Helen David

HELEN DAVID: Morning.

SADY SULLIVAN: Hello is this Helen David?

HELEN DAVID: Yes.

SADY SULLIVAN: Hello.

HELEN DAVID: Yes it is.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh great hi! This Sady Sullivan from the Brooklyn Historical Society.

HELEN DAVID: Yeah, good.

SADY SULLIVAN: Is now still a good time to do an interview?

HELEN DAVID: Yes it is just let me fold the paper, so I won't make noise.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay.

HELEN DAVID: Okay, fine.

SADY SULLIVAN: Alright, so um I am recording this conversation. Do I have your permission to do that?

HELEN DAVID: Yes.

SADY SULLIVAN: Great. So, well, what -- uh -- the process for the interview -- um -- I will start off asking you just some a little bit of biographical 1:00information and then we'll talk about your time working in the Navy Yard and then, um, your reflections on that after you stopped working in the yard. And then, since we're doing this by phone I will mail a release form to you and if you agree to put the interview in the archives here at the Brooklyn Historical Society and at the Brooklyn Navy Yard Archives, then you can sign the release form and mail it back.

HELEN DAVID: Good, um hmm.

SADY SULLIVAN: And, ah, I will give you a copy of the recording that we make today.

HELEN DAVID: Oh, good.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay, um -- so to formally start today is May 7, 2010 and I'm Sady Sullivan with the Brooklyn Historical Society. This interview is for the Brooklyn Navy Yard oral history project. And, now if you would introduce yourself to the recording.

HELEN DAVID: Well, I'm Helen Robertson David, I was Helen Robertson during my 2:00days at the Navy Yard.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm. And what's your birthdate?

HELEN DAVID: Five, twenty -- no [date redacted for privacy] '23.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow, your birthday is coming up.

HELEN DAVID: That's right, huh. I'm not looking forward to it.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh. [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: Well what can you say?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um -- and where were you born?

HELEN DAVID: I was born in Montreal, Canada.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh. And what about your parents, tell me a little bit about them?

HELEN DAVID: Well, [laughter] my father and his mother were born in South Africa. My father was born there in 1890 and I figure my grandmother went back another thirty or forty years. They were, grandmother was of English stock and 3:00the grandfather was Scottish. And they lived in South Africa intending to live forever -- there forever, but my grandfather took his family of six to see England and Scotland and the environ [phonetic], including sending the children to France to school for a year. They were interrupted on this grand tour by the Bore War.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: Therefore, at one point my grandfather returned to South Africa to protect his property and I understand he became a remount for the English. And that apparently means getting horses from who knows where.

SADY SULLIVAN: Hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Over and four children, four older children were still in England with their mother but then my grandfather got ill and grandmother and baby excuse me, went back, went back to South Africa leaving the children in the care of a minister. This lasted for four years and from what I hear from all of my first cousins, the children hated this couple that they lived with.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: Were cheaps, and they would take my grandfather's money and give that to the children, their own, and give their, my family, my father's family hand-me-downs.

SADY SULLIVAN: Umm.

HELEN DAVID: And they have a did last for four years. When my grandfather and grandmother came back after the War, I think they were pretty flat in money.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Previous to that they had help and all that all that goes with it. They tossed a coin, from what I've been told, whether to go to Australia or Canada. And Canada won.

SADY SULLIVAN: Umm.

HELEN DAVID: So at seventeen, with my father's education stopped at that point, temporarily, he went into work as a plumber in Montreal. They chose professions that would always be needed.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And one uncle became an electrician.

SADY SULLIVAN: And do you know?

HELEN DAVID: And then, yes?

SADY SULLIVAN: Do you know why they choose Montreal of, of, from other places in Canada?

HELEN DAVID: No, I you know never thought to ask.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I guess it was one of the nearest entrees, that's why -- I don't know.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Of, my mother comes from Lithuania, she entered America, the United States, through Ellis Island in about, she was born in 1890, she came in about, 1902.

SADY SULLIVAN: Umm.

HELEN DAVID: She was twelve years old, only had the family, a few cousins and sisters and had to support herself and did support herself from the age of twelve.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow.

HELEN DAVID: In the dress making industry.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow.

HELEN DAVID: Somehow or other, she had a brother in Montreal and she went to stay with him after a number of years where she met my father. They married in New York, because they could not have a non-sectarian marriage in Montreal.

SADY SULLIVAN: Umm.

HELEN DAVID: Then, apparently, they lived in Brooklyn for a while and went back to Canada, to Montreal where I was born.

SADY SULLIVAN: And why did they want to have a non-sectarian marriage?

HELEN DAVID: Well, they didn't want to, they were not religious.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: They went -- um -- they live, my father plumbed in Montreal, and I 8:00guess my mother was a stay at home housewife. There was a land boom in Florida in 1925. And a building boom also, of course.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And so my parents thought they would head for Florida to participate in it, because that was his trade. However, there was a limit to how many South African people could enter this country. The limit was 100.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ooh.

HELEN DAVID: And my mother was considered a South African at this point.

SADY SULLIVAN: Right.

HELEN DAVID: Therefore, I think they had number 100 and 101 they could not enter in 1925. They had to relocate, I guess they gave up their apartment, or they 9:00called it a flat up there.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: To another -- uh -- part of town which I, I recall certain aspects of that. And, they finally were allowed to enter the country in 1926, I'm three years old at this point. However, the boom was over in Florida, so they went as far as New York and settled in Brooklyn.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ah.

HELEN DAVID: Therefore I was, as you can see, I was educated in Brooklyn all the way through my bachelor's degree.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm. And so can you, for the recording, can you tell me, because I know from, from some of our emails I know where you went to school, but can you tell me about your education in Brooklyn?

HELEN DAVID: Well, I started in [laughter], sounds funny, in PS 161 and then my parents heard that they were building a new school not far away called a PS 241 10:00and they thought they would take advantage of that for their darling daughter. And, we moved into the 241 area, we had a march from 161 through the streets as a whole, the whole half the school went and entered 241, PS 241.

SADY SULLIVAN: And what neighborhood is that?

HELEN DAVID: Umm, I guess it could be called Crown Heights, it was off Washington Avenue -- President's Street.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh yeah.

HELEN DAVID: Out there.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, I stayed there, well this is Depression time, and they were anxious to get the children pushed ahead.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, during these few years I, I, skipped a couple of classes and that was the term that we used.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: They would take half a dozen kids, or they might take a whole class 11:00and call it rapid advance.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: This is what happened to us in 241 when we entered. At sixth grade, there was an offer to go to junior high school, and this was at junior high school 210 which was, I guess, well I don't know if you'd call it East New York, on Rochester Avenue and St. John's or St. Mark's?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I finished my two years, three years in two, because that was the purpose of sending us. They called the classes RA, RB, RC, and RD for Rapid Advance to begin with and then the B and C, and somehow or other we got three years work pushed into two.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Therefore, when I went to Erasmus Hall High School, I entered as a sophomore.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ooh.

HELEN DAVID: At, um, 1936 I was thirteen I guess, and I graduated from Erasmus Hall High School at the age of sixteen in 1939. Next step was Brooklyn College.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Which is a fairly new college then.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And where I eventually met my husband.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I graduated from Brooklyn College in 1943, war time.

SADY SULLIVAN: And, and what was your major?

HELEN DAVID: I was a science major.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Although at that time they didn't give a Bachelor's of Science, they only gave BAs, so it was a BA in Science.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And was that, I mean people still talk about women in the sciences, what about in at that time with how many women were in the sciences?

HELEN DAVID: But you know there were any like I said, my, my whole sorority was composed of science majors.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: There were plenty, but this is war time.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So little by little the men, or boys would come in one day and say I have my draft notice I have to go.

SADY SULLIVAN: Mmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, by the time I graduated the proportion of women was much greater then it would have been.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Because almost every man was at war.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I mean just that was -- that's it, everyone was in uniform except those that I think teaching and in the sciences and or the four Fs, the ones who didn't meet the requirements.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um, what do you mean that the people, the men who were teaching weren't being drafted?

HELEN DAVID: Ah -- they needed teachers so I think they let, um, I think some teachers did not get drafted by the fact that they were teachers, probably 14:00science and math teachers.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Were favored.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, the prospects for a science major, I mean there's no question about going and getting a job at that time.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And the prospects of being a science, ah, employee were very poor the alternative was either working for, in a doctor's office perhaps for five dollars a week --

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: -- or going to the Department of Health in New York City where one of my friends went and subsequently got typhoid fever from her experimentations.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ahh.

HELEN DAVID: And um, Eleanor Capson, with whom you spoke --

SADY SULLIVAN: Yes --

HELEN DAVID: -- went to the Navy Yard and she had been there for several months and she encouraged me. She was my great mentor even though we were about the 15:00same age.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: She encouraged me to apply for a position in the Navy Yard. I've already told you that at that time there were no professional sub-professional openings left, but they wanted me so I got the rating of a, um, unclassified employee. Of the people unclassified employees scrubbed the toilets, washed the floors, and did menial jobs. But the whole bunch of us came in. Girls came in as unclassified employees. And the only advantage of that or difference was that I got time and a half on Saturday.

SADY SULLIVAN: Umm.

HELEN DAVID: And the others got time and a third, or so. So that was the beginning of my career in the Navy Yard.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And, so tell me what you were doing?

HELEN DAVID: We had, we had all sorts of jobs. Some of the jobs involved testing materials that were going to be used by the Navy. I was in the sound and optics laboratory. Therefore, we tested anything related to sound or optics. I remember, one of the first jobs, I had was dropping ball bearings on goggle glasses, or sun glasses for helmets and testing -- from a distance -- and testing whether they broke or not, and making recordings like that.

SADY SULLIVAN: Hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And the sound, one of the sound rooms was the soft sound room and it was filled with fiber glass, so that really you could barely hear anything. 17:00And among things there I tested fans, electric fans. Another room was the loud sound room and that one was made to have as many echoes as possible. And there, I recall testing earphones and they would subject the exterior to louder and louder decibels, more and more decibels, and to find out what we could hear through the earphones.

SADY SULLIVAN: So was that experiment, was, was a person actually wearing the earphones?

HELEN DAVID: Yes, a number would be in the room. I was a partially blame that maybe for being deaf in one ear, but anyhow that was what we were subjected to. Again, we had the earphones on but a lot of the noise came through, penetrated. 18:00Then there were other things we did, I did a little drafting for one of the engineers, we had an office filled with, perhaps, with eight engineers, ten, I'm not sure, twelve possibly. And we had three or four girls by the end of the year that I was there, doing what I was doing, and also typing out reports that were going to go for -- ahh they were inspection reports that the engineers turned in.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, higher authorities. Part of the thing I was doing was using a Leroy pen to make typos under their pictures and diagrams which I thought was 19:00kindergarten work, after a little while I had --

SADY SULLIVAN: Ex--

HELEN DAVID: -- I had suggested using carbon paper reversed. If you use carbon paper in reverse, you get a print in the front and print in the back. Which I thought was adequate but not as pretty. So that was beginning to discourage me.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um, can you explain what, I don't know what a Leroy pen is?

HELEN DAVID: Okay, it's -- it was a three-pointed instrument, so it was shaped like a triangle and there was a point from each angle, end of the angle at the end. We also had a ruler with, um, engraved type, if you slid one of the points 20:00along the lower, a straight line, and the other point over the letter, traced the letter, the third point had ink in it and was applied to the paper.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh, I see.

HELEN DAVID: So, we would slide the, the rule back and forth and just fill that out to make sure we spaced it properly.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, it was really at a time of war, a terrible time waster.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And so the carbon paper idea, that would have been then in your own lettering and not --

HELEN DAVID: Ah that's right we, we had the old-fashioned typewriters and, um, it would give it a double darkness which would be essentially making it bold.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, but that was rejected, it wasn't pretty enough.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: We had any number of jobs related. I remember testing the search lights. They would come in intermittently and we would test the spread of the beam, and the depth of each, the beam, at each point.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I don't remember much else of what we did.

SADY SULLIVAN: I think in one of your emails you said signal lamps, was that similar to the search lights?

HELEN DAVID: That's what I'm referring to.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay.

HELEN DAVID: The signal lamps.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay.

HELEN DAVID: That we used on the ships.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Um, you also mentioned in, in the emails that there was a big concern about being on time. Can you tell me about that?

HELEN DAVID: Huh, well they tried, you know as, to this day is to the problem of getting everyone to get there -- ah -- on time. People, some people were always late.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: For a while they tried docking them, with a whole day's pay. I don't think that worked, or there may have been too many complaints. Again, this, I never had that problem, so it didn't involve me, it's just what I heard.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Another possibility was working an extra hour, if they were two minutes late in the morning, stay for an extra hour, because the lab was, ah, open for ten hours a day and most of our workdays to were eight hours.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So that was a possibility. Did, ah I don't know if they docked money, I don't remember.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I told you about the one time that I went by car and there was a 23:00possibility of our being late, and we ran it was double day light saving time, very dark, winter, and we ran all the way into the lab to get into the, to the Navy Yard, to get in on time. We had to get not only in to the Navy Yard, but up to our floor in the elevator and get to our punch clock. We, we had punch cards. I don't know if the SPs had punch cards, I think just us, the just the, ah lab workers. Now, there were all sorts of men who were doing testing of various other types, I know there were electricians that I was friendly with, and so, ah, the whole floor consisted of an office for the professionals, and then a front office for the prof -- the engineers and the sub-professionals. And then 24:00the whole back of the floor was for the real work, the mechanics, and they were also I think on on-time and a-half, and the same, so we had punch clocks.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Going in, we had to punch out for lunch even though we didn't -- I think I can only remember going out of the building four times and that was to see the Missouri being built.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ooh.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, think later, what did I write, the Fran, the Benjamin Franklin, what was his name? It's a nick name. If my husband were near, he'd remind me.

SADY SULLIVAN: Was it a ship? Ship?

HELEN DAVID: The ship, it was a flat top, Benjamin Franklin, but it wasn't the Benjamin Franklin, it was his nick name.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um, um, I'm looking here you mentioned a ship named the Bonhomme Richard?

HELEN DAVID: That -- yeah? I guess it wasn't, Benjamin Franklin?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I don't know who it was?

SADY SULLIVAN: Or maybe that was another one too?

HELEN DAVID: No, there, there just the two. While I was there the Missouri was finished and the Bonhomme Richard.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And, so what, where was the building that you were, where was the sound and optic laboratory?

HELEN DAVID: Under the antenna you were talking about?

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh, right.

HELEN DAVID: It was right near the front.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Of one of the entrances, our entrance.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm

HELEN DAVID: I don't remember the name of the street, but you know, you have it.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm, um-hmm. And, um, so that building was over looking the Missouri being built? Is that right?

HELEN DAVID: Yes.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: It was in dry dock. And, it seems to me that our windows, of course there was no air conditioning and our louvered windows were overlooking it. Or, 26:00there may have been a stretch -- ah we may have had to stick our heads out to see it. It's possible --

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: The dry dock wasn't all the way up front, it was a little bit back.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And so you saw, did you see the launching of the Missouri?

HELEN DAVID: I don't know? I thought I did but I don't, I'm not sure.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: It depends if it was lunch hour or not.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm

HELEN DAVID: And a lunch hour was a half an hour.

SADY SULLIVAN: And so you said that you didn't usually leave the building, where would you eat your lunch?

HELEN DAVID: You know I spoke to Eleanor about it, and we don't remember, and I'm beginning to think that there was a kind of a ladies, a very primitive ladies lounge. And, behind the bathroom section, toilet section, there were, there was a chaise and a chair and a couple of benches, there may have been a 27:00table. And, I guess we brought our own lunch, or maybe we ate at the desk?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Ah, the four times I went out was, again it was spring time, I had a friend in another division and we just decided we wanted to see the outside world. I don't know if that was taboo or not, but we did it. And meanwhile, Eleanor had left.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: She had a teaching job.

SADY SULLIVAN: And so what did you do when you, when you did go outside?

HELEN DAVID: Well, we had a little time to walk to where we had to go, that means we had to walk to the Missouri a little bit, I guess? And, um, there was no eating in between. I do believe, now it's funny the exp -- yes, there used to a ten o'clock, a person who came at ten with food to buy. Because I put on five 28:00pounds in that one year.

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: At that time I was very proud of it, my mother had always thought I was too skinny, and here I put on five pounds, whoopie! [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter] So what kind of food was coming around?

HELEN DAVID: Oh, potato chips, you know junk like that, nothing nourishing that I know of --

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: --or that I remember. Maybe cookies?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And so where were you living at the time when you were working at the Navy Yard?

HELEN DAVID: I was living at 5093, no I was living at 1776 Bedford Avenue.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ah and so is that what part of, what neighborhood is that?

HELEN DAVID: Well, it was the beginning of Flatbush, it was the ba -- you know near Ebbets Field.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh yeah.

HELEN DAVID: And it was -- um -- just below Empire Boulevard --

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: --there it was level ground.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: That's why it was part of Flatbush, whereas my former, one of my 29:00former residences was up the hill a bit between that and Eastern Parkway.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And that was already called Crown Heights.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Um-hmm. And so you also mentioned in the emails that even though you had grown up in, in Brooklyn, when you went to the Navy Yard there was something about you being born in Canada?

HELEN DAVID: Yes. Therefore, instead, I graduated from college in June 20th and other people went to work on June 21st, but I was held up -- excuse me -- because I only had my father's citizenship papers. So they had to go through a security check, I guess.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: It took ten days, so I had a vacation.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Which was good.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um another thing that you mentioned in, in the emails was something about a power station accident?

HELEN DAVID: Yes, that, that, now say alright you're helping me, the power station was directly across from the materials laboratory.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: A little bit behind that was the dry dock so I guess we had to stick our heads out of the windows to see it. That clarifies that, I think?SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: The lights went out briefly in our office and, um, soon after the ambulances came to the power station building and they took out one, at least one charred person, completely charred.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: And dead. Did I say there were two? If I did there was ah, if, ah, there were two dead, if I said that then that was correct because that was a year ago, I had better memory. And there was third with -- who was alive with a charred hand.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um. And what had caused the accident?

HELEN DAVID: Oh something in there, that they, who knows?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: That's one of these things you don't know, there was no newspaper that I can recall that reported it. So?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Um was there, was there a union or a shop number or anything for the materials testing lab?

HELEN DAVID: Not that I know.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Of. Just mine was sound and optics and, ah, my other, Eleanor 32:00worked in another one, I don't know, I don't think she remembered the name of her lab.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I spoke to her recently and, um, my other friend I don't remember the name of that either -- there was -- various, every aspect of materials they had to go into the Navy, had to be tested, I think in Eleanor's lab they tested wires. They had, um, um, containers which were blowing salt which were circulating saltwater over them, various conditions I guess and under different temperatures. But, I didn't go down there much.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I think again, to go back to the eating, they possibly, my friends would join me in that room. But, we had, um the two of us have no recollection.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: But we didn't, we weren't there that long.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And how did you feel about the work that you were doing?

HELEN DAVID: Well, again, at the beginning it was great, it was interesting. But after a while, I realized that, that was no future for me. And um, Eleanor already was teaching. So I took a -- an education course at night, the last six months that I was there. Not that that had much to do with teaching, really, it's ridiculous. But, um, I decided that was really what I should do.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And so I had applied, no one could leave the Navy Yard really, but I applied to the Admiral to be released and I was told, of course, I would not ever get another job for the Navy, blah blah blah. But, he released me.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um, so can you explain that to me a bit more, so why was it that people couldn't leave?

HELEN DAVID: This is war time.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I think that's the whole point.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Things were different, we were working for the government.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: In war, a very serious war at that time. So, you just didn't quit.

SADY SULLIVAN: Right.

HELEN DAVID: Or you quit and lost your reputation but, ah, as far as I was concerned, I wanted to do things the proper way.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And that's what I did.

SADY SULLIVAN: And so when the Admiral did release you did you, how did, you know, how did you get him to do that? How was that agreement made?

HELEN DAVID: Shall I say charm? [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: No. [laughter] I tried, I just tried to reason, ah in fact I gave some of the reasons that I gave you that it was ridiculous. I could really be doing more for the country educating its children.

SADY SULLIVAN: Right.

HELEN DAVID: You know, you have to use the patriotic, which was true.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Because I eventually did go to teach I was, I taught in a school 35:00that had not had teachers throughout the war, ah about eight teachers were missing. Anyway, I'm jumping so I'll go back to that. After, I did not have any preparation for teaching so I had to get my master's degree.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: In education, in science education.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I did that at Teachers College in a part of Columbia University.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm, and --

HELEN DAVID: And for five cents I could go from Bedford Avenue all the way up to 116th Street.

SADY SULLIVAN: That's a long commute.

HELEN DAVID: Well, I guess I studied.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And so were you, were you getting your master's while you were working at the Navy Yard?

HELEN DAVID: No, no. Only that one, that three-point course that I took at Brooklyn College, ah, was the only course I took while I was in the Navy Yard.

SADY SULLIVAN: I see. So you, it was after you left the Navy Yard that you went 36:00back to get your master's?

HELEN DAVID: That's right, my father supported me through that.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm, um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, I guess I was eligible, but again there was an emergency, there's a lack of teachers. Because a lot of them were men so that there we are, they were drafted.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, of course, men that -- well, I don't know if men, men that were already teaching were taken so much as there has to be a constant new supply. And there wasn't a supply of men. So, I got to teach, I went to teach in a very difficult school in, in, at the border line of Williamsburg and Bed-Stuy.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, I did my best -- at that time.

SADY SULLIVAN: Why was it a difficult school?

HELEN DAVID: We had -- a combination of pupils, um, I believe it was about a third Jewish, a third Black, and a third Hispanic.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, not that they didn't behave in other classes and not that there weren't smart children, but the science teacher at that time, I had fourteen classes two periods a week. So, I couldn't be taken seriously. I did not have a lab to teach in.

SADY SULLIVAN: Mmm.

HELEN DAVID: And actually the pupils helped cooperate in getting, ah, an Ursa lab set up. Some of them came with a metal drawer, metal lined drawer which we turned upside down and that was my lab table. I, instead of, we had no gas 38:00supply, it was a regular classroom. And, um, I had a Bunsen burner instead of a, a regular gas burner.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, I improvised some sort of water jug that I was able to siphon off water. Um, now you said why, why was it a difficult school?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: There, children who didn't have teachers were sent to the auditorium and allowed to do what they wanted.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh, my goodness.

HELEN DAVID: Instead of teaching, they were reading comic books. And here eight young teachers coming in, ages twenty-one, twenty-two, and I guess they didn't, 39:00a beginning teacher always has trouble. No matter where. So, that was difficult.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Fortunately for me, Eleanor's husband who taught in, it was at that time called Manual Training High School, which later -- what did it become, Charles? Manual Training High School? But -- in --

CHARLES DAVID: John Jay.

HELEN DAVID: -- John Jay, became John Jay, eventually.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh yes.

HELEN DAVID: Yup, in um, anyway he persuaded me to, um, leave this school, I wasn't going to, I was honored bound to get into this school, and ah I thought to stay, I remained to stay, but he persuaded me that I'd be much happier at, uh, Manual Training, and I was.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Now all this time we had to take teaching exams of various sorts. My husband's in the kitchen, I'm going to shift to the other phone.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay.

[Interview interrupted.]

HELEN DAVID: Hi, is that you again?

SADY SULLIVAN: It is, yes, I think we got, we got disconnected.

HELEN DAVID: Okay, well now I'm on the um handset.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay, good.

HELEN DAVID: All right. So, I didn't --

SADY SULLIVAN: So, I see you were --

HELEN DAVID: -- realize that it went off.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh, that's okay. You said that you were, you had to take while, so you were taking teaching exam?

HELEN DAVID: Oh yeah, I was running through the different things. Now that was for a substitute teacher.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: License, there were several licenses, substitute that I took in 42:00past through the years. Substitute teacher in the junior high school level. Substitute teacher in the high school level. Permanent teacher in the junior high school level. Permanent teacher in the high school level.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um hmm.

HELEN DAVID: There was a pay differential in those days. And I also took a lab, um assistant who ran the labs in the science labs in the high school. There were five exams. I guess I had already taken the, both the, the during the time I was in this school, I can't remember the name of the schools anymore. Anyway, at the time, I took the junior high, I took a senior high sub so therefore I was able 43:00to get into Arthur Capson's school and that was much better.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: There was more discipline in the school and, um, it just was great. And, it had a wonderful chairman who was able to supervise me and advise me. When I went into the junior high school, the first junior high school, I was, I walked in one day and I said, and they said "Teach," and that was it. I mean, I had no particular preparation, I thought there'd be more. And, um, as I say it was kind of a difficult -- ah -- beginning for a young person.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Anyhow, so that I was there, but while I was at, now, now, this now we're working into the end of the War. In fact, when I was in the junior high school, the reason that I'm talking to you about, on May 15th one of the boys said to me "Mrs., Miss Robertson, the War is over in Europe." And with that I'm 44:00placing you, I'm giving you a time.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Then, let's see, I was working in the, at the junior high school, and during that time, in the -- the high school, and um, towards the end of the time there, I got married. The men were coming home.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I married my husband, he had been overseas for a few years.

SADY SULLIVAN: So, was he overseas when you were working in the Navy Yard?

HELEN DAVID: He was overseas, exactly, he went, ah, he left while I was in the Navy Yard. Charlie, get out of the room, this is being recorded. We'll get a recording [inaudible] [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: [laughter] So he's been banished alright.

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: So, and he's still around which is good. Yes, um, you asked me, the 45:00last question was?

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh -- was, was that he was, so he was overseas when you were working?

HELEN DAVID: He was overseas, as a matter of fact, the reason I didn't go directly into education is because I had a lisp. And that lisp, ah in New York, in those days would just make -- no possible possibility of teaching, in fact, they wouldn't even teach me in Brooklyn College. They wouldn't let me take education courses because I lisped.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh, my goodness!

HELEN DAVID: When he came back, I had gotten rid of the lisp, or I wouldn't have gotten into any of these jobs.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: At that time, now I'm going to my experience at Teachers College.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I took a voice diction course and I didn't learn, all I learned was to become more like a New Yorker, I was taught to say "New Yawwk," believe it or 46:00not? And, got rid of my "r" that I used to have.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: From my parents' background, I guess.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, what they had in those days, it did not have tape recorders available to the public. But this voice and diction lab had what they call the voice machine. Or voice mirror, maybe? We um would sign up for time, fifteen minute intervals or a half an hour, I don't recall which. And, fortunately for me no one else would turn up. So, I was able to talk to myself and listen to myself on the tape recorder for hours and got rid of the lisp.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow -- that's amazing, that's really neat.

HELEN DAVID: It had to be, it had to be. Now the first speech test that I had, ah, of course I'll never forget it, because in it I had to read about the 47:00wallpaper hanger who divided the room into fourths, fifths, sixths, and sevenths, and there was that "s." [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I passed. I passed. Anyhow, when my husband came back from the army, we weren't married yet. Came back from the army, I spoke differently, I spoke like a New Yorker.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I didn't have a lisp anymore.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, all that changed while he was away. I remember writing to him and asking him what he thought I should do? This is during the Navy Yard time, ah whether I should try to become a teacher? It's something I had really wanted to do from first grade. I liked the idea. And, ah, he was very non-committal, he would never, um, didn't, ah, didn't want to influence me. So there was no help 48:00from that quarter.

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: But again, the Leroy pens did it. Anyhow, there I am, and, um, I'm at Manual Training and during that time I was taking a test for the permanent junior high school teacher. Now that also consisted of the a, the written, the, ah, short answer, the essay, that took a day. And then we had to have a, um, teaching test where we were sent to a school that we had never been to. There were a couple of supervisors there, and assigned a class and a lesson. I went to Girls High School for that.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Which was fortunate, because girls can be nicer than boys and girls together.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, my lesson was, the beginning circulation, beginning of circulation and for that one, no, I'm sorry that was my high school one. Can I go back on that?

SADY SULLIVAN: Sure.

HELEN DAVID: I was sent to Bay Ridge High School and, um, it was snowing so there was a very small attendance there. And my lesson was magnetism.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: But that was junior high school topic. My lesson was magna -- they gave me, either, generally they'd give you one period, forty-five minutes to prepare. But, since it was science and I had to order materials, science majors got, or perspective science teachers got an hour and a half, two forty-five 50:00minute periods.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: To order the materials, and then you had to, the lesson was magnetism there weren't many kids there, and someone was sitting in the back listening, and apparently, ah I got a, uh, grade number -- 79, or 85, or 94, I don't recall which appears in the newspapers eventually. And then there was an interview, a speech test, I passed. And that's why I was able to go and become a permanent teacher and that was in 252 in Brooklyn. That was East Flatbush. I was there for two years.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, had passed during that time my high school biology teachers test. And that was the one where I had to teach the beginning lesson was on circulatory system. I took what was, a daring chance because this one involved 51:00looking at the blood circulating through the tail of a goldfish.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: It involved a microscope, it involved wrapping the poor goldfish in wet cotton around the gills and maybe mouth, so that it could get its oxygen that way.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow, so they were live goldfish?

HELEN DAVID: Live goldfish. Spreading the tail, putting it in a Petri dish, spreading the tail out, putting a little glass slide over the tail, putting it under the microscope, and having the whole class look at it. The fish could have flipped, the fish could have died.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: It did none of these things, it finished, the people went through 52:00and, um, I got it back in the water and it swam away.

SADY SULLIVAN: That sounds great, I want to see that lesson. [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: [laughter] Well, I'm telling you it was a wild thing to do because anything terrible could have happened.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I've heard of people, I've, one man who thought that it was going to be easy -- at taking the teachers test. And he decided to run a film. The only thing is that we really had, we had to set up the machines ourselves and this film came in backwards and upside down.

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: That was the end for him --

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: -- for the time. Anyhow, it was very con, worried about getting these jobs because they hadn't offered teaching examinations for about fourteen years and I felt, here I'm a youngster, and um and all these old thirty-four and forty year old people taking the exam and they might have a much better chance.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: But anyhow, I got through and, the also there was the, the results were in the regular, maybe the Eagle, maybe regular newspapers. I don't know.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I went on to Washington Irving High School, leaving Brooklyn, almost forever.

SADY SULLIVAN: Where did, so when did you go to Washington Irving?

HELEN DAVID: In 1948.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Because they were building Stuyvesant Town then.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And very, and I just hoped, I had to go and get to have an interview to get into that school.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I hoped that a department would be ready for us in Stuyvesant Town and a few months later it was.

SADY SULLIVAN: Mmm.

HELEN DAVID: So then I was right near -- within either bus distance or walking, long walking distance.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: From Washington Irving. And, we moved from Brooklyn, we were 54:00doubled up in my parents' apartment. Got into Stuyvesant Town and lived there for five years.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: While there I started to have children. The first baby, after teaching a year or so, the first baby died, and I went back to teaching at Washington Irving. But, then a year or so later, two years later, I had my next child and the move, the big move was to get out of New York City. I was on maternity leave.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, when I, we, I had the, that was a living boy and then a little girl. And, ah, everyone was moving out of Stuyvesant Town. I say 55:00everyone, but hundreds were moving out because 800 babies were being born a year there.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh wow.

HELEN DAVID: Stuyvesant Town was only open to veterans.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh, I didn't know that.

HELEN DAVID: Oh yes, it was um subsidized by Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, but the, but I guess the arrangement with the government was that they would only take veterans. Well, that was the time to reproduce.

SADY SULLIVAN: Right.

HELEN DAVID: And so they did. [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: [laughter] And that inspired me copycat sort of thing.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And that's when all that started. So, I wanted to go back, when I was ready to go back to teaching, I -- ah -- had moved to, ah, Valley Stream.

SADY SULLIVAN: On Long Island?

HELEN DAVID: On Long Island.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, I asked to go to Jamaica High School because that was 56:00within reasonable distance.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: But they said -- no you, I hadn't been there long enough and it, in the high school division. By then, by the way, the pay was equal from kindergarten through high school.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So there was no particular incentive to be in any one place for the money.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: They would not let me transfer to Jamaica High School and by the way, also, I had to promise never to have any more children.

SADY SULLIVAN: Whoa.

HELEN DAVID: Would you believe that? Yup, they, um -- yup, they didn't want anyone to be there for a while and then leave. This even happened in Valley Stream High School. While I had three sections and I had the problem with the first baby, so my tubes were tied. And, I actually had to tell them that.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Why?

HELEN DAVID: Which was pretty disgusting for modern days.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: But that's the way it was.

SADY SULLIVAN: Yeah, I really can imagine hearing that in the job interview. [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: Yes! Well, yeah.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: They would, because again what would happen, people would have babies and some would leave.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And they would rather keep, uh, save and have a steady staff. Anyway, I couldn't go back to Washington Irving.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: It would, I mean to commute from Valley Stream to New York would be over an hour. And, ah, I don't think there was any particular parking space on Irving Place.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Or 14th Avenue. 14th, what was it? 14th Street? 14th Street.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, um, anyhow I just had to quit and went for an interview in Valley Stream and I was looking out the building, it was about two blocks away from me in a different school district. And, um, they were adding an 11th grade, 58:00it was a six year school, and they were adding an 11th grade and so they needed teachers.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I had five years of experience and they were very happy to have me over the dead body of my chairman who didn't believe in women, as he put it, women science teachers.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ah.

HELEN DAVID: But, my principal insisted. So, I was in a department with all men for any number of years.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow.

HELEN DAVID: There.

SADY SULLIVAN: And they were that upfront about not wanting women there?

HELEN DAVID: Well that was the chairman, he was an odd person, he was a chemistry teacher and he chewed tobacco and he'd spit in the sink.

SADY SULLIVAN: Uh. [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: [laughter] And, um eventually when, it was not very good for me in relation to him because all the time he still regarded me as a woman who 59:00shouldn't be teaching science, Spanish would be okay but not science.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So with the next chairman came in about five years later, you know I blossomed, that was the beginning of my really enjoying life.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I taught for the next twenty --- over twenty-nine years there.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow.

HELEN DAVID: Yeah, and at sixty-two I retired.

SADY SULLIVAN: And when did you move to Arizona?

HELEN DAVID: Well, um, we were what we call snow birds for a while?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: In 19 -- we bought this house in 1995 and commuted for ten years, I was a New York resident.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Until five years ago.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: My husband got macular degeneration.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, couldn't drive, couldn't really read the paper, couldn't do this. So, moving back and forth was getting difficult.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: We were very fortunate that it was a time when we could get the best prices for the house.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm

HELEN DAVID: So we sold that house and already had this one and we've been here now, I just renewed my driver's license, a five year license.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So we've been here, full time residents, very horrible in the summer and we're reaching that time.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh yes.

HELEN DAVID: But otherwise you don't shovel the heat.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And do your children still live in New York?

HELEN DAVID: No, my, well my daughter died about twelve years ago.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh I'm sorry.

HELEN DAVID: She had a, she died in Florida, she had a brain tumor you know one of inoperable things.

SADY SULLIVAN: Mmm.

HELEN DAVID: So she died, and my son followed us here about four years ago.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh that's good, so he's nearby?

HELEN DAVID: Yes, we're a little family of three now.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And um, she didn't have, she married but she didn't have children.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And he's a bachelor, an old bachelor, and so that's who we are, a family of three.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, of course he doesn't live with us -- [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And there we are.

SADY SULLIVAN: And so when you were teaching did your time working in the Navy Yard ever come up when you were teaching science?

HELEN DAVID: Not really, no. Because we had set curriculum.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: It was rather simple, in New York it was much simpler than Valley Stream, I was quite surprised. In fact, I think they tried to teach too much to the kids in Valley Stream.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: It was harder for them.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: We used to have in, in um, junior high, for example, every day we 62:00would, it was like a magic show. We'd have an experiment and the kids would take notes. The, ah, the first, the very first experiment would be: does air have weight? And we'd show how air had weight. And then does air take up space? And there was an experiment with that one and it was just prescribed and we didn't have to, in the junior high we had to follow the syllabus, that was all there was to it.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Also in the high school, and sometimes we'd run into difficulty. We would have to rush evolution into three days or so. [laugther]

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: But, um, for one reason or another, but we had and then we did ecology too in at the end of the biology curriculum. The kids had to pass the 63:00regents, remember?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, again it was limited. So did ours, have to pass the regents exam.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: But by then there were fewer. When I went to high school there was a two year French regent and three year French regent, and a two year math and a I think then there was the, ah, intermediate algebra regent and, I'm sure of another trigonometry, trigonometry regent, you know? And, um, we also used to have a four year regent in English, whereas, well it's down to three.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And meanwhile, in the, when I left, and I think it's still the same way today with the seniors, really didn't dare any more, they had taken their regents and they were applying for college and, um, until, they -- not all of 64:00them felt that they had to put all their energy into high school.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, I was glad by then I wasn't teaching seniors anymore. In the junior high, in the um, I said it was a six year school, so that we took children in from seventh grade through twelfth.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um, in the when it was new?

HELEN DAVID: To this day.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh okay.

HELEN DAVID: See in Valley Stream they had two schools in the center of the town, they had a junior high school and they had a high school. Then the population increased, people were moving out in the '50s, they were moving out to the Island and they felt the need for two new, two more schools. And what they decided to do was to have a, two schools built the opposite the periphery of Valley Stream, way at the opposite

end, that's why the end of Valley Stream teaching was across, almost across the 65:00street from me. So, our school, instead of building two, they build Valley Stream South, which was a six year school, and way at the other end of town Valley Stream North, Valley Stream North which was a six year school and was actually not even in Valley Stream. It was in some, place called Franklin Square.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And still is, of course.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um, I realize looking at my notes that I forgot to ask you about, about D-Day when you were at the Yard?

HELEN DAVID: Okay. Let me take a sip of coffee.

SADY SULLIVAN: Sure.

HELEN DAVID: Well I felt that was a very sad day, because we were so concerned with the description of the landing that I don't think we did a good days work.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And that was important to do, after all they were, everybody was 66:00involved in the War.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, that was my, I have guilt feelings whenever you remind me of it. [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: Because, again, we just were too distracted.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: There was, a radio appeared from somewhere or other. Because I don't think we ever had a radio on.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: No such thing in those old days.

SADY SULLIVAN: So, someone actually brought it into the, like the room where you were working?

HELEN DAVID: Yes.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I told you about the marines at the entrance gates.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um, you did, but not on the recording so, so?

HELEN DAVID: Oh, not on the recording?

SADY SULLIVAN: Yes, so please do tell me.

HELEN DAVID: And um we were always embarrassed and we had to bring our Kotex's with us because the marines would look at our pocketbook contents to see that we 67:00weren't bringing in contraband. And we were, it was a different day, and those things embarrassed us.

SADY SULLIVAN: Right. And so they even, they had to look, even if they saw you every day? You know there wasn't?

HELEN DAVID: Every time you walked in, oh yes, we wore metal passes with our pictures on.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I guess I had to turn it in because I don't have that.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: All I have is the sign that says Ms. Robertson that was on my desk and I have that here.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh!

HELEN DAVID: All these years later. [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: Neat!

HELEN DAVID: Yeah, so they, um, yup, if you had to leave, you couldn't, I don't think we could leave the Yard but, during the day.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-.

HELEN DAVID: [laughter] Certainly not in that half an hour.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Anyhow, every time they were there stationed, a whole bunch of boots which were not in the picture anymore, in the photograph you sent me.

SADY SULLIVAN: Right.

HELEN DAVID: And, uh, they were there and we had to go through and show. We 68:00weren't body searched or anything, but, ah, pocketbooks.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I guess we had our lunch in the pocketbook, I really, I -- we don't remember any more.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: We had to have because there was no dining room.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: No cafeteria.

SADY SULLIVAN: And so were, would -- would men and women separate to go through the security, or was everybody?

HELEN DAVID: No, no just one at a time.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: As you arrived.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I suppose the marines were different each day too.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And what about the surrounding neighborhood? Did you ever, were there any places that you used to go around the Navy Yard?

HELEN DAVID: I don't think there was anything. First of all, we had an eight to ten hour, they were encouraged to have a ten hour day.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow.

HELEN DAVID: Yeah, and even the eight was very tiring, it was eight and half, but including the lunch. So the idea was to get there and to, um, get out. But we had a chocolate factory outside, I think it was the Rockayak [phonetic] 69:00Chocolate Factory so it smelled great. [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: That's what I recall, and I don't remember, I guess, it probably was resi -- I don't know I can't tell you. It may have been residential?

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. So what about the other people that you were working with, how would you describe the racial, cultural mix of, of your colleagues and the people, the other people you saw in the yard?

HELEN DAVID: Well, racial -- White.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Mostly Catholic and Protestant.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: A few Jewish people.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. And what about, um, the, you've told me a little bit 70:00about the men and women, the mix of men and women in your office. What about women doing other jobs? Did you, did you have contact with them?

HELEN DAVID: No, there were no other women there were just the four or five of us.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And we all had similar jobs, sometimes we'd be on it together, and sometimes separately. But, I think towards the end most of the time we were writing up the reports.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And maybe, maybe the mechanics were doing some of the reports that we were writing up.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: We typed them.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: We did the typing.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Are there other things that you remember, ah about the physical experience, like you said the smell of the chocolate factory. Were there other sounds or smells or that kind of?

HELEN DAVID: I don't remember too much. I took ah, it was a new neighborhood for me completely. It's funny how Brooklyn is self-divided.

SADY SULLIVAN: Yes.

HELEN DAVID: It, I'm thinking I'm sure the same thing if you were brought up in Brooklyn, ah you may, you had the similar experiences. There's a certain circle that I knew when I was in elementary school. It broadened when I went to junior high school. Broadened further when I went to high school, found children coming in from other neighborhoods that I hadn't, uh, known before and, um, or known of before? Because, Erasmas Hall was in Flatbush and then when I went to Brooklyn College there were people coming from all over Brooklyn and some from Queens. Queens College at the beginning, my first year there, hadn't been built. Freshmen, ah had to start our classes late, they had to start about -- um -- 10, 72:00so we, we stayed there until 5 and the upper classmen had some of the morning classes and they got out earlier. When I taught in Washington Irving the academic teachers also had to start later, I taught from 10: 30 'til 10 to 5.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ah.

HELEN DAVID: My first period was called a preparation period. This is at 10: 30. My next period was called a -- um -- an assignment, sit in the lunchroom or in the halls, a sort of guard position. My first teaching assignment was at 73:00something like 12 o'clock, and then I had lunch. My full teaching from that point was 2 to 5 pm. We were near the 3rd Avenue L and it was rush hour by my last period.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, the trains were, course we didn't have air conditioning, I don't think they have yet. But, um, the, the 3rd Avenue L trains were running constantly. You talk about outside, I had more outside impressions of that area. That era, then I do of the Navy Yard. Because, to say, it was mainly get to work, do our job, we enjoyed it and go home. Ha --- and sleep for a while. Exhausted.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Well I think I've, I've covered my Navy Yard questions 74:00and it's been so good talking with you. And, um, is there anything that I didn't think to ask about that you think would be important to have in this recording?

HELEN DAVID: Unfortunately, the things I might want to tell you are gone. Hah -- I don't remember.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh, but I think, I mean you've remembered so much, you've, these are really great details.

HELEN DAVID: Yes. I may have mentioned to you that, um, it was to the professional in charge of the floors advantage to have, have as many people as possible working for him. It meant a promotion in salary. And, so, I think they went out of their way to hire more people than necessary.

SADY SULLIVAN: Ah, oh, that's interesting, I haven't heard that.

HELEN DAVID: Oh, yes.

SADY SULLIVAN: And so, who were the supervisors? Who was your supervisor?

HELEN DAVID: Well, I don't remember his name, but he was the professional, number P1, I guess he was called P1. And then the professionals went down, the engineers may have been P2, P3, P4, I don't know. Um, but while I was in the Navy Yard a few men were returning from the War, already.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: I [laughter] remember one experience where I, these were the working men not the engineers because they were there all of the time, and I remember walking behind one of the young men that was returning from the War and he wasn't aware that I was there, and he used a four letter word.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I heard it, and he was so apologetic, you won't believe it.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: And he was, again, just it was my fault, but that that I came up upon him, but [laughter] that's the way that was too [laughter] then.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And, um, well, I guess, I mean that's a very minor incident, but I was just thinking about that.

SADY SULLIVAN: Yeah, no, that's exactly the kind of things that we're interested in, that really give, you get a sense of the mood of the Yard, which is, um.

HELEN DAVID: Yeah. And, and then there was a thirty year old electrician there who would tell us stories. He was in love with a woman of about eighteen, and was wondering whether a twenty year difference in their ages would matter. And he also taught us how to roll up a wire, ah, you don't just roll it in one hand 77:00and have the other hand, even with your vacuum cleaner, you have a cloth around the far end so that it passes through the cloth and gets clean, or if there are any splinters, you don't get them.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh!

HELEN DAVID: So, that's something to know. I should do that with my hose here because every time I roll up the hose I get, I get thorns in my hands.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: There's nothing but cac -- in my garden there's nothing but cactus and the deciduous trees all have thorns too.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So anyhow, that -- we did intermingle with them somehow. I told you I think in that how we did store our, our milk, now we must have bought the milk somewhere but I don't know? We stored our milk in the refrigerator.

SADY SULLIVAN: At the Navy Yard?

HELEN DAVID: At the Navy Yard. We, the refrigerators were not for us, they were for testing purposes. And sometimes they were in Fahrenheit and sometimes in Centigrade. And when I left, I got a bouquet of flowers and I put them in the wrong refrigerator, so that we -- so that I could wear them when they took me out to dinner, and, um, they wilted immediately. It was like putting lettuce in the freezer. So we did do that, and then we would put names on what we didn't want the engineers, not the engineers, but the mechanics to take our, our, milk. So, we would put the names of bacteria on them.

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: And then one day they, we took the name off our label and put their label on and their label was "piss." [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: So we didn't drink that milk. [laughter] And, we stopped doing it.

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: So, again we were young, it was fun.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And now I think about it.

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: My friend, Mildred Leipzig whom you interviewed?

SADY SULLIVAN: Yes.

HELEN DAVID: She told me you were a very nice young lady.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um, I really enjoyed meeting her and doing that interview, that was, ah, really fun.

HELEN DAVID: Yeah, we were together from elementary school from that 241.

SADY SULLIVAN: Oh.

HELEN DAVID: And that's how we met.

SADY SULLIVAN: Wow.

HELEN DAVID: And then she, ah, her older sister was ill and they moved to Florida, and we sort of never went to the same school again. I was already, and they were there long enough, and I was already in the junior high school.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: But it was a long friendship. The only thing is that I don't hear 80:00from her much, she's not a correspondent even by email. So, I just don't hear from her. You heard from her more recently then I. She just has written me an email that, you know, would I want to be interviewed. I said "why not," so --

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm, um-hmm. But you so, so I haven't done the math, I don't know when, based on when you were born, but you guys -- so how many, that's many decades of friendship?

HELEN DAVID: Well, from the time we were nine until -- now we're, we're in our eighties, we're the same age. I'll be eighty-seven in a week. Ah, [laughter] I don't feel it. And ah, I don't think I act it.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: And I'm involved in clubs, the computer club here, and other clubs, Spanish club, I'm trying to learn Spanish. It's very important to learn it in 81:00this area.

SADY SULLIVAN: That's right.

HELEN DAVID: But, I will never, I mean I'll be able to read it but, I -- I'm -- it isn't staying. If it was French it would, because I had French in high school.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: But, that's the way it is. And they seem to be managing, the bit from all I know, they still have art shows and --

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: So, it's a long friendship, but I just haven't heard from her recently.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm.

HELEN DAVID: Perish the thought I'd pick up the telephone, you know, I'm still from the old days, you don't use the telephone. [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: Yeah, yeah.

HELEN DAVID: When, I used to, when I lived with my parents, I was, I never picked up that telephone without saying to them "may I use the telephone?"

SADY SULLIVAN: Right, and that's so, yeah, it's so different now, it's true.

HELEN DAVID: Oh yeah. Strangers who come into your house and use your telephone, 82:00[laughter] well they ask. Now they don't need to, now that they have their cell phones, but, um --

SADY SULLIVAN: Yeah.

HELEN DAVID: So, we've seen a lot of changes, and um, mostly for the good.

SADY SULLIVAN: Um-hmm. Well thank you so much, I've really enjoyed talking with you today.

HELEN DAVID: Oh, I enjoyed it also. One enjoys talking about oneself. [laughter]

SADY SULLIVAN: [laughter]

HELEN DAVID: Okay, then, that's great.

SADY SULLIVAN: Yeah.

HELEN DAVID: If you have any questions, you know.

SADY SULLIVAN: I'm sure I will have some follow-ups, I'm going to mail you a copy of the interview and then also the release form.

HELEN DAVID: Okay.

SADY SULLIVAN: So what is your? Or actually, I could email it to you? Um, if you want to print it out, or no I can't email you the audio, so what is your mailing address?

HELEN DAVID: Okay, it's very messy.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay.

HELEN DAVID: It's [address redacted for privacy]

SADY SULLIVAN: Great.

HELEN DAVID: So that's where we are. But, there are some other [address redacted 83:00for privacy]

HELEN DAVID: Ah now what, what, ah, form will the recording be in? A DVD or?

SADY SULLIVAN: Yes ,DVD or CD which ever you prefer.

HELEN DAVID: I think DVD will be fine.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay, great.

HELEN DAVID: Well, thank you very much.

SADY SULLIVAN: Thank you, it was so great talking with you.

HELEN DAVID: Okay.

SADY SULLIVAN: Okay.

HELEN DAVID: Bye.

SADY SULLIVAN: Bye.