SIGRIST:

Good afternoon. This is Paul Sigrist for the National Park Service. Today is the Fourth of July, Sunday, 1999, a very hot day. And I'm here in Westfield, Massachusetts and it's my pleasure to be here with Florence Queipo.

QUEIPO:

Queipo.

SIGRIST:

Queipo, Queipo.

QUEIPO:

Q-U-E-I-P-O.

SIGRIST:

Thank you. Mrs. Queipo came from Spain in 1916. And she was 13 — almost 14. In one month, she turned 14 after she got here. And I should say for the sake of the tape that we're in Mrs. Queipo's kitchen.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

And there's a fan going above us.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

And there's traffic out on the road and some of this may be picked up on the tape a little bit. But we have to have this fan going. It's too hot today.

QUEIPO:

Sure is.

SIGRIST:

Mrs. Queipo, thank you for having me come out.

QUEIPO:

You're welcome.

SIGRIST:

Can we begin by you giving me your birth date?

QUEIPO:

November 16 th , 1902.

SIGRIST:

And where in Spain were you born?

QUEIPO:

In Loma Somara.

SIGRIST:

Can you spell that, please?

QUEIPO:

L-O-M-A, Loma, Somara — Capital S-O-M-A-R-A.

SIGRIST:

What does that mean?

QUEIPO:

Loma is the top of the hill. Loma Somara. Somara is the — another part of the town where they have a — a chapel and the Virgin, another Virgin in there. And we go there with a — in — in a procession certain times of the year. Sometimes they bring the — the Virgin that is there in her own case, you know. And they bring it into the town when they — sometimes this rain is needed. And they — they — they believe this way, that if they bring La Rahin [PH], the Lomas [PH], the Somara Loma — how can I say that — is going to help the rain to come when it's necessary for all the — everything they do plant in there, because there's [unclear], because it's the dry season. And that's when they — they bring the Virgin in there. It's carried on the — I don't know if you've ever seen processions in Spain, pictures of it. You haven't seen them?

SIGRIST:

Well, when you say the Virgin, is this a statue of the Virgin?

QUEIPO:

A statue.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

Statue.

SIGRIST:

And what do they carry her on?

QUEIPO:

It's carried on a — on a platform. And there's four men, four fellows, one on each corner with a white shawl, like, on their lap — on the shoulder. And that's how it's carry. They carry it — they carry their way — all the way to the — from the — Somara to Loma.

SIGRIST:

How many men?

QUEIPO:

Four.

SIGRIST:

Four men.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, one on each corner.

SIGRIST:

I see. Do they — do they bring her out for any other occasions, other than when they need rain?

QUEIPO:

I — yes, I think they do. Really and truly, I cannot tell you just when. But they do bring the — the [unclear], Loma Somara, el Puervo [PH] the Loma Somara.

SIGRIST:

Is there something about the statue of the Virgin that you remember that sticks out in your mind?

QUEIPO:

Not really, because I was too young to know a lot of things about it. All I know, that whenever rain was needed, they plant — they pray to the [unclear], the Somara — [unclear], "Please give us some rain because our crop is dying," or things of this sort.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

That's all I can tell you.

SIGRIST:

Oh, that's —

QUEIPO:

I was too sm — too small to know the difference about a lot of things. But that, I can tell you.

SIGRIST:

Great. Let me just — I'm going to pause for a second [tape off/on] — yeah, the microphones are very sensitive. Yeah.

QUEIPO:

Oh, I —

SIGRIST:

Okay, we're now — we're now resuming. Where in the country is this town? What part of the country?

QUEIPO:

Is in the northern part of Spain. It's between France — across the water, they say that you can go to France within six hours. In Kataruna [PH] — this is something that — you want me to show you on the map?

SIGRIST:

Well, maybe after we're done. But just explain it a little bit in words. We'll be okay.

QUEIPO:

Okay. Something there, Borducos [PH], Kataruna. All that is by land into France. But I was never in France.

SIGRIST:

[laughs] So where — it's the northern part of the country.

QUEIPO:

The northern part.

SIGRIST:

How close to the seacoast?

QUEIPO:

Oh, we're on the seacoast.

SIGRIST:

On the seacoast.

QUEIPO:

We are on the seacoast. Yes, Santana [PH] is on the seacoast.

SIGRIST:

Oh. What do you remember about being so close to the ocean?

QUEIPO:

I don't remember very much because we live in this little town that was far away from there. I think it's — we were — [unclear] was. Quadralays was at Rinoza [PH]. [unclear]. I don't know how many. I can't tell you that exactly.

SIGRIST:

We'll — we'll look at it afterwards. Thank you. So the town was actually a ways away from — yeah. No, no. We'll look after.

QUEIPO:

[unclear]

SIGRIST:

We'll — we'll look after —

QUEIPO:

My —

SIGRIST:

Because it's just a tape.

QUEIPO:

My town was not at the coast.

SIGRIST:

Right. I understand that now.

QUEIPO:

Okay.

SIGRIST:

Yes, it was inland a little bit.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

And there was — Folay [PH] was — which means that — laywa [PH] means about two — about two laywas is about a mile from here, as I understand it. I could be wrong. But as I understand it, that's how it is. And we were about four — four laywas from my town to Rinoza. And from there to [unclear], I don't know how much.

SIGRIST:

[chuckles] Okay. What are some of the things that you do remember about the town, like some of the —

QUEIPO:

My town?

SIGRIST:

Yeah, your town. What are some of the things that —

QUEIPO:

Oh.

SIGRIST:

— stick out in your mind about the town?

QUEIPO:

You want to see — friendly as can be. Everybody knows each other. Everybody helps each other whenever is needed. And everybody's happy. We sing whenever we feel like it. At night, I remember carrying a lantern because there was no light. There weren't lights. Lately, yes, but not when I was growing up in there. You carry a lantern because everything's in darkness. And you sing at the top of your lungs.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember a song that you sang back then?

QUEIPO:

Many [several words unclear].

SIGRIST:

Oh, could you sing one for me?

QUEIPO:

No, I can't because my voice doesn't carry it any longer.

SIGRIST:

No.

QUEIPO:

I — they called me a singer because I was always singing.

SIGRIST:

Yeah?

QUEIPO:

We had a northern — a window on the northern part of the house. And I think everybody in town could hear me singing all over town. [laughter]

SIGRIST:

Well, maybe as we're talking you'll feel like you'd like to sing one of those songs.

QUEIPO:

I wish I could but my voice doesn't carry, honey.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember the words to the song? Could you say the words to one of the songs?

QUEIPO:

Oh, God. I don't know if I can remember the words of the song. I don't know, honey. I like to be truthful with you.

SIGRIST:

Okay. All right.

QUEIPO:

I used to play the tambourine.

SIGRIST:

The tambourine. Uh-huh.

QUEIPO:

[laughs] My girlfriend and I, we used to play at the dances. We used to sing at the top of our lungs.

SIGRIST:

Did you dance too?

QUEIPO:

Yes, I did.

SIGRIST:

What kind of dancing did they do at that time?

QUEIPO:

Jota.

SIGRIST:

What is it?

QUEIPO:

Jota.

SIGRIST:

Joka. How do you spell that?

QUEIPO:

Jota. Jota — J-O-T-A.

SIGRIST:

And what kind of a dance is that?

QUEIPO:

[tapping sounds]

SIGRIST:

Oh, you're snapping and you're stamping your feet. [laughs]

QUEIPO:

Don't forget. My friend — one of my friends that live out in California, before they move out there, she was taking out her citizenship papers. So was my father. And they had to go to city hall here in Westfield to dance the Spanish dance. And my father said to me, "Tina" — they called me Tina, the four letters in my Spanish name. He says, "Tina, why don't you go with Belare [PH] to the city hall and sing the — and play the — I mean, dance the jota with Belare?" This other lady was taking out her citizenship papers. And I says, "Okay, [unclear]." I said, "I'll go." [laughs] They had a photograph. They played the jota. Before we got to the jota, had enough [unclear].

SIGRIST:

[chuckles]

QUEIPO:

So when the jota was going to begin, we were in a — a room separate from where we were going to be dancing. And when it was almost time for the jota to come on, this lady from the city hall opened the door. And she says to my friend and I, "It's time for you ladies to go." Okay. We waited for the jota to come in and we started to dance the jota. I never laughed more in my life. [laughs] Oh, dear God. How we laughed! Belare and I — [unclear] — she's dead already. Dear God. My good old friend.

SIGRIST:

Did she get her citizenship papers?

QUEIPO:

Yes, she did.

SIGRIST:

[laughs]

QUEIPO:

Of course, she did. So did my father.

SIGRIST:

[laughs] Who taught you how to do the jota?

QUEIPO:

Oh, God. Everybody does the jota over there. Everybody, from the little child to the old man and ladies. Yeah. I don't know if I could do it today. [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

Oh, you're doing a pretty good job just sitting there.

QUEIPO:

[laughs]

SIGRIST:

And — and what kind of music do you dance to?

QUEIPO:

There — at the town? Panderita [PH].

SIGRIST:

What is that? The guitar?

QUEIPO:

No, no. Yes, you can just do a guitar or accordion or whatever. But there weren't too many who could play that — the accordion or the guitar. But panderitas —

SIGRIST:

You're doing this. Like a castanet?

QUEIPO:

Castanets. I've got some if you'd like to see them.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

But no.

SIGRIST:

No?

QUEIPO:

Panderita's one of these — is a lo — is a round circle —

SIGRIST:

Yes.

QUEIPO:

— with —

SIGRIST:

Strings?

QUEIPO:

Has bells.

SIGRIST:

Bells.

QUEIPO:

That you play and they sound.

SIGRIST:

Oh.

QUEIPO:

And the inside is leather. They are skin, this dry skin. It makes a good — good noise.

SIGRIST:

So that's what you did for entertainment in Spain.

QUEIPO:

Yes. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

A lot of singing and dancing.

QUEIPO:

In the little towns, yeah.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

The little towns. And you sing at the top of your lungs.

SIGRIST:

Uh-huh. What else did people do for fun? They sang and they danced.

QUEIPO:

Not much.

SIGRIST:

What else was there to do?

QUEIPO:

Oh, they'd tell stories at night. They got together and they — they even danced. Yes. I danced with my father. Yeah. My father was a very amusing man. He was an old — he was — he even taught school in — in our hometown. And that man was always ready to dance and sing on top of his lungs. You could hear him. He was — when he was here — he was down in the cellar you could hear him way over there singing. Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

What was his name?

QUEIPO:

Pedro.

SIGRIST:

Pedro.

QUEIPO:

Pedro Fernandez [PH].

SIGRIST:

And what was your name when you were born?

QUEIPO:

Florentina [PH].

SIGRIST:

Florentina.

QUEIPO:

Florentina.

SIGRIST:

Keep going.

QUEIPO:

And I changed my name. I says, "Everybody has this hard time pronouncing my name. When I become a citizen, I'm going to change my name to Florence." And this is what I did. So now, I'm Florentina with this behind Florence.

SIGRIST:

Here in America.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

So Florentina and then —

QUEIPO:

Florence.

SIGRIST:

Finish your name. Your name when you were born.

QUEIPO:

Oh.

SIGRIST:

Florentina —

QUEIPO:

Fernandez. E. Fernandez.

SIGRIST:

Florentina —

QUEIPO:

My father was Fernandez and my mother was Fernandez. But the ladies don't lose their name — their — their second name when they get married. I don't know if they do now. I don't know. I can't tell you that. But at the time they kept their own name. So you had to go — you had to use your full name. Fernandez E. Fernandez.

SIGRIST:

So your full name was Florentina —

QUEIPO:

Fernandez.

SIGRIST:

— Fernandez E. Fernandez.

QUEIPO:

E. Fernandez. Garcia [PH] — my father's second name — Gonzales [PH]. My mother was Gonzales. Garcia Gonzales.

SIGRIST:

All right.

QUEIPO:

You don't put the Y in between.

SIGRIST:

So I'll say the whole thing. Flor — Florentina Fernandez —

QUEIPO:

E. —

SIGRIST:

— E. Fernandez —

QUEIPO:

Garcia —

SIGRIST:

— Garcia Gonzales.

QUEIPO:

— Gonzales. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Wow, that's a long name. [chuckles]

QUEIPO:

It sure is. [laughter] Sure is.

SIGRIST:

Do you know anything about the day that you were born? Did anyone tell you a story about —

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

— the day that you were born?

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

Or what kind of a baby you were or —

QUEIPO:

Oh, I —

SIGRIST:

— delivery?

QUEIPO:

Great. My mother says she hated me. You know why? Because I was the first grandchild on my father's side. There were three young men in there at the time and three young ladies. They all want to hold me. And my mother said that they spoil me so rotten that I didn't want to go to sleep. [chuckles] I just — well, why did you [several words unclear] so rotten? I says, "It wasn't my fault that they were holding me all the time and they — they spoiled me." [chuckles] "Because I couldn't do a thinking with you." That is what my mother used to say to me.

SIGRIST:

[laughs] Do you remember what your earliest memory is?

QUEIPO:

Of what?

SIGRIST:

Your earliest memory? What's the very first thing that you remember —

QUEIPO:

I can't tell —

SIGRIST:

— when you were a little, little child.

QUEIPO:

I can't tell you that, honey. I wish I could tell you but I can't.

SIGRIST:

Well, it was a long time ago.

QUEIPO:

Oh, sure is.

SIGRIST:

[laughs]

QUEIPO:

Don't forget. I'm 96. [laughter] Pretty soon, 97.

SIGRIST:

Oh.

QUEIPO:

1902 is when I was born. [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

November of 1902.

QUEIPO:

Sixteen.

SIGRIST:

That's right. Yeah, you'll be — you'll be 97 in November.

QUEIPO:

Right.

SIGRIST:

Yeah, so 96.

QUEIPO:

It's a long time, isn't it? [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

It is. It is. Well, you're doing great. So tell me — all right. We started talking about your father.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

What do you know about your father's childhood and his upbringing?

QUEIPO:

Oh, I don't know, honey.

SIGRIST:

Did he ever talk about any of that?

QUEIPO:

No. I cannot — I can't tell you anything about my father. The only thing I know about my father is that his — his real father die and my grandmother remarried again. And him and his stepfather got along beautifully. Yeah. Yeah, my father and my grandfather, they were just like this. Yeah, they were.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember your father's —

QUEIPO:

My grandfather?

SIGRIST:

— mother and stepfather in Spain?

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What do you remember about them?

QUEIPO:

I remember them being very lovable and very kind to all of us. That I remember very well.

SIGRIST:

Did one of them ever give you something?

QUEIPO:

Oh, God, yes. Christmas and Easter and God knows.

SIGRIST:

Is there something specific that you remember getting from your grandmother or your grandfather?

QUEIPO:

Well, like, money. Money is very precious over there because there's very little, very scarce. Yes. And for Easter, it's usually a — a — a custom in there that everybody, all the children should have a — a loaf of bread made with three different kinds of meat. If your mother bakes and she's got three or four grandchildren and there's nobody in the family who's going to bake — because when you bake in there, you bake, like, a bushel of flour at a time. And if they can't make you umbrusco [PH], like they — they're called over there with this meat that's supposed to be eaten by the child on Easter Sunday, because on Easter Sunday all the children get together. And everybody carries this rusco [PH] meat. And you go out — out in the open and you have a great big fun, you know, with all the children of the — the town. And everybody has their own rusco with the meat inside. And, you know, you talk and you dance and you sing. Oh, what fun you have! Dear God. Those are the times that I remember.

SIGRIST:

What kind of meat went —

QUEIPO:

Pork meat.

SIGRIST:

Pork.

QUEIPO:

Pork meat, yes. Yeah. Yeah, either bacon or chorizo. Chorizo's a — like a sausage.

SIGRIST:

Sausage?

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

I remember that from —

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

— my Spanish. [chuckles]

QUEIPO:

Really?

SIGRIST:

Chorizo.

QUEIPO:

Chorizo. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Chorizo.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

So — and that was — that was for Easter.

QUEIPO:

Special for Easter.

SIGRIST:

Special for Easter.

QUEIPO:

If you — if your mother didn't have a — wasn't going to bake and somebody in the family, or friend was baking, you — you ask them, "Please make me umbrusco [unclear] soon." This one or the other one and they would do it, because if they needed, and then my mother was doing it, they would — my mother would make it for them also. Very friendly people.

SIGRIST:

And this was something that your grandmother did sometimes for you?

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes. Of course.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

Yes, my grandmother, my mother or my aunt, my godmother. My godmother was like a mother to me. Yeah. My father's sister — older sister.

SIGRIST:

How many brothers and sisters did your father have?

QUEIPO:

He had three sisters and three brothers.

SIGRIST:

Ah, it's a big family.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, yeah.

SIGRIST:

Did they all live —

QUEIPO:

In there.

SIGRIST:

They all lived in the same town?

QUEIPO:

Yeah. Then everybody separated. One marry here. The other one marry over there. And that's the way it was.

SIGRIST:

Did — did your father's parents live near where you lived?

QUEIPO:

Yes. Yes, in the same town.

SIGRIST:

Did you ever go and stay overnight with them?

QUEIPO:

Yes, I did. I remember very well.

SIGRIST:

What — what sticks out in your mind about staying overnight with your grandparents?

QUEIPO:

Well, what sticks out in my mind is that they were always — always asked me to — to sing. I had a — I don't want to, oh, say the things that praise myself when I'm not supposed to, but I had a very good voice. I used to sing in church. I used to sing in the choir when the Virgin Mary was going now on a parade, like they carry on their shoulders. I think you have probably seen it.

SIGRIST:

Yes, you were explaining that.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, okay. I — I would be one of the girls behind it to sing to the Virgin. And then one time I was the youngest of all. And we sang a song where we says, "They all — Dear Mother, they all offer you flowers and songs and everything. But me, being the youngest of all, I offer you my crown." And I took my crown and my veil off and I lay it on the — the foot of the — the [unclear] calling there, at the foot of the Virgin. Yeah, I remember that very, very well because I was the youngest, although I was, I think, a little taller than some of them. But I — in age, I was the youngest. And that's how I was.

SIGRIST:

We started talking about your father.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, okay.

SIGRIST:

And kind of got sidetracked to his parents.

QUEIPO:

Okay.

SIGRIST:

But let's come back to your father. Tell me a little bit about your father's personality.

QUEIPO:

Oh, my father was — he was so pleasant. He was a singer. He was a dancer. He could entertain. Where my father was, there was no crying. Everything had to be happy-go-lucky. Okay.

SIGRIST:

What was his profession in Spain?

QUEIPO:

Well, everything. He used to work the land and he became a schoolteacher too, because over there you only had school during the four months of winter. In the summer, you don't have school. And my father could be a teacher because he could — he could — he could teach. He was very well educated, as far as that goes.

SIGRIST:

Was there something that you enjoyed doing with your father —

QUEIPO:

Dancing.

SIGRIST:

— in Spain?

QUEIPO:

Dancing.

SIGRIST:

Dancing.

QUEIPO:

Dancing. My father could dance and I could dance the jota, the both of us. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. We could dance.

SIGRIST:

Everyone's dancing the jota. [chuckles]

QUEIPO:

Yeah. Jota, yeah. That's the only thing we danced over there. Oh, we danced that one, you know, where they — they — they — when they cut the wheat, because all we had there was wheat. Wheat and potatoes and all those things. And, now, how would I put it? When they cut the wheat and they — now, it slipped my mind.

SIGRIST:

You were talking about another kind of a dance, a different dance.

QUEIPO:

La jota, el bassa [PH]. Bassa, too. That's like [unclear] here. Bassa. Bassa [unclear] around where they — where they plow the wheat. You know, that in the summertime? They — they dance. They — when everything is clean, you can dance in there. Well, there, you can dance all around that — the circle right there. And you dance this way and the way. And you walk along at the same time. But you got to keep time with your — your partner. Yeah, well, I danced there with — with my father too. My father was a good dancer. Oh, he was a good dancer and a singer.

SIGRIST:

Was — was there something that your father liked to do for himself, for his own pleasure?

QUEIPO:

Sing, I think.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

I think he was a singer. No matter where he was, he had to sing. So did I. I think I took after my father.

SIGRIST:

I'm still hoping you'll sing something for us.

QUEIPO:

I wish I could, honey.

SIGRIST:

Uh-huh.

QUEIPO:

But I can't. My voice is gone.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

My voice is gone.

SIGRIST:

What was your mother's name?

QUEIPO:

Eduviges.

SIGRIST:

Can you spell that, please? Do you want to — do you want to write it out? Would that help? Here.

QUEIPO:

Yes, it would.

SIGRIST:

There.

QUEIPO:

Anywhere?

SIGRIST:

Yeah, just anywhere.

QUEIPO:

I don't want to —

SIGRIST:

No, you can do it right on the back there.

QUEIPO:

Okay.

SIGRIST:

Mrs. Quiepo is spelling out her mother's name.

QUEIPO:

Eduv — Eduviges.

SIGRIST:

Okay, so go ahead and spell it. E —

QUEIPO:

E-D —

SIGRIST:

D —

QUEIPO:

— U-V-I-G-E-S.

SIGRIST:

Okay. And she was — you say that Edu —

QUEIPO:

Eduviges.

SIGRIST:

Edu-we-hess.

QUEIPO:

Edu-we-hass.

SIGRIST:

Edu-we-hass?

QUEIPO:

Edu-v-v-hess.

SIGRIST:

Edu-v-has.

QUEIPO:

Hess.

SIGRIST:

Hess.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Hess — E-S-S.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And then it'd be, not Garcia —

QUEIPO:

Fernandez.

SIGRIST:

Fernandez.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, Fernandez. Fer —

SIGRIST:

Fernandez.

QUEIPO:

— N-A-N-D-E-Z.

SIGRIST:

And did she have any more names after that?

QUEIPO:

Well, this was the — the father's name —

SIGRIST:

That was the father's.

QUEIPO:

— that you go by.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, and her mother was Gonzales.

SIGRIST:

Gonzales, which you took also in your name. Gonzales at the end, right?

QUEIPO:

Yes, you do but not — not on everything.

SIGRIST:

Not on everything.

QUEIPO:

No, only when you had to have the four names.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, [unclear].

SIGRIST:

And tell me a little bit about your mother's personality.

QUEIPO:

My mother's personality. She was a — she was a happy-go-lucky too. They made a good couple, my father and her. They were always singing together. Yes, on top of their lungs. Just like a — their daughter, a noisemaker. [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

What do you know about your mother's background and her growing up?

QUEIPO:

I can't tell you, honey. All I know is all they know there is how to work the land, and those that live in — they plant everything. They plant wheat. They plant potatoes. They plant cabbage. They plant beans and they plant everything. Not [unclear] because those come from Mexico.

SIGRIST:

Uh-hmm.

QUEIPO:

It's got to be a very warm country to raise those. But the rest of the — they grow everything.

SIGRIST:

And did your mother work in the fields?

QUEIPO:

Oh, sure. We all work in the fields.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Men and women?

QUEIPO:

Men and women. Even children, if they're old enough. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And did you know her parents?

QUEIPO:

Of course.

SIGRIST:

Yes. What do you remember about your mother's parents?

QUEIPO:

My grandmother was a — was a very big lady, very, very white complexion and kind of a reddish hair. Her father was a short man with a temper like the devil, and a redhead with freckles on his face. But don't tell me because I know that for sure. Everything that he had in there, he had every tool that you could use. And every tool had to be put in place. And he — you could borrow anything you wanted. But make sure when you return it, the tool is in good condition and you put it back where you found it. Any other time, if you want to borrow and you didn't do it right the first time, don't ask for it because you don't get it. Oh, he was a A-number-one man, as far as that goes.

SIGRIST:

Very particular.

QUEIPO:

Very. Very particular.

SIGRIST:

[chuckles]

QUEIPO:

Yes, everything had to be in place, with a temper like the devil.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember a time where he got mad at you?

QUEIPO:

I suppose so but I can't think of it now. [unclear] time. [chuckles] All I know is that he had a temper like the devil.

SIGRIST:

When you say that your mother's mother was very fair —

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

— skinned and red hair —

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

— was she a different nationality?

QUEIPO:

No, honey. No, she was Spanish.

SIGRIST:

Spanish.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

So — so there's a strain of — of Spanish people who are fair-skinned —

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

— and red-haired?

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

I have an aunt — I had an aunt. She died already. There was a redhead. Oh, yes. Very red. And then my other aunts, they were beautiful ladies. They were beautiful ladies. They had — my mother, too. They had black hair but white, white complexion.

SIGRIST:

Hmm.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes. Very.

SIGRIST:

Do — do people who are very fair and have red hair come from a special area in Spain? No?

QUEIPO:

Not that I know of. If they did, I would know. But I don't.

SIGRIST:

That's interesting.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What were some of the things that your mother did around the house?

QUEIPO:

Oh, my mother did everything, honey.

SIGRIST:

What were some of the things that she had to do to keep the house running?

QUEIPO:

Well, for — for one thing, she had to do the baking. She would bake about 29, 30 loaves of bread every time she baked. Great big ovens.

SIGRIST:

Did she have an oven in the house?

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

Where did you go to bake the bread?

QUEIPO:

Into a — they have a place where they had this oven for the whole family. And everyone in the family uses the same oven. And the yeast — I don't know where they got the first one. But anyway, you had to leave a little piece of dough in the dish, well covered and well floured around it, so that the next one, they need to use it, could use the rest instead of the yeast that we used in here. Oh, yes. Ev — everything was natural in there. Nothing was artificial. [END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A] [BEGIN TAPE 1, SIDE B]

SIGRIST:

What other kinds of food did you eat at that time?

QUEIPO:

Oh, we had potatoes. We had beans. We had many kind of vegetables.

SIGRIST:

And you grew those yourself?

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Yes?

QUEIPO:

Everything was grown.

SIGRIST:

What — what kinds of things did you have to buy?

QUEIPO:

I don't think we had to buy anything because we raised the same — the animals. So you had your meat. You had your pork. You had your — your bulls or your — your cows to — to get your milk. And you only had milk in the summertime because any other — any other way, there was no milk in there. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Is it that the cows didn't produce milk in the winter? Why would you only have —

QUEIPO:

Not everybody had cows, honey. They had oxes.

SIGRIST:

Oxes.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, yeah.

SIGRIST:

Did you have cows?

QUEIPO:

No, we had oxes. My grandfather had a cow.

SIGRIST:

Which grandfather?

QUEIPO:

My mother's — my father's —

SIGRIST:

Your father's?

QUEIPO:

— family, yeah.

SIGRIST:

Uh-huh.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Now, what would you do with the oxes? How did you use the ox?

QUEIPO:

You — you — you worked the land with them. Yeah. They'd carry a plow. They plowed their land with them. Oh, yes. And one little child had to go in — in front of them to guide the — the oxes. Oh, yeah.

SIGRIST:

Did — what other kinds of animals did you keep?

QUEIPO:

Oh, we had pigs. We had lambs and we had goat. Other than that, chickens. Yeah, so we had everything that's — was needed at the home, we — we had.

SIGRIST:

And did you have — did you, particularly, have to take care of some of those animals?

QUEIPO:

Yes. I had to [unclear] because they had a shepherd and the shepherd had a helper. If you had six lambs or six goats or so, or whatever, you had to go with a — with a shepherd one or two days a week for a month, whatever was needed. They'd go around the — you know, the — the town that way. [unclear].

SIGRIST:

Did everybody's sheep go together?

QUEIPO:

No, no.

SIGRIST:

When you say there's a shepherd [unclear] —

QUEIPO:

You don't — you don't mix them.

SIGRIST:

You had your own shepherd?

QUEIPO:

Yes. There were two shepherd, one for the sheep and one for the goats.

SIGRIST:

Oh.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Why didn't you mix them?

QUEIPO:

I had no idea why. But that's how it was.

SIGRIST:

Well, that's interesting.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

I've never heard that before.

QUEIPO:

Is that right?

SIGRIST:

[laughs]

QUEIPO:

Oh, yeah.

SIGRIST:

Can you describe for me the house that you lived in?

QUEIPO:

I live in two houses.

SIGRIST:

Two houses.

QUEIPO:

At one time, yeah. I lived with — my mother used to make — do the baking. In — in that oven, the whole family of my father did the baking. And then from there, we move into a — when one of the uncles died — he was a — he was alone. His wife had died. They didn't have any children. And then my father and my mother moved into his house. And there we were, living by ourselves.

SIGRIST:

How old were you when that happened?

QUEIPO:

Oh, I can't tell you. I was 14 when I came here, so I don't know how old I was when we move in there. That's all I can tell you.

SIGRIST:

Which house do you remember better?

QUEIPO:

The house where we lived less. The other one was just —

SIGRIST:

That was your uncle's house.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What can you tell me about what the house looked like and —

QUEIPO:

You had a kitchen and you had a place to put your — your dishes in, like, a — outside of your kitchen. Everything was well put up. Like here, I have everything in here and there. Okay. That's the way — there, they call it —

SIGRIST:

Like shelves?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, they call it vasares [PH] where you wash your dishes and you dry and you — you put them in there. You — you put them up. And they show nice and clean in there. Yes.

SIGRIST:

So there was a kitchen and what else?

QUEIPO:

Like a place for your — for your luthan [PH], like what we call it there, the dishes.

SIGRIST:

Right.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And what were some of the — how — what other rooms did you have in the house?

QUEIPO:

Well, you had bedrooms and you have alcoves where you — these great big rooms where you have a dining room. Not everybody had it, believe me. My grandparents had it and we had it at one home but not before. And out of that, you have alcoves where you — I don't know if — if I can make it — where you — your bed is inside of a little space in that room.

SIGRIST:

Like, built into the wall, sort of?

QUEIPO:

Built into the walls.

SIGRIST:

Yes, sure.

QUEIPO:

Yeah. And there's balconies there to look out the window, go out the — to the street. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Was — did you have a favorite part of the house where you liked to spend time?

QUEIPO:

Yeah. I like a — [laughs] where — window where I could sing [unclear].

SIGRIST:

Sing at the window. [laughs]

QUEIPO:

Even in the morning, everybody could hear me sing. Thank God, I had a good voice. And I lost it when I was — when I came here, I lost my voice.

SIGRIST:

When you came to America?

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Oh.

QUEIPO:

I became a lady then. And my voice went with it. [laughter]

SIGRIST:

How — how many brothers and sisters did you have?

QUEIPO:

Two.

SIGRIST:

Two.

QUEIPO:

One brother and my sister [unclear].

SIGRIST:

And what were their names?

QUEIPO:

Lawrence.

SIGRIST:

Lawrence is your brother.

QUEIPO:

My brother. And Maxine, my sister.

SIGRIST:

And what was Lawrence's name in Spanish?

QUEIPO:

Lorenzo. [PH]

SIGRIST:

Lorenzo. And what was your sister's name in Spanish?

QUEIPO:

Maxima.

SIGRIST:

Maxima.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Oh, so —

QUEIPO:

X. With an X.

SIGRIST:

Uh-huh, I see. And I meant to ask you earlier. Were you named after somebody?

QUEIPO:

Yes, after my great grandmother.

SIGRIST:

Your great grandmother.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, my — my father's mother insisted that I had to be called like her mother.

SIGRIST:

Florentina.

QUEIPO:

Yeah. I don't like it but —

SIGRIST:

Oh, it's a beautiful name.

QUEIPO:

Oh, it's too long.

SIGRIST:

Florentina.

QUEIPO:

That's why when I became a citizen I said, "I'm going to change my name to Florence because it's shorter."

SIGRIST:

Is that when your brother and your other sister changed their — their names changed to Lawrence and Maxine?

QUEIPO:

No, they never did. They kept their own.

SIGRIST:

They kept the original.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, they kept their own.

SIGRIST:

I see. Let's see. We talked about your house. Oh, what — what religion were you?

QUEIPO:

Catholic.

SIGRIST:

Catholic.

QUEIPO:

Hey! Five priests in my family. [unclear].

SIGRIST:

Five priests in your family!

QUEIPO:

Five priests in my family.

SIGRIST:

Really?

QUEIPO:

Honey, one was here in my house not so many years ago before my mother died. I can show you his picture if you want me to.

SIGRIST:

When we're done, we can look at it. I — I assumed that you were Catholic but I wanted to just make sure —

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

— I said that on tape.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

How did you practice your religion at home?

QUEIPO:

Well, some season of the time we were — had a rosary at a chapel that was in the middle of the town. And when the season was out, you would have that — you would say the rosary at your house with your whole family before you have your supper. Oh, yes. And if you don't do it before your supper, you will do it after your supper.

SIGRIST:

In what language did you say the rosary?

QUEIPO:

In Spanish.

SIGRIST:

In Spanish.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Can you say it for me now in Spanish?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, el rosario. [PH]

SIGRIST:

Slowly.

QUEIPO:

[speaking in Spanish]. I do that every single night before I go to sleep. [sentence unclear].

SIGRIST:

Who taught you how to pray?

QUEIPO:

Oh, everybody. The priests, my grandmother, my father, my mother. Everybody.

SIGRIST:

Who was the most —

QUEIPO:

Five priests in my family.

SIGRIST:

[laughs]

QUEIPO:

How can you ask me that question?

SIGRIST:

[laughs] It just happened. Who was the most religious in your family? Mom? Dad? Grandma?

QUEIPO:

My most religious family person, I think, was my grandmother. My mother's mother.

SIGRIST:

Your mother's mother. This was the fair-haired — the fair woman with the fair hair.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes. See, the — Don Pedro [PH] was her brother. He was a priest. Don Ricardo [PH] was her nephew. He was a priest. Don Lauro [PH], he was a nephew to her. And Don Fauston [PH]. I went to his — when he became a priest, I went to his — when he — to celebrate his — the [unclear].

SIGRIST:

His ordination or —

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

They were carrying him under an arch with flowers and everything. The band was [unclear] in front of him praying. And he had a godfather and godmother, a doctor and the biggest man in town, the one that had a business. And they — his godfather and godmother. I went to his ordination. Yes. My mother and my two aunts and I, we went to another town where he was.

SIGRIST:

Did you give him a gift?

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

What kind of a gift does one give a —

QUEIPO:

A cake. A cake this big.

SIGRIST:

Cake?

QUEIPO:

Cake.

SIGRIST:

And you're gesturing. That's, like, two and a half feet high.

QUEIPO:

Oh, God. That was made at the — at the city. My mother and my aunts couldn't do that. But they — they bought it. They bought that cake. And when you go into his house before the mass, they — they have a table where all these cakes are. And they had their [unclear]. Cakes of all kinds, honey. Cakes of all kinds. And then, naturally, all those cakes are invited into all the friends that they go to lunch. And they're like we were. Yes. We didn't eat at the main dining room but we ate in a side room. His father had a beautiful white house with two — two, three balconies. Iron balconies.

SIGRIST:

Uh-hmm.

QUEIPO:

Yeah. And I remember after he came back from the church and the children were following him through the house, and the orchestra was following him through the house too. He went out to one of main entrance balcony in front. And he threw candy to the children and you should have seen the children picking up the candy and showing it to him. [chuckles] And he saved some candy for us. He came into the — into the living room where my mother and my — my aunts were. And I [unclear] and he gave to my mother the rest of the candy. He — "These are for your children." Yeah?

SIGRIST:

Can you describe how your family celebrated Christmas?

QUEIPO:

Christmas is a very holy day in there. We celebrate it with a midnight mass. Yeah. Massa — massa el galu [PH], it's called in there. The [unclear]. They have a — a nativity inside of the church. And two people are dressed like shepherds, and then the [unclear]. And they carry a real shep — sheep.

SIGRIST:

Sheep?

QUEIPO:

Yeah. With them. And they walk into the church and they kneel. They kneel, I think, at the altar or at the nativity that they have in there. Anyway, they stand after and they sing at the top of their lungs, those two shepherds, the male and female with the lamb right [unclear]. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And everybody goes to that service?

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes. Everybody in town goes.

SIGRIST:

And then what happens after the service?

QUEIPO:

You don't have supper before you go to mass.

SIGRIST:

You fast before you go?

QUEIPO:

Yes. Yeah. And then you all go back home and you have your supper, whatever you have at home.

SIGRIST:

Were there special foods that were served —

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

— at Christmas time?

QUEIPO:

Yes, yes. Special food.

SIGRIST:

What kind of special food?

QUEIPO:

Special meat and you always had some kind of a bread that you make special for Christmas. Navidath [PH]. That's what we called it. Navidath. Yeah. But it's got to be after 12 o'clock, after mass.

SIGRIST:

I see. You can't eat before that.

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

And then what happens? That's Christmas Eve, right? The mass. And then you go home and eat and then what happens?

QUEIPO:

Well, you either dance or sing or whatever you enjoy, do it.

SIGRIST:

I see. And what — what was the most important religious holiday back then in the — in the calendar?

QUEIPO:

I think Christmas is the biggest and Easter.

SIGRIST:

You think Christmas was.

QUEIPO:

Easter.

SIGRIST:

And Easter. You already mentioned about that special bread that you — were there any other ways that you observed Easter that were unique to Spain?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, the — where the — ah, you have a dance. You dance outside because there is a — there's an early season at the [unclear]. The [unclear] there is so ahead of this here. It — you know, at the beginning of the — we don't get these cold spells that we have here. We don't get the snow. And if we get the snow by that time, it's completely, completely gone months ago.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

So it's warmer.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, it is warm.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember a time when it snowed over there?

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes. Snow, God, this high.

SIGRIST:

Oh, three feet high [unclear].

QUEIPO:

Oh, God, yes. And when the — the growing — the snow blowing [unclear] from [unclear] [chuckles] make a tunnel to get out.

SIGRIST:

Let's see. The only other question I want to ask you while we're still in Spain, before we get you to America —

QUEIPO:

Oh, wow!

SIGRIST:

[chuckles] I have one more question. And that is, of course, you left in 1916.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And the First World War starts in 1914.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Do you or your family have any experiences with the First World War before you came to America?

QUEIPO:

No. I — we were — my father and my brother came ahead of us. And they came in April, I believe, by — because by the — May 8 th is when we go to this [unclear]. I don't know how many towns. Two towns, I think. And there we met these people from the other town that's beyond ours. And we met at the [unclear] and my mother had already received a letter from my father that they arrived safely in here in the United States.

SIGRIST:

So — so the war didn't —

QUEIPO:

Oh, no.

SIGRIST:

— affect your family at all —

QUEIPO:

No, no.

SIGRIST:

— before you left.

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

Why did your father and brother come to the United States?

QUEIPO:

Well, I'll tell you. My father was a — a — what shall I tell it? How should I say? He was in the Spanish and American War in here in — in Florida.

SIGRIST:

In Florida? Cuba.

QUEIPO:

Cuba.

SIGRIST:

The Spanish Amer — oh, in 19 —

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Excuse me, in 1898.

QUEIPO:

I guess so.

SIGRIST:

How did he end up there?

QUEIPO:

Well, in Spain, you — when you of age there, the government — they tell you you've got to go because you're of age. And you can't refuse. You've got to go. Either that or go to jail.

SIGRIST:

So he was fighting on the side of Spain during the Spanish —

QUEIPO:

Against the Americans.

SIGRIST:

Oh, isn't that interesting?

QUEIPO:

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

SIGRIST:

What did — what did —

QUEIPO:

And he went hungry. He says he went hungry. They used to go out at night out to the fields and see what they could get to eat, [unclear] potatoes or beans or whatever they could find. Because the ships from Spain were taking a long time to get there with the food that they needed. And the Americans were very close to there. They were helping the — the Cubans. And they could get all the food they wanted to. They were well fed. And my father was so hungry. Yeah, that's how my father put it.

SIGRIST:

Did —

QUEIPO:

"We were so hungry, we had to go out in the fields and see what we could get to eat."

SIGRIST:

Did he ever tell you any of his impressions of the Americans that he was fighting against? Any — any —

QUEIPO:

No. No, my father was such a good-hearted man. He had no grudge against anyone. He was a kind hearted — my father was.

SIGRIST:

Did he say anything else about that experience of fighting in the Spanish American War?

QUEIPO:

He wish he had been home because he didn't like to fight. He didn't like to fight. My father was a peaceful man, a good singer, a good dancer and a good father. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

So why did he eventually want to come? I assume he went back to Spain after that.

QUEIPO:

Oh, sure.

SIGRIST:

Yes. So why did he want to come to the United States?

QUEIPO:

I'll tell you what.

SIGRIST:

Okay.

QUEIPO:

One of his cousins was in South America in Argentina. And my father says, "Well, I'm going to Argentina." And my mother says, "Okay. You go to Argentina." And he went to this place where my cousin was making men's shirts, beautiful white linen shirts. I mean the front of it. And he — you know, years ago, they didn't have a —

SIGRIST:

Collar.

QUEIPO:

— collar.

SIGRIST:

Right.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, okay. So he was making that. And then white linen collars and cuffs. And that's where my father went. He went with his cousin and, from the minute — from the minute my — land — my father landed in Argentina, he was earning wages. He went to him and he says, "Pedro, there's your room. You're working here for me and your wages are starting from this minute." So my father was very grateful to his cousin. And on his way home, he was there five years working with him. And on — halfway home, my father was earning wages that his cousin was paying him. And everybody that went to Argentina from our hometown, he would take them in and get them a job. My cousin was very, very good man and very honest. And he helped everybody that he could from the hometown.

SIGRIST:

How did your cousin end up in Argentina?

QUEIPO:

Well, he was one of these wonders, you know, that he wanted to see the world and he landed in Argentina. And there he met a lady that he was — was working for him. Beautiful. I wish I had a picture. My mother had a wedding picture of theirs. And then I — I wanted that picture so — so bad. I didn't get it. Somebody else got it.

SIGRIST:

But she was very beautiful.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

Your mother. Yeah.

QUEIPO:

Very beautiful and very kind.

SIGRIST:

So —

QUEIPO:

Very kind.

SIGRIST:

You said your father —

QUEIPO:

They had no children. I'm sorry to interrupt you.

SIGRIST:

Oh, no. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt you. So your father spent five years in Argentina.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Well, how old — do you remember how old you were at that time?

QUEIPO:

I was about eight years old when he went to Argentina. And when he came back from Argentina to Spain, he says he wasn't going to stay there. And my mother says, "Fine. If you don't want to stay here, neither do I. Where you go, I'll be going too," and the children would go. So we sold the land. My father and my brother came ahead. They came in April here.

SIGRIST:

Of 1916.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

And they landed here, which they were warned that they were going to be interrupted, you know, by sea because of the war that was going on. And my father says, "No," unless there's a mine somewhere that — that they [unclear] — the waves."

SIGRIST:

Sub — yeah.

QUEIPO:

Um —

SIGRIST:

Submarine?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, something like that. He said, "No. There's no danger at all." So — because this time I'm going — he wanted to see land. My father kept — he kept going to different places where he never had been. My mother said, "Well, this time when you go, I'll be with you." So my father and my brother came ahead. They — we got note — a letter from him that he arrived in the United States in April. And we got the mail in — before May 8 th , which was the day they were going to [unclear] every single year to — well, it was a — a customary [unclear] to the [unclear]. And there we all had a great big mass. Great big beautiful cathedral. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

It was like a religious —

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

— service thing. Well, when your father and your brother came to the United States, where did they settle?

QUEIPO:

Westfield.

SIGRIST:

Here in Westfield, Massachusetts. Why did they go to Westfield?

QUEIPO:

Because there was a man who was a cousin, another cousin — second cousin from my — to my father. And he was here in Westfield. And he wanted to come with him because he knew Westfield, and my father didn't know a darn thing about Westfield. But the language — he had bought himself a little book that — what he could learn English. And he pronounced everything wrong. When he went to work in the foundry, my father was working — I mean, was — used to in Argentina — make sure that your hands are nice and clean before you touch the work in here. [chuckles] [several words unclear] in the foundry. He says, "What a change. I went to clean to dirty." [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

And was that the first job that your father got was in the foundry here in Westfield? And what did they make in the foundry?

QUEIPO:

Radiators.

SIGRIST:

Iron. Things made out of iron.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, yeah. Dirty. So that's why he couldn't got over it. He says, "From clean job, I went to a dirty job." [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

Was — was the foundry that big building that they just tore down recently down in the center of town?

QUEIPO:

Ah, no. Those were the boilers.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

The — the radiators were built in here on these —

SIGRIST:

Down the street?

QUEIPO:

Right across here. Across from Princington [PH] Street. There's a foundry there.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

[unclear].

SIGRIST:

What about your brother? Did he get work too?

QUEIPO:

Yes, he work in there also.

SIGRIST:

How — how old was your brother?

QUEIPO:

My brother was — he began washing windows in there in the foundry.

SIGRIST:

Was he older or younger than you were?

QUEIPO:

Younger than I.

SIGRIST:

He was younger?

QUEIPO:

Younger.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

I was the oldest.

SIGRIST:

You were the oldest of the children.

QUEIPO:

Yeah. Two years older.

SIGRIST:

Two years older than — and then is it — it's your brother, Lorenzo?

QUEIPO:

And then my sister.

SIGRIST:

And then —

QUEIPO:

Maxima.

SIGRIST:

Maxima.

QUEIPO:

Yeah. There were three years between my brother and my sister.

SIGRIST:

And two years between you and your brother.

QUEIPO:

Right.

SIGRIST:

So — so there's five years between you and your sister.

QUEIPO:

Yeah. My sister, yeah.

SIGRIST:

So on — where did your father live when he first got there?

QUEIPO:

Well, he live with this man —

SIGRIST:

[unclear].

QUEIPO:

— that he knew. Oh, I'm sorry.

SIGRIST:

That's okay. [chuckles]

QUEIPO:

That he knew that was living here in Westfield. He was second cousin to him.

SIGRIST:

So he lived with the second cousin.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, yeah. So he lived with him for a little while. My brother was going to St. Mary's Church and to St. Mary's School. And he was learning no English, only how to pray in English. And my father says, "No, you gotta learn the English." So he move out of the house with — because he — he had intended to bring his — you know, they came in the spring. And — and then in October 16 we came here, my mother, my sister and I.

SIGRIST:

So your father was here about six months or so —

QUEIPO:

Before.

SIGRIST:

— before you came.

QUEIPO:

Before we came.

SIGRIST:

I see. And —

QUEIPO:

And he move in here in 127 North Elm Street.

SIGRIST:

127 North Elm Street, which is just a few houses down from where we are right now.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, in that town, because of the Dunkin Donuts now.

SIGRIST:

Right. Where this is 133 Elm Street.

QUEIPO:

133 —

SIGRIST:

Was there any communication between your father and your mother in — during that six months when he was here?

QUEIPO:

Oh, surely. Sure. They always write. My mother couldn't write.

SIGRIST:

Did he send any money?

QUEIPO:

No, because my mother had sold a lot of land, a lot of animals that we had. [clears throat] Excuse me.

SIGRIST:

There's some water here.

QUEIPO:

And I — and so my mother didn't need any money. She had enough money to pay for everything. In fact, you had to have — I forget how much you had to have in hand before you can come out of Ellis Island.

SIGRIST:

That's right.

QUEIPO:

And so my mother had, I don't know how much, more than was necessary. She was well provided.

SIGRIST:

Yeah, so your mother was okay.

QUEIPO:

Oh, sure.

SIGRIST:

She wasn't living —

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

— on that money.

QUEIPO:

Oh, no, no. She was —

SIGRIST:

Did your father ever write you a letter while he was in America? Do you remember getting a letter specific —

QUEIPO:

In Argentina, I wrote to him at the first letter. And oh, boy! He showed this letter to his brother first and his cousin and everybody. "See, I got a letter from my oldest daughter." And he [chuckles] — he praised that letter of mine. So he went out and he bought me the prettiest paper that he could write a letter to me back to Spain. Oh, God. It was such a fancy paper, so well written. My father could write beautiful.

SIGRIST:

So he — he was educated. He could read.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

He could write.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

But your mother couldn't.

QUEIPO:

No, my mother could only sign her name.

SIGRIST:

She could sign her name. What about read? Could she read?

QUEIPO:

She could read.

SIGRIST:

In Spanish.

QUEIPO:

She could read everything, yeah.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

In there, the — [chuckles] years and years ago, the ladies didn't have to go to school or anything. As long as they could read the confession book, that was all they needed.

SIGRIST:

Confession book?

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

The confession book?

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

That's interesting. Mrs. Queipo, we're going to stop just for a minute because I want to put another tape in.

QUEIPO:

Oh, okay.

SIGRIST:

And — so that we can keep going. But we're just —

QUEIPO:

Have more questions?

SIGRIST:

Oh, I've got more questions for you. You're doing a great job. [laughs] But I just want to stop right now before we get too far ahead.

QUEIPO:

Okay.

SIGRIST:

So this is the end of tape one with Florence Queipo. [END OF TAPE 1, SIDE B] [BEGIN TAPE 2, SIDE A]

SIGRIST:

Okay. We're beginning tape two with Florence Queipo, who came from Spain in 1916. Today is July 4 th , Sunday, 1999. As we said before, very hot and humid. You may hear a fan and some traffic on the tape. Mrs. Queipo, we were just beginning to get you to America.

QUEIPO:

[laughs]

SIGRIST:

Your father and brother are already here. And you just told that wonderful story about writing a letter to your father, actually, when he was in Argentina.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, right.

SIGRIST:

But one thing I did want to ask you, before you came to America — before you got here, what did you know about America?

QUEIPO:

I knew about the [unclear] and [unclear] falls.

SIGRIST:

The what?

QUEIPO:

The rain [unclear] —

SIGRIST:

Rain?

QUEIPO:

No, the —

SIGRIST:

Waterfall?

QUEIPO:

The waterfall.

SIGRIST:

Like Niagara Falls?

QUEIPO:

[several words unclear] the waterfall. Okay.

SIGRIST:

The waterfalls. And where —

QUEIPO:

My mistake.

SIGRIST:

What waterfalls did you know about?

QUEIPO:

Well, we knew — I knew that they were great big, which I went to twice to look at two — three different years I went over there.

SIGRIST:

How did you know that? How did you know that there were waterfalls?

QUEIPO:

Oh, you studied it. I had an uncle, my fa — my mother's brother, oldest brother. That — he — that man bought us the latest of all the books that he could find. And he — I knew all about the — the Statue of Liberty. I knew about coming into the harbor in New York. I knew about Ellis Island and all those things that was necessary for us to know. He — he bought these books and he bought the maps and everything so that we could be, you know, alert on anything that could happen.

SIGRIST:

So you were very fortunate in that.

QUEIPO:

Yes, I was. We were.

SIGRIST:

Had he ever been in America?

QUEIPO:

No. He was a very [unclear] eye. He couldn't — it — in Spain, people — we were very behind [unclear], behind in everything. And he could have had glasses. If he had been in this country, he could have had glasses, like you're wearing.

SIGRIST:

Eyeglasses.

QUEIPO:

Eyeglasses. And then in there, there was no way that my uncle could get glasses. He was a poor man and he didn't have any way of getting eyeglasses.

SIGRIST:

That's too bad.

QUEIPO:

It was too bad because he was a very interesting man. He was [unclear] sighted and very smart, very self-educated, although not completely, because his cousin, Tomas [PH], who became a very noted schoolteacher in [unclear — he — when he came to town for the vacation during the summer, he and my uncle used to study all the time. And he — he'd show my uncle an awful lot. Yeah. And he, in return — he shows my brother, my sister and I. So I know a whole lot about America because we — before we came here.

SIGRIST:

Had you ever seen anybody who had been to America and came back to Spain?

QUEIPO:

Not that I can think of. Not that I can think of.

SIGRIST:

Did your family have anybody who had gone to America before your father did?

QUEIPO:

Yes, my father's cousin that —

SIGRIST:

That's why he was here.

QUEIPO:

— that built that factory there in Argentina.

SIGRIST:

But what about in America?

QUEIPO:

Ah —

SIGRIST:

To North America.

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

No? No [unclear].

QUEIPO:

No. Because the language, you see. Because of the language. There was all Spanish and here was all English.

SIGRIST:

Right.

QUEIPO:

And there was very inconvenient; let's put it that way.

SIGRIST:

Did — I didn't even ask you before. What was your schooling? Did you go to school in Spain at all? How much schooling did you have in Spain?

QUEIPO:

I believe that if I — I compare myself, I was way up in high school because of my uncle, my mother's brother. That man knew everything.

SIGRIST:

Was this the same uncle who gave you the books about New York? Oh, so —

QUEIPO:

Yeah, that man would come to our house every single night after he did his duty in the — you know, in the fields over there. And he would teach us. He would — he bought us the most — latest books that came out and all the maps and everything that go with it. And I know a great deal about America. Yes.

SIGRIST:

He was probably thankful to have someone to share his —

QUEIPO:

Oh.

SIGRIST:

— enthusiasm.

QUEIPO:

And you know, when he died, that poor man — he die, you know what? Building coffins for — for the poor people. Yeah. He was a kind man. Very, very well informed about everything. And he was doing everything he could to show us what was right and what was wrong.

SIGRIST:

Well, it's a shame that he never was able to get an education.

QUEIPO:

Well, being poor is pretty hard.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

It's pretty hard. If he had had some funds that he could have good eyeglasses, he'd have been a very, very helpful man. Yeah. He was never married. He was a single man. Yeah, and he ended building coffins for the poor people.

SIGRIST:

What was his name?

QUEIPO:

Akilena [PH].

SIGRIST:

Akilena?

QUEIPO:

Akilena.

SIGRIST:

Akilena.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Was there anything that expected to see in America?

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

You knew that you were going to see these —

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

— things. But was there something that you were —

QUEIPO:

He said to us, "The first thing you're going to see is the Statue of Liberty as you go into the harbor, the New York harbor. Okay. Okay, as you come in — into the harbor, you see the Statue of Liberty to your left. Right? Okay. The other side, you see" — do you see Ellis Island from there? I don't know whether you do it or not. All I know is that we got to New York early in the morning. We had lunch aboard ship. And from there, they took us on the ship to — to Ellis Island. And there, it — it wasn't quite time. We were still close. So I can show you [unclear] we were sitting out in front of the building, the three arches. That's where we went in, through the metal door. That's through the ones that I came out [unclear] ship. They was almost — we almost miss to come to Springfield — get the train to come to Springfield. Yes. We almost missed it.

SIGRIST:

Hopefully, we'll talk more about that when we get you to —

QUEIPO:

Oh.

SIGRIST:

— to New York. What — what did your mother have to do before she could leave Spain? What — what had to be done before the family could actually leave?

QUEIPO:

She sold everything that we had. We had cows — not — not cows, exactly. Bulls to — to work the land. We had sheep. We had goats. We had pigs. We had the eggs, had we — you know, they were home for more chickens. And you sold — because you had so many chickens, you had too — too many eggs. So you would sell the eggs to get some money. And your pigs, your — if you had a pig that you can raise some more pigs, well, you had the little pigs to sell. And there was money coming in also. And [unclear] what else?

SIGRIST:

What about paperwork or anything like that?

QUEIPO:

Paperwork?

SIGRIST:

Yeah. Did you have to get passports or —

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes. Definitely.

SIGRIST:

Where did you go to do that?

QUEIPO:

To [several words unclear] Ranoza [PH]. That's two different cities where you can get — where you [unclear]. You go to [unclear]. You go to boat in there. And to Ranoza you get all these — the government things that you need. Ranoza, another village, bigger has banks, you know. Paulientus [PH] doesn't have banks.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember any of that process yourself?

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Yeah? Does anything stick out in your mind?

QUEIPO:

Of what?

SIGRIST:

About going to these places to get the paperwork.

QUEIPO:

I — Paulientus had a — like a market every week. Every weekend, every Saturday there was a platha [PH] where you go and you take your wheat, and you take your chickens, and you take your eggs and you sell it. That's money coming into the house. In Ranoza, you have your banking. Okay, if you got any money in the bank, there's where you have it, in Ranoza. There, there's a great big platha. Do you know what a platha means?

SIGRIST:

Like a — like a piazza? Like a open space?

QUEIPO:

Open space where you —

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

— go and you — you sell whatever you have. And there everybody has sell. Not everybody, but some people have, like, potatoes. They have their — their cloth and [unclear] lined up. And you buy your cloth and whatever you need.

SIGRIST:

Had you been to these places before?

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

You had?

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And what —

QUEIPO:

Excuse me.

SIGRIST:

Excuse me.

QUEIPO:

And even a merry-go-round in Ranoza. That was the first time I went to a — to a merry-go-round in Ranoza. My cousin that came from Madrid happened to be there. And he says, "Come on. [sentence unclear]." We did. Oh, God. Do I have memories. Do I have mem — I wish I had the pictures that my daughter's got. She took all my pictures that I had from the Old Country. And she's now in Oklahoma so if you wanted —

SIGRIST:

Oh, so you have photographs of when you were in Spain in 19 — growing up?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, and when I came here too.

SIGRIST:

Really? Wow. On — did you have to have medical examinations before you left Spain?

QUEIPO:

No, not that I can remember.

SIGRIST:

Did you have to get your photograph taken before you left Spain?

QUEIPO:

Yes, I think you had to have it on your certificate, your birth certificate. Yes.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember anything about going to have your photograph taken?

QUEIPO:

Yes, I remember going to Ranoza and had my — have our picture taken. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

But nothing —

QUEIPO:

Nothing —

SIGRIST:

— special?

QUEIPO:

No, nothing special.

SIGRIST:

What did your — what did your mother or you or your sister pack to take to America?

QUEIPO:

Clothes. That's all. We only had a suitcase.

SIGRIST:

One suitcase for all three of you?

QUEIPO:

The only thing that we took with us, one [unclear], one box of cookies, all kinds of cookies. So we could eat aboard ship in case we got seasick, which we did. My mother and I, we got seasick, not — not so much me, but my mother did. And my sister was never seasick. She was up and down the ship and those stairs sliding down like mad. She was a tumbleweed.

SIGRIST:

So you took — you took a suitcase full of clothes and a box of cookies.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, from Madrid.

SIGRIST:

From Madrid.

QUEIPO:

We got — we stayed in my aunt — house for a week over there. And from there, we went to Cetiz [PH] and we sailed from Cetiz.

SIGRIST:

Before you left your town, was there anyone that you had to say goodbye to?

QUEIPO:

All of them. Everybody was so nice to us, say goodbye to us.

SIGRIST:

Was there any kind of a gathering to say goodbye to you?

QUEIPO:

No, no. We just say goodbye to them. Yeah. Some cry. Some didn't cry.

SIGRIST:

What about your grandparents? Were they living —

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

— at that time?

QUEIPO:

Yeah. Yes, and I remember my grandmother kissing my — my sister. And she says to her with tears in her eyes — [sniffs] I can't say.

SIGRIST:

Okay.

QUEIPO:

Sorry.

SIGRIST:

That's okay. Okay.

QUEIPO:

[sniffs] She says to her, "I know I'll never see you again," which was true.

SIGRIST:

So from your —

QUEIPO:

It's so hard.

SIGRIST:

From your town, you went to Madrid?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, just —

SIGRIST:

How — how did you go to Madrid?

QUEIPO:

By train.

SIGRIST:

By train. Does anything stick out in your mind about that ride to Madrid?

QUEIPO:

Well, you go through a lot of places where you haven't seen before.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

My aunt was waiting for us at the station. My uncle was a bookkeeper in the regular station. He saw us coming. He saw the train coming that we were on. And my aunt stayed outside — outside of the station waiting for us.

SIGRIST:

That's okay. Take your time. These memories are very strong.

QUEIPO:

Yes, they get you. When you say goodbye to your grandmother and she knows she'll never see you again, it's sad. And my mother's parents were very lovable. Very, very lovable. My father — my mother's father was a redhead with a temper like an old Irishman. And my grandmother was so kind. She couldn't give you enough.

SIGRIST:

Was your grandfather upset too when you left?

QUEIPO:

I don't remember. I don't remember him being, except I know my uncle cried. The one that showed me so much stuff.

SIGRIST:

I'm going to fix your microphone while we're stopped. I just want to get up a little closer to your voice. Here.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yeah.

SIGRIST:

There you go.

QUEIPO:

That's [unclear]. Maybe I should have buttoned this here.

SIGRIST:

Yeah. [sentence unclear]. How's that? So from Madrid you went to Cetiz, you said.

QUEIPO:

Cetiz.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

Cetiz.

SIGRIST:

And did you go also by train?

QUEIPO:

Yes, by train.

SIGRIST:

And then how long were you there?

QUEIPO:

We were there — in Cetiz?

SIGRIST:

Yes, [unclear].

QUEIPO:

Or Madrid?

SIGRIST:

No, in Cetiz.

QUEIPO:

In Cetiz, we were there only about a week. In Madrid, we were there longer in my aunt's house.

SIGRIST:

So it was a visit. You were visiting with your aunt too?

QUEIPO:

In — in Madrid, yes.

SIGRIST:

In Madrid, yeah.

QUEIPO:

But not in Cetiz. We had to wait because the ship was there but it was — they were loading it far away from — from port. We could see the ship at a distance but it wasn't in a port.

SIGRIST:

Kind of anchored out.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, where it's deep, because the water was down and it wasn't so deep where — by that — near the city.

SIGRIST:

Right.

QUEIPO:

When you put it that way.

SIGRIST:

And what was the name of the ship?

QUEIPO:

Barcelona.

SIGRIST:

Barcelona.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, Barcelona.

SIGRIST:

I've interviewed someone else who came on the Barcelona.

QUEIPO:

No kidding?

SIGRIST:

But on a different crossing. In fact, I think the guy I interviewed in New Britain came on the Barcelona.

QUEIPO:

It could be because there were so many that came.

SIGRIST:

Because I think he left from Cetiz also.

QUEIPO:

Cetiz too.

SIGRIST:

Ya.

QUEIPO:

From Cetiz.

SIGRIST:

I'm saying that wrong, right?

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

I can spell it. [chuckles] It's C-E-T-I-Z.

QUEIPO:

I don't doubt it but —

SIGRIST:

But the accent is on the — on saying Car-dee but I'm saying Cardeeth.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, Car-dee. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

So you were there a week. What happened in that week that you were there waiting to get on the ship?

QUEIPO:

Oh, God. You — you — you go to different places. You travel around the streets and you see many — you go into a — lunchrooms and places where you — you had to stay in their house, you know, overnight. And I didn't like the food in there. My mother didn't like the food in there either. So we [unclear] some lunchrooms outside. And at the same time we would take nice walks, the same as we did in Madrid. My aunt was a good cook. Oh, God! She was a good cook but my aunt couldn't afford it. So my mother had to give her some money. Yeah. My mother had the money because she sold a lot of stuff. She sold the — the team that we had to work the land with.

SIGRIST:

Those were the — the bulls?

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Uh-huh.

QUEIPO:

And all the other stuff that we had at home, which was an awful lot.

SIGRIST:

Right.

QUEIPO:

You needed — I don't know how many dollars you needed to enter the country. Mother had twice the money. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

So when you finally got on the Barcelona, had you ever been on a — a big ship before?

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

No. And how did you get from land, from the dock to the Barcelona?

QUEIPO:

With another little ship.

SIGRIST:

Another little boat took you out.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, yeah. Because the big sailboat couldn't get into where we were. It wasn't deep enough.

SIGRIST:

Right, shallow harbor.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What did you think when you saw the ship that you were going to be riding on?

QUEIPO:

I — all that was explained to us by my uncle. So it was no news to us.

SIGRIST:

He had prepared you.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes. My uncle was a very smart man.

SIGRIST:

Had he ever been on a big ship before?

QUEIPO:

I suppose so, in something there, because he'd travel. He'd travel. My uncle traveled, although he would have done a lot more if he had a pair of glasses.

SIGRIST:

Tell me what happened when you got on the Barcelona. What was the first thing that you had to do?

QUEIPO:

Well, the first thing we had to do was to buy a good — we bought in from — in Cetiz, they sold us some chairs so that we could sit in — sit around, you know, aboard ship. There was nothing to sit in there. We were in third class. My mother was so mad when she found out that we were going in third class. My mother said to my father when we got here, "Why did you let us come in third class when you know we can — we could afford to come in preferenthia [PH]?" [unclear] preferenthia. Then we would eat at a table like the humans. Over there, we had to eat on our lap.

SIGRIST:

What was — what were the third class accommodations like?

QUEIPO:

Nothing. You sleep in a — in a big hall, just beds, one layer and another layer. And my mother had a whole box of cookies we bought in Madrid to eat aboard ship, because she said — my aunt said, "You're not going to like the food in there, not all the time." So there were two — [chuckles] two [unclear] ladies that they knew had cookies there. And they were the ones that ate most of our cookies when we weren't there. The [unclear] were underneath it.

SIGRIST:

[laughs]

QUEIPO:

Oh, dear, dear, dear.

SIGRIST:

So you all had to sleep in one big room.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes.

SIGRIST:

Men and women?

QUEIPO:

Well, the men had their own department.

SIGRIST:

Their own —

QUEIPO:

And the women, you know, separate.

SIGRIST:

And what about — did you have running water and bathroom facilities in that area?

QUEIPO:

Are you kidding? The ocean. Could you do it? You had no facility there. You wash your face and hands and that's all.

SIGRIST:

And where did they feed you?

QUEIPO:

Well, you had to go get it, to the dining room, to the kitchen, rather. Yeah, you had to go get your own. My sister and I usually went after. My mother's — we had some [unclear] — we had some chairs that you open up and you take with you underneath it at night, because, otherwise, you won't find them there in the morning. Somebody would take them [unclear]. Okay. And my sister and I would go and get the food for the three of us. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What kind of food did they give you?

QUEIPO:

The food wasn't bad. Yeah, fish and — I love fish anyway. Yeah. So we ate a lot of fish and we ate. We'd enjoy the food that — when they gave us — the food was all right.

SIGRIST:

Now, you said that you and your mother got seasick.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Tell me a little bit about that.

QUEIPO:

Oh, you get so sick there. God, you feel like throwing up. Forgive me —

SIGRIST:

It's okay.

QUEIPO:

— for the expression.

SIGRIST:

[chuckles] It's true.

QUEIPO:

My sister didn't get seasick. She was a tomboy. But she didn't get seasick. She was running up and down those stairs like mad. [chuckles] Sliding on the rail. I says, "One of these times you're going to land in the ocean." "No." She never did.

SIGRIST:

I'm going to fix your microphone again.

QUEIPO:

Oh.

SIGRIST:

It's — the puffy part of your sleeve is —

QUEIPO:

Is my — no? Is my big neck.

SIGRIST:

Well, and you know, it's the — it's — the microphone is pulling it down is what's happening.

QUEIPO:

That's heavy.

SIGRIST:

No, it isn't but it's heavy enough, I think, that it's doing that. Let me just grab that mic. Okay.

QUEIPO:

Maybe it's because the way I'm holding it.

SIGRIST:

Well, we'll see how we do with this. Did they try to treat your seasickness in any way?

QUEIPO:

No, no. Nobody does anything for you. Not in third class, like we were. And that's why my mother was so mad. She says, "We could have come in — in preferenthia." [PH] And she said, "We had the money." My mother [unclear] here with I don't know how much money. You had to have so much — so much money to land here. And my — my mother had more than double that money. And that's why she said to my father, "We could have come in — in [unclear] preferenthia instead of a — just a poor ship."

SIGRIST:

Did you see any other passengers who were a type of person that you had never seen before?

QUEIPO:

Oh, a lot of them. A lot of third-class passengers.

SIGRIST:

I'm won —

QUEIPO:

The others, they don't mix with you because they're — they're high toned, you know. No, the other — they don't bother with you.

SIGRIST:

How long did the ship take to get to New York?

QUEIPO:

I think it was seven days and a half.

SIGRIST:

Did it stop anywhere else —

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

— along — it went from — right from Cetiz to New York?

QUEIPO:

No, no. No, it didn't stop anywhere. Straight into New York.

SIGRIST:

And this is October, right?

QUEIPO:

October.

SIGRIST:

October of 1916.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Now, what about — of course, this is World War I.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

You know, during that time. Do you remember there being safety drills —

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

— on the ship?

QUEIPO:

No. No, not on ours. Not on ours. This was a — a passenger boat. That was all. And they used to say, "Well, maybe some of the mines get in your way." My father used to say, "It's possible, but I don't think so."

SIGRIST:

Well, it happened sometimes. Some of the passenger boats were sunk. Yeah.

QUEIPO:

I guess we were lucky.

SIGRIST:

You were lucky.

QUEIPO:

We had five priests in the family. They — they were praying for us.

SIGRIST:

That's right. [laughs] But what's the first thing that you remember about when the ship comes into — to land?

QUEIPO:

Well, the first thing I knew that I saw the Statue of Liberty to the left of us. And coming into the harbor, I could see the tall — what was the tallest building in New York? That Empire State Building?

SIGRIST:

Well, no. That'd be later. Let's see, 1916. The Woolworth's Building? Was that there at that time?

QUEIPO:

I think so. It was one of these high, high buildings.

SIGRIST:

Yeah?

QUEIPO:

I remember seeing that as we landed in New York. And then I can't tell you much about anything else. I didn't — I wasn't impressed with the port.

SIGRIST:

Well, you said that the ship docked and —

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

— you had lunch or something on the ship.

QUEIPO:

Yes, we had lunch on board ship.

SIGRIST:

How come they didn't let you off the ship?

QUEIPO:

Because Ellis Island wasn't open until one o'clock, I think it was. So they fed us before we — we went over there.

SIGRIST:

Oh.

QUEIPO:

Only the third class went over there, like we were.

SIGRIST:

Where did the other ones go?

QUEIPO:

Straight where they were going. They got off — off ship and they got on whatever train or whatever.

SIGRIST:

Were you allowed to walk around on the ship while you were being —

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

— held on it?

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Did you see anything on the ship that you hadn't seen before during the crossing?

QUEIPO:

No. The ocean. Some [unclear]. We were pretty lucky because this month of October and September there, the ocean's pretty calm. At least, that's what we were told. But there were a couple of days when the ship was pretty rocky. We were going in — up and down, up and down.

SIGRIST:

Was there a storm that you can remember?

QUEIPO:

No. But I can't describe it. It was the ocean, the waves.

SIGRIST:

The rocking of the boat back and forth.

QUEIPO:

Oh, yes. Up and down, up and down. This way. Not sideways, but frontwards. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Now, how did you get — when the — when the ship docked in New York, now, how did you get to Ellis Island?

QUEIPO:

By another ship.

SIGRIST:

Another little one?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, another little boat.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember doing that?

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Coming over on — yeah. And then you said a little bit earlier, when you got to Ellis Island it was closed.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, it was closed. They open —

SIGRIST:

So tell me again what happened.

QUEIPO:

They open up at one o'clock and we got there a little after 12 because we had lunch aboard ship. But then right after, they put us on this boat and we went right over there. So they — they — we land there and we got off the boat and we sat on the steps by the three doors. I can tell you. I can show you.

SIGRIST:

That's — no, no. That's okay. Just describe it in words.

QUEIPO:

It's over there.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

And we enter into the middle door, the stairs where — there was nothing in there like it is now. They were just plain stairs. And they were closed yet because they opened at one o'clock. And as the doors opened, we went in, you know, gradually, not rushing or anything. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And what happened while you were there?

QUEIPO:

We went in there. The — there were two men that the — two Spanish men. They came to my mother and my sister and I. And my mother was questioned first and then my sister and then me. And my sister went right through the question fine. But when it cames to me, they wanted to know if I could read. I mean, read and write in Spanish. And I said, "Yes, I can read and write in Spanish." And then they said, "[speaking in Spanish]." When he got to 64, I — I started to cry. So they went and we had on a very pretty blue — light blue dress. And one of the guards from my [unclear], and I started to cry. And I thought they were going to ship me back, send me back [unclear]. We were, you know, told that if we didn't answer the question right we were going to be shipped back. I said, "Oh, they're going to ship me back alone." I could see that. I started to cry. It wasn't that at all. They [unclear] to let me go. And that's all I can think and remember. Then we — we went up on the second floor. And in there we were sitting in — on the bench and my mother says, "And what are we doing here? We're not doing anything here." And she kept going over to the desk with — to some men in there. And she says, "[several words unclear]." You know what it was? Our lunch, to come to Springfield so we won't go hungry. But the lunch wasn't there yet. We had to wait. And that's how we were detained in there. And that was that. [END OF TAPE 2, SIDE A] [BEGIN TAPE 2, SIDE B]

SIGRIST:

[laughs] And your mother was all nervous.

QUEIPO:

Sure. And we got the [unclear], yeah.

SIGRIST:

How did you — what do you remember about getting — they gave you your lunch, I assume. Yes? And then came off the island? Or did anything else happen that you can remember?

QUEIPO:

They took us to the train.

SIGRIST:

Does any — did you see anything at Ellis Island that you had never seen before?

QUEIPO:

It was full of people when we got there, all sitting on benches, different nationalities. I don't know. But th — to us, they spoke correctly Spanish. So they had no — must have had all different nationalities there because it was all kinds of people in there, not only our ship but how many ships, I don't know. Because there were a lot of people in there. Yeah. And this [unclear] that they were there. They were very polite and very well educated. You could tell.

SIGRIST:

Because of the type of Spanish that they spoke or —

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Yes.

QUEIPO:

They spoke very perfect Spanish.

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

And they were very well — they were very well organized and everything. Yes. They were good looking fellows too. Yes, they were. I don't know whether they were Spanish or English or what they were. But they spoke Spanish correctly. Very perfect.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember how you got back to the train station?

QUEIPO:

Yes, I remember going to the — coming out of Ellis Island. And we got aboard — aboard another ship. And they took us to the station. And there we went up, I think it was one flight of stairs, to the railroad. They put us on a train and from there on to Springfield. That was it. In Springfield, my father, my brother and this German lady that was — could speak Spanish correctly. She spoke German, Spanish and English correctly. And they were waiting for us at the railway station in Springfield. And I remember my brother was — he spied us on, you know, the train. We were standing already. "Pa, I [unclear]. I [unclear]." [chuckles] We got off the train and that was it. I mean, I got off the train and we came — got on the bus at the Springfield — the railroad. It wasn't a bus at the time. It was — what was it that they had?

SIGRIST:

Like a streetcar?

QUEIPO:

A streetcar.

SIGRIST:

Yes.

QUEIPO:

Right.

SIGRIST:

Tell me what it was like to see your father after not having seen him for six months.

QUEIPO:

Wonderful. Wonderful.

SIGRIST:

Did he bring you a present when he came to meet you?

QUEIPO:

No, no. The present was at home. Yeah. He had come to living here to 127 North Elm Street.

SIGRIST:

Here in Westfield.

QUEIPO:

Yes, and the house was so — furnished and everything. Yeah, we all had our own separate room. My mother had her own room. We had our own bedroom, my sister and I. My brother had another. And there was one Cuban man that was staying with my father at the time at the house. And he slept with my brother — in my brother's —

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

That was that.

SIGRIST:

Hmm. Tell me —

QUEIPO:

Well, what do you want to know?

SIGRIST:

[chuckles]

QUEIPO:

I think I — I could tell my whole history there.

SIGRIST:

[laughs] Well, we have to talk a little bit about what happened in America.

QUEIPO:

Well, I'll tell you. I — I started to go to school in the first grade.

SIGRIST:

Yes. Tell me about that.

QUEIPO:

And I was — I was a big girl, bigger than I am today because I shrunk already. [chuckles] And I was so ashamed to be in their room with all the small girls — with all small children. My brother and my sister and I, the three of in the same grade. There was one Spanish girl in there who was our salvation, because she spoke both languages. So she was an interpreter for all the three of us. Yeah. Theresa Herrera [PH] was her name.

SIGRIST:

Theresa what?

QUEIPO:

Herrera.

SIGRIST:

Herrera.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Huh.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Was — do you know if she was born in Spain or was she —

QUEIPO:

No, she was born in here.

SIGRIST:

Here.

QUEIPO:

[unclear].

SIGRIST:

Tell me about your teacher.

QUEIPO:

Stackwether [PH], she was a wonderful teacher. We — the three of us was in their room and the eighth grade teacher used to come down to the — into her room once in a great while. And they used to say to me, "Next year you're going to go upstairs with her, with the eighth grade teacher." It would never be. How could I? I couldn't speak the English or read the English the way I was supposed to. But anyway, they were trying to make it easier for me. They were very kind.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember some of the first words that you learned in English?

QUEIPO:

Yes. Some of the first words that I learned to read in English was, "The rain, rain, come away. Come again some other day." I never forgot those words because those were the very first things that I learned.

SIGRIST:

What was — what a difficult part of that process?

QUEIPO:

Speaking.

SIGRIST:

The hardest part of learning English for you?

QUEIPO:

To speak. To speak. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And in what ways was that difficult?

QUEIPO:

I can't describe it. You — your tongue seemed to be all twisted up inside. You couldn't pronounce the words. It was hard.

SIGRIST:

What about your mother? Did she attempt to learn English?

QUEIPO:

She tried it but my mother was very slow. She was very, very slow. My sister and my brother, they learned much quicker than I did, especially my sister, the devil. [chuckles] She could learn anything much faster than I. Being small makes a difference.

SIGRIST:

Well, yeah. Being younger.

QUEIPO:

Yes.

SIGRIST:

Sure.

QUEIPO:

Be younger — makes a difference.

SIGRIST:

And how well did your father speak English by that point?

QUEIPO:

Well, I'll tell you. He had a little dictionary this big and he [unclear] — he could understand a lot of things and pronounce [unclear]. When he came here, he found that he couldn't even use the book, [chuckles] because the way you pronounce it and the way it is, they're two different things. And he couldn't use the little dictionary. So he got along the best way he knew how.

SIGRIST:

What — what other nationalities worked with him at the foundry?

QUEIPO:

Oh, God. All kinds. Polish Americans, Irish. All kinds. Italians. All kinds. And he used to say, "Pucha, [PH] in my — in — in Tina, where I was. I couldn't have my — my hands dirty because it would dirty the work. In here, the dirtier — the dirty work dirties my hands. Even if they're clean, the minute I touch anything in here, I'm dirty." He couldn't get over it.

SIGRIST:

Do you know what his job was specifically in the foundry, what — what he did exactly?

QUEIPO:

He was in the — they call it a — a — the room with the — that they file the radiators.

SIGRIST:

Filing the metal down —

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

— somehow?

QUEIPO:

Smooth them down.

SIGRIST:

That was his job.

QUEIPO:

That was his job.

SIGRIST:

All right. Do you remember what he made? What —

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

I — I mean, what he got paid?

QUEIPO:

No. That I can't tell you.

SIGRIST:

Did he keep that same job?

QUEIPO:

Yes, he did. And then he went to work for a — up in a diner in Springfield. And there he — he was washing the dishes. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Can you remember why he left the job at the foundry?

QUEIPO:

Because he didn't like the dirty hands. [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

Well, now his hands would be clean all the time if he's washing dishes. Now, you turned 14 about a month after you got here.

QUEIPO:

I was 14 in November.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember anything about that birthday?

QUEIPO:

No. I do not.

SIGRIST:

And were you expected to get a job sometime soon?

QUEIPO:

I did get a job here in the factory over here.

SIGRIST:

In the foundry?

QUEIPO:

No, no. That — that building over here. They call it a textile.

SIGRIST:

Oh, the — the — what's now called the Torrington [PH] Mills?

QUEIPO:

Right.

SIGRIST:

It's all fixed up?

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

How old were you?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, it's all different.

SIGRIST:

Yeah, right.

QUEIPO:

It was a dirty job. It was — I was washing the — the pieces that they made for the caskets. They — they had to use pumice to — to scour them and make the design that they — they wanted to have made. And all I did was to wash them. And they used some kind of soap that my hands were always spotted. Yeah. I took an awful long time before my hands became normal again.

SIGRIST:

Are you talking about the fabric that's inside the casket? What —

QUEIPO:

No, no. The handles on —

SIGRIST:

Oh, the handles.

QUEIPO:

The handles.

SIGRIST:

I see. And you were washing them with the pumice.

QUEIPO:

Yeah, the pumice.

SIGRIST:

Really?

QUEIPO:

And some kind of a soap that it was very hard on your hands. Nobody liked the job. For me, I couldn't speak [unclear]. I had to take what they gave me.

SIGRIST:

How old were you when you took the job?

QUEIPO:

I think I was 15 because when I — I came here I tell my father, "When you sent me down at the city hall" — I says, "Make me a year older. My father did. I says, "I want to go to work. I don't want to go to school." I says, "I don't learn anything in school. I want to go to school."

SIGRIST:

How long —

QUEIPO:

"To work."

SIGRIST:

— did you stay in school?

QUEIPO:

I stayed in school one year. And the next year I went to work.

SIGRIST:

And do you remember how you got the job at the — at the factory?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, through a man that — the one that his wife went with my father and my — my brother to meet us at the railroad in Springfield.

SIGRIST:

This is the German?

QUEIPO:

The German. The lady that spoke the three languages. She even spoke Jewish. Yeah, she could understand Jewish. Very smart lady.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember how much you got paid for that job?

QUEIPO:

Yes, 14 dollars and 50 cents, which was more than they were paying any other one. There was — had work in there before. But me, like a fool, they give a slip every Friday. We were working Saturdays, half a day. Okay, they gave you a piece of paper. And the girls that they work in there, they were suspicious that they were going to pay me more than they got when they started there themself. And they did, because I had nobody to talk to. So I couldn't [unclear] any time. [chuckles] And so they gave you this paper the day before so that you know how much you're getting. You have to sign in then when they give you your envelope. You turn in your paper. And one of these ladies — her name was — oh, I can't think of her name right now — she — she asked me if I show my slip. Me, innocently, I says, "Sure. [unclear]." And she knew that I was paying almost like what they were paying. And — and they had worked there for so much longer. So [chuckles] she alerted all the others. And then this [unclear] came to me. "You were foolish to show them your slip because now you made it hard on yourself, honey." I was innocent. I was faithful [unclear]. [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

And — and the 14 — you said $14.50 — was that per week?

QUEIPO:

Per week.

SIGRIST:

Per week.

QUEIPO:

Per week.

SIGRIST:

And that's — that's five full days and one half day? Oh —

QUEIPO:

Half a day Saturday.

SIGRIST:

How long did you work there?

QUEIPO:

Not too long because this couple there out in Feeding Hills — he was Yankee and she was Cuban — and he was the owner of the whole tobacco farm in Feeding Hills.

SIGRIST:

Oh, in Feeding Hills.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

That's right, tobacco farm.

QUEIPO:

And she was Cuban and she heard of a Spanish lady, a Spanish girl that was here in Westfield. And she wanted Spanish maid for her children in there, because she didn't want them to lose the Spanish. She wanted her children to learn the English and the Spanish at the same time. So therefore, she wanted me to go and be a nurse for her children over there. So they speak to me in Spanish or I could teach them the Spanish with — for the three of them and at the same time [unclear]. That's how I got the job over there.

SIGRIST:

Wow. And what was the family's name?

QUEIPO:

Smith.

SIGRIST:

Smith.

QUEIPO:

Smith. They wanted to take me to Cuba in the wintertime with them. My parents would not let me go. So I went back to Westfield and work in the brine box.

SIGRIST:

The brine?

QUEIPO:

The brine box, which does not exist anymore. It's where the old [unclear] made an addition onto — into the brine box, because the brine box closed down. And after I was married, the brine box closed down and they added onto the [unclear].

SIGRIST:

Can you talk a little bit about working with the children and — and what your duties were as a maid?

QUEIPO:

Over there in Feeding Hills?

SIGRIST:

In Feeding Hills, yeah.

QUEIPO:

Oh, they — they wanted me to speak Spanish to them all the time.

SIGRIST:

To the children?

QUEIPO:

To the children, yeah. And at night, when they put them — after I put them to bed, I could sit in the living room with them. They don't allow the — all of them. But me, being Spanish, being different, they knew that I was lonely. I had nobody to talk to. So they had pity on me. And he — Mr. Smith spoke Spanish correctly. And her, being Cuban, well, she spoke both, but very broken English. I think my English was even better than hers and mine wasn't very good. [chuckles] But she was very good-looking lady.

SIGRIST:

Did you live with them?

QUEIPO:

Six months.

SIGRIST:

For six months.

QUEIPO:

Six months. They wanted to take me to Cuba for the winter with them. My parents wouldn't let me go.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember — say, within the first two years that you were in this country, do — do you remember how you felt about being away from Spain?

QUEIPO:

Yes. I was very lonely. Very lonely. My friends were all out there, especially one friend. To this day, I keep thinking of her. We were just like this, the two of us. We would sing together. We played together the panderita. You know, the —

SIGRIST:

Yes, you were telling me about the panderita.

QUEIPO:

Okay. Her and I were singing together and playing together and dancing together. We were like this all our lives. Ah, when you leave all your roots in there, it's hard to forget.

SIGRIST:

Did you communicate in any way with her?

QUEIPO:

No, I did not. No, I did not and she miss it. She missed it. And I — I should but I have a lot of company here. And my time was passing by.

SIGRIST:

Do you remember what her name was?

QUEIPO:

Elvina [PH].

SIGRIST:

Elvina?

QUEIPO:

Elvina Lopez.

SIGRIST:

Elvina Lopez, wherever you are now.

QUEIPO:

She's still there.

SIGRIST:

She's still — and she's still living?

QUEIPO:

Not in Loma, no.

SIGRIST:

No?

QUEIPO:

Not in my hometown but she's still [unclear], was married, older sister. And she took her with her to one of the village in [unclear] because she went to live there. That's where her husband was working and Elvina went with her.

SIGRIST:

Did your mother get a job?

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

No?

QUEIPO:

No, she was working at home.

SIGRIST:

And you mentioned earlier your brother had started washing windows in the foundry.

QUEIPO:

In the foundry.

SIGRIST:

But what happened after that for him? What —

QUEIPO:

Well, they got him a job right in the foundry.

SIGRIST:

In the foundry.

QUEIPO:

In the foundry, yeah. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And your sister's young enough where she probably went to school —

QUEIPO:

Yes, she went to school.

SIGRIST:

— longer.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

I went to night school too.

SIGRIST:

Oh.

QUEIPO:

In here.

SIGRIST:

In — here in Westfield? Can — can you talk a little bit about what that experience was like?

QUEIPO:

It was — it was funny because it was only four months of the year. Two — two days a week, I believe it was. Yeah, and it [chuckles] — there were a lot of Spanish men here. There were no girls, only two girls, another girl and I. And they all wanted to, you know, take you to school and take you back home. They wait for you when you come out of school. And my father wasn't too pleased. But anyway, it went on for a while. And then I — I got going with my husband.

SIGRIST:

How did — in night school, how did they try to teach you? What — what was it that they were trying to get you to learn in night school?

QUEIPO:

The school, honey. The — how to read and write English.

SIGRIST:

In — primarily —

QUEIPO:

In English, yeah.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

No Spanish. Only English.

SIGRIST:

And what about the teacher? Could she speak —

QUEIPO:

She was Miss — her name was Clark. No, Mark.

SIGRIST:

Mark.

QUEIPO:

Miss Mark, Jewish.

SIGRIST:

Could she speak Spanish?

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

No.

QUEIPO:

No. Well, we understood each other. Yeah, we understood each other.

SIGRIST:

Well, tell me — tell me how you met your husband to be.

QUEIPO:

Oh, he was just a pest. [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

Just a pest. [laughter] Uh-huh.

QUEIPO:

I called him when they see a girl and they like —

SIGRIST:

Was he from Spain?

QUEIPO:

He left Spain when he was 14 years old. He grew up in Cuba.

SIGRIST:

In Cuba?

QUEIPO:

Yeah. From there he came here. Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And we know his last name was Queipo.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What was his first name?

QUEIPO:

Candido.

SIGRIST:

Can you spell that?

QUEIPO:

Yeah, Candido. C-A-N-D-I-D-O.

SIGRIST:

Candido.

QUEIPO:

Candido.

SIGRIST:

Candido. Okay. And what part of Spain was he born in?

QUEIPO:

Asturias. [PH] Asturiana. [PH] They speak [unclear]. We don't speak that way. Castilian. [PH]

SIGRIST:

I see.

QUEIPO:

I'm Castilian. I'm pure Castilian.

SIGRIST:

And what — what was he doing in the United States for work?

QUEIPO:

Working. He was working at Pope.

SIGRIST:

Pope?

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

What was Pope?

QUEIPO:

They were making bicycles. Yeah, the bicycle — the Columbia bicycle. Don't you remember that Columbia bicycle?

SIGRIST:

[unclear]. They still make them, I think. Don't they? Columbia bicycle?

QUEIPO:

I don't know where. Not in Westfield, is it?

SIGRIST:

No, probably not. But I think the brand still exists.

QUEIPO:

I think they still make them but I don't know where.

SIGRIST:

Yeah. But that's what he was doing. He was —

QUEIPO:

Yeah, yeah.

SIGRIST:

— working in a bicycle factory.

QUEIPO:

Yeah.

SIGRIST:

And you say he was a pest.

QUEIPO:

Oh.

SIGRIST:

What was he doing that was pestering you?

QUEIPO:

Trying to take me home every time I went to night school. [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

Was he in the night school too?

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

Oh.

QUEIPO:

No. But he would wait for me outside. And my father couldn't see it. Don't take me — I mean, let me go. Will you, please?

SIGRIST:

Okay. [chuckles] All right. You want to go. Well, okay. Have you ever been back to Spain?

QUEIPO:

Yes, I have been.

SIGRIST:

How many times?

QUEIPO:

Twice.

SIGRIST:

How old were you the first time?

QUEIPO:

When I went back, I went back with my two friends from California [unclear]. And then I went back again and —

SIGRIST:

How old were you the first time you went back?

QUEIPO:

I was married. I was living here. I said to my husband, "Come on. Let's go with them." And my husband says, "No. You go if you want to but I'm not — I'm staying." You know why he didn't want to go? Because he came in here by — through Cuba. And he just jump aboard the ship. And he landed in Albany. And he was afraid that if he was going he wasn't going to be able to come back here. And he would — it would have happened to him.

SIGRIST:

That's right.

QUEIPO:

It would have happened to him.

SIGRIST:

Yeah. Well, did you go back to the town that you grew up in?

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

Oh.

QUEIPO:

Darn it. I didn't go back to the town, which I — I regret for all my years after.

SIGRIST:

Yeah.

QUEIPO:

And I could see it —

SIGRIST:

Have you ever been —

QUEIPO:

— in the distance.

SIGRIST:

Even — what about the second time you went? Did you go back to the town?

QUEIPO:

No.

SIGRIST:

No. So you've never actually been back to the — how did you feel when you were in Spain again for the first time?

QUEIPO:

I could see my town at a distance. I could go. I was — we were going to something there. We hire a man with a car, my friends and I. And wherever we went, wherever we slept, we'd pay for his luggage and for his meals and everything. Everything was paid for. His guests and everything, we'd pay for everything. And he was just one lucky man. All he had to do was eat and drive us around.

SIGRIST:

That's right.

QUEIPO:

We got to [unclear]. And he stopped to cool off because it was a hot one, very hot one. And we were sitting there under the shade. I look across the street and I — oh, my God! We're right in front of Hernando [PH] and Mario [unclear] where they live up here, up on the first floor in there, which — second floor in here. Because in there, the first floor doesn't count. Second and the third. We call it the third here. Over there, it's called the second. And the driver says, "Go ahead. Go and see him." I says, "Can we?" He says, "Here. I'll wait for you in here." Sure enough, we got up there. I knock on the door and his wife had gone out shopping — groceries. I knock on the door and he says, "Who's there?" I says, "Florentina [unclear]." "Wow!" He opened the door right away. [chuckles] He had eaten in my house every month because my husband and him were the — my husband were the secretary, and he was going out accompanying my husband to collect the monthly bills and gave out the receipts to everybody. And Fernando Reyna [PH], who's my husband now — helper in the [unclear], because he had been doing it before. But he got tired of doing it because there were no money in it. You had to do it free of charge. And so he didn't want to do in anymore so he gave the job to my husband. And when I said to him, "Florentina, the Westfield" — "Oh, my God!" He opened the door right away. [chuckles]

SIGRIST:

Florentino, Westfield. [laughs] Did you — when you were in Spain, did you feel any kind of emotional connection to the country?

QUEIPO:

Yes, you do. You can't help it but feel — you can't help it. The people there are so kind and so down — down to earth. Down to earth is what you call it. We were in Milanthia [PH] one night. And I was watching the — oh, what a beautiful scene, the sunset over the — the — the ocean. It was beautiful. And I says — I was talking to myself. "What a beautiful view," I was saying. And a lady was listening to me. And she says to me, "[speaking in Spanish.]" And we were talking for quite a while in there, the two of us. And she says to me, "You're so kind. Because there's so many that come from America here and they think they're the cat's meow." She says just because they speak a little English, they don't get to speak Spanish more. I says, "Senora, [speak in Spanish]." She said to me, "You're a [unclear] lady." Says, "You're — you're down to earth." [unclear]

SIGRIST:

When you think of yourself in terms of nationality, how do you think of yourself?

QUEIPO:

Right now, I feel myself as an American. I'm an American citizen. I became a citizen after. I had no trouble with anybody. I get along with everybody. Even at the center where I go every — two days a week, I get along with everyone.

SIGRIST:

You're talking about the senior citizen center here in town. Yes.

QUEIPO:

Yeah. My friend, Rena [PH], she doesn't [chuckles] make [unclear]. She just make — I says, "Rena, get along with everybody. We're all the same. We're all equal."

SIGRIST:

Someone might be listening to this tape 200 years from now.

QUEIPO:

Oh, God!

SIGRIST:

What kind of advice would you have to a young person who might be listening to this tape many years in the future about how to live a long and happy life?

QUEIPO:

Be yourself. Don't try to be anybody else but be yourself. Down to earth is the best kind of living that you can do, the best kind of friendship and relation you can have with anyone. That's the way I look at it. Get along with everyone. We all have faults. I have my faults. You have your faults. Everybody has a fault somewhere. Try to get along with everyone because that's the way God made us. We had nothing to do with us. God made us all.

SIGRIST:

Oh. Mrs. Queipo, thank you very much —

QUEIPO:

You're welcome.

SIGRIST:

— for a — you've been talking for two hours now.

QUEIPO:

Oh, God!

SIGRIST:

And I really —

QUEIPO:

I didn't know I could talk so much.

SIGRIST:

[laughs] Well, it's my pleasure. As I said before we did the interview, we just don't find people who came from Spain very often. So this has been really wonderful. This is Paul Sigrist signing off with Florence Queipo on the Fourth of July, [chuckles] a very hot, muggy Sunday afternoon, 1999, here in Westfield, Massachusetts. Thank you very much.

QUEIPO:

You're welcome, honey. [END OF INTERVIEW]