| Transcription of Oral History |
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Narrator: Wilbur Barton
Interviewers: Mildred Pratt and Lucinda Posey
Date: (unknown) |
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| WB |
I'm Wilbur "Barney" Barton,
and I have lived in Normal all my life. I was born here at [address omitted],
Normal, Illinois. (phone rings) I did all my schooling here, either in Thomas
Metcalf, University High, and Illinois State. I was born, as I said, here in Normal
on February 27, 1914, and I spent most of my childhood here in Normal. After I
graduated Illinois State in [19]36, I went to Mt. Vernon, Indiana to teach, and
I taught there two years. And then I went to Indianapolis. I applied for a job
at Indianapolis that belonged to Redford Morris, who at that time had gone to
tutor Joe Louis who was just getting up to that point where he would be champion,
and his job was filled when I got there by a young fellow named Fitzhugh Lyons
who was a graduate of Indiana University. But they asked me if I was interested
in another position at John Hope Junior High School which I was interested in
because I didn't have a job after graduating from class from Illinois State. So
I took that job and that was in [19]38. I stayed at John Hope School until [19]41
when I joined the civil service of the U.S. Navy, and I spent a year in the civil
service teaching in the Navy, and then I was drafted into the navy. I was drafted
in as a chief petty officer.
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| MP |
Was that during World War II? |
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| WB |
Yes, we were in World
War II. I went to school. My major at Illinois State was industrial arts and physical
education, and so I was kind of qualified for metal-work which was mostly aluminum.
We were trained to work on everything about the airplane except the engine and
that came under another service school. I was the second man in charge of the
service school at Great Lakes. I stayed there three years until I was discharged
three years later in December of [19]45, and I came back to Indianapolis and resumed
my teaching. So all my service was spent in Chicago, either in Great Lakes or
Chicago area, and the reason for that was because I was a chief petty officer,
and I was kind of a high ranking officer in the Navy which nobody wanted. So it
really worked in my favor - the prejudice.
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| MP |
You didn't have to go overseas, then, right? |
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| WB |
The prejudice really worked in my favor. |
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| MP |
That's interesting. |
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| WB |
So when I came back to
Indianapolis, I taught there in the city twenty-eight years. Indianapolis is a
city where it`s one school system of the city surrounded by eight other school
systems, township systems. When I left Indianapolis city proper and went to Washington
Township most people when they apply for a job in Indianapolis don't realize that
there's nine school systems to apply for. This I ran into when I was an assistant
in charge of recruiting for Washington Township. Everybody thought there was just
one system ...
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| MP |
I see. |
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| WB |
in Indianapolis, but there
were nine. Nine independent systems. And after that, I spent ten years in Washington
Township as an assistant principal and vice principal at West Lane Junior High
School. They worked me so hard at the junior high that I went back to grade school,
one through six, when I retired in 1978.
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| MP |
Now, when you went back to grade school, was that still in the same Washington Township?
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| WB |
Yes. |
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| MP |
All right. |
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| WB |
And when I retired in 1978, I haven't done anything since -- school-wise.
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| MP |
Now, would you go back and tell us about your family, your parents,
your grandparents, and that history in Normal?
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| WB |
I didn't know my grandparents, but I understand that he was Milton Barton
who Jesse Fell brought here to help plant trees.
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| MP |
He was your grandfather? |
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| WB |
Yes. |
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| MP |
Jesse Barton? |
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| WB |
Milton Barton. |
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| MP |
Milton Barton, all right. |
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| WB |
He was a full-blooded Indian in nursery business in Alton. |
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| MP |
In Alton, Illinois? |
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| WB |
Alton, Illinois. His family
had come from Alton because it seemed there was an Indian settlement near there.
And I have the years down in my written history.
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| MP |
You have that written there? |
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| WB |
And they lived at the corner at what is now School Street and what used to be Water Street.
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| MP |
Yes. |
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| WB |
And Water Street seems to be across from the theater. Isn't there a theater down there?
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| MP |
North Street? |
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| WB |
There's a theater at Beaufort and School Streets, isn't there, that faces east?
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| MP |
Oh yes, that's right. Yes, that's right. That's the University. |
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| WB |
They lived approximately that way facing the school grounds. |
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| MP |
So they really kind of lived kind of where the parking lot is now? |
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| WB |
Yeah. Well, you see that was back in the 1860's and [18]70's. That was pretty early.
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| MP |
Now, do you know how your
grandfather happened to have come to -- how his family happened to come settle
in Alton, Illinois?
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| WB |
No. |
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| MP |
You don't know where they came from to Alton, Illinois? |
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| WB |
No. |
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| MP |
I see. |
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| WB |
It was an Indian settlement
and where they came from, or who or what tribe or anything else...
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| MP |
You never knew what tribe? |
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| WB |
we never looked into. |
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| MP |
I see, yes. |
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| WB |
Which I may try to. |
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| MP |
Yes, that would be great.
You could probably find that out. You should go to Alton, perhaps.
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| WB |
Yes. That is what somebody
told me. But I know this that his wife came from Missouri.
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| MP |
Oh. |
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| WB |
I have it down. |
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| MP |
Yes, all right. |
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| WB |
They were married when
they came here, and then others followed him here.
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| MP |
Other relatives? |
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| WB |
Yeah, and the story goes
that Milton Barton didn't have anything but an Indian name, and Jesse Fell gave
him the name of Milton Barton. That's the way the story goes. (laughs)
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| MP |
And we don't know why he gave him the name, Milton Barton? |
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| WB |
Only other than he didn't
have a normal name other than an Indian name.
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| MP |
Yes. |
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| WB |
And my father... |
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