INTERVIEWEE: Lorna Lorensen Jensen

Sevier County Oral History Project

INTERVIEWEE: Lorna Lorensen Jensen
INTERVIEWER: Amy Naser
DATE: December 4, 1997
PLACE: Richfield, Utah
SUBJECT: The Great Depression

Amy Naser: This is Amy Naser, and I am interviewing Lorna Lorensen Jensen on her remembrances of the Great Depression. The date is December 4, 1997, and the place at her home in Richfield Utah.

Amy Naser: First of all, when and where were you born?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I was born in Elsinore, Utah in the year 1914. The 24th of April.

Amy Naser: Tell me a little bit about your family and circumstances of your early life?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I was born in a lovely brick home in Elsinore. It was considered a very nice home. There was five in our family. I had a first brother, who was born, Elden. He died quite shortly after he was born, about fourteen months. Then there was my three sisters, two sisters, three with me. Then another brother and another sister, so there was five of us in our home. We had a lovely home and never knew much about anything bad. We got along real well. We were a happy family. We enjoyed each other's company. We did the things that young people do at that age. I remember during the World War II, my youngest brother was born during that time. I remember my uncle going to war. I was happy when they got home, I remember that.

Amy Naser: How old were you when the Great Depression started?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I was about nineteen, but I married at that time when I was nineteen. We found out that the Depression was on at that time. We had quite a rough time. In fact, my husband would have to go pick up subsidies because it was during the ERA Depression, is what they called it then. We'd go each week to get subsides. My mother and father would help us a lot, but during that time my father passed away and mother was left a widow. She helped us a lot with our living. We had a fairly good living, but it was very meager. We lived on lots of potatoes and white gravy (laugh). Everybody was in the same shoes and was in the same conditions. We had lots of friends and they were all in the same condition. I remember my husband planted beets and that was the year they had blight in them, but we had kind of a rough time.

Amy Naser: Where did you live during that time?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: We lived in Richfield at that time. We got along pretty good, but he was ill. He had a hard time with his brain tumor and problems with his health. Then, he finally got a job when we first got married with the WPA. That's when Franklin D. Roosevelt was president. He had the big "New Deal" we'd call it. He got a job as time keeper and then we had a little bit better living conditions for a while.

Amy Naser: Did you have to provide for your family? Did you have to get a job?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I didn't at that time. I had a little boy at that time and his name was Bob. So, we just more or less just got along with what we had. Our house wasn't very modern like the one I had been raised in all my life, but we were happy. We thought we were doing just great and having fun. We spent time with our friends that were all in the same boat. We had to make our own fun, because we didn't have any money to spend.

Amy Naser: So did you have any friends that had it rough then?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: Yes, we were all about in the same boat that lived around where we did. It was hard, but we were happy at that time.

Amy Naser: How old were your parents and did they worry? Did your mom worry about the Depression?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: After I got married, my father passed away and mother was a widow. They worried about it because it was hard for them too. Their circumstances weren't so easy either, but they shared with everybody. What they did have they shared with other people in the same conditions.

Amy Naser: Did your family have to conserve money?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: We tried to save what we could. We always thought it was real exciting when we could gather together twenty-five cents for a show ticket, go to the old Lyric; that was kinda fun.

Amy Naser: What did you do for fun besides going to the movies?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: We played cards and we took in the mutual dances and the get togethers (laugh).

Amy Naser: Where did you go shopping and get your clothes?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: We'd get them here in Richfield. The clothes that we could get, but mostly I sewed clothes for my children too. We didn't buy very many things. We didn't have much money, but we got along. We were happy. During the depression it was hard because we had to have stamps for about everything. To get our sugar and nylons etc. we'd have to. We had to have wheat ground for flour and other essentials.

Amy Naser: I better learn how to sew. Did everyone get to go to school around your neighborhood?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: Yes, we didn't go to college. I didn't go past high school. My husband didn't either. We were both at that time just right out of school. It was kind of rough sledding, but we were happy at that time.

Amy Naser: Where did he work?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: He worked for the WPA and that's about all he ever did and the ERA. First, it was the ERA then it was the WPA, the Great Deal during the Depression.

Amy Naser: Do you think we could ever have another Depression?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: It doesn't look like to me now, but probably could, but you never can tell. It might come again.

Amy Naser: Did your family have to move a lot? Or were you settled all right?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: No, my parents stayed right in Elsinore and we lived right in Richfield. Things changed and my husband passed away. Then I had to go away to a beauty school and get a degree in cosmetology.

Amy Naser: Do you remember when the stock market crashed?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I don't remember.

Amy Naser: That's all right. How was your attitude changed from the Depression? How were the ways of living changed from living in the Depression?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I'm still quite thrifty because I've been so used to saving everything. I knew that every dollar had to be used wisely.

Amy Naser: What advice would you give to young people like me if we had to face the Depression?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I would say if you could, learn a craft that you could use even if you weren't able to go to school. Anything that would be interesting to you, like sewing or cooking. I think it's good for young people to learn how to take care of the home, how to do those things that they kind of like to get out of now-a-days.

Amy Naser: Are you glad you had the experience of living through the Depression?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: Yes, I think we appreciate what we do have now. We have it so much better. Because, when the rest of my family was born I just had the one little boy, when I married Tell. Then I had the six other children. It made me happy to have more children to raise and love. I used a lot of my skills in raising my children with sewing and homemaking.

Amy Naser: Was the Depression still going when you had another child?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: Yes, the WPA was going. Tell, my husband, got a job at the WPA. He worked with that for a long time. Then he worked for the city for a long time. Then he went to Provo and worked at the Geneva Plant. I was up there in my beauty shop in Springville. Our lives just went on and on. We were in Provo for quite a long time and in Springville. Then we moved back to Richfield (laugh). Then it went on and on. He worked for the city again. Then he got a job with the Indians (laugh). The Bureau of Indian Affairs. So we've had a pretty good life.

Amy Naser: Is there anything about the Depression that I've missed?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I don't think so. Just everyday stuff that went on. It was a struggle.

Amy Naser: Do you think I could manage through it?

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: I know you could, Amy. Because, you're a little born housekeeper. I've seen ya mess around (laugh).

Amy Naser: I think that covers mostly everything about our interview.

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: All right.

Amy Naser: Thanks, Grandma.

Lorna Lorensen Jensen: You're welcome, I'm not very fluent when it comes to talking.

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