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SAMUEL PROCTOR ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM at
the University of Florida
ALA 5AB
Mrs. Chris Matheson
February 26, 1917 sjm
I: This is an oral history interview being done with Mrs. Christopher
Matheson. We're out here in Gainesville, Florida. This is being
done for the Alachua County Historical Commission. The date of
today is **Mt=February tr..26#, and we are at Mrs. Matheson's house
here on ta Second AvenueJ, First Avenue?
M: First Avenue. Southeast First Avenue. '
I: Southeast First venue, and we are in her sitting room which is
just a breezeway of the house that she has adapted to a sitting room anr.-
Io begin with, Mrs. Matheson, I think that we might ought to begin
with your telling me about where you were born and some of your early
life.
M: I was born in Jaeebson, North Carolina,_3t's a small college town.
It's in Mecklinburg County. I was born ead~, .about the turn of the
century and was the oldest child of Mr. and Mrs. Charles P' n -
4e&d. My father was a farmer. He had farms in three counties,
said My post office is in Mecklfnburg. My school is in djg. My
church is in T:er&a and my ." He said
Li'-get in trouble, bua the sheriff would have a hard time catching
me. My father was later eprese tative in the c err # of North
Carolina for -ga&zee-County. Ana we really lived six miles out from
Davidson, and we went into school int-Davidson. Morning and after-
noon Aa2' { A-y s fK r ravele twelve miles.40/-
I: Did you go by wagon?
M: No, buggy. We had a little buggy, a two seated buggy. The curtains
ALA 5AB
Page 2 sjm
would drop down *r% lanterns to put at our feet. It was very cold.
We went back and forth to the school near Davidson then, until I
was in the sixth grade aed my father bought a home HeS in Davidson and
we moved into Davidson, s4x-miles-from the-eown- of-Davidson-whenI-
was- i-the- w it-h-g-ade. a2i '1 y 'father became the mayor of Davidson
GelAege and was secretary and treasurer of the Building and Loan, h i,
Swas director of the bank there. He told us that he was taking us
to the nicest place Davidson College. By the
way, he did not get to go to college because he came along, but his
father, my grandfather, Thomas Henderson Hamilton, was in the first
class that 1ar ,i.rtuJ entered Davidson College in 1837. WEas
I: Had the Hamiltons been in America for quite a long time?
O NM: Av / 7c) -- ey had come over from Scotland. They
ame-n -vr-th t-i49i brothers and settled in Peachbottom County near
Lancaster, New York, Pennsylvania and then, they came on down to the
Carolins. I don't know just what year, but they settled in Tfwsmee-
County W "4 =Fae s 3,still own. < -
I: ) 'f'L- your father's grandfather?
M: Yes, my father's grandfather.
I: So really *yOule, I guess, your grandfather, of course, was the first
of the Hamiltons that wa born in North Carolina?
M: North Carolina. And my addr brother is Thomas Henderson Hamilton.
I: What did your grandfather study basically? Was it a liberal arts
school?
M: A liberal arts school. Yes, it was a liberal arts school.
ALA 5AB
Page 3
I:
I:
M:
I:
M:
I:
N:
And they farmed there?
They farmed and still farm. Yes /'-,nd I remember he had a friend from
India, I believe, who brought some white mulberry seed. And this class-
mate gave my grandfather some of the seed that he took home and planted
on the farm. I remember the trees grew a69e- werwere-and we used to
play under the treeland when it died, my father was very sentimental
wV old things with a lot of history and he took a piece of wood that
he kept from that white mulberry tree that lived and then water when
I was teaching in Gastonia, North Carolina, I had a friend, a teacher
who was in the manual arts department who said,"I will be glad to make
you a gavel." So he took this piece of mulberry tree and made a gavel
out of it. My father appreciated it. He used it a lot.
So your father, he never did get to go to college, did he?
He didn't get to go to college. He went to a finishing school that
they had in those days.
Where was this at?
At Huntersville)near Davidson.
Do you know the name of the school?
No, I don't remember. It was a famous school for boys and girls, es-
pecially boys in those days, this school at Huntersville and then,
my father became a teacher there. After we moved into Davidson, he
kept his farm six miles out, but he used to like to laugh and say that
7 j ct --'.aC (.i, agriculturalist lived in town and spent
his money on the farm. A farmer lived in the country and spent his money
in the town. Well, we kept the farm for a while, for a long time.
ALA 5AB
Page 4 sjm
In fact, we still own about a hundred acres.
I: But he came to Davidson when you were in the sixth grade?
M: In the sixth grade. Yeah.
I: Were you going to the public school?
M: Yes, public school. Yeear
I: Did you remain in the public school throughout your childhood?
M: Graduated from the public school in Davidson.
I: How big a class did you have? Or was Davidson a big town at that
time?
M: Not that big. No, about 1500 people. Of course, the college had
around five or six hundred bodies, I guess, only men. bm.-.tiwed.
In fact, they have only taken a few girls in the last few years, but
it's still an outstanding college for Wa in that area-firi-=pVTod
See ge. l-graduated-from there were only eleven in my high school classy
-ag I was valedictorian of my class. A tne whole class stayed out
a year and we had private teachers Zar- the college. The YMCA secre-
tary and his wife, T. English, 4--bel~e-, history, and
icwent back to the high school for an extra year of Latin. I had six
years of Latin. FEDIiz7lke -...
I: This was after you graduated?
M: Yes. This was an extra year. Kind of an extra year of study,c alLn
the meantime, E~met my sister, Martha, was graduated so the following
year we went to Greensboro to the women's collegeAUniversity of North
Carolina NCCW, North Carolina College for Women. Ad mother, by
the way, had graduated from this college in the first class that had
ALA 5AB
Page 5 sjm
had four years of college. She graduated in 1896 from the Female College
for Women. It became the North Carolina College for Women -'iiki n
-ig-OWl.0. We graduated in 1924. There were seven hundred students
when we entered and fourteen hundred when we graduated. So then when
we graduated, my net sister, Mary said,"I'm not going to enter NCCW.
I don't want to be known as Mrs. Hamilton's daughter or Sarah and Mar-
tha's sister. I'm going to make my own." So she chose Converse Col-
lege in Spartanyburg, South Carolina, where she -db&c&ea@ewpapresident
of the student body, tau-Mm '^ L
I: -. c anl' fnlpcie for"at? .-v
M: U7-L- ytiiu
I: snr r Did you take liberal arts or anything like that?
M: Liberal arts. I majored in English.
I: What a.ruk kind of courses you take>-t.t-reaRTf ym a.-
or did you have a lot of choices?
M: No, we had to take science. I took one year of extra math. I.had
to take certain sciences, but mostly liberal arts,- W ad t
an AB degree, when I graduated, in English. eaM sister Martha
majored in history) (#d we both taught the first year. We taught in
Gastonia, North Carolina. Itaught the fourth grade and she the fifth
grade. She came back the second yeawith my mother and father at home
and I taught the second year in Gastonia. Then I went to Richmond,
Virginia to -2rz --v tvfhe Presbyterian School of Christian Edu-
c action to do graduate work ina --- -
I: In what year?
ALA 5AB
Page 6 s sjm
M: In 1926. Graduated in twenty oe, and taught two years then,
I went in the fall of '26 to Richmond which was Assemblies Training
School then but which is now known as the Presbyterian School of
Christian Education, and I graduated there with what was similar
to a gradte e s -- r d z
?V& 1Q -!
I: I take it your father was a Presbyterian.,.
M: Yes, an elder.
I: ....and was really steeped in the Presbyterian church. /WCiff
M: Ad]/y father was <1 .QC.-7 -
I: Were all these schoolsAtI take it them being Presbyterian, th 'ree
private school so you wind up having to pay the tuition to school
and all that. Was it pretty high? Was it kind of hard on your
father to be able to pay for all you girls to go to school ork,,,
M: Yes, well, we went to the North Carolina College for btmen a state
school so that helped quite a bi becaure- having two girls at e time..
We didn't have to pay for tuition nk nv-wry--.. Il* 1 but when I
went to PS eqa at Richmond for ta6s graduate work, I had a
scholarship given by Mrs. Cannon jou know the Cannon-mler people
in Concord, North Carolina. She was a good friend of my mother. My
mother was active in the women of the church and the presbytery. Mrs.
Cannon gave this scholarship, so t scholarship helped me with my
tuition in Richmond. And when I finished there, Dr. Walter
asipresident. AnlgIt said, "Sarah, I think that you would like to
work with Indians." And I said,"Why do you think so?" He said,"I
just do." So I said,"All right, get me a job." And he did. He got Z-7
ALA 5AB
Page 7 sjm
--
teaching religious education and Bible- ehEnglish, .
in the Presbyterian College for Girls, Oklahoma
I: You said you went to graduate school or you went to do graduate study
at this school. Was this in religious education?
M: Rj.M. Religious education, Jc 4ilf /4-cc~.
I: But then, you went to Oklahoma for a while.
M: Oklahoma in 1928.
I: What was it like when you went all the way 6* North Carolina to this
dust bowl ~4- 7
S M: I thought that I was going clear out st. When I bought my ticket,
the cma--"f --*-uid g- ticket *a& said,"Well, I hope you get there all
right."
I: Took the train?
M: By train. Had to change several times. In Memphis we took the Rock
Island. We had theSouthern kilroad to Memphis L: IC
then the Rock Island to McAlster Durant. Durant took longest. And
there I taught. We had Choctaws, Chicksaws, Seminoles, Creek, Pawnee
and em Comanche tribes, representja fev4- -_- Sj --- "
I: Was this on a reservation?.... fg'sxS OK, now you go ahead. We were
talking about the Indians. I was asking you if they were on a reser-
vation, and you*..,
M: Oh, no. The Choctaws, the five civilized tribes never were place on re-
servatio Most of them a Cheyenne and Arapahos and others in.the
C-, W- g stern part of the state were on reservations, but the Choctaws and the
ALA 5AB
Page 8 sjm
Chickasaws, the Presbyterian Church worked mostly with these two
tribes and-tshy had little farms. They found oil wells sometimes
on their land. Seminole oil field was just nineteen miles from
an.j. s n -par he southern part just about twenty-five miles
--
from Red River9 --t <'x-cJ i
I: What kind of town was it? Wide open?
M: Durant was western. It was a college town whc ~O klahoma Pres-
byterian College, which had a good manrry.- T -cid--g"" im tribes,
represented, but there were also/Anglo-Saxon girls, Put over on the
other part of town was the Southeastern College, developed into a
university later on& It- m+nw ..1..1.. ...-
6 .haa. I taught Bible and religious education. The Biblq Cair had
been endowed by the women of the Presbyterian Ci ch through the
birthday offering in 1926. So I was the second, Mary i sgr and
I, a classmate from Richmond, Virginia went out with me. The two of
us were the Bible teachers Swe were paid with the interest on the
birthday offering. 4 l~-t.a mounted to just a little over
//f40,000,. a .... I. interest on that paid the
Bible teachers, but it was very interesting' ) '
I: Was this a girls' school?
M: A girls' school.
I: Was there a men's school anywhere close?0
M: Later there was a preparatory department4 and some boys came then,l~ar
We had boys and girls, who came to the preparatory department. When
I tught there, it was an accredited junior college. So then, when
WTb~h hee
ALA 5AB
Page 9 sjm
they finished, they could go over to the tern State School, and go
on with their education. SW I found the Indian girls very alert and
quick to learn, memorize, and they were talented. They were especially
good in music and art. _aem 0-0l4e e art teacher the different
materials and say,"All right, I want some original designs." I art-some
hanging in my room here that they designed Qiat I like# very much.
I taught there at OPC~~.Ai from 1928 until 1933. Only five years.
I: Uh huh.
M: And that is where I met Chris Matheson.
I: How did you wind up meeting him or running into him/ a girls'
school or whatever?
M: Well, Chris had gone out to Oklahoma in 1920, I think it was to usee-
at Shawnee, Oklahoma -B'we@ hundred miles, I guess, from Durant
he was on the Board of Trustees that would come down to the college.
I: Was the church of Shawnee an Indian church like with Indians or was
it in a larger town, you know, where there are farmers and things like
that?
M: Shawnee now, was a larger town forty miles from Oklahoma City. About
thirty-five miles from Norman, the University of Oklahoma. Shawnee
had been an Indian name, after the Shawnee Indians, because it was in
..lja ae county And we had a street Kickapoo, Kickapoo Street)in
w-e county. Shawnee, the town of Shawnee. And it was five
mieecumseh d Tecumseh was another Indian chief. We were
right in the heart of the Indian territory, butj 1a-a-an-, Shawnee
had Oklahoma Baptist University which Aw developed into a;- i
-ePx^ ^ '
ALA 5AB
Page 10 sjm
I: Before we get on to Mr. Matheson, when you were teaching all these
Indians, did you ever have a chance to acquire their language? Did
you learn, did they work with trying to teach you their language, the
Indian language or4~did you work with that at all?
M: fWe didn't work with it a great deal. And I met a lot of the parents,
and we had one of our teachers that we called our Indian princess, Miss
Ann SAmple who was a sixteenth Indian, Choctaw Indian, very proud of
her Indian bloo~b ,ad he could speak some of the language. hen we
t~ to church, with them, the Indian Presbyterian or Indian churches,
they had their own little songbooks. There was no music passed
down from generation to generation and they sang in Choctaw;e-d hey
sand their hymns and I could follow aket by looking at the hymn book,
but I didn't have time toearn very much of the language.
I: Were there very many of your associates who learned the language,
or did you just rely on English?
M: They learned English because all the classes are in English. They
could only speak their Choctaw tongue when they got together here, but
we encouraged them to speak English.
I: Well, then we can -{i e )1V 71tHQ0--t---'-.
M: Christopher Matheson was a young bachelor/ minister in Shawnee, Okla-
homa)who was on the board, and he'd come from time to time to visit
the college. He would always speak in would take t
four young teachers, about the same age, 2jL ""-"i--+-ir- th-- all
out to dinner and to a movie and was quite nice to all of us. But thS^
y I came home in the summertime and to our summer home isn-aab
4
I
ALA 5AB
Page 11 sjm
.aUMLr Montreat, North Carolina. That was when my mother and father
r--.----------- ----,,,.
had bought a cottage in Montreat in 1919 d so I had grown up at
Montreat in the summer which was the Presbyterian conference center
for our area. J Mr. Matheson, Chris Matheson came to Montreat to
the hotel for his vacation Idso that was reai iywhere he learned
S toknow me better I used to say, pursued me, and won my ,,.
So we were married in 1933 at my summer homes Montreat, ) kcr Ar/'(..
I: How long had you known him? Did you know him well?
M: I met him in 1928, I guess. I've known himj.,,
I: So you met him as soon as you got out i fArj~ LrOY &
M bout four years. He was in Oklahoma.
I: So he was in Oklahoma when you got there.
M: Oh, yes. He had been in Oklahoma. He had gone to Oklahoma from
Gainesville in 1919, ; 1920.
I: And so I imagine your courting days were very exciting.
M: Oh yes. So many days there. I sm even sometimes at 1Oadi jLLT. Then
I visited in Shawnee and vistied the church there, /l-'_L tsrj;_e-eL
-ic minister since 1919.
I: Well, what? Did he talk to you much about how he came to go into the
ministry and go to Oklahoma? Did he tell you very much about e '
M: Well, yes, he....I guess that would take us back to Gainesville.
I: Right, that would take us back to Gainesville. I'd like to-~AAc-."
M: '-- .. I don't know where to begin. His ancestors
really go back, Judge Steele, wag --SOm_- _who was Augustus
Steele, his grandfather, had come from Connecticut, and had settled
ALA 5AB
Page 12 sjm
in Savannah/ in 1819. and then had come to Magnolia, Florida, in about
1828/ abo t 1830. He was editor of the MagnoliaAdvertiser, and we have
the only complete copy, bound copies of this paper that were published
at Magnolia)which was about eight miles out from Tallahassee on St. Marks
River and of course, this was hand set by5i f But he didn't
miss an issue d that paper was kept and bound)and we presented the-'
Sto the 1j'brary, Library of Florida P.. Yonge Library. After
gt ft Magnolia to go down to Fort Broo near Tampa on the
Hillsborough River in 1832, I guess he was there in 1832, g U know
that3 hsg hp
that he single handedly got Hillsborough County, g said it was ridicu-
lous to ride horseback 150 miles up to the iae 1 ch a the
county seat of Alachua County.
I: Which was a part of Alachua County?
M: Wi was a part of Alachua County at that time so had to ride horse-
back up here.
M: ...| t834 he got Hillsborough ountyGover-
nor Du l was governor at that time. Governor DuVal said,"All right,
Mr. Steele shall have a county, and we'll call it Hillsborough county.
,*it3^3~Ee-^ 7, *fi^^ ife^ jr^* ^-^^-e/ ^ L[ =? : -
"ms... .... '....... ... ,ll anyway, he got the county and we have
a letter that he wrote to his niece about that time and he said,"If you
think that I have been neglecting you, let me just tell you what I have
been doing." And then, he tell4in the letter that he was collector of
ctthe port, s = y-Of ^^ j-^^^-t_.tr.fcfi findrrIm ...
ALA 5AB
Page 13 sjm
We----.^---- .'----I.--- --- ^?C,
,he was in charge of the fish in e was county and probate judge
--- f was postmaster of Tampa and the Indian Wars were going on then,
and the influx of mail had to come through his post office)so he was
quite busy. And we have a paper edited in 1956 by Ri*a ycD.D. Mcd(ay
where he said Judge Steele was Tampa's first promoter and outstanding
citizen. -nJr. mn that hangs here in
our living room. MS)Steele later was disappointed. He had bought two
islands and quite a bit of land and....
I- Do you know which islands they were?
M: I wish I did know the name of the island. Right near the mouth of the
river, you see, on the Hillsborough River, and we have the copies of the
town that he started out there on the Hillsborough River, but he
thought Fort Brook, the militarywould *-Q-i-in when thelar was over,- O~C
you see. Ie q e represented this land company .M....m ,
out of New York of over a million acres, all aRund Tampa Od so he CL
was trying to sell lots and bought some himself, but Fort Brook/re-
mained. And imsrn t the land 6ht around his property was not pre-
--tede as he suppose^ S he was disappointed and)after doing all this
as the first citizen of Tampa.he sold what he could and salvaged as
best he could and moved up to Cedar Keys, but he homesteaded the island
of Siepeeyo and there....
I: Did he do farming? Did he try and do farming on the island?
M: He did some farming, but he bought up at auction. We have a little
slip here showing how mamy much money he paid for the barracks and some of
the hostels, y gg and barracks that the people had moved during the
ALA 5AB
Page 14 sjm
war. He bought the material at auction and built those cottages and so
the island was just covered with nice cottages I". s i.-P-k-..soi ...
s-g agMo ...a ad people moved in and bought lots all along
the island that he homesteaded. But the properties were especially for
the planters from mid-Florida who would come over and spend the summer
during the hot month-g-ssE- e G;ome-and- ta tag r- I have a couple
of letters here from @a*. Senator Yulee from Washington saying," I hope
to come, Mrs. Yulee and I are hoping to come to the keys this summer.
Please try to save us a cottage."
I: Now, is Cedar Key where your husband, Chris, was born?
M: No. No, Chris was born in this house. His mother was born- hat's
what I am getting to. Judge Steele married. He did not marry until
he came to Cedar Key from Tampa. So there he married Elizabeth Cotting-
ton, and they had one child, and she" .1a- a little girl, so her name
was Florida Augusta Steele. Her father was AugustS5Steele, Judge Au-
gustA Steele, and she grew up on that island t-snd had private tutors.
They would have different teachers come to teach her. Music teachers.
Later, in this house, I found this old music book that I was looking
at one day and wondered why, why in the world .T L" i
dggg h.why this book had been kept. Here was huge book, you
see, with the cover gone, but it had A&eW~ .a.e e, Augusta A. Steele
on it. And then I opened it and began to see this old music ii e
'" -" "T --l ..... 1 "The Cedar Key
March", t dedicatU o ge Aum dedicated to Judge Augustar Steele) -
spectfully dedicated to Judge Augusta Steele, "Cedar Key March" by B.R.
L
ALA 5AB
Page 15 sjm
Lignoski. And then, I turned over and here was another one dedicated to Mrs.
Elizabeth A. Steele of Cedar Key, East Florida, W z", and then
a third one here dedicated to erM Augusta Steele, Hill Quick
Step." And so there you have a march to the man, a waltz to the wife,
and a quick step to the young daughter.
I: Was there a chance that he was, he wasn't very musically oriented?
M: u-r 'An------ ---d I found'this about him
that he taught music at Florida (FSU) developed into the music
department up there. He had been c l
I: So, that was Chris's mother.
M: Yes, that was Chris's mother, an only child.
M: So now we go to the Matheson estate. This was Florida Augusta Steele.
On the other hand, up in Camden, South Carolina were the Matheson family,
-ie Mathesons, James Douglas Matheson, was Chris's father. He had been
S-.in-hg-armyduring their as a lieutenant and when he was mustered out
--4~r5, when the war was over -' came down to Gainesville as a young
lieutenant to try his fortune in the south. A lot of people were coming
from South Ca ina, the planters and planted cotton and indigo in this -
central part of Florida. The ae Plantation outside of Gainesville qp,
brother, Uncle 1ik Matheson had come earlier, in the early fifties,
and I think it was tid'k Matheson who bought this property where we live
now, but Efifk decided to go back to Liberty Hill, South Carolina, near
Camdetn and James Douglas, his younger brother, decided to stay hereso
when he came down in '65, 1865, he was working for Savage and Hale, a
cotton broker It must have had an office at Cedar Key because that is
rA
ALA 5AB
Page 16 sjm
where he met Florida Augusta Steele. They fell in love and were married,
in 1867, iJune 1867, and that's -iggt .the date that we claim
that:this house was built. They went to housekeeping *aw far as we
know in this house in 1867 when he was AY Wi'W n...
I: Now you say they went to housekeeping)so apparently you have done some
research. Now, I don't think the whole house was built at the same
time or did you have a chance to find anything out about
M: No, I would like to talk to some of the architect people to know what4,
1: I was curious if you had seen anything, any writings that suggested that.
M: I wish I could. I'd certainly love to know thatr1 o built it; ether
~ e helped to build it, or whether James Douglas)after he came,
built it.
I: So in any case, they came in here and set up housekeeping.
M: They came right here in 1865, and I know when Mr. James Douglas Mathe-
son die ,d ___ -MWan ag s Rma ter working for
Srale became a merchant because we have the picture.'--
-asemi of our early days here. This picture NiO shows his own business.
It was his store and he was a merchant and they had shoes and groceries
and all kinds of things. He also, from one of the maps that we have7
a map that was printed in 1872, I think it is. It had Real Estate Banking
and Collecting Agency, Matheson and McMillan, Gainesville.
I: This was AleMatheson, right?
M: No, this was James Douglas. James Douglas, yes, Chris's father.
I: James Douglas, yes.
M: James Douglas Matheson J.D. Matheson. Then Matheson Dry Goods, you
ALA 5AB
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see, clothing, cloths, shoes, hardware. I have seen an outline of a big
wooden shoe that used to hang out in front of the store, and when Chris
died, after his death, I think they gave it to one of the Duval Shoe
Stores. Now, I don't know whatever happened to that shoe, but I'd like
to see it '
I: So this was Chris's parents' store?
M: Chris's parents'
I: So they came and this store was what? Sometime around ,
M: 1870 --9 / / 1.A"- 8g
I: Did he engage in any farming or anything before that? Or have you been able
to find out?
M: I don't know about farming. I know they connected ~ 0 ) in te real
estatei-McMillan and Matheson. Mr. James Douglas Matheson, and then,
later, Chri as a lawyer to take in a lot of real estate in payment
SL L .... I have twenty acres of land that I have
never seen.
ALA 5AB
Page 18 sjm
I: So, Chris, was, -. -n',if't '''" > '
M: No, t: i i. .. L. -:= ChIa,.-:i fourI pihey had
two little daughters, little Catherineand little Bay who lived
on3 to the second summer. You know, they used to say, "Oh, if
they could just live through that second ce was not too /_ "'/ .
a and it was pretty hot in Gainesville and Cedar Key. But
Sthe little girls died after about two years, Catherine and
a4o Then she had Chris and Steele, named for Judge Steele of
course. So Christopher named for his grandfather Chris Matheson
Christopher Matheson was the father of James Douglas Matheson. So
Chris was named for his grandfather and Steele was named for his
_ grandfather Steele. So they were young boys. )Uher; Chris went to
the Citadel, South Carolina military academy in Charleston, known as
the Citadel which was the West Point of theSouth and he, oh he
excelled. He was valedictorian of his class, was adjutant of
the battalion, and very, very good with his classes. I have a
copy of his valedictory that I found written in longhand j1bwe,
tied with a red ribbon. And it said,"Goodbye to the city of Charles-
t on hard to understand at first, but once understood, taken to
your heart..' He loved the city of Charleston.
I: When did he graduate?
M: In 1895.
I: 1895.
M: As I ; valedictorian (d- when we were married, he
ALA 5AB
Page 19 sjm
brought me back to Charleston, and with great pride, showed me
the old Citadel. And then we went back to commencement several
times with the old guard. We'd sit wityidg%. General Sommer-
all a' president when we went back for commencement) ( hi; s
classmates were having a runio ggga d- would sit 4 -
J with the resident in his for the parade and watch the
ar Chris would say,"There comes General Allison," you know,
a lot of his classmates had gone on to become generals in the army,
but he had graduated, as I say, in '95, and came home and stayed
a part of that year at home, surveying, helping with some surveying
locally and working in the store. And then he, because he had ex-
celled in the military/ 'l -- thought that he would like
to continue. So he went out to Fort Bliss, and joined the Fifth
I: Was this in, what, about what year?
M: About '96.
I: '96.
M: Uh huh. 'ahiat was the yea I think A& Steele was a young
sixteen year old cadet at the East Florida Seminary. Well, by the
way, while Chris was still here that year that he was out survey-
ing and helping his father, he was called on to substitute some of
the classes ver at the East Florida Seminary. sasse his father
was chairman of the board of the East Florida Seminary, *AdsNcz -a e jO
C, __CC_ and then he became treasurer, county treasurer for
Alachua County. James Douglas Mathison/ was treasurer and was
chairman of the board of, I mean of the county commissioners. He
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was a county commissioner and served several years as county
commissioner.
I: So Chris was mafi ed in Fort Bliss.
M: Well, he was in Fort Bliss when his younger brother, Steelewas
a cadet at East Florida Seminary tfnd one day, one weekend/ I
think, he and two other cadets went out on a little hunting trin
m~-i agfe: sua Aad their horse and buggy and, and Steele's
dog Bruce was with them. And they were out on the Kincaid Road
on a hunting trip when, we are not sure whether the dog jumped
up and knocked the gun over, or whether the buggy fell into a
C r' rut) xt the gun went off and shot Steele.
I: You said on Kincaid Road, do you know where that is?
M: Yes, that's out toward the Melton Plantation, you know the Mel-
tons that used to have the Buick place?
I: Right.
M: Well, it's t out .M there. That's called the Kincaid area, Kin-
caid section. Mr. Moseby Taylor was one of the young cadets with
^lltfg Steele when it happened, and these young boys were so
excite cThey did their best. and got him back to the hospital as
quickly as possible, but he died before they, or by the time he
was brought to the hospital. So Chris was all his father and mother
had left then, so he just got his honorable discharge as promptly
as he could/and came on back to Gainesville to be with his father
and mother and began to study law. sml~e B8...8BaeB.
I: Who'd he study law under?
M: Studied law under ,J.mm as Judge was one of thee Thomas
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Page 21 sjm
Kag I believe, was one of the local judges.
I: I have some information you might could tell umjrn one of his
obituaries they mention W.E. Baxter.
M: Oh, W.E. Baxter was one of his partners in law.
I: Well, they mention after studying under Baxter,* .
M: Oh I see, well I wonder if that was correct.
I: Well, it said, it said in his obituary that from 1898 he was
certified as a lawyer after studying under W.E. and E.S. Baxter,
A -^ I wanted to check his name.
M: Judge Kei was one of the ones that I know he studied under, and was
admitted, I had that confused a minute ago. Those two .
*'Lt-*---- about when he was admitted to the, to the bar cuse
he went up to Columbia also. Here's one of them, I believe. This
is the United States of America, District of South Carolina, Fourth
Circuit,"To all whom these may concern. Clerk of the circuit court
VWh< -I jhie dei'li
of South Carolina, district of the United States of America do
certify that Christopher Matheson, Esquire is this day duly admitted
and qualified before the Honorable William H. Brundy, United States
Judg) to practice as an attorney, solicitor and proctor in the cir-
cuit courts of the United States of America for the district afore-
said ~~ to a rule of said court. The State of South Caro-
lina. The 26th day of October in the year of our Lord, one thousand
nine hundred and seven, and in the 132nd year of our independence
of -f Sc/t s That was when he was admitted to the South Caro-
lina and then also, into the Tallahassee, December 4, 1900, Tues-
day, ten o'clock. __ pursuant to adjornment, Pe- 5t
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Honorable R.A. Tay4Lor, chief justice, M.H. Mabry and F.D.
Carter, justices. Christopher Matheson, a practicing attorney
in the circuit courts of this state appearing at the bar. and
on motion is admitted to practice as an attorney and counsel
in the Supreme Court, _
I: So then he became a 9upreme-
M: Supreme Court, in the Supreme Court of Florida. He was prac-
ticing in 1905, I have this! "Christopher Matheson, attorney-at-
law, Honorable J.W. Perkins, Deland, Florida. Dear Sir: The peo-
ple of Gainesville, believing that our city is a proper place for
the location of the state universt 1 created by the Buckman Bill
recently passed by the legislature, have determined to use all
honorable means to secure the location of the university here. They
believe that they will be supported in their effort by all who sin-
cerely believe that, who sincerely wish for the success of higher
education in this state, and its complete separation from the
blighting alliance of politics. I enclose you a small pamphlet pre-
pared by the people of Gainesville showing twelve reasons why the
school should be located here. If after thinking the matter over
carefully, you decide to give Gainesville your support, we'll be
glad if you would write a letter to Governor Broward or some mem-
ber of the board, urging Gainesville as the place of the university.
I ask this of you, not only in the interest of Gainesville, but in
the interest of fairness and the cause of education in the state of
Florida. With kind regards for yourself, I remain very truly yours,
1rc /V
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I: Now I believe that gets into some of his participation in /r0 i/
the University of Florida to GainesvillyOTust before, and I'd like
to go on to that, but to get this down1 5iu-said, you mentioned 2
that you thought he practiced with the Baxtersj and I was going to
ask you ,)I~ fdSi s there anybody else hc /ru/ /g T;
M: W.E. Baker, he practiced with W.E. Baker, who is the father of
Elizabeth Baker who was in the museum? / and___Pj
Cox.
Side Two
M: Chris was practicing with these men/and was made mayor, was elected
mayor, you remember about 191,9)I think it was 1910.
I: Right.
M: 11,A2, '13, 14, I15,'16,17, for nine terms, he was mayor. All
this time that he was practicing law and serving as mayor, he was
an elder in the Presbyterian church with his father ri w .it
James Douglas Matheson, had been an elder for life, practically;
- i"- d Chris was one of the youngest men made an elder with his father.
So he would agggl g iq on1MO 0 I preach on Sundays out
at Kanapaha, the old mother church. He would go out to Kanapaha
and I found a little booklet that showed the
amount of money.he'd get. He would have to rent a ca ars were
just ---
I: So he was actually preaching all along then,
M: Preaching, yeah, he was preaching, that's right.
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M: Preaching on Sundayg4 tois father died then in 1911^, ,age -
-go, &- was gliao aiW- at that time ). was Lunty measure.
And so Chris and his mother continued to stay on here, and he
served as mayor. Then he was in the legislature in 1917 and 1918,
and the war , m- came on, and he stumped the state selling
as iag liberty bonds and helping out as a speaker. He was
called onA was quite an orator, and made many talks to the
Elks Club and to the different organizations in Gainesville. -Ae-
gag B-l -is mother died Ut in 1917, I think or 1918.
And he thought, "Well, I didn't have a law office o the legisla-
ture and up at Fort Moultrie the war. If I'm ever going to
make the break, now's the time." So that was when he decided
to go the ministry and was taken out to Oklahoma.
I: Did he, did he have to go back and study in school to go into the1 )
M: When he was here, and while he was practicing sometime, he took
P--- "reek at the & diversity.
I: Oh. yr"
M: But he never did get to,, ,Pwas on the ard of stees of the
Columbia Seminary in Columbia, South Carolina, which was training
t -- siLers) ht he never did get to go to the seminary. So he was
taken out to Oklahoma, and friends told me that 4md- Dr. Morris
quizzed him on theology and Bible, and things of that nature, all
the way out there. He said,"This man knows as much theology as
many ministers." But he was ordained under special license/be-
cause he had not been to a seminary, you see. So, after we were
ALA 5AB
Page 25 sjm
married, I remember, he tried to resign, a tell
his church. He said, "I'd like to go to the seminary and study."
But they said,"You preach just fine for us. You don't need any
more training."
I: So he became ordained in what?
M: He became ordained in 1919. This was out in4,,
I: Out in Oklahoma. So there he'd gone the circuit.
I: There's a couple things before we go on that I'd like to get to)
and you might tell me a little bit about. And that's, the first
thing is regarding his involvement in bringing the University of
Florida to Gainesville. And his involvement, I have been told
he had some direct involvement bringing the University of Florida,
you know, like that letter you just read.
M: Yes, yes, yes he did.
I: And4-, ,
M: He was very interested ,,
I: Were there any other things he did, besides writing letters like
the one you read me before?
M: He wrote this letter and made talks and also got the ministers A
found this in the a plea for Gainesville., that was about that same
timesigned by the one, two three, four, five ministers of Gaines-
ville. "Finally, the long faithful, noble work of the East Florida
Seminary has so thoroughly imbued this city and the whole citizen-
ship with high ideals of social, moral and educational lifei-that
we believe this place socially, morally IF. i-fi..
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Page 26 sjm
place of all in this state for a great school location.* Reverend
Thomas P.Hayes, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, Reverend
T.J. Nixon, pastor of Kanapaha Methodist Church, Reverend Francis
H. Craigfield, pastor of Trinity Episcopal Church, Reverend Stuart
R. Rogers, pastor of the First Baptist Church, and Reverend Father
J. Lynch, Roman Catholic Church, Gainesville, Florida. June the
3rd,19~-7 That must have been 1905, too, about that time. Chris,
you see, knowing all of these ministers, I'm sure, influenced them
Sto write this article telling why Gainesville was such an ideal
place for the diversity.
I: Did, then there's also something we talked about, that you had men-
tioned to me before about his working on getting gas lamps put up
around Gainesville.
M: Oh yes, yes, these lamps. They're the old, you've seen the ones
in my backyard that was erected, well, I think it was about 1910
when he was mayor that through Major Thomas, W.R. Thomas 54
Major Thomas of the Thomas Hotel fame/j Major Thomas and Chris
worked together very closely on the town council together.
I: I'm not sure but I think, was he mayor at that time, W.R.?
M: Oh no. -- -
I: I guess W.R. was on theP,
M: He was on the council, yeah. Chris was mayor, and they were put
up o-, I remember Chris telling, he said, Major, at that time, the
train you remember, came right down through Main Street, nd it
would stop iSeLae ppa- at the station, which is just about where
the First National Bank is. And the White House was another hotel
ALA 5AB
Page 27 sjm
that later became, or was, first of all was the girls' dormitory
1t5^o the East Florida Seminary. And then it was made into the White
House, the hotel. And the, the train would stop and fuel, and
the passengers would get off and go to the White House foro(fF
their meal, noon meal and then they'd get back on the train.
But, Major Thomas said,"Oh, Chris, these lights are so beautiful.
The people will wake each other up and say,l~ook at nubeauti-
ful lights of Gainesville as they pass through. 1 So they did.
They were all around the square. And I don't remember what year
it was that they were going to tear them down. And I went to some
of the officials and said,"What are you going to do with them?"
And they said,"Oh, we're just going to get rid of them." I said,
"Well, I want one for sentiment's sake." Because they were placed
in the square when my husband was mayor. So they said,"You're
H-
welcome to "and they brought one out and dumped it on my yard.
I got Shorty Bean, paid him fifty dollars to light it, but now I
can turn the light on in my kitchen and it floods the backyard.
I: Glad you managed to save one.
M: So many people come by and say," / 9/,v/ /f. AWhere
did you get that light?" he city has been so good to
help me keep the bulbs in itjbecause sometimes it's been Ae L
target for rocks.
I: Sure.
M: But that's/f .
I: I wanted to find out about that because like you say, people
now wanted to know about them 7 -T IWv4 f// Okay, so now
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Page 28 sjm
upug you went out to Oklahoma, and you, in Ma Wlow I guess we can
come back. I just wanted to do some background.r.
M: 'Yes, sure.'
Mr. Mathesoi 5.J ae,/ 7f /t i check on some of
the, the only thing we have, as a matter of fact on Mr. Matheson
is his obituary ,- Atl/ .fwV C _ff r /l'_C5r
M:
I: It's good to have some things checked from you in relation to his
obituary. So you all, you -all went and got married. Did you get
married inA?
M: We got married in Montreat, in my summer place there. He said,
"Sarah Hamilton, you promised that we would have a very quiet
wedding, and you've selected the most public place in the world."
jMI Because it is a summer resort. But we were married on the
porch. My brother played the violin, and I have a friend who played
the golden harp. She brought the harp up to the v because
we did not have a piano. And a very close friend sang "Because" and
"I Love You Truly" and two of Chris's cousins who were ministers,
united ; aceremonyI John Matheson from Union, South Carolina
who was a cousin, and Gordon Matheson from Jackson Springs, North
Carolina. Chris did not have very many relatives left, you see. He
was the only child after Steele's death yemm-n, and his little
sisters$ and there weren't any other close Mathesons. But these
were two cousins as I spoke of earlier Kenneth Matheson, who was
president of Georgia Tech was a cousin and he had met him in At-
lant-i i
ALA 5AB
Page 29 sjm
I: Did you r- AI/ < come to the wedding?
M: Well, we had a good many. The Hamiltons were there, and I said,
"Now Chris, it isn't fair to 4o friends not to have a little
reception." So he agreed, and we did have the reception over in
the nn, which is the big hotel. Very beautiful, all rocky, /-LU,.
It looks likefortress built there on the side of the mountain
t --- d we had a ou ,- in the private room upstairs. It's,
irie now known as the Memory Room, so I've enjoyed going back to
the Memory Room most every summer ftsfe .
I: Is the hotel still operating?
M: Oh yes, gWstill operating, yes. This was in 1933, now. So then
*g' after the receptionewe started our honeymoon in Asheville, then
Hendersonville, Columbia, South Carolina, coming by train --
7 i day by day. It came down to Charleston, and spent a
couple of days in Charleston, and then on to Gainesville to his
Aunt Ola-. Aunt Ola Matheson, had, had really kept the house to-
S gether here. You see, when Chris left to go to Oklahoma, 1919, he
just walked off like a bachelor, and left all of the property here.
And there was one room upstairs that was kept with a lock and key,
not very secure, but a few things were left in there, and the house
was rented to a cousin at first, and then just to ordinary people
later on, who did not take care of things at all ..----. eLrs/*
f-d ^'; 4/Ao So we were thankful for anything that we could
salvage. And so Aunt Ola, who was the widow of William C. Matheson
You see James Douglas had this, this dear old home was dbS kind of
ALA 5AB
Page 30 sjm
a center. James Douglas was the brother that they all flocked to.
He had a sister, Miss Carolyn Matheson; Miss Callie, they called her,
Miss Carole, who taught at the East Florida Seminary. And, Mr.
Willie Matheson who worked in the store with haekg.b So
Aunt Ola lived right up the street rom Chris's house, and bhe had
kept some of the paintings gag9S and had tried to preserve some
S --the things that we still have today. So we came back here, and
then went over to Daytona Beach for a couple of days, enjoyed the
water there, the beach. And then we went back to Davidson College,
back to my home town. My mother had closed the house in Montreat,
and had come down to her winter home in Davidson where IAborn and
so we were there for two or three days before going back to Ok-
lahoma. And then you can imagine howAeverybody q b* ,"Who is
this person that Chris Matheson has married after all these years?"
He'd been a bachelor all this time.
I: Yeah.
M: I was received though:, with open arms and lived in the se in
Oklahoma ish- for twelve years.
I: Where is this now?
M: Shawnee, Oklahoma.
I: Oh, this is still Shawne-gI thought you said, .
M: Went back to, you see, I began teaching at Durant, and then when
I married, we went up to Shawnee, Oklahoma. And there I became
active in church and civic life. I was the president of the Haw-
thorne Club, andC,,
ALA 5AB
Page 31 sjm
I: What was the Hawthorne Club?
M: Hawthorne was a study club. That was a study club.
I: Was this just something that was there in that town or was it a-
national type of club.
M: No, it was just loca )I
book, kind of a book club, XJ. mu- ee. id we had pro-
grams. I became president there, worked with the Red Cross/and
did church work. I became president of the ir Presbytery,
Presbyterial. And i-_ Ip I was also president of the
'Ti of Oklahoma (ati, he
the whole state of Oklahoma _p-. .d was active in the
AAUW, American Association of University Women. d I was presi-
dent of a local group there.
I: nn h do any teaching?
M: I did some substitute teaching, yes. Substitute teaching.
I: For just the public schools.
M: Just for the public schools there. And after we came back to
Gainesville, Chris, as r very active in the Me was president
of the Oklahoma encampment for about fifteen years. od that was
something unique. They had, you see, being an Indian country, In-
dian encampments where the whole family would come together, and so
Chris being president of this association, encouraged families to
come together for summer camps. And they went for years down to
the Oklahoma Baptist Assembly grounds there in Oklahoma where they'd
spend a week or ten days together, all family, whole families. And
ALA 5AB
Page 32 sjm
it was something unique. But at that time, Richmond, Virginia
education department began saying,"That's not the way it ought to
be. The young people ought to be together, you know, for their
meetings, and the women ought to be together." And they began to
separate. As you look back now, and you realize that that was some-
thing that was really great and unique, to have a family encampment.
So then the young people broke away, and would meet separately, and
.- the)1 the men and womenjg~ oneers continued to meet together for a
few years. I got to go to one encampment after we were married (o
I got to see Chris in action there. He was president of the, chair-
man of the board of /home missions for Oklahoma for, oh, fifteen
years or more, seeing that the home missionaries, the home mission
ministers were paidq~pMaM. They got their salary and he would
oversee their work. And he was on the committee on union2and was
really an outstanding^ e was commissioner to the General Assembly,
at least twice.
I: Was he all this time still running his church as a ,,
M: He was a pastor.
I: He had a pastorate.
M: Yes. He had a pastorate there.
I: What was it like, divorced from your social life? wiat was it like
being a pastor's wife.
M: Pastor's wife.
I: And having to run a church.
M: Well, I tried from the very first, I said,"I'm going to live a
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Page 33 sjm
natural life. I'm just5)minaB- I'm a human person. I don't
want to be jq-rput on a pedestal or thought of just as the mini-
ster's wifevthat has to be different from anybody." And for that
reason, I took part in civic life, gw-x-m, and social life, and
just tried to be myself, 4 natural. And I, because we didn't have
any children, that was our only disappointment, we never did have
any children) I had one miscarriage t we didn't have children. .
So I had more time, then, to do these outside things,)and to take
part in the church life. So I taught Sunday schoolOI was superin-
tendent of the junior department in the church,9and president of the
women, you see, 4nd I went on to the local and the state work.
I: I'm sure you had the great social*
M: But I had to be, oh, yes, we had parties for the young-people, es-
pecially. We'd have waffle breakfast for the adults.
I: It all seemed to get thrown on you as his wife.
M: Yes, the e-ilbiq-college boys and girls when they'd come home for
Christmas, we always, that was just a tradition, that we'd always
have a waffle breakfast for our young people and college people.
And then of course, I always entertained for my circles, and we
had family night suppers, and the preacher's wife always did her
part of the work.
I: I've been interested/ in the preacher's wife. It's a, it's a hard
life, I'm sure.
M: /I ges.
I: I guess a pastor gets up, has to get up in the middle of the night
j
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Page 34 sjm
some nights.
M: Yeah, oh and weddings. Oh at weddings)you see. _d-
I: You know, at things like that, I'm sure that they probably didn't
have a wedding council, or a person who helped them.',
M: A-didn't counsel.
I: Not, not counselling, but I'm talking about, like we have a wed-
ding planner today, you know, ladies.
M: Oh, to do them.
I: Did you get the, as the pastor's wife, did they turn to you, some-
times ask you to help them?
M: Yeah, sometimes they did. Yes, they asked me to help them plan the
the social life.
I: I know, and we don't have those. You know, they didn't have those
bridal sections of the store like we have today.
M: No, that's right, they didn't.
I: You know, it'd seem to me to be logical that somebody would turn to
the pastor's wife sinceA,
M: Yeah, that's right. I've played the piano sometimes, you know, the
wedding march, when they'd come to the manse, for just a private
wedding' why I'd go to the piano sometimes, and play the march for
them, you know. And it was real interesting. It's been a custom,
I don't know whether you know it, but the preacher supposed to give
his wife any of the wedding fees that he gets. That's just a custom,
that the wife gets the fees. So, it was real interesting to see,1Y
how they varySometimes they're, *'tWb* a dollar or two dollars.
y
ALA 5AB
Page 35 sjm
Once I remember, the man gave my husband a cigar, ahe didn't
smoke. But he said,"Thank you very much," took the cigar, and after
the party had gone, he looked at it, and there was a ten dollar bill
wrapped real tightly around the cigar.
I: Did you get the cigar?
M: So I got the cigar and the money. Well, we had some very interesting
experiences, O t we nearly always went back to Montreat 40=2 in
the summertime. That was back in North Carolina to our cottage, for
our vacation. During the war, we couldn't get gas to go, so we
went down to Ai Texas,'exas encampment grounds. One
year we went up to the Ozarks, up to the Methodist, I've forgotten
the name of that Methodist camp. We had some interesting....oh yes,
very shortly after we were married, one of the men in the church,
Mr. Ike Bfrry, and Dr. Byre Dr. .yjrn was our doctor. They gave
us a Buick car, and Chris had never driven t id e ving.i7'
One member of the church, Mr. Ike B/rry, had a summer place up in
Qe- Colorado, and he had invited Chris to come up several summers)
and he never had gon)SSSa kw we had a car. And so we were invited
to join them that summer. So that was good experiencP I drove the
car. We went west out through Texas, out through Amarillo, and over
Raton Pass up to La Va Pass, and Wagon *eel sap,
pan -pa 1- m way over the mountains of Colorado, that were
covered with snow, you know, clear up to Creede, which was the
fisherman's paradise. And that was where the Rio Grande starts
S--- nd we did some fishing. ChrisY hiducaught a fish. Poor fellow,
ALA 5AB
Page 36 sjm
I IwB he caught, he BBrrys caught many fish, but they didn't
eat fish S they'd fry them for us, and broil them, and we'd
enjoy their fish. And then, I had a cousin over at Pueblo, Colorado,$~tlia
-woColorado Springs, and we left our friends and drove over to Colorado
Springs and to Pueblo for a little visit, then came back and
joined the B]rrys at a rodeo. The first rodeo I ever saw, Chris
too. And Chris was always very fond of animalsand cows rhe
did not like to see these little calves ropedg id~j That was
too much for him. So v- we watched it a while, and then we left
and drove down t-o-aiao ,ais-- W to Taos, Taos, New Mexico, the art
center for the night, and then on to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where
we had a very nice visit. The whole trip was-~'i 6t-
I: When did you, when did you all come to Gainesville? We came back
to Chris began 4W his health began to give way, and
we went to the Mayo's, Mayo's clinic, the Mayo clinic. And they said,
"It's Parkinson's disease." That is a dread creeping paralysis in a
way. And they said,"We don't have any known cure, but we give this
to retard it." And then one summer we went down to Temple, Texas.
-- Wr WCE Ithat summer, we stopped at Temple, Texas, which is
the southwest, Temple Texas, Scott White clinic at Temple, Texas,
which is the Mayo d the southwest. And they said the same thing,
"It's Parkinson's. We don't know what, there's no known cure, but
we feel this which was the tincture kiQov/, and we'd like-", he
could take that better than what they gave us at Mayo's. We were
at Mayo's twice --m '4-" t began with a little
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Page 37 sjm
shaking of the hand. And so that developed till Chris retired), nd
^ ~ signed there, We had two more years before retirement, but he
had to resign in '46 ~e came back to Gainesville, h eept
this dear old home all these yearsQo Mp-r
I: Had you all come back to Gainesville on and off?
M: Every summer we'd come back.
I: Every summer, when you came to Montreat, you'd come back.
M: Yes, we'd come to Montreat, then we'd swing around through Florida.
I: Who kept the house up all this time?
M: Here? This one?
I: YeS -- Did you always close it up and leave it?
M: No, it was, it w rented through that time) cause when we came,
well, when we, when Chris resigned o' -, / /CNea3 been there
twenty-five years, and they, oh, they --~-- He was a charter
member of the Kiwanis Club and was quite aAhonored member, and
quite a speaker there nd the, the oilmen loved him. See, before
he married, being a bachelor, he ate at the hotel a good deal. Al-
ways went to the barber shop. He never did like to shave himself,
so that was one of the, the extras that he had, was to go to his
barber shop every day. And this was in the big hotel. And some of
these roughnecks that worked around oilfields, they all loved ChriqSA/L
had some appeal hey just loved him. He was gentle, and very
handsome,and very charming. But they ad draw to him 6d there
was # one, Mr. Word, that gave him, deeded him some land, three-
fourths of an acre of mineral rights or something, oil, you know.
L
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And he had hi mother's funeral a._ __; e ., So anyway
hhey all came to this big dedication, a big celebration
on Chris's twenty-fifth anniversary, gave him a purse, you know,
and all the different ministers came and honored Mm,and so forth.
t. S,_
He was so beloved, very much like our preacherGordon here who'd
been twenty-six, he was twenty-six years in this one church. And
so when he resigned, they said,"Oh, Mr. Matheson, don't leave Shaw-
nee. Here's a house, you wouldn't ever have to think about -s" -
You owe it to the town. You belong to the whole town, not to
just the Presbyterian church, because he had had funerals frm
Methodists, Baptists, Jews and Mormons, and most, you name it.
And, but I said,"Chris, we've been so happy here, and you won't
be the minister,and I won't be the minister's wife, I think it's
much better to keep these happy memories/and move on." And he
felt the same way, so we, we left there, and came on to Davidson
to visit my mother. And she said,"Oh, Davidson's such a wonderful
Splac many college presidents, h1'7y mainjt ave retired here,
and I have a big two-story house all alone. Why don't you settle
in Davidson?" And I said,"Well, mother, we know it's fine, and
S we love it, but wherever Chris is going to be happy, I will ad-
just-." JSo we came on down in January, Mg*pto Gainesville. Our
house was rented, but January and February the azaleas and camel-
lias were blooming, and it was so beautiful; and people spoke to
Chris, and I saw that his roots were here, and he still had so
many friends, that I said,"We will have to live in Gainesville.
I I
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After all, he's retired now, he's resigned, and r- s'-.... we
have the property that has been kept heratThat will have to make
a living for us. We'll live in Florida, and you come and spend
the winter months with us, and we'll go to Montreat in the sum-
mer." So that was a nice settlement. And so that was '46, and
Chris died in '52. "f Oeet-ept active, though, I didn't let him
I: What was, what was, this was right after the war, I guess.
M: Yes.
I: What was it._alh^_r what was Gainesville like then?
M: Well, it had grown a lot. You have a clipping where they'd 6-nv*en
masmd Chris when he came back hero. d I thought that was right
interesting how heaoa felt that it had changed a lot, but the
streets wAt.Jhad been renamed, you know, and so forth since he
Ijn^k )JA8 Wrci
was here. But it was, the air, the air was so soft. \mig f-um--
Oklahoma, where it'd been very cold in the winter, and very hot
in the summer. It just seemed that the air of breathing was so
easy, and soft, and welcome. People on the streets spoke to youo
You still tipped your hat when you met people ag You seemed to
know everybody. It's so different now, eleven years later, it's
getting too big.
I: Gainesville's getting big, for sure.
M: Too big, too big.
I: You'd mentioned that you had, that you still have a lot of friends
left. Could you tell me a little bit about some of the close
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Page 40 sjm
friends that, that Mr. Matheson had?
M: Well, the XFad He had known John i ll, and AJ U very,
very well, in the church and in the drugstore there. He, Mr. Baker,
his former partner was still here,and we went to see hinI remember
giving a dinner party one time,, for Chrig invited Mr; Baker
and Dr. W Dr. J.M. 9#i* who was, who had been active in civic
affairs, J.M P
affairs, as well as a doctor) (fd Mr. 44-il, and Mr. E.Al Turner.
E.0. Turner was a Republican, but he was a very close friend, that
had worked for Mr. Dutton in the Dutton Bank in the early days. Mr.
Turner's still living. Mr. Turner and James Chesnut, James Chesnut
who was uncle, I guess, of Gibbs Chesnut, who started the Chesnut
store. Those were some of the ones that came. Oh, and the Tysons
Mason and Gordon Tyson. They were here. I don't remember who else,
but those were some of the ones that came and oh, they sat around
the dining room table and had such a good time, discussing things.
---t M stayed, we couldn't get into our house when we first came,
it was rented. And, and this woman knew what a good thing she had,.
It was hard to find housing. In fact as you say, right at wartime,
'46. *if ht we gave her notice, and finally just had to, had a
hard time getting her out of the house, so that we could begin to
restore this dear old house. So we stayed with j Walkerahnd
Aunt Sally, cousin Sally, Sally Walker. She said,"Chris, you're,
you're family, you're part of the family. We want you to say here."
It was right close, right across from Mr. Keeter t's now
torn down, the house. He bought it and part of his parking lot
ALA 5AB
Page 41 sjm
-4 there. The Florida National Bank is where the First Presbyterian
Church was and they were right ~ae Pleasant Street. So we
stayed there about ten days, enjoying life with cousin Sally.
Because Chris's first cousin, one of the Matheson girls who had
married a McEwan,;- ( nyways she had married *2*m-
Walker's brother, and so really by marriage, they were kin som--
M-4r so we 1.1rpr t,'j -L/ftM .' And we stayed over at Mrs. a-
pgggs right here, waiting to get the woman out of the house,
and to start getting it restored, and we did. We finally got it
restored, got it painted. We'd go to Montreat, and come back and
do some more. O gQ~i/ 'gthe house got Wrestored and
painted, and they said, it was prettier than it ever had been.
In the early days, I don't think they painted houses as much~ s a _
I: No.
M: And so it never had looked as pretty as when it was painted then.
But people from the university had come through the years, to
sketch it, the architecture department would send their students
out to sketch the house because it had been, well when James Doug-
las and M4atheson, before Chris was born, when they lived
- here in the house, it was just a part of a plantation. The-eou-th
Aide& // you know cause the Sweetwater Branch
was the east, east boundary> And the Ct iLr~ i the street came
up from University Avenue to the barn behind te4rtf. 270-, /^N)/
ra 1ely hi gave a little passageway, a little alleyway, and then the
street was Union Stree and now, it's S.E. First Avenue. And as
street[ wa nonSre
ALA 5AB
Page 42
you know, last summer, the house was listed .ggo!Oto
..,aslg he State of Florida, in recognition of its Sig-
nifigance-/and to encourage its preservation, Matheson House is
hereby officially listed on the National Register of Historical
Places. Office of Archaelogy and Historic Preservation. National
Park Service, Department of Interior, Washington, D.C." And it's
signed by Reuben Askew, pvernor, August 13, 1973. Richard Stone,
Secretary of State, and Robert Williams /igqiS;t (7/C',.
I: You know, it's k/c C /' /CI the backgrounQ -
^^*n ,--------- .
M: I think it's interesting. Is there anything else you want to say
about your husband? I'd like to get on, you know, in a few minutes
to sum your life up after Mr. Matheson died.
M: -'h. Well, Chris *, his life, he really almost had
three careers, didn't he?
I: Yeah, I was going to focus in on that when I was doing the research.
M: His military, you see, in a way, his citizen life, and his military t
Fort Bliss, and his love for that type. And then his law. And he
excelled in all three. He excelled in his military, being adjutant
of his battalion, and so forth. Then in his, in his law life, he was
a very good lawyer, attorney-at-law. And while practicing law with
these other two partners that we spoke of, Mr. Baker and Mr. Baxter,
he, he just left his law office when he went to Oklahoma to become
a minister. He left his, oh, what do you call it, where you keep
your files in your safe, had no safe then. When we came back, his
ALA 5AB
Page 43 sjm
law books were gone, and we don't know what happened to them. The
old safe, we would like to have had that safe, as just a C(c, /
It had his name on it, but someone had taken it from the office.
But he/ become a mayor of the town, and oh I wish we had time to
go into some of the articles.
I: Did he, did he ever do anything in law when he was a minister?
M: In his law?
I: Did people ever come up with problems.or did he ever use his law
experience to help people out out there?
M: I'm sure that his law helped him in the logic of his sermonizing.
You know,you could just see that way it was organized, his sermons
and so forth. And in his counselling with people, he could give them
help, and he still kept up with some of the, the Negroes, the black
people of Gainesvill He was such a good friend to them when he was
a lawyer. And some of them were still on his books, his accounts.
They would write to him in Oklahoma, and say,"Would you help us
with this?" So that he did continue to help a good deal with that.
I remember when he told me once about, he was talking to George
rBey who was president of the Building and Loan/ in Oklahoma,
a very big business. He was a Baptist in the Baptist church there ,
but they were quite good friends, and they used to tell tales of
early life, you know, when he was a lawyer. When he went to Wash-
ington, I think it was in 1907, that he said, Mr. Frank S6@i was
their representative from this, from Alachua toasingon. And,
anyway, when he came through Washington, Mr. atr met him one day,
ALA 5AB
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and took him through the Supreme Court, you know, and into the
Senate. And he said, "Oh, you must meet Theodore Roosevelt, our
/-- ~-eint. Chris,you must meet our resident." So he took him
over to the White House to meet him, and they had to sit outside
quite a little while waiting for him to come out. And Chris said,
"Oh, do you think we should wait longer?" "Oh, yes," he said. So
L just then, the resident, IQW President Roosevelt came out and
Mr. iB.-said,"This is Chris Matheson from Gainesville." And he
said, he just pumped his hand. He said,"Mr. Matheson, I am so
glad to see you. I would have been greatly disappointed had you
come to Washington/and not stopped by to speak to me." Sgm!se-
SSo he excelled as a lawy And then as a minister, he
"T_^ hada1i te honors of being a representative to the -< Oi-s-
representing his Synod, on so many committees for the General
Assembly. He was a member of the Presbyterian Foundation in Char-
lotte, and went every year to represent Oklahoma. And we had this
committee on union; Chris was the minister from all of the Presby-
terian church of Oklahoma to represent on the General Assembly. He
was a commissioner to the General Assembly at least twice. I went
with him once when he was commissioner at Chattanooga, Tennessee.
I remember there were seventy-five wives at that meeting, and we
were entertained while the ministers were attending that meeting.
He was a vice-president of the American Bible Society for thirty-
,one years. o/ 'Ia (l' O^ "
one years. &/I4i gj C0 He had many, many honors )
I: You said that Mr. Matheson died in 1952. I guess that/ 41
t/ d
ALA 5AB
Page 45 sjm
started your third life then didn't you?
I: Yeah, that's right. I remember that my family came down for
the funeral. They loved Chris, just like everybody else loved
him. My whole family, my mother, my one brother, all my sisters
loved Chris. So several of them came to the funeral here. Then
I went home therrLto Davidson for Christmas. He died in October)
and I went home in December. While I was there, Preacher Gordon
called, and said, "Mrs. Matheson, we have a job for you. We want
you to come back and take over the Presbyterian Center out here,
the Presbyterian Center off University Avenue, you know, where the
Methodists have one and the Presbyterians and Baptists have one."
And I said,"Oh, dear." Well, he said, "I'll call you tomorrow
night." So he called the next night, and my family said,"That's
exactly what you should do, Sarah." So when he called, I told
him I would come and do the best I could. He said,"It may be a
month, it might be six months, we don't know how long, but m-9
alwayshad a man. But we want you to take over, until we can get
a man." So I came back then, and was in charge of the Presbyterian
Center on University Avenue for six,-practically six months exactly,
from January to June. Neilly McCarter came over in June, and that
was just right for him to take over and I was free to go to Montreat
for the summeWd)Wm So I worked there six months. And then, oh,
what have I done? Let's see, I was, became, I was
president of the Suwanee Presbytery here.
I: I've had some information that you had done some teaching in Alabama
ALA 5AB
Page 46 sjm
and North Carolina.
M: Yes, that was the, in the _/ gaining schools, I wou
be asked to teach: I've forgotten, maybe Bible courses, or some
kind of Christian education coursev'1st last summer, I was asked
to teach at the South Carolina r..- ining school at Clinton,
South Carolina, Presbyterian College at Clinton. And that course
was "The Changing Role of Women in Today's World." Those were the
courses I taught last year. a / Swe e / L /- 7-; s /oo/
I: So you kept, you kept your teaching up for a long time.
M: I was president of the hurchwomen Iited of the state of Florida.
I was president j oia t.oen when I got a letter one day out of the
blue saying,"Mrs. Matheson, you have been recommended for mission
service. Would you consider going to Korea?" Well, that was such
ya surise, I said,"Well, how about it, Sarah theson,are you willing
to go to Korea, that cold country and all your age, to teach?"
And I prayed that the door would open wide or shut tight, and it
just kept opening. I did then accept and that was in 1960 1960.
-. I went out in the summer, of 60 d my nephew, who was a student
0 at Princeton University drove me out to California, and we had a
41p_memorable going out _rough the Grand Canyon, the southern route.
I: Did you go to Oklahoma?
M: We went right through Oklahoma, spent the night in Shawnee. I was
glad to get to meet some of the friends there. We called them, and
said,"We're coming through." They said,"Come right on, spend the
night." So we stayed in Shawnee. And I went to Sun Chung, Korea,
S^^-L^ ^1L-ue-A-/
L
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and taught missionaries' children for two years, 1960- / L- 2-*
I: You taught missionaries' children?
M: Missionaries' children. So I didn't have to get the language,
you see. Again I was busy teaching. I had seven students the
first year, but I had first grade, third grade, fourth grade,
fifth grade, sixth grade.
I: Well, what was, what was Korea like? What wasf,,.
M: Oh, Korea was, i--- .
I: A stark change?
M: It was, it was a change, yes. It was cold. You felt like apla-es-
the wind was just coming from Siberia, straight down over the
Afganistan right down to us. Of course, there's mountains every-
where. You don't get out of sight of the mountains. But it's so
beautiful. You have the sea and the mountains and the, the southern
part of the, of the, south of the 38th parallel is the breadbasket
1 of Korea. ce paddies everywhere. The northern part was the moun-
tains, the mountainous district. Hydroelectric power in the northern 7er
They really, it should be one, because you need both in the country)
S--- ut I'm sure that since I have left, I have kept up with a lot of
friends, and they say that the economy has risen considerably. See,
this was not too long after the war, 6j, .. ,~* /l o p
I: How did the Koreans receive you?
M: Oh, they were just great. They're such friendly people, such lovely
people, and I wore the Korea dress when I would go out to church.
I learned a good little bit of the language. Today we a Korean
tl-^
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student at our women's church luncheon this noon. She wore her
dress, and when she came in, I said, 5,5)fI / 'sr,'.J v-
and she said,"Oh, you know Korean." You know, just a few words,
it really takes it a long way. So when she had sung, I said,
Iw $SJiA Aa"t, thank you very much. Oh, being a teacher, I
used my holidays to see the country, and we went down to the
south district that's an island about a hundred and fifty miles
south of Korea. We went on a little boat down to visit that is-
land where they had some citrus, the only place they have citrus
trees. And then one summer, I took a boat from u S-4A and went
over to Japan, visited the three islands of Japan.
TAPE TWO
M: ,.,Ihe summer in Japan. The first Christmas was spent in Hong Kong,
and in Taiwan. I have a cousin who planned my itinerary all over
the islan~g eautifulJ then when I came home in the summer of '62,
Mrs. Kirkpatrick, a friend that I had met, another teacher, came
.tA- Georgia, and I travelled home together. lae &%.came home
around the world, visiting mission stations. I had friends in
various countries where I stopped and visited.
I: What was the, what kind of missionary work did the mdmai m church
do in Korea? Were they, did they leavethe kids, I mean, did the
parents go out and do their missionary work and leave the kids
with you at the schools, orn?
lit
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M: In the daytime, yes. I taught, I taught, we have a lovely little
school building. It's beautifuluilt, just like the architecture
of the country. But the men the women were so glad to have a
teacher, so they didn't have to teach their own children, you
know. They had charge of the planning of the family of this/ the
meals and taking care of the home, while the husbands, two of them
were ministers, rural, they'd go out to their rural churches. And
Hugh Linton developed libt a design at building churches out of
concrete, so that the lumber wouldn't just rot out, you see, when
they'd build wooden ones. Hek would pour the concreteand
then carry on the trailerAbggBs f -the beams and so forth,
and the local Korean men would help hifrect churches. And, oh,
I went with them on is an rips own o w ere, one time where
there had never been a Christian service before. And he would
carry radio equipment and films, and show slides. Put up a big
sheet, you know, and start, start some music and show some pic-
tures, and before you knew it, you'd have hundreds of people coming
around to see it. And a doctor came at, one of the doctors, Stan
aA er, had graduated from Davidson College, my old hometown and
he was working with the leprosy mission there in SoohChuno. And
his father and mother came out to see him with another friend who
was a doctor. So we had two doctors. And we went on this island
trip and set up a clinic. these two doctor~Sygga Oh, the
people lined up. Some of them hadn't seen a doctor in years.
I
ALA 5AB
Page 50
Some of them would just pretend to have a4 an ache or a pain to
see one of the doctorshwould say to them. And it was very in-
teresting. We had medical work going on then with this Wilson
Leprosarium. And we had rural ministers preaching the gospel,
and we had the business manager happened to live down in Soo,-7.
Chung. -He--g9g would meet the boat when new missionaries would
come, and when they'd ordered things shipped, you see) (,~e have
to go and meet the boat and see that the supplies were delivered
to the right people and so forth. Sa; have to get on a /77/
train and go up to Beoul quite often, to the big city. He pre-
ferred to live down in the quiet beautiful CrA_ 'O_ n, /_rcO
yaum rE PJi garden spot of Korea, SooChun. And it was beautiful.
The early missionaries had planted beautiful gardens.
I: jky /AIm) AO /CF4I#i missionaries?
M: From 1892.
I: 1892, that long.
M: And they, the people are so responsive, the Koreans. They have a
strong vibrant church,"ecause, -thp, they didn't start a church
until there were a certain number of believers, you know. They'd
give them so much money to start a church) and so tf-Abat least
ten percent 6f the people of Korea are Christians. That's counting
alllo.
I,
I: I believe I remember the / that where Billy Graham had such a
great meeting over there.
M: Yes, that was there. Over a million people at one time. This one
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church, the largest Presbyterian church in the world, there in
Seoul, Korea, called the /6/ ~/ok Yurch, with about
fifteen thousand members. And they have three services every
Sunday morning, with over two thousand at each service. Just
-yrE
think of six thousand people coming to church every Sunday. Ye-,
very lovely people. I had some wonderful friends there.
I: And I understand also, that you've been, at least in the early
years, you know, the sixties, that you did a lot of work for
the people at the university here. Is that right? Students
and things?
M: Students, yes, student work.
I: What kind of work did you do? I think you said you were at the
center for a while. Now what else?
M: Yeah, I was at the center,4meeting there. And a lot of my boys,
they're still my boys and girls. One of the boys who graduated
has gone on to the seminary and now he's one of the high officials
in Atlanta. And when I see him, he just runs right into my arms.
He's one of my boys. I worked there Then I also have)through
the years, been a member of the Gainesville Council International
Friendship, working with international students, especiallyA With
my experience in Korea and so forth, I have especially adopted the
Korean students here. But English in Action is something that is At1
ecumenical experiment here, open to all denominations to come and
give an hour a week tog,9t's kind of like a bridge across language)
agP culture/ religion. We're assigned a person, a student)who has
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come who wants to improve his English. And I've had people from
Taiwan, from Indonesia, from Colombia, Venezuela and various places.
India, lots of them from India.
M: Yeah, '? a /o7 o from various places around the world.
So I've enjoyed working with these students. But I have two sisters
who conduct tours every summer, k(// VE -' ith them. We went back
around the world in 1970, this time going from New York, you see, and
landing in California. The time we went out to Korea we went
to California, and came back to New York. So, two summers ago, we
went all i Rs'to Russia ( Moscow for two or three days.
I: Was it hard to get to go into Russia at that time?
M: That year, it was a little bit hard. My sister, Mary, who's the
business manager of the tour had to wor1 ehe had to get a personal
friend in Washington to help he et the visa straight. But the next
summer they went~and had a much better time, the second summer.
This summer, she's planning to take a youth cruise. Sister Martha
teaches at Ashley Hall in Charleston; she takes the girls. But when
they get back from their youth tour, Mary is planning a farmer's tour
to Russia They're planning to go to Leningrad and then to Moscow,
and then to Kiev, and she's taking these farmers' bankers who have
these farms that are going to visit the farms around Kiev, and then
they're going to get onl S Siberiai Seven days, it'll
take them seven days to cross to Tokyo for
three days, and then to Fairbanks for a few days before flying home.
ALA 5AB
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I: That's interesting. Well, I take it, you know, you've really,
from what I understand and have gathered from you've
really, I guess, taken youth asdgg your stand, andd,,,
M: Well, they used to syay, that's the way to keep young. A constant
>i
application of youth is the way to stay young. I enjoy the youth
here, but I like them all ages. a hien I came back from Korea,
I had never had any social security, all these years. That was one
of the fringe benefits that the world mission put me on social security)
so I had sixty, sixty-one and sixty-two and I wrote to reacherr
Gordon, and said,"I need a little paying job to finish out my
quarters, you know, for Social Security." So, I was made church
visitor, and I continue to be the church visitor for First Presby-
terian, visiting the new people that come and the new member qsraD
~_6a.ea..ga.... eg. . the sick at the hospitals, and the shut-ins
and so forth. Then I was made the first woman elder at First Presby-
terian.A Preacher Gordon was here, he didn't want any women elders.
So after teacher left, when Mr. Tucker came, 4JWI was elected the
first, the first woman elder in 1969.
I: How did the churchf,,
M: How did the church,,
I: I guess te church really kind of Gci-ri it- 1t
t (r^<^ c' 'a9 -rO I "
M: The preacher called me, -- "How's my
elder A ?" And I said,"Preacher, I didn't know whether you'd
speak to me." "Oh, yes," he said,"I love you just the same." And
then he came up with,"But you didn't make while I was here, did
41
ALA 5AB
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you?" But now, the latest thing is that Mr. r came back
PeFsbyr y
from AN -a, and called and said, "Congratulations, nominee."
-t loderator nominee. So I would be the second woman moderator of
theApresbytery this coming May k' ,*"..
I: You really have been active in the Presbyterian church, I must say.
When are you going to get to be the head?
M: Oh no. .~t-e--I /
I: Make it a first for women's lib.
M: I don't have any aspirations that way. None of this, they've
all, my honors have just come to me, much more than ever deserved.
I: Well, is there anything else that you would like to say that
I may not have been able to cover? Because, you know, this kind
of oral history taping is, is really for you to say what you want,
and there may be some things that I haven't been able to find be-
cause, as I said, we were, had so little information on you and
of course, there's so much on Mr. Matheson in the newspapers and
thing3A1nd it takes a lot to cover it, and I just wondered if
there was anything that you thought of interesting to relate or
stories or something that we might have gone over that has come
to you since we started.
: I had some people here the other day for lunch
M: I had some people here the other day for lunchswag --u old
friends from near Charlotte, North Carolina, and we were talking
about some of these things. They said,"I think it's amazing that
you have as many of these papers from the early, you know, when
Chris left, just went off and left everything, it's a marvel
ALA 5AB
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that we have any of the things that his mother had kept, you see."
She realized that her father was an interesting one of the early
pioneers of Floridai and had kept so many of these, Vll, he was
quite a, a writer, you know. We spoke of his editing the Magnolia
Gazette. And he, after, at Cedar Key, there's this wonderful
scrapbook that his mother kept and Judge Steele was quite a writer.
He wrote a poem every year for Augusta for her birthday. He would
write a poem honoring her birthday. Sometimes it was set to music)
sometimes it was just a poem. But I find that his pen name; he
contributed to a lot of newspapers; and his pen name was Steele
spelled backwards, Eleets. S-T-E-E-L-E, you see)would be E-L-E-E-T-S.
Eleets, I find, A.S., Augustus Steele, or Eleets. And I don't know
whether he made this book or whether his daughter did it but it
Acs
i a lot of his own poetry and a lot of his early writings. And
clippings from Randal ~)g James R. Randall. Must have
been one of the teachers that they had come to the island, you
see, to instruct Gussie when she was a little girl. Randall wrote
the poem "Maryland, My Maryland". Acrostics, they used acrostics
a lot in those early days) Ja and we have his, his glasses, you
know, in the little silver case with Augustus Steele. And an old
an old sundial that was used it's also a compass) that he used in,
both at Cedar Key and at, because he was collector of the~ ven
you know at, at Cedar Key as wel d also, wrote a lot of articles.
Yes, look at some ofAt,,
I: He, what was I going to say?
ALA 5AB
Page 56
M: He wrote some of the articles. te and Mr. Riny, you see, brought
the railroad from Fernandina to Cedar Key. And he was influential,
in writing articles to prove that it would be much better for the
railroad to come from Fernandina to Cedar Key than to go to Tampa.
And you see, Jg-he had left Tampa, you see, and come to Cedar Ke )
So really they did get the railroad, the first railroad that came
down from Fernandina down through Gainesville to Cedar Key. You
a5
can still, 4* you go to Cedar Key now, you can still see where
the, where the railroad used to be. He "
I: Oh, I know what I was going to ask you now.
M: Yes.
I: Did, was most of this stuff here? Did you have, you know, you
didn't have much trouble having to try to locate F .
M: No, no.
I: Did it, was it, safe for that long period?
M: In that room upstairs, yes. And then Aunt Ola had taken what she,
what she felt that wasn't safe here, she had taken over to her
house, that we still own)up the street here a little ways. She
had kept, and oh, they were wrapped up. I have a little gold
thimble that belonged to Gussie Steele, Gussie Matheson (
A
little pieces of gold, coins, and things that were done up in
little, little silk bags, you know, and tied so carefully with
ribbon, and all of it very interesting to me. The way things were
ALA 5AB
Page 57 sjm
Preserved kept Mr. O'Neill, you know, Clarence O'Neill, who was
assistant clerk commission here, assistant clerk for year 9 W
told me one day, "Mrs. Matheson, you should go by and get Nd -/L Z ~I=vE
compiled." Up to 1970, he was clerk. And this year was the begin-
ningeou know, that Alachua county is 150 years old this year.
It was in 1824, 1824, that the county, Alachua county was formed
And then in 1854, approximately, they purchased approximately 100
acres of land which was the city of Gainesville. And ninety-three
people voted that first year. And I noticed that J.D. Matheson re-
ceived thirty-five votes, hat was just two years after he'd come,
you see, in 1867. This was in 1869. Wg Mr. O'Neill had listed
all of the mayors from 1884. The mayors and the aldermen from
1884 on up to 1970. And I suppose Chris was mayor /oYIir- be-
cause his was 1910 through 1917, that he was mayor. But that's
quite interesting to see now, showing how long they were mayor.
I: Well, Il~6"-am n would like to thank ,you for talking. You've
been one of my best subject Cswatr~
0t0rou've been a very good interviewee.
M: Well, thank you so much.
I: I've enjoyed it, and I think that, you know, you'll enjoy reading the
transcripts when they get back. I'm not sure exactly, we're supposed
to be getting the typist started, and then when they get through
typing transcripts, we'll send you a copy, or get a copy to you.
But if I have gone or graduated before, see)I'm leaving in June,
It'll be in r. Proctor's office and we will get somebody to get
ALA 5AB
Page 58 sjm
it to you. And then they'll read it, and let you read it, and
see if there's anytgng you want to add, sdothing you've thought
about. You can write in at the back. What we try to do is main-
tain that copy just as you..g ~corrected it, o you don't
go through and correct the grammar, but if there's something that
say the transcriber picked up wrong off the tape, you can make the
annotation, and we'll keep it just like that. Whatever copies are
made, will be off of that. And then the oral history people will
ask you to give over them the right to use it as a reference source
so that it can be placed in the library as a memoir and primary
source material, you know, just like anything else is. So you know,
we hope you'll look forward to to reading it.
M: Yes, I certainly do.
I: I hope it will be helpful to people.
M: I certainly enjoyed talking with you.
I: Thanks a lot.
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