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Interview with Dr. J. Kline Harrison
No full textDr. J. Kline Harrison, Associate Provost for Global Affairs, Kemper Professor of Business at Wake Forest University, interviewed by Paul Stroebe
Francis J. Kline oral history
No full textGrocery store owner & operator. Text only (audio missing from record)Oral Interview with
FRANCIS J. KLINE
April 30, 1986
Prepared for the Kent Historical Society
Oral History Project
Gene Helton
Kent State University
William W. Wilen,
Oral History Project Coordinator
TRANSCRIPT
Kent Historical Society Oral History Project
Tape 86.2
Interview with Francis J. Kline, Kent, Ohio
April 30, 1986
Interviewer: Gene Helton
My name is Gene Helton and I'm a graduate student in Education for Kent State
University. Today is Wednesday April 30, 1986. And I'm at 453 West Main Street
in the home of Francis J. Kline, current order of Kline's Market in downtown
Kent. Today we're going to talk about the economic changes in Kent and their
impact on Kline's market and on the Kent community in general. I am
particularly interested in the 1930's and 1940's because of two historic events.
The Great Depression and World War II. I wanted to mention to you the tape and
transcript will be preserved so all this important information will be available
to students and historians. And after the interview I'll ask you to sign the
release form stating how the material will be used. And as I mentioned it's
destined for the Kent Historical Society. Is that okay with you?
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Yes.
Ok, let's start off with what is your earliest recollection of
Kent, what was the city like, as you remember it.
When I was young the population was probably about 4,000 people
and most of the people worked in the Erie railroad. They built
box cars and pullman cars, and they had a place down out on
Franklin Avenue ••• that ah ••• a turntable for engines and they'd
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work on engines there too, and they'd turn them around and it was
easy for them to go both east and west, to turn around there.
So it was kind of the hub transport at that time.
Yes, it was.
Was there any changes in the 1920's?
Not very much as I recall.
Pretty much stayed the same and a lot of people coming in and out
because of the trains •••
People getting transfered from the other junction points on the
railroad to Kent and a lot of people came from Meadville and
different points like that along railroad, they'd be transfered
in to here.
When you look at Kent today was there anything really different
back then as far as the town itself more buildings, is it much
different today.
You mean in the downtown area?
Yes, in the downtown area.
No, there's a lot more businesses but of course the fires have
diminated ••• but actually not very much. Except for the theater
and the hotels are pretty flourishing a piece antiques, well not
antiques but they were new buildings in those days.
What is your earliest recollection of Kline's market.
My earliest recollection of Kline's market was I lived about two
blocks from there and my job was, I was about six or seven years
old, was to go down and get wood, you know a lot of things those
days used to be packed in wood and it would come into the store
and my dad would break them up and I would have to haul them up
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there to the house, kindling wood. And I was down at the store
you might say, half the time and my dad used to stay over at the
store till about ten o'clock at night. He used to chase me
home and then I'd come back.
Do you remember some of the people who used to come in during
those years? Some crazy people.
Yes. I can't recall their names but I remember this one guy we
used to call Jersey VanHorn, they had train horses, they used to
get a lot of stuff in by train, express. Like bread and stuff
like that. And about five or six train horses in town and these
guys would get it off the train and then deliver it to the stores
and all over Kent. And my dad started in business in 1910 and he
was a Wells Fargo agent too, because there wasn't to many
groceries actually being sold, they used to have to get all the
freight that was shipped by Wells Fargo and deliver it to the
college and the different people around town and then you'd have
to also ••• people would ship stuff out and he would have to get
that and take it down to the train station. And sometimes they'd
even ship cattle and they'd have to have them on those big
holding carts and then they'd transfer them into the box cars
were they kept them.
And the Kline's market, if I went up there right now, is at the
same place where your dad was in 1910. In the same general area.
Yes.
When you look back on the depression what do remember most about
Kline's market and the Kent community also?
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Well the depression was really rough. People didn't have any
money at all. It was kind of hard to describe it. There wasn't
too many jobs around, the railroad laid off a lot of people, it
was rough.
And did people come to Kline's market let's say, friends, and say
I'm hungry and could you spare any apples or anything like that.
My dad helped a lot of people. A lot of people before they died
came and paid him what they owed him. Which is kind of
surprising. I remember there was one black preacher and his
name was Hesikiah, Hesikiah Gant, we used to kid him a lot, and I
remember asking my dad one time, Dad how come you trust that guy
he's never paid, he don't have any money in the first place. And
he said he's got some good furniture I could take.
The furniture in his house ••• , three or four chairs in one hall,
he hardly had anything the poor guy, I don't think he ever had a
job, he used to always be in and out of the store, and people
were always kidding him and in those days there weren't more then
20 or 25 families of blacks in Kent, that's about all. Not too
many.
So the city of Kent would say during the depression was kind of a
slow pulse, there wasn't a lot happening. You were growing up in
that time, what did you do for fun. Were there movies to see in
Kent, did you go to Akron, did you take the street car, or •••
When we got older we used to hitchike, we were pretty successful
in getting rides and stuff and we'd go to the show in Akron for
15 or 25 cents and there was a movie in Kent at the corner of
Columbus and Water street, right across from the mill, you know
where the drive-in bank is, that was where the movie was. They
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called it the opera house, and it was a pretty much of a place
for people to congregate. They even held graduations there and
they had Vaudeville shows and things like that.
I heard about it being a opera house of some type but maybe it
was earlier on but W.C. Fields and acts used to come to Kent.
It was at that same place. In about 1929, '28 or something like
that, they built a theater across from the Kent Hotel.
Where it is today.
And I was the first guy that went in to see that movie. It was
on a Saturday afternoon that's when they opened it up and I
thought that was a palace. They had an organ, it was silent
movies, I think they paid a couple thousand dollars for the organ
it was considered really one of the top things there was.
And that was the big thing, the organ I guess at the movies as
well, I remember at the Civic they still have the big organ. And
during this time I guess you were at school a lot too at St.
Patricks up here, right up here in the downtown area.
Yes, it's not too far.
What kind of education did you receive there, a strict one?
Oh, I don't think it was all that strict. A lot of people I've
heard they don't go to catholic schools because it's rough, but
to me it wasn't. We had a good time.
How many people were at school there at that time?
Oh, I would say 150.
And that was the catholic school as well as the public school in
Kent of course. Did you find any animosity between who went to
the public school •••
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Quite a bit. They used to call us "catholicers", and we'd call
them "propsticks". We didn't mingle to well together like we do
now.
There was more of a tension between the protestants and the
catholics.
That was all eliminated when they went to high school and they
all became one, I think football and sports brought them together
a lot.
Who were some of your childhood friends and are they still around
here in town and do you see them much anymore.
A kid I went to grade school with was James Waylan and Joe
Lolamon and there was quite a few Italian and Polish kids, they
were real nice guys. But I don't think there's hardly any
around here anymore.
They all kind of moved out and got jobs somewhere else •••
California and what have you.
At school at St. Pat's did you get involved in football and all
the other kind of crazy things.
They didn't have any.
Backyard football.
Stickball or whatever.
I guess later on there, right after you finished your high school
education you went on to the university up here.
The university school.
The university school was right next to the university I think
Franklin Hall, I think that was the building. Did you enjoy that
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period ••• did you have a good time and involved in activities and
that type of thing.
A lot more then grade school.
Did they have a football team?
Oh yes. Football and basketball.
Played probably area teams here.
All the area teams.
Do you remember the university in the mid 30's there, you were
born in 1917, so in the mid 30's there you were still 10 your
teens there. Do remember the university and the students you
would meet on the street or down at the market.
Yes.
What were they kind of like.
Just regular high school kids.
Ok, we're talking about your educational background, Kent, and
the depression and all that. Let's talk about the market again
for a second, who were some of your main competitors in the
grocery business in the 30's?
Well there's A&P, there was Kroger, and a store called Piggley
Wiggley, that was the first self serve store, you don't near much
about them anymore. That had to be about 8 or 10 years ago, I
think they're in Alaska out in that area now. It's probably not
the same concern but they just use that name.
Were there other family grocers in Kent that competed.
Were there other ones?
Yes.
I would say 15 at least maybe 20.
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Any of them still around today.
No just Ferrara.
So a lot of them went by the wayside then, after years •••
Yes, dying.
No one there to take over basically.
Mr. Lancoy had the largest store.
Where was that?
It was where copy print is now, know what I mean?
Yes.
It went all the way through, he also owned a packing house which
was over in back of Fred Fuller Park. He was real nice fellow.
He probably had 34 employees all together counting his packing
house, he used to sell the sausage and stuff to other small
grocers around.
So he was kind of an outlet as well as grocer himself.
He was a very cooperative man.
So you had some competition, but kind of went by the wayside as I
said.
Well there was competition because everybody try to be getting
more customers you know.
Especially during the depression.
Yes, it was rough, really rough. Thing that saved my father
during the depression, many stores went out of business, but he
got the agency to sell liquor and it was a state, we didn't have
a state store, we had a state store agency because we were to
small a city for a state store. And my dad made five percent of
the sales, that was his profit, and all us kids had to work we
had to
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sell whiskey and haul all the stuff up and put it on the shelves.
And we stayed open until 10:00 every night.
So all during your school life you were busy working at the
market as well as your studies.
Sports and everything, kept busy. When the depression hit my Dad
was about $100,000 in debt, he just built about 12 homes and then
the crash came, of course most of the was borrowed money and it
was up to us we had to pay it all back and we did. In the 40's
we finally got it all fixed up.
So during that time again was a ••• myself looking back you see
Franklin Roosevelt as kind of the major of course political
figure of the United States, when you think back on him what's
your reaction and at the time what was your reaction.
Well I'll tell you he was a savior. As he continued in office I
didn't think too much of him because I think he didn't use the
truth to well. He claims he hated war and all this stuff and at
the same time they were convoying ships and giving medals for
guys helping England at the time. There was an awful lot of
controversy, but he still had ••• he at least got things up in the
U.S. tried to do something.
Kind of had a good image and made people feel •••
We never knew he .was so crippled. They never showed it on
newsreel of course the only time you ever say newsreel was when
you went to the movie. And the news media never mentioned that
he was ••• how crippled he was.
The people you talked to let's say, your father and family were
they pretty supportive of Franklin Roosevelt?
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They were originally, but later on they weren't.
War came.
My dad and mother hated war.
Let's talk a little about the coming of World War II we just
touched on it a bit there. When did you first think war was a
possibility.
When I thought it would be a possibility was when Pearl Harbor
was bombed by the Japanese. And I think the majority of people
were that way.
So kind of didn't think it was going to come •••
Of course we knew the Japanese and the Americans were negotiating
and the sneak attack took everybody by surprise.
Where were you on that day.
I was down at the drug store and it came over on the radio.
It must of been a big shock?
Yes it was.
Let's backtrack a second here. When you were in the market and
you're looking at the newspapers, what was your first reaction
when you saw a picture of Adolph Hitler?
My own personal opinion I thought he was kind of crazy. We used
to see him on newsreels, boy he'd be screaming and yelling, but
actually I guess according to historians be was a pretty sharp
guy when it came to getting people wound up. He was a master at
that.
Did you take him seriously?
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No, not in my own mind. Of course we seen all the troops he had,
but we knew in our own minds we defeated him in the first world
war.
Yes that's true.
So I think we had confidence in our abilities.
I remember reading about Charles Linbergh when he went to Germany
in the late 30's there and said that we couldn't beat them.
I think the guy was telling truth in his own mind, they had such
a war machine built up but Roosevelt didn't go for Linbergh, and
disagreement you know. And later he became an advisor and I
think he even flew some missions against the Japanese and shot
down some planes. But he was quite a man. I remember taking a
paper at my grandmother's house and reading about it and it was
quite a thing and I even read the book WE and he was quite a
hero.
Exciting time there. What did you do personally during the war
years, and how was Kent doing economically?
It was booming. You see my brother enlisted in the Marines and
my other brother enlisted in the Army. And of course I was the
only left in the store and of course I was drafted and taken to
an induction center, of course they wouldn't accept me because I
had traces of albumen in my urine specimen.
What is albumen?
Women have it sometimes after child birth. Something to do with
your kidneys or something. I was taken up to Cleveland for a
week, they checked me all out but they wouldn't accept me, but
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they knew as soon as I get in I could get out. And I think I was
called up about six times and they'd check me every •••
And your brother was in the Marine Corp in the Pacific.
Iwo Jima all those places.
Saw a lot of bad •••
My other brother was ••• he was the first guys that landed in
Austraila which was as big feet. I think it took 2 months on the
water going over there. It was a long time without being on
land.
The Kent business scene during those years as you said was kind
of booming because of the war.
It started right up just like that.
Because people getting jobs •••
Contracts •••
Do you remember what some of those contracts were for?
Well I'd imagine they were mostly all war machinery. Tanks and
parts of tanks and most of these shops in Kent were small and
they did a lot of work for Akron and the rubber works and Akron
plants and Cleveland plants.
And there were businesses in Kent that made war products, like
planes?
No. That Twin Coach pulled some stuff but I don't remember
exactly what it was.
What about the effect of rationing on Kline's market?
Actually it turned out to be a money maker, as far as the food
rationing but there should never been a food rationing because
they didn't eat it at all.
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What was food rationing really?
Well they gave you a book that had so many points in it and you'd
buy a can of beans it would cost you 10 points, and there were so
many allowed each person per week or month, I think they came out
by the month. And then people had plenty to eat and then come
the end of the month and these people would have all these
coupons left and they would come in the store and they'd just buy
anything they could get their hands on, down to the wall. And
then everything would be sold out. And then it would take a
while to fill back the store up. Of course you didn't have any
trouble getting it, just the time 1n receiving it and putting it
back on the shelves. Every month that would happen. Meat was
hard to get, that was due mostly to pricing. You see the
government could buy all the meat they wanted, there wasn't any
ceiling on meat. If they go to the market the cattle would cost
50 cents a pound they could buy it for the armed services, but
the civilians now the ceiling price on it was about 30 cents so
they wouldn't get anything. It was really a shortage of meat.
Then the black market started, that was where the farmers would
kill it on the market and bring it into the stores and they had
ways of getting around it. You'd have to pay them over the
counter, but people were crazy for every item. It was every
item, stockings, cigarettes ••• that happened in the first world
war too, sugar was a big thing in that war because the money
people wanted to make more money so they'd create a shortage
because they didn't have any controls on it, I don't know what
sugar was but sugar was very cheap during the depression like 3
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or 4 cents per pound. They had some trouble in the second world
war but the first world war I remember how scarce it was.
So during the second world war, rationing was a way, could you
buy things at the Kline's market with cash as well, but every
family got a rationing book once a month you say but also could
come into the store and buy with their cash if they wanted to.
But they were supposed to have the tickets too, but you could get
the tickets from anybody. There were thousands of tickets that
weren't even used. If you had a family of 5 or 6 people probably
one book would be enough for your families needs so they'd have
four extra books, if anybody wanted anything they'd just give
them the books. Same with gasoline. And there was a black
market on everything.
Did you have the book when you went to the Sunoco and bought five
gallons and used the book then.
It was separate though, tires were separate. You had to go
appear before a board in order to buy tires.
So you would have a coupon that would say gas. And that was kind
of more difficult to get the gasoline products I bet.
No, not really. Everybody knew somebody. It's hard to defeat
the American public when it comes to brains and screaming, their
way ahead of everybody, they're sharp.
So pretty much during those years you could pretty much get what
you wanted at the store with the coupons.
I knew a lot of guys that were black marketing and stuff, that's
what they used to call it. All it was was if you want to pay the
price for it you could get it. That's what it amounted to.
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SIDE TWO
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Merchandise was scarce, guys would scrounge around for it they
could find it any place.
Do people did basically sceem a little bit during those times to
kind of make out. And of course they had jobs as well because of
the war.
They had plenty of money, you'd come downtown after the shops
were out of course that's when the women and guys would all go to
the bars, and that's when all hell broke loose in the family life
because there was a lot of drinking and carousing.
•••• Directly after the war what was the economy like?
It continued good, because appliances and a lot of things were
scarce, and people were still working and they bought good, real
good. Things boomed for quite a while there.
How did the city of Kent change during the war years, did you see
the increase of businesses or anything like that?
Yes. There started to be more smaller machine factories and so
on that began to start up, and a lot of these people worked for
the Gouglar Machine company.
Where's that.
On Lake Street.
That big big place?
One of those used to be called Black and Decker, no it has a
different name now, but it's the next factory after that. You
see he did a lot of walr work, and he
Kline, J, NX39588
No full textThis record was harvested from a previous catalogue system and will be withdrawn in 2025. Information in this record may be superseded or incomplete. Visit this record in UMA's new catalogue at: https://archives.library.unimelb.edu.au/nodes/view/397536Surname: KLINE. Given Name(s) or Initials: J. Military Service Number or Last Known Location: NX39588. Missing, Wounded and Prisoner of War Enquiry Card Index Number: 17178.235783
Item: [2016.0049.29829] "Kline, J, NX39588
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