Anne McDonald and Chuck McDonald

[00:00] ANNE MCDONALD: Still here. My name is Anne McDonald. I am in Boise, Idaho, with my father, Patrick McDonald, and I am 40 years old. Patrick also goes by Chuck, with my father, Chuck McDonald. Now it's your turn.

[00:19] CHUCK MCDONALD: And, yes, I am Chuck McDonald. Chuck is a derivation of Charles, but I seldom use the term Charles.

[00:32] ANNE MCDONALD: And how old are you?

[00:33] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well.

[00:47] ANNE MCDONALD: You'Re 40 years older than I am. We can just leave it at that if you'd like. I'm 40, and you're 40 years older than I am. And you're also in Boise, Idaho, with me, correct?

[01:00] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah, about a foot and a half away from each other.

[01:03] ANNE MCDONALD: Foot and a half away from each other in Boise, Idaho. All right. So, dad, we having our 40th and 80th birthdays occurring in the same year has made my mortality very apparent to me and brought to light the importance of the relationships with those I love. And that importance has grown so strong, it's almost painful. I want to ensure that I live the best life while I can and while I'm able. And in my eyes, you have lived your life to the fullest. I would like to ask you about the most important things that you've experienced in your life and the lessons that you've learned from them. Hopes to follow in your footsteps.

[01:52] CHUCK MCDONALD: That's a big task.

[01:54] ANNE MCDONALD: Well, it is a big task, but I thought we would break it down maybe, and maybe we could just go through. Maybe start with your time as a child in Butte, and then move forward and see where the conversation leads us. Does that sound good? Can you tell me when and where you were born?

[02:16] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yes, I was born in Butte, Montana. It's the county seat of Silverville. Silverville county.

[02:28] ANNE MCDONALD: And what was it like in Butte when you. When you were growing up?

[02:35] CHUCK MCDONALD: Um. Stay away from the railroad tracks. That was the domination, dominant theme.

[02:44] ANNE MCDONALD: Stay away from the railroad tracks.

[02:46] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[02:46] ANNE MCDONALD: What about the railroad tracks did you have to stay away from?

[02:50] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, Butte was a big mining town, and there's a probably from our house, there's probably six, eight blocks away from.

[03:12] ANNE MCDONALD: There from the train tracks.

[03:16] CHUCK MCDONALD: Was the.

[03:34] ANNE MCDONALD: Was it the train yard that was six or eight blocks away from your house? Yeah. Who told you not to go? Or how did you know not to go there?

[03:47] CHUCK MCDONALD: Parents said, stay away from the railroad tracks. And the train yard and the mining yard.

[03:53] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh.

[03:54] CHUCK MCDONALD: Kids were supposed to be anywhere near those facilities.

[03:59] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[04:03] CHUCK MCDONALD: And Carol was three years younger than me, so everybody was clued into Carol's.

[04:13] ANNE MCDONALD: Stay away from home to keeping Carol safe.

[04:16] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[04:16] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. How old were you?

[04:19] CHUCK MCDONALD: Three years more than she was.

[04:21] ANNE MCDONALD: Three years more than she was, what, about eight, seven or eight years old at this time?

[04:29] CHUCK MCDONALD: I think so.

[04:30] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay. So did you have. So you sounds like you were tasked with helping keep Carol away from the train tracks and the dangerous areas.

[04:43] CHUCK MCDONALD: Right.

[04:44] ANNE MCDONALD: Were there other kids in your. The other kids around you? Did you have any extended family, neighborhood kids? Neighborhood kids, yeah. Did you guys ever find yourself sneaking over to the railroad, the train yard, or to the mines? Of course. Can you tell me about that?

[05:06] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, we would be down the street about two blocks and would be looking right at the railroad tracks. And we like to train through probably twice a day. They're ore cars. You know what an ore car is?

[05:32] ANNE MCDONALD: Yes.

[05:33] CHUCK MCDONALD: Okay. There's. They're open topped. There was no cover on them. And there's probably three or four kids in the neighborhood, including myself, to do stuff like that.

[05:55] ANNE MCDONALD: Would you get inside the or cars?

[05:57] CHUCK MCDONALD: No.

[05:58] ANNE MCDONALD: No. What did you do?

[05:59] CHUCK MCDONALD: The rock was open.

[06:00] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[06:01] CHUCK MCDONALD: Just wide open. What would we like to go down and watch the trains come by? They would be blowing their whistles or horns. They came out of the train yard, and they had to cross several residential streets. And we, in turn, like to watch them come across the residential streets and head off to the west towards that.

[06:38] ANNE MCDONALD: Was it towards. Did they head towards the mines, the trains, you said. Or would you head off towards.

[06:48] CHUCK MCDONALD: They could go either way.

[06:50] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[06:52] CHUCK MCDONALD: As kids, we wouldn't. We see the train coming. Of course, we get off the track.

[06:56] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[06:57] CHUCK MCDONALD: And you'd stand off on the side and watch it come by and go by it. But one of the things we really enjoyed was. Gave us a big thrill was to take. We would save up glass pop bottles, mail jars, milk jugs, you name it. Anything. We take broken pieces of those things in a coffee can, spread them out on the track. To spread them out carefully so they.

[07:34] ANNE MCDONALD: Stay up until the train went by. So what happened to those when the train went by?

[07:42] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, the miners got wise after a while, and maybe. Maybe they did. Maybe kids did this. When I was growing up. They.

[08:14] ANNE MCDONALD: Why did you spread the glass on the tracks?

[08:17] CHUCK MCDONALD: The idea was to take chunks of glass and let the wheels of the train go over the top and grind it up.

[08:29] ANNE MCDONALD: And then what? What did they do with it when it was ground up?

[08:34] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, we were smart. We were making our own gunpowder, you see. 0067 year old kids.

[08:43] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, my goodness. You guys had your own methods. I love it.

[08:50] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah, they were really grouchy, too, wouldn't it? The miners, the railroad people that see us down there, they'd be on the side of the train. And sometimes they walk ahead, they'd look down ahead and see who was on the track, and they would. They would chase us off, and they'd sweep. They'd broom and sweep all that stuff.

[09:26] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, man. So you had to be really stealthy. Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay, so if you were successful, then, in getting the glass, if not getting chased off by the railroad people and them not sweeping away your glass, if you were successful and you turned the glass into gunpowder, then what did you guys do?

[09:48] CHUCK MCDONALD: You can't turn gunpowder.

[09:51] ANNE MCDONALD: No, I know, but you used it as gunpowder. You said. You said you used the crushed glass as imagination. Gunpowder, yeah. Then what did you do with your pretend gunpowder after that?

[10:04] CHUCK MCDONALD: Put it back in a can.

[10:06] ANNE MCDONALD: Put it back in a can.

[10:08] CHUCK MCDONALD: And then we had. So every native had a lot or two that was empty.

[10:13] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, okay.

[10:14] CHUCK MCDONALD: And we take. For the most of the time, we could get. We salvage that glass powder, and we'd sweep it into the cans, and then we scurry back to the vacant lot. You look down into the deep? I don't know. A lot. The hole in the lot was probably about that deep.

[10:40] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[10:41] CHUCK MCDONALD: Maybe three.

[10:41] ANNE MCDONALD: So you could climb into the hole if you wanted to.

[10:44] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah. It was part of our fort. Oh, yeah. We have. We had. We made our own guns out of wooden.

[10:59] ANNE MCDONALD: Out of pieces of wood you found around.

[11:01] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah. Oh, they were just l shaped guns that in the. One of the neighborhood gentlemen would make guns for us.

[11:18] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, cool.

[11:19] CHUCK MCDONALD: And wooden swords. He'd make all those things for us. I don't think we peted them up, but we had fun with them.

[11:32] ANNE MCDONALD: Then take them down to your fort with your gunpowder.

[11:36] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[11:37] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. Did you ever have any turf wars? Did you have to protect your fort?

[11:44] CHUCK MCDONALD: I don't know. Usually there was a couple of forts in every lot, and there were fairly close to each other.

[11:52] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh.

[11:53] CHUCK MCDONALD: So I don't think we were smart enough to make. What do you want to say? We were. We were in companies, and we like.

[12:21] ANNE MCDONALD: Different companies in the. If the. If the lot was the base, you had different companies in each fort in the lot, like, different groups of kids? Is that what you're saying?

[12:30] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah, we never had that many kids.

[12:33] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[12:35] CHUCK MCDONALD: We certainly. I remember the two german kids that. Sure.

[12:45] ANNE MCDONALD: That you two german kids that you played with.

[12:48] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah, yeah. And then the kids next door guy. Kid lived on the corner. And I don't know if he was that involved, but I remember he. He had his. He always seemed to have a gun or a sword or something to fight with. Mister Anderson, make sure. He had one, too.

[13:19] ANNE MCDONALD: Did anybody get hurt from the, during the, like, did anybody get hurt fighting with the guns and the swords? Like, if somebody was there, anybody who was maybe a bully who had, like, come after other kids or was it pretty amicable and you guys are all.

[13:36] CHUCK MCDONALD: On the same team at all. And there's always tension in a situation like that where you've got this group would fight with, argue with, or defend yourselves.

[13:56] ANNE MCDONALD: So there were different groups, though?

[13:58] CHUCK MCDONALD: Oh, yeah.

[13:58] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[13:59] CHUCK MCDONALD: We defend ourselves. We dare to our fort.

[14:02] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, wow.

[14:03] CHUCK MCDONALD: They'd come by and they were looking and they'd kick in the. Kick in the walls of the fort.

[14:09] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, what jerks. Yeah. You had to defend it.

[14:13] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[14:13] ANNE MCDONALD: What were, how were the different groups. What were the different groups of kids composed of?

[14:20] CHUCK MCDONALD: Like, probably four or five.

[14:22] ANNE MCDONALD: Was it like, who lived closest together?

[14:24] CHUCK MCDONALD: Pretty much the same, yeah.

[14:28] ANNE MCDONALD: Or how, I guess. How did you group up?

[14:31] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, I lived in house number two from the corner.

[14:36] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[14:39] CHUCK MCDONALD: And the kid on the corner, his name was Larry. Larry cased here.

[14:46] ANNE MCDONALD: Was he one of the german kids?

[14:49] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, I suppose his dad was a doctor.

[14:52] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, wow.

[14:54] CHUCK MCDONALD: And on the other corner was a kid named. His name was. But he was. He never got involved. His parents didn't let him get people.

[15:09] ANNE MCDONALD: And then the rival groups, where were they from?

[15:16] CHUCK MCDONALD: I have no idea.

[15:17] ANNE MCDONALD: They just materialized.

[15:18] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[15:20] ANNE MCDONALD: Were they from your neighborhood or different neighborhoods?

[15:24] CHUCK MCDONALD: They were. I presume they were from our neighborhood.

[15:29] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[15:31] CHUCK MCDONALD: It's a warm Saturday morning and we had, if we had some new swords, guns and so forth. Boy, that was, that was top notch. You know, you have to expect boys to be doing things like that.

[15:48] ANNE MCDONALD: Lots of energy. That's one thing I appreciate about you that I've noticed. Just in our time together, and specifically, especially recently, your imagination is wonderful. You're very creative. Yeah. Well, just in hearing you, hearing you talk and looking how you look at the world, you have a creative viewpoint. Sometimes you'll be looking up at the clouds and you'll see pictures in them or relate back to your skydiving adventure and just wonder how high up those clouds are or whatever. And meaning, like, you see what's in front of you, but maybe a part of what's in front of you that somebody else wouldn't be seeing. Right. And so it sounds like your creativity and your imagination has been with you since the beginning.

[16:51] CHUCK MCDONALD: Oh, yeah.

[16:52] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[16:54] CHUCK MCDONALD: My dad did his share of neighborhood construction projects. Did you know him at all?

[17:01] ANNE MCDONALD: I knew your dad just a little bit. He died when I was pretty young. When you. So grandpa did neighborhood construction projects in Butte. So those were probably some of the spaces where you would build your forts, I imagine.

[17:18] CHUCK MCDONALD: Oh, yeah.

[17:19] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. What did he do for employment while you lived in Butte?

[17:25] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, he worked for Mercy Hospital.

[17:38] ANNE MCDONALD: Mercy hospital.

[17:40] CHUCK MCDONALD: It was a major hospital, and it was fairly close to the train yard, our house, and so forth. Just a big facility near our neighborhood.

[17:56] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay. What did he do there?

[17:59] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, when he was younger, he was a time key. He was a timekeeper in the mines. He logged everything. They didn't have electronic this. Electronic.

[18:12] ANNE MCDONALD: So he worked in the mines?

[18:15] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[18:15] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay. I didn't know that he.

[18:23] CHUCK MCDONALD: He had. When he was working in the mines, specifically, he was a timekeeper, and that's what people did. So when we moved down the street, about four blocks, he moved from the hospital? No, from the. From the mine. Pardon me? To the hospital.

[18:57] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[18:59] CHUCK MCDONALD: Working? I don't know. I get all gagged up.

[19:07] ANNE MCDONALD: That's okay. Do you want a sip of water? So, Grandpa. Go ahead and take a drink. Grandpa, when he stopped working at the mines, or he changed from working as a timekeeper in the mines to working at the hospital. And what did he do at the hospital?

[19:33] CHUCK MCDONALD: I want to say he was a timekeeper, but I don't really think so.

[19:37] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[19:38] CHUCK MCDONALD: You had some kind of an administrative job.

[19:41] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay. And you had a lot. Besides grandma and grandpa in Butte, was there more family there? More of your family?

[19:55] CHUCK MCDONALD: You remember Marie Louise?

[19:57] ANNE MCDONALD: I remember Marie Louise, yeah.

[19:59] CHUCK MCDONALD: She was the youngest of Alice's girls.

[20:02] ANNE MCDONALD: So she's one of your cousins? Yeah, yeah.

[20:07] CHUCK MCDONALD: She's the one we need to talk to.

[20:09] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. Well, we can talk to her for sure. So, Alice, your family, and then your aunt Alice's family also lived in Butte, and did your grandparents live there?

[20:23] CHUCK MCDONALD: Oh, yeah.

[20:23] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. What was the family dynamic like? Did you guys see each other? Was the extended family, like, very familial? Uh, did you see each other a lot?

[20:37] CHUCK MCDONALD: Very common. Let's see. One, two blocks away, which is pretty cool.

[20:48] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah, that is pretty cool.

[20:50] CHUCK MCDONALD: Who? Who?

[20:50] ANNE MCDONALD: Alice was two blocks away from your house. And at this time, did you guys live with your grandparents? Okay, so you lived when we moved.

[20:59] CHUCK MCDONALD: Down the street to the hospital zone. Dad would. I think he took the bus about that time and might have taken the bus.

[21:24] ANNE MCDONALD: To work.

[21:24] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[21:25] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. I saw you get a little bit teary eyed when you mentioned Alice and Marie Louise. I know family. Or at least what I've learned or observed from you is the importance of family. And that's been a lesson that I've uncovered from you. Or uncovered. I don't know. Discovered. You have taught me. Can you tell me more about maybe the family, the traditions that. No, let me start over. Can you tell me about, like, a regular day in Butte, Montana, with the family, with the bigger extended family, like, what went on? Did you see?

[22:13] CHUCK MCDONALD: Once a month.

[22:21] ANNE MCDONALD: I think there's a card going by.

[22:24] CHUCK MCDONALD: Anyway, my nose. Anyway, they.

[22:36] ANNE MCDONALD: Said once a month you.

[22:37] CHUCK MCDONALD: Would have a family dinner.

[22:40] ANNE MCDONALD: Family dinner.

[22:41] CHUCK MCDONALD: Right. Renoir's kids. We would be home from college.

[22:46] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[22:47] CHUCK MCDONALD: The McDonald kids were too young to do anything like that. We went to their house for a meal.

[22:57] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[22:57] CHUCK MCDONALD: Mom, dad, Carol and I.

[23:00] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay. And then grandma and grandpa. I mean, your grandma and grandpa family.

[23:04] CHUCK MCDONALD: Four.

[23:05] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[23:06] CHUCK MCDONALD: Plus mom and pop. Grandparents.

[23:08] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay. Plus Alice and her husband.

[23:12] CHUCK MCDONALD: Right.

[23:13] ANNE MCDONALD: And how many kids did they have?

[23:16] CHUCK MCDONALD: Um, five. Let's see. Alice, Marie Louise, Elise, Andre and Clara junior. I think that was. That was all.

[23:42] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah, that sounds right. Tell me more about those dinners.

[23:49] CHUCK MCDONALD: I don't. You know, I should tell you that I don't remember whether it was people would bring serving bowls full of food or they said, Alice, do everything. But I don't think they did. I think they probably just sent some food up to her house and she and her girls cook things at the house.

[24:17] ANNE MCDONALD: Did you all sit at the same table?

[24:20] CHUCK MCDONALD: Oh, yeah.

[24:20] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. Must have been a big table.

[24:24] CHUCK MCDONALD: It was a big table. We ate in the dining room. Okay, here's the. There's the dining room. And from here to there was. They had to. The girls helped Alice get all the food put together and the table sat and all that stuff families do. And occasionally, I remember some family members would come up to the house also.

[25:22] ANNE MCDONALD: To help out. Yeah, to help get ready. So you were one of the youngest people at the table at that time?

[25:32] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, right, yeah. Wasn't Carol was.

[25:38] ANNE MCDONALD: Carol was the youngest. And then you were second youngest, probably, yeah. So what did it look? So if you were seven or eight and you're seeing your big cousins, and some of them are at college, and your parents and your aunt and uncle and your grandparents, do you remember what was being talked about or did everybody get along?

[26:02] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[26:03] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. What did they talk about?

[26:06] CHUCK MCDONALD: Boy, that's a good question.

[26:10] ANNE MCDONALD: Were you part of conversations or were you supposed to be seen and not heard?

[26:18] CHUCK MCDONALD: I know I didn't say much. I don't remember any kind of insight from that.

[26:26] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[26:28] CHUCK MCDONALD: During the course of the meal, Marie Louise Washington, she had a big help. You cooked peas and she had an arm plate, and she said, oh, my gosh, I peed on the floor. Oh, God. She peed on the floor.

[26:55] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, that's wonderful. So it sounds like it was a very lighthearted and joyful. Yeah. Was that the feeling that came with the family? Most of the time, yeah. You carry that through. That's a feeling that resonates from you with the two.

[27:17] CHUCK MCDONALD: Claire's very humorous people. Claire Junior and Claire's.

[27:26] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[27:29] CHUCK MCDONALD: They were always cutting up.

[27:34] ANNE MCDONALD: Do you remember any of the specific jokes or gags that they would say or pull?

[27:40] CHUCK MCDONALD: No.

[27:40] ANNE MCDONALD: No. But they were kind of the needlers of making people giggle.

[27:45] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah. The girls, Andre wasn't. Elise and Maria Rishi were more.

[27:52] ANNE MCDONALD: More silly and playful. Yeah. Andre was more serious. Yeah.

[27:59] CHUCK MCDONALD: I don't know what. I don't know what she did.

[28:03] ANNE MCDONALD: I don't either. Out of that family, I knew Claire the best. Claire Junior, how was. Tell me about grandma. My grandma and grandpa. Your mom and dad, what were they more on the, like, jovial, jokester side or were they more serious in these situations or in these settings?

[28:23] CHUCK MCDONALD: Your dad's kind of parents.

[28:25] ANNE MCDONALD: No, your parents. Your parents at the dinner table or in family settings.

[28:34] CHUCK MCDONALD: I was frustrated because I didn't have any numerous things to say. Bothered me a lot.

[28:44] ANNE MCDONALD: When you were sitting at the table.

[28:46] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[28:47] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[28:49] CHUCK MCDONALD: I just felt like I was just a little kid, and I sure knew it. The bigger kids dominated the meals.

[28:58] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. They probably got the attention from the grownups as well.

[29:03] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[29:04] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[29:04] CHUCK MCDONALD: Right.

[29:05] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. Yeah. I understand being in the situation of man. People are being witty and funny around me, and I'm enjoying it, but I really want to add to this conversation, and my brain feels like it's just stuck. I got nothing to come out.

[29:21] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah, yeah. They had a big, beautiful piano. And I know some of the girls played the piano, so they'd be playing the piano. The piano was right up against the window. Main window. And so I like to sit on the couch and listen to whoever was playing.

[29:50] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, beautiful.

[29:50] CHUCK MCDONALD: It was.

[29:51] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. So as we're. If I can move us forward a little bit. So it sounds like when you were in butte, you had. You were one of the younger I. You were younger in Butte, and so your responsibilities to be a kid were basically to be a kid and behave. But as you moved then to Boise, I'm skipping over salmon for right now. But when you moved to Boise, I know that at least what I've heard from you so far is that family remained very important. That's kind of a through line. But you had more responsibilities then as you were getting older and you were one of the older members of the family. Can you talk about your contributions as a teenager to the family when you lived in Boise.

[30:48] CHUCK MCDONALD: We moved to Boise. When? Let's see.

[30:58] ANNE MCDONALD: I know. I think it was, like, junior high, high school age. No, you went to St. Joseph's, didn't you? Or St. Joe's. So must have been elementary school, but higher elementary school, I think.

[31:15] CHUCK MCDONALD: I can't remember just what timeline is.

[31:21] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah, I think, like, 1213 sound about right?

[31:25] CHUCK MCDONALD: 13 to 7th grade.

[31:27] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. Yeah. I think you were about that age when you moved to Boise. And I remember you telling me about your. Your newspaper job on the corner. Yeah. Would you tell it again? Well, do you remember?

[31:46] CHUCK MCDONALD: Give me a lead.

[31:47] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. So, I know that you were expected to have a job when you're old enough. And so I think you told me you were in junior high, high school when you started selling the evening paper on the corner. And it was on either 8th and Fort or 8th and somewhere on 8th street between Fort and Bannack, right downtown, where all the.

[32:14] CHUCK MCDONALD: 8Th and Bannock.

[32:15] ANNE MCDONALD: 8Th and Bannack. So you were right by the Capitol building, all the. And by the churches. So you saw city officials and religious leaders, and you were slinging newspapers. Yeah.

[32:33] CHUCK MCDONALD: That's cool.

[32:34] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. So, with your paper job, I know that you got to know a lot of people in Boise that way, that you might not otherwise have known. Were you expected to contribute to the family with your earnings, or did you get to save? Or was the money that you earned just for yourself?

[32:56] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, I know because I wasn't contributing to the family finances. I wasn't to put money in any fund.

[33:09] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay.

[33:11] CHUCK MCDONALD: So apparently not.

[33:13] ANNE MCDONALD: Okay. You had a pretty strong work ethic, though. You've had. That's another thing I've observed and learned from you as a solid work ethic, starting when you were young with your. Was that your first job, being the evening paper boy?

[33:30] CHUCK MCDONALD: 13.

[33:31] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. You were 13 when you started doing that.

[33:35] CHUCK MCDONALD: 14 when you're 8th grade.

[33:38] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. Since that paper being a paper boy, have you ever. Has there been a time in your life where you've ever not had a job? What's that? Oh, yeah, it sounds like roller skates are happening.

[34:02] CHUCK MCDONALD: The next time I had a job, washing in the summertime, told dad I'm not making enough money mowing other people's lawns for a couple of bucks. Just didn't make any money to me.

[34:23] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[34:23] CHUCK MCDONALD: And I was rather unhappy with that situation that you can about imagine.

[34:32] ANNE MCDONALD: So, did you get. Did grandpa give you more work or find you more work?

[34:40] CHUCK MCDONALD: No, no, no. You assigned me lawn mowing jobs, which I really didn't care.

[34:50] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah. 14 mowing lawns.

[34:55] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[34:56] ANNE MCDONALD: So we have about five minutes left in our interview.

[34:59] CHUCK MCDONALD: Oh, good.

[35:00] ANNE MCDONALD: I know. That went fast, didn't it?

[35:02] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yes.

[35:03] ANNE MCDONALD: So I want to move forward a little bit. So what I've heard you expand on is the importance of, and what I've also learned from you is being creative and playful, keeping a spirit of joy and playfulness and creativity, the importance of family. And even if it's just the presence of being around family and knowing that they're there and experiencing them as much as you're able, as well as a strong work ethic. We just touched on that a little bit, starting with your paper delivery service. But I, as I've watched you over your life, you've always been a hard worker. I'm wondering, is there anything else? Those are three big things. But is there another lesson or something that you would want to impart to me that we didn't cover?

[36:17] CHUCK MCDONALD: So I had about three different neighborhood lawn, lawns to cut for a couple of centers, and one of them was a little bit dangerous.

[36:41] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah.

[36:46] CHUCK MCDONALD: Maybe it's that deer.

[36:48] ANNE MCDONALD: Maybe there's the deer knocking on the window. Can I shift your direction just a little bit away from the lawn for a moment? So I'm definitely going to remember you forever in so much as your value and love for your family, how strong you work, how playful and happy you are, how sincere and kind you are and have always been. How do you want to be remembered?

[37:48] CHUCK MCDONALD: Things that draw things that draw interest to you. How would you do that?

[38:07] ANNE MCDONALD: Things that draw your attention. Inquisitive. You want to be remembered as inquisitive and curious?

[38:19] CHUCK MCDONALD: Oh, yes. Big time.

[38:21] ANNE MCDONALD: Yeah, I would say that fits you. We got about two minutes left. Are there any final words you want to give to me?

[38:38] CHUCK MCDONALD: Well, one of the, one of the houses that I was cutting, the lawnmower. I pushed the lawnmower into the base of a rose bush.

[38:53] ANNE MCDONALD: Well, did you destroy the roses?

[38:56] CHUCK MCDONALD: No, no, I didn't.

[39:03] ANNE MCDONALD: Cure deer mowing lawns pretty much. That's another thing you seem to get yourself, and I think I've taken after you in this and really awkward Orlando, funny situations of something very, while it's something very mundane, like hitting a rose bush while mowing a lawn and like having a predicament with that. Yeah, you, you definitely keep life interesting. I think you've passed that down to me. So thank you.

[39:39] CHUCK MCDONALD: Rose Bush has about this bunch of updates to it. And people used to take wire, thick wire, and wrap it around the base of the.

[39:52] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, no. So you ran into the wire with the blades of the lawnmower?

[39:55] CHUCK MCDONALD: Yeah.

[39:55] ANNE MCDONALD: Oh, gosh.

[39:57] CHUCK MCDONALD: Thankfully, they weren't.

[40:09] ANNE MCDONALD: We're gonna have to pause it right there. Yeah, but we can leave it to our imaginations with a lawnmower driving into a wire framed rose bush driven by a 14 year old kid. Oh. And it cuts you right through the middle of your nose. Oh, my. Oh, my. Thank you, papa, for sharing these stories with me. Thank you for sharing you with me.

[40:40] CHUCK MCDONALD: I suspect that I gave you some.

[40:49] ANNE MCDONALD: You gave me a lot of fun. You gave me a lot of fun. We have to. We gotta end now.