Oral history interview with Matthew and Caroline Tiger

Milligan: This is Sarah Milligan with the Oklahoma State University Library [Oklahoma] Oral History Research Program. I'm here at the Chilocco campus at the annual reunion. Today's date is June 1, 2018. I'm here talking with Matthew and Caroline Tiger. We're just going to talk about both of their time at Chilocco and why they're here together. (Laughter) Maybe individually you all can sort of figure out who wants to go first. I'd like a little bit of background information on each of you, so where you're from, maybe a little bit about your family, and that sort of thing. Caroline, I think you're getting volunteered to go first. I can see this.

C. Tiger: I'm from Wyoming, the Wind River Reservation. I'm Arapaho.

Milligan: Do you have any siblings?

C. Tiger: I have four brothers and five sisters. There's ten in our family. I'm 1:00the only girl left in my--. I have a brother, one brother left.

Milligan: Your surviving siblings?

C. Tiger: Yes.

Milligan: Okay. How about you, Matthew?

M. Tiger: I'm from Okmulgee, Oklahoma, and I'm full-blood Creek. I have three brothers: one's passed away, and I have two younger brothers. I come from kind of a small family, I guess you'd say. I guess the thing that's different about 2:00me is I was born and raised in a Christian home where I wasn't really exposed to a lot of the--. I know about my culture, but that wasn't the main thing in my life. That's kind of where I am. We have nine grandchildren, and we have two great-grandbabies. We have a daughter, our oldest daughter, she passed away a little over a year ago. That's kind of where we are right now.

Milligan: Okay. Let's talk a little bit about Chilocco. How did you all end up--that's another separate side I'm sure, but how did you all each end up at Chilocco? Do you want to go first, Caroline?

C. Tiger: I stayed with my sister in Washington; went to school there through 3:00the seventh grade. Then I met this girl. She told me about Chilocco, and she said she was going to go to school down here. She kind of talked me into it, and when I got back home to Wyoming, I asked my mom. We went ahead and filled some papers out, and then they accepted me. I come down here in 1963.

Milligan: Were you in the eighth grade then?

C. Tiger: I was a sophomore.

Milligan: Oh, you were a sophomore, okay.

C. Tiger: Yeah, I went to school in Washington.

Milligan: So how do you think that girl heard about Chilocco, that she was going 4:00to come down here?

C. Tiger: She never did tell me. I don't know. She just heard about it, I guess, and some of her friends come down here.

Milligan: So what did she say that made you want to go?

C. Tiger: I don't know. We just talked about it, and it was--. I liked going off to school. It was kind of scary at first, but getting down here, I got use of it and made a lot of friends.

Milligan: Do you remember coming down here for the first time?

C. Tiger: Yeah, my mom put me on the bus to come down here. I rode down here, and I got off at Ark City. Somebody come by and brought me here to Chilocco. I 5:00lived in the dorm. Home Three, I think it was. It was scary at first, but I got use of it and made some friends.

Milligan: What was scary about it at first?

C. Tiger: Being so big, and everything new. My friend Gloria, she was already here. There was some other girls from Wyoming that come down here. I knew them, but I didn't know they was down here.

Milligan: Were they from the same reservation you were from?

C. Tiger: Yes.

Milligan: So you did know people. You knew one person for sure that you were going to know.

C. Tiger: Yeah, then when I got down here, I found out there were some other girls that were down here from our reservation. I went to school the first year. 6:00My mom and my sister picked me up after school, and I come back the following fall. I was here until '66 and graduated.

Milligan: Okay, so you went back to Wyoming during summers, then?C. Tiger: Yeah.

Milligan: So was that the--it sounds like you spent some time with your sister somewhere else. Was this the first time you were going to school away from home, or had you done that before you came down to Chilocco?

C. Tiger: No, that was the first time. When I went to grade school, I went to a Catholic school in Wyoming, Saint Stephen's. I went there. Then I went to Mill Creek grade school until I got in the seventh grade. I went to stay with my sister in Washington.

Milligan: So when you were in seventh grade, you went to stay with your 7:00sister?C. Tiger: Seventh and eighth grade, then ninth grade. Then I come down here when I was a sophomore.

Milligan: What was interesting to you about coming to Chilocco versus staying in the school system you were at?

C. Tiger: I guess being--I used to get transferred to different schools. I liked to go in different schools and meet different people.

Milligan: Did you? That's interesting. I think a lot of people usually don't say, "I wish I could move more times in high school."

C. Tiger: Yeah, I went to Catholic boarding school, and then I went to grade school in Mill Creek. There was a little school at Ethete [Wyoming], so I was at different schools

Milligan: What about you, Matthew? How did you end up at Chilocco?

M. Tiger: I had made some not too good choices for myself. My mom and my dad 8:00tried to straighten me out and tried to get me on the right path, but I continued to make the wrong choices for a while. They said, "Maybe if you went to boarding school, that would help you." I didn't get into legal trouble or get thrown in jail or anything like that, but I was kind of rebellious and not being who I needed to be towards my parents. I wasn't mean to them, but I just didn't listen like I needed to. They thought that this might be a place for me to come and get the discipline that it seemed like I was lacking at the time. My dad filled out the papers. I got accepted, and I came to school here in 1964. I came here as a junior. I finished out that junior year here, and I graduated, also, 9:00in 1966. I got adjusted to it after a while. I think the biggest part that was hard for me was when I first got here. I didn't live that far away from here, but I hadn't been away from my parents.

The hardest part for me was to see my mom and dad leave me here and go back, and I had to stay here. That was difficult and took some time to get adjusted to that. After I was here for a while and made some friends and started getting some things lined out, it proved to be beneficial to me after I graduated. Some of the things that I learned while I was here, I still do. When I went to school here, we had details that we did. We worked. I used to work over there across 10:00the road in the chow hall. I would sweep and mop the floors, and clean up the milk dispensers and things like that. I had to keep my room clean, and we had to pass an inspection every day. I learned to wash my clothes and iron my clothes and things like that. I tell her, I don't do as much as I used to. I learned how to iron my clothes, so I can iron my clothes better than her.

Milligan: I'm sure she was critical of that, actually. (Laughs)

M. Tiger: I still help her make the beds. Some of the things that I learned while I was here I still try to put into practice, and I try to pass it on to my kids and grandkids. That's kind of how I ended up here.

Milligan: So it was tough for you to see your parents leave. Did they drive you 11:00onto campus?

M. Tiger: Yes. They brought me. My mom and dad didn't own a car, but they had a friend that owned a car. Actually, my mom didn't come. My dad brought me up here. That was pretty hard at that time. It took some time to get adjusted. I guess one of the things that I liked about being here was, like my wife said, all the friends that I made. I have friends sitting out there now that, one is from Florida. I can go different places and reconnect with somebody that I met here. I had friends all over the United States. It was good. Like I said, it just took some time to get adjusted to it.

Milligan: What was the hardest thing to adjust to?

M. Tiger: I think being away from home and having to do a lot of these things for myself. I didn't have my mom there to wash my clothes, and I didn't have my 12:00mom there to make the bed for me, and those kind of things that I had to learn for myself, which, like I said, helped me in the long run. It was strict here, but I got treated fairly. I can't speak for everybody, but, myself, I got treated fairly. It was good for me.

Milligan: Caroline, did you do work duty?

C. Tiger: Yeah.

Milligan: What did you do?

C. Tiger: I don't really remember what I did. Probably got hours for being late to breakfast or not going to breakfast.

Milligan: Oh, you had disciplinary work duties is what you're talking about.

C. Tiger: Yeah. (Laughter)

M. Tiger: You had details, too, didn't you?

Milligan: You had details?C. Tiger: Yeah, we had details, too.

Milligan: What was your detail that you did? Do you remember?

C. Tiger: Working in the dining room. They had a little café we used to work in. I don't remember the name of it, but the older students could go there and eat. It was just like a restaurant, but we worked in there cleaning up and washing dishes.

Milligan: So you were both in the food service area?M. Tiger: Pretty much.

Milligan: I had someone tell me earlier that as long as they weren't in the bakery, because those people had to get up early--.

M. Tiger: I think that's one of the things that I remember about my time here was we had to get up and go to breakfast. Not like her, we'd get up. We had a choice. When she was here, they had to go to breakfast or they would get the work detail, the extra duty hours if they didn't go to breakfast. We had a 14:00little bit of freedom in that way. It was kind of interesting.

Milligan: When did that change happen, then, from being required to go, to having some choice?

M. Tiger: For us guys, it was always here when I came, but when she was here, I think there was--. After we left there, they were still required to go to breakfast, for girls to go to breakfast. The boys didn't have to.

Milligan: Oh, it was boys versus girls for that, is what you're saying.

M. Tiger: Yeah.

Milligan: Oh. I thought, "Aren't you all there at the same time?" Oh, so that was the--.

M. Tiger: Breakfast was at six thirty, so some mornings, especially during the wintertime, you would--. My dorm was way down on the other end, Home Six, so we had to come over here and cross the road there. When you get up at six thirty in the morning in the middle of wintertime, it was very cold. You've got that cold air hitting you right in the face as you walked into the chow hall. I remember 15:00that part of it. I didn't really care too much for it, but it was okay after you got used to it.

Milligan: At least you were used to the weather. From Wyoming, I'm sure it's different weather to get used to. I know the heat's different down here than Wyoming. (Laughs) So did you all meet when you were here in school, then?

M. Tiger: Yeah, we met here the last part of our junior year. Her friend, the one she was talking about, Gloria was the one that introduced us. That was in our junior year. We stayed in contact during the summertime, writing letters and stuff like that.

C. Tiger: I did most of the writing. (Laughter)

M. Tiger: We came back in '65 and '66, and we graduated in May of 1966. Then we 16:00got married in June of 1966. This month we'll be celebrating our 52nd anniversary.

Milligan: Oh, my goodness, congratulations!

M. Tiger: Been together for a long time.

Milligan: Do you come back to most reunions?

M. Tiger: It's odd that you asked that. We live right here in Oklahoma, but for a long time, we didn't come to the graduation. I had the opportunity to go to work in Florida, for the Seminole tribe in Florida. My friend down there, the one I was talking about earlier, he would come up here. He invited us to come up here with him, and that's how we started coming. Every year, we try to come as often as we can. It's pretty fun to get to reconnect with people and reminisce about things, so it's good.

Milligan: So you all got introduced together, but how did you actually get to know each other on campus here? Was there social things that you got to do together? I don't even know. How do you date on the Chilocco campus? (Laughter)

C. Tiger: When they ask you to date you, they usually come pick you up, and then we'd go to a movie. There used to be a movie over there at the school, or to a dance. They had different activities you can do, but we never did leave the campus.

Milligan: So you get picked up at home and dropped off.

C. Tiger: Yes, you'd walk up there and check me out. We'd go to the movie, or we go to a dance or something.

Milligan: Did you have to really sign her out? What does that mean, "check me out"?

M. Tiger: She had to sign out that she was going out on a date. That's what she was talking about. I stayed down there at Home Six. Her dorm was down here at Home Five, so I had to walk down there and pick her up. We didn't have a vehicle; we just walked over there. We went to a movie over in the auditorium, and we would go to a dance at the old gymnasium. That was pretty much our dating time. We weren't allowed to see each other off the campus. Everything was pretty structured. They watched you here. They had a free time where you could be with your girlfriend or boyfriend there on what we called the oval, and you could socialize together then. Even then, they were watchful. If you got carried away with showing affection to each other, you got in trouble, (Laughter) those kinds of things. That's how we got together. It was interesting. Like I said, we've 19:00been together for a long time. It started right here. I guess that's probably one of the most rewarding parts about it was meeting her here. Like I said, we've been together for over half a century. (Laughs)

Milligan: Crossed that mark, yeah. So when you--I was thinking about this, too, with the oval. I can't remember if it was last year or the year before, that big tree that was out front fell over, like, the day before the reunion, maybe. I remember hearing people talking about that was a tree that couples used to hide behind, and there were all of these places that you could get away from prying 20:00eyes. (Laughter)

M. Tiger: Yeah. There were some bushes that I would see people sneak off behind, but even then, you would get caught.

Milligan: I'm sure the teachers knew which bushes to check. (Laughs)

M. Tiger: I guess we thought we was fooling them, but we wasn't fooling them. They been down that road before. We used to have, out there in the middle of the oval, there was that water thing that we used to socialize over there...

Milligan: Yeah, the fountain.

M. Tiger: --not only with each other but with other friends. We'd get together over there.

Milligan: The fountain is still out there; it's just not on right now.

M. Tiger: Yeah, right there.

C. Tiger: I remember when they used to clean it out and fill it up. They used to throw the girls in there. The boys used to throw them in there. She'd just be hollering and screaming. (Laughter) I got throwed in once.

Milligan: Did you? What do you do? Is there a way to retaliate against that?

C. Tiger: No. Nobody will help you. (Laughter) You've got all those boys dragging you to the fish pond. (Laughs)

M. Tiger: That was kind of a way of showing that they cared about you, when they did that. That's the way it was explained to us. If they did that to you, that showed you that they thought of you, enough that they put you in the water, as strange as it may sound. (Laughter)

Milligan: He liked you enough to dunk you in the water.

M. Tiger: Doesn't sound too cool, but that's the way it was explained to me. Sometimes guys would be sitting on the wall of the fountain out there, and some of the girls would come up and push the guys off in there, too. It wasn't just 22:00the girls. Sometimes the guys got pushed in there. I never seen no girl pick up a guy and throw him in there like they did the girls. I seen guys get pushed in there by other guys or even girls. It was fun.

Milligan: Did you all get in trouble from your teachers or the matrons or anything?

C. Tiger: No.

M. Tiger: No.

Milligan: No? They just expected it by that point?

M. Tiger: It was just something that they learned to accept. We had--I don't know if anyone's mentioned it to you, but when we were here, we used to have what they called a play day here. Did somebody mention that to you?

Milligan: I don't know if I'm thinking about the same thing. You explain it to me.

M. Tiger: I think it's usually in early spring or in the springtime of the year. They have a play area back in the woods back there. They would go back there and play ball and kind of hang out together and do some stuff. The girls would go to 23:00that play area from this way, and so the boys had to go that way so they were never--. They weren't allowed to mingle. When you got down there and the play day was over, you had come back that way. They allowed us that time to go down there just to socialize and play games and things like that.

Milligan: I've seen pictures and things of watermelon socials and things like that. Is that sort of--.

M. Tiger: Yeah. I think they used to have what they called ice cream socials and the watermelon--. Those days kind of happened when school first started back up. You would come early. Right before school started or right after school started, those things happened. It's pretty interesting.

Milligan: Yeah, it's interesting that you all had to go separate paths even to just get to the same--.

M. Tiger: Yeah, they didn't want the girls and the boys to end up doing things 24:00they shouldn't be doing, so they had them go different routes.

Milligan: Yeah, disappear in the woods on the way there.

M. Tiger: Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. There was always separateness, and that's probably a good thing.

Milligan: Did you all have separate eating space, or were you all mingled then?

M. Tiger: We had a boys' side and girls' side.

C. Tiger: The boys come on this side, and the girls on the other side.

Milligan: So you all could moon at each other from across the room? (Laughter)

M. Tiger: That was about it. In the chow hall on that side, they had what they called elementary students would come in that side. The high school kids would 25:00go on this side, and they would be on this end. It was interesting.

Milligan: So you all talked a little bit about some of the friendships that you made. I'm curious if you remember any of your--. Are there special memories with teachers or classes or anything like that? ... Having to think pretty hard about the school part! (Laughter)

M. Tiger: Did we have school? (Laughs)

Milligan: Why were we here? (Laughs)

M. Tiger: Why'd we come here? (Laughs)

C. Tiger: I remember Mr. [Leonard Hathcoat] in our sophomore--. He was a pretty good teacher. I liked him. I think he taught history. I'm not sure. And our matrons, the matrons.

Milligan: Do you remember some of the matrons?

M. Tiger: We had a guy that was a matron in the building that I was in. His last 26:00name was Mr. [William] Beaver. He worked the night shift, and he was the one that woke us up in the mornings to get up and go to breakfast and start cleaning your room and getting ready to go to school. He'd come around. I think it was about six o'clock or so he'd wake us up. You know how he would wake us up? He had a trash can, one of those old metal trash cans, and he had a big olʽ stick. He'd beat on the end of that and wake you up. He'd walk down the hall, and if you didn't get up, he'd come in your room and wake you up. I remember Mr. Beaver doing that. That was all a part of teaching us discipline, I guess you'd say. At the time it didn't seem like it, (Laughs) but that's what it was. It ended up being that. Cleaning your rooms and working the details and all, you was getting the structure and the discipline that you needed, that maybe for whatever reason 27:00you might not be getting at home. I remember that part. Like I said earlier, it helped me even today.

Milligan: You said that you came here because your parents gave you the strong suggestion maybe to come here because you were having some disciplinary problems. Do you think that this was the fit for you that you needed disciplinary-wise?

M. Tiger: Now that I look back on it, I think it was. At the time, it didn't seem like it. The longer I was here and the things that I had to be a part of, it worked out that way. I did get the discipline and the direction that I needed while I was here. I guess that's probably what I would put in my mind about this place. I guess it's what brings me back here, to come back--.

Milligan: Did either of you have family members that either came to Chilocco or another boarding school, or Indian boarding school, I guess, specifically?

C. Tiger: I had a couple nieces come here in the ʼ80s, I think, or ʼ70s.

Milligan: Seventies, so after you came. Did that have anything to do with you and your experience?

C. Tiger: No, I didn't even know they was coming. They came here. My sister went to--two of my sisters went to Haskell. Maybe that's where I learned about boarding schools.

M. Tiger: My older brother went to Haskell. I just thought of this. He went to 29:00school there, and then the brother next to me, he went to school there. My brother, my oldest brother, it was a high school when he went there. When my younger (the one next to me) brother went--they call it Haskell Indian Nations University now. That's what it was when he went. We had some relatives--I have a cousin that went to school at Haskell at the same time her sister was there.

Milligan: So I wonder why you all didn't end up at Haskell with this family--.

M. Tiger: I think a lot of it, too, was that Haskell was where all the kids went to school, so it was kind of booked up a lot. You had to get ahead of the game and get your paperwork and stuff like that in early just to get in. I think 30:00that's why I didn't go. We had talked about that with my parents, and come to find out that it was full.

Milligan: I see, so they had looked at other options besides Chilocco. Do you know how they settled on Chilocco for you?

M. Tiger: Not really. I think it was kind of like the last option because other schools were full, so I just signed up here. It was all right.

Milligan: For you, it was close to home, too.

M. Tiger: Yeah, it was close to home. I'm probably about two and a half hours away from here, not like her.

Milligan: Wyoming is quite a bit farther.

C. Tiger: Yeah. The only time we could go home was after the school year was out.

Milligan: Was it hard to convince your mom or anybody else to let you come down here? I know you said you went back and asked.

C. Tiger: Yeah. You'd get lonesome, especially during the holidays, to see your 31:00family. The kids that lived here in Oklahoma, close by, they could go home. The ones that lived out of state, they had to stay. It was kind of quiet.

Milligan: What did you do, for example, for Christmas if you were on campus? What were some of the things that you did?

C. Tiger: They had Christmas parties and a church service. I went to this Catholic church, and they used to have caroling. You could go caroling to different--. I guess the teachers that lived here, you could go to their house and sing. It was pretty fun. They had things to do for the kids, when they stayed here.

Milligan: I don't think that I quite have been able to understand, because there 32:00was several different--there's a lot of different denominations of students here. For example, you went to Catholic church. Did you have to go off campus for that, or did they bring service on campus?

C. Tiger: No, down there they used to have a Catholic church. Then they had Baptist, and they had different--Methodist, I guess.

Milligan: Oh, here on campus they had physical buildings for each of the different services?M. Tiger: They just used some of the buildings. They didn't have a church building for Methodists and Catholics. They just used some of the building space that was already there.

Milligan: Okay, so maybe there was a pastor or a priest assigned.

M. Tiger: Yeah, they came from town or someplace. They come out to do a service. I'm from the Baptist, so we had a place over here on the southwestern part of the campus. They had a upstairs area--that they used for services. That's where 33:00I would--not all the time, but I went sometimes. (Laughs)

Milligan: You were away from your parents. So it wasn't mandatory that you go to church?

M. Tiger: Sometimes I would go with her. She would go to Catholic church, and every now and then I'd go to church with her. She wouldn't ever go to church with me, but I went to church with her. (Laughter)

Milligan: I can see the way this relationship started. You wrote to her during the summer; you sometimes went to her church. (Laughter)

M. Tiger: It's odd. I guess that's probably the wrong word to say, but now we both go to church together. We both go to a Baptist church. I'm associate pastor of a church in Edmond, and recently we just moved back from Florida. We pastored a church down there for seven years with the Florida Seminoles. I've been in the 34:00ministry for a long time. We both go to the same church now, so she had no choice. (Laughs)

Milligan: You got too involved, and she had to come over. Yeah, I saw that you all live in Moore now. How long were you in Florida, then?

M. Tiger: Seven years.

Milligan: Oh, that's what you said, seven years that you were down there, not just the seven years in the church.

M. Tiger: Off and on there since 2004 or 2005, we went back and forth to Florida. We'd go down to Florida and get lost and come back home. Back then when all of that was going on in Florida, opportunities wasn't too good here in Oklahoma. We'd come back and couldn't find a job, so I'd call my friend. He'd say, "Come on back. We'll put you to work." I think we just went back and forth, and then last time we went, I had a job. I had just started work there, and then 35:00the preacher or the pastor of the church, he decided to step away from it. I guess I was called a [inaudible] pastor at the time, but the church wanted someone to be their pastor all the time. I gave up my job and became a full-time pastor. We went back and forth for a while, but the seven years was the longest time we've spent in Florida.

Milligan: I see. I do want to get a little bit to what you all did after Chilocco, too, so I'm curious. I know there's a lot of vocational opportunities on campus here, too, or some job training I think at that time, too. Did you all do any of that sort of track, or did you strictly just do school and work detail?

M. Tiger: When I was going to school, they had an electricity class, and I took 36:00that when I was here. I kind of dabbled in it, but it was never really, I never made a career out of it. That's kind of what I did.

Milligan: Did you do any vocational training or job readiness?

C. Tiger: They had a (what do you call it?) cosmetology class up here in the dining room. I took that. I was really interested in it. Then I took home ec. She taught us how to sew. I really liked that.

Milligan: Did you ever do anything with the cosmetology or anything?

C. Tiger: No, it was too hard. You have to learn all those hard words, and I was probably afraid I'd mess somebody's hair up. (Laughter)

Milligan: There's not many places you can hide here if you mess someone's hair up. (Laughter)

C. Tiger: I got in trouble. My mom picked me up after school. I went and dyed my hair, and it turned red. She was really upset about me. My hair was real red.

Milligan: When she came to get you in May?

C. Tiger: Yeah. She said, "What'd you do?!" (Laughter)

Milligan: So when you all graduated, I know you were on the road to marriage. How did you end up getting engaged? Do you remember?

M. Tiger: I don't think we really had a normal engagement. I think when we were here together we had talked about getting married, so there was really never a time where I really gave her an engagement ring or nothing. I did ask her when we were here if she would do that, and she said, at the time, she had thought 38:00about doing something else. Then we talked about it more, and she decided to become my wife. We didn't have an engagement time. I tell people this. I graduated from high school, and I got married in June. (Laughter) There was no engagement time. That's kind of how we--. Just like a lot of couples, we went from here to universities and college. I went to college for a while.

Most of the time, she's been a stay-at-home mother, so she's been a homemaker most of her time. There was a period of time where she did some work at a job, but it wasn't that long. I was blessed to be able to take care of both of us at the time so she didn't have to work. She raised the children and took care of 39:00the children. That was her job. She did that. Finances get tough sometimes, so there was a period of time where she did have to work. It took both of us to make the ends meet. You know how that goes. It all worked out. She was talking about sewing; she still sews. The grandkids say, "Grandma, can you sew this for me?" So grandma sews stuff for them. She don't sew nothing for me, but she sews something for everybody. (Laughs)

Milligan: You could do your own. You can iron better. I can see where this is going. (Laughter)

C. Tiger: He does his own clothes.

Milligan: So when you all graduated, did you feel ready to go out and--. I guess by that time you were married, so you were adults. Did you feel prepared?

M. Tiger: We thought we were, like a lot of young couples. They think they're prepared, but in reality, (what do they call it?) a work in progress. That's kind of what we did. We worked it together. It all worked out pretty good for us. We didn't sit down and evaluate everything. I think the thing that stuck with us was that we wanted to be together, and I think that's what drove us to make this decision to get married right after we got out of high school. We had some friends of ours that went to school here that got married, and they didn't stay together. I guess that goes back to we must have made the right choice somewhere along the way. It's been okay.

C. Tiger: Lot of prayers from his mom and my mom, probably. We had hard times and good times. We struggled. Sometimes we didn't have--. Were hardly making it, but we stuck together.

Milligan: How was your mom about you making the decision to get married right after school and not come back to Wyoming? It sounds like--.

C. Tiger: I talked to her about it, and she said if that was what I wanted to do that, "it's okay with me." My sister wanted to have a big wedding, but we just had a small wedding because his dad was, he was homebound. He couldn't hardly get out, so we got married at his mom and dad's home, small wedding.

M. Tiger: My dad suffered from--

C. Tiger: Emphysema.

M. Tiger: --emphysema, so he wasn't able to walk great distances. His health was failing him, so we decided just to have a very small family wedding at my dad and mom's house. We had a man that did the wedding for us. My father was a preacher, too, and he had a friend that did the wedding for us. I'll never forgive that man. (Laughter) I'm just kidding.

Milligan: I can tell. So when you all come back to campus for these reunions, what is something you look forward to seeing while you're here?

C. Tiger: Our friends.

Milligan: The people first?

C. Tiger: Yeah. Really good to see them. It seems like they're family. You just keep in touch. I got my friend Gloria. She lives in Washington. I got to see her 43:00about a year ago, two years ago. We went up to Washington. My sister had died, so we went up there for her funeral. I got to see my friend Gloria and our friends from school that went here, too. It's just like seeing your family. They're like your family.

Milligan: What about the campus? Is it meaningful for you all to come back to the campus, or does it really matter the location where the reunion is?

M. Tiger: To me, I agree with my wife that we come for our friends. I like coming here. It's like my home, but the thing that really breaks my heart is to see the condition of the buildings. I wish there was some way that someone could 44:00fix the place up because there's so much good things that we experienced while we were here. It's like coming home. To see how in disarray and how dilapidated and being demolished, it really tears at your heart. I come because, like she said, we have friends from all over the country that come. The buildings, you know how they are. You kind of have to spend time with your friends and reminisce and think about the good memories because the sad part of it is the buildings that will never be the same again.

Milligan: If you all could have a magic wish about that, what would you like to see happen with campus?

M. Tiger: Myself, I'd like to see it just as it was when we were here. If I had 45:00access to finances to do that, I would not hesitate to do that. Like I said, there's a lot of good memories and a lot of good things here that I remember that's a part of my life, and I don't want to see it be destroyed.

Milligan: What about, what would you want people who have never been involved with Chilocco before that don't know anything about it, what would you want them to know about the school?

M. Tiger: It's a wonderful place. It is. It's a family situation when we were here. Like she said, we have friends, and they're just like part of our family. I think that would be the thing that I would say. If somebody's having 46:00difficulty with their children, if they have access to a place like this that can bring structure and can bring discipline into their life, I would recommend that they would seriously consider something like that because it does make a difference. I know it helped both of us, so that's what I would tell them. It's a wonderful place, and I don't regret my time here. I don't regret my time here. I think the only biggest regret I have about this is the circumstances that I come under to get here. Some of the things that took place while I was here changed my outlook on life and, like I said earlier, brought the discipline and the structure that I needed for myself. To me, it's a special place. To both of 47:00us, it's a special place. This is where we met, so that makes it kind of special, too.

Milligan: The fountain. (Laughter) What about you? Do you have any thoughts for people that you want them to know about?

C. Tiger: There's this place that people care about you that will guide you, and if you did something wrong you get disciplined. You have to work hours off. You can't go any place until you've got it worked off, and you can go. Teaches you not to do it anymore, just like a parent disciplines you.

M. Tiger: I remember one time--she'll probably get mad at me about it. This will probably one of the things we'll take off after we--.

Milligan: You'll have time to review. (Laughs)

M. Tiger: I had asked her to go to a movie. For some reason, I don't know what she did. Maybe she didn't go to breakfast or something, but she got some extra duty hours. We were supposed to go to the movie that night. There used to be an area out here where you could go play ball and stuff like that, and I was out there fooling around. She wasn't there, so I was wondering where she was. She come out of the back of that building. She's standing, carrying a big olʽ trash can because she was working those hours off so she could go to the movie that night. (Laughter) That's why I was saying this will probably be part of it 49:00that's going to be taken off.

Milligan: I think I've already guessed that she had some hours that she had to put in that were extra, but it's also not fair because you had the choice to miss breakfast and she didn't! You should have helped her with that trash can! (Laughter)

M. Tiger: Well, I couldn't go over there--.

Milligan: If you had made a date and, for example, you couldn't come, how did you let someone know that you had duty and couldn't come?

M. Tiger: They had phones in the dorms.

Milligan: Oh, so you could call each other.

M. Tiger: Yeah.

Milligan: You didn't have to send a runner or anything. (Laughter)

C. Tiger: "I can't go! I've got hours."

M. Tiger: That's one thing I remember, too. We stayed in Home Six, and she was in Home Five. They had a telephone down there, and we had a telephone down here. The guys would call their girlfriends, and you'd have to stand in line because there would be a long line and you had to wait. For some reason, they had a 50:00policy for the length of time you could be on the phone, but it never got enforced. It was always a long line because the guys were talking to their girlfriends. That's how we dealt with that. If she couldn't go, or if I had got into trouble, I'd have to call her and tell her I can't make it. That's how we communicated that part.

Milligan: And everyone could hear your conversation in the line behind you.

M. Tiger: Yeah. (Laughter) I remember them guys used to--you know how girls are. They'll tell you they love you, and once they do, you do the same thing to them. I remember seeing these guys. That girlfriend would be talking on the phone to them, and every now and then they would tell them "I love you." They want him to say that, and he would say, (whispers) "I love you," (Laughter) because he knew he was going to get razzed if he said it out where everybody could hear him. Sometimes they would say, "Me too," (Laughter) because it was just part of the 51:00deal growing up. They'd razz you about things.

Milligan: Everything was in front of everyone. It's public!

M. Tiger: There was no secrets there! (Laughs)

Milligan: I'm sure, especially in the dorms that you lived in.

M. Tiger: Yeah. I remember seeing those guys trying to get that in, and the boys all would razz him.

Milligan: So what did you choose? Did you man up and say it, or did you say "me too"?

M. Tiger: I was always at the end of the line, so it never was a deal with me. (Laughter)

Milligan: Strategic.

M. Tiger: I made it a point to be at the end of the line. (Laughs)

Milligan: Smart. I think for me that was all of the questions I had. I'm wondering if you have anything that you think I missed or that you want to talk about or make sure that you get a chance to share?

M. Tiger: I don't know if this is something that can--I know that this school is 52:00listed on the historical society as a historical site. I wonder why something hasn't been done to try to at least restore some of the buildings because it is an important piece of history to those of us that went to school here. It's a part of our lives. For us to come back here, you have to see it like that. Like I said earlier, it's really heartbreaking. I don't know if that's something that could ever take place or not, but that would be what I would hope for. We bring our son. We brought our son here before. We've brought our grandchildren here and said this is where we met and this is where we went to school. I guess what disturbs me is that one day it might not be here. If there was some way to 53:00change the direction that it's going, I would be very in favor of it. I don't think I'm speaking by myself in that part. Since we've been here today, I was talking to a lady right over here a while ago, and she said it's just disheartening to see the old school building that's caved in and things like that. That would be what I would say. I don't know what kind of action can be taken if any, but I would hope something would be done to try to restore the place. That would be what I'd say.

Milligan: It's important. What about you?

C. Tiger: I was looking at the buildings a while ago, how they were first built. There was some beautiful buildings here. That Home Three, it was really pretty, 54:00and Home Five or something. I don't know, the boys' building. Was yours Six?

M. Tiger: Six.

C. Tiger: It must have been Five.

M. Tiger: You was in Five down there.

C. Tiger: I get them all mixed up, but they sure were beautiful.

Milligan: It seems like the buildings kept being worked on and built for as long as, pretty much as long as you were on campus, a lot of new things being built even in the ʼ50s and ʼ60s, it sounds like.

M. Tiger: The architectural design of these buildings, you don't see much, so it's unique in that respect. Maybe--will try to keep that. It's a monument. To me, it is a monument, and it is to her because this is a part of our life.

Milligan: Does your family who went to Haskell, do they go back to reunions in 55:00Haskell like you all do at Chilocco?

C. Tiger: No. Both of my sisters are gone. My nephews, my nieces, I thought one of my nieces would be here, but she moved back to Wyoming.

M. Tiger: My brother, the one that's next to me, he was on the Board of Regents at Haskell. He just recently resigned. He had some other things that he was doing, so he didn't have time to give it justice. He resigned from that. From what I remember, my older brother, he never did go back. He talked about it a lot, kind of like us, reminiscing and telling you how they felt when they were there. I remember him talking about that, but he never did go back to be a part 56:00of that reunion process.

Milligan: I was just curious. You just see so many people come to this reunion, too. Such a vibrant alumni association.

M. Tiger: Yeah, and I hope that that stays that way. My friend Mitchell Cyprus here, I don't know if you heard him earlier. He said that we don't know if we'll be back here next year or not, to be able to spend time with people that you're really close to. I'll stop at this story. This lady that's part of our class, she was at Mount Rushmore, sightseeing, I guess you'd say. This guy walked up to 57:00her and started talking to her, and it was somebody that was part of our class that was here. His name was Danny. She said, "I hadn't seen Danny since we graduated in 1966, and here he comes walking up and started talking to me." She said that was truly a blessing. Like we said, you run across people from all over the country. She was telling us about how that really affected her because she knew him and she had a good relationship. I'm not talking about a romantic relationship, but a friendship, a bond. That's what I tell people here. I have bonds with people that are all over the country by just being here. That's the way I am with Mitchell Cyprus. He's in Florida, though. We have a special bond that we are kind of tied to for the rest of our lives. It's interesting. That's 58:00something that a lot of people don't have. It's unique in that respect. I'll shut up now. (Laughter)

Milligan: I've enjoyed talking with you all. --

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