Interview with Lorene Hensley Pritchard, October 9, 1989

Partial Transcript: Uh, okay, today is October the 9th, 1989, and this is Nola Hadley.

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard talks about her family's genealogy and their lives in Hazard, Kentucky.

Keywords: Grandparents; Lower Second Creek (Hazard, Ky.)

Subjects: Agriculture; Caregivers; Families; Genealogy; Genealogy--Appalachian Region; Hazard (Ky.)

Partial Transcript: You, you were telling me that, that there was some uh, connection, eh, one of your grandparents had some attitudes...

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard discusses her grandmother's fear of black men, and the incident that sparked this fear.

Keywords: Grandmothers; Grandparents; Reconstruction

Subjects: African American men; African Americans; Race discrimination; Rape; Segregation; United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865

Partial Transcript: Your parents, they were both from Hazard?

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard explains how her parents met, and talks about their marriage. She also discusses her father's alcoholism, and how it eventually led to divorce.

Keywords: Alcoholics; Bars; Fights; Grandmothers; Grandparents; London Clements (??); Moonshine; Rocks; Soldiers

Subjects: Alcoholism; Coal mines and mining; Divorce; Marriage; Parents; Prison violence; Prison visits

Partial Transcript: And one man got hit in the head with a two by four, and he drove part of the way home before he died.

Segment Synopsis: Prichard tells how her father was accused and convicted of manslaughter, after which he served seven years in prison. She talks about his release, his work after leaving prison, and his eventual exoneration for the crime.

Keywords: Arrests; Carpenters; Death; Employment; Factories; Fathers; Fights; Handbags; Lawyers; Manslaughter; Murder; Parents; Purses; Reliable Casting; Solitary confinement; Violence; Work

Subjects: Coal miners; Divorce; Prisons

Partial Transcript: Um-hm. I wanna take you back a little bit.

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard shares some of the happier moments of living with her grandmother, and describes her grandmother's house.

Keywords: Bedrooms; Biscuits; Breakfast; Chickens; Cows; Custody; Fathers; Grandmothers; Houses; Meat; Milk; Mothers; Negligence; Popcorn; Vegetables

Subjects: Families; Gardening; Work ethic

Partial Transcript: ...And the other one was always used for... and Granny had a bunch of sisters, and they used to come and stay...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard discusses relatives who visited her grandmother's house when she was living there. She talks about her great-aunts in particular.

Keywords: Aunts; Banjos; Cholesterol; Death; Eggs; Fathers; Food; Grandmothers; Health food; Houseguests; Relations; Sisters; Work

Subjects: Families; Work ethic

Partial Transcript: Let me ask you a little bit about, um, so then your mom got remarried?

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard discusses visiting her mother when she was a child. She also talks about attending school, and how her grandmother strongly supported her education.

Keywords: Anger; Grandmothers; Hull School; Mothers; One room schools; Reading

Subjects: Children; Education; Families; Literacy; Marriage; Pregnancy; Rural schools; Schools; Spelling

Partial Transcript: Did, how about your, your mom, when you saw your mom or your dad? Did they ever say anything?

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard tells how her grandmother's house burned down. Her family moved into another house on the same property, after losing all of their possessions in the fire.

Keywords: Dolls; Fathers; Fires; Grandmothers; House fires; Houses; Purses

Subjects: Dwellings--Maintenance and repair; Education; Fire

Partial Transcript: Well, let, uh, I want to go back to school, and ask you some more about that.

Segment Synopsis: Prichard tells how she helped her grandmother to budget her expenses, since her grandmother was illiterate.

Keywords: Bills; Budgets; Cars; Clothing; Fathers; Grandmothers; Learning; Money; Parents; Responsibility; School subjects; Sewing; Shoes; Stores; Taxes

Subjects: Children; Education; Literacy; Public welfare; Teachers

Partial Transcript: What kind of other chores did you do outside?

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard describes her household chores when she was living with her grandmother. She states that she sometimes became angry at her sister for not helping her.

Keywords: Chores; Household chores; Sisters

Subjects: Gardening; Outhouses; Washing machines

Partial Transcript: Well, um, let me take you back to school a bit. Did you go all the way through?

Segment Synopsis: Prichard tells how she dropped out of high school after only a few days, ran away from home, and then was sent to live with her mother for a few months.

Keywords: Clothes; Drunkenness; Fathers; Fighting; Grandmothers; High school students; High schools; Mothers; Textbooks

Subjects: Discrimination; Education; Rape; Runaway children; Students

Partial Transcript: I want to interrupt you for a second. How were you feeling about things at that point? Did you, did you have any, uh, dreams...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard tells how she was sent to live with her mother when she was a teenager, and some of the problems that resulted from this situation.

Keywords: Abortions; Anger; Aspirations; Behavior; Doctors; Friends; Grandmothers; Mothers; Teenagers; Weight gain; Work

Subjects: Children; Youth

Partial Transcript: So when I came to Cincinnati, my dad, first thing he did, him and his wife both worked...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard describes moving to Cincinnati as a teenager to live with her father and his family, as well as her struggles to attend school there.

Keywords: Anger; Babysitting; Drinking; Fathers; Favored children; Hughes High School (Cincinnati, Ohio); Money; Sisters

Subjects: Alcoholism; Children; Cincinnati (Ohio); Education; Rape

Partial Transcript: I wanted to interrupt you just a second. Um, when you were raped, was there anybody you told about that?

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard talks about her rape by her cousin, her pregnancy, and the birth of her first child.

Keywords: Abuse; Adoption; Babies; Catherine Booth Home for Unwed Mothers; Dating; Elopement; Grandmothers; Hughes High School (Cincinnati, Ohio); Parental abuse; Sisters

Subjects: Families; Pregnancy; Rape; Teenage pregnancy

Partial Transcript: And so I, I took Angie, and I went to Dad's with her.

Segment Synopsis: Prichard recounts coming to live with her father after the birth of her first child, and how he punished her for trying to get a job so that she could support herself and her daughter without his help.

Keywords: Abuse; Babies; Book binding; Cincinnati (Ohio); Dating; Diapers; Factories; Fathers; Job hunting; Jobs; Welfare

Subjects: Public welfare

Partial Transcript: So I got a letter that day from Buddy. He was, he was in the Army.

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard talks about her marriage, the death of her grandmother, and the resulting arguments over her will.

Keywords: Death; Farms; Grandmothers; Verbal wills; Wills

Subjects: Alcohol abuse; Alcoholism; Caregivers; Family farms; Marriage

Partial Transcript: Then my husband took and sold it, without my permission. And that was one of the first things that broke the marriage.

Segment Synopsis: Prichard recounts how her husband sold what had been her grandmother's farm without her permission.

Keywords: Farms; Husbands; Loans; Movie theaters; Water parks

Subjects: Family farms

Partial Transcript: Back when, before you had your first child, before you first got pregnant, had anybody given you any information about pregnancy and sex and any of that?

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard discusses the small amount of sex education she received from her grandmother, and her experiences related to childbirth.

Keywords: Grandmothers; Sex education

Subjects: Childbirth; Pregnancy; Sex instruction

Partial Transcript: Um, say more about your marriage.

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard discusses her elopement to West Virginia, and her wedding.

Keywords: Churches; Elopement; Grandmothers; Marriage licenses; Ministers; Mothers; Newlyweds; Sisters; Weddings

Subjects: Alcohol abuse; Easter; Finances; Marriage; West Virginia

Partial Transcript: The marriage, it started out okay. I'd knew him since I was, what, I don't know...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard shares the reasons she and her husband had for getting married. She tells how her husband became possessive of her, and how they began to have arguments more frequently.

Keywords: Bills; Fighting; Friends; Grandmothers; Husbands; Jealousy; Love; Money; Moving; Ownership; Possession; Submissiveness; Trading; Trailers; Wives

Subjects: Alcoholism; Children; Families; Marriage; Sex role

Partial Transcript: I felt, I guess, uh, you know, rejected or, or abandoned again.

Segment Synopsis: Prichard describes her mother's sudden death from a heart attack, and how she took in one of her step-siblings after this.

Keywords: Death; Grandmothers; Heart attacks; Illness; Mothers

Subjects: Myocardial infarction

Partial Transcript: There was so much of, loss in the marriage because he kept trading, trading, he would, he kept working, but...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard tells how she and her husband both suffered from alcoholism, and describes how he physically abused her.
[there is a break in the recording]

Keywords: Abuse; Arrests; Cars; Christmas; Drunkenness; Money; Receipts; Separation; Sisters; Trading; Trailers

Subjects: Alcoholism; Children; Divorce; Wife abuse

Partial Transcript: Um, this is tape two. This is Nola Hadley interviewing Lorene Hensley Pritchard.

Segment Synopsis: Prichard tells how she and her children escaped from her abusive husband.

Keywords: Abuse; Assault warrants; Clothing; Daughters; Police officers; Sisters

Subjects: Child abuse; Wife abuse

Partial Transcript: Christmas 1981, I left him and I come to uh, Ohio. Stayed with my dad two weeks.

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard tells how she moved to Cincinnati after leaving her husband. She talks about her decisions to get her GED and to attend Xavier University in Cincinnati.

Keywords: CTC; Cincinnati Technical College; Dean's list; GED; General Educational Development; Lower Price Hill Community School (Cincinnati, Ohio); Price Hill (Cincinnati, Ohio); Welfare; Women Helping Women

Subjects: Apartment houses; Education; Public welfare; Xavier University (Cincinnati, Ohio)

Partial Transcript: I was doing volunteer work with Blair, with the Teens Helping Teens group.

Segment Synopsis: Prichard tells how she considered several career paths when she was a student at Xavier University, eventually deciding to become a social worker.

Keywords: Architectural engineers; Classes; Computer programmers; Computer programming; Prerequisites; Psychologists; Psychology; Social work; Spanish; Student advisers

Subjects: Counselors; Social service; Voluntarism; Xavier University (Cincinnati, Ohio)

Partial Transcript: But, I never made the dean's list anymore, and I have lots of reasons for that. One is transportation...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard describes the reasons that she did not make the dean's list for most of the time she attended Xavier University.These reasons included her lack of transportation and her children's problems with the law.

Keywords: Buses; Cars; Daughters; Sons; Transportation

Subjects: Children; Xavier University (Cincinnati, Ohio)

Partial Transcript: And all during this time from, from the time that I got out of Eden House til today, I've been living with, with Robert, Bob Coffee.

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard talks about meeting Robert (Bob) Coffee at a bar, and how he took care of her children when her doctor ordered her to attend an in-patient treatment center for her alcoholism.

Keywords: Alabama (musical group); Bars; Bob Coffee; Concerts; Counseling; Drugs; In-patient treatment centers; Robert Coffee

Subjects: Alcoholism; Apartment houses; Drug abuse; Rehabilitation

Partial Transcript: And when I got out, he uh, he, his ex-wife, his second wife had really done a trip on him financially, and he was having...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard tells how Bob Coffee came to live with her and her children, and how this was partly for financial reasons.

Keywords: Bills; Bob Coffee; Businesses; Discipline; Groceries; Money; Rent; Robert Coffee; Spankings

Subjects: Children; Discipline of children

Partial Transcript: ...How long you've been together now?

Segment Synopsis: Prichard shares why she does not want to marry Bob Coffee, even though they have lived together for years.

Keywords: Bob Coffee; Calculators; Cars; Dictionaries; Fathers; Fear; Frisch's; Houses; Independence; Professors; Robert Coffee

Subjects: College teachers; Commencement ceremonies; Friendship; Marriage; Spelling

Partial Transcript: But if I had anything at all to say about my life... Jake and, and Blair and Bob would be the ones I would have to say...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard talks about the support that she has received from Bob Coffee and other friends. She also discusses her graduation from college, and the people who were present for the graduation ceremony.

Keywords: Bob Coffee; Fathers; Homework; Newspapers; Pride; Professors; Robert Coffee; Support

Subjects: Appalachians (People); Commencement ceremonies; Education; Women; Xavier University (Cincinnati, Ohio)

Partial Transcript: And what I'm trying to do right now, today, is I'm trying to get my own self up to feel confident about myself enough...

Segment Synopsis: Pritchard describes her interest in creating a program to help Appalachian men with drug and alcohol abuse. She discusses trying to find a job as a social worker, and the position she eventually chose.

Keywords: Appalachian men; CCAT; Droege House (Dayton, Ky.); Emotions; Job interviews; Jobs; Self confidence; Social work

Subjects: Child sexual abuse; Children; Counselors; Social service

Partial Transcript: I went down there and uh, started to work. And when I got there Monday morning to start work, uh...

Segment Synopsis: Prichard describes some of her duties as a social worker. She also explains in detail how she plans to change and revitalize the family program that she is in charge of.

Keywords: Clients; Codependency; Communication; Diseases; Family program; Jobs; Lectures; Orientation; Paperwork; Social work; Videos; Work

Subjects: Alcoholism; Counselor and client; Families; Social service

Partial Transcript: Um, you mentioned for yourself personally how important AA, Al-Anon, and uh, ACA has been. Do you wanna say something about that?

Segment Synopsis: Prichard discusses the effectiveness of treatment programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous and Al-Anon, and the effect they have had on her own life. She describes why these programs are important. The interview is concluded abruptly.

Keywords: Abandonment; Codependency; Detachment; Drug treatment; Eden House; Relationships; Self-reflection; Tough love; Trust

Subjects: Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters, inc; Alcoholics Anonymous; Children; Education; Hope