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Chapter 18: The new dealWalk down lover's lane diminishes life's cares
Photo courtesy of the Arizona Historical Society
In the Depression, government jobs were the salvation of many. Three Civilian Conservation Corps camps like this opened in the Duncan area. By Carmen Duarte The Arizona Daily Star The Depression in cotton and copper dragged on into the late 1930s. The young men and women of the Gila River Valley worked hard when they could find work. They were given their rewards on the weekends.
The big events were held at Lover's Lane, an open-air dance hall on grower Heaton Lunt's property, outside of Duncan proper and not far from Virden, N.M. Lover's Lane was a road, flanked by cottonwoods, which led down to the Gila River. Near the trees was a large ramada where dances for Hispanics were held. Nala (my Mama) was a girl when the Depression began and grew into womanhood during the hard times. She loved to dance. She and her cousins would dress up in the one or two good outfits they ordered from catalogs or bought at Duncan's stores. They may not have had a lot of clothes, but what they had was sharp-looking. At the dance, ``The men would pay and the women entered free,'' Nala remembers. ``We'd sit on benches and were chaperoned by Madrina Juana. We had to dance with whoever asked us, even if we didn't want to. Madrina Juana made us, because she didn't think it was right to hurt boys' feelings. ``We had certain boys we wanted to dance with and prayed they'd hurry up and ask us before other boys did.'' The crowds danced to music played by visiting bands or by Otilio Reyes, the town barber, and his daughter Margaret. Otilio played the violin and saxophone, and Margaret played the piano. The musicians played a mixture of English and Spanish tunes. The women and men felt free under the stars. This was not time to worry about the patrón, or payday, or the cotton, onion or potato crop. It was a time for friendships, possibly romance. It was a true getaway from the monotonous harshness of daily life. It was a time to dance and let their strong, muscular bodies enjoy life. Couples took over the cement slab and artistically moved to rancheras, corridos, boleros and also to the jazzy tunes of swing. It was so good, so wonderfully good. There were other bright spots during the Depression. Nala, like so, so many other poor people, regarded President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as a hero. Before Roosevelt, my family's only contact with the federal government had been the Border Patrol. Now, it seemed, the United States government actually cared about them. Arizona and New Mexico had the highest proportion of people receiving emergency relief from the federal government, according to Thomas Sheridan in ``Arizona: A History.'' And the federal government also provided jobs. Three Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camps opened in the Duncan area. Nala remembers one camp in Virden, and two in Duncan - one by the cemetery and the other at the fairgrounds. Nala's brother Antonio joined the CCC and was among hundreds who worked in the valley building small dams over streams in the surrounding hills. Her brother Juan joined up and was sent to a CCC camp near Prescott. Roosevelt, my Mama believes, wasn't just another politician who wanted votes. He believed in the people. He gave them work. If you want an explanation of how the Democratic Party's New Deal coalition of labor and immigrant minorities lasted so long, ask my Mama. When I turned 18 in 1974, she told me: ``Democrats are for the poor; Republicans are for the rich.'' Now I could go vote. The worst of the economic hard times ended by 1940. The United States, not yet at war, was on a war footing. Copper and cotton roared back. Now the family had only to deal with the ordinary problems - grasshoppers, aphids and worms infesting the crops, epidemics of disease and periodic floods. The Gila River had flooded in 1934 and would do it again in 1941, taking out a neighborhood near Duncan's train depot. It was a Mexican-American settlement known as Chihuahuita. ``There were about 50 families living in Chihuahuita at the time of the flood. They lived in nice wooden homes,'' says Frank Francese, who was born on his family farm in Duncan the same year Nala was born in Virden. The growers suffered as well. ``This was one of the best farms in Duncan for a long time. You dig down there 3 or 4 feet and you will find the richest soil in the world. It is buried with this sand and river silt,'' says Francese. The river has claimed 20 acres of the Francese farm, and Frank is living in his third house. In 1941, he estimates, he lost $10,000 worth of crops. ``You just borrowed from the bank and called it a bad year. You just went ahead and milked the cows and kept them eggs.'' Flood or no flood, life was improving in the 1940s. Any jubilation, however, was tempered by the knowledge that the war in Europe would most likely hit home - every home - very soon.
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Ch. 1: Field of death
Ch. 18: The New Deal
Ch. 24: Cotton pickers and copper miners Ch. 27: The family doubles its size
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