Huerfano County,
Colorado
Oral Interviews
NOTICE All data and photos on this website are Copyrighted by Karen Mitchell. Duplication of this data or photos is strictly forbidden without legal written permission by the Copyright holder.
Dan and Jean Bonacci
Scanned by Dick Chenault
Edited by Zale Nagler
Interviewed by Rosalyn McCain
Date of interview - 12-5-1979
Dan Bonacci
Date of birth - 4-15-1896
Parents - Bonaventura Bonacci and Luisa Tonozzi
Ethnic group - Italian
Family origin - Lamamocoggno, Italy
Date of family arrival in county - 1914
Location of first family settlement - Walsenburg
Language spoken - English / Italian
Kinship ties: Jean was a Ugolini
Profession: Miner, bar and restaurant owner
Photos and artifacts - Photos of miners and mules in front of Ideal camp, newspaper articles and photos of mines and camps.
This is Rosalyn McCain, and I am talking with Dan Bonacci and his wife, Jean Bonacci, in their home in Walsenburg, Colorado. Mr. and Mrs. Bonacci begin by showing me a photograph of the mules and the miners with their mules in front of Ideal Mine.
RM: Isn't that interesting? I have heard many people talk about the mules in the mines, but I haven't seen any pictures of the mules.
JB: Mule drivers. They called them the mule drivers.
DB: This is the barn that they stayed in, and this is where they are waiting to go in the mines. They are supposed to go in, and take their mules in.
RM: So this is the Ideal Mine and that was six miles south of Walsenburg. Isn't that fascinating? Each miner had his own mule?
DB: Oh, yeah, every miner had his own mule. A lot of places, they didn't have no mules. At Alamo they couldn't have no mules because Alamo is like that. (He shows the picture of the mine). It is too steep, a mule can't go in. But this one here is a level mine. It is level like here.
RM: Did you work at the Ideal Mine?
DB: Yeah, I worked there.
JB: I think he is in that picture there. He pointed that out to me one time.
DB: I'm in here someplace. Where did you see me in here?
JB: That's him on the end there.
DB: I know I am in there someplace. It's pretty hard to make them out. I know I am in there someplace.
RM: This is really a fascinating picture. This is the first picture I had seen of the mules in the mines.
DB: We had more than 30 mules go into the mine every morning, everyday. They had a outside team, you see, to bring the coal out from the mine. See, all the other single mules, they put them in the park. They make about nine or ten cars, then the outside team brought it outside to the tipple. The outside team was six mules.
JB: This is the Alamo Mine. That is a piece of coal that they took out of that mine. See, that is the superintendent, Jim Hamilton.
DB: I helped take that out, too.
RM: Is that right? That is a big piece of coal. Now did they get that out from way down?
DB: That is a five-ton, pretty near six ton, piece of coal in one piece. We had a lot of trouble getting that out. The big slope was big enough, but when we got it into the entrance across this way, we had a lot of places we had timbers on the sides and timbers up above, and some places were a little too tight. We had to take the timber out, and then replace it. That way we could go through. Yeah, we put in one of those little flat cars, you know. It was just about that high from the ground, and sometimes it was touching the roof, too, where it was on the low side. It was work like heck to get it out. But we got it out.
RM: What year would you say that was?
DB: I would say that was in 1933 or l934. I got hurt in 1936. Do you want to take these pictures and put them in the paper?
RM: That would really be nice. I'll bring them back to you. That's wonderful. These are really interesting. When did your family first come to the county?
DB: Well, I came from the old country myself. I didn't have no family. I was about 17 years old.
RM: Where did you come from in Italy?
DB: The northern part.
RM: Northern Italy. How did you decide to come here?
DB: See, I had two cousins, and they was here before. So they figured they wanted to come back again. They was here, and then they went back to Italy. Coming back they said, “We'll go over and stay another three or four years and then come back again.” But they never did come back. They went back again, but I didn't.
RM: Did you come straight to Walsenburg?
DB: Straight to Walsenburg. 1914.
RM: 1914. That was during the strike years?
DB: During the strike years.
RM: Did you go, work when you first came here?
DB: Oh, we could have got all kind of work, but we didn't go work. Because we didn't know much about it, so we thought they was strike, and the people was all, thousands and thousands of people walking the streets in town. And so they told us why they was out on strike. They was on the strike for better conditions. In them days they was really rough conditions. Oh, they was bad. They used to work ten hours and only $2.80 for ten hours.
RM: So low.
DB: That is why they was out. When they told us, we said, “We aren't going to go to work.” We stayed out from the first of March that year until September. Then I got a job at Ojo Mine. See, that was the only mine in the Huerfano County that was under the Union.
RM: Is that right?
DB: Yeah, it was under the Union, and a friend of mine was working in this mine. So through this friend, me and another friend, me and his brother, we both got a job up there. So we started working in there.
RM: Who owned that mine?
DB: There was two brothers, two Scotchmen. But it was a big mine. I remember one was Joe, I'm sure. There were two brothers. Joe and Pete, I think, something like that. Anyway there was two brothers that was running the nine.
RM: And they had already signed a contract with the Union?
DB: Oh, yeah, they was under the Union all the time.
RM: That's real interesting.
JB: They called it Oakview.
DB: No, Oakview was a scab mine.
RM: That's right. They had a lot of trouble at Oakview.
DB: This is Ojo. Oh, they had a nice camp there. They had the store. They had everything there.
RM: I didn't realize that any of the mines had signed with the Union at that time.
DB: That was the only mine signed. And we was lucky. We got a job in it.
RM: Until that time did you have relatives that you could stay with here?
DB: Well, see, through this one that was my cousin, I had a lady that was married. She was my cousin. And then I had a first cousin that was Louie Bonacci. He was my first cousin. That's why I come in with them.
RM: So you stayed with them until you were able to get on at Ojo.
DB: And then we got my cousin on up there after that. After I got in there, I started to get friendly with the boss, and I got a job for them, too. So after that, you know, we was young, and this man, we went up together. He was young. He says, “Dan',' he says. The strike was over. Everybody was back to work, whoever could get jobs. He says, “We'll go back to Walsenburg. Down there we'll have more fun. There's more girls and this and that' I says, “Well, all right.” So we came back to Walsenburg, and we went to work at Ideal.
RM: So you went from Ojo to Ideal Mine.
DB: Yeah, but I had a tough time. I couldn't put my name down. I had to go under another name.
RM: Why was that?
DB: Because of CF&I. See, I was pretty strong on the side of the Union, and they had signed as a Red Ball, and they had my name in the office.
JB: Black Ball.
DB: Black Ball or whatever they call it.
RM: So what name did you tell them that you had?
DB: Carlo Dan Bocanoni. He was a friend of mine. He come from the same town, too. You know we was going to school together in Italy. So when he saw me, he just got back from the Army. And when he saw me, he says, “Dan, what are you doing? Looking for a job?” I says, “Yeah.” He says, “Dan, they ain't going to give you no job here under the CF&I' I says, “Why?” He says, “They got you Black Bal1ed. They got your name in the office. But I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll tell them you are my brother.” That's how I got that. Then they gave me the job right away.
RM: I bet that worked pretty well. What are some of the stories that you remember from the days of the strike when you were here?
DB: They was pretty rough, especially the first day when I got in, when I come in. Yeah, we got off up here at 3: 00 in the morning, up here at Rio Grande. The train was coming in, going to Alamosa. And they stopped there. We got off there. It was late, and it was the first day of March, and there was that much snow on the ground. (He demonstrates.) So I was looking around to go to rest room. I looked all over. They told me, they says, “Don't go where it says 'Women' Go where it says, 'Men' so I looked all, over. I didn't see no 'Men' and no 'Women! So I just took a walk outside to go against the wall there. It was all right, but all of a sudden I hear somebody poking me in the back, and I put my hand there, and it was a knife. There was a guy with a gun, and he had a bayonette in front on top of the gun. He was poking me with the gun, with the knife, not awful hard, but. And I turned around. I thought he was giving me heck because I was on the outside, and I told him, “I don't see a latrina? In Italian we call it latrina. He didn't know what I was talking about so he kept poking me. He kept on poking me, and he sent me down where the captain was, the captain of the militia. He was a soldier, a militia soldier that was protecting the owner of the mines. They was protecting them against the strike. So we went down to the Captain. He was talking to me, but I didn't know what he was talking about, and he don't know what I was talking. So finally the other guys that was in the station came out looking for me. So these guys, this guard, he saw them come out. He says, “You looking for some friend of yours?” They said, “Yeah.” He says, “He's down there in jail on the Captains place, in the Captains tent. He's down there. Go see. So they went down there. This captain told us, “I'll turn you loose if you guys go to work” And he asked, “Where's your destination?” Because you have to have a destination, what house you was going to go to, who was going to pick you up when you get to Walsenburg. So we said, “Lenzini. That is our destination in Walsenburg. That's where we are at.” When we told him, “Lenzini” he was looking kind of funny because Lenzini was pretty strong on the side of the strikers. They had a grocery store and stuff like that. They used to feed the strikers. So he says, “You go ahead. I'll let you go, but be sure. I'll show you a good crew up there. You go to work. You tell us that you do, that you go to work.” I says, “Yes, we go to work.” But we never did.
RM: Were the Lenzini's relatives of yours?
DB: No, but they came from pretty close there where we lived. And these people, these cousins of mine, they know them pretty good, because years ago they was buying all their groceries from them and everything. We knew them good. That's why we mentioned them when we came here.
RM: Was that Sandy Lenzini?
DB: Sandy and the old man, Joe, and his wife. And he had three sons. One they killed him right here. They killed Mike. There was Sandy, Mike and Albert. They killed him right in front of Walsen Camp. The Militia shot him. He was in front of the store. They had a platform in front on the store as long as that, and he was walking on that platform to load the car with some groceries, and they shot him, killed him. But anyway, we got up in the morning after we left the soldier there, the militia. We went up there. They put us to bed and sleep. They made some beds on the floor so we could sleep. Then in the morning we got up. They gave us a good breakfast, hotcakes, bacon and eggs and things like that. They was real good, real nice. Then Mike had to go to town to get some stuff at the store. So he says, “Do you guys want a ride?” There were just three of us. There was my cousin and my first cousin and myself. So there were the three of us went down with him. He says, “We don't stay long, just 20 minutes or half an hour, something like that. Then I'll be right out.” When we got there, he still was right there by where the filling station is on Main Street. Right in there was a big store there. And he went in there. We got out of the car. There was about 2,000 people on the street. It was full. At that time there was 22,0O0. It wasn't 5,000 or 7,000 like it is now. In the county about 100 of them came over and talked to us. Yeah, everybody knew us. They say, “How's my mother?” “How's my wife?” “How's my dad?” “How's my brother?” “How's my sister?' “Did you see them?” One is talking from this town. One is talking from the other town. We knew everybody. Gee, they had a bunch around us, about a hundred of them. And old Shorty Martinez, he was the policeman of the town here. Jeff Farr who was a friend of her daddy was the sherrif. This Shorty Martinez was about seven feet tall. They called him Shorty, but he was pretty tall to touch that light up there. He walked down the street. You ought to see him. He had a big gun on his side with a white handle. I'll never forget that handle. This guy told us all. They told us after. I didn't know what he was talking about. I say, “What does the carabiniere want?” Because that is the way we call them in Italy. We call them carabiniere, policeman. So I said, “What does that carabiniere want?” “He told us not to bunch up,” he said. “He is scared we are going to make something to make trouble.” I said, “No, we aren't making no trouble.” But anyway he told us, and. this guy knows how to talk English pretty good. He tells Shorty, “We don't want to bother nobody. We just want to see these people here. They just got in from the old country this morning, and they know my mother. The other one, he knows my brother. And this one knows my wife. We are asking them questions.” So Shorty said, “All right. I'm going across the street and make my round. I'll be back. If you guys are here, I'll have to do something about it.” By golly, he just goes across the street to a little theater on the other side, and he came back and he told us this guy was from a different town from where I came from, but it is right close to our town where he came from. I forget the name. But he told Shorty, “We didn't mean any harm to hurt anybody.” You know that Shorty pulled that gun out, and he hit him across here. He made a dent that long on his head (demonstrates the length). He was down on the floor there. Gee, we don't know what to do. Pick him up, where we going to bring him? Everybody says, “You can't get no doctor in this town. The CF&I has got them all. They ain't going to help the strikers. They won't come if you are a striker.” That man, we picked him up and brought him to the St. Charles Hotel. It was a two—story hotel. Now they lowered it down. In the front room they had a pool table in there. We layed him on the pool table. Then pretty soon here comes a Mexican. He said, “I know where is a doctor.” We say, “Where?” He say, “Down at the Star Drug Store in the back. They got an Arabian doctor down there.” And by golly, we took him down there. He fixed him up.
RM: What was the doctor's name?
DB: Oh, he was here for a long time until he died. He was here for a long time. He took 13 stitches in his head to fix up that wound. Yeah. Dr. Abner. That was Dr. Abner. We stayed out on strike six months from March to September. Here we stayed in the house, and then they had no more room. They had a camp down close to the house where you (Jean) lived, and they had a camp in there, but they didn't have no room. So they had a lot of room in Main over there. That is about five or six miles. There used to be a little station over there at the main junction before the turn to go up to Pryor. That road goes to Pryor. You ever go over that way? You know where the turn off is. You go over that big bridge. Well, we had there a camp in on the right hand side on that prairie on that railroad. We had about 40 or 50 tents there full of people come out of the Rouse Mine that was on strike, and there was another in Pryor and Hezron. There was three mines, and all the people was in on that. So the union here, they send us over there because they had more room over there. So we stayed over there about a month or a month and a half. Then we had to move. Because somebody had heard that the militia was going to burn the camp down. So this guy Sirisky, they called him, come down and advised us to move. So we left everything there. There was a train come by at midnight. We put all the women in there and the kids we had, and we all walked to town, left everything there. When they saw there was nobody there, they didn't burn it. They just let it go.
JB: But they burned Ludlow.
DB: That was after that, Jeannie. So we moved to town, and we got a little house up here by Lenzini's, a two—room house. Two rooms and we was all living there.
RM: How many of you?
DB: Four of us. Well, then we got tired of going out in these mines, picketing every morning. First we go to Rouse. Then we go to Ideal. Then we go to Walsen, Cameron, Pictou. Every morning we was going to these camps to picket the mines and to tell them to stay out. And that is how they know me. Because I was in every one of them. That's why they Red Ball, Black Ball. They know I was pretty strong for it. So we was lucky. I was doing that all summer, go here and go there. We went clear to Birwin in LOS Animas County. They had a shooting down there. They killed one guy.
RM: Where was that?
DB: Down on Ham Street here, down there where Corrine's restaurant is. We had a building, a hall up there. We had the Union Hall upstairs. They killed one guy there, the militia. And I was down there, too. But there was shooting on the street. So I went there where Hobeika is. They had a big round tank made of cement clear up to the top. And I went up against that so they can't hit me through this one. They shot about four or five shots. But they hit one guy, and then I went home. I didn't get hit. I was lucky
JB: You were on strike all the time.
DB: Then every strike that come, we went out. That's why I go to Alamo. I don't want to go to Alamo because the coal is down like that. That is where I got hurt.
RM: How did you get hurt?
DB: I got hurt. I was a timber man, see.
JB: Three days before it closed.
DB: I never worked one day after that. I never worked one more day. So this entry was going up the hill. And then they had one cross entry like you see that car there. The entry was going that way, and the coal come down, and they had a shute down there about 400 feet where the entry crossed. They had a big shute with timber that big around, and the coal was going through the shute. Through the shute, it was going to the car, see. There was a little part in there that holds two cars, one empty and one full So when the driver comes, he takes the full one out and puts another empty in. Then they opened the shute until the car fills up. So I was working up there, and there was a little better than 300 feet straight up that way. The coal had to come down and go down the shute, and the coal was pretty high, about 12 feet, and they was only taking about 6 or 7 feet out and leaving the top coal up. But there was some new guys. They didn't know how to drill the coal, and they went up a little too high, and it was too close to the roof and the roof come down. So the machine men, one was Maffaley (?) The other was Chachine (?) they used to call him, Italian too. They told the boss, “We can't go up there and cut under that guy's roof because we are scared we are going to get hurt': The roof was real bad. That is why it was real undercut to make it solid. So the boss was coming through, and he says, “Dan, I want you to put two bar in and save that roof up there. Even if you have to stay a little overtime, you go ahead, and I'll pay you for it.” So me and another kid that was helping me, another guy. So I already had the bar up, one here, and one there. I was filling up, to the roof, filling up so it touched solid, and this guy was clear through on the roof about 50, 60 feet ahead of me, and there was a squeeze. One chunk of coal come down, and I was with Terry. He says, “Look out.” But it already broke all of my scaffold that was on top. So it took me from here to across the street. When I fell down, this chunk of coal fell right over me, right on my back.
RM: So it had you pinned under the coal?
DB: No, it just stood one second, and then it went clear down to the bottom.
RN: So everything rolled over you, and then off of you?
DB: Yeah, it just passed me over, just like lightening. But it broke my back in five, places. If it was a little mine, I wouldn't have known that coal fell down. You know, we had these timbers. That's how big that chunk was.
RM: That's almost two feet across, wasn't it?
DB: Then from there on I never did work in the mine no more. The doctor told me, “You lost between 40 and 50 percent of your ability. I mean strength.” That's what he told me.
RM: So you couldn't lift things after that. What year was that?
DB: That was 1936. March 11, 1936.
JB: Before he was at the Alamo, he was at Cameron Mine.
DB: That was during the Wobbly strike. But it wasn't a Wobbly. It was the United Mine Workers.
JB: He was working at Alamo, and then they told us to get out of there. Then we went to Ideal. “Nothing for to do for you.” Not in Ideal. I mean we went back to Cameron. We see if they will give us the job. “Why, you had a job here. How come you quit? Now we fill up.” We went to Walsen Camp. Same thing, fill up. We went to Pictou, filled up. I went to Turner. He says, “If you want to wait a couple of weeks, maybe we give you a job. We'll let you know.” They never did let us know. Oh, we went in all these little mines and everywhere, trying to get on. We even went in Aguilar. We tried to get a job down in one of those mines. Nothing doing. So we had a friend in Alamo. His name was John. He married that Fink's daughter, the crippled one. I can't remember his last name. We asked him if he could tell the super to give us a job. So the next day he called us up right away. He says, “I got a job for you.” So went up to Alamo. And that was the last mine I worked in.
RM: What did you do after that? Did you do other work?
DB: I had to go in business.
RM: What business did you have?
DB: I bought the Busy Bee, and I had a bar and a restaurant.
RM: Where was that?
JB: 617 Main?
DB: Right across there on the middle of Main Street.
JB: We stayed there 24 years.
DB: Yeah, I stayed there until we retired. 26 years.
RM: How did you like that after you had mined?
DB: Oh, it was lO0% better. lO0% better. Oh, that Alamo was a rough mine. We went up in the Alamo pretty near in the end of 1927 until 1936. I was there about nine years. I loaded coal first before they put me on company work. Did a lot of work, straight down, straight up, every direction. It was really hard. Then I had to work in a deck entry they called it. My brother Louie, was on the top entry, and I was on the back entry. See, on the top entry they bring the car to the face to you. But there's where I was, if you can go down there, because it was straight down like that, they just put it in the cart, and then I had to push it with my back 200 or 300 feet clear up. Big cars weighed two tons when it was full, sometimes two and a half tons. Oh, boy, I was just working like mad. Yeah, heavy work. Push the car back. See, I had to lean the car because I had to make the track so that the full comes out. I couldn't push the full up. You know, after you fill it up, they are heavy. So I made it lean this way, the track. I had to lean my own track. But that was to push the empty cars back that was hard. I had to push them with my back. Yeah, it was a hard job.
RM: When did you get married?
DB: I got married in 1922.
RM: Where did you meet your wife?
DB: Down here.
JB: I lived in Ugolini farm dairy.
DB: She used to deliver milk all over town. It is still there. It is the same one. Her folks still run it.
JB: We got one son.
RM: Where is he?
DB: He is in Denver. Leo. He is a Certified Public Accountant.
JB: He has a nice wife and four nice kids.
RM: How nice. So you have four grandkids.
DB: He was in the war for four years, in the Second World War.
JB: He was in college, and they took all those college kids out.
DB: Well, he volunteered. Because he knew they was going to call him. So he volunteered.
JB: They put him in the Combat Engineers. They took them all out of college. He volunteered for the army, but to go to college.
DB: What they did, after he come back from the war, he come back to college to finish, and they help him to finish their course.
RM: So you have seen a lot of changes in Walsenburg, haven't you?
DB: Oh, I'm telling you. That Walsenburg was a lively town. You have to figure we got, between little and big mines, we got around 30 coal mines in Huerfano County. Yeah, we had a lot of coal mines here. Me and John Pratt, we had the pool hall in Toltec, and we had the Union upstairs. That building was two—stories. We had the Union Hall up there. We figured up all the
JUST NOTE A PAGE MISSING
We work, say in the wintertime, we started like now (December), take even October and November. Say October and November and December. Then January and February. And then March, no more. We mostly just worked in the winter. Then in the summertime they left the mine open, but there was just a few guys working.
RM: Why didn't they mine in the summer?
DB: I guess they didn't have enough contracts. Wow there was some mines like the Trinidad mine that was working in the summertime too, because they got that coal that goes for the steel. But this coal don't go for the steel. This is hard coal. This is a better kind of coal. It is a higher grade. But it is no good for heating the steel. Down there is just the soft coal, and that is what they need for the steel.
RM: Were there a lot of mine accidents? Did a lot of men get hurt in the mines?
DB: Oh, there was plenty of them. Yeah, there was plenty of them. And they didn't have no insurance. You could get killed, and they would bury you, and that's all. If they would lose a mule, boy they would get mad. It was worth, the mule. But they didn't care about you if you get killed. And then the regulations started coming in after.
JB: Now, when he got hurt, he got compensation.
RM: You were late enough that they paid.
DB: Yeah, after that strike and the regulations, we got better wages and shorter hours and we got the regulations come in after that strike. We got a lot better regulations. But before that they would rather lose a man than a mule, because they had to pay for the mule. But the man, they could get all the men they wanted.
RM: Boy, that is awful. But afterwards they got Workmen's Compensation.
DB: Yeah, after that, yeah. They give me, even when I got hurt, they helped me to get in business. That was the State Compensation. They cave me $3600. They helped me out to get in business.
JB: If you want to see the change in the town, just look at these prices here. This is an old newspaper. See, this White Grocery? They had roast veal steak 19˘ a pound, and round roast 12—l/2˘ a pound. Sausage, 2 pounds for 45˘. Oh, it makes me sick to look at all these prices.
DB: Yeah, eggs two dozen for a quarter.
JB: Milk, 5 cartons for 45˘.
DB: Yeah, all the stuff was... You know for $1.00 you could buy enough for one week, easy. Now $5.00 don't even fill the bottom of the sack. It don't even fill it.
JB: They sold 5 bars for 23˘. They wasn't even 5˘ a bar. I'd like to go shopping now for those prices.
I guess it is always the same. Prices go up and wages go up. Wages are low when prices are low.
DB: I'll tell you one thing. We needed the Union then. They needed it real bad because the way the conditions was provoking people was really bad. Of course, you could say that you don't like it. He says, “You can go work some other place. There is a lot of other mines.” Like in Ideal I was 12 cars in one week, and I went in and protest, and he says they didn't error. I know they did error because the driver was taking one of mine a day and putting it on his buddy. And he would take one of my checks and put it in the car of the other guy. He put the other guy's check in. He take mine out and put in the other guy's check. So I was protesting about it. Of course, I don't blame the bosses there because it wasn't their fault. But anyway the answer I get. The boss was Schmidt. I says, “What can I do?” He says, “Well, Dan, why don't you go some other place? There is a lot of mine you could go and work.” He answered me that. If you don't like it, you got to leave. But one thing the Union did. They got pretty ornery, and they got recognized. Now they went too far. They're taking advantage.
RM: Of the mine operators.
DB: They're taking advantage now. The mine operators, now they are the underdog, see. They turned it that way. They took too much advantage because they got the power. And they shouldn't do that. That's why we got this inflation. That's what start that, the Unions. Prices so high, so high and everything. Gas goes up, and everything, everybody else. So they go, they say, “We go up too.” And we keep on going, and no way to stop it. They keep on going. And that is way out of the limit the way the Union do now. Roosevelt told them. He says, “Don't forget. I gave you guys the chance to organize and everything. But don't overdo it.” But you know how it is. The people, they are never satisfied, never satisfied.
RM: I guess that's human nature.
DB: Yeah, that's right. That is what that is.
RM: I know I talked to a girl about a month ago that is working down by Allen Mine, and she makes $9.00 an hour. For an 8-hour shift, she, makes $72.00. That's a lot of money.
JB: We didn't make that in a month. If he brought home $35, $45.
DB: $40, or $50, when we was working steady, $50, $60.
RM: That's a big difference, isn't it?
JB: Well, it makes it hard on them that's got a fixed income, a fixed salary. That's what makes it hard. Because their groceries go up like everyone else's. Like the old, age pensioners, social security, and all of them. They have to make it do.
DB: Yeah, now the working class, they can't say they don't have it the way they want it. It isn't like when we was working.
JB: Well, they don't know the difference. They weren't born in those days. We know it is different because we have seen both sides. But the ones that are working now weren't even born at that time.
DB: Today the working class has the over hand of everything.
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