History interview with Mr. Holmes W. 

Frederick, class of 1927, conducted by Marilyn Summers on the 12, 15, and 97 at his home in Greenville, South Carolina. The subject of this interview is his life and his days at Georgia Tech. Mr. Frederick, thank you so much for letting us visit you. It's a pleasure. 

Beautiful, sunny winter day in South Carolina, and we're happy to be here, and we're looking forward to hearing your story. 

Shall we begin? 

Where did it begin? 

Well, my story began in 1905 in Talbotton, Georgia, T-A-L-B-O-T-T-O-N. I was born there in my grandfather's home. We lived in Atlanta until my father died when I was seven. A few years later, my mother remarried, and we moved out to Seattle, Washington. Far away. Yeah. Then down to San Antonio, Texas. Then to Washington, D. C. He was in the service. I went to school at those various places, grammar school. In Atlanta, it was the old I can't remember the name of the school. I'll think of it in a minute. We had classes, I remember, in the annex of the building out in the back. The restrooms were out in the backyard and on rainy days it meant a lot of muddy feet. I bet it did. And then I went to school in Tarleton, Georgia again after that, after we lived in Washington. That was at the end of the war, World War I. Went to grammar school, the last year of grammar school down there in high school. Oh, you went to high school down there? 

Went to high school down there. 

Were those the days of three -year high school or four-year? 

Well, they were four years, but they cut off one of the grades in grammar school. Oh, I see. It was four years, but you only had seven years of elementary. Seven years of grammar school, yes. 

So you were a young man when you were finished with high school then? 

Oh, yeah. Yeah. About 17. I thought I was awfully old. 

And how did you make up your mind you were going to go to Georgia Tech? 

I think it's because my father spoke to me about that a number of times. 

When he was still living, he had a disinfectant company, Frederick Disinfectant Company, on North Street, just beyond where the Coca-Cola Company is now. 

At his death, the ownership of the company went to his partner, and they continued to operate under that name, oh, right up until the 30s or 40s or somewhere up in there. 

You were just a small child, and yet you can still remember talking to him and being influenced by him. Oh, yes. As a matter of fact, my memory is better for that time than it is now. And your dad made you think about Georgia Tech? 

Mm-hmm. He said, that's where you'll go someday. Oh, he did tell you that. No, I was bound and determined to go. 

An idea was planted, huh? 

My various uncles, my mother had five sisters, and all of their husbands were my uncles, tried to get me to go to law school, but I was bound and determined to go to engineering school. You were going to follow dad's wishes, huh? 

Did you know you wanted to be an engineer? 

Yeah. Oh, sure. Had an aptitude for it? 

Well, I thought I did. And you did, obviously. 

Well, I don't know. 

What do you remember about going into school? 

I mean, what do you remember about that time? 

Well, I remember going up on the train from Togleton and getting off and going over into the Swan Darnatory, getting in there at night, and finding that I was rooming with two other boys in a room that was built for one. Oh, really? 

So you were going to be close. It was close. Close roommates. Those little rooms were not very big. 

And was that your first? 

Well, you had traveled a good bit, but was that your first? 

I haven't traveled around. That was the first time I went to Georgia Tech. 

Well, I traveled by myself, too. Oh, you had? 

Yeah. 

So you were seasoned. Made trips across the country on trains. 

Well, what did you think when you ended up in that little room in that dormitory? 

I don't know that I thought anything, to tell you the truth. I just accepted things as they were and went on from there. That would have been, what, 1923? 23. What was life like at Georgia Tech? 

Well, actually, that was 1922. It was in the fall of 1922 that went up there. And what was life like in those days? 

Well, it's kind of hard to tell. There was a difference in the physical aspects of the place. A lot of the buildings that are there now, most of them, I guess, were not there at that time. 

Just life in general, what was it like? 

What was Atlanta like? 

Were there good times? 

It was after the war. 

Well, it was right after the war. 

So, but financially, were people managing all right? 

I suppose so. Wasn't it a hardship for you to come? 

Well, it wasn't easy. 

So it was a sacrifice. No. My mother and my stepfather were divorced about that time, a little before. And she didn't have too many sources of income at that time. 

So it was a sacrifice. 

But you could go to school for, oh, a whole year with minimal rent and that sort of thing for $700, $800 a year against, what, $20,000 now, $10, whatever it is. 

So you started out actually in the Swan Dormitory, but then later moved. Did your mom move back up to Atlanta? 

Yes, she moved to Atlanta. We had a house there, and I lived there in the house. About a year and a half, and then I moved over to the dormitory. I mean, to the fraternity town school. 

Now, school was a social adventure for you in addition to academics. It was, and I was not a very good social critter. You weren't? 

No. It looked like you were doing pretty good with all the things you joined. I was sort of timid and bashful in those days. 

I just hadn't been around very much, you know, a little country town high school where you know everybody, and everybody's business, things that they did and didn't do and all that sort of thing. 

So now that you were in the big city, it was different. In the big city, and I just didn't know which way to go. 

So I just went whichever way the wind blew. It was a random thing for you. 

Now, you had played in the band before, had you? 

No, I had learned to blow a horn, I put it that way, when I was in high school. And so I joined the band when I went to Tech. And Frank Roman was leading it. We had our practices up in the old YMCA building. What do you call it? 

The administration? 

That's not it. We call it the Alumni-Faculty House. Alumni-Faculty House in the second floor that used to be sort of a meeting room up there. And there still is. 

And then they stopped us from doing that and we went over and practiced under the east stands, concrete blocks looked like on the side of the steps, and the reverberations were terrible. Oh, my. And the band sounds were terrible. 

And old Frank Roman would stand up there on the box, he's a little short fella, and beat on the lectern there with his drumstick that he used as a baton and break the drumstick Trying to make the gang stop while he told us what we should have done back at Measure So-and-so. Was it a good group? 

Yes, we had over 100 or more in there. Very large group then. 

And when we would travel, go to out -of-town football games and things of that sort, we usually cut it down to about 40. Did you get to travel? 

Yeah, a little bit. A little bit? 

So he was a little mad trying to control a hundred. Oh, he had a hard time, but he was up to it. All male students, too, because there were no women around in those days to be playing. No, not in the regular school. They were in what we call a night school. 

I think that's, what is that now, Southern Tech or something like that? 

That's turned into Georgia State. Georgia State, yeah, but at that time it was a school of commerce at night. Did you ever come across those women at all? 

No. No, never saw them. No, saw them. they all met downstairs downtown so here you were all a hundred of you guys underneath the stadium blowing your brains out and then we'd get out on the field and march and that was a lot of fun too we practiced on I think it must have been Spring Street which is not cut through at that time or one of those streets and it had a lot of potholes in it and we would march along there trying to read the music that was on it and you step in a pothole and knock your front teeth out it was a lot of fun it was fun honey but we learned how to do it and you learned how to play the rambling wreck oh no it is frank told me one time when he was cutting my hair but um he'd gotten that stole it from some opera i can't remember right now what it was the the basic tune of that i asked and got the sound of it. It sounded very much like an opera thing. And he said, yeah, he just took that and put that to the music. 

Well, he was astute enough to register it and copyright it. And goodness knows everybody loves it now. Oh, yes. It's been around for a long time. 

Now, you said he was cutting your hair. He was a barber, too. He was a barber. 

Where was his barber shop? 

Down in the basement of the same building we're talking about, the alumni building. Uh-huh. The old YMCA. 

So did he cut every guy's hair on campus? 

No, I don't think so. 

But you went to him, huh? 

Yes, I did. How much did it cost to get a haircut in those days? 

I imagine 25 cents. I don't remember, really. 

And that wasn't conflict of interest for him to be cutting hair and teaching men at the same time? 

No, no. He'd talk, talk, talk all the time. He had the best time. Did you like him? 

He was a friendly fellow? 

Very nice. Awfully nice. And his son was one of the best trumpeters I ever heard. Really? 

In school, I mean. 

So his son was in school with you? 

Yes, he was in school and in the band. Oh. And he was good. He was really good. I wonder what ever happened to him. I don't know. Don't know about him. I haven't heard anything of him or from him. I just don't know. Don't know. Besides the band, the Georgia Tech band, you also were part of the Marionette band. 

Now, who directed that? 

I can't remember. It wasn't Mr. Roman, though? 

No. No. I was in it for just that one play. About one half year, I guess you'd call it. You called the play The Seven Veils. The Seven Veils, yes. And did they travel with that? 

I don't know. You don't remember? 

I never did. I don't think they did. I think they just had it in Atlanta. Where were the performances for that? 

Where would you go? 

It was up on Peachtree, somewhere. I can't recall. I almost think it was the Fox Theater, but I don't believe the Fox Theater was built at that time. It wasn't, but there were other theaters that were along there, so. 

Well, it was one of those theaters that were up in that section. 

And it was all Georgia Tech performers that were in the play? 

They had a slogan that all of our girls are boys, and all of them are nice girls. 

So they had to advertise that to get the guys to come out for one. There were no women in school, so they just had them pretend they were. And that was a real orchestra, huh? 

Yes, we had a pretty good orchestra. I guess about seven, eight pieces. Maybe nine, I don't know. 

Well, that's wonderful. 

And there was a chap, a young fellow who lived close to downtown, who wrote a lot of the music for him for that thing. It was a musical play. Happy memory, huh? 

Happy memory. Yeah. What else was going on on campus? 

Did you ever go to any classes? 

Yes, we did. Tell me. And some of them were interesting and some of them I slept through. 

I remember one in thermodynamics, bless their hearts, they tried to teach us all about thermodynamics in one term. 

The next year after I left there they put it in two terms and I understand they're doing it in four but anyway. 

We had our class right after dinner at one o'clock And, of course, for dinner, we always had to have a main meal at dinner. I was at that time eating in a boarding house where we could buy a meal ticket for $5. For the whole month, or for the week, or for how long? 

I'd forgotten what it was, a week, I think. I know it was less than that. It must have been a month. 

So you could get your money's worth for sure. Oh, Lordy. And we'd go in there and stuff ourselves and then go up and sit in that classroom. Of course, there was no air conditioning in those days. 

And the window would be open and the sun beaming in and you see this fellow on the bench kind of gnawed a little bit and this one over here was bright and then that one would drop off and then this next one would drop off and then I'd drop off. Who was the professor? 

Do you remember? 

I can't remember his name. 

He was one of these perennial professors, I think, when he graduated there with honors or something of the sort. He just went on back to teaching. And he knew the whole thing just completely by rote. Never varied his voice at all. Keep on going and right up on the blackboard. 

So he could hypnotize you very easily. Oh, it was easy. 

But some of the classes were quite interesting. I was really quite interested in a lot of them. What do you remember? 

Oh, mechanical engineering. Dr. King was head of that. Incidentally, I was just noting in the blueprint there this morning that I was reading. He was one of the few that had a doctorate at that time. In those days, yeah, it wasn't required, so. No. He was an accomplished mechanical engineer. 

That's right, and the standard professorial salary was $3,000 a year, and I don't know what the poor instructors got. Less than that for sure. 

There was one fellow in the physics department, in the chemistry department, excuse me, who was one of the best teachers I ever saw. He was getting along in years, gray hair a little bit, and shiny pants. We called him Mr. Shiny Pants, because I think he wore the same ones all year long. And I don't know what, I bet his salary was less than a thousand dollars. Oh my. You wonder how they survived, huh? 

Well, things didn't cost as much. Yeah. Students had a way of giving names to professors, didn't they? 

Oh yes, yeah. Do you remember any of the other ones? 

Oh, one of them we called Scary Jesus. Really? 

Yeah. I don't remember hearing that. 

He wouldn't face away from the class because the tradition was that if he faced the backboard, people would throw erasers at him. They wouldn't really, would they? 

Yeah. Y'all would throw things? 

Oh, my goodness. 

So he would stand up right on the backboard. 

Backwards? 

Because he didn't want you to throw things at him, huh? 

I'm not sure that I have that nickname straight, but it was something about that. Something like that, yeah. 

Do you remember in those days, did you have to take shop class or? 

Yes, we did, and it was under the old dispensation. 

That is, instead of going in and getting a card and the things that you do and all that kind of thing, we were taken in and gathered around the tool bin, which was a place. place almost as big as these two rooms. And the head of the shop stood back there and told us what to do. 

Well, we didn't have any idea what it was all about. 

So then they assigned us to machines. I was assigned to a metal cutting lathe. Something you had never seen before. Never seen it. I didn't know what in the world it was all about. And the assistant to the shop manager, came around and told us what to do. 

And incidentally, that fellow knew all the names of the people in that class, and I'm sure he did of the other classes that met all the time, after the second class that we held. He was a quick study. He was. He came around and he'd ask your name and you'd tell him. He'd tell you what it was. And 25 years later, I happened to see him outside. He was retiring that day. And I told him who I was, but he didn't, he knew me. And he told me about things that had happened that I didn't remember. What was his name? 

Do you remember? 

No, I can't recall right now. Maybe it'll come back to you later. Yes, it might. 

What did you make in the shop? 

What was your project? 

Well, we just did little exercises for the most part. 

And then toward the latter part of it, this is our senior year, we were allowed to make either a drill press or a motor, electric motor. I attempted to make an electric motor. Attempted? 

Does that mean it never finished? 

No, we didn't. I got this thing all wound and all that sort of thing, electrically, I mean, wiring. 

But the bearings did not arrive in time. 

So I left mine with one of the other students who was going to be there during the summertime. To finish it up for you. 

So you never got your motor back? 

No, I never did. They're nice things to have today. A lot of people cherish those things. 

Well, I don't know. That one probably wouldn't have worked all that time anyway. 

Now, did you have to go to shop every year? 

Was that required? 

You always had a shop class? 

Because I heard you say you were a senior. That was, yes I was. That was in machine shop. We had to go to wood shop one term. I've forgotten. I think that was our sophomore year. And I liked it so much that I took another half if you have it. Just on my own. That was a lot of fun. Yeah, something you were interested in. Old Uncle Heine was there. He was still there. He was there. In fact, he was there some years later, too. Professor Heinecke. Do you remember him? 

Oh, I surely do. Yes, I did a lot of little odds and ends of work for him. He had a job, sort of a project on, built a little office in the corner of this big old shop. The floor was raised and he wanted to put an inlaid Georgia Tech seal in that thing. It was an oak floor and he put it in with holly and some darker wood walnut, I suppose it was. and I helped him with a half dozen or more other boys too putting that thing in. It was a lot of fun. 

So you actually cut the pieces out and laid them into the floor. You had to route out the floor. It must have been beautiful. It was. I saw it some years later. I wonder whatever happened to it. I don't know. Was he a nice man? 

He was the principal man. Awfully nice. We'd get mad at him when he would give his talk about the lobster being smarter than we were. Tell me about that. 

Well, they were pretty careful about boys getting the fingers in the saws and that sort of thing. 

He would give a talk to them early in the period and he'd tell about the lobster being so smart and we were so dumb. He took a, break a cloth and he could grow another, we couldn't grow another hand. It kind of got the point across though, didn't it? 

It surely did. Made people be more careful. Yes. It was a lot of fun. The more intellectual classes I found reasonably interesting for the most part. 

Did you have drawing, mechanical drawing? 

Yes, we did in the old drawing building as they called it. And we made blueprints, too, in the sunshine. 

So many people said that, I've heard them say that mechanical drawing was hard, it was challenging, that they were hard on you. 

How did you feel about that? 

Well, fortunately, there was one fellow in my class who was real bright, and he taught me the things that I was supposed to do. I couldn't understand what the instructor was saying. 

I think he was one of these sort of, I don't know, I can't say it exactly, sort of frustrated kind of man. He was a middle man for you, in other words, aren't you? 

Well, he was sort of frustrated. 

He had written a little thing, a little seven by five booklet on what to do, you know, what And he put it in language that I couldn't understand. I didn't know what he was talking about. 

So I got this other fellow named Jabez Whittlesey. 

Well, that's an interesting name, isn't it? 

Yes. He was in our class, and he was one of the smartest ones in there. And he told me what was to do, you know. 

So in your language? 

In my language. And then after— And I had a lot of fun with it. I enjoyed it. That was good. 

But in those days we would write or draw on a piece of drawing paper which was a heavy beige color, quite thick, and used a hard pencil and we practically engraved the thing in there. Then put a sheet of transparent tracing cloth, we called it. 

It was a fine linen cloth with a kind of stuff that had been soaked in and dried so that you could see through it, put it down on top, and then you'd finish off copy of what you had on the pencil drawing and this with ink. And then that would be used as a blueprint to make blueprints. It sounds beautiful. It was really a work of art, then, to do that. Well. You didn't think of yourself as an artist. I've had an awful lot of patience, anyway. Yeah. Yeah, I bet it did take a lot of patience. And that blueprint machine was cylindrical, vertical, about eight inches, ten inches in diameter. 

And you'd wrap a piece of, you'd put your drawing in there and then put a piece of translucent, no, you'd put the paper in there as a sort of negative paper. paper and then the tracing over the top of that put it out in the sun for a certain length of time. And it really would make a, you know, a blueprint. And that would photograph it on this, what it was. Then you'd have to take and wash it out, of course, and all that stuff. 

So you, it was more than just creating the drawing, it was creating a whole series of things. How interesting. 

Well, see, well that was kind of old-fashioned even at that time. 

But still very interesting what the process was. Along about that time, just before you graduated, they were building the Biltmore Hotel. 

Do you remember ever having any opportunities to? 

Yes, that was built, I think, it must have been around by 1923. They were starting to build it then. Yeah, it opened in 26, I believe. 

So I wondered, did you ever get any opportunities to? 

Yes, I was in there several times. and across the street from it was to build more apartments. I think that had been there a little bit longer. I'm not sure which was the first. Some of the Georgia Tech students surveyed and blueprinted and worked on that project. Oh, did they? 

You didn't get a chance to do that? 

No, no. 

All I saw was, well, I'd go up there and catch a train, a streetcar, or hook a ride on an automobile someone would take me all out Poncelain Avenue to when I was going home when I was living out there on Ripley Drive. 

Well you had time for some social life did you not? 

Yes we'd go to dances once in a while and the boys from fraternities would flock around to the The girls housed it sometimes. Flock around. That's interesting. Yeah. They'd get an automobile full of about five or six of us, and we'd go around to see somebody. And then we'd stay for a little while, and then off to see somebody else. Oh, so that. The girls would stay at home and act as hostesses. 

So they could entertain the Georgia Tech guys that were coming, huh? 

Yeah, that's right. Great fun. Great fun. It was a lot of fun. And, well, we had the dances, too. Mr. Frederick, tell me a little bit about a dance, the dances you remember. 

Well, I never was much of a dancer. I always had two left feet. 

But we went to dances. There were the paid dances that we would have to pay a dollar for to go to. And the different places, there was, well, I can't remember the names of them. Then there was the Panhellenic dance, which came at the end of the year. That was the big dance, so far as the school was concerned. And I went to a couple of those. They had big bands, Cone? 

You know, I can't remember the orchestra to save my life. 

But you know it was a big deal. It was a big deal. I mean, everybody got really dressed up for that, didn't they? 

It was fancy. 

Well, they dressed up in tuxedas and things for that sort. We thought that was being quite dressed up. It's very dressed up. Yeah, yeah. And then there were the house dances, as you call them. 

The fraternity houses would have a dance, and then another would have one somewhere, and you'd go to a few of those. 

Were you polishing up your social skills by this time, by the time you were a junior? 

Oh, by the time I was a junior or senior, it wasn't quite as painful as it had been before. Tell me a little bit about that now. didn't you say your mom let you borrow a car yes she had a model t coupe and she let me drive it read generous about it and that that was a lot of fun and that's the way i met carolyn made you a popular fellow tell us about carolyn how'd you meet her well a friend of mine whom whom I'd known since we were infants, was going with Carolyn at that time. Quite enamored of her, I think. 

And so he thought it'd be a good idea if he would introduce me to her so that I could come around and take him and her and another girl to the shows. One thing or another. 

So did he fix you up with a blind date then? 

Oh, yeah. Oh, okay. 

So you were just going to be the chauffeur. That's right. 

So all four of us piled into this coop. You know, those things weren't about this wide. And we were stacked about three deep. We were young and healthy. It was a lot of fun. 

Well, that was about all of that. 

Well, when did you realize that maybe you might be interested in Carolyn just as much as he might be? 

I think it was a year after I got out of school. You went back and looked her up? 

Mm-hmm. 

Now, Carolyn was going to Agnes Scott. She went to Agnes Scott, yes. It was? 

Well, during my senior year, she would come into town. She lived in Atlanta. Her parents lived there. And because of that, she could come in and bring some girls with her. Otherwise, Agnes Scott was right strict in those days. The girls had to be in there by sundown. By sundown? 

Yeah, yeah. Daytime dates only. 

And they weren't allowed to play the Victrola record of Tonight You Belong to Me because that was naughty. You remember that, huh? 

Yeah. 

So they would come in, and usually there were three or four of them at our house. 

So we would just sort of gravitate down there a little bit. And have a good time. And have a good time, just sort of gathering around. 

And in between times, this friend of mine and Carolyn and her neighbor would go to shows and sit up in the peanut gallery and watch the plays. The student prints and things of that sort. Oh, regular shows, theater productions, not movies necessarily. 

Yeah, we'd go down and stand on the side of the old, I can't remember the name of the theater now, downtown somewhere. and go around to the other side of it, and then they'd open up the door, and we'd go up these stairs, and way up to the peanut. It was sloping about a 45 degree. I was always afraid I'd fall out of that. You were going to fall right out of the theater top. 

Well, we had a good view of the tops of the heads of the. Of all the performers. You could hear all right. It was all right. 

So that was a pretty rich cultural life that you're taking in the theater and going to dances. It was a happy time, wasn't it? 

Yes. Yes, it was. I think for the most part, the students at that time had a pretty good time. 

You mentioned you were lucky enough to borrow your mama's car, but there weren't a lot of cars on the campus at the time. Tell me the story about one of the professors that you remember who had a car. 

When I was living with my mother in Atlanta, we would go up to the corner of Peachtree and Piedmont Avenue and catch a ride or get on a streetcar and go out home. And there was one professor, and I can't remember whether it was Dr. Fields or one of the others, mechanical engineering department. I can't remember the name of the car now. One of them is extinct now. 

Anyway, he was bragging about how that thing had a conical clutch in it and he liked it because he could get across the street in a hurry. He said he didn't like to pause when he was going across. 

So he would sit on the side of it, and when he was ready to go, he'd rev the engine up and slip his foot off the clutch, and that car would jump across the street. It didn't have to even touch the ground, huh? 

It would just shoot out. You felt that way when he ended. Do you ever remember Dean Skiles? 

Was he around in those days? 

Dean Skiles was. Dr. Britton? 

Dr. Britton. Did you ever come across them in your? 

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah? 

Yeah. Yeah. Was the student able to approach somebody of that stature? 

Yes. They were not difficult to approach. And I think it was Dr. Fields who went with us in our senior year up to Tallulah Falls. The mechanical and electrical engineers were students, were invited to come up there. 

If we could raise the fare to go up on the train, it cost $11. 

And sometimes we couldn't do it, and one of the professors, the instructors, we wanted to go, and he couldn't raise it either, so we collected 1,100 pennies for him. Oh, my goodness. Anyway, we went up there and stayed at the Cliff House, which was still, it burned later. And they had built the dam up there by this time. The place down below it was just a trickle of water because most of the water went around. We went in through the power plants and things of that sort. It was a lot of fun. An outing, a field trip or whatever they call it. Definitely an outing. Yeah, there's a lot of, we had a lot of pleasure. 

Anyway, one thing about this festival, we were walking down to the power plant for Tallulah Lake, and it was about, oh, I guess a mile or so away from the Cliff House where we spent the night. We walked down the road, and then we cut across country, and it was up and down over the ribs. A lot of underbrushes, kind of hard going. I remember some of those big old football players were in there just blowing, all puffing and tarred. Of course, the field was way out in front up on things. Oh, it's wonderful. Isn't it grand to be out there? 

He was the character, wasn't he? 

He was. Did y'all call him Billy Goat to his face or was that no? 

No. It was definitely Professor Field. Oh, yes, yes, it was. It definitely was. Yeah, it's a wonderful story. 

Now, most of those professors were, and instructors, were quite, quite approachable. You felt like they were there to help you? 

Mm-hmm. It was tough going to school. 

There were a few of them that were a little standoffish and didn't seem to like to be bothered by the students, but not many. That was the exception rather than the rule. 

So for the most part you felt pretty comfortable being there with them? 

I really can't remember how any of them that weren't, if you went to them in the right way. They were all right. 

Was George Griffin around? 

He wasn't Dean yet, but was he around in those days? 

Yes, he was coaching baseball, I think, and track, if I'm not mistaken, and also teaching mathematics. Oh, he was teaching? 

Mm-hmm. 

Ah, so did you ever come across him in your travels? 

Yes, it was one year in taking calculus, I think, in which we had him for a short time. 

It was a time when a professor had apparently failed to show up for one reason or another, and they just rung in a lot of different people. That was a bad year for me in mathematics. You remember it well? 

I sure do. I somehow can't imagine Dean Griffin teaching mathematics, but he did, huh? 

That's my memory of it. I may be wrong on that thing after a while. After all, things do shift around a little bit. 

He called himself a sackbrain because he said he could never remember anything, so I wonder how you remember the numbers. 

Now, you managed to make yourself captain of the ROTC, too. You were involved in that while you were there. 

Well, I didn't do it. Did you enjoy ROTC? 

Yes, I did. I really enjoyed it. And, of course, playing in the band, I just automatically stayed in anyway. I mean, so we didn't have to. 

But we had to take the first two years. ROTC and we liked it. I enjoyed it. For one thing they paid us. They did. They paid us nine dollars every three months. 

So it was worth your time. It may have been nine dollars a month. I don't remember now but anyway I saved it and we bought a motorcycle with it. You did? 

With your ROTC money? 

Good time? 

Well, we had fun. Another fellow and I put our money in together with it. And we bought an old Indian scout. And that thing was falling apart. Could you fix it yourself? 

Well, mostly, yeah. The chain would come off and the frame broke. Didn't take you very far, it doesn't sound like. 

But we started on several trips where we never did get off of it. Never? 

Never did. 

But it was around campus? 

You used it around the campus? 

Yeah. It was a lot of fun. It sounded like you had a lot of fun. It sounded like happy times, that's for sure. 

When we talk about those days and about the fact people were not worried about money as much because it was before the Depression. The Great War was over with. 

So everyone was kind of optimistic that things were. 

Well, you know, there was a depression in 1922. A minor. Oh, yeah. It was a minor one, yes, but it was major for some people. And the farming people had a hard time on that. Oh, did they? 

Cotton went down to about six or seven cents a pound and that sort of thing. 

But didn't Atlanta seem exciting and all revved up at that time? 

I don't know. Was it prosperity or good times? 

I really don't know. I didn't have that, I had a sort of a worm's eye view of it. 

You weren't a part of the social set? 

You weren't moving across the street? 

No, no, we didn't, I didn't know much about what was going on. I didn't pay any attention to it. I was often naïve. 

Well, and you were at football games playing and you were at marionette and you were at ROTC and you were in classes and you were. Oh, yeah, we were in classes. Social, yeah, you did a lot of things. You had a busy life. 

I'll tell you one thing I remember about that old administration building, the one with the steeple on it. We had classes two times up in that thing. There were several, there were two levels up there. On cold days when the wind blew, it blew right through those bricks. 

And one time, or several times, I remember when it was blowing so hard that we had to hold our papers down on it. Really? 

If you blow off the thing, it's pretty porous. They didn't have any insulation in it, obviously. No insulation, not even any sealing. It was just a bare brick was there. 

So you had to hold your papers down. You made a nice filter kept the dust out as the wind came through. 

So it was clean wind, but you had to hold your papers down. 

Well, that must have kept you awake then. It did. It was probably not easy to fall asleep if a blizzard was going on. It did. No uncomfortable at all. 

We were talking about some of the places that you might have eaten at that time, and you said you didn't remember Frank Gordy's place particularly, but you had a friend that did. No. 

I think, for one thing, it was a little bit out of my way because when I went to the fraternity house, I cut down before you did it, and I think when I was living at home there, I don't believe it was there. 

Because it was over up on Lucky Street, towards the other end of the campus from where you were going. 

But you said you met a friend who told you he had worked there. Tell me that story. Chapped out in Anderson here. I ran into him 25 years ago, I guess, or more. He said that he had worked there when he first started, when he first started out. And he said that he had made some million or more peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. 

So it wasn't just hot dogs, it was peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I asked him if he didn't get tired of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, he said no. He says when I get hungry now I make for myself. He's still eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I guess that's been the staple of... I suppose so, but I never did know anything about it, to tell you the truth, while I was in school. 

You weren't aware of it at all? 

Usually when I had lunch, I'd go across, what was that street up there that ran into North Street and then north from there, right back of the Swan Dormitory. Cherry Street? 

Cherry, that's what it was. On the other side of Cherry Street were a number of small eating places. Was the robbery there in those days? 

Yeah, they didn't call it that. They called it the bookstore, and it was just down in the basement of the tower there, I think. Yes, it was. Yeah. They didn't go eat there? 

They didn't have anything to eat there. Oh, they didn't in the 20s? 

Later times they started serving. 

All they had was a long counter, and you could go in there and buy drawing paper and sometimes books and things like that. 

So just between your boarding house and the fraternity house and whatever, you had plenty to eat. It wasn't a hardship to find places. Oh no, no problem finding a place to eat. We'd just find some, one was 15 cents and the other 20, we'd go to the 15 cent one. Every time. Do you remember graduation? 

I surely do. Tell us about it. 

Well, the graduation was held on the campus, oh, fairly close to where the old library was. 

As you stood on North Street and looked at the cross-campus administration buildings to the right of the administration building, the Carnegie Building, that's right. And it was set up outdoors. boys. We graduated there. I think there were about 300 people graduated. Oh, pretty good graduating class. Yeah. 

About it, someone told us when we went in there, I remember as a freshman, we sat down and the fellow says, well, now you boys look to your right and look to your left, and said, those two fellows are not going to be here since you graduated. 

Was it true for you? 

Well, that was about true because we had just about one -fourth of the many in the freshman class. Even less than he said. Yeah, between 250 and 300. We had about 1,000 in the freshman class. What did you think you were going to do with that degree? 

I didn't know. I didn't have a first clue. You did. You followed your dreams and got that degree, but you didn't know how it was. Then I scrounged around and got a job with the Detroit Edison Company. Detroit? 

Uh-huh. You went up to Michigan? 

Yeah, that's where I went. 

Did they come and recruit you? 

Well, there was a fellow that came down and talked to the group, and it was through him that I got the job. 

So you moved away right off the bat? 

Right off the bat. I went on up to Detroit. Stayed there a few years, and then sort of got on the scholastic circuit. 

I was not scholastic either, but I went over to work at Harvard University, the buildings and grounds department. And from there over to Cornell, from Cornell to Columbia University. Wow, you had a very interesting... Yeah. And then... Don't go by this too fast. We want to talk about it. 

But first, what about Carolyn? 

You left her back in Atlanta? 

Yes, and then she went down to Miami and got a job as an advertising manager for of a Burdines department store down there. She had a good job. She was making a lot more money than I was. And you were up in Detroit. Were you keeping in touch with her? 

Well, I did, not particularly, but just a little bit. She came up there to visit with her uncle and aunt one time, and I saw her. And then by the time I moved over to Boston area, I got a little more interested. Made a couple of trips to Miami. 

Uh-huh, did a little courting, a little serious courting, huh? 

Yeah, a little long-distance courting. Yeah, opposite ends of the United States. She finally agreed to come on up and stick around. She has ever since. Isn't that great? 

That's great. What year did you get married? 1933. 1933. And you were up in the—now, first you went to Harvard, you said. Buildings, what were you doing? mechanical engineering job? 

Yes. I was an assistant to, let's see, at Harvard. 

I was an assistant to the man who was in charge of the mechanical part of it, that is heating and that sort of thing. 

Now, why did they hire a Georgia Tech man? 

I don't know. You don't know? 

I don't have the slightest idea. 

They called me and asked me to come over there and I talked to the people at Detroit, the way I was working, and they couldn't give me any advice. 

So I just went on to see what was happening. 

So there you were at Harvard. And then you said you went on to Columbia too? 

I went to Cornell next. Yes, this was after our first child was born. 

So you stayed a few years with Harvard? 

Oh, I was four, five years, six years. And Cornell and then down to Columbia. 

And each time you were working as a mechanical engineer in the actual facilities of these famous schools. 

Well, at Cornell, I went over there to take the place of a man who was in charge of a lot of stuff. 

Said he was not very well, but as soon as I got there, he got well, took the strain off of him a little bit. And then I went on down to Columbia as assistant director of the department. Of? 

Mechanical engineering? 

Buildings and grounds. Buildings and grounds. Yeah, the whole thing. 

So you were specializing in keeping these. 

Now these are old, old schools, weren't they? 

Did they need, they needed a lot of attention? 

Well, they had a number of new buildings. Harvard particularly had a lot of new buildings. And of course a lot of old ones too. A lot of old ones. Yeah, but they had residential halls were all quite near at that time. 

Now what did a southern mechanical engineer think about living up in the coal country? 

I just decided to like it. You did? 

Yeah. Good for you. 

But when I was at Columbia, sort of the gloss had worn off a little bit and I got thinking about it and I just decided I didn't want to die in a snowstorm. And it could happen. It could happen. I want to come back down here, so. And by this time you and Carolyn had a child, you said? 

Well, yes, I had two of them by that time. 

Well, one of them lives now. The older one lives in St. Mary's, Maryland. It's about 75 miles south of Washington. And the younger one lives in Kingsport, Tennessee. And they are boys, girls? 

What are they? 

Girls. You had two girls. Yeah, we had to marry our boys. You married them. Okay. Two girls, and the girls' names are? 

Lynn is the oldest one, and Peggy is the youngest. 

Okay, so Lynn and Peggy. And then Mom and Dad decided they better come back south. Yeah. 

And what did you come back to? 

What did you decide to do? 

Well, I turned around and found a job opening at J. U. Serene Company in Greenville here. here. And I came down here and stayed ten years with them. Went with Lockwood Green in Spartanburg and stayed ten years with them. And I guess I was down here about twelve years. Anyway, then retired up there. From Lockwood Green? 

Lockwood Green, the ripe old age of 66. 

But you had already put in a lot of years of mechanical engineering. 

So I wasn't ready, quite ready to quit entirely so I did a little consulting work after that but I finally decided just too much sugar for a dime. Too much sugar for a dime. When you think about the advice your daddy gave you, was it good advice? 

I think so. I think so. 

Everybody likes mechanical engineers better than lawyers anyways, don't they? 

You never hear ***** things about mechanical engineers. 

So your uncles were never disappointed? 

Oh, and they never did say anything about it. I remember one of them in Atlanta, my father's brother said, I never hired a Georgia Tech man. Oh, he said that. Yeah, he never did tell me why. Maybe he had done once and he didn't like it. Maybe, oh, I don't know. Maybe he was fond of that other school, that other Georgia school. No, I don't think so. You don't think so? 

That's where most of the lawyers came from, you know. 

Well, he wasn't a lawyer. Oh, he wasn't a lawyer. No, he wasn't. This one wasn't. He just wanted you to be a lawyer. 

But you made the right choice. I think so. And you have grandchildren? 

Yes, both girls have two children. Of the lot, there are three girls and one boy and grandchildren. And the boy is married, and he has two children. 

So you have great-grandchildren, too. We talked earlier about the confusion in your name, Mr. 

Holmes Frederick, not Frederick Holmes, and you told me when you moved to the Boston area, it was a problem all your life. Tell me about the Boston area. 

Well, around the Boston area, Holmes is a last name, of course. I was named for my father, and my father was named for a friend of his father, Dr. Holmes Russell, who was a Navy doctor. And how he and Grandpa got friends, I don't know. You don't know. Anyway, that's the way it came about. 

But when you got to Boston. When I got to Boston, people called me Freddy Holmes. They just couldn't deal with it. Couldn't stand it. No matter how many times you said it. 

Well, so you absorbed the stature of the Holmes family while you were in Boston. That's right. 

Well, Mr. 

Frederick, when you look back at it, you're happy with your decision to have been a mechanical engineer. Yes, I often think about what a man who was in the insurance business told me. 

He said that all the time you're making little decisions, you don't want to know you're making them, really. 

He said, but once in a while you come to a really important decision, as though you're standing here and your road is forking off that way, and you've got to decide which one to take. 

He said, I always decide that the one I took is right, because if I'd gone on the other one, I might have fallen in the ditch and gotten killed. 

That's exactly so, isn't it? 

So whatever I've made a final big decision, I've decided it's right and it stays right. And it's been so. I think that's the correct way to look at it. Otherwise, you'd be wishing all the time. To change things, yeah. All that wasted energy, huh? 

Well, your stories have been very, very pleasant for us to listen to. We've enjoyed hearing about them. 

Well, it's also nice of you to come and stir up all these old memories. Stir up the old memories. We've enjoyed it. We thank you so much for taking the time with us today. It's been a pleasure. Thank you, sir. You're good.