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• Wendell Watson interview
• Wendell‘s parents; growing up
• Attending college; working at Viscose
• God abundantly provides!
00:00 [WATSONv4: Wendell’s parents; growing up (00:00-02:30)]
Mike: You were born right up here…
Wendell: Grew up on the farm, Miller Station way.
Mike: What were your parent’s names?
Wendell: George and Betty Watson
Mike: From this area?
Wendell: He was. She was from down in Slippery Rock area. And he had gone to State College; he was a milk tester. And he was testing milk down in that area, and that is how he met her.
He ended up with a dairy farm. But more of a jokester…he didn’t have much for a long time. They had two horses. Her dad gave them one, and his dad gave them the other. That is how they got started. It was very interesting. Then we, of course, grew up and went to school there. And went eleven grades there, and then we went last year went to Cambridge up here. So, it was a very interesting lifestyle we had. We worked a lot. Made maple syrup, always made maple syrup every spring. Made about 30 gallons and carried buckets to the sugar house.
Mike: 30 gallons. That is quite a bit.
Wendell: It was quite a bit back then! Thirty gallons of syrup. That was a lot of sap!! And then we went Rockville to school, of course. We were never allowed to go caddy down the golf course down there in Cambridge because they sold liquor. Besides, I had responsibilities on the farm. I was an active kid, and I drove horses from about the time I was six years old. I would work in the field. Dad was always a good encourager. He had a way of doing it. He could encourage you to work, but he never complained if you broke something. He said if you are doing something, you are going to break something once in a while. So, he never complained if you broke something. It a pretty good…I had good folks—they were good people.
02:30 [WATSONv4: Wendell attends college and works for Viscose (02:30-07:38)]
Mike: So, when did you move away from home and…
Wendell: Oh, see I went to Alliance College for two years. And then I had a cousin that had married a fella that was a department head down at Viscose down here. See I kind of majored in chemistry, and he knew the gentleman that headed up the chemistry department. So, he was a little connection there. I remember the very night we went to this Mr. Coffser’s house for the interview. It was the evening, and this gentleman was home and this cousin of mine, he took me. It was probably about 8:00 and we went little…
Mike: That is kind of unusual…
Wendell: That’s right, right…this little interview. But this Coffser guy was a pretty big-shot over there because he was head of the chemistry department. Had a pretty fancy house, you know. This little farm boy going in there was kind of different. But they hired me in. And then I…let’s see, I was turned down for the draft. I was 4F. So, I did go to work for Chemical Warfare Service. I was around different places, and I met a girl down in Maryland that was a pretty nice little girl. And then I went off to Goodyear where I met Betty…she was a little fancier than the other one! And, of course, it was a match.
Mike: Now you came back and worked for Viscose, right?
Wendell: Right! And that was something else that was very interesting. After we got married, you know we didn’t go together very long. We met, I think it was in August, and we were married the next April. But we come back to Meadville after the war was over. Rented a place and I went to Viscose. But I went in, I thought I’d reenter production. But I wasn’t quite satisfied with that, so I went back to the lab. And then I went…there was a couple that was in the same building with it…Oh, we went on strike, that was it. I was in production; we went on strike at Viscose.
So there was a fella living with a woman in the apartment building where we were at, and he says (he was kind of a foreman over the labor gang) you come on over; I will give you a job. Now this whole thing put an addition on Viscose, see, put an addition I forget the… So I went over and he put me on. Well of course the union got on my case, then see. So, I said that I’ll just quit Viscose. It was quite a stint, but I was disgusted, so I left Viscose. And of course, we only worked another two or three months and they went back to work again. Then I quit there and went back to Viscose…they hired me back. But this time I went into Vinyon??. And I was only in there about…I was looking the other day. I went on foreman in ’48, and I was making a $1.30 an hour. And then they promoted me to the foreman in that department Then I was foreman from ‘48 until I left in ‘74. So that was kind of interesting. It is kind of the story of my life.
07:38 [WATSONv4: God abundantly provides! (07:38-13:40)]
Wendell: But you know the Lord has been good. We, of course, lost that little boy, Stuart. We got saved, then we established the store. You know we’ve had that store 46 years, Betty probably told you. Established the store, and then we had that stupid fire that just about did us in. But you know, this, I probably shouldn’t even tell ya…but I had, when Bruce got killed, a friend at the church in Meadville. He was an insurance man. And just to give him some business, I bought $500 worth of insurance. I not sure I got any on Keith, just on Bruce at the time. So, when Bruce got killed, it was double indemnity. So, we got $1,000; so I think that left something like $500 dollars in that insurance company fund. Then in the meantime, I had bought some other stock when we were in Saegertown…United Fund it was. And I was wanting to get some life insurance and this agent said you’d better get this stock. So I bought some stock.
Never paid very much into it, $25 a month for a while. And then after a while, the expenses increased...you didn’t have to pay…so I kept this up and that stock one year paid about $15,000 dividend. And another year, I think it was $12,000. And then when the stock market got so disruptive here, and mutual funds weren’t doing very much, and it hadn’t been doing very much for quite a while. I had given it and another stock I had to because I didn’t need it and didn’t want it. He could have it. So, when the stock market went down and went back up again, he decided (I told him I thought it was a good idea) that he would sell those two stocks. I think he got pretty near $40,000 on each one of them. Isn’t that amazing!
Another interesting thing was my aunt, Dad’s sister, when we went into the last depression, she had $500 in the bank in Cambridge. And of course, the banks went under. They gave her $500 of stock then. When she died, she divided it up between the three kids and my dad and then they gave what little they had to the three kids. It paid some pretty big dividends, once in a while. And again, I told Keith he may as well take it. He is hanging on it. It is only paying about 3 percent, but that is worth about $40,000 now, too. Isn’t it amazing how some of that stuff works out? You don’t even figure…and then a fellow tries other ways, and it just doesn’t work out, you know. But it is just interesting. But I thought you would appreciate it. So, he’s done very well at the store. But it was well worth his time to stick with us. You know, it was tough to stick with us back when we had the fire. Cause he could have said look this isn’t going to work out, I got to get a job. He stayed with us.
Mike: Well, it is amazing that you and Betty have been able to keep working.
Wendell: Well, it is kind of nice. I am thankful that we could still work. Yeah, I am thankful that I can. Cause I am pretty near 85…it’s kind of getting up there!!
Mike: It is, but you are still in pretty good shape.
Wendell: I am in pretty good shape, Mike. Yeah! I enjoy life. I enjoy doing things. I enjoy just a lot of stuff that I get a big kick out of. I just do it. I have a lot of church customers now…we have a little bakery down in Meadville that makes real good rolls…it is a real nice bakery. It’s in the market house on the way in. And I have many of my customers, every quarter, I will drop them off a pan of rolls or something. And they get a big charge out of it, you know. In fact, yesterday morning, I had her bake me four special rolls about that long and about that big around…they were cherry/raspberry. The bank is real good to us down there; they really treat us nice. So, every once in a while, I’ll take them some…they just got into a new bank in Meadville. Of course, it is larger, and they have more people in it, but they still appreciate it. I took them two yesterday morning. You know it’s just fun to do this stuff. I had to have these made special, and then I had gone to my eye doctor and these girls, I usually take them one, too. And they always get a big charge out of it. So, it is just a fun thing. You get excited about life and to do things to encourage people. And it just makes life worthwhile.
Mike: Yeah, very good.
Wendell: I guess that’s about the end of the story. [Laughter!!!!!]
14:30
Vol1 recorded April 16, 2004 at the bookstore in Meadville.
Vol 2 & Vol 3 recorded July 20, 2004 at the bookstore in Meadville.
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• Watson family information
• Betty & Wendell early work experiences
• Betty & Wendell engagement and marriage
• Stewart’s death leads to salvation
• Christian bookstore opened
• Information about Wendell’s family
• Bruce dies in construction accident
• Bookstore burns; Laura born w/multiple handicaps
• God is faithful!
00:00 [WATSONv1: Watson family information (00:00-01:55)]
Mike: Let’s start with you first. Tell me when you were born, the day and everything. Where you were born.
Betty: I was born August 3, 1922, in Kanawha City, WV.
Mike: Now were you born in a house or a…?
Betty: I was born at home.
Mike: That was across the river from Charleston, right?
Betty: That’s right. And my people moved to Ohio in the Akron area shortly after I was two.
Mike: You never really remember down there at all then.
Betty: No. I don’t remember anything about that at all. And I went to a fairly small school. For eleven years of my life, Uniontown grade school and high school. Graduated from there in 1940. And through Roosevelt’s…one of his programs...I was able to attend Kent State University for one year.
01:55 [WATSONv1: Betty & Wendell’s early work experiences (01:55-04:30)]
And shortly thereafter, WW II was in progress, and I was able to get a good job at the Goodyear plant making $5.35 a hour. Which to me was…
Mike: That was good wages!!
Betty: Yeah, it was wonderful. After working in a basket factory in the summer for $0.35 an hour or a five-and-ten, down in the city of Akron, for about the same amount of money. Then in the summer or 1943, Wendell was transferred from a small town in Pennsylvania called Saegertown to Baltimore, Maryland to Akron, Ohio working as a lab technician for the government. I was working on an assembly line at Goodyear making gas masks. However, the line on which I worked was attaching a canister to the gas mask to help the soldier breathe. And after about a year, I was promoted to supervisor of the line where the government girls tested these canisters, to make sure that they were usable for the soldiers. In the spring of 1944, we got wind that the war was diminishing, and that we were going to be transferred.
04:30 [WATSONv1: Betty & Wendell are engaged and married soon thereafter (04:30-07:00)]
Wendell and I had become engaged by that time and were going to be married in June.
Mike: How did you meet Wendell?
Betty: There at the plant.
Mike: Was he on the same line of you? Was he a supervisor?
Betty: No, he was in the lab, in the chemistry side of the program. He evidently tested the charcoal which was put in the cans to purify the air. And he struck up a friendship with me and he had been deferred from the service of our country because he was examined during hay season fever and also had a finger off on his right hand. So, we had become engaged, and when we found out along in March that we were going to be transferred in different directions, Wendell said let’s get married before June and you go with me. I was to be transferred to Cleveland, and he was going back to Pennsylvania. So obviously that is what I did. I went with him back to Pennsylvania.
Mike: Did you have a job?
Betty: No, I had no job. And I didn’t work outside of the home until…we were married in 1944… April 6, 1944.
Mike: Where were you married?
Betty: We were married at my home [Hayne Road] by Reverend H.H. Wilson, who was my grandmother’s pastor in Akron. We just celebrated 60 years of marriage.
07:00 [WATSONv1: The youngest of their three boys dies in a freak accident. Both come to know God personally through this experience. (07:00-10:08)]
So, until 19…then the Lord blessed us with three sons. The first one, Bruce Marrow(?) Watson, November 6, 1945. Keith Lou Watson was born January 21, 1949. And Stuart Wayne Watson was born June 8, 1951. And because my husband was a Methodist, I became a Methodist. And that all changed when our youngest child was killed on December 22, 1956.
Mike: He was only five years old.
Betty: Five and a half. And it was a freak accident. A large tree rolled over on him (after he slid down this tree) and pinned him. Died almost instantly. God spoke to my heart that very day, and when I look back on that experience it is an amazing part of my life to think that I would come to know God personally on the day that my youngest child was killed. I realized that that is not an ordinary pattern for one supposed to grieve, especially for children. But God in His providence had different plans and different purposes, and how I thank him for speaking to my heart that day and bringing me through that experience.
10:08 [WATSONv1: God led them to open a Christian bookstore in Meadville (10:08-13:27)]
He began working in our lives about a Christian bookstore the following fall. And we attached ourselves to a Baptist church in Meadville, PA, in October and we gave our testimony there and were immersed as believers. God brought certain people in our path to bring about this bookstore. First it was the money problem, which we borrowed from my mother. And then it was a matter of becoming acquainted with gospel literature to make sure that it was conservative in nature. But God had sent a young man from Meadville to Houghton Bible College and from there to Los Angeles Baptist Bible Seminary. And at the time he was in Meadville, and he volunteered to help me go through the Book and Bible catalogue to know the conservative writers and publishers. His name is Arthur Walton. He is a Greek professor at Ankeny, Iowa at the Faith Baptist College. He still teaching Greek New Testament there. It was a tremendous help that he gave me. I have never forgotten it because I was as green as any grass you ever saw. I do thank God that he gave me a good mind and a good memory to help with the calling and purpose he had for us. And I thank him for my husband who has a good business head. He has truly been the right kind of priest in the home (as the Bible speaks of it). He has led all the way.
13:27 [WATSONv1: Information about Wendell and his family (13:27-15:39)]
Mike: When and where was Wendell born.
Betty: Wendell was born about…[Speaking to Linda, Keith’s wife] Linda how far would Wendell’s home have been from Cambridge Springs?
Linda: Six or seven miles.
Betty: I was going to say five. He was born about two miles on beyond the little railroad crossing called Miller’s Station. He was also born at home, on October 30, 1919. His first name is Lloyd. His middle name is Wendell. And he had one sister, Ethel, who was three years younger and one brother, Wilson, who was eight years younger. Wilson died…When did he die, Linda?
Linda: 1994 or 95?
Betty: I would guess he has been gone 10 years. I would say 1994. What did he have?
Linda: He had a cerebral hemorrhage.
Betty: Died of a cerebral hemorrhage.
15:39 [WATSONv1: Bruce dies in construction accident in 1967 (15:39-18:44)]
Mike: Okay, then tell me about Bruce.
Betty: Oh, yeah. Our oldest son died subsequently to a job accident May 28, 1967. He was home on break from University of Kentucky. He had been home on a spring break and had gone back to school. But he had come home for the summer and gotten a job on construction. They were putting Interstate 79 in this area. He was the only one they hired that summer. And on the 2nd or 3rd day on the job, he was hurt with a piece of paving equipment. Accidently fell in front of the machine which wasn’t working properly and he and another young man, one on either side of the machine were doing the work manually with this paving machine. And somehow, he was on the side of a slight incline and although he was not a clumsy young man, still, he fell in front of this machine. It ran up on his body to his chest and pushed the blood somehow in the chest that it punctured the heart. And he lived almost six days before he died. But I was assured that he was ready to meet the Lord before he left this world. That has been a great, great comfort to me.
18:44 [WATSONv1: The Gospel Book & Supply store burns; Laura is born with multiple handicaps (18:44-23:52)]
We got our store established and opened in April 1956. The next difficulty was that our store burned in November of 1974. And that was a difficult experience, especially for our son Keith and his wife, who had come into the business with us. And they were expecting their first child in December of that same year. Little Laura was born on the 14th of December about five weeks after that fire. And I wonder now how we ever lived through those two traumas. I am sure it was simply God’s grace and strength. Little Laura was born a special child with multiple physical and mental handicaps. In fact, they took her to Pittsburgh Children’s Hospital for two weeks. But they had no help for her, so she was brought home and with tender loving care she is still us, now 29 years old.
Mike: Almost 30, that is really something, isn’t it?
Betty: And I must say she has an unusual and exceptional mother, who has become a nurse and a special mother. She has a good dad, too. He loves the Lord and has now taken over the administration of the store. And we are grateful for that Lord, that His work can carry on. I am so thankful that the Lord has spoken to our heart and caused us to understand all these things that have transpired. And now Lord we are in our eighties and still able to do some things at the store, but not like it once was.
Mike: Well, not too many people at that stage in life do what you do.
Betty: Well, we are grateful. Every morning we thank the Lord that he has given us another day of life and given us the strength to have a testimony for Him and to share our faith. It’s learning to give up our independence and self-control and realize that there are others now to carry on. I thank Him.
23:52
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• Watson family information
• Betty & Wendell early work experiences
• Betty & Wendell engagement and marriage
• Stewart’s death leads to salvation
• Christian bookstore opened
• Information about Wendell’s family
• Bruce dies in construction accident
• Bookstore burns; Laura born w/multiple handicaps
• God is faithful!
00:00 [WATSONv1: Betty speaks at churches and events (00:00-04:00)]
Mike: Keep talking this is just between you and me.
Betty: And I did a lot of that type of thing. I was in the junior and senior plays with the lead. And I wasn’t necessarily afraid, so I said yes, I will come. I ask them if they have anything special. they usually say whatever the Lord lays on your heart.
Mike: So how did they find out about you, through the store?
Betty: Through the store. And so, I got there, and they told me where to go. I thought it was strange they weren’t having it at the church, but I didn’t dwell on it. When I got there, there were 500 women and they ushered me in. And I will never forget, a captain in the Salvation Army came and sat with me and said, “I hope you’re not frightened.” “No,” I said, “I wasn’t really expecting this many women, but I know the Lord and I know the message he has given me.” She said, “Well, we will all be praying for you”. So…
Mike: Where was this?
Betty: In Erie. And the Lord was good, I got up and gave my testimony. Told how I was saved, about the deaths of the children, how God had worked to bring it all about, and how we got into the bookstore. I had my Scriptures and a little outline. But I will never forget when I looked over that room and she said this is where we are going to meet. It was a big auditorium somewhere, but their church wasn’t that big. So, I have been to small churches, and I went up Peak and Peak, a big ski resort in northern Erie Country. I don’t know how they heard about me, but I went up there to speak. And then locally, I have been to most of local churches that know about us in Crawford County, you know. Mother’s Day, they like you to come for Mother’s Day. Although it begins as a sad story, still God brings triumph out of tragedy, through His grace and strength. It is wonderful, Mike, that Wendell and I were lifted out of what you would call poor families to do something special for God. So, we have been privileged; we have been blessed. I wouldn’t tell anyone that it was easy.
04:00 [WATSONv1: The bookstore recovered and prospered (04:00-16:28)]
It’s been agony at times and anguish for me (as a woman) and Linda (as a mother and a woman) and for the men (especially for the fire) when we didn’t know whether our ministry had concluded or whether God wanted us to do something else. Or whether He was going to put us back on our feet. But He marvelously spoke to the various companies and to many of the people in our area to help us recover. Publishers and manufacturers of products gave us big discounts of 60 and 75 percent and some racks to get us back in business.
Mike: Is that when you moved over to Park Street?
Betty: Yes.
Mike: Right at that time…
Betty: Yea, the fire was in November, and we were able to move over there in April. It took that long to get organized. The only thing that we were able to salvage from the fire was a small nook in our rooms—we called it the Bible nook. And we were able to salvage some Bibles.
Mike: It was a lot of smoke damage, wasn’t it?
Betty: A wasn’t fire, it was water and smoke. They told us they poured 4,000 gallons of water in there. We were the corner store and there were three other businesses in the strip there. A beauty salon, a drug store that rented just for space for back up stock, and a garage. And they think the fire started in the garage. But God has been faithful and brought us through. Many, many various people from different denominations came and helped clean up the mess. Even helped clean some of the product, as we had to wipe everything. There were a few novelties that we rescued. Novelty items with Scripture on them for children, as awards. And it took a good year to work through that fire.
Then we rented a space up on Park Avenue about half of the size of our store now. We outgrew that in 2 or 2 ½ years. And moved to our present location. Keith said we have been there 26 years. And it has proven… We have a downtown mall in Meadville…and they came after us to rent there, but we prayed about it and Lord just didn’t open that door. Instead, we saw the flow of traffic seemed to be north and south on Park Avenue. The furniture store was closing, and it was only two doors from where we were. Sop, Wendall contacted the owner. The rent was reasonable enough that we could afford it and we had a carpenter come in and put in the shelving we needed…they worked on that for probably two months. Takes quite a while to build shelving. We worked on that for two months. Moved in, I believe it was April, I know it was good weather because we were able to wheel the merchandise mostly up on dollies. I will have to ask the men when we opened, but I am sure that it was in the springtime, 1975. So, it has been kind of a hectic life, but God has seen fit that we have survived.
Mike: Well, you have more than survived…prospered, I think!!
Betty: Well, I think that is a good word. We have prospered spiritually. We have prospered materially. We have been able to build two new houses before prices rose to what they are today. But we do thank the Lord, at one point and time, we were renting an upstairs apartment that had a flat roof.
Mike: I remember that well!
Betty: It was hot in the summertime!!!! But we lived there 21 years, before we could get the boys through college and the business on its feet. But if you wait on God, the timing will be exactly right, and he will give you your heart’s desires. And of course, most families want to own their own home, and we weren’t any different. I can honestly say, I have been privileged even though it has cost a price…I wouldn’t ask God to change it. Because I wouldn’t know and understand those truths today without it. I am sure I wouldn’t be where I am spiritually. It has been worth it every step of the way.
16:28