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Document - Historical interview notes - Interview of Philip Browman by Ray Wade -INTERVIEW OF PHILIP BROWMAN BY RAY WADE Ray: When did you move in here and where did you work? Philip: I moved in here in 1954 and worked for the United States government in meat inspections in South St. Paul. Ray: How long did that last? Philip: Until we moved in and they were going to have a reduction of work, so then I got put out. Ray: You got put out after you moved into the house. Philip: Yes Ray: So then you went to work for a guy drilling wells over in Bloomington. Philip: Amodt? Oil Company (sounds like - om mit) Ray: Wasn't that in the wintertime. Philip: When they talk about it being colder than a well drillers head, yes, I knew what they're talking about. Ray: How long did you do that? Philip: Until after New Year's sometime. Ray: So, then you went to work for the State of Minnesota? Philip: I was still a federal inspector, but I was working for the State. Ray: You were working for a guy whose name sounded like glockenspiel? Philip: Glockenhauer. Ray: He was in the State Capitol? Philip: No, he was in the Minnesota Building in St. Paul. Ray: He was in charge of 9 Philip: State Sanitary Board. Ray: Did he have a job just for feeding hogs? Philip: It's about what it amounted to. Ray: I was still a federal employee, but I worked for him as an inspector. Female: What kind of food were they feeding the hogs? Philip: Garbage. Ray: Garbage from where? Philip: From restaurants Ray: They sorted the garbage out, so they didn't have paper napkins or toothpicks or anything? Philip: No. Ray: All clean garbage that they cooked? Philip: This Clarkson, he cooked it right in the truck. He had a steam boiler and he hooked it up with a hose. He had a coil in the bottom of the tank in his truck. Ray: How much did he cook at a time? Philip: He must have cooked 5 or 6 tons at a time. Ray: And then it was your job to go and check on him? Were there others in the state that you checked on? Philip: Yes, I had a route way up on the North Shore, north of Duluth. There were some up there too. I had to make it twice a month. Ray: How many were there? Philip: I was with one other guy; there were two of us. We checked separately. He took one route and I took another. Female: How far north and how far south did you go? Philip: Two Harbors. Red Wing. Ray: I had a friend that lived across the street from one out in Roseville. Did you check in Roseville? Philip: Yes. Ray: There was a guy over there off County Road D on Fairview. It was across the street from my buddy. Philip: I checked that one. Ray: That thing smelled terrible. Did all of them smell? Philip: They all smelled. He bought 300 peter pigs from South St. Paul and put them on the garbage feeding. And they had some kind of a hair worm in the gut and they couldn't do anything about it. He had to shoot them all. He dug a hole and buried 300 of them in one hole. Ray: This is Clarkson you're talking about? Philip: Yes. Ray: You live on the south side of Diffley, but Diffley wasn't there in 1954. Philip: No it wasn't there. Ray: How far did his farm come? Was his farm a neighbor to you? Philip: Neighbor enough. Some times his pigs would get out and come over here in the yard. Ray: You said he had the biggest farm in Minnesota on cooked garbage? Philip: Yes. He had about 1500 pigs. 300 of them got sick and he buried them in one hole and when they went to dig the house, they hit some stink. They were digging the basements for new houses. Ray: This was in 1990? Philip: Something like that. It was the rottenest smell you ever smelled. Ray: He used to cook 5 tons of garbage at a time. How long would that last. Philip: He would do 2 loads of that a day. Ray: He would feed his pigs 10 tons a day? Philip: Ya. Ray: So, 1500 pigs. Philip: His wife drove one truck and he drove the other one. They each took a route to go pick the garbage up. Ray: In St. Paul? Philip: In St. Paul and Lake Street in Minneapolis too. Ray: In a dump truck? Philip: It wasn't a dump truck. It was a tank truck. And, it had a steel box and then it had steel covers on top. Ray: How did they get the garbage in there then? Philip: They would take off a cover at a time and pour the garbage can in the tank truck. Ray: And they did that twice a week. Philip: I don't remember if they went twice a week or not. But, they went a lot. I used to have a thermometer with a guard on it that I could stick in the tank to see if I got it hot enough. It had a dial gauge on it. Ray: What was the minimum temperature you needed? Philip: About 210. Ray: That would actually boil the garbage? Philip: Sometimes the smell would too, depending on what it was. And then if one hog didn't like what the other one was getting, he would bite him in the rear -end. Ray: They're not a gentle animal then. Philip: No they are not. Ray: Do they have sharp teeth? Philip: Or ya, you bet ya. Ray: He didn't have grass over there; it wasn't like a pasture. It was all dirt. Philip: All dirt for sure. Ray: And 1500 hogs and he fed them garbage. Philip: He had cement platforms. He would take the truck in there and raise the box and then go ahead and spread it out. Ray: What was his name? Philip: Clarkson. Ray: Which Clarkson? Do you remember his first name? Philip: Bud, I think. Ray: And you said that he died in his truck? Philip: Yes. He always stopped up at the booze hall and he got drunk and he went out in his truck and died right out there in the parking lot. Ray: Starks Saloon? Philip: Yes, Starks. Ray: He was related to the Clarksons that had the marina under the Mendota Bridge? Philip: I don't know. Ray: There was a Clarkson, this was before the Mendota Bridge was built, that used to run the ferry across from the St. Paul side of the river over by the fort. That was a Clarkson. It was probably the dad. How long did you work that job? Philip: I worked in meat inspection for about a year and then I think I worked this one for about a year too. Ray: Then you went to Minnesota Mining. Philip: Ya. Ray: Then you retired from Minnesota Mining. Philip: Ya. Ray: So you have seen a lot of changes in the area. Do you remember when they put Diffley in down here? Philip: Ya, there were no roads through there at all. Ray: The closest road was up at the top of the hill by the fire barn. Up by Dodd Road. Philip: Clarkson came in from Hwy. 3. Ray: Except for 3, the closest road was Dodd Road then. And Diffley came down to Dodd Road? Philip: And that was as far as it went. Ray: So if you went anywhere, you went to Rosemount one direction and to Wescott Station the other direction on 3. Philip: Wescott Station used to have a light so the bus could stop and pick up passengers. Ray: The Jefferson Bus Line? That was on the side the grocery store is on now. Philip: Ya. Ray: The grocery store was on Wescott Station at least from 54 on. Philip: We always used to buy our gasoline and bread and stuff at Wescott Station. Ray: There wasn't anything from Wescott Station down to Starks? Philip: No. Ray: Were there homes down there? Philip: Ya, there were homes and farms. Ray: Wescott Station and then Starks was the next place down the road. Philip: Starks used to be called the Halfway House. That's where Clarkson died right in the parking lot. Ray: That was after you worked for him. Philip: I didn't work for Clarkson. Ray: After you worked for the state? Philip: Ya. Ray: He thought you worked for him. Philip: He thought I was a plant out here to catch him. Because he was always violating. Female: He wasn't really so much violating, but Glockenhauer didn't trust him, in fact he was the first one to get a garbage feeder going. Ray: He was the first one in the state to get on that program? Female: Yes, but he did a lot of other violations; you know traffic and all that kind of stuff. Philip: He didn't give a darn for anything. Female: He didn't like any kind of authority. Philip: He bought a bunch of them Shetland ponies one time. Most of them died. Ray: He wasn't a very good animal husband, then? Philip: No. Ray: Well, that was interesting.