Isabella Taylor:Okay, my name is Isabella Taylor. The date is Friday, September 23rd, 2022. I'm here in the College of Ed interviewing LeNelle McInturff for my History 325 oral history project about the 1960s in Moscow, Idaho. Let's get started. So my first question is how would you have described yourself in the 60s? What would you have characterized your values at the time as?
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LeNelle McInturff:I was born in Gritman Hospital here in Moscow and raised on a farm between Moscow and Genesee, and then I graduated from Moscow High School in 1965. And I was gifted intelligently, but I think I was really naive otherwise. Clueless about a lot of things, about the larger world. I was a shy and quiet person. I watched other people do things rather than doing them myself, and I did go away for college after graduation. And that changed a lot of things for me. And I had to rely on myself and learn a lot of things.
We were a farm family, so our values were hard work, and honesty, and doing what you can for other people, and helping build a community that way. Just being responsible and not hurting other people, not stealing from other people. Just basic values as far as I was concerned.
IT*:Awesome. So, thinking back, what music or artists did you listen to in the 60s? And do you think music was more about, like, kind of the more casual aspects of enjoying it or more about social change? Because like, more recently we talk about looking back at that era in music, how songs were speaking to, kind of the like, the social change of the era. So what was your experience with music growing up?
LM*:Right. And I think both things were there, it was just what you cared about, what interested you more. I was rock and roll popular music. Elvis, of course. Ricky Nelson, Roy Orbison, Connie Francis. I liked tragedy songs. Like Patches and Ebony Eyes and and all those. I had a whole album full of those songs. And I like those.
But there was also, later on, the, the message songs as we call them. In The Ghetto by Elvis was his first really, real message song. But Blowing In The Wind and If I Had a Hammer and those kind of things too.
But I was... And then of course we had all the dance, twist, and the mashed potatoes, and all those things. But i was more the social ones and the tragedies. More serious songs I guess you call it. I was not a party person. I mean, I liked It's My Party and I'll Cry If I Want To, but...
LM*:Right, right, yeah. Good thing we're just... But I was more, and then later in the 60s I turn more to country music. My sister got me started on that. She gave me a country album for my birthday when I was 15 and I thought, "What's this?" (laughter) But it was Buck Owens and after a while I was singing his songs too. But... So... It was... And I think, you know, different groups migrated to different, different attitudes.
LM*:Yeah, and I was more a serious type person, not the party type.
IT*:Yeah, I can definitely relate to that one.
LM*:Yeah, I think that's probably all I need to say about that.
IT*:Alright, so other than music, what other memorable,, like films or books or, kind of, pop culture accoutrements, did you really like and connect with at the time? And were there any that were, like, fundamental... like fundamentally changed, kind of, your perspective on anything?
LM*:I saw Gone With The Wind the first time, and that was... the love story was what impressed me. I was not tuned into the slavery issues and, and those kinds of things. But... And then I like things like Psycho and Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte and Whatever Happened To Baby Jane. Kind of more horror type films.
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LM*:Rather than Beach Party Bingo and all those, those things that a lot of... I had a friend that really liked those shows, so we go to that sometimes, but I gravitated more to this, more gorey ones or more serious ones.
I remember reading the book Ramona when I was in junior high, and, I don't know if you're familiar with that, but it's in the southwest, and she... there was racial... I mean she was in love with this guy that, they were different classes. One was a I think, Mexican, and one was mixed race and stuff, and so they couldn't, they just couldn't be together. And so that affected me, I thought that was not right. And I remember reading Up From Slavery by Booker T. Washington in junior high, I think it was too. And, and that kind of... So I've always kind of had the, the slant towards, "We need to be equal," and racial equality, and, and equal opportunity for other people.
And, and I remember my mom had an aunt who had gone to, Portland, I think and she had seen a mixed race couple walking down the street and she was saying how it just made her sick to see that, and I thought, "What could be wrong with two people walking down the street together?" So I was not tuned into prejudice that way.
I remember my mother saying, I mean her parents family settled in the 1870s and 1880s out in that area, and so at that time Native Americans were still going by, you know going to the camus fields and those kind of things, and so her predjudices, if she had them, would be more fear of Native Americans rather than black people, because we didn't have black people here. But, um, but my family I think was more live and let live and everybody is, is okay. They weren't prejudiced about other people, so... But I also enjoyed West Side Story and The Graduate and, and laughing. We loved laughing on TV. That was when I was in California. It was a whole different world down there.
IT*:Oh I bet, yeah. So, what do you remember about a your education in the 60s? And, kind of, what sort of things you learned about in your classes? Or maybe things you didn't learn about in your classes that stood out to you?
LM*:Yeah. I, I took typing and shorthand and then I took languages. I liked languages, so I took French and Spanish. And so I pretty much avoided, we always had to take english and science and math, but I pretty much managed to avoid history. So I had U.S. history, and then we had government and civics when we were seniors, and sociology. But, um, so history I, I didn't really... I mean it was dates and battles and, you know, the presidents and all that kind of thing, but it wasn't engaging for me, at all, that way. Sociology was more interesting 'cause we talked about mental illness and psychology a little bit, and those kind of things, which interested me. And I remember in government I was shocked when our teacher told us that there had been a KKK chapter in Moscow, Idaho, back in the day. And I thought, "Why in the world would they be in Moscow?" 'Cause as far as I was concerned that was all black and white and we didn't have blacks here in Moscow. So what were they doing? So, but I I really didn't learn a lot of history in high school. And in college we had an instructor who read from his notes and didn't do anything out of blackboard and go into any side stories or anything like that to make it come alive, so I, I really didn't learn a lot of history. So I've been reading historical fiction and historical nonfiction and catching up on that.
IT*:That's wonderful. You mentioned that, uh, in like your sociology class, the discussion of mental illness, like piqued your interest. Like, ho- how would you, kind of, compare the conversations that were had back in the 60s with, kind of, the conversation about mental health nowadays? Like what was the conversation like I guess?
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IT*:In as far as you're comfortable speaking on.
LM*:Right. We, we had an opportunity school for kids that were developmentally disabled, whatever we called it, handicap then, or crippled, or whatever it was. I remember, there was a boy in my class who, I don't know what it was, he couldn't talk. Somebody said he'd swallowed his tongue or something. And so he would go to the opportunity school mornings and then he would come into a class in the afternoons. And I remember in 5th grade then he would just put his head down on the desk and sleep most of the afternoon. I was not very tolerant really of, of disabled people. I hate to admit it, but I wasn't.
My dad had a, not a good childhood. He had a dysfunctional family. His parents split up and his sister, I think, was abused and quit talking after her mother left the household. And was... And eventually they decided to put her in the, at the Saint Mary School they had a, a (uninteligable) Academy, and so she went to school there, and then later she was in Orofino at the home there, she had TB I think also. And so she and my dad were not close at all. And I remember, probably when I was in junior high, something like that, she did marry somebody and had a baby, and they didn't have anything, so we were gathering up a few things to send to them. I sent them some of my doll blankets for baby blankets and things. (LeNelle gets choked up) But my dad's comment was she should never have had a baby. That people like that should not have children. And it was not that she wasn't intelligent enough, but her childhood traumas had just destroyed her. And so that was sad.
Somehow I was always drawn to psychology, and wanted to be a psychiatrist, until I learned you had to go to medical school. And I faint when I see blood, so I thought, "Well that's not going to work." But I was interested in that, and then my grandmother when I was a senior in high school, had a series of strokes and then she had, I don't think it was Alzheimer's, we didn't know about Alzheimer's at that time, but she had some hallucinations and she didn't recognize us and that kind of thing, so that interested me. I didn't... I wasn't... I didn't want to take care of her, or help her, or anything like that but, but it interested me what was going on and I wanted to try to know more about that.
But in those days, yeah, a lot of people were just put away in institutions rather than trying to integrate them into the rest of the society, and that's just the way it was at that time. And luckily we've made some progress in that area, but yeah, it was, it was hard. We, we learn in sociology, we learned about senile psychosis. I remembered that term. And, and different ways.
And in junior high we had to give a little talk in our science class and so my talk, we had an old medical type book at home, I don't know how reliable it is now, but in there, there was a chapter on mental intelligence, you know, the different ratings, morons, imbeciles, and idiots, and that kind of thing, and what the IQ equivalents were. And that was my talk, and the class was really interested in that because we could call other people idiots or morons or imbeciles, you know it was, it was that kind of thing. So it was, it was not a serious study of it at all, but... And we called each other names, and made jokes, and yeah...
IT*:As high schoolers tend to do.
LM*:Junior high especially is really bad for that.
IT*:Oh yeah, definitely. Um, so, moving onto a lighter topic, not really. So what were, at the time, your thoughts on the Vietnam War? And did it change how you felt about America as a kind of global leader?
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LM*:That. Again, I was, I got married in 1966 and, so, like my focus then... I wasn't going to school anymore, I had to work to support him while he went to school, and then he was disqualified from school, so he lost the draft deferment category for being in school. But Vietnam to me, I was, I was pretty much detached from all that. I mean, it was far away, I didn't watch the news a whole lot, he was able to get into the naval reserve instead of being drafted into the full Navy, so he only had to serve, like for a couple of years, I think. He had 14 months of active duty and he never saw the coast of Vietnam at that time.
His younger brother was two years younger. He was drafted and he did go to Vietnam for a year. He died a few years ago now, and had had cancer. Before that I was visiting him and we talked a little bit about it but, I don't remember writing him letters when he was in Vietnam. And he remembered he was in trouble because he did not write letters home to his wife and mom, and so they were after him for not staying in touch with his family. But- and then I remember when he came back early in 1970, and a friend of his mothers was wanting to talk to him about how he felt about Vietman, whether we should be there or we shouldn't be there, and all that kind of thing, and- but I never talked to him about that either. I remember we went to see the movie Mash, and I hated the movie because I thought it was making fun of Vietnam, and I didn't think that was something to laugh about.
And I worked with a guy at one of my jobs, my first job at Caltech, was in the industrial relations center, where we were focused on, you know, industrial relations. But he had worked there as a library aid and then he had gone to Vietnam, and I was impressed because when he came back from the Navy, and he had been replaced in his job at the center, but the director there found another job for him. And I thought that was positive because a lot of people came back and they couldn't find jobs, and they didn't they couldn't get back into regular life. So I was impressed with the director there that that he did take care of someone who came back. But I was not- I was detached from the whole thing. It didn't affect me that much. My husband had a cousin from the San Francisco area who had at least two tours in Vietnam. He was a marine and he had been injured in the war, and I know both of them have had had flashbacks and stuff all the rest of their lives. More or less. You know, part of the time they could kind of forget about it, but not- But I was not- I didn't think that much about the right or wrong of it. And I was not- I was just not really involved with that, I didn't do any demonstrating or anything like that. I know they were going on, that was going on a lot. But I was somehow just detached.
IT*:Do you remember having like, particularly strong feelings about any of it? Like any concern or anything like that? Or was it just like something that didn't really cross your mind much?
LM*:The reality of it just didn't sink in I think. It was there, and you see the movies on the, on the screen, and it's horrible, but then it's over and over and over and you get kind of numb to it after a while, and and nobody that I knew personally died over there. My brother-in-law came back, and he had struggled with smoking and drinking before he went and afterwards it was worse of course, but, um, I, I did though, I did it did impress me when the Vietnam veteran, who happened to be black besides, came back and, and the boss, the director, found a higher level job for him when he came back and promoted him. I thought that was a decent thing to do. But, I don't remember thinking about the right or wrong of the whole deal. I just wasn't that involved, so...
IT*:So, we've touched on this a little bit, but what, like, what social movements at the time were you aware of, and, um, like how tuned into those things were you, and what was, um, for yourself, and also for, like, your community, your family and friends, what was the general, like, attitude towards those movements? Thoughts on leaders in those movements?
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LM*:Well, I mean we could look here- I had, there was a Chinese family in Moscow who had a restaurant. One of the girls who was in my class, and she ended up being one of my very best friends. And we're still in touch and all that. She was the only Chinese. There was a black family, obviously black. I mean, later on, after I look back, I thought there were a lot of people there who had mixed blood, but, but we didn't talk about it. That didn't register a lot. But we had one black family. There was a boy a year ahead of me in school and a couple of girls that worked at the Kenworthy theater as ushers and concession stands people. And we had- there was a Native American boy in my class who is a good friend of mine back in grade school, and it irritated me 'cause one of the kids that were supposed to be one of his best friends would tease him or joke with him about walking like an Indian, and being pigeon toed like an Indian, and sneaking up on people, like an Indian could sneak up on you or something. And I just thought that's not something you say to a friend of yours. But and then, of course, we watched Cowboys and Indians on Saturday mornings on TV. But somehow, um, I mean, there where just so few that there wasn't any need to see any prejudice. The Chinese family was all very intelligent, so I didn't get exposed to prejudice that way. I know there were demonstrations later on, up on campus here, with the war and everything.
When I left Moscow I went to Pepperdine College, which was in LA at that time, and that was the summer of '65, which was the summer of the Watch Riots down there, so we became aware of that because Pepperdine was not that far away from Watts, and they kept in touch with us as it came time for me to go down there. They were in August and I was supposed to go to school in August. And they kept telling us, "The campus is open, we'll be open and will let you know if it's not going to be," and when I got there- and of course our our dorm was integrated at that point, there were black girls and there were white girls on the same floors, and classes of course were all integrated, but it was a different experience for me to have that many people and then knowing the neighborhood around Pepperdine was becoming more integrated, there, it was becoming more black, and so we were warned as white girls not to walk, not to leave campus alone, not to walk around, even at the broad daylight stuff, we were supposed to go alone from campus grounds. Which, I mean, I just thought everybody- people and people, so I wasn't afraid, but I never participated in those kind of activities. In demonstrations or anything. But I always felt that we had a lot of social wrongs that needed to be fixed and they needed to be equal opportunity and, and treating other people like other people.
And I don't, I know in the 1960 election between Nixon and Kennedy we were we put up a board, a display in the hal,l you know, for the election and stuff, and it seemed like most of the class was in favor of Nixon, and there was one other girl and I that was favor of Kennedy, and so we thought he should have some space out there on the board too. Of course, I didn't say anything 'cause I was shy and quiet, but the other gal was more talkative, and so she did do something that way.
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But- And I remember my Chinese friend, back then her grandparents were still in China, and she was talking about they were trying to get them out of China. And I thought, "Well what's the big deal? Just bring him over here." But, of course, that wasn't possible in those days. And I, I didn't know that. I wasn't that aware of that yet either. Yeah, I don't know, does that answer your question?
IT*:Yeah it does, it does. So... Again, this is a little bit redundant, 'cause we've been talking about this the whole time, but were there any, like, issues or anything that you did have any, like, strong convictions about? Even if you didn't necessarily protest or, like, take public action? Like, were there things that you had strong thoughts and feelings on?
LM*:I did. I did have strong feelings about segregation. I thought it was wrong. I worked at Caltech to- the replacement for the guy who had come back from Vietnam, you know, was also black. He was an art student at Cal State Los Angeles I think it was, and I remember- well the guy that came back from Vietnam then, there were group of us in the office that would go to lunch together, and I never thought about it at the time, but I think there's one time we went to a restaurant- he was the only black guy and he had three or four white- young white women with him, and it seemed like there was a time at a restaurant that there was a question whether they could serve us or not. If there was room, and we could look around and see that there was plenty of room in there, and so I, I didn't think too much of it at the time, but then afterwards I thought, "What was that about?"
And then there was a party that- a work party related, a holiday gathering, out in La Cañada I think it was. Anyway, there were three of us that wanted to go together, the black guy that worked in the library, and then another gal, and I were gonna drive together. Well, she had a little MG, which really helped two people, and he had a car but it didn't have reverse at that time, so he didn't wanna drive. I had a a Chevy that was a four speed on the floor that I wasn't comfortable driving on hills with, so I asked Ron if he would drive, so he did, but then we started going up on the hills and he was not real comfortable with it either, and so he pulled over he said he probably shouldn't drive. And so the other gal did drive, but I thought afterwards, I wondered too if it was partly there was this black man with two white women in a car. And maybe the visual was not what it should have been, and could have caused problems otherwise. So I was aware of those kind of things, and I thought they were very wrong, but I, I didn't demonstrate or anything. I just tryed to treat the people I knew as people, and I- we're all different. I mean some white people I like, some white people I don't. And the same for black people. There were some I didn't care for, but some that I did. And- But segregation and, and inequality. Seeing they couldn't live in a lot of areas.
When we bought our first house up to the hills, the house next door was rented out, and at one point a black family moved in there, and I think some of the rest of the neighborhood did not like that at all. And then, about that time that we were selling our house, so there was concern that we would sell it to a black family. And those things just really bothered me. It wasn't fair.