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[Tape 73_01 begins]
Blatti: Okie doke. Can we start with your upbringing and where you were born and raised? Let's
start with that. Where were you born?
Butcher: Okay. I was born in Detroit on May 18th, 1943. Was the youngest of eight children. I
was the only one in my family to be born in a hospital, Lincoln Hospital in Detroit, which no
longer exists. But all the rest of my brothers and sisters were born at home.
Blatti: What was your, what kind of neighborhood? I don't, I don't know Detroit very well. So,
can you situate me in terms of the neighborhood you lived in?
Butcher: Okay. Well, I was born in the city, but I actually grew up downriver, downriver Detroit in
a community called Lincoln Park, Michigan. Has a population, I believe, around 65,000, and I
lived in a very nice, I guess, a middle class neighborhood. And we had a fairly big home. But
actually, I guess when you think about eight kids, it wasn't all that big. It was two stories, and we
had three bedrooms upstairs and a big living room, dining room, and kitchen.
Blatti: And was this a new development after the war, or was it an older neighborhood?
Butcher: No, actually, I believe my parents moved there in the ‘40s. And at the time they moved
there, it was a relatively undeveloped area. They had, they had lived in the city of Detroit until
that time. And when they moved to Lincoln Park, it was, the homes were very far apart.
And I guess as they grew, as the neighborhood grew and filled in, there were a number of
homes built. We became just like any other residential area, with a lot of homes right across
from one another. But we did, we did have a beautiful, big side lot on our house. In fact, we
were the second home from the corner, and at one time, my parents owned the corner lot as
well, and then later sold it to a neighbor.
But we were fortunate that we had a little more green around us, maybe more than the typical
residential home did at that time. And we had a great big fat tree that was kind of a centerpiece
on the side yard.
Blatti: Now, can you describe your parents for me, their names and what they did and…..
Butcher: Sure. My mom was named Ethel Losancy Butcher, and my father was Alexander
Butcher. He was really Alexander Mészáros with a Hungarian surname. But changed it
translated to Butcher.
Blatti: That’s what Mészáros means in English?
Butcher: Yes, it means butcher. And so at some point, I think in the early in their marriage,
maybe in the ‘20s, they, my father, legally changed it to, to Butcher.
And I often think about how my whole life may have been affected because we're, because of
where I fell on the alphabet, falling in with the b’s instead of the m’s. But, anyway, they were
both from Hungary. They were both Hungarian immigrants. So, I'm a first-generation American
here.
They, my dad came to the States when he was about ten with an aunt, I believe. And my mother
came when she was about 16 or 17.
Blatti: By herself or with family?
Butcher: She came with my grandmother and her three brothers.
My grandfather had earlier emigrated to the US to see if he could raise the funds to bring the
whole family here. And, he, he had heard all those fantastic stories about the automobile
factories and Henry Ford's $5 a day. And that seemed like a big sum at that time, I guess. And
so he came ahead of time and the money for, for passage for the rest.
Blatti: Did he in fact work in the Ford plant?
Butcher: He did for a while. In later years, and when I, when I knew him, he really lived on a
farm. They had a farm in Bellville, Michigan, which is now getting to be more built up than it was
at that point. But it's not too far from Detroit Metropolitan Airport in the Romulus area.
It's sort of on the way to Ann Arbor.
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Blatti: Okay. I recognize the highway sign.
Butcher: Yeah. If you were going on I-94.
But anyway, my parents were pretty special people. I think they, they met, my dad was eight
years older than my mom, and they met in this country. I guess they both lived in the Del Rey
section of Detroit, which was a sort of a Hungarian community.
Blatti: Is there a big Hungarian community in Detroit? I'm, I'm very familiar with Polish-American
communities throughout the upper Midwest, but I, I don't happen to know very much about
Hungarian communities.
Butcher: Well, I think it was fairly sizable. And that was probably an area where they first, you
know, found countryman and shared a lot of experience.
And there's still some Hungarian restaurants here that play the Hungarian music. And at the
time that I was growing up, there was Hungarian hour on the weekends where they would play
Hungarian music on the radio. I don't know if that still exists or not, but we would often take
Sunday drives to my grandparents’ home and, and play that music.
But anyway, I would say, as I said, my, my parents were pretty special in that they managed to,
to raise a family of eight kids and gave us all a lot of love, and I think a lot of ambition. They
always kind of encouraged us to, to get an education and to, you know, strive for a better life.
They, in terms of their own education, my father had, I think, all he had completed, eighth grade
of formal education. But he later went on to, he later went on to get his GED, and then he took
special classes, I think, in drafting and that sort of thing. He, he became a tool inspector at Ford
Motor Company.
He probably had other positions before he got to that job, but his formal education really was
only to the eighth grade, but then... Oh, I, I neglected to mention that when he first came to,
when he first came to the States, he lived in Pennsylvania and lived with his father and
stepmother.
My, my mother came immediately to Detroit with, with her family. And my mother did finish high
school, and she was always a very avid reader. She really devoured books and newspapers,
and I, maybe that's where I got my love of reading and language.
Blatti: Do you remember what kinds of things she read?
Butcher: I think she read everything that she could get her hands on. I think she, she liked to be
informed, as I do, about what's going on in the world. And so she read newspapers avidly, and
she, I don't remember any specific books right now, but I, I know that she did read a lot of
books.
Blatti: Did you grow up in a bilingual household? Was Hungarian spoken and read in your
house?
Butcher: Yes. Although just by my parents. We always used to, we always used to laugh about
the fact that, when they didn't want us to know what they were saying, they would speak it,
speak in Hungarian.
And, they, they spoke Hungarian to my grandparents on visits, and they had other family and
friends that spoke Hungarian. We had some neighbors right across the street that were
Hungarian. And so they would frequently speak the language to them. It was ironic because I
think when, when we got older, as young adults, teenagers, young adults, my parents would
say, “Why don't you learn Hungarian?” And we would always say, “Why didn't you teach us. you
know, when we were younger?”
But I think there was a very concerted effort on their part to encourage their children to speak
English, particularly my older brothers and sisters. Because I think they saw what had happened
to children of other immigrants who didn't master the English language when they went to
school. And so I think there was this, a conscious effort on their part to make sure that we were
very fluent in English. The only one in my family that I know of that, my immediate family that
speaks Hungarian is my oldest brother, Ernest, who lives who now lives in Mexico City. But he
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spent some summers with my grandparents on the farm, and I think he picked it up basically on
those experiences.
Blatti: Can you describe the rest of your siblings for me, so that I have a kind of a list of who
they are, and maybe where they are now, as a way of kind of understanding?
Butcher: Sure. Well, as I'm I mentioned, I'm the youngest of eight children, and there was a big
age spread in my family. My oldest brother was about 21 years older than I am, and his name is
Ernest Butcher, and he now lives in Mexico City.
Blatti: What does he do there?
Butcher: He's an engineer. He, he had his own business for a while and then sold it, and now
has his own business again. But he basically has specialized in building cooling towers for
industry. And has found it a good market for that product in Mexico.
And he married, he married a woman who grew up in Mexico City, which is how he ended up
there.
And then the next oldest in my family was my sister Anna, and she was about 20 years, 19 to 20
years older than I. And, she became sort of a second mom to me after my, my own mother died.
My mother died when I was aged 24. And, unfortunately, she died in 1980. She died rather
young. She died at aged 54 herself.
And she was a very devoted mother, wife, and homemaker. But she also had studied chemical
engineering at the University of Detroit. She didn't finish, didn't get her degree because of
financial, a lack of financial resources at the time. But I think she was very, she was very, very,
very bright, but then very, very devoted to the, her home life of her family.
But she also played, played baseball and softball at the time, back in the ‘40s and ‘50s. And,
this current movie that's just come out, A League of Their Own, is one that I'm very anxious to
see because….
Blatti: Was she on one of the women's exhibition teams?
Butcher: Well, I don't think she was in, in that league, exactly. But she was very active in a
women's softball league. I have to find out more about it from my brother-in-law, who still
survives.
Then I have another brother, Robert Butcher, who was an attorney. He's 65 or 66 right now. And
he has a large family. They live in Grosse Ile.
Blatti: I don't know, is that a suburb of Detroit?
Butcher: Yes. I probably should back up. My sister's married name was Anna Palmeri, and
they lived in Macomb County in Roseville, Michigan.
My brother Bob and his wife Gladys live in Grosse Ile, Michigan, which is also in the downriver
area. And they had five boys and one daughter.
I’d better not tell you about all my brothers, sisters, and all the kids, because there are so many
more.
Blatti: We’ll concentrate on the siblings. All right?
Butcher: Okay. And then I have a sister, Betty, and she's living in Garden City, Michigan, and
she has raised a sizable family, and has also worked until recently at a variety of office
positions. And she was working in the Wayne County clerk's office until she retired recently.
And I have a brother, Joe, Joe Butcher, who lives not too far from here, lives in Southfield,
Michigan. And he's in computers and computers, computer equipment sales.
And then I have a brother, Paul, who's a dentist. Has a practice in the downriver area. He lives
in Dearborn, Michigan. Has a practice in Island Park. And he has been my dentist ever since,
ever since I've been a student, actually. When I was, I think, in grade school, I think he was, he
was studying at U of D Dental School, and I would take the bus and, and be his practice patient.
He provided me with free dental care during my high school and college years, and I go to him
regularly.
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Blatti: Must be nice to have that kind of professional in the family.
Butcher: It is at times because he's a very good dentist, and he is very gentle. And if you have
an emergency, sometimes he’ll make special hours or special arrangements for it.
And then my brother Michael, who is, was closest in age to me, was six years older than I am.
Was someone I have a, I've had a very special bond with, and sadly, he died last December
26th of lung cancer. We, we shared a lot in our growing-up years.
Blatti: Now, was he in this area, too?
Butcher: Yes. He was. Well, he was living in Southfield, Michigan, just before he died. But prior
to that, he was living in Petoskey, in northern Michigan. He was in real estate development. He
was an attorney and then, specializing in tax attorney and as a tax attorney, and then he went
into real estate development. And so he developed a lot of property in northern Michigan, which
is why they moved up there. And then they moved back recently. Fortunately for me, during the
time that he became ill, he was ill for about a year before he died, and I was able to spend more
time with him than I had in a long time.
And so we, we did have the opportunity to, to be together. And also because I wasn't working
full time, I was in the position to take him to a lot of his radiation treatments and, and then to, we
had a lot of very pleasant lunches and reminisced a lot this past year before he died. So we had
some special time together.
Blatti: Well, one of the things that's really striking in the kind of description of your family is that
everybody in your generation seems to have received quite a bit of education and gone on in
the world. It makes me wonder, did your parents have expectations that you all kind of… Were
you aware of receiving messages about what you were supposed to do and how you were
supposed to do it as you were growing up?
Butcher: Well, I think that we were all fortunate in that we were all encouraged to strive to get a,
a higher education if we could, and to get a chance to compete for, you know, a professional
job. And it was with a lot of love and support, but it was also with the understanding that we'd
probably have to work our way through to do this, because my parents, you know, with the kind
of job my father had and the size of the family, certainly, they certainly didn't have the resources
to send us to college, but, they gave us all the, I think the support that you could imagine in
terms of making this a goal. Education was a goal.
You know, being the best that you could be, I think, was always something that was, something
to, that we were encouraged to strive for. And, you know, to the extent that they could provide
room and board, they could, you know, maybe provide you with extras, they would. But most of
us worked our way through or got loans to go through, or a combination of those two things.
And I can remember from a very early age, apparently, I did very well even early on,
academically. And I was always encouraged by my parents to think of, you know, applying for
scholarships, and I know Ford Motor Company had, had some scholarships for children of
employees. And, you know, that was always something that I was encouraged to think about.
Maybe you can get a scholarship from Ford. Well, as it worked out, I never, I never was able to
get one from Ford. But I was successful in getting a number of scholarships from the University
of Michigan when I went there. And also was successful in getting a student loan, and I also
worked all the way through college. But, you know, there was always an expectation that, you
know, we would have to, you know, work to help pay for education, but that it could be done.
You know, I think maybe that, that was a very common attribute of immigrants who brought their
kids here, or moved here and raised their families here to have a better life, you know, have a
better chance at success and financial well-being than the parents.
Blatti: Did your family stay in touch with Hungarian relatives in Eastern Europe? Did you have a
sense of family on both sides of the Atlantic, or was it pretty much centered here?
Butcher: Well, I think that there was some correspondence, but probably more of the, you
know, the older relatives. And so, I think as time went on, there was less and less connection
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back there. And since my, my grandparents were here, I think that their, their focal point was,
was in the, in the US and in Michigan for my mother's side of the family.
And my dad's family was based in Pennsylvania. So, there was communication within the
relatives in the US, particularly, and friends.
Blatti: You were just describing Lincoln Park to me as a neighborhood that had been built up
during the time that your family lived there. I wonder what it was like, culturally, in terms of the
neighborhood schools and who your friends were? You also mentioned that one of the
neighbors was Hungarian, and I wondered, was it a neighborhood that had a real Eastern
European identity? Was it lots more mixed up with that than that? What did it seem like to you
as you were growing up?
Butcher: Okay, I don't think it was particularly ethnic. I just, I think, I think we were just lucky
enough to have some Hungarian neighbors across the street. And it's funny because their name
was Celonte, too. And, Frank and Ethel Celonte. And the woman’s name was Ethel, which was
my mother's name. And I identified real strongly with her, and she, she was like a little second
mother to me, too, in a way, maybe about the same age as my parents.
She would often invite me over to visit with her, maybe watch her bake cookies or sew, sewing
projects. And they had a little dog that I used to like, a little cocker spaniel. But they, they had a
couple of older kids who were more the ages of some of my older brothers and sisters, so they
didn't have any kids my age. But, I think that there was a mixture of people, but, and not, not
one particular ethnic group or not real, real strong ethnic of any type was just kind of a mixture.
That's all I could say, I guess.
Blatti: Was it a neighborhood again, since I don't know Detroit all that well in terms of its, its
neighborhoods. Was this a neighborhood in which a lot of people worked at the Ford plant, or,
was it all sorts of different kinds of occupations?
Butcher: Yeah, I think that there were quite a number that worked at the Ford plant and maybe
other auto plants, and maybe some of the steel companies, because downriver is noted for a lot
of the steel companies.
Blatti: Now, did your mother work outside the home or was she primarily based in the house?
Butcher: Well, during the time that I knew her, she always worked at home. I believe that before
they were married, she did have a number of different jobs outside the home. And I don't, I don't
know if she ever worked when they were in their early marriage years, but. And I know she
worked, I think, doing some sewing in some kind of factory or plant. I'm not sure which.
Blatti: What was your family active in, religious or political, or some other kind of community
group? Was that part of your growing up to..?
Butcher: Yeah. Well, we were raised Catholic. We belong to St. Henry's Parish in Lincoln Park.
And in fact, I went, ended up going to St. Henry School from the second grade on till eighth
grade. My father was not Catholic, but was very good about driving all the kids to church on
Sunday and that sort of thing.
I think this may be more of a center of social life, probably was the American Legion, which was
based on Southfield Road, just a few miles from our house, maybe two or three miles. And I
think my dad participated in a lot of gatherings at different times with other veterans.
Blatti: Now, was he a veteran of World War II or World War I?
Butcher: We'd have to, World War I, and/or after World War I. I'm not, I'm not quite clear on the
dates, but...
Blatti: Do you know? Did he serve in the American military as an avenue for citizenship? I, I
know some men did. I wondered if that would...
Butcher: Yeah, I think he might have already been a citizen. Let me think this through. I don't
think that's why he did it. I think, I think he, he came here at age ten. So I think it was he was
going to be a U.S. citizen or may have been a U.S. citizen through his father or..
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Blatti: As the son of a naturalized…?
Butcher: Yeah, I think that's what happened. But I'm just not clear on the dates right now, when
he was actually in the military.
Blatti: Do you know what year he came to this country?
Butcher: He came probably about 1905. He was born in 1895 or 1896. I have to check the
date. And he came over about ten.
Blatti: So, in fact, he would have been just old enough to serve in World War I.
Butcher: Yeah, he very likely did. And I think I've seen some pictures of him in his uniform, and
he, because I said it was somewhat tied into events or gatherings with the American Legion.
And my mother liked for her, her social, pleasure she liked to play bingo. And they would often
have bingo nights on Friday night at the American Legion, and sometimes maybe twice a week.
And, she would go to those when she could.
And then there were, I'm sure, they had social events for, for couples as well that they went to.
In fact, that's where my oldest sister Ann got married, at the American Legion Hall, or got
married at the church and had a reception there. And I was a flower girl in her wedding. I
remember it being a great party.
Blatti: Did growing up with a lot of older brothers and sisters did, did, did you hear a lot about,
kind of politics or other kinds of current events at the dinner table, or was that part of your
family's…? I guess I'm looking for things that might have set you on a, you know, path toward
being interested in communications and journalism. And wonder if there were any memories
from childhood, hearing about things, or being aware of a public side of the world?
Butcher: Well, that's a good, good thing to think back on. If you put it in context of when I was
born in May of 1943, obviously, we were in the middle of the war.
My oldest brother, Ernie, was in the military, and my brother Bob was in the military either right
then or shortly thereafter. Ernie was in the Army Air Force, and Bob was in the Marines.
So, when I was really young, some of my older siblings weren't there, you know, they were, they
were in the military.
So, by the time I would probably be aware of a lot of discussion, the issues would probably be
late, you know, late ‘40s, early ‘50s. And I remember certainly the, the Eisenhower - Kefauver
campaign and things like that.
I remember, remember when we first got a radio. I remember when we first got a television.
Blatti: When did you first get a radio?
Butcher: Well, actually, I should say when we first got a first, got a new radio, which was a big,
stand-up type of radio.
And my brother Bob brought it home one night. I'm not sure how or where he got it, but it was
like a bigger and better radio that I used to listen to, you know, things like The Lone Ranger and
other, other great, serial programs on.
Blatti: How old would you have been around them?
Butcher: Well, what I'm thinking back about that, I think that had to be probably, you know,
when I was five or six, something like that.
And I just remember my sister Betty stayed up all night, because she couldn't figure out how to
turn it off. [laughter]
And my brother Bob said, “You could have gone to bed. Didn't make any difference if it was on
or off,” but she felt a duty to stay up with it. [laughter]
Blatti: Oh, that's funny.
Butcher: Then, I remember we got a television, and when we got the television, it had to be, I
think, around 1950 or ‘51. So I would have been seven or eight years old. This would be, was a
little black and white TV, Halifax brand, which doesn't exist anymore, I'm sure. But that was a
big, big step into a different world.
Blatti: Do you remember early shows that you watched on it?
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Butcher: Oh, sure, I watched Howdy Doody and…. What other kids’ shows were on at that
time? I don't know, but I, I have strong recollections of Princess Summer Winter Fall Spring.
Blatti: Oh, yes, I do too, I do too. I know the other one I remember from that period of my own
life is Captain Video, who I remember went back in time like….
Butcher: Oh, really?
Blatti: … every program, you'd go back in time to some particular event or some particular
place that's, you know.
Did your, just to return to the radio and the TV for a minute? Did your family watch, like, listen to
the radio, or watch TV together as a group? Or was it more kind of whoever happened to be
home or..?
Butcher: I think there were a lot of shows that we listened to together. The Lone Ranger
somehow stands out in my mind because I guess that must have been one of my favorites. I
think there must have been other mysteries or series-type programs that we listened to
regularly.
And we listened to, you know, different music. And that was probably determined by who had
control of the radio at the moment.
Blatti: Who do you remember? Was the, were these things that your parents controlled or your
older siblings, or was it much more, kind of negotiated?
Butcher: I think, probably seemed to me, you know, more siblings… I don't remember, you
know, like my parents, you know, dominating it. But I think there were just things that we, we
grew to make as a habit.
And, of course, you know, as I was, as I was growing up my, my other brothers and sisters were
growing up and moving out of the house into either college or marriage. And so, they might be,
they might be back and forth. They wouldn't, we wouldn't all be there as we'd have a lot of big,
Sunday dinners, a lot of big family dinners, you know, as they got married and, and began
having their own families.
In time, then there were grandkids coming along too and, and in fact my, one of my nieces
who's just seven years difference in age, seven years younger. You know, she, she came along
at a time that kind of, maybe disrupted my status as the youngest child in the house. Because
when my sister, this was my sister Ann’s daughter, Carol. When she, she was working, my
mother babysat for her. So I remember being the, you know, the youngest for a long time. And
then all of a sudden, I had a niece who became the youngest in the house. And we've had a lot
of friendly rivalry over the years.
Blatti: Kind of shared the spotlight.
Butcher: Yeah. Probably vied for my mother's attention.
Blatti: You mentioned that you remember the Eisenhower - Kefauver, election? And I wondered,
do you remember knowing your family's politics or being aware of, you know, how they thought
about..?
Butcher: Oh, yeah, my parents were always Democrats. My father was a big supporter of the
unions and always very democratic. I think there was always the, the feeling that the Democrats
were more on the, on the side of the underdog. And, you know, they probably felt in that
category, since they were immigrants and, you know, autoworkers supported, and, you know,
really having to stretch, really having to stretch the dollars to feed this, this family.
And, you know, I think they had very fond memories of Roosevelt. A lot, you know, a lot of that
stuff had happened during those periods before me, or before, you know, I was really
recognizing what was happening in the world of politics. I think that was very formative, you
know, on the parents.
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And, of course, they had lived through the depression and had to really struggle at that period.
Yes. I heard a lot of stories. I heard a lot of stories about the depression, and yeah, I, I think it
probably had a lifelong impact on them, as I'm sure did most people of that generation.
Blatti: Are there one or two stories that are really kind of emblematic of, I mean, kind of that you
can remember now that were just real important in your family explaining things?
Butcher: Well, let me think about that. I remember that my, my parents opened a restaurant for
a while during prohibition. And so what, what time period are we talking about? Late ‘20s.
Blatti: Yeah, prohibition came in, I'm not sure I have the exact date right, but it was in the ‘20s,
and it was repealed by the Roosevelt administration. I think maybe 1919 is when I'd have to….
We'll have to check it.
Butcher: Well, in any case, they, my mother was a fabulous cook, and she was, she was really
great in that department.
And apparently they decided to try, try to have a restaurant, and they found that people would
rather ... Their experience was that people would rather pay a lot more money for booze than
they did for good food.
So I think that's one lesson I always learned was don't open any restaurants, that it's a very hard
life. Yeah, it's very difficult to make a go of it.
Blatti: Do you have any sense of how long they worked at that?
Butcher: I don't know, I don't think it was terribly long. I think, you know, it might have been.
They might have tried it for a year or so, give or take, you know. But, I, I'd say, probably,
probably, good food was very important in our family, partly because I think both my, my, mom
and dad, you know, came from, meager beginnings.
I, they came from small villages in Hungary where, you know, there wasn't enough, always
enough to go around, or the, the children were kind of given, given the last. Not the first, you
know, if there was meat left after the adults ate, they would get it. If not, they didn't have it.
And so I think both my mom and dad were really prided themselves on being able to provide for
their kids what they didn't have in terms of nourishment and emotional satisfaction from good
meals.
And as I mentioned, my mother was just a wonderful cook and loved to cook and loved to bake
and, you know, have these wonderful, hearty meals and have all the family around.
Blatti: Was, was her cooking Hungarian style, or was it a mix of Hungarian and kind of Middle
American? Do you remember it being...?
Butcher: Yeah, I would say so. You know, she certainly had several, several dishes that were
very authentic Hungarian, very traditional Hungarian, things like stuffed cabbage and chicken
paprikash. And she had a wonderful, green bean soup, though somehow I think, you know,
came out of her background. But then she made wonderful things like Spanish rice and pork
chops and all kinds of other wonderful roasts and things like that.
But she also cooked, I mean, baked extremely well, and made a lot of sort of ethnic pastries that
my, my grandmother would make as well when I was growing up. But, she, she really liked to do
that. And she really liked to entice the family to eat them.
Blatti: I'm getting kind of hungry.
Butcher: She also made wonderful, fresh, deep-fried donuts with powdered sugar.
Blatti: Let me turn this over.
[Tape ends]