LEVINE:

Today is February 16 th — 15 th , excuse me, 1996 and I'm here in Sparta, New Jersey at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Jack Carnegie. Mr. Carnegie came from Scotland in 1921 when he was five years of age. Today Mr. Carnegie is eighty-one years of age and this is Janet Levine for the National Park Service. Okay, let's start at the beginning. If you would say your birth date and where in Scotland you were born.

CARNEGIE:

I was born on November 14 th , 1914.

LEVINE:

And where in Scotland?

CARNEGIE:

Dundee, Scotland, and I think the street was Dalfield Walk, D-A-L-W-A-L-K, in Dundee, and I think the number — what was the number, Margaret? (laughs)

LEVINE:

It was Dalfield Walk?

CARNEGIE:

Dalfield, yeah, in Dundee.

LEVINE:

In Dundee. Now, did you live in Dundee and on Dalfield Walk —

CARNEGIE:

Yeah.

LEVINE:

Right up until the time you left?

CARNEGIE:

Right.

LEVINE:

Okay. Well, what do you remember about it? What do you remember about the house, for example, that you lived in?

CARNEGIE:

Not too much. I know there was a lot of cobblestone streets and at the bottom of our hill was a public bathroom. Like, you know, men's room, women's room and I remember that because there was two entrances and then there was a walkway between them and there was a railing, and it was some kind of antiques there from World War I.

LEVINE:

In the house, you mean?

CARNEGIE:

No, near these bathrooms at the bottom of the street, and I remember I was crawling on one and I fell and got my tongue caught on some barbed wire and my mother had to take me to the hospital. So I got it sewed up. [laughs]

LEVINE:

Wow. [Laughs] What kind of antiques were they?

CARNEGIE:

They were like big cannons, you know, from the war, from the First War.

LEVINE:

Now, were these public bathrooms, they were there because — did people have bathrooms in their home?

CARNEGIE:

I don't remember a bathroom in the house and I know we were on the third floor. It was a walk — you know, walk up or whatever you call them. So, let's see. Oh, I remember when we used to go — see, I was born and the war was still on, the First World War. I remember my mother taking me and my sister — not my sister. She wasn't born yet. My two brothers and my other sister, my oldest sister, to these public — I don't know, these government run restaurant — not a restaurant but a place you got a handout.

LEVINE:

Oh, like rationing?

CARNEGIE:

No, you got food. You got oatmeal and bread. You know, they fed you. It was like the government operated, subsidized restaurant. Not a restaurant. It was just a —

LEVINE:

It was like a place where you would eat, right? It had tables and you ate the food there?

CARNEGIE:

Right, and we used to go there every day. I remember that.

LEVINE:

Did you go like one time in a day or would you go —

CARNEGIE:

No, we only went once. Maybe you weren't allowed to go anymore than once, I don't know.

LEVINE:

Did they also give food to people to take home to cook at home?

CARNEGIE:

No, I don't think so. They were just like it was oatmeal or soup. You got a bowl of soup and a piece of bread and I don't remember anything else about. There was no niceties about it.

LEVINE:

Were most people going in there?

CARNEGIE:

Yes, a lot of people. Well, like my father was fighting the war and there was nobody to make a living, you know, in our family. My mother was — I guess she must have been pregnant with my sister. No, maybe not. I don't know, but she had three boys and a girl. Or she had four boys and a girl. One boy died. David, he died.

LEVINE:

As a child?

CARNEGIE:

Yes, as a child. I don't know, maybe he was two years. He was older than me. He was between — I was the last boy and there was three boys in front of me. My brother Bill, Bob and David.

LEVINE:

And your sister, your older sister?

CARNEGIE:

And my older sister, yes.

LEVINE:

What was her name?

CARNEGIE:

Helen.

LEVINE:

Was she oldest of all?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah. Yeah, she's the one that remembers most about, her about, Ellis Island. So she remembers the doctors examining us and my mother being so concerned about whether we would be sent back, you know. Because I can remember in Ellis Island I was in like a prison. It was a cage.

LEVINE:

Okay, let's talk about what you remember about Scotland and we'll get to Ellis Island when you got to this country after that. So, what was your mother's name?

CARNEGIE:

Margaret?

LEVINE:

And her maiden name?

CARNEGIE:

Her maiden name was — who was that author that wrote Treasure Island?

MARGARET:

Robert Louis Stevenson?

CARNEGIE:

No, it wasn't.

MARGARET:

Treasure Island?

CARNEGIE:

Let's see.

LEVINE:

Oh, maybe it's on here.

CARNEGIE:

Her maiden name was Clements. All right.

LEVINE:

So Margaret Clements and your father's name?

CARNEGIE:

William.

LEVINE:

William, and did you have grandparents that you remember?

CARNEGIE:

Never met them. Never knew them. I heard my father talking about them, but I think they lived down the south of Scotland more. I never got to see grandparents.

LEVINE:

So that means that your father came from Dundee from the south of Scotland, probably.

CARNEGIE:

Right.

LEVINE:

Do you know — did you ever hear the story about how they met, your mother and father?

CARNEGIE:

No, I don't — do you Margaret?

MARGARET:

No.

LEVINE:

Your father was working in the jute mill before —

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, he was a jute mill. He worked in a jute mill. He was a millwright, what they call a millwright. They set up the machines, you know, and he joined up in the service, 1914 and then when he came out, 1918 I guess it was, when he came out of the service — he served the British army and he had saved enough money to come to this country and he got a job here.

LEVINE:

So he came first.

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, he came first. He got a job in a dye house, Paterson, New Jersey and his sponsor was a man by the name of Bob Christy and he claimed him. You know, that's how they did it. They claimed them years ago and Bob Christy came down and claimed us, my mother and the children. My father — not my father. He was already here. But he went to work in this dye house in Hawthorne, New Jersey, United Piece Dye Works and he was what they call a millwright. You know, they install the machines and whatever is in the dye house.

LEVINE:

Did he write home when he came here while you and the rest of the family was still in Scotland?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, he wrote and he sent money and then his employer found out that he was saving up his pay to bring his family over and he gave him the money to bring us. And then he worked it out, you know, which was very nice.

LEVINE:

So he must have been well respected.

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah. Well, he was — he was — I guess he was good at his trade, I don't know, but he was a very mild person, you know, and let's see, what else about him.

LEVINE:

So essentially did the same trade — he had the same trade in Scotland that he had here.

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, right. So when he got the money from the employer, he sent for his family and he brought us over.

LEVINE:

Do you remember anything he wrote back to the family about this country before you came here? Like what you thought or what you expected based on what your father said?

CARNEGIE:

Well, I think we thought there would be gold in the street. [Laughs] So I don't know. I didn't find any. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

How about anything else about — can you remember the house? Can you remember anything about your living quarters or what —

CARNEGIE:

When we came here?

LEVINE:

No, over there.

CARNEGIE:

Not too much. It was real simple. I think there was one bathroom on every floor and I remember my mother did the washing in the tub, you know.

LEVINE:

So you had running water?

CARNEGIE:

Yes. Yeah, and when we came to this country, we landed in October, Halloween night and my mother thought the people were crazy. [Laughs] You know, Halloween. You know what Halloween is. Maybe not in New York, but up in the area we were people were going — kids were going house to house, what they do today, you know.

LEVINE:

What do you remember — do you remember any celebrations while you were still in Scotland? Any occasions that were cause for celebration?

CARNEGIE:

No.

LEVINE:

How about religion? Was your family religious?

CARNEGIE:

Not really. We were Protestants, but we never — I know my mother used to go to church over here. She used to go to Presbyterian Church and outside of that, I don't think — my sister is a big church- goer.

LEVINE:

Was it a Presbyterian church in Scotland, do you know?

CARNEGIE:

I don't know that. No.

LEVINE:

How about music or dancing, do you remember any occasions over there?

CARNEGIE:

I don't think we were too happy for dancing. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

Were many people leaving for this country, like from where you were in Dundee? Were people coming to the United States that you knew of? Did you know of other people?

CARNEGIE:

No, I didn't know of anybody that — we left from Glasgow and then we stopped in Ireland, Belfast, a port on the eastern — yeah, on the eastern side of Ireland, stopped there overnight, I think. Took passengers aboard and then we come to this country.

LEVINE:

Do you remember your mother packing up things to leave?

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

LEVINE:

Do you remember anything she took with her?

MARGARET:

A trunk.

CARNEGIE:

[Laughs] Yeah, she had a trunk.

LEVINE:

What did she have in it, do you remember anything?

CARNEGIE:

I imagine schools and some sort of memorabilia, I don't know. My mother was half Irish, you know. I think she was, wasn't she Margaret? Yeah, she was half Irish and she loved to — like after we got settled in this country a year or two, we belonged to or she belonged to the Caledonian's Club and Daughters of Scotia. They used to meet every month down in Paterson, and I used to — when I got older, I used to drive her over there, you know. And she liked to do the Irish Jig and all. [Laughs] That's the only thing I know.

LEVINE:

Were there any other memories you have of your mother when she was still in Scotland? Can you — do you have any recollections of like things you did together or any experiences?

CARNEGIE:

We didn't have much of a civil life, you know. It was just an existence.

MARGARET:

Worked in the mill.

CARNEGIE:

Work in the mill. She worked in the mill, too.

LEVINE:

Oh, she worked, too?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, and then my sister was born around 19 — 1919, I guess, wasn't it?

MARGARET:

She's five years younger than me.

CARNEGIE:

So she was born over the other side, and I know she was only three months old when we left Scotland. I remember she was in my mother's arms, you know. My mother was sick all the time aboard the ship. Ten days, I think it took.

LEVINE:

Do you remember saying goodbye to people?

CARNEGIE:

Nope. I don't remember that.

LEVINE:

So really it seems like you can remember the house. You can remember that falling on the barbed wire by the cannon and when your mother took you to the hospital, do you remember anything about that?

CARNEGIE:

I had to put my tongue out and the doctor put a couple stitches in it. Well, I don't know if — I guess you can still see it.

LEVINE:

Huh, it's hard to tell.

CARNEGIE:

And anyway, I had a little problem speaking, you know, when we first came over because this must have happened maybe a couple months before we left Scotland, and it left me a little tongue tied. So when I come to America, the kids would make fun of you, you know, which was normal. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

Do you remember leaving Dundee and getting to the port?

CARNEGIE:

I remember leaving. We left in Glasgow.

LEVINE:

Did you take a train to Glasgow?

CARNEGIE:

Yup, took a train, got into Glasgow and then we went aboard the ship.

LEVINE:

Now, it was your mother, your older sister and the baby sister and your three brothers and you. Was anybody else traveling with you?

CARNEGIE:

No, that was it.

LEVINE:

Boy, your mother had her hands full.

CARNEGIE:

She was a hero. Yeah, she was — you know, she didn't take too well to the voyage, so she was mostly in her cabin, which wasn't much of a cabin. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

Can you describe the cabin?

CARNEGIE:

Well, seems that we were all in one little section, you know. Probably not — maybe half as big as this room and there was bunk beds. One, two, I think there were three and that's all there was. I think there was — the bathroom I think was out in the passageway somewheres.

LEVINE:

What about, do you remember the dining room?

CARNEGIE:

No, I don't. I think it was a big section in that particular part of the ship and everybody ate there. It was like tables and, you know, benches and whatever. But the food, I don't even remember anything about the food.

LEVINE:

Were you sick, too?

CARNEGIE:

No, I wasn't sick. I was a pain in the neck.

LEVINE:

Why?

CARNEGIE:

I was running all over the place, you know. I almost went down the garbage chute where they throw the garbage into the sea and my brother, Bob, he pulled me back. My brother, Bill, he was a brain. He was the smartest one of all of us, so I don't know. I don't even remember coming into New York.

LEVINE:

No?

CARNEGIE:

No.

LEVINE:

Okay.

CARNEGIE:

I remember a little bit about Ellis Island, though.

LEVINE:

What do you remember about Ellis Island?

CARNEGIE:

I remember, you know, being in a crowd of people, my mother with the baby and the kids, and moving along and then they'd call your number. You had a big tag on you and she had a tag. Then we had to go before the doctor. The doctor, I remember he examined us and then I don't know what the hell we did. We went back to the cage, you know, where we were in and then they called us out and I can remember the guy that claimed us, Bob Christy, he was waiting for us, you know, to get through our examinations and then he came in and he identified himself and he showed his identification and then they — he was responsible for us. You know, it isn't like today, they come in this country, they go onto Welfare. But we never were on Welfare.

LEVINE:

So your father didn't come to Ellis Island?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, he was there. He claimed us and then Bob Christy was —

LEVINE:

The sponsor.

CARNEGIE:

The sponsor. Then he took us — I think we took a train from Hoboken I guess it was, into Paterson.

LEVINE:

What was it like for you, a five year old, to see your father?

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah! I remember that, and I remember we were all dressed in short pants and all.

LEVINE:

Were you like dressed up for the occasion?

CARNEGIE:

Well, we had the best clothes, we had, you know. Hobnail boots. We had boots on with big, they called them hobnails. I don't think you ever saw them. Well, that was so you wore the nails out first, before you wore the boot out, you know. That was to save money. And then we landed her in Halloween. October 30 th , I guess that's around there, huh? And we lived on Turner Street, 113 Turner Street, Paterson, and my mother says, "What kind of a country is this? All this kids running around with false faces." [Laughs]

LEVINE:

So in Patterson where you lived, were there a lot of other people who had just immigrated?

CARNEGIE:

Not too many. There was — I guess there were some Irish there that had just come over. A lot of Italians. When we lived in Paterson, just across the railroad track from us was a lot of Italian immigrants. Italians, you know, they'd sit outside in the summertime and drink their wine. It was a nice neighborhood, though.

LEVINE:

Did you start school soon after you came?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, I went right into School Number 7. Margaret went to School Number 7, too.

LEVINE:

Oh. So do you remember like you first — well, first of all, do you remember any things that struck you as new and different like during that first few weeks or months here? Things that maybe you hadn't seen before?

CARNEGIE:

Well, I was — you know, we were — it was a different way of living. You know, we had nicer things. My father was working and I don't know how much money he made, but we weren't starving, you know. Then I think my mother went in the Dolphin Jute Mill, I think until we got settled there for a while. My oldest sister, she took care of the baby and my mother went to work, but she didn't — yeah, she didn't work too long, though. I don't know whether she was in failing health or not.

LEVINE:

Well, now, your sister, she didn't go to school here?

CARNEGIE:

No. No. She went in the jute mill, too, when she was about fifteen. That's when we were here. I don't know, maybe she went in right away. I think she did because I don't think she ever went to school here.

LEVINE:

Now, did all your brothers go?

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah, they all went to school and Bob, he was — he was about five years older than me, I guess, and my brother Bill, he was a couple years older than Bob. He went into school. He was smart. He skipped second grade, third to fifth. First thing you know, he was graduated at like thirteen or twelve, I don't know.

LEVINE:

And then what did he do after he graduated?

CARNEGIE:

He was quite an athlete. He played soccer over in New York and my father took him in the dye house, you know, where he worked, but my brother Bill said, "No, this is not for me. So he went to work for the Eerie Railroad in the office in New York. So he did very well.

LEVINE:

He made a career of that.

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, he got to be in charge of a district and he was like an accountant. Stop at the stations and balance their books, had a good job.

LEVINE:

Well, you had an advantage over a lot of people who immigrated because you knew the language.

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah. Yeah, we knew the language, you know, and I don't think it was — I don't think I ever had a brogue like most Scotch people do. So let's see.

LEVINE:

What do you remember about school when you first started it?

CARNEGIE:

I remember going into the gymnasium. Remember the gym in School Number 7, Margaret?

MARGARET:

Yup.

CARNEGIE:

And the gym teacher, Mrs. Bailey her name was, she took me and my two brothers up to the front of the class. It was in a big area, you know, and she said, "This is three boys that just came from Scotland," and she introduced us to the other kids. But we never had any trouble, and Bill was quite an athlete. He was a soccer player. I was a soccer player, too, but I was never as good as him. And he got to play professional ball and he helped with the money. You know, I think he got maybe ten dollars a game, something like that, and it would come in handy, you know.

LEVINE:

Did you have much to do with, was it Mr. Christy, the person who sponsored you?

CARNEGIE:

No. We lived — he lived upstairs, we lived down. We didn't stay there too long, maybe about two years. Then we moved into a house of our own.

LEVINE:

In Paterson?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, up the road from that. It was an individual house, you know, and we paid rent there, I think, and we stayed there a couple years. Then we moved further up the road into the mountains on Garrett Street right up here in Paterson. Have you ever come through Paterson, if you came in through Grant Street, you'd look up to the left and that's what they call Garrett Rock. We lived beyond that. So we lived up there for about, I don't know, ten years and then I graduated grammar school. I went onto vocational school where I learned a trade.

LEVINE:

What did you learn?

CARNEGIE:

I was an electrician. Then I come out of there and I couldn't get a job. This was during the Depression, 1931 or so. I come out. I graduated from vocational school but the couldn't get a job for me, so I stayed another year at school, rather than walk the streets, you know.

LEVINE:

What do you remember about the Depression?

CARNEGIE:

Oh, Depression was terrible. I remember people lined up around the block for a job that paid seven dollars a week. I remember going down to the — like if you had heavy snow like we had a couple weeks ago, you go down to the City Yard — where the hell was that? That was on Governor Street and the foreman would come out and he'd pick the men out and hand them a shovel, you know, to shovel snow. I don't know what — I think it was fifty cents an hour. So I never got to shovel snow, but we enjoyed our stay in Paterson. My brother was a good athlete and he was well liked, and I played soccer, a lot of soccer, too, and then — well, we assimilated right into the community. END OF SIDE A BEGIN SIDE B

LEVINE:

What was your mother and father's attitude about, did they want to become Americans?

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah.

LEVINE:

Did they hold onto certain customs from Scotland?

CARNEGIE:

Not that I know of. My father wanted to get — he got his citizenship papers and he waited the five years. I think there was a wait. You had to wait, didn't you?

LEVINE:

Yeah.

CARNEGIE:

I mean before you got your final papers. He got them and he became a citizen. My mother never became a citizen. She didn't want to become a citizen.

LEVINE:

Do you know why?

CARNEGIE:

Well, she thought some day she might go back, you know. But then I went to work in Wrights. I couldn't get a job at the trade. So, you know, things were bad in that Depression, and I had to get this derivative citizenship. So that's what I went and did and then I got a job in Wright's Aviation, not as an electrician. In a foundry pouring metal, hard work. Then the war came on, 1938, '37. It looked like it was going to be a war, so I worked there until '41 and then I enlisted in the service.

LEVINE:

What prompted you to enlist?

CARNEGIE:

To get out of the foundry. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

In the army?

CARNEGIE:

No, I was in the navy.

LEVINE:

In the navy. And where did you go?

CARNEGIE:

All over. I was all over. The South Pacific and the North Pacific.

LEVINE:

Did you see — you saw actual battle?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, we were in it. I went to Hawaii for six months and after the Japs attacked, it was a lot of work there. We used to work like ten, twelve hours a day on these ships that were damaged. You really learned your trade there.

LEVINE:

In other words, you were repairing damaged ships?

CARNEGIE:

Yup. Sure, Pearl Harbor. So then I got — that was kind of monotonous work because it was dirty work. You know, the whole place was full of diesel oil. So I asked for a transfer. I wanted to see a little more of the war and I went aboard a destroyer, which was a mistake. [Laughs] Well, we saw a little action here and there, you know. Went up to the Aleutian Islands, put the Japs out of there, and what the hell else? Well, I was hurt up there in the North Pacific. We were rammed and I was in the water for a while, but was all right and I come back to Seattle and I went in the hospital for about three months, right, Margaret? Couple months, anyway. Then I was — the war was over then.

LEVINE:

Do you remember when you were told the war was over?

CARNEGIE:

Yup. I was on another ship and we were — we were going from Cold Bay to the Kurile Islands. See, that's where they were going to invade and we had like three or four ships loaded with Marines. This was towards the end of the war, and we had — we had said we'd go over there and shell them, the Kurile Islands. That's north of Japan. That's where the invasion, if we were going to invade. I don't know the details, but that's where we were going to go, and we were at sea in the North Pacific when somebody said they dropped a bomb. You know, and that was the end.

LEVINE:

Did you know the end was coming or did you sense of the end of the war?

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah, because, you know, you could — you know, there was victory in Europe. We used to have a little bulletin that come, the radioman used to pick it up and they'd give you all the news, you know.

LEVINE:

You mean like a newspaper?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, every day and the radioman would — and then you could read what was happening in Germany or whatever, you know. After the war I came back to — came back to Seattle. I was in the hospital there for a while.

LEVINE:

How do you think about your whole experience in the navy now?

CARNEGIE:

Oh, I thought it was nice. I liked the navy. You know, it was a good experience. You know, we did a little traveling. I went down through the Canal and — [Laughs] I seen a lot of things I wouldn't have seen when I was in there. I was in all them islands, in the South Pacific. We hit them, you know, and Eniwetok and Majuro, the Marshall Islands. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

What are those?

CARNEGIE:

These are things my father brought back from Egypt when he was in the British Army. She won't bother you.

LEVINE:

That's okay.

CARNEGIE:

Get down, Pepper. He was in the British Army and his service was in North Africa. So he brought these back from — I think he was in Israel or something.

LEVINE:

So, let's see. You must have run across a lot of people from all over the United States, being in the service.

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah, and I saw a lot of this country, too. I was in California for a while and Newport, Virginia. Newport, Rhode Island. That's where I took my training. You know, I was there for about four — no, three months. And I went to college, too. I went six months to college in Moorhead, Kentucky.

LEVINE:

What were you studying?

CARNEGIE:

I was studying electrical theory. Or was that Moorhead, Kentucky? What was the name of that school, Margaret?

MARGARET:

Moorhead.

CARNEGIE:

Oh, Moorhead State Teachers. There was a lot of navy men there, you know.

LEVINE:

So you met Margaret, your wife Margaret in grade school?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, I think so. Right, Margaret?

MARGARET:

No.

CARNEGIE:

No, after grade school.

LEVINE:

Well, do you remember meeting her?

CARNEGIE:

No. Oh, I remember meeting her, but I didn't know her before that. She was about twenty, I guess, twenty-two. I don't know. Then we got married. We went together for a couple years.

LEVINE:

What was it you liked about her?

CARNEGIE:

[Laughs] Well, she was a very nice girl. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

So now when you were in the service, were you married?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah. I got married when I was in there. I got married when I was in uniform, right, Margaret?

MARGARET:

Yup.

CARNEGIE:

Got married by a minister in Paterson in a Presbyterian church.

LEVINE:

So when you got out then, did you work as an electrician then after that?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah. Well, when I got out I had — I went to work out of different locals. Then after about two or three years, I finally — it was hard to get into the locals. It was very difficult. I finally got in the local in Morristown, which is a good local, 581, and I worked there for thirty years, different jobs. You know, we used to do a lot of school work, hospitals, big buildings, you know. We didn't do any housework or anything like that. It was a little more complicated. So I enjoyed it. I made good money and they had a good pension. I don't know how good it is today, but it was sufficient to keep us going after I retired, you know.

LEVINE:

When you look back, what have you done in your life that you feel proud of, that makes you feel satisfied?

CARNEGIE:

Just making a living, I guess. Making a good living. We always had a nice house and you know, we didn't have any extravagant things.

LEVINE:

Did you have children?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, I had one daughter. That's who gave me that, and she went to college and everything.

LEVINE:

And what's her name?

CARNEGIE:

Margaret. She married a nice guy and they get along very well. Have a beautiful house. So I think we when we came to this country, we all did well. The country treated us well and we were never a burden. We never had any Welfare or nothing like that, you know. Everybody had work. My sister worked in the mill. My father worked in the mill. My brother, Bob, he worked for public service, the gas company and my brother Bill, he was an accountant with the Railroad. So I mean they all — it really was a land of opportunity, I think. I could have — I feel I could have gone much further, but my mother and father never knew anything about college or nothing. But you know, I was an average student, but it never entered my mind to go to college. All I wanted to do was go to work and try to get some money. You know, to increase our standard of living. So, you know, I often think if I had the opportunity, I would have liked going to college.

LEVINE:

Well, you made it possible for your daughter. [unclear] get the opportunity [unclear].

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah, and she put her daughter through college. Graduated Rhode Island, University of Rhode Island. I went to night school for a while there in Newark, and I went further into the electrical trade. I was in the estimating and I did — I worked for a firm estimating work, you know, but I didn't like the inside office. I didn't care for that. I liked the outside. So in the winter I used to go — I went inside and stayed until July, then I would sit and look out the office window and then it's too nice. [Laughs] I said, "This ain't for me," so I quit, and I should never have quit. There was a lot of opportunities there, but I did what I wanted to do. So I went back in the field and I liked that. You know, it was rough and ready and you had to call everybody Mister. Uh-huh. What did you say?

LEVINE:

So how about this time in your life, your retirement time, how is that for you?

CARNEGIE:

Well, I don't know. I think it — I could do a lot more, I think. You know, if I wanted to go to school or help somebody else out. I don't know, but we're just taking it easy. We don't have any problems. I had the knee operation, but I just got over that. So other than that, we've been pretty fortunate.

LEVINE:

How did it feel for you to visit Ellis Island?

CARNEGIE:

Well, it was something. I enjoyed it, yeah, but the place is so modern, you know. I think I remember more like when it was all those cages and everything, you know. I got a little recollection of that and the tag around the neck was very — a big tag about this big. [Laughs] And other than that, I don't know. We survived. My mother was a tough woman. She —

LEVINE:

What was she like?

CARNEGIE:

She was very upbeat about everything. You know, if you had a setback, she was, "Oh, it will be all right," you know. My mother and father, they never got out of that area where we lived originally. In fact, she died in just about maybe half a mile from where we —

LEVINE:

Where you first started out.

CARNEGIE:

Where we first got in there. Yeah.

LEVINE:

And how about your father, how did he like it?

CARNEGIE:

Well, he was very active in the Scotch Club, Caledonia. He was a football trainer. He used to rub them down and put bandages on them. He loved that, you know, and he made his own rub down —

LEVINE:

Ointment?

CARNEGIE:

It wasn't ointment. It was like a — it was — I don't know, it was white liquid. He used to have it in a whiskey bottle all the time. [Laughs] he was a trainer of the — the Caledonian's, they had a soccer team and he was what they called a trainer. He'd bandage the men up and I played a lot of soccer in Paterson, too, but he never —

LEVINE:

Bandaged.

CARNEGIE:

Never bandaged me up. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

Well, your older brother was playing, too, right?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, well, he took care of my brother. He was the best. Yeah, he used to get ten, fifteen dollars a game, which was a lot of money. I remember I went up to Narragansett with him and we had to go in New York, him and I. He was playing, but I was just along for the ride, and we got a boat. Left New York at six o'clock at night, I think and we were with the team, you know. It was the New York team. The New York Hispanics, they were, and we went to Narragansett and he played and we come back on Sunday night or something, you know. It was something. But he was very well liked. Good looking guy, and he could run like a deer. But he — I don't know what happened to Bill. He got something, jaundice or something and he didn't last long. He died pretty young. He was only like maybe — what would you say Bill was, sixty?

MARGARET:

Yes.

CARNEGIE:

He married a school teacher and they had two girls. In fact, one lives right down the street here. So other than — you know, there wasn't any big successes in the family.

LEVINE:

Well, you sound successful.

CARNEGIE:

But we took care of ourselves.

LEVINE:

Do you remember any like attitudes that your mother or father had about life or what you should do or what you shouldn't do? Any kind of —

CARNEGIE:

I don't know. They weren't — my mother and father was never too — they were never to push their kids into college. They didn't know nothing about college. In fact, they never went to — they went to grammar school and they could write and read and that's all they had. But they were never, never the kind of parents that were ambitious to have their kids go to college. In fact, I never heard of college, you know, while I was like fifteen or fourteen, you know. Nobody ever mentioned college. You're lucky you graduated high school, which I never did. I did later when I come back from the service. You know, I took that what do you call?

LEVINE:

GED? Equivalency?

CARNEGIE:

Equivalency. Yeah, equivalency and I remember my daughter was in college and she says, "Dad, you'll never pass this test," you know, when I told her, I went up to Paterson State College and took the test. I never studied for it and then when I got the results, I know when I got them through the mail I never opened them because she was away to college. I waited for her to come home.

LEVINE:

Weren't you curious?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, I was curious, but I figured I passed, you know. So I let her open it and I passed. I don't know what they hell I got, seven point four or something, or four point seven. No, wait a minute. I always did pretty good on tests. In fact, in the service I was a First Class Electrician in no time because, you know, they give you tests aboard ship. Then I could have been a chief, I guess, if I had wanted to stay. But like I took police tests in Paterson. Fireman, I could have — in fact, I was a fireman for five months and then I quit. JL; Didn't like it?

CARNEGIE:

No, I didn't like that. You know, after working outside and having so much freedom, I didn't like hanging around the firehouse. But we went to a couple of fires and I never did learn how to do bells. You know, when the bells come into the firehouse?

LEVINE:

No, I don't know.

CARNEGIE:

Well, I used to — I was studying a lot.

LEVINE:

That's your wife talking. Yeah.

CARNEGIE:

I was taking correspondence courses.

LEVINE:

Electrical?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, engineering. I thought I'd be an engineer, but it never happened.

LEVINE:

Well, that's college, isn't it?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah, I guess in a way. But I used to be upstairs in the firehouse all the time. I never came down, only to eat or when the fire — when the bell hit, you know, and then I'd go to the fire. Then people hung around the firehouse, they said, "Where the hell do you keep yourself?" I said, "I'm upstairs."

LEVINE:

You were studying.

CARNEGIE:

Taking a correspondence course. [Laughs]

LEVINE:

Okay. All right, well, is there anything else you can think about you would like to say, you know, about the whole family coming to this country and starting a new life and then living out your lives here?

CARNEGIE:

Well, I think it was — we had plenty of opportunities in this country. The only thing is we didn't have guidance. Like, if my mother and father had realized they got three boys here — this is the fourth boy. He died before we left Scotland. But anyway, if she had like my brother, Bill, he should a went to college, but he never did. Oh, he went to college nights in New York. So he learned to be an accountant. We all made a good leaving. We didn't have any problem. Nobody ever got arrested. I don't think anybody ever got a ticket, for God's sakes. Traffic ticket.

LEVINE:

Do you think there's some part of you — when you think about yourself, do you think you're some part Scottish and some part American?

CARNEGIE:

Yeah. Oh, yeah, I think so. Yeah, I think I'd like to go back to Scotland and see it, you know, which will probably never happen. But you never know. But I think we had a good life here. We never went hungry, you know. Never — was always — wasn't a lot of money, but we always had enough food. In fact, I don't know how my mother fed us during the Depression. I know we ate a lot of potatoes and a lot of soup and it was hard. It was hard for — I think that was the most difficult time, the Depression, between 1930-31 and 1937. When I went to work in Wright's Aeronautical, we weren't making a lot of money, but we were making a little more than we did in the dye house, you know. My brother, Bob, he got married very early. He wasn't much help. [Laughs] But we always — you know, everybody — there wasn't any divorces in the family. Nobody went to jail. We were all law abiding citizens. Not big church goers. My mother was, but I don't ever remember my father in church. But he worked until he was, I guess sixty-five and then he had Parkinson's Disease and that killed him finally. And he died about seventy-four, seventy-three, seventy-four.

LEVINE:

Now, do you have grandchildren?

CARNEGIE:

Oh, yeah, I got one grandchild and she's got a child, right Margaret?

LEVINE:

So you have a great grandchild.

CARNEGIE:

Right, great grandson and they live up in Rhode Island. She married — my granddaughter married one of her fellow students when she was going to college there and they've got a nice house up there. He drives into Boston every day. I don't know, what is he an accountant, Margaret? So they got a good life

LEVINE:

Okay.

CARNEGIE:

Nice kids.

LEVINE:

Well, good. Well, I think we can close here, unless there's anything else.

CARNEGIE:

Okay. Well, [unclear] is there anything else?

LEVINE:

I think we covered the high spots, and I want to thank you very much. I've been speaking with Jack Whitecross Carnegie.

CARNEGIE:

Right.

LEVINE:

Who is eighty-one at the time of this interview. We're in Sparta, New Jersey and this is Janet Levine for the National Park Service on February 15 th , 1996 and I'm signing off. Thank you.

CARNEGIE:

You do this every day? END OF INTERVIEW