"Many people have told me that they took them to Mexico [in 1921] but I tell them it is not true. They did not throw them out. The work was over and the company gave them passage to other places because the camp was closed. Where ever they wanted to go. Many took passage to California. Others to New Mexico and Colorado. And others, who preferred, went to Mexico. Free because the company gave them [passage] to wherever they wanted to go. But they were not thrown out. They left voluntarily. Many of them went to Mexico and a year later when Morenci started again, many came back to Morenci. A few stayed in Mexico, but many came back again. We stayed. I was little.

Everything was closed [in the mine]; there was no work. There were people who had family in Morenci and there was work in Los Angeles. The man would go to work in Los Angeles and left the family in Morenci. There he would be working. Everything was very inexpensive. He would send money to the family. As I told you before, my father bought some burros and I carried firewood at $1.25 the load. I sold firewood to those people who were being sent money from California. We did not have much, but our family was not lacking. That is how we passed the depression of '21. Then in '22 was when I started working for the company. In some way, one makes a living here in the United States.

Many did not go because they knew that in Mexico they would not get anything. Mexico is not an industrial nation; I am going to tell you. The United States is the largest industrial nation in the world. Did you know that? Here in the United States came people from all over the world. Did you know that the United States is not a nation like Mexico? In Mexico, they are Mexicans. In France, they are French. In Germany, they are Germans. In England, they are English. Like that. In the United States, it is not like that. The United States is formed from all the people of the world. They all came because here in the United States was where there was work and life was easier than anywhere else in the world. Still to this date, there is no nation like this. There is not, that is true. I do not say that I have traveled to Europe. I have talked to people who have gone to Europe on a trip, to France, to England, to Russia, and others who have gone to Japan and China. All of them when they return say no matter where they go; there is none like the United States. That is why I say that, not because I have gone myself."

It [the Depression] started in 1929 over there in New York and the east. That is when it started and that is when I got married. It started in the east and it came bit by bit. It took three years to get to the state of Arizona, the Depression. When it arrived here in Morenci, I was recently married and we had nothing because then there were not the luxuries there are now. There was nothing. There were not any couches like this; there were no beautiful chairs. There were no rugs either. But we would go visit very happy everybody. That is how the people lived.

I already had a car. I bought it in 1925. Before 1925 there were very few cars. About 1919 was the first time they put a Chevrolet agency in Clifton but they did not sell very many cars like they sell now. People earned very little. They did not earn enough to live and to buy themselves a car. There was not enough money to buy furniture like there is today. No, now one goes to a house and they have everything. Everything has progressed. Not then. Then it was just starting. Before 1919, cars were not around. There were not any highways either. The only road there was the one to Duncan to Lordsburg to El Paso. People did not travel by car because there were not any. People traveled by train. They went to Los Angeles. The trains always went. By Lordsburg, two trains went through every twenty-four hours with coaches, all coaches. With maybe eight coaches full of people going to California. Some came in the direction of Texas, also full of people going to visit. It was the only means of travel, the train. Of cars, there were one or two. The first cars before 1918, the lights were not electric. The lights in front were carbide. Before that they used candles.

Later in 1915 or 1916, they also made carbide lamps that the [mining] company used. They gave out carbide lamps every morning when they went in to work. There was a box there full of carbide lamps. They used them all day. Some took them home to use in their house at night because there were no electric lights. But the automobiles also did not have lights. All of them had carbide lamps. The cars did not have glass windows. All of them had curtains on the side for when it rained. You bought a car and it had curtains under the seat. They were called touring cars. You would go on the road and if you saw it was going to rain, you stopped at the side of the road, got the curtains, and put them up. So if it rained, you did not get wet because you put up the curtains. In 1925 the first cars came with windows. In 1925 I bought my car. I bought it second-hand. It was an Oldsmobile. Before 1925 all the cars were of four cylinders. In 1925 they came out the first cars of six cylinders. They were Oldsmobile. There were many more brands, but in the end all those brands came to nothing because the biggest company, GMC begin to buy them.

In 1926, I traded it for a car with glass windows. So from there on I always had a car. I drove cars for seventy years. I had every brand of car except Chevrolet. I did not like the Chevrolet because I rode in a friend's when the road to Safford was a dirt road. It had very hard seats. I bought an Oldsmobile. The best car I had was a Nash. That one, you could drive all day. I could go to California and drive all day and not get tired. It was very easy. I have experienced all of them. I took good care of my cars, very beautiful. I always had two, but I did not have cars. I had a pick-up. At first there were not any pick-ups, but when they first started coming, I bought me one. The pick-up I used everyday for work, for everything. The car I always kept in the garage, very well taken care of, very clean.

When I would go to sell a car because I was going to buy another one, I would ask how much that car would cost. If I liked it, I would say, "That price for that car is with trade-in, right?" "Yes, with trade-in." "Bueno, now tell me, how much does it cost without trade-in." Would you believe there were cars they lowered four hundred dollars? Because it cost more when you had an old car. Still if I go to buy a car now, I do not drive anymore, but if I were to go buy a car. I would ask, "How much is that car?" They say, "With trade-in?" "Yes. And without trade-in?" Because I always sold my cars by myself. There were always people who wanted my cars because I had them well cared for. I always got my four hundred dollars or more. No, I knew what I was doing. The ones from the garage, I had a good friendship with. Sometimes I went to the garage, the agency, and talked with them. Sometimes I just went to visit them to see them. I did not buy. I just went to see them. It was in Clifton. They knew me and I had a good relationship with them, with all of them. I had many friends. I always had friends.

There was no work [in the Depression] but the government opened [work]. At that time the treasury of the United States had a lot money but now the treasury of the United States owes money. It does not have money. At that time, Roosevelt went into the treasury and started opening jobs to help the people. There were about three different kinds of jobs. He started hiring people. We worked eleven days a month. They paid us four dollars a day. The work I did? They had us on the hills making rock walls to stop the water so when rained it would not erode the soil; so it would stay there. Because water takes the dirt and then leaves the earth bare with only rocks. This way to conserve and to plant grass and plants. The plants protect the soil with roots when it rains. We did that type of work. [It was] the WPA. I worked in the WPA and in the forest too. They also had a program. Yes, [it was the CCC]. The forest one paid less but I worked five and half days per week. We worked over there on the hills, protecting the plants, planting, and like that. That was the forest [job]. They took us in truck here to Cherry Lodge. We went up the Coronado Trail and also around here from Clifton to Morenci, all around. They also had programs here in Safford but I lived in Morenci.

[During the Depression] we used to buy in Clifton, J.C. Penny. There was a J.C. Penny Store in Clifton. The company store of Morenci was closed and it was taken over by someone who worked in the General Office, an Italian. He sold only produce there. But when Morenci started again, they took the store away from him. But it was closed during the Depression. We bought our clothes in Clifton or we ordered it from Sears Roebuck or the Montgomery [Ward]. At that time Sears Roebuck and the Montgomery did a lot of business by mail. Today, only a short while ago, the Montgomery closed. You know that there is a lot of competition among companies that have opened recently and it is not like in the old times. Everybody goes to buy there so the Montgomery closed. The one still around is the Sears.

I am going to tell you that President Roosevelt, I consider to be the best president that there has ever been in the United States. All have had one defect or other, but not him. He was elected a third time, the only one because the law only permits two times for four years. He ran two times and the third time the people voted for him except that he died in the presidency. But I think he is the best because he was the one that got the United States out of the Depression. It was he. He took money out of the treasury to open jobs all over the United States so the people could work. He was the best president in my opinion."