Women of Fenn College Oral History Project
Betty St. John (BA, 1946)
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Interview conducted through Cleveland State University's Mary Joyce Green Women's Center.
Transcript:
BETTY ST. JOHN: --organic chemistry teacher, Dr. Pesuit. And there were only three of us in the class because it was the war, only three women in the organic chemistry class. And he was giving us advice, and he told us that we should all go to graduate school because that's a good place to meet your husband.
SPEAKER 1: Oh, that's cute.
[LAUGHTER]
That is cute. Oh, that is so nice.
SPEAKER 2: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: That's so cute.
BETTY ST. JOHN: I don't know what professor now would be talking about it. But it was a small class. Fenn was so small because of the war.
SPEAKER 1: Yes, it was. Yeah, yeah. Aw. Yes, and that continued. Even when I was there, we would have three people in some classes.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes, you'd have--
SPEAKER 1: Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER 3: It's amazing.
SPEAKER 2: It is amazing.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Did you have large classes?
SPEAKER 2: In and out, mostly, yes, large group instruction for my undergraduate degree.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yeah, that's what my grandchildren-- 250 in the class.
SPEAKER 2: Oh, easy. Yep.
SPEAKER 1: Yep.
SPEAKER 2: Yeah, you missed that personalized instruction.
SPEAKER 1: Yes, yes, which was so important. Yes.
SPEAKER 2: Very much.
SPEAKER 1: Yes.
SPEAKER 2: Very much.
SPEAKER 1: How should--
BETTY ST. JOHN: They didn't go on to college. And I earned every bit of my tuition. And then one year I earned part of my sister's tuition. But because, when I worked at Republic Steel, I worked shifts and, sometimes, I would work a double back.
You'd work an eight hour shift, and then you'd be off eight hours, and then you'd work another eight-hour shift, and you'd get a dime and a half for pay. And it was, for those times, working in a steel mill was good pay. So when Dick and I got married, I was making more money than he was because he was working for Fenn College.
[LAUGHTER]
And I was working at Republic Steel.
SPEAKER 1: And you're a Collinwood High graduate, aren't you?
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: Now, it's-- yes.
SPEAKER 2: Yeah.
SPEAKER 1: So you're--
BETTY ST. JOHN: Collinwood High had a very good reputation in those days. It was thought of to be a very good school--
SPEAKER 1: A major work center and everything.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER 1: Was it still a major work center?
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes. So--
SPEAKER 2: If I could ask, did you feel any kind of identity as a woman as this was a privilege, or it just was what you were doing?
BETTY ST. JOHN: I think it was mostly what I was doing. You know, I did what I needed to do every day. I didn't want to put it on the tape, but I would get on the streetcar or a bus like-- it was just what I was needing to do.
SPEAKER 2: Mm-hmm. Were there a lot of women in your classes? Did you feel camaraderie of--
BETTY ST. JOHN: Oh, yes. I had a lot of "ca-ma"-- "ca-ra"--
SPEAKER 2: You-- with the women.
BETTY ST. JOHN: A lot of fellowship with the women, I think, mainly, through the sorority. We had a lot of fun. We'd play basketball. We'd have-- I remember playing against the faculty and against Jane Pease. I had to guard her.
SPEAKER 1: We should have got Jane Pease in there. Everyone remembers her.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Everyone remembers Jane Pease. So we'd play basketball. And then they had, like, choral competitions in the different sororities. And, well, I can't remember any organization that was there-- the fraternities.
And we worked really hard on some pieces for a choral competition.
SPEAKER 1: Oh, my goodness. What was the sorority? Do you remember?
BETTY ST. JOHN: Gamma nu sigma.
SPEAKER 1: Oh, my goodness, yes, gamma nu sigma.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: And is that off?
SPEAKER 2: It's on. Do you want it off?
SPEAKER 1: For a minute.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Now, women weren't into science. To this day, I have a friend who just thinks that ladylike women do not understand science.
SPEAKER 2: Oh, no.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes. She's of my generation. But she keeps-- she's very proud of the fact that she's not into science or any medical terms or anything like that because that isn't-- she doesn't think it's ladylike, but--
SPEAKER 2: Did that distract you? Did you even have those kind of thoughts?
BETTY ST. JOHN: No, I didn't even have-- it was just what I was interested in. Particularly, I really liked biology.
SPEAKER 2: Yes.
BETTY ST. JOHN: But I had chemistry. And I didn't like physics very well, but I had to take it as a requirement. But I loved biology.
SPEAKER 2: Biology, yes.
BETTY ST. JOHN: To this day, I remember some of my bacteriology.
SPEAKER 1: Aw.
BETTY ST. JOHN: I remember the least sterile item is-- the least sterile item is how your end product is going to turn out. And when I was making formula for the children, when you used to do that and sterilize everything, I thought, you can't lay the spoon on the table, because the spoon is going to get contaminated on the table, and then you're going to stir your formula, because I remembered my bacteriology.
SPEAKER 1: See, it came in handy with the family.
[LAUGHTER]
BETTY ST. JOHN: When you were growing something in a petri dish, you had to have it sterile. So I really enjoyed it.
SPEAKER 1: Yes.
BETTY ST. JOHN: I liked anatomy, and I like the biology, and so-- and I didn't think that it was anything unusual.
SPEAKER 2: And at your time at Republic Steel, did you feel any kind of difference because you were a woman working in the labs?
BETTY ST. JOHN: No, because-- we had men supervising. We still had men supervising, older men who were not going off to the service. But by the time I started working-- and it was at the height of the war-- our lab was all girls.
I did go to work in the open hearth for a while. And that's where they pour out the steel. And it's very dirty and hot. And you had to do a preliminary test on the steel before it came over to our lab. It was just a rough test to see if the steel was anywhere near ready to pour out.
And they had no women over there at all. So they had a young man who would accompany me over there. I would do the work, but he accompanied me over there because they thought that I could not be in this huge open hearth with no women at all. I would be the only woman in the open hearth.
It was different than in the lab where we were doing the final analysis. We had women. But in the open hearth, I was the only woman. So-- but other than that, I didn't think anything of it.
I made some good friends working there with the women. One night, we went bowling after 11 o'clock shift at 105th and Euclid.
SPEAKER 1: OK. All right.
BETTY ST. JOHN: We went bowling. And I took the 105th Street streetcar to St. Clair, where I had to pick up the St. Clair car to go to Collinwood. I stood there, and I was there with a woman who appeared to be a little tipsy and a man walking back and forth, flipping a knife in his hand--
SPEAKER 1: [GASPS]
BETTY ST. JOHN: --waiting for a streetcar. The woman was picked up-- car came by and picked her up. And I just--
SPEAKER 1: You were alone there with him?
BETTY ST. JOHN: I just stood there. Nothing happened, and I got on the streetcar and went home.
SPEAKER 1: Oh, my goodness.
BETTY ST. JOHN: I don't think you could do that today.
SPEAKER 1: No, no, no. wouldn't-- no. Wouldn't-- no. They were encouraging--
BETTY ST. JOHN: See, I'm thinking the money was better then that it was--
SPEAKER 2: It was probably better then, yeah, when the Depression--
BETTY ST. JOHN: See, when I started, I mean, we were in the midst of the Depression.
SPEAKER 2: --midst of the Depression, yeah, yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: I can remember the WPA men working on the street. And, I mean, it was-- a lot of men didn't have jobs.
SPEAKER 2: Didn't have jobs, yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: And it was-- as I said, a lot of people didn't have cars. My dad had a car because he was a traveling hardware salesman.
SPEAKER 2: Oh.
BETTY ST. JOHN: But in those days, you didn't have the freeways. So he traveled to Youngstown and Warren around there and stayed all week. This is another thing-- talk about a strong woman, my mother.
SPEAKER 2: Your mother, yeah, yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: My father went off to work all week--
SPEAKER 2: That's right.
BETTY ST. JOHN: --as a traveling salesman. So he boarded down in Youngstown during the week, and he would come home, like, Friday night. And my mother ran the house all week.
SPEAKER 2: Yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: And she was the strong person in the family. Now, maybe that made a difference because I had a strong mother.
SPEAKER 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: You know.
SPEAKER 2: Sure.
BETTY ST. JOHN: I mean, not that my dad was strongest-- I mean, he wasn't a wimp.
SPEAKER 2: He was the provider.
BETTY ST. JOHN: But he was gone. He was gone all the time.
SPEAKER 2: So she had to play two roles.
BETTY ST. JOHN: And so she was the one that ran the house.
SPEAKER 2: Yeah, yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: And so--
SPEAKER 2: And told you as girls, do what you like, and be what you need to be.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes. That's the way-- I think that made a big difference, the fact that she was strong.
SPEAKER 1: Mm-hmm. Mm, yeah. Yeah, but, yeah, just the way she was looking at things then.
SPEAKER 2: Right.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yeah.
SPEAKER 1: This is the '30s. She's thinking this way.
BETTY ST. JOHN: I know, back in the '30s.
SPEAKER 1: Back in the '30s, she's thinking this way. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. Wonderful history. Yes. Yes.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Because I'm trying to think-- we had a little short street there in Collinwood.
SPEAKER 1: What street?
BETTY ST. JOHN: 154th Street.
SPEAKER 1: OK, right off St. Clair.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes. So it was only two blocks from Collinwood and two blocks from the elementary school. So you'd come home for lunch--
SPEAKER 1: Yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: --you know, and walk every place.
SPEAKER 1: It was a neighborhood.
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes. And of all the young women that I played-- the kids that I played with on my street, my sister and I were the only ones who went to college.
SPEAKER 1: Sure, yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: You know, now-- and I still see a couple sometimes. But you just-- of our economic background--
SPEAKER 1: No, having a high school education was exciting back then. It was looked upon as a wonderful thing, yeah. Yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: So--
SPEAKER 1: Yes, having a high school education was something.
SPEAKER 2: Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER 1: Yeah, yeah.
BETTY ST. JOHN: So the only other influence, I think, that my mother might have had-- we went to the congregational church in the neighborhood.
SPEAKER 1: OK.
BETTY ST. JOHN: The church was our center, too, because we could walk to church.
SPEAKER 1: OK, yes.
BETTY ST. JOHN: We walked to church, and I belonged to the Sunday school, and my mother belonged to the [INAUDIBLE]. And we had some families in that church who were better off, a couple of doctors.
SPEAKER 1: Oh, OK.
BETTY ST. JOHN: And my mother was very friendly with our family doctor's wife. They visited back and forth. And, of course, their children went to college because they were a whole--
SPEAKER 1: Sure, yeah, yeah, given the social--
BETTY ST. JOHN: So now I don't know whether that influenced my mother. But I wouldn't think it'd be enough to--
SPEAKER 1: Something--
BETTY ST. JOHN: Whatever--
SPEAKER 1: It was something there that was just--
BETTY ST. JOHN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: That's amazing. It's a wonderful story, Betty.
SPEAKER 2: Yeah, a story-- it would be nice if we--
