Robbie Zimmerman and Paul Zimmerman

00:00 Hello, this is Robbie Zimmerman. I'm 71 years old. I'm in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Today's date is March 18th, 2021. I'm with my son. Paul Zimmerman was going to talk about his grandfather.

00:17 And I'm Paul Zimmerman. I'm 42 years old. Today's date is March, 18th, 2021. I am in Chicago, Illinois, and I will be interviewing my mother Robbie about her father. My grandfather.

00:36 Okay, so

00:39 When I was young, our grandfather was was not terribly involved in our lives. And he recently passed away and you know, as I read his obituary and learn some things about him. I found there was certainly a lot more interesting information that I had previously known so growing up. When he, you know, wasn't that involved and he was just you know, around occasionally mine even has an adult when he had retired and then move to another part of the country. I really didn't see that much of him. So, you know, I didn't hear a lot of the background and history of his life and the things that he had accomplished than I thought. That this might be a great way to sit down and I'll learn a little bit more about his life and preserve that you're my daughter to and to know about him and to understand where she came from.

01:38 And one thing that I think I have been able to observe from afar about him. That's pretty interesting. Is that unlike what I think most people expect of somebody in their seventies eighties or nineties. He lived to be 94. My grandfather seemed to grow and expand his interest as he advanced in age at a time. When most people's lives are shrinking and their worldview becomes more fixed. He seemed to become more compassionate, more interested in others more open to New Concepts and more appreciative of what was in his life. All very different than what I remember of him when he was in his fifties and sixties. And he would have been more nearby where I lived in more involved in my life. So that gives a little bit of an overview of my impression of him. And now I'd like to get a little bit more information from my mother about him. So I guess I'll start off early on, you know, you you haven't talked a lot about your child.

02:38 But as you know, as I've grown up and I understand that you're you came from, you know, a pretty your poor background and money was tight and you had five kids and you know one railroad salary to raise everybody. What was life that like back then and it was grandpa and grandma is life. What were they like back when you were young?

03:01 Well, you know, it sounds like it was a poor background, but we were working class. We really weren't poor.

03:10 You have to look at the context of the 50s and 60s. How much was changing in the United States in the world and my dad worked, and he worked hard, and had a job where you could do.

03:26 Never be laid off or go on strike, which was real common during those times.

03:36 It was a, not a bad childhood by any means.

03:41 I get a little weepy because of Grandpa's death.

03:48 But,

03:50 It was just normal, you know, we didn't have a lot, we had a house. We went to call, we had a good education, public education, but it was good. We just grew.

04:06 Great, you know, it was certainly different time and it sounds like things weren't easy. But you guys, you know major way through and with a lot of hard work, you know, everybody was able to go to school and do well. And you know what band sung life some things, right? Because all of you five children did what I think most parents want is you they they've done better in life. They've exceeded what their parents were were able to achieve. What caused the lessons influences. Did you take away from your parents growing up?

04:43 Will certainly my work ethic.

04:47 And, you know, you you alluded to the

04:53 I'm kind of in you remember unpleasantries you? No arguments and Loud talking in that sort of thing and took a lesson from that not to have that part of my life.

05:05 But job.

05:07 You know.

05:10 We were open-minded, we were living in that time has changed for women for for society.

05:23 And we were open to all of it, and my parents didn't.

05:27 I didn't influence us to not change. I guess the positive influence was that they didn't say. You can't do that and you can't believe that and

05:42 I think the most, I think the most strong that there was work there always had to work.

05:51 Told work.

05:57 And we all get along, we would close his family.

06:01 Which is so odd because of your childhood. That was just so upside down. I mean, we had grandparents that lived with us. We had aunts and uncles that would come and go. Sometimes when they needed assistance. We had closed me ways. We lived in neighborhoods. You don't like you live in. I live in the suburbs and we knew all our neighbors. Most of our relatives were our neighbors, my friends, when he was growing up volume, all their family. It was very family-oriented Society in the late 50s and early 60s and and then things just blew up in the world change very quickly at the end of the 60s and

06:46 Once I was married and moved away from what had become a difficult place to live in the city of Detroit, you know, growing up in Detroit. It had gotten to be a very good old with a lot of drug activity. And a lot of insecurities for being in public like I go to your house in Chicago, when we walk on the streets and we feel safe and comfortable. I would never go to Detroit in walk on the streets and feel safe and comfortable turn to be a very violent and unsafe place to be. And so when I married and made the decision to move over here to West Michigan, this is just what we stayed and there was no family and that's, you know, there was no, there were no cousins for you. Your grandparents were still raising children at the time. I had children and they weren't that involved with you and it's a big missing Factor when I look back at the positivity that a close family ties hat.

07:44 And that and it is a it's just a very different time to, I think, you know, with the typical, you know, nuclear family of the 50s and 60s than living in one place. Had one job for so long compared to, you know, the baby move to the suburbs and exurbs, and the portability of jobs and the amount of moves that the families do. I think it's a very different time.

08:13 LOL, you're not even phone. So, you know, we didn't even get very many phone calls when your dad. And I first, we're married and moved away. We might have talked to her parents, once every four months because it was a long distance cellphone sentences. And that was an expensive call. You know, I'm today will be all over the world and and it's nothing to text or message or or phone.

08:37 How to share. And so, ties are maintained differently now than they were then. And I think that was something that

08:48 Kevin always tranzind, he likes your Gram and Grandpa Zimmerman. They were not able to ever even Grant Wilson. Let's stick with him. He would never even when we gave him a cell phone, and he never picked up the phone to call because it just wasn't part of his his being. It was something you just hitting the, date to know local calls. Broke a long distance calls, not so good. It yet. You can't imagine it, was it. It's funny because your dad and I talked about that often how seldom we had contact with relatives. Probably takes a lot to do to change that. I guess you'd have to look at what price is listed at $10 phone call. Sometimes they were in in dollars would buy a week's groceries in the 50s.

09:43 So you said that you grew up in Detroit, but Grandpa wasn't originally from Detroit. As I understand it. That's where he met grandma. And that's certainly where you were born and raised. How did he end up in Detroit?

09:59 Well, you know, you have to, I'm go back a little bit farther farther than your dad. He actually hit, he ended up in the South because his grandfather. John Wilson was in the 13th, Iowa Cavalry. During the Civil War. And so think about that Paul. Your grandfather's grandfather was in the Civil War. It seems like so long ago, but it wasn't. And when he was discharged, he he got out of the you and his discharge was in 1864, Civil War, ended 1865. And if you had an honorable discharge and you were in the Union, Army were given tracts of land on the other side of the Mississippi because they were working towards expansion of the nation. And so he moved from Iowa, to Arkansas and became he made his living by by cutting trees, lumbering and providing lumber for for the growth in that pot.

10:59 The country. And so his Grandpa's family was in Arkansas and Arkansas, was very rule in very poor and Grandpa was born in 26. So he lived his early years through the depression. But when the Depression was over, it didn't change their circumstance because the after reconstruction, the South had very few schools and, and very little industry. And they just didn't have a lot of means of, of advancing, their economic Futures. He his, father than what? His grandfather was a tinsmith originally. He was a blacksmith. And when horses were not part of the society, he changed his work to being intense Nathaniel on his own business, in a small town.

11:59 And,

12:01 My grandfather than was a mechanic.

12:05 And when mechanization really was taken over and people were pumping out cars and Detroit, I think about 50% of the state of Arkansas, relocated to Michigan and got jobs. They all lived in a in a community together. They all knew each other and the war started, and the, they had more work and more money than the new one to do with. They send their their background. So Grandpa then had gone.

12:36 In his early childhood two schools in Arkansas and back to Michigan, and move to Michigan, and back to Arkansas for a couple of years and then back to Michigan, and he graduated high school in Michigan. And that's where his grandma and where his parents, my grandparents were loving. And so when he was discharged from the Navy, then he actually went back to where his parents were.

12:59 He?

13:02 Never really considered living in Arkansas because there just was no work for him there. And always just plan on living in Michigan, until his retirement. And then Arkansas was hole in Arkansas, is where he wanted to be buried. But never really heard a lot of details about that. I learned from his obituary, that you volunteered at a really early age, and I knew he was in the Navy. What else can you do?

13:33 Okay, he was he was 17, but you have to remember, you were drafted. During World War II. You'd be drafted, when you took the day, you turned 18, and he wanted to go into the Navy. So he joined the Navy. Just shortly before his 18th birthday. He finished high school and went to boot camp in June. I think it was 1943.

14:02 So he was eighteen when he actually was in the Navy, he then was went to boot camp and he was supposed to go to the Pacific. This isn't something that I learned only recently. He was he was on track to be sent to the Pacific and fighting in the Japanese theater, but came down with a very severe illness and sometime in Cuba at a naval hospital. And then was shipped out to North Africa will. By the time he got to North Africa, all the all the real fighting was done. He was actually awesome kind of a clerk where he noted correspondence for. He was assigned to a captain or whatever. They are in the Navy and did a lot of clerk work, but he was in an area near

14:53 Oran Algeria in the fighting had been over and they were responsible for directing ships that were going to go if they were in the med training and they were going around to Eataly into that part of Europe through the Minefield set still insisted. And so that was his job. He didn't really see combat service and that's why he never really talked about his service much because so many of his his friends and Associates had seen serious combat and he felt like he just had an easy job. And really in retrospect. It was an important job. All the same saved lives, by directing them through Minefield, but he had an interesting time in North Africa. He was able at one point to go out with his commanding officer to a French Foreign Legion me. How many of us could say we've ever been to Fort, that was a French Foreign Legion port.

15:54 Fort and. He really did enjoy that time. It was them.

15:59 Different other houses for different. Everything was different in that part of Africa was very sophisticated. It was really an exciting place for him to be later was transferred to Italy and I have to look at the back of my sheet to see his bass was in Naples. He said he wasn't too crazy about Italy. But again, the fighting was done at that point, that World War II wasn't over until 45 but where he was the fighting had long since been over there was most mostly just

16:39 Doing a logistics and sending people places. Trying to put, take care of refugees. That's one thing. So it is his Naval service. He always play down is not very important. You know, he was discharged in 45 came back to Michigan. Met your grandmother and they got married very, very quickly. You know, I may be quicker than, you know,

17:07 Grandpa was a pretty intelligent person. Without a lot of edge formal education, just through high school and like I said, was back and forth between school systems, but he would have done. Well to not got married and taking advantage of the GI Bill and gone further than just left because he was always a good learner. So, you know, I recalled my whole life knowing grandpa that he never flew and this was tied to some incident in World War II. And I remember being told well, you never got on another plane after World War II, what was the impetus of that? And I think you really never get on another plane.

17:54 Now he really never did it. He would not fly. He would drive everywhere. He was in a transport. Going to be at when he was being relocated from Africa to Italy that was full of nuns. They were taking these nuns to Italy and it was way over. I don't overpopulated. I don't know. They had too much weight on the plane and it was flying like 3 feet off of the water and never really crash-landed, but they thought they were going to. It's going in my father, get off that plane and would never go on another plane again, he stuck to boats and trains and cars.

18:38 I guess it's a good thing. He was in the Navy rather than the airport.

18:43 So after the war he came back to Detroit and you know settled there in and started your family. And that's where you grew out of you. Moved out at at right after high school and you went to college and lived in West Michigan. The rest of your life. At some point. I know, Grandma and Grandpa left. The Detroit area and move to West Michigan roughly. When was that, and why did they make that move to? And the reason why is that the real reason was that your aunt Nora got beat up on her way, home from school. The area had turned really Ross and there were, you know, when you went out on your porch at night. Now you see me people making drug deals and they said they just needed to be in a different environment. So they grabbed was able to transfer his job and they did that.

19:43 Are they just moved?

19:46 It is heated up on 10 Mile. If you remember that. It was a it was a lifestyle that he really liked.

19:54 But, you know, you go back to being 60 years old and working out in the snow in the rain and the cold, you know, when he retired. He was ready to leave, Michigan, to go someplace warmer.

20:07 Yeah.

20:19 Well, that worked out. Well, you guys have stayed there your whole life.

20:24 So, so they they moved in the seventies. They must have stayed in West, Michigan for around twenty years Ballpark. And then they, they moved to Arkansas as you mentioned, for retirement and lived there for 25 or 30 years. I guess, you know, we certainly saw them last so, you know, a long ways to go with three kids and, you know, it's not an easy drive to make was that similar for, for all of your siblings and their families or did some of your siblings managed to stay in closer. Touch?

21:07 Probably true that. We saw them less than my other siblings, but none of us saw them a lot. Gail had some circumstances in her life that she would dump her kids off at Grandma and Grandpa's for a while. So some of those grandkids are a little bit closer to them, but pretty much. They before they retired. They were traveling a lot on their own after Toby, you know, there's a big difference in age after Toby, graduated from high school and he went into the army himself, then they started traveling and they were looking to retire and when they came across hot springs that was they just knew that was going to be yet. They came home and put their house up for sale and moved as soon as Grandpa's retirement came through in. You know, they're just yeah, they turned from people who had been concentrating on making a living and raising their kids to Independence.

22:07 Not wealthy, but they went from having that they went, they were in a point in their life, where they had more disposable income than ever before. And so they felt they could do anything and they just really didn't make time for us, is what it was. They were busy traveling and building relationships in their Community doing volunteer work. They were living the life that they had missed having dinner Lee parent in, never able to do anything except raise kids.

22:37 That's understandable.

22:48 The better way to do it.

22:50 Yeah, well, hopefully it works out well in the end.

22:55 So, you know what, I think about Grandma and Grandpa visiting when I was young, when it was coming from me, or just try it over to where we lived in West Michigan, or when they came up for longer than zits, from Arkansas after they retired. I don't recall. This is really pleasant visit. I remember, they seemed, you know, very you do kind of unhappy and argumentative and stuck in the mud about a lot of things. And I recall thinking, you know, that, it didn't seem to be very happy with much of anything that was going on in the world. Whether it was, you know, a little league baseball game or the Nightly News, but then, you know, later on, in retirement, as I got older in particular with with Grandpa and especially since he outlived Grandma seem to be much more pleasant.

23:54 Aging much more thoughtful about what was going on the world. You're much more open and inflexible. And in his ideas about things. Did you notice the shift? You know, what do you make of that? And do you think that this is something that particular to him? Or do you think this is just started the trend of people being there, their most unhappy in their forties, and fifties and being your most happy and retirement in their 60s and 70s and 80s.

24:23 You know, I know that you were going to ask about that a little bit and it's a really hard concept for me to understand because everything you observed is correct. They were not Grandma and Grandpa were not happy people when they were younger. And I don't know if that was a reflection of the pressure of of the economy, you know, just making enough money to feed, everybody going to Grandpa and Grandma's often took care of family relatives. Like I said, always somebody living with our family. I am not really sure. I do know this though. That Grandpa came from a very loving stable, home life.

25:04 And he married my your grandmother who was somewhat unstable. She was a difficult person. And I think a lot of the arguing was brought on by her.

25:21 And Grandpa's inability to manage or deal with it, just not having the patience for it and it has the air pressure is reduced and

25:32 Grandma could start to be her own person.

25:37 You know, she when she can no longer had children to, to have to care for and she could get out in the world and make her own friends joined organization. She became a lot more about

25:50 Lunch with less argumentative less unhappy, and she just became more content. And I think grandpa had to learn through all of his life. Like I said, from a very stable loving relationship to being determined to make things work. So, you know, they stay together. When all of us kids. They shouldn't have, you know, but he was determined to make things work. So I think that's just part of his personality and as he, you know, when he went and turned into retirement and he had the freedom of travel and concentrating on his old self. I think he was able to make observations of our society and a kind of appreciate the diversity a little bit. And I think that

26:40 Willingness to always be learning something and to observe and understand different peoples position in the world. I think that made him a much more tolerant person. I'm getting a heap, he passed.

26:56 You know, let's talk about the gay and lesbian movement. You know, he just shakes his head hit that and see what difference does it make? If these people are happy contributing people just Society. Why should anybody hold that against them? And why should even if he discussed, you know, stuff and that surprised me because I would have thought that he was Old, South conservative and would never accept something like, you know, a gay child or whatever, you know, it's not that people over all our, I'm happy in their forties and fifties. I think that people who go into retirement with a little bit of Financial Security in a, his pension wasn't huge amounts of money, but he was never going to go without housing your food. He had plenty to support himself without asking for help from anybody, which because he had always helped others.

27:56 That was something that he found distasteful. He didn't want to put that burden on anyone, but he just was able to to explore the world a little bit differently and it in his case because he had a determination to make things work. I think he just changed how he felt and reacted towards things and he became a much more engaging conversationalist for sure.

28:24 I don't think that's true of all people. Who do you say? The forties and fifties are tough. All of life is tough, but when he went into retirement and live for 30 years in retirement, he he, he had a good life and I think he valued and appreciated that older white man from the South but in reality not being who knows who that person to stereotype? That because you lived a different life is Been Around the World in His youth as part of the Navy and experience different cultures. He grew up in the South but they moved the verse in Troy and it would be there for quite a long time and while he retired back to the South and so

29:24 It may be a case that it wasn't much of a change in who he but rather just not really getting the chance to know him and see him in that part of him when he was younger.

29:38 Trip, you know, your your background through your whole life, adds to what you are at the end of your life. And so those people who have had fewer experiences fewer opportunities and in Grandpa's case, you know, the war turned out to be a good opportunity. He didn't see all of the, the death and destruction. He saw the Reconstruction and I, I think that

30:04 Everything adds up to who you are in the end.

30:09 So I mentioned at the start, Grandpa died recently at the age of 94 and he was remarkably fit, both mentally. And he had, you know, one example that I'm always amazed that since I happen to be married, to a neurologist who specializes in Kidney Care is that he managed diabetes for decadence without any medication or insulin just by managing his diet and, you know, he that that's something that's pretty rare. Right? And it indicates to me somebody with a lot of willpower and self-control and someone who's willing to do things that they be both people are willing to do, make some sacrifices in the way. They live their life for, you know, the Tri-State and things are those traits that you would associate with Grandpa threw his whole life? Or is that something that you know, what was a later life development?

31:09 Requirement to be able to survive, you know, where with diabetes.

31:17 I hadn't thought about it that way. I mean, I always was amazed that he could change his lifestyle so much that he could not even have to take medication for his diabetes. And it does take a lot of willpower and I just didn't remember him that way as it as a young man in his twenties. When I was a kid. He was a young father. I don't I didn't see that treats, but in hindsight going back, you know, I think yeah, he was always a very determined person. He had his flaws.

31:58 I think he had a low level of self-esteem, and I think that made him try harder.

32:05 He always, you know, he didn't.

32:09 He didn't.

32:11 He didn't step forward and put himself on display a lot, you know, but he always did the work that was required. So, yeah, I think he was a pretty determined person and the educated himself about about his disease and he is just like how he live, he could have lived on a larger scale, but he knew what his finances were and he knew what he wanted to do. And he always forced himself to live within those five years or so. We could have had a bigger house and nicer house. You know, he always did have a new car and I think he bought in his later years. He bought his last new car, five times.

32:53 Do you know you guys had a new car that was important to him? But he he could have lived more lavishly but chose not to because he wanted to live within his needs and yeah, those are you know, he looked at the bottom line or he looked at, you know, he looked at the circumstances. This is what I had in. This is what I need and this is how I'm going to spend my money. I think it was pretty organized. That way this might be where I get my attendance need to be an account. You know you just do.

33:20 You just look at the facts and, and you do the math.

33:25 So I ate I would have not made that observation as a as a young person about him. I mean that just wasn't my thought process about him.

33:36 Yeah, I know.

33:38 Some of the starters, I feel like I've heard about him, don't indicate someone who's terribly disciplined but then others do. So. It's a bit of a contradiction I suppose.

33:50 So I think in Grandpa's obituary, he was described as being very proud of his been his kids. His grandkid with the grandkids. I think there maybe even been one. Great great. Great, grandkid. Do you do feel like that's true or do you feel like that's just a platitude from his his obituary because I missed it in the family when I was a kid.

34:19 You know, it's really true. He knows he knew all of his grandchildren's name right at the end. He knew where they lived what they did. He knew about them. He just you know, that is a generation that didn't have parenting books to read. You know, they didn't get involved men certainly didn't get involved with raising children, but my dad was the better parent you. He was really loved us and showed it, but he didn't do the things that we know today are important with children. You know what, he, he just I think I have a red signal now.

34:59 On my box. I think it stopped recording. My box is going to read it. Okay, if he was very proud he knew what everybody did and he was very proud. I think I told you the story about

35:15 About Anna that when I said that Anna in conversation because Grandpa was quite a foodie, you know, he's a good cock in. It said that Hannah was a vegetarian. You know what? He said to me, but was never had one of those in her face, like a, just a little quirky things. I like, how am I going to make a meal for her? I only cook meat.

35:36 Well, luckily for dinner.

35:42 Yeah, he ain't. No, he he just what he wasn't involved, but he definitely

35:48 On the outside, knew everything that was going on.

35:52 And incurred very deeply about his family and horse-racing and the Detroit, Tigers in two.

36:16 Why can't I hear it? He got involved with Wildlife Federation and got very interested in conservation. He was always a hunter and fisherman that he got very interested in conservation. He he was definitely a foodie you actually would have liked a lot of the meals that Grandpa used to make because he could cook from scratch just like you do. I didn't have quite a sophisticated palate that you do, but he would never spend your $50 for a meal at a restaurant, but he definitely was a foodie in

36:47 Yeah, those were things he liked. Okay, so, you know, I think kind of the way I think about him. I would say that he's and I don't mean that in a negative way or flippantly, but, you know, he's a man from a different is born in the twenties and he was a kid during the Depression, you know in his generation probably lived through as much changes is any generation in history are going from the the 1920s to the 2020. It was definitely a simpler time when he was a young man, when, you know, you worked one job and you had a pension that you were tired on, and, and that was fine. And you could support a family and that's through into the same thing. I'll certainly a much more complex time but being from such a different era. She really even seem to have gotten better with age.

37:44 What, what else would you say about him to wrap things up? I lost you.

37:55 I think you've summarized it very well. It's

38:00 We could all aspire to get better with age.

38:05 I,

38:07 It certainly would be a good girl.

38:16 And,

38:18 I think he died too young.

38:23 Well, if we all played the 94 will be in good shape.

38:28 Thank to to sit down and talk a little bit about Grandpa with and then to ship memory.

38:36 But thank you for asking.

38:41 That's all.