Carolyn Wolfe and Carrie Aho

[00:02] CAROLYN WOLFE: Hi, my name is Carolyn. I'm 81 years old. We are in April, April 23, on a Saturday. The year is 2022. I live in the Ozarks of Missouri. My partner here is my beautiful daughter, Carrie. And she's my daughter, like I said.

[00:28] CARRIE AHO: Hi, I'm Carrie.

[00:29] CAROLYN WOLFE: Aho.

[00:29] CARRIE AHO: And I'm 44. It's Saturday, April 23, 2022, in the Ozarks, Missouri. And I'm here with my mom. Well, I just. I've always wanted to talk to you and get you on recording. And when StoryCorps was coming through, I thought this is a perfect opportunity for us to just connect and have this for ourselves and our families. And I know we've talked a lot in our lives about your family, and we have so much in common that I just wanted to find out more about how you feel about your childhood and getting married and becoming a mom. The older I get, the more I think about, you know, your experience as a mother and everything I learned from you about being a mom. And I'm just curious what your perspective is on all of those things. So I wanted to start by asking you about your childhood. And, you know, you've talked a lot about Graham and about your experience and not knowing your dad. I just. I wondered, what is your earliest memory, and what do you think about with your childhood? What resonates with you, you know the most? With your gram or with my gram? Your mom and your aunties?

[02:07] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, I felt I had a wonderful childhood, actually. It was a happy time. There was a lot going on in my family, especially with mom, that she never shared. Like her aging parents. We were living with them and having to work when she had no skill. And they always were good to say things about my dad, what he was like. He was a very happy, jolly person. Loved life. Very musical. Quite, very involved in community activities of all kinds. And he was really big in church and in masonic. He was ready to become a. Oh, what is it?

[03:02] CARRIE AHO: One of the leaders?

[03:04] CAROLYN WOLFE: No, it's that shrine, mosque. What is that? Masonic?

[03:09] CARRIE AHO: The temple?

[03:10] CAROLYN WOLFE: No, the group. They belong to them. The Masons. Masons, I guess, yeah, because he'd worked his way up through other masonic organizations. And then you can become a mason. So he really enjoyed that work a lot. My mom was a typical mother at that time. Cooked, cleaned, ironed, washed clothes, cleaned house. And she was at home until he passed away. And that was really hard time.

[03:46] CARRIE AHO: That was 19 41 42.

[03:49] CAROLYN WOLFE: That was a year and a half. And she had to go into his business, insurance business, and learn the business. And for an income. And she was very fortunate to have her father and mother there to help support her, too. And my grandpa was a very. Oh, I don't know. He left us well taken care of. Not well, but adequate taken care of, because she wasn't a salesman and she had business. She did business with a lot of friends, but she didn't go out and hit the pavement and get other people to be insured.

[04:39] CARRIE AHO: Did she like the business or she just did it because she had to?

[04:45] CAROLYN WOLFE: Possibly. She never said she had a secretary that was an angel. She was Catholic, and she was dedicated to my mother, who was also. She just had a lot of people around her who were so supportive and all. I know she said a lot of people tried to get Mary to be their secretary, and she would probably have made a lot more money, but she never left mom.

[05:14] CARRIE AHO: Oh, wow.

[05:15] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah. She was a jewel.

[05:17] CARRIE AHO: Did your dad ever complain of stomach issues? He died of a perforated ulcer.

[05:22] CAROLYN WOLFE: Right, right, he did, I'm sure. But I don't. You know. I don't know. No. I was thinking, why didn't he have the surgery earlier, before it perforated? I guess they didn't do it in those days. And, of course, there was no antibiotics. That was in 42, and they just had sulfa, I believe, come in. And that was for the army, the soldiers, and they even extracted it from their urine to reuse it again. Isn't that crazy? Yeah. So had there been an antibiotic? I don't know that it would have saved his life.

[05:58] CARRIE AHO: Was it in the family? Was that common?

[06:01] CAROLYN WOLFE: We all had stomach issues, I think. Yes. But no one. My uncle Harry died of the same thing in 1959, and they had antibiotics, so.

[06:15] CARRIE AHO: Did your mom ever talk to you about the difficulties of being a single mom? She never remarried. Right.

[06:23] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, she was asked to go out, and I put up such a fuss. She didn't go. I think she would have if it hadn't been for me.

[06:31] CARRIE AHO: No, I don't think so.

[06:33] CAROLYN WOLFE: I don't know.

[06:34] CARRIE AHO: Do you think she was trying to protect you?

[06:35] CAROLYN WOLFE: I think so. I was a real. I was really high gear, you know? I was real ed as much as my brother Washington. Calm and peaceful. I was the opposite. But again, there was a lot of challenges there, you know, they weren't home to talk with me. It seemed like I was in a playpen all day, so. Or a lot of the time.

[07:00] CARRIE AHO: Were you close to Graham?

[07:03] CAROLYN WOLFE: I think so, yeah. I loved her. Yeah, she was. My mom and my dad, we loved to go and shop for clothing that was our favorite thing to do. We took trips to St. Louis to her cousin Amel and Hughie, and we were really close to them, and they were so much fun. And, of course, St. Louis was fun, too. We got to do a lot of things there, and that was mainly our vacation in the summer. We always went there. They were real close. Their name was Summer. Her mother's name was Julia Sommer. S o m m e r. What.

[07:44] CARRIE AHO: Do you think you had in common with Graham?

[07:48] CAROLYN WOLFE: We were kind of opposites in a way. She always said, I can read Ed like a book because he was so much like her. But I think she didn't know what to do with me sometimes. But she kept me involved in music. I took piano lessons. I took dancing lessons, ballet and tap. That was twice a week. So she kept me really active, you know, and that I took dancing till I graduated from high school. And I think that's one of the best things she could have done for me, because it wasn't that I was so great, but it was such great rhythm and such great activity and lots of friends, you know, and it was what I did after school, and that gave her time to continue working at the office, I think. What did I have in common with her? Well, we both liked to cook. We both liked shopping.

[08:54] CARRIE AHO: I remember her apricot coffee cake that she would give us to take home sometimes.

[09:00] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah. Yeah.

[09:01] CARRIE AHO: That was so good.

[09:02] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah.

[09:03] CARRIE AHO: Do you remember when we made that?

[09:04] CAROLYN WOLFE: I do. At my house, I do. It's a thought. We need to do it more times to really learn how to do it. But I never would work with her in the kitchen. I was too busy with my social life, you know?

[09:18] CARRIE AHO: Yeah. I remember her sunny kitchen and dying Easter eggs there. She always had a bowl, a green melamine bowl of tapioca.

[09:26] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yes. I've never made it like she did. It was so good.

[09:30] CARRIE AHO: It was so good. I know. I keep thinking I need to make it. What was your childhood like with Ed, your brother, who's six years older, right?

[09:42] CAROLYN WOLFE: Six years old. Six years old.

[09:43] CARRIE AHO: Four years old.

[09:43] CAROLYN WOLFE: Three and a half or four. Depends on birthdays.

[09:47] CARRIE AHO: You lived right by where mother's brewery is now, on walnut? Yes. And the neighborhood was, you know, you said bustling, and the downtown was right there. What was it like growing up there?

[10:01] CAROLYN WOLFE: I loved it. We were in the center of town, you know, and you could walk any place you wanted to walk or take a bus stopped right in front of our house. Of course, we had a car, but it was. I walked a lot, like from Central High school home, Parkview home. But I did have a good friend that had a car. She would always pick me up or take me home. Not always, but most of the time. So that was really helpful.

[10:33] CARRIE AHO: Did you and Ed get along or. He had his own thing.

[10:36] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, it was typical. He couldn't stand me, I think.

[10:40] CARRIE AHO: Oh, you know, he played basketball because.

[10:41] CAROLYN WOLFE: I was always bothering him, and I adored him. You know, he was my brother and really kind of the male person in my family, although my grandfather was, too. He was a wonderful man. I loved him a lot. My grandmother was a little bit of a general. You know, her house was spotless, and that's what she did all the time, which was nice, a great cook and everything. But Ed, he really started to like me. I think he liked me always, but I think he appreciated me. When I was a freshman in college, and he was a senior at Drury. At Drury. Because then I had girlfriends that he could date, you know. So suddenly he would drive me to college with him, where before I couldn't get any scar and just typical brother sister attitude. Yeah, he loved sports. Baseball? Basketball. No, football. But those two and our whole neighborhood were mostly boys, and they loved it. So we had the basketball net on my garage, and they were out there all the time playing basketball, and they just kind of met there in the afternoons. Then in the summer, they'd play baseball. So, yeah.

[12:14] CARRIE AHO: What was it like for you to grow up without your dad?

[12:19] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, not good. I really missed that relationship with a father, and I still do to this day. I was always really interested in, like, Kay's dad, but he was an unusually wonderful man, too. And so you kind of learned about him through other people's father. And nobody, very few of my friends had no father. You know, there were no divorces, and if they were divorced, there are very few. Not like it is today, where, you know, it's kind of a common thing. But, yes, I miss that relationship, and I just heard a lot about him from different people. What a wonderful voice he had. And singing. Loved to sing. Mother said he loved life, and I loved people, and I was really a people person.

[13:29] CARRIE AHO: So your male father figures were your brother and your grandfather and your uncle, and then Kay's dad, your best friend, Kay's dad. So you kind of pieced together what it would be like to have a dad.

[13:42] CAROLYN WOLFE: I think so, yeah. Most of my uncles on the Hoffman side were distant, you know, and I don't know why, you know, again, maybe I was. I was pretty hyper, and maybe they felt they but they were that way with Ed, too. They were not like they should have been, because my dad would have done more for their children had it been they the ones that had passed away.

[14:11] CARRIE AHO: You think they should have stepped up more and spent more time with you?

[14:14] CAROLYN WOLFE: But my auntie stepped up many times. They were the family leaders and birthdays and dinners and Christmas couldn't have been more. I mean, it was always such a gala of time because they really.

[14:30] CARRIE AHO: They made sure that you felt loved.

[14:32] CAROLYN WOLFE: That everybody did, you know, not just me, but everybody.

[14:37] CARRIE AHO: Did you learn to cook from your aunties and your gram and your mom? My grandma did.

[14:42] CAROLYN WOLFE: I learned to cook.

[14:42] CARRIE AHO: To cook? Yeah.

[14:44] CAROLYN WOLFE: You know, I never helped them, but I think I watched.

[14:48] CARRIE AHO: Did anyone make pies like you make pies?

[14:51] CAROLYN WOLFE: No.

[14:52] CARRIE AHO: How did you learn that?

[14:53] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, I was in an activity at church, and I had to make a couple of pies, and I just opened Betty Crocker and did the dutch apple pie, and it went over, and so the recipe for the crust was on the crisco can, so, you know, I had no leadership in that. But it just worked out, you know? And then I made pies. Mother made wonderful cakes. She made pies. But I didn't eat desserts when I was young, much. I ate the cake, but an angel food cake.

[15:34] CARRIE AHO: When do you think you developed a sweet tooth?

[15:37] CAROLYN WOLFE: What?

[15:38] CARRIE AHO: When do you think you developed a sweet tooth?

[15:41] CAROLYN WOLFE: I think after I had a child, after I got married and started cooking myself, you start to eat. Of course, Kirk loved desserts, and my best dessert was the Texas chocolate cake, you know, and that still is wonderful recipe. Yeah, you just don't go wrong with it, you know. It's so simple.

[16:08] CARRIE AHO: Well, it's simple for you. You have it memorized. You've made it so many times.

[16:12] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, sure, sure.

[16:13] CARRIE AHO: So you went to central the first, your freshman year, and then, oh, my sophomore year. Sophomore year. That's right. It didn't. Freshman year wasn't high school. And then you went to Parkview because it had just been built, and then you graduated from there. Did you know you were going to go to Drury?

[16:29] CAROLYN WOLFE: I did, yeah. And I knew I was going to go to college. There was never any question about it. And it was, of course, the best thing I could do. I loved it. I absolutely loved it. And teaching was hard that first year. I was wanting to quit several times. It was mainly the organization and the keeping the children on a good schedule. I mean, there were a lot of things, but in that time, we didn't. We did practice teaching, but we really didn't get into it, you know, like they do today where they had it for the whole day, and it's improved so much.

[17:18] CARRIE AHO: You mean the teacher education program?

[17:20] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yes. Oh, my. Much more. Yeah, because they really start their freshman year working in a building, maybe running off papers for teachers or doing things in the classroom for not actually teaching. That's what I've observed. And that was so important. I mean, like, I didn't know how to set up my room. I'd never had anybody show me what to do. So I just kind of watched the other teachers and learned from them. So you did a lot of learning that first year.

[17:51] CARRIE AHO: You said that you wanted to quit your first year, and Graham said she.

[17:56] CAROLYN WOLFE: Should just stay for a while. She said, I think you can handle this. And, you know, she didn't, she never made a big talk about stuff, but she was always so kind about it. And by them it worked. You know, the second year was a lot better and the third year and fourth, you know, then I. You were stuck. You were there. Not stuck, but you were there.

[18:20] CARRIE AHO: And you started out in second grade.

[18:21] CAROLYN WOLFE: Right.

[18:22] CARRIE AHO: And how many years did you teach? Second?

[18:25] CAROLYN WOLFE: About ten years before you had kids? Yeah. Well, I had a first, 2nd grade in there, and I had a kindergarten in there, and I didn't like that at all because I had two classes, morning and afternoon, and I. The behavior of some children was, you're the first one to try to straighten it out. And it was really different. I just didn't care for the curriculum either. I loved fifth grade because it was so much, so many things I'm interested in, like american history and the science. Life science. It was just wonderful.

[19:06] CARRIE AHO: How many years did you teach?

[19:07] CAROLYN WOLFE: 5Th, 18.

[19:09] CARRIE AHO: Okay. Okay.

[19:10] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah. I like the personalities of the fifth graders.

[19:14] CARRIE AHO: You can joke with them.

[19:15] CAROLYN WOLFE: They're kind of coming into their own and you can kind of be a little sarcastic and they catch it, you know, and I really loved it. Of course, I was at a wonderful school, too.

[19:28] CARRIE AHO: Did you know you were going to be a teacher? Always. I mean, that's. You didn't think about it.

[19:32] CAROLYN WOLFE: It was either that or a secretary or a nurse.

[19:35] CARRIE AHO: Oh, okay.

[19:36] CAROLYN WOLFE: And I somehow was an aide in the hospital, you know, though not an aide, but you take the flowers around to the room.

[19:44] CARRIE AHO: Oh, like a candy striper.

[19:46] CAROLYN WOLFE: Candy striper, yeah. And I saw somebody vomit. Well, I vomited with them. I mean, I just, you know, I caught whatever they had.

[19:55] CARRIE AHO: Oh, God.

[19:55] CAROLYN WOLFE: I didn't. But it was just terrible. And somebody else vomits and I always vomit.

[20:00] CARRIE AHO: Too.

[20:00] CAROLYN WOLFE: So I thought, well, nursing's out of the fold for it, you know, I never minded the blood. You know, some people can't stand to see blood, but, man, vomiting really got.

[20:13] CARRIE AHO: One of my students actually just got sick the other day outside at recess. So I guess you saw it probably as a teacher a little bit, some of the vomiting.

[20:21] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, yes. I had a student that vomited on his math book.

[20:24] CARRIE AHO: Oh, gross.

[20:26] CAROLYN WOLFE: Right in class. He just. Right there in second grade. I didn't have any trouble then, but I had trouble in the hospital, and I just. And I decided this is not for me.

[20:38] CARRIE AHO: Well, I'm glad you got to choose.

[20:39] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah. Well, it's either that because there was no jobs for women in the fifties and sixties.

[20:45] CARRIE AHO: Yeah.

[20:46] CAROLYN WOLFE: You know.

[20:47] CARRIE AHO: Yeah.

[20:47] CAROLYN WOLFE: I had three friends that were in the business department. We all thought they were nuts, you know, really, they weren't.

[20:54] CARRIE AHO: They so just women just weren't considered need not apply kind of thing?

[21:01] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, I don't know. I think it was a man's world, and that's the way it was. R1. Interesting thing, when I was a senior, they bought a computer. It took up the whole half of the room at Drury.

[21:16] CARRIE AHO: A senior at Drury.

[21:17] CAROLYN WOLFE: It was huge. Wow.

[21:20] CARRIE AHO: What'd they do with it?

[21:20] CAROLYN WOLFE: It went from one wall in a room, one wall, another full long wall, and another part of a wall. That was the computer.

[21:28] CARRIE AHO: But to do what, like type things or.

[21:30] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, no, to, you know, to do math problems. I don't know what computers do nowadays, you know.

[21:41] CARRIE AHO: Huh. Was it open to students or.

[21:44] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, for business students, yeah.

[21:47] CARRIE AHO: So you went to Drury, you were a tri delta, and dad was a sigma nu. How did you meet dad?

[21:54] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, I knew him from jury, and I didn't like him. I thought he was conceited, and he was spoiled brat, you know, he really was.

[22:01] CARRIE AHO: Did you meet him at a mixer or something?

[22:04] CAROLYN WOLFE: No, just knew him. He was in my class.

[22:06] CARRIE AHO: Oh, okay.

[22:06] CAROLYN WOLFE: And knew him. And then I.

[22:09] CARRIE AHO: What was his major? Biology.

[22:11] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yes.

[22:12] CARRIE AHO: Okay.

[22:12] CAROLYN WOLFE: Uh huh. And then he stopped and went into the six month plan for the army, and so he was in that, and then he decided to become a mortician. So he went to college in Dallas for two years. It was a two year procedure. So he was an intern at one of their funeral homes when my uncle passed away, and so I reconnected with him at that visitation.

[22:49] CARRIE AHO: Oh, and then he was the mortician when your uncle died?

[22:55] CAROLYN WOLFE: He was an intern. He practiced teaching practice. Mortician.

[23:01] CARRIE AHO: Why did he want to do that?

[23:03] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, you'd have I don't know.

[23:06] CARRIE AHO: Of all the things.

[23:07] CAROLYN WOLFE: Of all the things he's doing, the.

[23:08] CARRIE AHO: World, I mean, it has to be done, you know? But I just wondered.

[23:12] CAROLYN WOLFE: I know. Well, he didn't continue with it because he really wanted his own, you know, one funeral home, and that was so expensive at that time, you know, and he really wanted to fly. He was a pilot anyway, but about the time he was applying to the different airlines, we had all these soldiers coming back from Vietnam that the only thing he didn't have was jet time.

[23:46] CARRIE AHO: Mm.

[23:47] CAROLYN WOLFE: And so.

[23:49] CARRIE AHO: So he market was saturated with pilots.

[23:52] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, it was from Vietnam. Yeah. Because they all had their jet time.

[23:56] CARRIE AHO: I see.

[23:57] CAROLYN WOLFE: And to get jet time on your own was $3,000 an hour.

[24:02] CARRIE AHO: Oh, my gosh.

[24:03] CAROLYN WOLFE: And that was down in Oklahoma. There was a school there. And so then he did. Well, you know, he was just kind of. He did finish. He did finish at jury, and he was going into the medical field. He thought he'd do that, but math was a real hold up for him. He could do everything else. Biology was easy, and, you know, all the other subjects were fine, but higher math, Washington, his Achilles heel, he just couldn't get it.

[24:35] CARRIE AHO: So he. What if he had gone to dentistry school and taken over grandpa's dentistry office in Ozark?

[24:44] CAROLYN WOLFE: I always wondered about that. And his mother said, oh, he didn't want to look in people's mouths. She pretty well answered things for him that way, instead of letting him make the choice or maybe having doc more involved in encouraging his son and teaching him things about it there, you know, not from missing school, but still, he could have done a good job.

[25:11] CARRIE AHO: Was he close with his dad?

[25:12] CAROLYN WOLFE: And mom loved his dad.

[25:14] CARRIE AHO: Yeah. His dad always seemed really quiet to me.

[25:17] CAROLYN WOLFE: Grandpa, he was. He was a, you know, he had kind of a. What do you call that when you just have one, like, stoic. Now, one thing on your mind, like, we talk dentistry all the time.

[25:29] CARRIE AHO: Tunnel vision. I don't know.

[25:30] CAROLYN WOLFE: Tunnel. Kind of a tunnel vision. You know, he told me one time how to do a root canal. It took him 2 hours.

[25:38] CARRIE AHO: Oh, no.

[25:39] CAROLYN WOLFE: And we were eating lunch, you know, and it was kind of that way.

[25:44] CARRIE AHO: Obsessed. He was obsessed.

[25:45] CAROLYN WOLFE: He just had kind of a one.

[25:47] CARRIE AHO: One track mind.

[25:47] CAROLYN WOLFE: One track mind. Yeah.

[25:49] CARRIE AHO: So you reconnected at your uncle's funeral with daddy.

[25:53] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, then we started going out on dates.

[25:56] CARRIE AHO: What changed your mind about him? You had said you didn't really like him at first.

[26:00] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, we just had such a good time on the first date, and I guess I had time to go out? I don't know. I don't.

[26:11] CARRIE AHO: What do you think drew you to him?

[26:13] CAROLYN WOLFE: He was so good looking.

[26:16] CARRIE AHO: Yeah. And confident. You think?

[26:18] CAROLYN WOLFE: I think so, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

[26:21] CARRIE AHO: So after you got married in 1964 or three. Right, 64, you moved out south?

[26:30] CAROLYN WOLFE: No, west. Oh, we had a mobile home.

[26:32] CARRIE AHO: That's right, the mobile home. For how many years?

[26:35] CAROLYN WOLFE: Five.

[26:35] CARRIE AHO: And then you moved out southwest of the airport.

[26:39] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah.

[26:40] CARRIE AHO: So it's like 30, 30 minutes of 25 minutes drive back to your house on walnut. You were way out in the country, and we had 20 acres. What was that like, to move from the center of town to being way out in the country?

[26:57] CAROLYN WOLFE: I hated it.

[26:58] CARRIE AHO: Really?

[26:58] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah, yeah.

[27:00] CARRIE AHO: Why?

[27:00] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, it was just so lonely, you know, I'm kind of a people person. I want to be around what's going on. And of course, he loved farming. He inherited that from his wolf family.

[27:15] CARRIE AHO: Did he really love farming or he liked the idea of being a farmer or something? Like, why did he kind of do it? And then it was a hobby farm. Right.

[27:24] CAROLYN WOLFE: It really was. I think he just had to learn everything he could about it.

[27:29] CARRIE AHO: Okay.

[27:30] CAROLYN WOLFE: Before he finally realized it was a lot of work and a lot of money.

[27:35] CARRIE AHO: So we had cattle and goats, and then he had to stop because of the price of the hay. Is that right?

[27:44] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, that was one of the problems that was way down the line.

[27:48] CARRIE AHO: Oh, okay. I kind of barely remember the cattle and the goats. You said your experience wasn't great because he. At that time, then when did he start working for the Burlington Northern?

[27:59] CAROLYN WOLFE: Oh, it was in the summer of. Well, he bought an airplane with two other men, had a flight to schedule between Springfield and Wichita. But the other two men, who were pilots, were retired, and so they really did nothing in the business. It was all on his shoulders. And even my mother was working for him at the airport when they had.

[28:24] CARRIE AHO: It was a charter business?

[28:27] CAROLYN WOLFE: Oh, no, they had a schedule, but it was a small. It was a twin engine, and eventually that just didn't work out. Well, you can't have two people who are supposed to help out, do nothing, and you have it all on your shoulder. And I knew it wouldn't work out. You know, I just. You have that gut feeling, you know, and it was just not set up right, you know? And of course, I was never asked if I wanted to do this, if I wanted cattle, if I wanted goats.

[29:02] CARRIE AHO: They just showed up and where to live. It was not a joint decision.

[29:06] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yes, I did. I liked the house and all. And of course, at that point, I was teaching, so I was kind of glad to get out in the country when it was Saturday and Sunday, but it was quite a drive.

[29:19] CARRIE AHO: Would you say you made decisions together or. Mostly he was in charge.

[29:24] CAROLYN WOLFE: He was in charge, and I was in charge of what I wanted to do, I think. Yeah.

[29:31] CARRIE AHO: Do you see my relationship with Kyle, my husband Kyle? Do you see my relationship in a different way? Like, do you look at Kyle in my relationship and think, like, gosh, it's different than the way it used to be?

[29:47] CAROLYN WOLFE: Oh, I think so, yeah. Kyle will empty the dishwasher once in a while, but he does.

[29:54] CARRIE AHO: He does a lot.

[29:55] CAROLYN WOLFE: He's so crazy about you. He just really idolizes you. It's a good match.

[30:02] CARRIE AHO: How do you think your relationship with dad started out, and how did it change?

[30:11] CAROLYN WOLFE: Oh, I don't know, Carrie. On that. We had children, of course, and he was such a good dada. It was such a happy time, really having family, you know, it just kind of gelled your relationship.

[30:30] CARRIE AHO: Did you know you always wanted to have kids?

[30:32] CAROLYN WOLFE: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I would have had more, but I was. I didn't start early enough to have more than three.

[30:41] CARRIE AHO: Did dad want more?

[30:43] CAROLYN WOLFE: No.

[30:43] CARRIE AHO: Three.

[30:44] CAROLYN WOLFE: Was it two was it.

[30:46] CARRIE AHO: Oh, two was it. But then you got pregnant with me.

[30:49] CAROLYN WOLFE: Uh huh. A miracle.

[30:53] CARRIE AHO: He liked being a dad.

[30:54] CAROLYN WOLFE: Oh, he loved it.

[30:56] CARRIE AHO: Yeah.

[30:57] CAROLYN WOLFE: You know, he thought about the monetary part of it. I just thought of how wonderful it was to have children. I loved it. Loved it, loved it, yeah.

[31:07] CARRIE AHO: And you stopped working at that time to be a. Well, you changed careers. You went from a teacher to a stay at home mom.

[31:13] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, he didn't like that either. He wanted me to work, but I didn't want you coming home off the bus at six and seven years old in a country like that. I just didn't feel. And, of course, when you teach, you know, you're there late and then you have to drive home, and then you have to cook a supper, and then you have to clean the kitchen. And he wasn't always home. That was also a problem. He was gone half the time.

[31:43] CARRIE AHO: Yeah, I think about that as a mom. You know, Kyle's there every night with me, and I think. And I only have two kids, and I think, how did you do it with dad gone half the time and you had three kids?

[31:57] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, after two, it doesn't matter how many you have, I figured out.

[32:03] CARRIE AHO: But, I mean, were you ever worried or scared or, like, overwhelmed with the idea?

[32:09] CAROLYN WOLFE: I was overwhelmed at times, yeah. But I was never scared. You know, I could handle that. It's fine. Well, if you teach, you can do anything. You know, if you can organize 30 kids, surely you can handle three. Yeah, I think that was really good experience for having a family.

[32:29] CARRIE AHO: So dad working for the Burlington Northern as a conductor, he.

[32:34] CAROLYN WOLFE: No, he was always an engineer.

[32:36] CARRIE AHO: Engineer. He. He seemed always stressed and tired because his schedule was so strange and also resentful of his job.

[32:48] CAROLYN WOLFE: He didn't care for it at all, you know?

[32:51] CARRIE AHO: Yeah.

[32:51] CAROLYN WOLFE: He made the highest score.

[32:53] CARRIE AHO: Yeah.

[32:54] CAROLYN WOLFE: Of any of the engineers on his staff. Yeah, well, he was so mechanical.

[32:59] CARRIE AHO: Why did he stay with it if he didn't like it?

[33:01] CAROLYN WOLFE: It was such a good income and good benefits. Benefits, good vacation. You know, it was just. And he, you know, he had good friends, some he didn't like, and he let him know it, of course.

[33:16] CARRIE AHO: So he quit smoking when he was around 40, because we asked him to. But his health wasn't great. Like, he didn't exercise, and then he was on the train, and then he didn't sleep. Sleep well, and he didn't eat very well. And then he had gone to that doctor's appointment, and the doctor said, you'll live 25 more years if you.

[33:37] CAROLYN WOLFE: That was a lie. That was a lie.

[33:41] CARRIE AHO: What do you mean?

[33:42] CAROLYN WOLFE: He was told to go to the hospital immediately from the stress test that he had. Of course, he didn't tell me that. And his triglycerides were way. They even sent him a letter that was delivered special delivery, saying that his triglycerides were so high to go to.

[34:03] CARRIE AHO: The hospital to have heart surgery right then is what they wanted.

[34:05] CAROLYN WOLFE: Blockages? I think that's what it was.

[34:08] CARRIE AHO: But then he.

[34:09] CAROLYN WOLFE: And he. That was a lie, though. They didn't tell him that. He just told me that so I wouldn't, I think, investigate what, you know. He didn't tell me the truth. He never told me the truth.

[34:22] CARRIE AHO: How did you find that out?

[34:24] CAROLYN WOLFE: One of the men over that talked with David said that he had told him that they told him to go to the hospital immediately, and he wouldn't do it. I guess they needed to do open heart surgery to open those blocked veins or whatever their block, whatever's blocked.

[34:43] CARRIE AHO: So instead he bought a bike and started riding it.

[34:47] CAROLYN WOLFE: He was doing his own. Trying to fear himself.

[34:50] CARRIE AHO: Yeah, to lose weight and to take his cholesterol down. And then he went out. He came in from late night on the train and got called out and didn't have time to do the ride. So when he got home from that second trip, he was going to try to double his miles. And so he was going 13 miles instead of 6.5 or whatever. And then he had a heart attack on the side of the road. That's right. And so then a lady was walking and found him.

[35:24] CAROLYN WOLFE: And then she was driving.

[35:26] CARRIE AHO: It was driving. And then she wasn't sure if he was faking it or, you know, like trying to attack somebody.

[35:32] CAROLYN WOLFE: That's right.

[35:32] CARRIE AHO: So she went to another neighbor. Then they came out, and then they called the ambulance. But by the time it was way out in the country. So by the time the ambulance got there, he was in bad shape. And you said they resuscitated him on the way to the hospital, but then he passed.

[35:47] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah, it was. Who knows how long he'd been lying there, you know, and he just overdid it, you know, 6.5 miles is enough. And especially if he had blocked arteries or blocked veins, you know, you weren't. Your heart was over pumping, trying to get enough blood through.

[36:08] CARRIE AHO: He always seemed like he did everything by his own rules.

[36:13] CAROLYN WOLFE: Exactly.

[36:14] CARRIE AHO: And in the end, I think that's what killed him.

[36:17] CAROLYN WOLFE: I think it did, too. I tried not to investigate it a whole lot because I just couldn't stand it. It was hard enough. Well, it probably should have gone back to Hammond's hardest.

[36:33] CARRIE AHO: I don't think they could have told you, though. It was his personal. Personal health information, you know?

[36:36] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, I'm his wife. Maybe that might have, you know, maybe they could have told me. I don't know.

[36:44] CARRIE AHO: So mister Walker told you. Came to tell you that dad had died? Yes. Mister Walker up the street. The pastor. Reverend Walker?

[36:54] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah. I said, oh, he's been hit by a car. Because I always, you know, the cars just flew down those country roads and I thought maybe a car did him.

[37:04] CARRIE AHO: Did you know?

[37:04] CAROLYN WOLFE: I said no.

[37:05] CARRIE AHO: When, Reverend, like, what did he say? He said, kirk has passed, or he had a heart attack.

[37:11] CAROLYN WOLFE: He didn't tell me. He said no, he wasn't hit by a car. And so he said. I just thought, well, he had had. It was his own, you know. I don't know what I thought, Carrie. I just knew I fell apart. Cause I kind of realized that it was really bad. And so I went to the hospital and he was dead.

[37:36] CARRIE AHO: So Mister Walker. Reverend Walker didn't tell you he had died? He said he was at the hospital.

[37:40] CAROLYN WOLFE: They said they're taking him to the hospital. No, he didn't say anything. He didn't know.

[37:44] CARRIE AHO: He didn't know. So then you came to school. I was a freshman at Willard, and they called me out of Pe. And I remember what I was wearing? Even a volleyball t shirt with neon pink and neon green and neon blue and my cutoff sweatshirts. And the nurse came to get me from Pe. It was, like, maybe my first class.

[38:07] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yes. It was early March.

[38:08] CARRIE AHO: She said, you know, I need you to come with me. And I thought, okay. And so, on the way, I was just making conversation, and I said, what's going on? And am I in trouble? And she said, I don't know. I'm just the messenger. And then when I got to the office, Christy. Christy was coming out, and I saw her brown sweater, but she was being kind of held up by two other teachers, and I could tell she was crying. And then they ushered me into the principal's office, where you were sitting. I remember you had on an orange coat, and you told me that he died. And it just. It was like time stopped, you know? I just held my face.

[38:48] CAROLYN WOLFE: And what I should have done is just picked you girls up and taking you over to the hospital with me, and then we could have seen it together. I think it would have been more comforting that way, and it wouldn't have been such a shock. I could have said that he's really sick, and we need to go to the hospital now.

[39:09] CARRIE AHO: Well, I mean, you didn't know. I mean.

[39:11] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, I know. You never know. You know, you just do things on the spur of the moment, and you have that planned, you know?

[39:18] CARRIE AHO: Yeah.

[39:20] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah, it was terrible. And then I had to go tell his mother that he had died.

[39:25] CARRIE AHO: And how. How did that go? I mean, how was it?

[39:28] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, it was awful. Peggy went with me. But, you know, to not even know your son's ill, and then he's suddenly dead, and I'm, you know, in the wolf family. He had a cousin that died about 50 of a heart attack. So I'm thinking there was something in his DNA or something in the family that was a problem for them. Like, you all are now getting to be 50 years old, so watch it, you know?

[40:04] CARRIE AHO: I know I do. I try to watch my cholesterol.

[40:07] CAROLYN WOLFE: I know you do. And Marcus, too, works out, you know? But he doesn't jump into it and do it. All of a sudden, he has worked up to it, you know, riding his bike up in the mountains and so on for a long time.

[40:22] CARRIE AHO: Were you worried when he died about what you would do?

[40:27] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, I was, but, you know, God's there with you. And I believe it. I was hired. I had told my principal I was subbing at that time that if there was any opening for an aide. I would like to apply. And Pat Strecker was the principal and a good friend, and there was an opening at sunshine in kindergarten for an aid, and I interviewed a week later and got the job, and that started my time at sunshine, then.

[41:05] CARRIE AHO: Didn't have any life insurance?

[41:07] CAROLYN WOLFE: Uh uh. Well, there was supposed to be half of the engineers or any workers salary went to the wife. And then they passed a rule in that I couldn't double dip in Social Security twice because the teachers had Social Security from the state. And so I had to choose either that money or my retirement. Mine was much better than that.

[41:43] CARRIE AHO: But that could have helped you, obviously, a lot.

[41:45] CAROLYN WOLFE: That would have been so much better. Yes.

[41:48] CARRIE AHO: So I think about if Kyle, you know, were injured or hurt or killed and how I could possibly do it, raise two kids. I mean, how did you. Marcus was a freshman in college. I was a freshman in high school, and Christy was a sophomore. How did you do it? I mean, I don't.

[42:07] CAROLYN WOLFE: You were good kids. I never had. You know, you weren't on drugs, you didn't drink, but you were so busy with school activities. You were a dancer in the. And Christy was sports, and Marcus was music, and I just didn't have any problems with you. And I think where you grew up helped a lot. And you had. You were so active, and you loved to go to the lake. You know, you rode four wheelers. I mean, you had other things to do you weren't bored with, and you were good studies. I mean, your grades show that, and you were just so involved with people and school, and it worked, you know? I don't know. I think there's somebody helping you there.

[42:57] CARRIE AHO: What do you think you would like to tell dad if he was here?

[43:03] CAROLYN WOLFE: Oh, I don't know. Lots of things. You should have been more. You've had. We have a wonderful family. We have wonderful grandchildren. I wish you could have been here for that, because he would have loved five boys.

[43:23] CARRIE AHO: Yeah. And all the computers and the Internet and all the gourmet coffees.

[43:28] CAROLYN WOLFE: Oh, yeah. Oh, he would have gone crazy.

[43:30] CARRIE AHO: What about your own dad? What do you think you would have liked to say to your dad about.

[43:38] CAROLYN WOLFE: The same thing I missed so much by not having you there, but he couldn't help it, you know, just the way it was.

[43:46] CARRIE AHO: I'm glad that you and I have shared, you know, even though I was a journalist first becoming a teacher, and we were in the same sorority at Drury, and, you know, now that I'm a mom, I am so glad that I have you for advice and help, and I appreciate everything that you do for us, you know, making dinner and picking up the boys and just advice on teaching, and you always make me feel like everything will be okay.

[44:14] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, you have to think that way. You know, my mom was that way, though. She was. She was very religious, too, in her own way, and she. It worked out. She worried, but she never let you know.

[44:31] CARRIE AHO: So she carried a lot of the heaviness like you have always carried for us. Do you think that you've protected us?

[44:39] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah, she really did. And then she had my aunties. She had no brothers or sisters. She was an only child. But my aunties were so wonderful. I mean, you know, we were in the family, whether it was through marriage or a sister or brother, but they were just tops, you know?

[45:02] CARRIE AHO: Are you proud of the way that we turned out?

[45:05] CAROLYN WOLFE: Well, I don't know. Of course I am. I'm one of the lucky people whose children are bright, beautiful and handsome and smart. Hard workers, good parents, you name it. And a good relationship. I have a good relationship with you. Christy. Eh, she's a little distant sometimes. I don't know why. I hope she likes me. I sometimes wonder if she does.

[45:36] CARRIE AHO: She loves you.

[45:37] CAROLYN WOLFE: I know, but she's so involved with her own activities, and her work's really time consuming, too, so wrap it up. I'm so lucky to have you. Yeah.

[45:52] CARRIE AHO: I'm so lucky to have you.

[45:53] CAROLYN WOLFE: Yeah, we're lucky to have each other, actually. You know, it's been a much better life.

[45:59] CARRIE AHO: You're the best. I love you, mom. You're the best.

[46:02] CAROLYN WOLFE: I love you with all my heart and soul.

[46:05] CARRIE AHO: You always said I'm the icing on the cake.

[46:08] CAROLYN WOLFE: You are. You are. I mean, it's just such a good thing for you because we had a boy, we had a girl, and then suddenly I was having another baby, and it was just meant to be, you know?

[46:24] CARRIE AHO: I love you, mom.

[46:25] CAROLYN WOLFE: And you are the icing on the cake. I love you, too. You know that?

[46:30] CARRIE AHO: Yeah, I do.

[46:31] CAROLYN WOLFE: Amen.

[46:34] CARRIE AHO: Thank you.

[46:36] CAROLYN WOLFE: This has been really fun. Thank you.