J.R. Wilson, Blair Wilson, Blake Wilson, and Nadia Wilson

Recorded May 30, 2011 Archived June 3, 2011 39:51 minutes
0:00 / 0:00
Id: SCK002554

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Participants

  • J.R. Wilson
  • Blair Wilson
  • Blake Wilson
  • Nadia Wilson

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Transcript

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00:01 My name is Blair Elizabeth Wilson or at my grandfather called me the dude and I'm interviewing my grandfather. Will Wilson and I'm 22 years old. It's May 30th, 2011 and we are in Tampa Florida in the upstairs bedroom of his beautiful house. Thank you Blair. This is oil Wilson age 86 + very much. The Northside of 86 of the date is May 31st. You said 2011? We're at my house and my granddaughter Blair is interviewing me.

00:46 You forgot to say that your other name is the coach on by by our whole family known as buyer whole family will their mother Doris calls me the coach and I said, why do you call me the coach? I was never coach. She said well, we couldn't think of what else to call you and I didn't want to call you. Mr. Wilson and I didn't want to call you boil, but you just kind of reminded me of Coach. So I used it. And I said, well that's flattering and I appreciate it. So, I'm the coach.

01:19 It's stuck. Well Grandpa last interview. We talked a little bit about how you got into the Navy and the Bikini Island testing that you did or it were involved in and I was curious about how you got out of the Navy and what your life was like immediately after that and what stories around you leaving the Navy the Navy was very easy.

01:46 They knew I was going to leave I said I want to get out and so they sent me to San Francisco.

01:53 Now wait a minute. I was at San Francisco because the radiological safety section sent me and 7 other guys that flew us back to San Francisco the monitor ships that have been frozen in place in San Francisco because they were suspected of having Radioactive.

02:17 An inverted water water purifiers the Steelers

02:23 White radioactive Stills, and that's where they made their drinking water when it's c.

02:29 And so I couldn't leave a dog with water without knowing that their Stills were okay. So they flew us back influence directly to the to the office of the admiral of the western sea Frontier. I didn't talk about this before. Okay, so we came into I'm not sure what are base it was and they drove us to the Admiral's office and the Admiral said listen, this is the most important thing on my agenda there a hundred fifty ships out there in the harbor that can't move until they get an okay from you.

03:09 No, you can have anything you want. You can have a car you can have an airplane. You can have a boat whatever you need to get these ships clear. And if you have a problem call me and if it's at night, here's my card with my home number on it. Now. This is a vice admiral.

03:31 Big wheel

03:33 Charge the Western sea Frontier, which I think is a glamorous name. So we're meeting at got to work. I lived at the Stanford Court Apartments right across from the Fairmont Hotel in right behind the

03:50 I'll shoot Mark Hopkins.

03:54 And had a very nice room.

03:57 On the corner of California and

04:02 I can't remember the other street. But anyways, the high point.

04:10 Just about in San Francisco and it's right a barely almost diagonally across the street from the the Stanford Club know I'm getting clubs around. That

04:25 Anyway was a great location, I could see the bay see the Golden Gate Bridge and

04:33 So I began work as a Monica there now. One of the stories was about the oil tanker.

04:39 I told you that then all right, so there's no point repeating it, but I got out of the Navy.

04:47 When they would let me go from radioactive work and I got out at Treasure Island, which was in the naval base in the middle of San Francisco Bay.

05:00 And it was very pleasant very easy. And that's the story. I immediately went home.

05:10 And

05:13 I had not finished. I've been an unusual guy and that they had commissioned me before I ever went through any kind of Navy school or even had a degree. I had one more semester to go I do and I don't know that they had any non degreed officers in the Navy at that time, but I was and so I had to go back for a semester to finish my engineering degree I do.

05:44 Which I did meantime Jackie my soon-to-be wife had moved to Florida her family had moved to Tampa.

05:54 And I came down to see her a couple of times but we finally agreed on the telephone that we're going to get married and we agreed on the date and the place and it was Tampa at the church St. John's Episcopal Church where Mary Audrey and I go when I go today, but she's a good member and

06:20 There we got married and I remember my brother-in-law dick Jones standing behind me.

06:25 And

06:27 The laughing when we were coming out and I said what were you laughing at? He said well, I was right behind you and he said your hemline on your pants with dancing.

06:43 So one would say I was nervous when I got married.

06:47 And we honeymoon did like Fern which was home by the Blake family and it's one of them beautiful lakes around here and there was nobody on it, but the Blakes so they had a lovely house out there and then Orange Grove and we honeymooned out there for a week. And I remember we went to this is terrible. We went to the Tarpon Springs for dinner on our wedding night.

07:16 And we drove home and both immediately got deathly ill.

07:24 I mean really ill throwing up all over the place romantic wedding night, but things got better items next morning and we had a wonderful time just being there canoeing and swimming just being alive. It was great. It was great that we have wondered about that. But I mean just being with each other then newly-married very happily alive, and I had gotten a job.

07:59 As an engineer

08:01 Which means a technician really add a new radio station that was being built Wahoo in Orlando.

08:12 And a

08:14 I remember after I got the job. I came to Orlando. I forgotten where I stayed.

08:24 Anyway, the chief engineer came to pick me up first day of work and I was

08:31 Dressed in a sports jacket and nice pants and got in his car and he look me up and down. He said, where do you think you're going? I said, well, we're going up to the transmitter Army. Am I working for you or not? He said put yeah you're working for me, but I just don't think you gettin understand what you're supposed to do.

08:54 I said, okay. I like to see so we get out to the job site and hear these Ruffians looking guys out there and torn jeans and no shirts and what not. And so he handed me a shovel.

09:08 And he said the

09:11 You can go change in the transmitter building there. But I want you to make a bank right in front of the transmitter building on which we going to plant sod now. That's your job for the day. Go build a bank.

09:24 So I strip down to my underwear.

09:28 This is about 9 miles out in the country and worked all day in my underwear shoveling. And I rode my electrical engineering Dean about it the next day or the next week and said you always said we would have a shovel in there and Sunday, but I didn't think it would be this soon. So we were living on nothing. Just nothing and we

10:01 I got a one room or two room apartment 3 room kitchen bedroom and living room apartment on the ground floor on the ground right next to the railroad where I trust is Colonial Avenue in Orlando. And when the railroad train came by the whole house or jump up and down.

10:24 Panda

10:25 So we knew where we lived and I remember that the place was so old.

10:32 And so Shamel Chevy that I remember one night Jackie went to the bathroom which was attached to the kitchen. So she had to go through the kitchen to get to the bathroom and she reached up to turn on the light and there was a hole around the light fixture in the ceiling and hundreds of roaches dropped.

10:56 Right on her and she screamed and she said I'm going home to mother and I remember there was a big spider I said we will let spider take care of this a big tarantula like spider like that above our bed. That's where he made his home just directly above our bed, but he kept the roaches out of the bedroom.

11:26 And I had a 1935 Buick.

11:30 Which I borrowed money for 2 to buy and it was so heavy that I had to send it into the shop one day and it broke the lift now. That's a heavy car make a block and tackle chain.

11:45 Block and tackle and I got about 5 miles to the gallon.

11:50 Hello.

11:52 They were Roshes in the trunk living in Old burlap sacks.

11:57 And that's the way we lived. She would keep Groceries on the table meals on a table for five bucks a week.

12:06 And we were poor believe me. We were poor we didn't have the money to go to the movies. And I remember one New Year's Eve. We were across the street from a nightclub, which was up over truck stop and

12:23 I found a dime and she found a dime and I went across the street to the nightclub and bought a beer and we came back and celebrated midnight New Year's by sitting on the stoop the steps and sip in the beer.

12:40 And that was our celebration.

12:43 And she had to come out every morning because of Buick wouldn't start and had to have had to be choked carburetor adjusted and she would sit in the car and press the starter.

12:56 And move the spark advance to a certain point that I had determined and I would then fool with the carburetor until the engine started and she would keep it running and then I'd kiss her. Goodbye and hop in the Buick and go to work out at the transmitter in the country.

13:17 And we did that for

13:21 Jose what months I guess?

13:23 And then

13:26 I moved to Lakeland to become an announcer in the salesman that w o n n.

13:32 But I think that's as far as that story goes does that answer your question darling that also has to do with Jackie and I hate to make you repeat things, but I was wondering if you could tell us about the marriage letter that you got from her that you told us just moments earlier about her sending you a letter when she went to go with her mother to the hospital and Indianapolis when you were still on chip.

14:08 But you told us moments earlier a very touching story about you and Jackie and deciding to get married.

14:19 Personality friends most most Charming personality. I should tell the story. Well, I might get some things wrong. But he said that my grandmother Jackie had gone with her mother to Indianapolis to the hospital to get a history for the mother her mother to get a hysterectomy and it was very serious and she wrote you a letter saying that she was going with her mother to the hospital and also PS as we paraphrase said do you still want to marry me? Well it didn't I just tell the story of the hams.

15:08 Well, my two best friends out at bikini were truck Google the chief engineer of victoreen instrument who designed and built all of the various radiation meters we had out there and we were on the hospital ship Haven because it was their condition and we were on that air condition ship because it was necessary to keep the meters from being eaten up by Pacific Salt and humidity in high temperatures, so we were very fortunate in that respect we the radiation people were able to say and air conditioning while the rest of the fleet except the animals sweated

15:54 Are they any right during the process of being out there and the various activities in which I took place. I asked my buddies both of whom or ham radio operators if they could reach Jackie and tell her that I wanted to marry her and I wouldn't stay in the Navy.

16:20 And

16:22 They said oh sure that's easy. All we got to do is build a transmitter and I thought so he went down the supply room and he fills the parts he needed to do this and there was a big Electronic Supply aboard this hospital ship.

16:43 So he did and in just a few minutes really I'm sure it was less than an hour. He booked together a small transmitter and I said we got to reach the stage know he's a don't worry. This will will go on a 20 meter band. Well a 20 meter band was illegal to go on during the war. It was an amateur band before the war but during the War the government made it so isolated that nobody was supposed to use that van.

17:13 But I put up an antenna. I crawled up I'm asked at night and hung an antenna and then the next night maybe the same night.

17:26 They began tapping out in Morse code both of them great code operators a message to and I think name the station vx33. I'll never forget that. So this is vx33 Marshall Islands South Pacific looking for Jackie Wilson supposedly at a hospital in Indianapolis. Can any of you help us?

17:53 Panda Cam in Seattle answered and said no, but I'll be glad to try.

18:00 And so he got on the telephone and lo and behold he found her at the hospital in Indianapolis and told her what I'd said, and she said come home. I wanna marry you and

18:13 So about that time I guess was when they sent me to San Francisco 2 to monitor ships.

18:21 And then you've got the rest of the story already.

18:26 But that's how we finally submitted the deal, you know, three beautiful son is Latin for beautiful. Is it for three beautiful Noah for beautiful granddaughters?

18:47 Out of it

18:49 And one beautiful grandson

18:52 So I'm pleased it worked out that way. Thank God for Addison and Samuel FB Morse.

18:59 Making radio possible. Absolutely in the morse code of marriage proposal through Morse code possible. Thank you for telling my story. I'm going packages and made me water up a little bit when you first told it and it's worth retelling. So thank you. Well speaking of your three wonderful boys. I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about your adventures with them and Jackie. I know you guys I know you worked at a radio station on Mount Mitchell Mitchell and I'm curious as to how you got there and what sort of trouble your boys got into and you got into it with them. I know my dad has some stories of being

19:51 Having some close calls, and I know that you do too so I don't have a specific question. But just tell us how you got to Mount Mitchell and those Adventures. I was general manager of a local radio station in Sebring.

20:09 IW jcm and we have salesman of all kinds come by selling what they called transcription Services then because radio stations use great big heavy turntables, very large and could play what they call transcription discs, which were about o married to feed not quite in diameter and had were cut with vertical grooves instead of horizontal like today's records are and so they had to have special heads and the

20:46 Transcription salesman came by and said you know there but they're looking for a chief engineer of it wmit and I said the hell happened to Novi wmit is because when I was in college, I room next door to Steve Clark who I was one of the engineers or technicians who helped build the station and I've been up as far as the road goes and I've seen the structure up there, but I don't know who owns it don't know anything about it now, and he said well and here's ownership and he named off the guys who owned it.

21:24 And so I got hold of one of them and said the I'd like that job.

21:30 And he said what he qualifications and I wrote him a letter and they wrote me back and said, okay. You got the job come ahead. So we moved and

21:43 We moved to Charlotte because the station had his studios in Charlotte, and we wanted a base there and I was raised in Charlotte. And so we got moved in we rented a house and we got moved in and

22:03 The station Studio was half of the top floor of the Charlotte news building.

22:12 And had they built a beautiful Studio there and there was a microwave transmitter microwave his new stuff then and we had the longest top in the world. It was 95 miles Airline from Charlotte news building to the radio station.

22:31 And

22:33 So I took up residence there and and the chief engineer finally quit as he had said he was going to do.

22:41 And

22:43 So we moved to Clingmans beat there was a big transmitter station up there that it had the

22:52 One bedroom one big bedroom and one bath downstairs

23:00 And

23:02 Not two bedrooms two bedrooms and two baths downstairs. So Jackie and I moved into one bedroom with one bath in the boys moved into the other one.

23:14 And we did you two usually had to have to cook up there. So Jackie wouldn't have to cook and the cook slept in the same room with the boys. I remember one day bar got lost. We couldn't find we finally found him asleep hanging in a sheet between the wall in the bed.

23:36 How old was he he was about to 3 something like that. And he was a funny little boy.

23:45 And that's the time you got lost going to town to shop for your mother and you just started off in 10 degree weather with only a jacket on and you here as my father Blake who's also in the room and the suns are Blake Barton Pratt, but this is a great story to keep going like my dad. Oh your dad yet you bet you bet. Anyway, they found him and I will coerce a nervous wreck. I was in Charlotte when they discovered he was lost and then call me on the radio.

24:26 And they didn't have a phone up there but that two way radio link directly with the office and sharlan Studio that at that time was the longest microwave up in the world 95 miles something like that.

24:44 Using Klystron tube

24:47 First of which I've ever seen it was a Duke.

24:52 At any rate

24:55 I'm lost darling see why dad went out in the snow in the first place. He was going to the store in Marion, which is 40 miles away to get groceries for his mother. His mother had fallen and had had a a disc replacement operation at that time. That was very serious. It wasn't a commonplace thing at all, and they usually did them in clean rooms. And so she was recovering in bed and Blake went in and made an imaginary list.

25:34 I heard he couldn't write yet.

25:36 Of grocery said she wanted and he supposedly wrote it down and said well I'm going to the store and he walked out went to the store and it was 40 miles away in 10 degree weather and I finally found him of course took off from Charlotte like a shot bird and but I didn't get there till after then found him and then found him wandering down the road very happily cold, but happy going to town to get groceries for Mama.

26:14 Sounds like a very loyal boy. Oh, yes. He was he was a good child.

26:21 You may have been good. But I also hear he had a lot of close calls. Can you tell me about a few of those like are well of his and yours one of his that I remember is an encounter with a bear and maybe say what it felt like to be raising three boys on a mountain and how that made you feel I was just glad they were boys, but referring the to the bear story Jackie, my wife was the cook at the time which was a terrible imposition on and I should never have allowed it, but I did.

27:01 Always been sorry, but it anyway, she was standing in the kitchen and Blake had decided if he was going to die on the explore the woods so there was were right off the kitchen. I mean not five feet away and he went down in the woods and we didn't worry about it when he did things like that because even though we were in a bear preserve a nature preserve, we never seen any bears up at the top close to the building and so Blake came rushing back up the hill and rushed into the kitchen to his mother saying mama. I just met the nicest bear. So those are two times he was King close to death.

27:51 Well, I told the story about almost freezing in the snow, but I haven't told the story about turning Loose by accident while I was working on the tower. That's how it was a hundred and eighty-five 80 feet above the top of the mountain. So the tower top was the highest point in eastern America and they'll tell us Side Story one morning.

28:16 I was up there working on tuning one of the FM transmitter for FM antenna ring portions of an antenna and I'll never forget it.

28:29 The fog was so thick the clouds were so thick I couldn't see my feet and it came up to a little above my knees and sped off in the distance is far as I can see the bright sunlight up above and nothing but a white blanket from my knees straight out and I can talk to my wife on the ground a hundred and eighty feet below in a conversational Dome at that level. She could hear me and she talk back to me conversation okay time to go in now and turn on the transmitter. I'll get out of the way and so I climbed out a few feet and between the antenna base and shego in turn on transmitter.

29:14 And I would make my little adjustment or figure out what it had to be and she would turn it off and come back out and we can continue like this and that way she helped me.

29:26 With the engineering now, does that answer your question about forgetting some you almost fell off right when I was working up at the top on on the antenna and I just forgot where I was I had been working. I would come up and hook up a safety belt lean back and work and then get ready to move on. I don't hook my safety belt go up and do it again.

29:59 Well, I did that five times in the last time. I forgot to hook up my safety belt. So I'm working away there happily probably whistling and lean back and said they realize I didn't have my safety belt and I just barely caught onto one of them runs has been welded onto the tower which was totally frightening.

30:29 About a hundred and seventy feet.

30:31 Off the ground

30:35 No, I would not have survived and I was

30:39 8000 7800

30:45 I guess 70 feet.

30:47 Above sea level

30:50 So it was quiet up there.

30:56 Well, it sounds like everyone had some close calls, but I was wondering if you knew maybe what your happiest memory from those times were that time at Mount Mitchell?

31:07 From Mount Mitchell

31:09 Or your happiest memory in life, if that's possible to place your happiest memory in life if that's possible to place.

31:24 Yeah, I'm not going to talk about the problems, but everybody has those but let me see if I can think of a happy moment at the mountain.

31:37 I think it was when I discovered.

31:40 Let go

31:43 Where the standing waves were bothering us on the antenna.

31:47 And nobody had thought about it before.

31:50 And I figured it out. It was standing waves that the antennas weren't matching a transmitter which has to be done in electrical transmission. If you're going to get resonance and waves to jump off the antenna.

32:04 And so I figured that out and then I didn't know how to get rid of it. So I had to call in a consultant to help me figure out how to get rid of it. And we finally got rid of it and increase. I don't know how much a significant amount and then there were times when

32:24 Well, I remember one afternoon.

32:27 Your mother and I just took off I haven't had a day off in god-knows-how-long. And so we just jumped in the car and took off again driving down the Blue Ridge Parkway on a gorgeous day.

32:42 And the

32:44 I think we took a picnic and we took a picnic lunch and we went back up into the woods.

32:51 Just off the parkway where it was very green and all pine trees and just gorgeous. We found a sunlit place Rock the lunch. That was fun. And it really fun. How does it feel to remember that day now is it I mean, it sounds like such a wonderful day.

33:14 Makes me feel old.

33:19 I know. I don't know how to answer that question.

33:24 And I just felt wonderful tonight. That's one of my happiest memories.

33:30 It was great.

33:34 I know that we don't have much more time left. But do you have a favorite story about your kids not necessarily from Mount Mitchell time, but any particular story that stands out about these three Rascal boys image of Bart and His short pants which reached almost to his ankles.

34:05 And I was watching him walk with those freckles and red hair.

34:12 And I remember the Christmas that Harry Dalton boat over presents for the boys like a fire engine from bar and he was sitting on the couch and I living roomin but walked up to him but was about three or four and he says

34:29 Hey.

34:31 You ain't got no hair.

34:34 And Dalton says we're seriously back to him. I ain't got no freckles neither.

34:45 I thought the best comeback anybody could have possibly at

34:54 Was Bart violence at that?

34:57 I don't remember what it is response was with an Aries and mine went to laugh like the Dickens, you know, but bought was a funny little boy.

35:08 Do you remember me? Such Blake?

35:11 Funny little boy. He still a funny man when he tries.

35:21 Any other questions what happened after Mount Mitchell what what made you move from there? I know that you moved all around and is moving around what you imagine that your life would be. No, what happened was it assumed many different jobs when I lived at Mount Mitchell and then I became general manager of the station and then president of the company and had to move to Charlotte.

35:50 And hire a chief engineer

35:53 And

35:55 When did that also began to sell, LOL?

36:01 Convince my shareholders that we ought to get a music franchise.

36:06 Because it provided steady income and it was almost impossible to sell it wmit is radio advertising because nobody identified with it. It's covered Greenville as well as it did Charlotte and people just couldn't sink a wmit is their home station.

36:26 So they wouldn't buy any advertising on it.

36:29 So I finally gave up on that and said well, let's get a music franchise.

36:35 So I went to New York along with one of the stockholders and talk to the music Corporation and we worked out a contract and got a music French and then I began to sell news that customers there was a system.

36:53 Known as the ultrasonic beep system and a real complicated name. What would happen is that we would play music over the air and when it came time for commercial, we would hit a supersonic tone because we had great receivers at each of Travis location.

37:19 That were sensitive to this tone and they would go silent when we hit that at the mountain in that signal went out over the transmitter so we could put on a commercial or whatever we wanted and that's what it was over with yet another frequency and therefore receive as we come back on and which start the music flowing again. And so that's how we got the music franchise started.

37:43 And we later switch to Multiplex, which we pioneered. I helped Pioneer which was a second carrier below the main carrier on which we put music and I left the main carrier free for anything. So but at any rate, I was very successful at selling music and they invited me to become sales manager in New York. So I went to New York house. They were paying me about double what I tell you haven't talked to you in Spanish.

38:19 And the boys adapted very well.

38:23 To Glen Rock, New Jersey where we lived

38:27 Cuz it was a nice town.

38:33 I have nice memories are of your daddy and me going out to play tennis every morning about 6, and he did so very happily after he went off to school his brother wouldn't do it also happily, but he went on to learn to play tennis and I didn't we really did it when we get so dark, we could hardly see the ball and and we really had a lot of fun playing tennis.

39:06 That's one of the happy moments of my life.

39:11 But mine too if you have one left to pick up in the next one, I just want to say thank you so much for doing me if it's so important to me to hear all these and haven't heard all these stories and thank you Dad also for sitting in and I love you both. Thank you, very proud grandpa and love my granddaughter is very much and thank you for the opportunity. As I said in the beginning. I love to hear myself talk.