James Perrin and Heidi Kharbanda

00:06 I am Heidi Elizabeth Perrin carbonda. I am 34 years old. Today is September 30th 2012 and we are in Arlington, Virginia and I am James Clifton parent. I'm 65 I go by cliff.

00:27 It's September 30th 2012 and we're in Arlington, Virginia and I am interviewing my dad.

00:36 Great.

00:39 Tell me why do people call you by your middle name?

00:43 This I think is a family tradition on the parents side of the family. My father was James Wilkins pairing.

00:52 And would by Jimmy his father was John Wilkins. And he went by Wilkins. So I guess I'm the next step of that. It was time for a middle name.

01:05 Tell me about your parents your grandparents and your siblings when mother was Myrtle Mae Hoffman, and she was she grew up in Gordonsville, Virginia.

01:20 Which is about 25 miles Northeast of Charlottesville and my father who is James Jimmy Perrin and he grew up in a little Crossroad of pain Bill Virginia witches in Amelia County, which is about 60 miles Southwest of Richmond.

01:40 My grandparents on my mother's side where Gatewood Angus Hoffman and Bessie Mae Estes.

01:52 And they were farmers in Gordonsville on the app. Just outside to Gordonsville.

02:01 On my end on my father's side.

02:07 My grandmother was Sally Virginia wingo and she married John Wilkins parent.

02:17 And they were as I said from Amelia from Bainville.

02:23 The my grandfather Perrin was a gentleman. I think a gentleman farmer and Ace store have a small General Store. He actually died eight days after I was born when my grandmother was up helping my mother.

02:46 With with the their first child. Yeah, so I have no recollection, of course of of him.

02:56 There and back in that time is that's what a hundred and sixty 180 miles away from Northern Virginia. So to go down to either pain pill or Gordonsville was

03:12 A multi-day activity take almost of the better part of the day to drive down there you spend the night and then you come home so we didn't go didn't visit my grandparents all that off.

03:26 And tell me about your siblings on the oldest of three children.

03:30 All my sister Mary Ann was born 11 months after I was and my brother was born in.

03:40 4 years after after I was with my sister because I was held back in third grade. We were actually in the same school year and so we often joked about us being twins that were separated by 11 months.

04:00 The

04:07 Where did you grow up? And what was the area like?

04:11 I grew up when when I was born my parents lived in in Falls Church on the south side of town in the small home that they had bought right after World War II.

04:27 And we lived there until I was five my father who is in the construction business his I guess with under the auspices of his company built our home out in Idlewood.

04:43 Which is just outside of Falls Church.

04:47 And so well

04:50 That's where I lived now the

04:54 The street down at the bottom of the street in our Falls Church home. That was this little tiny Creek.

05:02 And one time and I love playing in the creek one time. I was down there. I fell into the creek and beside a tree that was playing over the creek and I was sort of a pothole I guess they're beside the tree and I thought for sure I was going to drown. I held on the tree and I finally managed to pull myself out. I've since looked at that Creek. I doubt if the water was more than a foot deep, but the essay.

05:33 Three or four year old, you know that that was a life-threatening event.

05:39 Yeah, I have two other Recollections of that time. One was that course? This was the baby boom years all of the men come back from World War II and so there were lots and lots of kids.

05:56 And on our street we got one time or maybe multiple times. I'm not sure.

06:03 All made a Wagon Train by one person would put their feet hook onto the wagon behind you and and in our Hill had a gradual slope on it. And so we would go down snake down the street and it was our Wagon Train.

06:24 The other thing I remember is course. It wasn't a perfect child.

06:32 That

06:34 I would go to the parent but I wasn't in trouble with and I remember on one occasion.

06:41 That I done something that Mom was after me about and I remember running out the front screen door hollering Mom and Daddy Mom and Daddy trying to figure out who is going to protect me from the other one was that wasn't around though. There is one more event there. The I remember hiding behind in the backseat of my father's car planning to go to work with him one today. I can't imagine that he didn't know I was back here, but I thought it was I was pulling something off.

07:18 And what was I'm sorry. Well, I guess I'll talk about moving out to Idlewood Idlewood. As I said it was about four miles out of Falls Church. But back in that day. It was the outer suburbs of Falls Church, which was just a little village.

07:41 And so we lived on a gravel road. It was a new subdivision and mom and dad had to draw maps for church friend to come out and find us for social occasions again. I had us a creek at the bottom of the street and I spent many many years playing in the creek. Also, there were Woods by my house. I guess they were probably about a half a mile deep. So I loved wandering through the woods and that's where I found my dead trees family joke. I was always fascinated with the American chestnut trees that the end chords that have been killed by the blight and they're they're sober gray Trunks and of course at that point a lot of mud falling over.

08:37 One other event from that time was the

08:43 No thinking about this. I don't know why I did this, but I had a fox trap and so I set up a a trap out in the woods and I ended up catching a possum.

08:58 And it was one ugly possum. It is five. His face was all scraped up. I don't know if it was from being additives like course caught in this trap.

09:11 The

09:12 But the whole side of his face was scraped up. I thought he was dead. I managed to somehow another get him out of out of the Trap and I figured I went ran back to home to get a box to put them in.

09:26 Course being a possum. He wasn't there when I got back probably fortunately.

09:33 And One More Story yet because when I was in

09:39 Boy Scouts we were over a friend's house of backs up to the w&od bicycle trail.

09:48 And there was a it was all brush there between from in the back of the house out to well at that time. It was the railroad tracks and I saw something running moving around in the undergrowth.

10:04 And this thing ran up a tree I threw a stick at it and knocked and knocked I knocked it off the tree or fell off the tree and I managed to get it and grab the sewer rat by the tail.

10:21 And this thing was probably eight in long as you're not counting the tail, which fortunately was longer probably equal length.

10:32 And and I went back up to the house at 8. Look what I got.

10:37 Fortunately, the father was home at the time and he put it in the trash. Can I think you subsequently drowned it, but it's amazing that I didn't get their doing that.

10:51 What was life like when you were a child in terms of TV shopping centers phones?

10:59 We got our first TV black and white small TV.

11:07 When we were in our first house, so that was before 52, but not much before and I remember.

11:17 Watching Howdy Doody on TV and we had and I forgotten who it's the name of the show was there was some show that was sort of interactive you had this plastic that you put on the TV screen and then you could use grease markers on the TV. And so it was like connect you do things like connect the dot type of activities on the TV set.

11:50 So what?

11:52 Let's see shopping centers Suburban Washington was just

11:59 Just starting to go up after the war. I mean, I guess it have been built up during World War II, but when I was very young we had to go into Clarendon, which is almost into DC to go shopping and then they built Seven Corners shopping center. And of course in my kisses your childhood, they built Tysons Corner, which is a was probably the largest US shopping center at the time.

12:33 Phones

12:36 We when we moved out. I don't remember anything about phones when I was in Falls Church, but when you moved out to Idlewood.

12:44 We had course of rotary phone.

12:48 Weather supposed to push button or anything else. I guess that's what we have now is push button phones, but Touch Tone dial phones. Yes, very good point because I was you or your sister didn't know how to use one to one time you had to it was

13:12 How to dial with Heather it was like a wheel with

13:19 10 holes in it and there was a number behind each hole and went from courses 0 to 9.

13:28 And so you put your finger in the hole and then you went clockwise till it hit a stop and you let go of it when you did that it created it created a bunch of interruptions as it as it rotated back to its original position. And that wear the number of clicks associated with that number.

13:52 So the baby so that's how you did it is you just kept sticking your finger and each individual hole and back in that day course, we didn't have as many telephone telephone numbers consisted of two letters that were usually had a name associated with him. Like ours was je which stood for Jefferson.

14:20 And then it will be two numbers digit and then 4 digits. So now course in Northern Virginia. We have to always use 10-digit dialing because of all the area codes.

14:36 Banking v. I I wanted to mention banking because one of the things that I didn't appreciate was back after back at the end of World War II and I guess before that time banking was really personalized people didn't not everybody had a checking account like we do now.

14:58 Banks and your checking account didn't have a number associated with it. It was you were in my father's case. Do you know Jimmy parent and the bank knew who Jimmy Karen was and they knew with Jimmy parent signature was I found a check after my father died of what that he had used a cancelled check that he used to pay off.

15:25 Purchasing the land for a house and it had no bank account number. Of course, no bank routing numbers back then. It was just in a $1,000 GameStop your parent.

15:39 Wow, that's really different computers or course computers didn't exist as I was growing up the and I guess we'll get to that though a little more later Church. My my parents were active members of Columbia Baptist Church, so I started out in the nursery and then there ever since

16:09 I wanted to mention square dancing as I got it when I got into High School whenever intermediate school. I went to throw Intermediate School.

16:24 One of my friends father was a square dance caller. And so we started having square dance had a square dance club in his basement.

16:34 And he was called for us in high school. That was one of my big social activities that use square dancing. That was my click of friends that that work non-church rent anyway.

16:48 And we're back in those days. We used to have annual convention over at the Sheraton Park in DC with 4500 square dancers. Not just children all ages, and we would dance one whole weekend. And in order to get registered for the following year you had to do it at the convention or you wouldn't wouldn't be space than the following year.

17:17 Tell me about some world events that made an impression on you.

17:23 I guess I should first talk about the Cold War and the I grew up in the 50s World War II attended a communist Soviet Union and the United States were at loggerheads. We called us the Cold War but it always was threatening to become hot.

17:49 What do you mean by threatening to become hot the

17:55 There was there were always a lot of talk about and threats against each other, but they're so threatening. The hot knows me an actual War where you were shooting at each other.

18:14 As a result of that it was normal practice to have air raid drills still probably left a little bit left over from World War, but we would go out in the hall and put our heads down in the hall there.

18:32 In the aftermath of World War II in the creation of atom bombs. That was the the hot threat was that fact us would bomb Russia or Russia with bomb the US and of course being in the suburbs of Washington DC was a little risky or location.

18:56 A lot of people actually built bomb shelters in their backyards. We didn't build a bomb shelter, but we had a basement furnace room that didn't have any outside windows and we had stockpiled food and water down there in the event of an attack of some sort. So they was always it was a

19:24 An ear of of

19:29 Anxiety

19:32 Maybe more so than now.

19:35 You had two events. You told me earlier that you remember exactly where you were when they happen only about those. The first one was the assassination of President Kennedy. I was in high school. I was actually on my way just going into the locker room at Marshall George C Marshall High School when the announcement came over the PA system that President Kennedy has been shot.

20:05 And the other course you September 11th 2001.

20:11 I was working for waiting on.

20:14 I was at 8 at our office and Chantilly we had a night guard that you know solid watched over the building at night and he had a TV in his little cubicle.

20:29 And he was still there early in that morning. And in the TV was turned onto I guess the Today Show or something like that. And so for we breathe we I remember walking by and seeing the first plane going into the World Trade Center and course than we watch the two second plane attack and you know, so those are things I guess I'll always remember where I was

21:05 What are your Recollections of integration and no segregation had ended sort of when I was a child. We still had in Fairfax County segregated school system.

21:30 Luther Jackson was the was the black guy High School.

21:36 And

21:40 The

21:41 So I didn't have any African-American children in my elementary school or probably even my Intermediate School.

21:54 What's the end when I started Marshall in 62 at that point?

22:02 African American parents could petition to have their child go to a formula all white high school, but it wasn't a sure thing by any means and in my freshman class there were

22:21 Just two African American boys. How large was your class? Oh, my class was probably.

22:34 For 500 people kids and only two of those were African-American, right?

22:41 It even when I went to Virginia Tech as a freshman.

22:45 Again on on my

22:48 In my on my floor my freshman year. We had two African-American maybe cuz they had to room together. Also my roommate freshman year. Was it fell by name Earl Carter from Farmville, Virginia Farmville was one of the communities in Southside, Virginia.

23:16 That chose to close their Public Schools rather than integrate them so Earl and all of his buddies ended up going to the Prince William Academy. I think it was called for high school and when they got the Virginia Tech, they stuck together. Like they were just never apart. They always moved around in a herd. So it was very interesting being from Northern Virginia where we were I would say more Progressive.

23:55 And then her being rooming with a fellow from Southside Virginia where segregation was what was still expected?

24:08 Moving ahead in history. There's a family joke about how you and Grandpa built Lake Anne in Reston. Tell me about that.

24:21 Robert E. Simon

24:25 Who came up with this idea of a planned community?

24:31 And he bought a about 8,000 acres in Fairfax County in the outer Western reaches of Fairfax County that were owned by The Bowman Distillery, makers of Virginia gentleman.

24:47 And to create this plan community that he humbly name to Preston.

24:57 The first three letters of which are his initials, correct? And so my father is I said it was in the construction business. He work for Eugene Simpson and brother Know Who We R General Contractors, and they were the general contractors for the building of the first

25:18 Community Lake and Center which was a combination of shops and Townhomes and high-rise.

25:30 Apartment building

25:33 And I got I worked for the company in the Summers as a laborer as Helper and Waterboy, so I got to be The Waterboy on building a lake in I was actually there when Life Magazine which doesn't exist anymore but was a photography magazine came and did the feature article for Reston the photographer was there one day and he was taking picture of the model with the flaking and in the background and he was having trouble talking to the model because we were right behind him and do it equipment making a lot of noise.

26:17 All with her bobcat and so he came over and asked us if we would mind turning off the Bobcat which is like little front-end loader so he could give instructions to Miles and we said always sure that no problem. That I was the leader of this thing, but the ins the superintendent on the job pillows and you and he had a trailer up on the hill that overlooked the shopping center. He came flying down the hill and he wanted to know why we were why we were working and I thought for sure that I was going to get fired that day that me and my fellow compatriots.

27:03 What is a really neat the aspects of that job was I delivered water to the resident sculptor with had a year ago and fellow who had been a ninja in Benin engineering become a sculpture that did most of the the sculptures around Lake Ann. And so I would deliver water to him and we've talked I got to see all that stuff being made. What did you do after you graduated from college?

27:40 Oh, I went to college. I went to college during the Vietnam war. The

27:49 During Vietnam in order to have enough soldiers to fight the war we had what was called the draft Selective Service draft and people were from each County were selected to go to be soldiers if you were going to college you were granted a deferment.

28:14 And that was my case.

28:18 But as the war became less and less popular as they there was this feeling that the only people doing fighting or the poor and the African Americans.

28:33 They decided to change the way they did the draft they had what was called draft lottery in 69 December.

28:42 And what they did is one night, they pulled a birthday side of a bowl and assigned the numbers. So the first number was number one and that meant you were the first one to be drafted. You can still finish college, but you as soon as you graduate you were going to be drafted.

29:05 All the way up course the 366. My number was 312.

29:12 So I was pretty certain in the war was beginning to wind down. I was pretty certain that I wasn't going to get drafted and I made and the economy was not good at that time. We were going into it some sort of a little recession. I saw they weren't a whole lot of jobs. I decided that I wanted to go to Germany. I caused my mother's family was from Germany, although way way way back and so I signed up for a foreign exchange program work exchange programs.

29:50 Not that I was exchanged with anybody, but I just went to German. So I went to Germany and ended up working for IBM.

29:58 And for two months, I was initially supposed to be

30:06 Down in Stuttgart and then I ended up in Hamburg. I

30:14 Work for them for 2 months then after that. I got a job with Philips. I continued working there 6 months got laid off again, but had first dibs on a any other positions ended up working going to work for Electra Phillips Electra logika, and I so felt which is in the county is Eagan and I work there for about additional 8 months before I came back to the States finally.

30:41 So and it turns out that my mother's family was from zegen. They were part of the Germania colonies. It's were brought here to Virginia in, don't know what time say the 17 hundreds to do mining. So Miami Cruise calendar and tell me what you did in Germany in terms of computers. We were building business computers and 72 or we were developing a computer. That's the same year that Intel introduce the 8008 their first microprocessor 8040 8008. So we were at I was actually building a mini computer at the same time that essentially PCS were the beginning of personal computers were it was started.

31:41 And I was spent most of my career in working with computers.

31:47 Tell me about how you met mom and something about your courtship and marriage.

31:54 As I also said I was acted in our Sunday school class. So is Sunday church. I was in a singles class when when I got back from Germany one time. I had a party at my house, and I guess I somehow another invited everybody that was a single to my house and this girl shows up in a white Mustang with glasspack Mufflers, which make this really cool rumbling sound turns out it was her brother's car, but we that's when we first met and then I guess I had the temerity to ask her out on a date or we went to Big Meadows up on Skyline Drive and went down a dark Hall foot down Dark, Hollow Falls.

32:45 And when we came back we were getting a drink of water and she splashed order my face. So that was the beginning of our little romance in that was in 73 for sometime summer of 73 her stepdad. Who was the Air Force Colonel. They were stationed out in Hickam air base and her mother were going to fly her out there for Christmas and Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii. Thank you.

33:22 And but I was planning on going to Germany that Christmas but the Lord had other plans for me. None of it came to fruition are all my plans just weren't working out for going back to Europe by Christmas time. And when he was here in the fall, he invited me to come and so we decided that hey baby, I would go. You know, she said she invited me as well and I figured well if we can stand each other two weeks that was how to make or break the relationship. It was very movie like rains and warm sunshine and beaches. We went to Hanauma Bay and

34:16 So that I ended up proposing in Valentine's Day of 74. We got married in October 12th of 74. I've never done anything that fast and we've been happily married for 38 years.

34:39 You've mentioned Church several times. Tell me about your faith.

34:45 I grew up in a Christian family. So in a sense it's was inherited Faith, but it's evolved and I'm surprised that it continues to evolve the I saw the wood would have expected that by now. I would know all the answers and have it all figured out but it's ya hi, I find myself continuing to learn everyday what it means to be a Christian or what at least I perceive it means to be a Christian how to live a life that is.

35:26 In line with what would Jesus do in every situation? I've come to believe that the kingdom of God is is worth striving for creating a kingdom of God here on Earth and we do that by showing Grace to each other loving each other because I I believe that God loves each one of us. He sent his son to reconcile us to himself through his death and Resurrection.

36:04 And so there's that utopian Vision out there that I'm trying to do my little piece to

36:12 Contribute to

36:15 Tell me about your family now.

36:18 Well, I hope this two wonderful daughters and two wonderful son in laws. You're married to Colonel kabanda and live here in just outside of Washington Sterling, Virginia. And our younger daughter. Susan is married to David Murphy and they have a wonderful grandson. Who is the smartest most?

36:52 She's just the smartest most wonderful grandchild. You could ever want no pious.

37:02 Is there something else I should say?

37:06 I love my family and how has your life changed since you retired last summer, I'm getting to do more reading I get to really have my my power 20 minute naps. I'm I've Lost Boyz love photography now that we have digital photography.

37:30 I can take all the pictures. I want two weeks ago when we were in Ireland for 2 weeks between Mom and I we took 3000 pictures. I think my inventory is up to over a hundred thousand pictures. I don't know what you guys are going to do with him all I do a lot more yard work. I never had time for yard work when I was working. So it cleaned up some around the house. I like to do reading, but I haven't gotten there yet.

38:03 Travel-size I said Mom and I have done several major trips.

38:12 The

38:14 2 years ago, we drove across country through Canada all the way out to Seattle to visit my brother and his wife and my brother Ken and his wife Leslie and then came back down to the States. We have a friend that vacations in Ireland every year and this year. We went over and stayed for five days on the south side of Galway Bay and then down did the southwest side of Ireland.

38:46 We love going out to Great Falls Park and watching the waterfall. We do water aerobics out of that was a big surprise has started water aerobics, maybe three or four years ago. And I really enjoy that even though I'm not always there's not a whole lot of guys in the class.

39:09 So tell me about your handyman Ministry at church.

39:13 One of the things that we've done is in at church is part of the deacon Ministry because deacons are about taking care of the needs of the congregation he is

39:30 Created the handyman Ministry for fellows, like myself that can do odd jobs for some of the older people in. So I've taken a leadership role in that and trying to connect seniors that have odd job type of needs with other people in church that are willing to help and do that. Well, thank you for taking time to tell me your stories in the share those with future Generations.