I thought, "Gee, would you be able to do that?"
That would be hard to walk across the ice. Then she
left my grandmother's house
and walked across the ice to Cross Village, you know,
for medical help.
Now, that's a pretty strong lady to be able to do that.
Another one was Alex Hornstock,
He had told some great, some great stories.
But probably, too, I was fascinated and taken up with
the people, and I still am. Like with older people
sometime you can see a great deal of in depth
character, like in their face. And that was Pat Bonner.
Pat Bonner radiated to me a lot of love, a lot of caring.
He was something that
I think if he had never seen you before
he could just open up his arms to you. And he was
always ready to give himself in playing the fiddle.
And I remember what I thought was awfully strange,
because in normal households, where we come from,
you're normally, as a kid, you're in bed by 9,
at least by 10 o'clock.
Well, gosh, here on this island I remember going with
my dad, and we'd go over somebody's house and it
might be 10 o'clock in the evening.
And I remember one time when Jules Gillespie
came over with his guitar, and then
Pat Bonner came over, and, my gosh, we were
there all night long.
And I mean, it was a nice party, a really nice party.
And someone would recite a poem, or sing
songs and play, and
real good conversation. So i was fascinated with that
as a kid, I never encountered that before.
They must have been quite a treat, to have come from
the city, and then you're
here visiting and kind of stepping back in time.
Well, I was so intrigued with the place that when I got
married, my wife and I spent
our honeymoon here, back in 1961. We stayed
at the lodge and we were the only people in the lodge.
And so the proprietor at the time, I can't think of his
name, he was a young fellow and
him and his wife had 2 small children.
So anyway, they had the fireplace going at the lodge,
which was very very nice.
He set us up a table with candles, you know.
And that was good for one night, then I asked
if we could eat in the kitchen.
They said, "yeah." So that was,
I mean, that was good, I mean, very very nice.
I really enjoyed it.
People were very hospitable.
Charlie, what about the time you were here as a
kid alone and you ran out of money?
Oh, that was on our
honeymoon. We got snowed in here, we couldn't
fly out. So, anyway,
my dad called, I think, yeah, Archie Lapender.
And Archie, there was a knock on our door,
here was Archie with money.
He was a grand fellow, too, and his wife, Francis,
she was very gracious. But we had stayed
with the Lapenders, too. I brought my two boys up
probably 15
years ago, and we walked all over the
side of the island. But Archie, we stayed with him, and
he loaned us his truck and so we had that
for a while. And then Mary Burt
loaned us her car. And Archie got kind of
a kick out of it, because it was at night, and the roads
were not marked, and you could make a mistake
and make the wrong turn, you know.
We were enlightening this to him, and one of my boys
says, "Gee, yeah, you could get lost on this island."
And he laughed,
he got a big chuckle out of that. You could get lost
on the island. So that's
what I remember mostly, and that was very, I mean,
it impressed me, like to come back for my honeymoon.
So this has been a pretty important weekend for
you and your family, the reunion.
Exactly, it's
extremely warm. In fact, some of our group,
they were all very deeply moved with Beaver Island,
and I would be very surprised
if some of them never come back, I mean,
they're gonna, everyone I talked to was just
anxious to come back.
Yes, they were.
In fact, one of the fellows in the group, he
married into the family.
And I talked to him in the evening before
he left, and how here's a man and he's right
at the verge of tears.
He says he's never experienced anything like this in his
life, in his adult life, in his life, period,
where people care about you. And, God, what a
profound effect on him. See, we're used to it and if
people didn't care about us,
they'd know about it, I think. But here's
a grown adult, maybe in his 40s, who never in his
whole life experienced anybody really caring about him
And here, people paid attention to him.
Quite a moving experience, I tell you. I mean, he's a
convert.
He wants to be part of the scene very very much.
So I know he'll be back.
And some of the other guys were
talking about even coming in the winter, that's a lot.
That means they're what...?
You talk winter, that's...
Well, it's common for a lot of Americans to return to
Europe or other areas to visit their ancestral homeland,
but I think in a lot of ways, for literally hundreds
and hundreds of people now, a return to Beaver Island
is as important. It has that
feeling about it, partly because time
moves a little more slowly here, but it's also, I think,
a pretty amazing thing, just watching this
over the weekend,
that thousands of people around this country
can trace their lineage back to this small island.
Yes, yes, yes.
And from here back to another island, a few
counties on the western side of Ireland.
But it is,
it's very gratifying I think.
Extremely so. And just to
add a note to that, when you say thousands,
Jim Sumpkeys in his database now
has well over 13,000
people. 13,000 people
from this island, their extended families.
And, God, he's not near ended.
So it's amazing, see, the people got a grounding here.
That's a part of the Irish mission and, I think, Why God
got them out of Ireland was so they could
spread that influence through the whole world, to
bring something special. And the Irish
have some of that special thing. It's a mission for them.
It happened in the early days of the Church,
when thousands and thousands of monks, see, after
the dark ages left Ireland,
right after St. Patrick was converted, converted them.
Within a hundred years, see, they were sending
thousands of monks
to reestablish the monasteries and churches in Europe,
and educational systems, which was another big
benefit of St. Patrick's coming.
That's why the Irish, God wanted the Irish
to be converted. The timing was just too providential.
I think too, you know, like,
we know in this country, like, the family values
are really diminishing
compared to what they used to be like 40, 50 years
ago. And I think this family reunion was a rekindling of
the family values, and you can't really
put a price on that. So it was a very good experience.
Really. People want to know
their roots, they want to know they belong.
And until they do that, they're kind of a distracted,
displaced person. Just
alone, they're alone in the world until they can make
that connection.
So that's why it made such a profound effect on them.
Here they do, they attended our reunion,
they knew they belonged, no matter who they were.
Well, we were glad to be a part of it, and glad that you
came back here to celebrate.
Maybe I should add with one note here,
I want to say that you have that spirit. You
communicate it. People feel welcome with you. I
knew this the first time seeing you, you didn't have to
say a word. I didn't
know you belonged to the family, but I knew
you had it, that you were a part of this community here
caring community. So I want to compliment you and
thank you, too, really,
for all your efforts. Because this is quite a laborious
job to try to piece this thing all together.
Yeah, well, as one amateur historian to another,
and as an islander too, I appreciate what you're
saying. And we appreciate your work, too, and what
you contributed here to the society.
Oh, thank you immensely.
And thank you both for speaking here with me
tonight.
Oh, well, thank you for your patience.