Hall: Sandpoint community provides ongoing joy

(It was on Jan. 15, 2001, that Erik Daarstad and I sat in the living room of Hazel Hall to interview her for the upcoming Sandpoint Centennial movie. Today, in her own words, Hazel continues her story about the Farragut days.)

Well, Ross had to go to Seattle, and a number of places, to try to find the right kind of cameras. They were big panorama-type cameras, 11x17, and big long ones. And portrait cameras he had to find - and all the details of this or that. Well, recruits were coming and they needed to be taken so they took the pictures, but the darkroom wasn't ready yet so he would bring the films over to our studio here in Sandpoint and we would develop them and print them the next day.

We built a big long printer and a bigger tray to wash the prints in and it was a scramble, but we did it. Sometimes we'd have to work all night and had many a night of keeping prints moving in the wash because they had to be washed so well. We had no drier to dry them. We had to lay the prints, great big old prints, out in the front room, all over the front room and the dining room and the bedroom. We would let them dry, dampen them on the back, put them in a pile, put a weight on them to flatten them so that they would look well, and Ross would take them back to Farragut the next day.

So that went on for several weeks but finally we finished the studio over there (Farragut) and I ran the studio in Sandpoint. I hired a couple of girls to help me in the studio. I believe I'll add this little bit. I had the two girls that were working for me, one was an Italian and one was Japanese, both good little workers. They were seniors in high school and they were friends.

One day, here came the FBI and they took, gee, I can't think of her name, this little Japanese girl. They took her right out of the studio right then because, you know, they were taking all the Japanese then. That was kind of a shock. In no way would she ever have hurt anything or her family - she was the third generation Japanese. That's one little incidence that occurred.

We had to close the studio down, except for three days a week, because we couldn't get supplies.

We couldn't get film to sell, or film to use, or chemicals, because it all went to the war. But we could maintain it for three days a week. During that time, I'd take all the school pictures out to all the little schools, and the senior pictures, and everything else that came along. I did the Kodak work and I would sell a camera now and then. Then Ross even had me go over and help over there (Farragut) some on the days that I wasn't working at the studio in Sandpoint. I trained about a dozen people to retouch and some other things, air brushing, and a few things like that.

The sailors would come to town. I remember having Thanksgiving dinner and a Christmas dinner of all things for some of the sailors. Other people in town certainly did it a lot, asking the sailors into their homes, but I just did it a little bit. A lot of Navy wives lived in town then. They boarded and roomed in different houses because there wasn't enough room in town then you know.  Town was overcome with people all of a sudden it seemed like. The sailors came to town quite a bit but I think mostly they went to Spokane and Coeur d'Alene for entertainment.

We did have the USO, which was in the Community Hall, and incidentally, I didn't tell you, and you probably know, was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps way back in the mid-1930s. They built that and the place at the beach, the beach house. Anyway, I got off the subject but that's where they had dances, dances and food was always there for the sailors. Everybody still thinks of it as the USO building instead of the Community Hall that was first built for the Boy Scouts.

After Farragut, it did leave the community in better condition. Everybody had more money and building began again. Dr. Neal Wendle came home from the war and he built a clinic right after the war there at that building that is Sharon's card store. We built our studio, a new studio, right after the war and others around town began to build and grow. And a lot of the old board stores started to come down - they were buildings that had a wooden store front. I told you about the hospital. It made the town a better place. You asked me about change - it was kind of fun to see it grow.

The whole time I've lived here, it has been kind of a joy - it has been a real joy. The '50s and the crazy '60s, I was really involved quite a bit during the '60s with little theater. Then there were the '70s when Schweitzer came and the arts really began to grow and so the '70s, '80s, and '90s have been growth in the arts. The town is changing and I'm glad to have lived through this period and seen it.

 I'd kind of like to know what the future's going to be but you people will have to tell me about that when you get to heaven. Anything else? I think that's about it, isn't it.