INTERVIEW WITH ORSON CLARK

Interviewed by Clark S. and Ruth Knowlton

30 November 1981

Interviewer: Going back to back to Farmington, we were quite impressed with what you told us about your life in Farmington. There are one or two things we wanted to ask you. What were the conditions of employment from the standpoint of the teachers in the Bountiful school district? When you were teaching, how were the teachers treated?

Orson Clark: There was a surplus of teachers at the time I started which was in the fall of 1925. The wages were low, salaries were very low at that time. Teachers weren't too plentiful but it was difficult to get work.

Interviewer: I imagine that was especially true in 1930's wasn't it?

Orson Clark: It was for awhile there.

Interviewer: Did the school district manage to pay salaries all through the depression up until you left?

Orson Clark: The superintendent that we had was a local man in Kaysville. He was superintendent for many years.

Interviewer: What was his name?

Orson Clark: Burton, Hubert C. Burton. For years he was superintendent. He just bid them down just as low as he could. They didn't pay much during his whole administration. He held the thing right to the bottom. When there were plenty of teachers (it was after I was in it) some of the teachers went in for sixty-five dollars a month.

Interviewer: Good heavens! How could they live?

Orson Clark: I don't know. A married man couldn't live. 

Interviewer: When you went in, were most of the teachers unmarried women?

Orson Clark: Mostly.

Ruth Knowlton: Did he have difficulty finding degreed teachers? Fully qualified teachers?

Orson Clark: No. I don't think so. It seemed as though Salt Lake, Davis County, and Ogden teachers liked to come into those plaes. They would accept lower salaries if they could get a job in these cities.

Interviewer: How many of the teachers had outside sources of