She Describes Her Life BEFORE 1900! And These Are Just Outtakes!
She Describes Her Life BEFORE 1900! And These Are Just Outtakes!
Please remember when you are watching this that you are watching 16mm work print outtakes from my 1979 prime time television special, The Information Society. unfortunately, the material that I selected as possible to be used, has been lost in my fire of 2008. This wonderful video presents what I was going to use, including a lot of irrelevant questions. I wish I had more of this. I wish I had been smart enough as a young filmmaker when I did this back in 1979 to realize the incredible history that she was so able to articulate. She was 98 years old when I interviewed her in Lancaster Pennsylvania. The time before the telephone. Before the radio. Certainly before television. The time when she traveled by train and trolley and horse. The time when people essentially stayed in their own towns and didn’t travel much. The time when the telephone was a device where everyone in town could hear everyone else speaking. I found this old 16mm workprint in my basement and digitized it not knowing it would be as wonderful as it is. I recorded this for a television special I was making in 1979 called “The Information Society.” You can see the entire 1 hour film on my YouTube channel by searching it although I did not use this clip in the film.
My great grandmother ( 1887 – 1977 ) said she loved her lifetime because she witnessed from horse and buggy to the moon landing. So very much innovation. Plane travel, automobiles, TV, two world wars, the depression era, it was wonderful listening to so much history lived by one person.
Oh hey! I remember you! You did a documentary on Appalachian music. I think I’ll subscribe now LOL
Do you know her name? it shouldn’t be that difficult. she said she was born " (18)81" year in lancaster, PA. and i checked people who were born in lancaster Pa, and live 98 or longer. it appears 2 people. 1st is Cathryn May Ulmer (Johnson) (1881 – 1981) , 2nd is Lucinda Berry (1881 – 1979). i don’t think many people can live 98+ in lancaster and born 1881. Do you now remember who she is?
The woman being interviewed here is Mrs. Louise Souder, born Sept 15, 1881 and died May 23, 1990. So, she lived another full ten years after this interview was filmed! She is buried in Lancaster cemetery, Lancaster PA.
Mrs. Souder was born in Lancaster County, PA and married Paul Souder around 1908; their only child, Paul Souder, Jr. was born in 1909 or 1910 and died July 4, 1962. He served in the US Navy in WWII, though I was not able to determine much else about his service. Paul Souder, Sr. was born in 1878 and died in January, 1950. They lived in a three story townhouse in East Orange Street in downtown Lancaster, PA from at least as early as 1910 until at least 1980….Louise Souder died May 23, 1990, though I did not find any obituary or other info. available to determine the circumstances of her life in those last ten years from 1979 onwards.
Annoying how much the interviewer interrupts this lady. When old people start talking about the way things were, let them talk.
Great respect for my elders….the Era who knew how to get shit done and it was just casual ….learned the most from.my grand parents
And one day people in future generations will ask us things like: what where you doing on september 11th ? How bad was co vid? What were video stores like? What was life like before youtube and google? There is already one generation who grew up with the internet and will maybe look at days of playing outside without phones as the "boring" ages
I was born in 1987 and the only person I know of that I met born in the 1800s was my Great Grandmother’s older Brother, who was over 100 years old when he died in 2001, which means he certainly new Civil War veterans (his parents’ generation) and possibly war veterans from the war of 1812 when he was a boy.
David please old Scottish Americans please
Wow just wow! So amazing to hear this woman tell her stories, so absolutely amazing! Thank you for putting this on YouTube so that I could experience such a piece of history. I’m just blown away
My grandma was born in 1980
I was born in 1980.. my great grandmother was born in 1905 and lived into the late 1990s. She was a huge influence on me, but as a youth I can remember her talking with my parents of times and family past and sadly being BORED OUT OF MY MIND. I am so thankful to still have some memories of stories she passed down to me, but watching a fantastic video like this brings a profoundly deep sadness to my heart over the immense loss of experiences she must have had and how immature I was to not have treasured and recorded every experience.
Here is a family story I remember her sharing with me. Her family had 13 brothers and sisters and lived on a large farm… sadly they struggled as much of the land was soiled with tar. Clearing it away deep enough to plant and raise crops was a constant struggle. In the meantime as a child she remembered seeing passersby stopping at their farm and rubbing the tar on their wagon wheels like grease to smooth their rides. She had frequently told her father and brother that it might be a gift from god not a burden. That too many had come offered to pay for the land meant there was something more to it, but being the youngest and female she was told to mind her place.
Fast forward her father sold the farm to a distant relative in order to buy better agro land. As you may have guessed, the "tar" was actually oil seeping up from a massive oil deposit underground. It always seemed her "I told you so" was bittersweet at best.
Life was great before cars, enslaving electric & water companies, corrupt banks and greedy realtors. You may think technology made things better but when you get old enough to understand you will despise technology because it has ruined this world. Life was nice, there was beautiful architecture, now all buildings are ugly. There was no pollution or electrosmog. Now the world is filled with pathetic vain gullible cell phone addicts that don’t have a brain of their own to think with.
I could listen to her recountings for days! Love her personality and sharp mind! Very inspireing and uplifting! ❤❤❤
Was there much excitement for the turn of the millennium before it came?
Love the way she talks
Just to think that in 57 years from now, in 2079, someone could interview a 98 year old that was born in 1981. Although it probably wouldn’t be necessary because the latter half of the 20th century and the 21st century are so well documented.
Hollywood Squares on TV!
Boy if she was living today she’d be very disappointed with people in general.
I am a RN and worked in a rural hospital for a time about 20 years ago. I would always ask the older folk about how they lived their lives – most were farmers. They would talk about hand milking 30 cows twice a day and hand threshing, and horse teams for plowing. I was often picked on by the other nurses for these conversations – they’d hear me talking with them and laugh saying “Molly’s getting the farm report again.” I enjoyed hearing stories of the lives lead by some of the hardest working folk I have ever known.
Thank you for sharing this video, extremely interesting. It would have been great if she was given the opportunity to speak freely.
What kind of people do we have in our government???
Yeah, this was a missed opportunity but at least you got this much to show, the part about the leaders of the country really hits home at this time. I used to love to hear my grannies stories of her life, she died at 95 in 1993. She lived through the Banana Wars in central America and Typhoid epidemic, how our grandpa worked at the Panama Canal, so much knowledge it’s incredible, we would die easily nowadays.
What a gem this video is! Thank you for sharing this with her. What a joy it is to listen to this sweet woman!
Her accent is really interesting. Just don’t see people who speak like this anymore.
What she said about family life, wow. Family was everything back then.
My great-great grandmother was named Celina, and she was born on a farm in 1888. I never met her (my mother did), but she lived into the 1980s, and I’ve seen photos. She kind of looked like this woman and it feels like I’m watching an interview with her. Judging by their age, they would have been peers, roughly speaking — only a few years apart. Nice video.
I was lucky enough to have all my grandparents around to where they told me their stories. I’m 63 now and their stories are invaluable.
My family never had a TV until I was 12. I remember it well…
But everyone else had a TV and video games it seemed like.
It was always a struggle for my dad who wanted to protect us from being hypnotized by the "neon god" aka. "boob tube"
‘I don’t like stories that don’t end’. It is a shame I didn’t listen or ask questions not only to my great grandmother, grandparents, but also my parents. I keep a journal, I wonder if my children will bother to read them?
This speaks volumes as to the break down of the family. She feels like she can’t get help, yet when she was growing up, family was always around. We need to get our children off computers, back outside discovering nature, digging in the dirt to build a good immune system and speaking to each other. Good old family values. Instead of wanting the kids occupied away where they can’t be seen or heard. Play games, talk to each other. I love that she couldn’t really answer about the news, why? Because she didn’t bother with it. That’s how we should be today. The saying, "no news is good news" can teach us a thing or two.
Thank you for sharing.
Peace love and Grace to all
💛🕊️
If Florida was a three day trip the news would take 3 days to get there if it was sent by mail.
This is fabulous! And the tv running behind her is the icing on the cake!
I live in York, PA, one county away from Lancaster. It’s great to hear Lancaster is pronounced correctly even in this video.😃.
How evil and wicked they were back then.
Lord she’s right
this was a great inspiration for settling the date of my stories setting. i love learning what it was like back then 🙂 glad you made this!
I just discovered your channel and I’ve been binge-watching it all day long.. it’s just amazing what you’ve managed to capture on film. ❤️🇮🇱
I was born in 1981 so I was fortunate to see the end of one era going into the information and computer age. The oldest people I had around me were born in the early 1900s and they still had fascinating stories. Still amazes me though we can watch this and even from the time this video was made to now, life has changed so drastically much. You talk about phone as a modern technology and now you have communication virtually everywhere.
This lady is a jewel
She would spit her dentures seeing the world today
I wonder what she would think about NFT’s!!
Very cool that this wasnt used in a film or tv show but was posted on a video sight 40 years later and garnered over 1.1 million views! Super interesting to hear her perspective of life back then!
Did she toot at 4:21🤣
She was in her 80s when women were buying guns in 1968!! I can’t imagine she had enough strength at that age to shoot a pistol but imagine her shooting a musket in 1910
those are the thickest glasses I’ve ever seen.. thank god they invented high index lenses
Had a neighbor back in 2000 I was 9. The neighbor was 102 when he passed 2 weeks before 9/11 . he said in the early 1920’s people were very handy and creative than today. He even called that problems were going to occur in the world. More sicknesses more diseases. RIP mr Moe 💙 he was a well spoken man with intelligence and knew so much about weapons
I like that every time he tries to interurp her she speaks louder to not let him 😂
4:20 Bronx cheer! 🎶💨
She was luck born in the right time period life was simpler and there was no technology just yourself doing everything surrounded by nature I swear I was born in the wrong time