Legacies Project Oral History: William Murphy

Mon, 08/29/2022 - 12:27pm

When: 2022

Transcript

• [00:00:11] INTERVIEWER: This is an anterior view for the Legacies Project, which just stands gathering oral histories and putting them into an archive for future generations. The best of your ability, please ignore the camera. While your eyes consume, they wander mainly will give me, please do not directly at the camera lens. Each video tape is about excellent hits law. If you're in the middle of answering your question and we have to change state. You will ask to hold that thought while we change tape and we'll pick up where we left off on the new tape. [BACKGROUND] I'm first going to ask you some simple demographic questions. These questions may jog memories. Please keep your answers brief and to the point for now, we can elaborate later in the interview. Please say and spell your name.
• [00:01:00] William Henry Murphy: William Henry Murphy. W-I-L-L-I-A-M-H-E-N-R-Y-M-U-R-P-H-Y.
• [00:01:12] INTERVIEWER: What is your birthday including the year?
• [00:01:15] William Henry Murphy: May 25th, 1934.
• [00:01:19] INTERVIEWER: How would you describe your ethnic background?
• [00:01:24] William Henry Murphy: Caucasian.
• [00:01:27] INTERVIEWER: What is your religious affiliation, if any?
• [00:01:31] William Henry Murphy: Agnostic.
• [00:01:34] INTERVIEWER: What is the highest level of formal education you have completed? Did you attend any additional school or formal career training beyond where you completed?
• [00:01:42] William Henry Murphy: I graduate from Wayne State with a BA in history.
• [00:01:48] INTERVIEWER: What is your marital status?
• [00:01:51] William Henry Murphy: I have been married for 54 years through the same person.
• [00:01:55] INTERVIEWER: How many children do you have?
• [00:01:57] William Henry Murphy: Just one.
• [00:01:59] INTERVIEWER: How many siblings do you have?
• [00:02:01] William Henry Murphy: Well, I had two and my sister died four or five years ago but I have one brother.
• [00:02:10] INTERVIEWER: What would you consider your primary occupation to have been?
• [00:02:15] William Henry Murphy: I worked at a factory for 30 years, General Motors. Had 30 years in a moment. I have been retired for 32 years.
• [00:02:28] INTERVIEWER: Now we can begin the first part of our interview beginning with some things so you can recall by your family history or beginning with family naming history. By this we mean any story about your last or family name or family traditions in selecting first, sir, or middle names. Do you know, any stories about your family name?
• [00:02:47] William Henry Murphy: Well, my mother was a ventique and a grandfather was a doctor during the 1980s. He wrote for the medical journals and through he met somebody in medical school [inaudible 00:03:11] and said to him. He started using his practice and it was success. They wrote about the medical journals. Sigmund Freud wrote about it. Instead of using in his practice and it spread throughout the world. This was cocaine, if you Google history of cocaine, you will see my great grandfather's first doctor and first Western person to write about the good parts of cocaine. He was WHO Bentley Murphy, namesake in a way, curse. We didn't know about it until a researcher from Columbia University came in the late 1960s and told us about it. We had no idea about our great grandfather. His sister called him a devil. His sons said that he had drank himself to death. But when you read his journal articles, you can see that he was really caring physician and he really cared about his patients and I lose my train of thought. [LAUGHTER]
• [00:04:57] INTERVIEWER: Well, why did your ancestors leave to come to the United States?
• [00:05:05] William Henry Murphy: Well, my father came from Loveland. He had 10-12 siblings and I guess for a better life. He came in through Canada and came to the United States. My mother was born here in Kentucky.
• [00:05:31] INTERVIEWER: Do you have any stories about how your family first came to United States and where did they first settled?
• [00:05:39] William Henry Murphy: Nothing I can think of. My parents divorced when I was 12 or something like that. Really lost contact with the Murphy side of the family for a long time.
• [00:06:00] INTERVIEWER: How did they make a living either in the old country or in the United States?
• [00:06:03] William Henry Murphy: Well, my father was a tour guide. My mother, I think they work in a hat factory for 30s. Then let's say I got divorced. She worked at Hudson's for $25 a week. She had a hard time with. She had three kids and eventually she remarried 18 or something like that. Lifetime. But we got through and we didn't see him as we always had something, he was cute. She would get bakery products, like cake or something. As soon as it got in the house, she walked away when we don't eat it. She literally had to put it in a locked and locked in relation to keep cake and stuff like that in the house.
• [00:07:25] INTERVIEWER: To your knowledge did they make an effort to preserve any traditions or customs, their country of origin?
• [00:07:36] William Henry Murphy: I don't think so. My father did speak Gaelic. I can't remember that. But no real effort to, because at that time there was always a great emphasis put on not speaking your own language. You were really looked down and useful for your your home language. You spoke English. You've come here, left your old country. This is something I'm going to say. He's forced to speak English, period, and it's not quite as bad as that.
• [00:08:21] INTERVIEWER: How did your parents, grandparents, and other relatives come to meet and marry?
• [00:08:31] William Henry Murphy: I don't think I know how my parents met and married. We may have worked in a hat factory together or something. No real story there though I can remember.
• [00:08:54] INTERVIEWER: Today's interview is about your childhood up until you began attending school. Even if these questions jog memories about other times in your life, please only respond with memories from his earliest part of your life. Cell phones. Anything else that will make noise can be Hessian. [BACKGROUND]
• [00:09:25] INTERVIEWER: You can call for a break anytime that you want. Also, please remember that you can decline to answer any question or terminate the interview at any time for any reason. The set of questions covers a relatively long period of your life. From the time you completed your education, entered the labor force or started a family until all of your children left home and you and your spouse retired from work. We're possibly talking about a stretch of time spending as much as four decades. What did your family enjoy doing together when your kids were still at home?
• [00:10:05] William Henry Murphy: I think we traveled mostly around the country because I would have four or five weeks off of work during the summer so we would travel. We went to every state except for Oklahoma in the country. During the week, my wife worked for most of the years. [inaudible 00:10:41] in 1982, after 30 years. I was only 47 at the time. During the week, movies and stuff like that. But nothing that stands out except like I say, we would go on trips because during the summer the auto companies would have changeover so that we'd get 2-4 weeks. Say a couple of weeks for that and I would get three or four week vacation besides. I tried to put it all together and move. Went out to California and we camped all the way there, and in '74, and '76 went to all the national parks and stuff like that.
• [00:11:44] INTERVIEWER: Is there anywhere in particular that was your favorite?
• [00:11:51] William Henry Murphy: There's Yellowstone and there's the big trees, not the redwoods, but the Sequoia National Park, that's beautiful. We went on a walk. We always go on a walk with the rangers and he would point up to this little limb and he said that limb is bigger than any tree east of the Mississippi. Just to show you how big those trees are. Also Crater Lake was a beautiful place and the Canadian Rockies and '70s was pretty too. Those are the major places.
• [00:12:56] INTERVIEWER: What were your personal favorite things to do for fun?
• [00:13:01] William Henry Murphy: Again, it's trying to remember back 40, 50 years, not easy. While I was working, it wasn't that much time because I would work afternoons, so I would be able to be home for our kid during the day and she was working. She had a 9:00-5:00 job being a teacher. Many years, just we only have weekends. A lot of times I've worked six and seven days a week. When the plans were going well and I just wanted to make as much money as I could. It's cute. We put it in a swimming pool in the backyard. I put it up and then I thought about it, and I said it was going to be too much maintenance, too much pooling with all this. Because at that time you had a really check all the chlorine and it wasn't easy like it is now you can just pour the stuff. I tore it all down. Then a few days later like well, I should do that again. I built one up, and I had one swimming. My son had to swims in. Some black stuff got in the water and everything. He kept going in and I told don't go in there until we figure out what was wrong. Then you know how kids are, he's just going anyways. I said that's all, I tore it down and that was the end of our pool experience, but two different pools open same backyard. My wife never swam in them. Either one.
• [00:15:28] INTERVIEWER: Are there any special days, events or family traditions that you practiced that differed from your childhood traditions?
• [00:15:38] William Henry Murphy: Well, we didn't have much of traditions at our home as a child because first my mother worked most of the time. My father left when we were probably eight or 10 years old. We didn't have bunch of any traditions that I can think of special. I don't know. I don't think of any real traditions, like most people watch a lot of television, and she worked a lot, so there wasn't much time left for other things. One thing, that we used to take drives. You go out and you drive 100 miles or something because gas was 18 cents a gallon. We had a car that got 37 miles to the gallon. Gas is 18 cents a gallon, so you can fill up for week or two for five dollars or four dollars or something. We would drive all over the place and I guess that would be the big thing. I remember it was before seat belt, so our son would be standing up between us and the seat. We thought about of it. Now, if you don't have some cocoon you could get hit with an airplane and wouldn't hurt. It's all together different then, just nothing ever happened but we were lucky. Just a different 50 years away.
• [00:17:46] INTERVIEWER: Please describe the popular music of your adult.
• [00:17:51] William Henry Murphy: Well, I always like classical music. But I never cared for rock and roll. I didn't like [inaudible 00:18:03] .
• [00:18:03] INTERVIEWER: Did you did that?
• [00:18:03] William Henry Murphy: Are you sure you want to do that?
• [00:18:14] FEMALE_1: I know we're missing me out. [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:18:18] FEMALE_1: [inaudible 00:18:18] Talking to you.
• [00:18:21] William Henry Murphy: What did she say?
• [00:18:22] FEMALE_1: You want me to come in too?
• [00:18:24] William Henry Murphy: It's up to you [inaudible 00:18:26] . [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:18:36] FEMALE_1: It's a yes. [inaudible 00:18:36] [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:18:38] INTERVIEWER: [inaudible 00:18:38] have you move over this way.
• [00:18:44] William Henry Murphy: [inaudible 00:18:44] [OVERLAPPING].
• [00:19:11] FEMALE_1: No. [inaudible 00:19:11] [LAUGHTER]
• [00:19:17] William Henry Murphy: Who's going to catch my guts? I'm spilling my guts here. [LAUGHTER]
• [00:19:29] INTERVIEWER: I don't really, I mean, [OVERLAPPING] I just ask questions and maybe they can converse to each other and be like.
• [00:19:40] FEMALE_1: Yeah.
• [00:19:41] INTERVIEWER: Thank you all. [inaudible 00:19:51]
• [00:19:51] FEMALE_1: This one?
• [00:19:51] INTERVIEWER: Yeah.
• [00:19:53] FEMALE_1: How is that?
• [00:19:53] INTERVIEWER: Yes. [OVERLAPPING] Please turn off any cellphones, pages, or anything that needs chimes. You can call for a break anytime that you want. Also, please remember that you can decline to answer any question or terminate the interview at any time, for any reason. This set of questions covers your retirement years to the present time. When taking your life after retirement or your kids left home. At the present, what important social or historical events were taking place and how did they personally affect you and your family?
• [00:20:53] William Henry Murphy: Well, I don't know. Recession. 2002 and then 2008, it cost me $2 million. That's how much we lost in the market. 3 million but I tried to get it back ever since. In a flash. But we had basically a good job, pensions. So it doesn't really affect us too much. So that we can leave our son something. That's the basic motivation. I have a poem for me that my wife had written.
• [00:22:01] FEMALE_1: It's a wonderful poem. It's just so great. Yeah.
• [00:22:08] William Henry Murphy: You don't want like if you go into a canyon and your voice can echo. Well, this is Love Echoes. It's love echoes and builder's dream. On these Happy Hearts, I will build my family and my mom while I go through the ages.
• [00:22:30] FEMALE_1: Love echoes.
• [00:22:33] William Henry Murphy: Brave first words. Not a baron of barons Hall of stilted hay in portraits. Instead a symphony of sinking strings. Vibrations do not echo. Lovingly lovely Laughter. Let's echo. Love echoes. Silt from the happy heart at flood stage renews. So give them their days of flower fields. They won't listen on the valley floor. When did the mountain laurel and be completed by shining eyes reflect echoing, love echoes, traceless tears, tracing letters and the trackless sand, as do the understand the builders dream. Each generation Platon tag with the next. So that mirrored smiling faces go echoing through the nations [OVERLAPPING] Love echoes. [APPLAUSE] [inaudible 00:23:46]. I wish I could read you, but.
• [00:23:51] FEMALE_1: It's so emotional for both of us. Like he said it's hard to resize it or read it.
• [00:23:58] William Henry Murphy: It really doesn't. I don't think it really reflects in our family, but I don't think I did. Well. I am a perfectionist, so that's. One other thing we do is, we've traveled throughout the world and we've got, see here's our picture. We're on a cruise. In every cruise at the beginning, they always make you put on the life jackets and stand around to where you're going to get in.
• [00:24:42] FEMALE_1: I'm afraid or in the South Pacific.
• [00:24:44] INTERVIEWER: Yeah.
• [00:24:44] FEMALE_1: It was an amazing trip.
• [00:24:46] William Henry Murphy: Yeah. Here's, we were in Antarctica and I wouldn't sit up.
• [00:25:01] FEMALE_1: The rubber zodiac.
• [00:25:05] William Henry Murphy: Rubber zodiac. I've got the motor and I'm driving the boat. Probably I shouldn't have but it was.
• [00:25:16] FEMALE_1: We were on a [inaudible 00:25:19].
• [00:25:19] William Henry Murphy: Or Russia and research vessel and we had lectures about the history of Antarctica. Here we are. She's walking through the penguins. There's thousands of penguins and they don't fear you because all enemies.
• [00:25:39] FEMALE_1: Enemies are.
• [00:25:40] William Henry Murphy: Enemies are in the water, and so we could walk among them and they weren't afraid or didn't.
• [00:25:46] FEMALE_1: She had to be very respectful and catch up on work. Anyway.
• [00:25:53] William Henry Murphy: We made this a few years ago. We had such great pictures. Here we are in China, the Great Wall. We climbed up and down the Great Wall, which is hard to do, especially with all the Chinese people. That's a great thing for them. That's what they dream of doing. You see a lot of Chinese people climbing the Great Wall. It's a really interesting thing.
• [00:26:24] FEMALE_1: The Chinese young people were so helpful because these a big deep steps and I'm short. Even though I was younger there than I am now, they were quick to offer help till I said it was a very touching and memorable time.
• [00:26:40] William Henry Murphy: Here we are in Paris by the Notre-Dame Cathedral. I think we're in Lascaux, 200. Then here's a Bouchard garden in Victoria, British Columbia. One of the most beautiful gardens in the world. In fact, on their brochures, they have this exact same picture. Except they don't have me.
• [00:27:14] FEMALE_1: It's the same shot.
• [00:27:14] William Henry Murphy: It's the same shot. Here we're on Easter Island with the mole eyes. It's really something to see all of these. We had lectures from a former governor of the island who took us around. He's a famous archaeologist and he's like No Buck, you'll see him.
• [00:27:41] FEMALE_1: That's the one that found that the moth's head had the white part of the eye there?
• [00:27:47] William Henry Murphy: Yeah.
• [00:27:47] FEMALE_1: Before that, they didn't know.
• [00:27:48] William Henry Murphy: They hadn't. Also, he found out how they moved them around the island like you do a refrigerator. Before and they still were solely finding it out. But he told us that in 1999 when we were on a trip. Here's another because what happened is they destroyed their island and then they, these were made to honor their ancestors. They just stopped one time and they had a war and they went all the way down from 20,000 people down to 100 and lost their culture.
• [00:28:35] FEMALE_1: They lost all the trees on the island too because they had to use some of the wood for rolling and moving outside of the island.
• [00:28:43] William Henry Murphy: Here we are in New Zealand and we're all like what do you say, volcanoes and it's like Yellowstone.
• [00:28:55] FEMALE_1: Like Yellowstone.
• [00:28:56] William Henry Murphy: It's a beautiful world. Here we are in China. We had the most beautiful hotels we've ever stayed in while in China. It was a cheap trip. We were there for 25 days.
• [00:29:19] FEMALE_1: So say you're my boys and girls.
• [00:29:23] William Henry Murphy: Here's again Easter Island and here we are. Where we go to storytelling in.
• [00:29:32] FEMALE_1: Jonesborough, Tennessee.
• [00:29:34] William Henry Murphy: Jonesborough, Tennessee. Every year, in their first weekend in October they've written, The best storytellers from around the world. They tell stories for the whole weekend and it's great.
• [00:29:47] FEMALE_1: They set up in huge tents, way bigger than this room. People come early in the morning and stay till midnight listening to these wonderful stories.
• [00:29:59] William Henry Murphy: One year we were there. It's usually in the 70s. One day one year was like in the '30s. We still came. We just bundled up and we stayed all day and night even though it was in the '30s.
• [00:30:14] FEMALE_1: Beautiful little town to see oldest town in Tennessee. It's always the first weekend in October.
• [00:30:22] William Henry Murphy: Here's the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles in Paris. This is where they signed the peace treaty for the First World War, in the Hall of Mirrors. Versailles is a beautiful museum right in Paris.
• [00:30:47] William Henry Murphy: Here we're in Antarctica again and we'd had a outdoor barbecue on the back of the boat.
• [00:30:58] FEMALE_1: On the ship.
• [00:30:58] William Henry Murphy: It was probably in the '40s and how what we had on was the jacket. Then right after that they started to move and so it got cold. So we had to put on our face masks. Then this is Paradise Bay, both of these are Paradise Bay. This is a really beautiful picture of a sunset, it's probably about 11 o'clock at night because of the sun never sets in Antarctica. But that's just to give you a little view of some of the things we've done over the years.
• [00:31:38] INTERVIEWER: I'd like to ask a few questions about the calendar at home. The home seem very emotional.
• [00:31:47] William Henry Murphy: Yeah.
• [00:31:48] INTERVIEWER: If you don't mind me asking, when did you write it?
• [00:31:51] William Henry Murphy: It's got to be 20 years.
• [00:31:57] FEMALE_1: The only poem he ever wrote. The only one.
• [00:32:02] William Henry Murphy: I could probably pinpoint it because I was going to school craft at that time because I showed it to English professor. She liked it. I don't think it was to her taste. It's more for family thing. I don't have to worry. Robert Frost doesn't have to worry about [inaudible 00:32:40]
• [00:32:43] INTERVIEWER: Moving on to the calendar. On the rushing [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:32:52] FEMALE_1: Research vessel.
• [00:32:53] INTERVIEWER: Research vessel. Did they have a translator or did you have to [inaudible 00:33:01]
• [00:33:01] William Henry Murphy: Well, we had a leader. [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:33:04] FEMALE_1: This is a part of a problem that used to be called Elderhostel. Now it's called Road Scholars. They have people there that speak English and people from all over the world were on the trip.
• [00:33:21] William Henry Murphy: I remember we were in Antarctica, the doctor, he walked up this mountain and snowboarded down.
• [00:33:32] FEMALE_1: Yeah.
• [00:33:32] William Henry Murphy: I don't know how he did it. Another thing too, whenever we go on our trips, we have great weather always. We never had bad weather. We went to Switzerland and I don't know if I told you about this where we, as the plane came in, it had been raining and it just stopped and had 67 days of perfect weather. And then just as we leave, as we're taking off, it started raining a little bit. Even on that trip through the South Pacific, I think we had maybe about two hours of rain one day. Sometimes it would rain if we're on a boat going somewhere at night or something. But basically we always had great weather everywhere we go.
• [00:34:32] INTERVIEWER: So you said you've all seen the Great Wall of China?
• [00:34:36] William Henry Murphy: Yeah.
• [00:34:37] INTERVIEWER: How long did that take you?
• [00:34:38] William Henry Murphy: It was good. It's hard. You'd think it's not like this. It's up and down. [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:34:46] FEMALE_1: We only walked.
• [00:34:49] William Henry Murphy: Yeah. [inaudible 00:34:52] it's 2400 miles long. So we just walked a quarter of a mile or something, very short.
• [00:35:00] FEMALE_1: Because it's something you have all your life and to be there, it was quite thrilling.
• [00:35:10] William Henry Murphy: We've been on the [inaudible 00:35:12] and [inaudible 00:35:12], but there's the other.
• [00:35:20] FEMALE_1: Where the Three Gorges are, you've heard of the dams. [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:35:25] William Henry Murphy: We were there before they did the dam. And they told us, look over here, here's this village, whole big city. And in 2006, it'll be this far above it. And in 2009, it'll be this far above it. I think right now it must be near the top of the mountains.
• [00:35:47] FEMALE_1: Right. Yeah.
• [00:35:49] William Henry Murphy: I don't know how they did it.
• [00:35:51] FEMALE_1: It's a big project for China.
• [00:35:57] INTERVIEWER: Moving back to the [inaudible 00:35:58]. When thinking back on your entire life, what important social historical events had the greatest impact?
• [00:36:06] William Henry Murphy: I don't know.
• [00:36:13] FEMALE_1: Social events.
• [00:36:20] William Henry Murphy: Well, I escaped the war. So that helped a little. I was going to school during the Vietnam War. And then by the time I was eligible to go in, I had a child. [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:36:41] FEMALE_1: Just a matter of time.
• [00:36:43] William Henry Murphy: Just timing. I was the perfect age. I was too young for the Second World War and Korean War. I slipped through the Vietnam War, then I was too old for anything else.
• [00:36:57] INTERVIEWER: It was having a child?
• [00:37:02] FEMALE_1: It did at that time, I think. I'm not sure. Probably not now, but at the time it did. He was also going to college or [inaudible 00:37:11] went State.
• [00:37:17] INTERVIEWER: What family [inaudible 00:37:18] or keepsakes and mementos do you possess? What's their story and why are they valuable to you?
• [00:37:29] William Henry Murphy: I don't know if we have any.
• [00:37:31] FEMALE_1: We do have that locker and table from 1976, remember?
• [00:37:39] William Henry Murphy: Yeah, we have a rocker for the 200 year of [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:37:43] FEMALE_1: [inaudible 00:37:43]
• [00:37:51] William Henry Murphy: [inaudible 00:37:51]. We hope to give it to one of our grandchildren. I don't know why, I never get to feel like we have much of an impact on their lives or anything. I don't know about this.
• [00:38:09] FEMALE_1: No. I think you're wrong.
• [00:38:11] William Henry Murphy: No. Okay, I guess.
• [00:38:15] INTERVIEWER: Thinking back over your entire life, what are you most proud of?
• [00:38:21] William Henry Murphy: Well, one thing is not stuffing the bad childhood. In other words, I had our family we all had bad childhoods, and I wanted to stop that going on. I think you pretty well have done that so that our son is well-liked and what I think has a good self I'm aging.
• [00:38:48] FEMALE_1: He is a good father.
• [00:38:50] William Henry Murphy: Good father.
• [00:38:51] FEMALE_1: Good grandfather now because we are great grandparents, so he's a wonderful father.
• [00:38:57] William Henry Murphy: I think we will stopped that going on, never perfect, but is the worst of them.
• [00:39:11] INTERVIEWER: What would you say has changed the most from the time you were my age, to know?
• [00:39:20] William Henry Murphy: What is the change is?
• [00:39:23] INTERVIEWER: From when you were a teenager to now, is a very good questions?
• [00:39:28] FEMALE_1: Telephones [OVERLAPPING]. My grandmother had in her house an old phone that you had to pick up the phone and listen for the operator.
• [00:39:41] William Henry Murphy: You would have to.
• [00:39:42] FEMALE_1: You had to crank it for first.
• [00:39:44] William Henry Murphy: Crank it first and then [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:39:45] FEMALE_1: We've gone from that.
• [00:39:46] William Henry Murphy: You might have eight or 10 people on one line. I don't think things have changed that much so except for the technologies.
• [00:40:00] FEMALE_1: The technologies, computers and navigational systems.
• [00:40:06] William Henry Murphy: One thing too is that we have better cars now.
• [00:40:14] FEMALE_1: Yeah.
• [00:40:15] William Henry Murphy: Cars that before you see old jalopy is on the road, and I think I told you about that I had a car that had almost no breaks, and almost hit two cars that with them. I think cars are much better now and they last a lot longer.
• [00:40:42] FEMALE_1: They don't last like they used to.
• [00:40:43] William Henry Murphy: Yeah. It was three years, and then you've got rid of it because it was all rusted out. When they stopped that that was a major change.
• [00:40:55] INTERVIEWER: Do you notice a big change in social or political?
• [00:40:59] William Henry Murphy: Well, I think attitudes toward minorities have changed tremendously. [OVERLAPPING] I think I told you about the police who was the captain of the police in a small town, where her brother and I were, it was a Sunday morning, and we were just having breakfast or something, and we look next door and this guy came out and his dog kept going in and out of this house. He had a screen door, and it had a slit in it, and the dog would go in and out of it. He didn't like that, and he kept curse anatomy, he kicked it, and then he then got a gun and shot the dog right there. This is a Sunday morning, in a small Southern town. It's out a little way, it's not right in the heart of the time, but shot it. I saw it laying there, and then he took the rifle or a baseball but I'm not sure which and started hitting it. He would hit it and it go [NOISE]. He kept doing that, and we just were looking, it was this terrible. Then her brother said that he was the head of the Police Department of that town, and her father said that about six months or a year before, he had killed some black man, and there was some real question whether it was legal or not, whether he bumped into set. You could believe him when doing anything. At that time, it was not uncommon for people to just say anything against black people and just, they would want to kill him or anything. That was just a standard. Down there was whites only, drinking fountains and whites only going to in bathrooms. We saw that was it, bathroom white only, are great confound white and black over here or something.
• [00:43:33] FEMALE_1: We come a long way.
• [00:43:35] William Henry Murphy: Yeah. That's the thing I can say for this country is, in such a short time, it's really been just a major change because some white person couldn't say kill that. That was a standard, so there really been a change,
• [00:44:04] INTERVIEWER: What advice would you give to my generation?
• [00:44:10] William Henry Murphy: Save your money, that's the big thing. Save your money. Invest it. I think I said before, the stock market is the greatest thing ever invented, and you also have what is called a Roth IRA. You could make $100 million in that, and never pay any taxes. That they have that is crazy formula taxation standpoint. That's one of the reasons I came here, is that I have discovered the equivalent of the cure for cancer in the field of the stock market. But I know that it just falls on deaf ears, but it seems crazy to have found the equivalent of a gold mine, and nobody is interested, nobody believes you. I want to put it on tape somewhere so if somebody in 50 years from now will say because what I found will be probably working 50 years from now as today it was working 50 and 100 years ago, it's the same thing.
• [00:45:44] William Henry Murphy: Just like I said, it seems crazy that have that knowledge and not be able to use it.
• [00:45:55] INTERVIEWER: I'm out of set questions. We have a pretty good summary of time. Is there anything you would like to add? [OVERLAPPING] .
• [00:46:02] William Henry Murphy: I like to tell you well, remember we were talking about trying to stop, having bad childhood passed on. Well, my grandfather took the kids up to Montana. This was a great westward movement. They were going to be farmers out in Montana. Well, his wife died and he started drinking, and the kids were going hungry and they were going around to neighbors and to get food, and they called the police or whatever, and so they disperse them to different relatives, and my mother was sent to this woman who was a very rigid Christian who didn't leave you. If you move to a foot, you're dancing and that's against the indoor devil was making you do that, and there are people that still believed that. Don't laugh too much. This is even her sister went through a period of that. Luckily, her kids all turned out. All right but you didn't go out at night because that's when the devil was to tempt you and and so it traumatized her.
• [00:47:43] FEMALE_1: Your mother?
• [00:47:44] William Henry Murphy: Yeah, my mother, and so that's an awful whole lifetime of going in and out. I think it's called PSTD now post traumatic stress disorder, and we use it for veterans. But I think it also applies to people, children who have bad childhood, it might be better explained. That this is a bad childhood it what it is, and so she wound up having a whole lifetime of being in and out of mental hospitals. In fact when I'm view her that she was not my mother. She was just the crazy woman and had a bad father to reach all the time. Now that's set up. I have had PTSD and in my late '20s, I came close to having the same kind of problem my mother did, and we were listening on the radio to us. Psychologist. He is one of the foremost experimental psychologists in old day that from U of M He's in the medical and psychological history books because he discovered how memories are stored in the brain chemically, and the way teaching planaria worms to go through a maze, cutting them up and feeding them to other worms, and they would, instead of taking, let's say 10 times to go through a maze to learn it. They would do it maybe three times. So they were married just from having that information in their brain. Well, he gave a course in the psychology of influence in the 1960s.
• [00:49:48] FEMALE_1: Tell them the same house, his name.
• [00:49:50] William Henry Murphy: You say what?
• [00:49:51] FEMALE_1: McConnell.
• [00:49:52] William Henry Murphy: James VI McConnell. He is one of the foremost experimental psychologists in the world, and he gave this course and it was a video audiotape and re-broadcast over FM radio, and we used to listen to him, and he told me about how they would take people and put them in isolation tanks, and then they would do all kinds of things to them of how isolation can mess people up, and also one time that he told about it. I think I may have told this story where this anthropologist was studying this group of holy rollers, what we call, they go into fits in as part of their religious experience, and he noticed some kid was there we didn't belong into, kept watching them and he went back and forth and then one day went over. He says you don't belong here. Yeah. He said he kept it came to light that he would watch the girls went through this experience. Because if you go through a traumatic experience, your for about a day and a half, you're more susceptible to influence, and he would try to take those girls out as soon as he could. After that experience that he told him he had a high score rate. Then one time he told above psychiatrist at this hospital, and at the same time, I was going to a psychiatrist and I was having problems, and he told about this psychiatrists were the hospital and let's say Vermont and this guy was always bothering them, and he wanted to do his thing, but he was always bothered. Finally, he said, quit acting crazy, and the guy after that got well, and something happened in my brain. It is what happened was the equivalent. If you ever have driven and let's say you're you put your foot on the gas and you put it from reversed clumps and something plugged in my brain, and ever after that, I was fine, and I was in fact cured and saved from going through what my mother would've gone, what she went through and I could have gone through to and I told my psychiatrist that and he didn't believe me and I said, you're wrong. I've been fine for the last 50 years because of that one program. I always mean to tell psychiatrists that, that it is possible to do something like that. But if it's not in.
• [00:53:17] FEMALE_1: Textbook.
• [00:53:17] William Henry Murphy: Textbooks.
• [00:53:19] FEMALE_1: Things about the terry cloth.
• [00:53:21] William Henry Murphy: I think I told you about the terry cloth mother experiment from knowing. Oh I didn't. In early 1950s or '60s. At University of Wisconsin. They had an experiment and they took rhesus monkeys, and they, brought them up. They brought up in isolation, and they brought up with regularly and in some in groups while they took the ones who were in isolation and they gave, they would scare them and they put up a mother, terry cloth mother or a wire mother, and the ones who had the wire mothers were all messed up and it did. They would look for [OVERLAPPING] ?
• [00:54:19] FEMALE_1: Comfort.
• [00:54:19] William Henry Murphy: Comfort and the wires didn't know. But once who had a terry cloth mother were a lot better, we're fine, and the ones who are brought up as a group didn't well.
• [00:54:33] FEMALE_1: That was a Harry Harlow.
• [00:54:35] William Henry Murphy: Harry Harlow experiment is a famous [OVERLAPPING] experiment in psychology, and we went to the University of Wisconsin right after that and saw the monkeys in their cages. We've done a lot of things and seeing the a lot throughout the world.
• [00:54:58] FEMALE_1: We are very lucky.
• [00:55:04] William Henry Murphy: We've came through when jobs were plentiful, saved our money. [NOISE] There won't be any pensions for any of you probably. You have to save your money for time when you retire. There may not probably shouldn't be even so security.
• [00:55:28] FEMALE_1: May not be.
• [00:55:29] William Henry Murphy: Because the country can't afford it on this level of taxation, and that's what we're doing is borrowing trillions of dollars we're in trouble. Initially.
• [00:55:50] INTERVIEWER: [NOISE] I have a a question. How did you guys meet?
• [00:55:51] William Henry Murphy: What is that?
• [00:55:51] INTERVIEWER: How did you guys meet?
• [00:55:53] FEMALE_1: How did we meet?
• [00:55:54] William Henry Murphy: Well I think I told where we met.
• [00:56:02] FEMALE_1: I grew up in the South, but I had come North to stay with my cousin and look for a better job for myself. Her husband and Bill work together. They set us up on a blind date on Christmas, 54 years later [LAUGHTER] .
• [00:56:21] INTERVIEWER: Well, if there's nothing else you'd like to add, we can wrap up a little bit early today.
• [00:56:35] William Henry Murphy: Do have anything
• [00:56:35] FEMALE_1: Do want me to say about your great grandfather?
• [00:56:38] William Henry Murphy: Well, I think I told you about my great grandfather [OVERLAPPING] in fact do you want to see a picture of him? Why don't you go get my them. [NOISE] Good thing. Case right in the top. [inaudible 00:56:55].
• [00:57:10] William Henry Murphy: Here's a picture of them. Like he said, he lead to devastation, probably killed a million people and counting. But he was a good man, really, if you read his articles in the [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:57:31] FEMALE_1: He wrote for the medical journals and we found a lot of them here at UFM.
• [00:57:36] William Henry Murphy: Not here but UFM and Ann Arbor. But he was a good man.
• [00:57:43] FEMALE_1: He was trying to get people off of morphine and magnum, [inaudible 00:57:48] He had no idea why he was [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:57:54] William Henry Murphy: What it was about. He thought it was just, and like I said, you can go to Peru now and you get coca tea. That's what they give you for heights sickness. But it's just very weak, so it doesn't really do anything. [OVERLAPPING]
• [00:58:19] FEMALE_1: It another good place to go as well. Actual picture.
• [00:58:23] William Henry Murphy: Yeah.
• [00:58:25] FEMALE_1: Beautiful.
• [00:58:26] William Henry Murphy: That's a beautiful place.
• [00:58:29] FEMALE_1: Thank you.
• [00:58:38] INTERVIEWER: We want to tell your story as one of inspiration to others of all ages about how not to only survive hardship and becoming even better person and parent as a result. Some of the questions may seem familiar because we have asked them before during the first three sessions. We are asking again because the questions are critical to the story we wanted to share about you, and because it will be easier for us to edit the video tape into the story that will engage any audience. We've got 27 questions to cover today. We would like to start with some background questions to set the context for your story. When and where were you born?
• [00:59:11] William Henry Murphy: I'm born in Detroit in 1934. She went hospital. Do you remember the hospital?
• [00:59:22] FEMALE_1: I don't know.
• [00:59:24] William Henry Murphy: No. Detroit, 1934.
• [00:59:28] INTERVIEWER: Is your birth place different from the place where you grew up?
• [00:59:32] William Henry Murphy: No. I grew up in Detroit until I got married in 1960. I stayed in Detroit basically until I was almost 26.
• [00:59:48] INTERVIEWER: Where did you go to elementary school, naming location, if you remember.
• [00:59:56] William Henry Murphy: Went to a Catholic elementary for a while, then a public school because obviously, family broke up, so they couldn't afford to go pay the money that a Catholic school required. That's one of the problems when you get old, is I can't remember the names of them.
• [01:00:21] INTERVIEWER: Was this in Detroit as well?
• [01:00:23] William Henry Murphy: Yeah. It was.
• [01:00:27] INTERVIEWER: Where did you go to middle school or junior high?
• [01:00:30] William Henry Murphy: Junior high. It's right off of Grand River in Myers, but I, again, can't think of it right off hand. Too bad, you didn't ask me how maybe over. I could look it up or whatever, but I had a good middle junior high experience.
• [01:01:05] INTERVIEWER: Who was responsible for preparing meals, cleaning, and laundry in your home?
• [01:01:11] William Henry Murphy: Does the cleaning and laundry?
• [01:01:13] INTERVIEWER: House and chores.
• [01:01:15] William Henry Murphy: I do a lot of some of them. I do the laundry and the wife does the cleaning.
• [01:01:22] INTERVIEWER: Who is responsible for these things when you were growing up?
• [01:01:25] William Henry Murphy: When I was growing up. My mother worked because my mother and father got divorced, so she worked a lot and never made very much money. She worked at Hudson's and made $20, 25 a week. But we tried to help, but she she probably did most of the work because when we were kids, we didn't know what was going on. She probably worked from dawn to dusk besides having a regular job.
• [01:02:02] INTERVIEWER: Did you do any chores around the house?
• [01:02:06] William Henry Murphy: Maybe cut the grass or something, but nothing that stands out.
• [01:02:15] INTERVIEWER: How would you describe your family home life as a child in terms of your relationship with your parents and your siblings?
• [01:02:22] William Henry Murphy: Like I've said before, my father was like a reign of terror. My father wanted to beat you if you look cross-eyed. Kids are always looking cross-eyed. It was not a good home life when he was there and just every little thing he would be watching and he just seemed like he wanted an excuse to beat you. Although I don't remember it being beaten so much, but my brother was somewhat. But I don't remember. I can understand somebody living under a Nazi regime.
• [01:03:15] INTERVIEWER: How would you describe your relationship with your [OVERLAPPING]
• [01:03:21] William Henry Murphy: Nothing great. Just my sister was very sarcastic and she was damaged. Both my brother, I think had a nervous breakdown when he was in the navy. We were all damage. I came up with the best, which it's not saying great, but of the two, my sister was just laid on the couch for 20 years and she's had three married and divorced and was bitter her whole life. My brother gets awards for being some of the most sarcastic person in the world. But he's bellowing a little bit when you're trying to reach out in his later years. I'd say my sister died 4, 5 years ago of lung cancer from smoking. But not a real close relationship.
• [01:04:23] INTERVIEWER: Are you the oldest or the middle?
• [01:04:25] William Henry Murphy: Middle.
• [01:04:28] INTERVIEWER: How would you describe your parents philosophy of raising children?
• [01:04:36] William Henry Murphy: My fathers, you had to be perfect. My mother was more lenient and I doubt if they had a philosophy. They just doing things as things came along. I don't think they had a general. My mother did go to high school. She finished high school. I don't think my father went to school all the way. I'm not sure. He didn't go to the sixth grade or something like that. But he became a skilled tradesman during the war. He had ability. But I know what he dissed you he is dying. He was saying that how he felt like he should have done so much more here. He was only in his early 40s and he was dying, and he felt really like life had really messed him up because that's what he told me as he was dying. I didn't care what he said because I guess I hated them. But I loved him at that time that when I die, I'm not going to say, even though I don't feel like I've reached my potential, that I would do that to my son. I would just say how what a great person he is and try to make it a nice exit from life. Is there a problem with me? [NOISE].
• [01:06:49] INTERVIEWER: The next set of questions are designed to examine the hardships you faced while growing up. Describe the circumstances regarding the removal of your mother from your home, including why this occurred and why?
• [01:07:03] William Henry Murphy: Removal? Say that again now?
• [01:07:07] INTERVIEWER: In a previous interview, you mentioned your mother [OVERLAPPING].
• [01:07:10] William Henry Murphy: Would go in and out of mental hospitals?
• [01:07:13] INTERVIEWER: Yeah. Can you describe her 70s.
• [01:07:20] William Henry Murphy: The big time was probably about 80 or 90. She was gone for about a year-and-a-half and we went into a Catholic orphanage for say, a year-and-a-half.