Shirley and Linley Brinker interview
Item
Title
eng
Shirley and Linley Brinker interview
Description
eng
Daughter and grand-daughter of a water witch who searched out good well drilling sites in the Valley for years.
Creator
eng
Brinker, Shirley and Linley Brinker
eng
Holyoke, Thomas
Relation
eng
Water Archive Oral Histories
Coverage
eng
California State University, Fresno
Date
eng
8/21/2013
Format
eng
Microsoft Word 2013 document
Identifier
eng
SCMS_waoh_00053
extracted text
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, we are here today with Shirley and Linley
Brinker, talking about their grandfather Lloyd. Shirley Brinker, let's
just start with a little bit of your father's history, where is he from?
>> Shirley Brinker: He was born in Illinois, in Mount Carroll, Illinois,
and he wanted to move, well, the family moved West -- I can't remember
what year it was -- but, oh, probably ...
>> Linley Brinker: In the early 1900s because he graduated from high
school in Covina.
>> Shirley Brinker: In Covina, California.
>> Linley Brinker: And that would have been in the 19 teens, he graduated
from high school because they were married during the big -- my
grandparents, my mom's mom and dad, were married during the flu epidemic
-- isn't that 1918, I think? Because it could only be three people, it
was the preacher and my grandma and grandpa, because there was some kind
of law about too many people together. So they had spent his young
childhood, part of it at least, in California.
>> Shirley Brinker: And they met in Covina, California, and my mother
said, she grew-up on a ranch and she was –- she was never going to live
on a ranch again or a farm. And he -- I don't know how he got in -- he
was farming, ranching there, and then he moved to Fresno and they had the
Peerless Pump Agency [assumed spelling], where he bought the Peerless
Pump Agency in Fresno. And then Peerless Pump was later bought out by
Food & Machinery Corporation, and they kept my dad on as the head Manager
of that. And the first building was on H Street, and Food & Machinery
Corporation was a lot bigger company, and he bought the land for them on,
well, he arranged the rental, where it is now, next to the Rainbow
Ballroom. You know, downtown Fresno?
>> Thomas Holyoke: I do know where the Rainbow Ballroom is at actually.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, well, it's on the -- Food & Machinery bought out
Peerless Pump Company, and they kept my dad on as the manager, and he
hired all the people that worked there. And it grew, and then he always
wanted to be a farmer. My mother never liked to live on a ranch, but.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Dad do farming in Illinois, come from a farming
family?
>> Shirley Brinker: They -- He farmed -- Five Points...
>> Linley Brinker: When he was little, his folks, they were farmers in
Illinois.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, but I...
>> Linley Brinker: I don't know what they did in Covina.
>> Shirley Brinker: I was born in Covina. And my...
>> Linley Brinker: I know that when Grandma and Grandpa got married that
they lived in Covina at first, and they -- my grandma used to raise geese
and rabbits, wasn't it? For food, and Grandpa farmed.
>> Shirley Brinker: And it was the smallest incorporated city in the
United States.
>> Linley Brinker: Covina was.
>> Shirley Brinker: Covina, the year I was born.
>> Linley Brinker: Where they farmed was in that area, and actually they
stayed there for a long time. Grandma used to tell stories of how they
would catch the streetcar to go downtown Los Angeles and go dancing on a
Saturday night, and then they would come home and Grandpa would start the
irrigation in the furrow and he'd lay down someplace down the way, and
when the water hit him he knew it was time to get up and turn the water
off and go to bed. [Laughter] And so I know he was farming when they
first married, and she wasn't too thrilled with that. But then they had
the Peerless Pump and moved to Fresno, and then when they were bought by
Food & Machinery Corporation that is when Dale Crummy came to Fresno, and
he was also a big person at Fresno State. He's given a lot of money to
the campus, I know, and so that's how our family got to know their family
because of the Food & Machinery Corporation.
>> Shirley Brinker: And it's right next to the Rainbow Ballroom -- you
know where that is?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Downtown.
>> Shirley Brinker: It's still there.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Peerless Pump, that's pump manufacturing or?
>> Linley Brinker: It's a pump manufacturing.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Peerless Pump, I was just wondering?
>> Shirley Brinker: Peerless Pump, no, we sold pumps to farmers. And my
dad was a well witcher, then he would go out to the ranch or farm and go
around with the little wands, a little trick, and he would walk around
and tell where to start drilling where the water was, and he was a well
witcher.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Well, and this brings us to the main subject here, did
he do the water witching as an employee of Peerless Pump or would people
simply pay him to do that?
>> Shirley Brinker: He had – he bought the agency.
>> Linley Brinker: Yeah, he owned it, and then it was bought out by...
>> Shirley Brinker: And then Food & Machinery Corporation...
>> Linley Brinker: As the owner of it when he would sell a pump I think
that just came with it, you know, it was different times, you didn't have
contracts, you just shook hands, and say I'm going to come out and put
your well in for you and we'll charge you ...
>> Shirley Brinker: But there were farmers that wouldn't drill a well
until my dad came out to witch it, and he would use the – palm...
>> Linley Brinker: The willow tree.
>> Shirley Brinker: Willow Tree.
>> Linley Brinker: And you said one time that my dad, my mom's husband,
went out with Grandpa because everyone it seems like hocus-pocus, not
real, and he went with him. He said he could put his hand on my grandpa
and he said he could feel it kind of shifting a little bit. And then I
guess when you got to the spot where Grandpa said the water was then it
would do a different kind of pull, like so many pulls for how deep it
was, and it still seems like hocus-pocus.
>> Shirley Brinker: He’d go up and say how many feet it would be before
they hit water.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And do you know how he learned to do this?
>> Shirley Brinker: No, I don't. He was born in Illinois, and his folks
moved to California, and Covina -- you know where Covina is?
>> Linley Brinker: We were talking about that earlier, and I asked her if
her grandfather, my grandfather was...
>> Shirley Brinker: It was the smallest incorporated city in the United
States at the time.
>> Linley Brinker: I asked you if your grandfather had witched wells,
too? And you said that you didn't think so, but you didn't know how
Grandpa learned. I mean someone must have taught him somewhere along the
way. I don't think that that's something that you just say, oh, gee
[Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: You know, to take willow wands and go out and
especially on the West side, clear out at Five Points, so it was a
desert.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, it was originally dry land farm before they dug
the wells.
>> Shirley Brinker: And my husband went
he held onto my dad's wrist, he said he
wand, and like that, and then he'd find
he'd go up and down until how many feet
before they could hit water.
out with him one time because and
wandered around with his willow
the right place to go. And then
they were going to have to go
>> Thomas Holyoke: And was he usually right?
>> Shirley Brinker: Did he want?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Was he right? Did he...
>> Shirley Brinker: He was right! Oh, yes. And the farmers, well, all
around here, they wouldn't drill a well until my dad had come out to tell
them, witch the well to find out where the water was.
>> Linley Brinker: So he must have been pretty right. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes,
whichever -- and then he
willow wand and Dick put
could feel this pulling.
and then his hands would
many feet they had to go
when I got married my husband said, well,
went out with him one time, and my dad had the
his hands on my dad's wrists, and he said he
And when he got to the spot where the water was,
go up and down, his arm, and then tell them how
to get water, and it worked.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And this is in the 1950s or the '40s?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, no, I think '30s probably.
>> Linley Brinker: '30s and '40s, and then Grandpa kind of got out of
Peerless Pump after that.
>> Shirley Brinker: They moved here when I was six months old.
>> Linley Brinker: And you were born 1926, so I think they probably moved
to Fresno maybe after the holidays in early 1927.
>> Shirley Brinker: Because he bought the company, the Peerless Pump, and
then they were bought out by the Food & Machinery Corporation, and they
kept my dad on. And he was responsible for building the new building,
which is on the corner of...
>> Linley Brinker: Is that H Street?
>> Shirley Brinker: H -- well, no, it was on H Street, and then the next
one over...
>> Linley Brinker: G?
>> Shirley Brinker: ... by the Rainbow Ballroom, you know where it is?
>> Thomas Holyoke: It's on Broadway or Fulton?
>> Linley Brinker: Downtown, it's almost -- yes, it could be.
>> Shirley Brinker: It's west, it's before the railroad tracks.
>> Linley Brinker: I don't think it's Fulton, on the west side.
>> Thomas Holyoke: It might be Broadway down there.
>> Shirley Brinker: It was Broadway.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: It is Broadway.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: Did you bring pictures?
>> Linley Brinker: There's a picture right there, that's Grandpa. That's
Mom's dad [Laughter].
>> Thomas Holyoke: Wonderful.
>> Shirley Brinker: L.A. Horace [assumed spelling], Lloyd Alvin [assumed
spelling].
>> Thomas Holyoke: And he...
>> Shirley Brinker: His brother, he had two brothers, and they moved to
Fresno later on, and all worked for Peerless Pump Company. And it's still
next to the Rainbow Ballroom.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And he -- Father Lloyd did water witching for -- I
mean did he keep doing it for decades?
>> Shirley Brinker: I don't know how he...
>> Linley Brinker: Did he do that in the '60s or did he stop kind of in
the 1950s and just focused more on farming his own property?
>> Shirley Brinker: No, there was still -- he still -- well, Food &
Machinery Corporation bought the office there, and he stayed...
>> Linley Brinker: I think that was in the early 1950s is when Food &
Machinery came.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he stayed, and he stayed on, they kept him on,
and he was responsible for finding the new place for the building, and
it's still there on what is that street?
>> Linley Brinker: Broadway.
>> Shirley Brinker: Broadway and Amador.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Broadway and Amador, okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: Okay, Broadway and Amador.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: And then, my mother grew-up on a ranch, she said she
didn't want to live on a ranch again. And my dad started buying land out
at Five Points so that they never moved out there because [inaudible]
[Laughter].
>> Thomas Holyoke: So, oh, so your Father also did farming, himself, out
by Five Points?
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: The 1950s or maybe in the late '40s, dry land farming,
and then gradually put in the pumps.
>> Thomas Holyoke: After witching his own well.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, he started buying -- my mother didn't want to
live on a ranch or anything, but we never lived out at Five Points.
>> Linley Brinker: No, but he had the land out there.
>> Shirley Brinker: But he started buying the -- he said it was the
richest soil and the best place to grow cotton and what other kinds of...
>> Linley Brinker: Well, he farmed up until he passed away in 1977.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Do you know if it was mostly a cotton crop he grew out
there or...
>> Linley Brinker: Grew lots of cotton, grew wheat and barley.
>> Shirley Brinker: We had lettuce. We had -- what did we have?
>> Linley Brinker: Well, that was really Dad's thing. My dad started
farming with my grandfather the year I was born, he had a big heart
attack, and my mom was only child, and she had a new baby, and plus in
those days she was a woman, she wasn't going to be the farmer. So my dad
started working for my grandfather, and in the 1960s he started a seed
business, and that's when they started doing the lettuce for seed crop.
But Grandpa usually grew cotton and wheat, alfalfa.
>> Shirley Brinker: We moved from H Street over to...
>> Linley Brinker: That was the Peerless Pump Agency.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Just one more question about the water witching, was
this something that many people did or was he unique in that he could do
it and no one else did?
>> Shirley Brinker: I don't think there were any other well witchers, no,
but there were farmers that all over the west side that were just
starting to -- they were starting to build-out on that God forsaken land
[Laughter]. You could see the coastal mountains from there.
>> Linley Brinker: Before smog. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: And he and his -- he had two brothers, and they came
to work with him, and they came after.
>> Linley Brinker: Did Grandpa ever do any water witching on the east
side?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh yes, no, no, he did on the east side, too. When
they were installing a pump they want to know where the best place to
drill for water was, and...
>> Thomas Holyoke: Did he leave you his willow wands?
>> Shirley Brinker: Did he what?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Do you still have his willow wands, the willow sticks?
>> Linley Brinker: Do you still have the willow sticks? I don't think so
[Laughter].
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, no, I don't -- my husband -- I'm trying to think
what business his family were in, but...
>> Linley Brinker: They had a furniture store and apartments that they
rented.
>> Shirley Brinker: There were things that they rented, and he had to get
dressed up in a suit and tie every day and go to the store. They had a
furniture store, too. And my dad really needed someone else to be helping
him out, working on the west side. And he asked Dick's father, you know,
would you mind if Dick came here because I really need someone to work
there? And he had two brothers that worked in the furniture business and
rental, house rental. And so he just loved going out there, and he didn't
have to put a tie and a suit on and go sit in the store waiting for
people to come in. And he drove out to Five Points and thought that was
the neatest thing.
>> Linley Brinker: It was great.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he learned how to witch the wells.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Now you also talked about him being active in other
ways. In fact, you showed us that picture of your father with President
Eisenhower?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, here, my dad was called Mr. Republican. He had,
he was...
>> Linley Brinker: He was on the Republican Central Committee for ages.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, and when General Eisenhower was President, he
went back for the inauguration, and when General Eisenhower -- I have a
picture of him going to the airport to pick-up the general when he came
to Fresno. This is my dad, and that's General Eisenhower.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, so when President Eisenhower flew into Fresno
your dad got to meet him at the airport and pick him up.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, and he came here for speaking -- I can't
remember what the...
>> Linley Brinker: I don't know.
>> Shirley Brinker: But he was active in politics here.
>> Linley Brinker: He was also on the draft board. He actually drafted my
dad. [Laughter] It wasn't because he didn't love Dad, but it was World
War II.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he lived, his folks were four doors down from our
house.
>> Linley Brinker: Your husband, before... my dad.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, well, we had met him when my friend, a
girlfriend of mine lived across the street from us, two doors down, and
Dick's folks bought the house across the street from them. And they never
had mailboxes out on Van Ness and he met Nancy, and then Nancy said, oh,
I have a friend, a girlfriend. And she introduced us, because she had a
boyfriend, and she introduced us and from there he got out of the
furniture store business and house rentals, and started working with Dad,
Dad needed someone to go out there and...
>> Linley Brinker: That was in 1955, but you got married in '47, so he
had put in a lot of time with the furniture store.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: I think you should tell him about the story about
where you were on the day that Pearl Harbor was bombed, that was a very
interesting story?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, yes, he was sitting in the car.
>> Linley Brinker: I think you were down with your cousins in LA, and
Grandpa was always ready before anyone else, so he was anxiously sitting
in the car saying hurry up, hurry up.
>> Shirley Brinker: He was sitting in the car, and my mother's cousin
lived in Hollywood, and it was on the way up the Hollywood Hill. And my
dad was sitting in the car because we were going home then, and he was
listening to the radio. He said I have to get back there, because he knew
when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. And he called the men that worked
for him and said get down there and get those pumps out, they need to get
over to the railroad track. And he sent the pumps down to Los Angeles,
and they were put on the ships to go over to Honolulu to lift the boats
up.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Oh, really, so...
>> Shirley Brinker: And have you ever been to Hawaii? Did you go to Pearl
Harbor?
>> Thomas Holyoke: I've never been to Hawaii or Pearl Harbor. I do know
that when several of the battleships went down they had to be pumped out
to raise them.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, I've been to Pearl Harbor, and we went out on
the deck and looked down and there were ships still down there with the
bodies in them that they never brought them up.
>> Thomas Holyoke: The memorial, SS Arizona.
>> Linley Brinker: Right, but there were other ships that were close to
the harbor entrance, and Grandpa knew that they needed to keep that open.
And luckily, I guess, a lot of the ships were out doing some kind of
maneuvers or something, so they weren't all in port. And he said that
we've got to get these pumps over there so we can lift the boats up, so I
guess a number of them were okay and enough to be repaired so they could
be used still. And it's just kind of interesting because you could never
do that today, you know? And in those days -- here you'd have to go
through a bunch of requisitions, and someone would have to call you, and
everything, but he said, no, we need to do this.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor.
>> Linley Brinker: Right, but then apparently his pumps were on the ship
to Honolulu on Monday morning because this was on a Sunday -- on Monday
morning they were already on a ship headed to Honolulu, and I don't know
how long it took to sail there, four or five days, so that they were
there right away to lift those ships up and then they could repair them.
So I thought that was always an interesting story that Mom was in the
swimming pool at her cousin's house, and Dad is in Hollywood. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: They had a swimming pool. We didn't have a swimming
pool. They lived on the side of a hill, and Hollywood -- and my dad was
just sitting in the car listening to the radio because we were headed for
home, and he said he just knew that something was happening because the
Japanese were coming in over there. And then when they bombed Pearl
Harbor that's when he said, get in the car, and he phoned Fresno and
talked to the men that worked or some of the men that worked for him. And
said get down there, and they're going to need those pumps to raise the
ships.
>> Thomas Holyoke: So he knew immediately that his pumps would be in
demand.
>> Shirley Brinker: He knew, yes, but I don't know how he knew that it
would take pumps to lift up ships.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Who would have thought that the pumps would be put to
such a purpose? Not a bad purpose, but, so any other memories?
>> Linley Brinker: That was one that she used to talk about a lot, and I
thought that was always interesting that he was -- reacted quickly and in
a way that really helped the Army or the Navy, actually.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, the Navy.
>> Linley Brinker: And I think that was always interesting. The water
witching was interesting. I never -- he didn't really ever talk about
that as much with me, but I did hear a lot more about the Pearl Harbor
incident, and I know that he just loved farming. Nothing better than to
spend the afternoon out in the west side chatting with everybody.
>> Shirley Brinker: And my mother said she grew-up on a ranch, and would
never live there again on a farm.
>> Linley Brinker: Yes, Grandma didn't go with him. [Laughter] She was in
town.
>> Shirley Brinker: And, but he bought the Peerless Pump Company, Agency
in Fresno, and then it was bought by...
>> Linley Brinker: FMC.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, the Food & Machinery Corporation, and they kept
him on because the first building was over on H Street, and then he built
-- was responsible for having the building built where it is now today,
that was what year -- Pearl Harbor?
>> Linley Brinker: Pearl Harbor was 1941.
>> Shirley Brinker: '41.
>> Linley Brinker: And so, but he'd already had the agency since 1927, so
he was familiar with what his pumps could do.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he had people, farmers wouldn't drill a well, a
water well until my dad came out to witch it because he would take the
willow, branches from a willow tree, and he would walk around. And my
husband [inaudible] and he'd put his hands on my dad's wrists, and he had
this willow wand that my dad was holding on to. And he said he'd walk
around, and then he'd find a place, and he'd say this is where the water
is. And then he'd go up and down, and how many feet they were going to
have to go before they hit the water. And he was...
>> Thomas Holyoke: Fascinating.
>> Shirley Brinker: He was remarkable.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Did he pick -- did he always find his own willow
wands?
>> Linley Brinker: I guess so, I don't think that the willows...
>> Shirley Brinker: What was that?
>> Linley Brinker: Did he always find his own willow wands? I remember in
their old house on Van Ness there used to be a willow tree in the back
yard.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, no, he knew where the willow -- because he did
all the farmers ranches and he knew...
>> Linley Brinker: He must have had to bring the willow branch with him,
not everybody had a willow tree; they kind of take a lot of water anyway.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, and for a start, most of the ranchers were
here, and then they started in out at Five Point. And that's when he
bought land out there, and he just loved farming.
>> Thomas Holyoke: So it sounds like he was very -- a very fundamental
part in developing west side agriculture?
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, yes.
>> Linley Brinker: He was out there with some of the original people -Jack Harris was out there early on, and I know that the Dieners were out
there very early.
>> Shirley Brinker: We were...
>> Linley Brinker: Grandpa was out there with a lot of those folks.
>> Shirley Brinker: I think we had...
>> Linley Brinker: He sold a lot of land to the Britses [assumed
spelling] at one point and that's when they got started with land...
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, we had...
>> Linley Brinker: ... and farming because they were doing just the
fertilizer.
>> Shirley Brinker: They had 640 acres.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, at one point Grandpa had seven sections.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: But that was -- when he passed away we had two
sections of land.
>> Shirley Brinker: He had two brothers...
>> Linley Brinker: It's 640 acres more or less to a section.
>> Shirley Brinker: He had an older brother and a younger brother that
moved to Fresno, too, and then Peerless Pump Company, it's still next to
the Rainbow Ballroom. But my Mother, they never moved out...
>> Thomas Holyoke: She wanted to stay here in Fresno?
>> Shirley Brinker: She said she grew up on a ranch and she was never
going to live on a ranch. And the ranch she lived on in southern
California were like the west side, you know, it was really -- flat
and...
>> Linley Brinker: Covina was in the hay day of their citrus farming at
the time. It was before the citrus blight came and wiped out the
orchards.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: And then conveniently at the same time is the end of
World War II and they needed a lot of houses, so orchards went, houses
came in.
>> Shirley Brinker: But I don't know how he knew where to find water, but
he did.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Wonderful.
>> Linley Brinker: He didn't pass that trait on to you. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: No, my husband, before we were married, he lived four
doors down the street from us, and his family had houses and apartment
rental properties. And then the furniture store, so Grandmother had the
furniture store, and he had to get dressed every day with a shirt and tie
and coat and go down there and wait for the people to come in to buy
stuff. And my dad really needed someone else out there, and Dick said -my dad asked his father would you mind if I asked Dick to come? And he
said, no, it's up to Dick, whatever he wants to do. And he said, wow, you
know, he thought that was just the greatest thing to get in the car at
five in the morning and drive out there. And I said “I'm not going out
there.”
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, well, thank you very much for the memories here.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, thank you very much.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
[Pause] [Silence}
Brinker, talking about their grandfather Lloyd. Shirley Brinker, let's
just start with a little bit of your father's history, where is he from?
>> Shirley Brinker: He was born in Illinois, in Mount Carroll, Illinois,
and he wanted to move, well, the family moved West -- I can't remember
what year it was -- but, oh, probably ...
>> Linley Brinker: In the early 1900s because he graduated from high
school in Covina.
>> Shirley Brinker: In Covina, California.
>> Linley Brinker: And that would have been in the 19 teens, he graduated
from high school because they were married during the big -- my
grandparents, my mom's mom and dad, were married during the flu epidemic
-- isn't that 1918, I think? Because it could only be three people, it
was the preacher and my grandma and grandpa, because there was some kind
of law about too many people together. So they had spent his young
childhood, part of it at least, in California.
>> Shirley Brinker: And they met in Covina, California, and my mother
said, she grew-up on a ranch and she was –- she was never going to live
on a ranch again or a farm. And he -- I don't know how he got in -- he
was farming, ranching there, and then he moved to Fresno and they had the
Peerless Pump Agency [assumed spelling], where he bought the Peerless
Pump Agency in Fresno. And then Peerless Pump was later bought out by
Food & Machinery Corporation, and they kept my dad on as the head Manager
of that. And the first building was on H Street, and Food & Machinery
Corporation was a lot bigger company, and he bought the land for them on,
well, he arranged the rental, where it is now, next to the Rainbow
Ballroom. You know, downtown Fresno?
>> Thomas Holyoke: I do know where the Rainbow Ballroom is at actually.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, well, it's on the -- Food & Machinery bought out
Peerless Pump Company, and they kept my dad on as the manager, and he
hired all the people that worked there. And it grew, and then he always
wanted to be a farmer. My mother never liked to live on a ranch, but.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Dad do farming in Illinois, come from a farming
family?
>> Shirley Brinker: They -- He farmed -- Five Points...
>> Linley Brinker: When he was little, his folks, they were farmers in
Illinois.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, but I...
>> Linley Brinker: I don't know what they did in Covina.
>> Shirley Brinker: I was born in Covina. And my...
>> Linley Brinker: I know that when Grandma and Grandpa got married that
they lived in Covina at first, and they -- my grandma used to raise geese
and rabbits, wasn't it? For food, and Grandpa farmed.
>> Shirley Brinker: And it was the smallest incorporated city in the
United States.
>> Linley Brinker: Covina was.
>> Shirley Brinker: Covina, the year I was born.
>> Linley Brinker: Where they farmed was in that area, and actually they
stayed there for a long time. Grandma used to tell stories of how they
would catch the streetcar to go downtown Los Angeles and go dancing on a
Saturday night, and then they would come home and Grandpa would start the
irrigation in the furrow and he'd lay down someplace down the way, and
when the water hit him he knew it was time to get up and turn the water
off and go to bed. [Laughter] And so I know he was farming when they
first married, and she wasn't too thrilled with that. But then they had
the Peerless Pump and moved to Fresno, and then when they were bought by
Food & Machinery Corporation that is when Dale Crummy came to Fresno, and
he was also a big person at Fresno State. He's given a lot of money to
the campus, I know, and so that's how our family got to know their family
because of the Food & Machinery Corporation.
>> Shirley Brinker: And it's right next to the Rainbow Ballroom -- you
know where that is?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Downtown.
>> Shirley Brinker: It's still there.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Peerless Pump, that's pump manufacturing or?
>> Linley Brinker: It's a pump manufacturing.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Peerless Pump, I was just wondering?
>> Shirley Brinker: Peerless Pump, no, we sold pumps to farmers. And my
dad was a well witcher, then he would go out to the ranch or farm and go
around with the little wands, a little trick, and he would walk around
and tell where to start drilling where the water was, and he was a well
witcher.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Well, and this brings us to the main subject here, did
he do the water witching as an employee of Peerless Pump or would people
simply pay him to do that?
>> Shirley Brinker: He had – he bought the agency.
>> Linley Brinker: Yeah, he owned it, and then it was bought out by...
>> Shirley Brinker: And then Food & Machinery Corporation...
>> Linley Brinker: As the owner of it when he would sell a pump I think
that just came with it, you know, it was different times, you didn't have
contracts, you just shook hands, and say I'm going to come out and put
your well in for you and we'll charge you ...
>> Shirley Brinker: But there were farmers that wouldn't drill a well
until my dad came out to witch it, and he would use the – palm...
>> Linley Brinker: The willow tree.
>> Shirley Brinker: Willow Tree.
>> Linley Brinker: And you said one time that my dad, my mom's husband,
went out with Grandpa because everyone it seems like hocus-pocus, not
real, and he went with him. He said he could put his hand on my grandpa
and he said he could feel it kind of shifting a little bit. And then I
guess when you got to the spot where Grandpa said the water was then it
would do a different kind of pull, like so many pulls for how deep it
was, and it still seems like hocus-pocus.
>> Shirley Brinker: He’d go up and say how many feet it would be before
they hit water.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And do you know how he learned to do this?
>> Shirley Brinker: No, I don't. He was born in Illinois, and his folks
moved to California, and Covina -- you know where Covina is?
>> Linley Brinker: We were talking about that earlier, and I asked her if
her grandfather, my grandfather was...
>> Shirley Brinker: It was the smallest incorporated city in the United
States at the time.
>> Linley Brinker: I asked you if your grandfather had witched wells,
too? And you said that you didn't think so, but you didn't know how
Grandpa learned. I mean someone must have taught him somewhere along the
way. I don't think that that's something that you just say, oh, gee
[Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: You know, to take willow wands and go out and
especially on the West side, clear out at Five Points, so it was a
desert.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, it was originally dry land farm before they dug
the wells.
>> Shirley Brinker: And my husband went
he held onto my dad's wrist, he said he
wand, and like that, and then he'd find
he'd go up and down until how many feet
before they could hit water.
out with him one time because and
wandered around with his willow
the right place to go. And then
they were going to have to go
>> Thomas Holyoke: And was he usually right?
>> Shirley Brinker: Did he want?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Was he right? Did he...
>> Shirley Brinker: He was right! Oh, yes. And the farmers, well, all
around here, they wouldn't drill a well until my dad had come out to tell
them, witch the well to find out where the water was.
>> Linley Brinker: So he must have been pretty right. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes,
whichever -- and then he
willow wand and Dick put
could feel this pulling.
and then his hands would
many feet they had to go
when I got married my husband said, well,
went out with him one time, and my dad had the
his hands on my dad's wrists, and he said he
And when he got to the spot where the water was,
go up and down, his arm, and then tell them how
to get water, and it worked.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And this is in the 1950s or the '40s?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, no, I think '30s probably.
>> Linley Brinker: '30s and '40s, and then Grandpa kind of got out of
Peerless Pump after that.
>> Shirley Brinker: They moved here when I was six months old.
>> Linley Brinker: And you were born 1926, so I think they probably moved
to Fresno maybe after the holidays in early 1927.
>> Shirley Brinker: Because he bought the company, the Peerless Pump, and
then they were bought out by the Food & Machinery Corporation, and they
kept my dad on. And he was responsible for building the new building,
which is on the corner of...
>> Linley Brinker: Is that H Street?
>> Shirley Brinker: H -- well, no, it was on H Street, and then the next
one over...
>> Linley Brinker: G?
>> Shirley Brinker: ... by the Rainbow Ballroom, you know where it is?
>> Thomas Holyoke: It's on Broadway or Fulton?
>> Linley Brinker: Downtown, it's almost -- yes, it could be.
>> Shirley Brinker: It's west, it's before the railroad tracks.
>> Linley Brinker: I don't think it's Fulton, on the west side.
>> Thomas Holyoke: It might be Broadway down there.
>> Shirley Brinker: It was Broadway.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: It is Broadway.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: Did you bring pictures?
>> Linley Brinker: There's a picture right there, that's Grandpa. That's
Mom's dad [Laughter].
>> Thomas Holyoke: Wonderful.
>> Shirley Brinker: L.A. Horace [assumed spelling], Lloyd Alvin [assumed
spelling].
>> Thomas Holyoke: And he...
>> Shirley Brinker: His brother, he had two brothers, and they moved to
Fresno later on, and all worked for Peerless Pump Company. And it's still
next to the Rainbow Ballroom.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And he -- Father Lloyd did water witching for -- I
mean did he keep doing it for decades?
>> Shirley Brinker: I don't know how he...
>> Linley Brinker: Did he do that in the '60s or did he stop kind of in
the 1950s and just focused more on farming his own property?
>> Shirley Brinker: No, there was still -- he still -- well, Food &
Machinery Corporation bought the office there, and he stayed...
>> Linley Brinker: I think that was in the early 1950s is when Food &
Machinery came.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he stayed, and he stayed on, they kept him on,
and he was responsible for finding the new place for the building, and
it's still there on what is that street?
>> Linley Brinker: Broadway.
>> Shirley Brinker: Broadway and Amador.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Broadway and Amador, okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: Okay, Broadway and Amador.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: And then, my mother grew-up on a ranch, she said she
didn't want to live on a ranch again. And my dad started buying land out
at Five Points so that they never moved out there because [inaudible]
[Laughter].
>> Thomas Holyoke: So, oh, so your Father also did farming, himself, out
by Five Points?
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: The 1950s or maybe in the late '40s, dry land farming,
and then gradually put in the pumps.
>> Thomas Holyoke: After witching his own well.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, he started buying -- my mother didn't want to
live on a ranch or anything, but we never lived out at Five Points.
>> Linley Brinker: No, but he had the land out there.
>> Shirley Brinker: But he started buying the -- he said it was the
richest soil and the best place to grow cotton and what other kinds of...
>> Linley Brinker: Well, he farmed up until he passed away in 1977.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Do you know if it was mostly a cotton crop he grew out
there or...
>> Linley Brinker: Grew lots of cotton, grew wheat and barley.
>> Shirley Brinker: We had lettuce. We had -- what did we have?
>> Linley Brinker: Well, that was really Dad's thing. My dad started
farming with my grandfather the year I was born, he had a big heart
attack, and my mom was only child, and she had a new baby, and plus in
those days she was a woman, she wasn't going to be the farmer. So my dad
started working for my grandfather, and in the 1960s he started a seed
business, and that's when they started doing the lettuce for seed crop.
But Grandpa usually grew cotton and wheat, alfalfa.
>> Shirley Brinker: We moved from H Street over to...
>> Linley Brinker: That was the Peerless Pump Agency.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Just one more question about the water witching, was
this something that many people did or was he unique in that he could do
it and no one else did?
>> Shirley Brinker: I don't think there were any other well witchers, no,
but there were farmers that all over the west side that were just
starting to -- they were starting to build-out on that God forsaken land
[Laughter]. You could see the coastal mountains from there.
>> Linley Brinker: Before smog. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: And he and his -- he had two brothers, and they came
to work with him, and they came after.
>> Linley Brinker: Did Grandpa ever do any water witching on the east
side?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh yes, no, no, he did on the east side, too. When
they were installing a pump they want to know where the best place to
drill for water was, and...
>> Thomas Holyoke: Did he leave you his willow wands?
>> Shirley Brinker: Did he what?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Do you still have his willow wands, the willow sticks?
>> Linley Brinker: Do you still have the willow sticks? I don't think so
[Laughter].
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, no, I don't -- my husband -- I'm trying to think
what business his family were in, but...
>> Linley Brinker: They had a furniture store and apartments that they
rented.
>> Shirley Brinker: There were things that they rented, and he had to get
dressed up in a suit and tie every day and go to the store. They had a
furniture store, too. And my dad really needed someone else to be helping
him out, working on the west side. And he asked Dick's father, you know,
would you mind if Dick came here because I really need someone to work
there? And he had two brothers that worked in the furniture business and
rental, house rental. And so he just loved going out there, and he didn't
have to put a tie and a suit on and go sit in the store waiting for
people to come in. And he drove out to Five Points and thought that was
the neatest thing.
>> Linley Brinker: It was great.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he learned how to witch the wells.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Now you also talked about him being active in other
ways. In fact, you showed us that picture of your father with President
Eisenhower?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, here, my dad was called Mr. Republican. He had,
he was...
>> Linley Brinker: He was on the Republican Central Committee for ages.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, and when General Eisenhower was President, he
went back for the inauguration, and when General Eisenhower -- I have a
picture of him going to the airport to pick-up the general when he came
to Fresno. This is my dad, and that's General Eisenhower.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, so when President Eisenhower flew into Fresno
your dad got to meet him at the airport and pick him up.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, and he came here for speaking -- I can't
remember what the...
>> Linley Brinker: I don't know.
>> Shirley Brinker: But he was active in politics here.
>> Linley Brinker: He was also on the draft board. He actually drafted my
dad. [Laughter] It wasn't because he didn't love Dad, but it was World
War II.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he lived, his folks were four doors down from our
house.
>> Linley Brinker: Your husband, before... my dad.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, well, we had met him when my friend, a
girlfriend of mine lived across the street from us, two doors down, and
Dick's folks bought the house across the street from them. And they never
had mailboxes out on Van Ness and he met Nancy, and then Nancy said, oh,
I have a friend, a girlfriend. And she introduced us, because she had a
boyfriend, and she introduced us and from there he got out of the
furniture store business and house rentals, and started working with Dad,
Dad needed someone to go out there and...
>> Linley Brinker: That was in 1955, but you got married in '47, so he
had put in a lot of time with the furniture store.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: I think you should tell him about the story about
where you were on the day that Pearl Harbor was bombed, that was a very
interesting story?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, yes, he was sitting in the car.
>> Linley Brinker: I think you were down with your cousins in LA, and
Grandpa was always ready before anyone else, so he was anxiously sitting
in the car saying hurry up, hurry up.
>> Shirley Brinker: He was sitting in the car, and my mother's cousin
lived in Hollywood, and it was on the way up the Hollywood Hill. And my
dad was sitting in the car because we were going home then, and he was
listening to the radio. He said I have to get back there, because he knew
when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. And he called the men that worked
for him and said get down there and get those pumps out, they need to get
over to the railroad track. And he sent the pumps down to Los Angeles,
and they were put on the ships to go over to Honolulu to lift the boats
up.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Oh, really, so...
>> Shirley Brinker: And have you ever been to Hawaii? Did you go to Pearl
Harbor?
>> Thomas Holyoke: I've never been to Hawaii or Pearl Harbor. I do know
that when several of the battleships went down they had to be pumped out
to raise them.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, I've been to Pearl Harbor, and we went out on
the deck and looked down and there were ships still down there with the
bodies in them that they never brought them up.
>> Thomas Holyoke: The memorial, SS Arizona.
>> Linley Brinker: Right, but there were other ships that were close to
the harbor entrance, and Grandpa knew that they needed to keep that open.
And luckily, I guess, a lot of the ships were out doing some kind of
maneuvers or something, so they weren't all in port. And he said that
we've got to get these pumps over there so we can lift the boats up, so I
guess a number of them were okay and enough to be repaired so they could
be used still. And it's just kind of interesting because you could never
do that today, you know? And in those days -- here you'd have to go
through a bunch of requisitions, and someone would have to call you, and
everything, but he said, no, we need to do this.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor.
>> Linley Brinker: Right, but then apparently his pumps were on the ship
to Honolulu on Monday morning because this was on a Sunday -- on Monday
morning they were already on a ship headed to Honolulu, and I don't know
how long it took to sail there, four or five days, so that they were
there right away to lift those ships up and then they could repair them.
So I thought that was always an interesting story that Mom was in the
swimming pool at her cousin's house, and Dad is in Hollywood. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: They had a swimming pool. We didn't have a swimming
pool. They lived on the side of a hill, and Hollywood -- and my dad was
just sitting in the car listening to the radio because we were headed for
home, and he said he just knew that something was happening because the
Japanese were coming in over there. And then when they bombed Pearl
Harbor that's when he said, get in the car, and he phoned Fresno and
talked to the men that worked or some of the men that worked for him. And
said get down there, and they're going to need those pumps to raise the
ships.
>> Thomas Holyoke: So he knew immediately that his pumps would be in
demand.
>> Shirley Brinker: He knew, yes, but I don't know how he knew that it
would take pumps to lift up ships.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Who would have thought that the pumps would be put to
such a purpose? Not a bad purpose, but, so any other memories?
>> Linley Brinker: That was one that she used to talk about a lot, and I
thought that was always interesting that he was -- reacted quickly and in
a way that really helped the Army or the Navy, actually.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, the Navy.
>> Linley Brinker: And I think that was always interesting. The water
witching was interesting. I never -- he didn't really ever talk about
that as much with me, but I did hear a lot more about the Pearl Harbor
incident, and I know that he just loved farming. Nothing better than to
spend the afternoon out in the west side chatting with everybody.
>> Shirley Brinker: And my mother said she grew-up on a ranch, and would
never live there again on a farm.
>> Linley Brinker: Yes, Grandma didn't go with him. [Laughter] She was in
town.
>> Shirley Brinker: And, but he bought the Peerless Pump Company, Agency
in Fresno, and then it was bought by...
>> Linley Brinker: FMC.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, the Food & Machinery Corporation, and they kept
him on because the first building was over on H Street, and then he built
-- was responsible for having the building built where it is now today,
that was what year -- Pearl Harbor?
>> Linley Brinker: Pearl Harbor was 1941.
>> Shirley Brinker: '41.
>> Linley Brinker: And so, but he'd already had the agency since 1927, so
he was familiar with what his pumps could do.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he had people, farmers wouldn't drill a well, a
water well until my dad came out to witch it because he would take the
willow, branches from a willow tree, and he would walk around. And my
husband [inaudible] and he'd put his hands on my dad's wrists, and he had
this willow wand that my dad was holding on to. And he said he'd walk
around, and then he'd find a place, and he'd say this is where the water
is. And then he'd go up and down, and how many feet they were going to
have to go before they hit the water. And he was...
>> Thomas Holyoke: Fascinating.
>> Shirley Brinker: He was remarkable.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Did he pick -- did he always find his own willow
wands?
>> Linley Brinker: I guess so, I don't think that the willows...
>> Shirley Brinker: What was that?
>> Linley Brinker: Did he always find his own willow wands? I remember in
their old house on Van Ness there used to be a willow tree in the back
yard.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, no, he knew where the willow -- because he did
all the farmers ranches and he knew...
>> Linley Brinker: He must have had to bring the willow branch with him,
not everybody had a willow tree; they kind of take a lot of water anyway.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, and for a start, most of the ranchers were
here, and then they started in out at Five Point. And that's when he
bought land out there, and he just loved farming.
>> Thomas Holyoke: So it sounds like he was very -- a very fundamental
part in developing west side agriculture?
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, yes.
>> Linley Brinker: He was out there with some of the original people -Jack Harris was out there early on, and I know that the Dieners were out
there very early.
>> Shirley Brinker: We were...
>> Linley Brinker: Grandpa was out there with a lot of those folks.
>> Shirley Brinker: I think we had...
>> Linley Brinker: He sold a lot of land to the Britses [assumed
spelling] at one point and that's when they got started with land...
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, we had...
>> Linley Brinker: ... and farming because they were doing just the
fertilizer.
>> Shirley Brinker: They had 640 acres.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, at one point Grandpa had seven sections.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: But that was -- when he passed away we had two
sections of land.
>> Shirley Brinker: He had two brothers...
>> Linley Brinker: It's 640 acres more or less to a section.
>> Shirley Brinker: He had an older brother and a younger brother that
moved to Fresno, too, and then Peerless Pump Company, it's still next to
the Rainbow Ballroom. But my Mother, they never moved out...
>> Thomas Holyoke: She wanted to stay here in Fresno?
>> Shirley Brinker: She said she grew up on a ranch and she was never
going to live on a ranch. And the ranch she lived on in southern
California were like the west side, you know, it was really -- flat
and...
>> Linley Brinker: Covina was in the hay day of their citrus farming at
the time. It was before the citrus blight came and wiped out the
orchards.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: And then conveniently at the same time is the end of
World War II and they needed a lot of houses, so orchards went, houses
came in.
>> Shirley Brinker: But I don't know how he knew where to find water, but
he did.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Wonderful.
>> Linley Brinker: He didn't pass that trait on to you. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: No, my husband, before we were married, he lived four
doors down the street from us, and his family had houses and apartment
rental properties. And then the furniture store, so Grandmother had the
furniture store, and he had to get dressed every day with a shirt and tie
and coat and go down there and wait for the people to come in to buy
stuff. And my dad really needed someone else out there, and Dick said -my dad asked his father would you mind if I asked Dick to come? And he
said, no, it's up to Dick, whatever he wants to do. And he said, wow, you
know, he thought that was just the greatest thing to get in the car at
five in the morning and drive out there. And I said “I'm not going out
there.”
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, well, thank you very much for the memories here.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, thank you very much.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
[Pause] [Silence}
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, we are here today with Shirley and Linley
Brinker, talking about their grandfather Lloyd. Shirley Brinker, let's
just start with a little bit of your father's history, where is he from?
>> Shirley Brinker: He was born in Illinois, in Mount Carroll, Illinois,
and he wanted to move, well, the family moved West -- I can't remember
what year it was -- but, oh, probably ...
>> Linley Brinker: In the early 1900s because he graduated from high
school in Covina.
>> Shirley Brinker: In Covina, California.
>> Linley Brinker: And that would have been in the 19 teens, he graduated
from high school because they were married during the big -- my
grandparents, my mom's mom and dad, were married during the flu epidemic
-- isn't that 1918, I think? Because it could only be three people, it
was the preacher and my grandma and grandpa, because there was some kind
of law about too many people together. So they had spent his young
childhood, part of it at least, in California.
>> Shirley Brinker: And they met in Covina, California, and my mother
said, she grew-up on a ranch and she was –- she was never going to live
on a ranch again or a farm. And he -- I don't know how he got in -- he
was farming, ranching there, and then he moved to Fresno and they had the
Peerless Pump Agency [assumed spelling], where he bought the Peerless
Pump Agency in Fresno. And then Peerless Pump was later bought out by
Food & Machinery Corporation, and they kept my dad on as the head Manager
of that. And the first building was on H Street, and Food & Machinery
Corporation was a lot bigger company, and he bought the land for them on,
well, he arranged the rental, where it is now, next to the Rainbow
Ballroom. You know, downtown Fresno?
>> Thomas Holyoke: I do know where the Rainbow Ballroom is at actually.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, well, it's on the -- Food & Machinery bought out
Peerless Pump Company, and they kept my dad on as the manager, and he
hired all the people that worked there. And it grew, and then he always
wanted to be a farmer. My mother never liked to live on a ranch, but.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Dad do farming in Illinois, come from a farming
family?
>> Shirley Brinker: They -- He farmed -- Five Points...
>> Linley Brinker: When he was little, his folks, they were farmers in
Illinois.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, but I...
>> Linley Brinker: I don't know what they did in Covina.
>> Shirley Brinker: I was born in Covina. And my...
>> Linley Brinker: I know that when Grandma and Grandpa got married that
they lived in Covina at first, and they -- my grandma used to raise geese
and rabbits, wasn't it? For food, and Grandpa farmed.
>> Shirley Brinker: And it was the smallest incorporated city in the
United States.
>> Linley Brinker: Covina was.
>> Shirley Brinker: Covina, the year I was born.
>> Linley Brinker: Where they farmed was in that area, and actually they
stayed there for a long time. Grandma used to tell stories of how they
would catch the streetcar to go downtown Los Angeles and go dancing on a
Saturday night, and then they would come home and Grandpa would start the
irrigation in the furrow and he'd lay down someplace down the way, and
when the water hit him he knew it was time to get up and turn the water
off and go to bed. [Laughter] And so I know he was farming when they
first married, and she wasn't too thrilled with that. But then they had
the Peerless Pump and moved to Fresno, and then when they were bought by
Food & Machinery Corporation that is when Dale Crummy came to Fresno, and
he was also a big person at Fresno State. He's given a lot of money to
the campus, I know, and so that's how our family got to know their family
because of the Food & Machinery Corporation.
>> Shirley Brinker: And it's right next to the Rainbow Ballroom -- you
know where that is?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Downtown.
>> Shirley Brinker: It's still there.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Peerless Pump, that's pump manufacturing or?
>> Linley Brinker: It's a pump manufacturing.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Peerless Pump, I was just wondering?
>> Shirley Brinker: Peerless Pump, no, we sold pumps to farmers. And my
dad was a well witcher, then he would go out to the ranch or farm and go
around with the little wands, a little trick, and he would walk around
and tell where to start drilling where the water was, and he was a well
witcher.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Well, and this brings us to the main subject here, did
he do the water witching as an employee of Peerless Pump or would people
simply pay him to do that?
>> Shirley Brinker: He had – he bought the agency.
>> Linley Brinker: Yeah, he owned it, and then it was bought out by...
>> Shirley Brinker: And then Food & Machinery Corporation...
>> Linley Brinker: As the owner of it when he would sell a pump I think
that just came with it, you know, it was different times, you didn't have
contracts, you just shook hands, and say I'm going to come out and put
your well in for you and we'll charge you ...
>> Shirley Brinker: But there were farmers that wouldn't drill a well
until my dad came out to witch it, and he would use the – palm...
>> Linley Brinker: The willow tree.
>> Shirley Brinker: Willow Tree.
>> Linley Brinker: And you said one time that my dad, my mom's husband,
went out with Grandpa because everyone it seems like hocus-pocus, not
real, and he went with him. He said he could put his hand on my grandpa
and he said he could feel it kind of shifting a little bit. And then I
guess when you got to the spot where Grandpa said the water was then it
would do a different kind of pull, like so many pulls for how deep it
was, and it still seems like hocus-pocus.
>> Shirley Brinker: He’d go up and say how many feet it would be before
they hit water.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And do you know how he learned to do this?
>> Shirley Brinker: No, I don't. He was born in Illinois, and his folks
moved to California, and Covina -- you know where Covina is?
>> Linley Brinker: We were talking about that earlier, and I asked her if
her grandfather, my grandfather was...
>> Shirley Brinker: It was the smallest incorporated city in the United
States at the time.
>> Linley Brinker: I asked you if your grandfather had witched wells,
too? And you said that you didn't think so, but you didn't know how
Grandpa learned. I mean someone must have taught him somewhere along the
way. I don't think that that's something that you just say, oh, gee
[Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: You know, to take willow wands and go out and
especially on the West side, clear out at Five Points, so it was a
desert.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, it was originally dry land farm before they dug
the wells.
>> Shirley Brinker: And my husband went
he held onto my dad's wrist, he said he
wand, and like that, and then he'd find
he'd go up and down until how many feet
before they could hit water.
out with him one time because and
wandered around with his willow
the right place to go. And then
they were going to have to go
>> Thomas Holyoke: And was he usually right?
>> Shirley Brinker: Did he want?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Was he right? Did he...
>> Shirley Brinker: He was right! Oh, yes. And the farmers, well, all
around here, they wouldn't drill a well until my dad had come out to tell
them, witch the well to find out where the water was.
>> Linley Brinker: So he must have been pretty right. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes,
whichever -- and then he
willow wand and Dick put
could feel this pulling.
and then his hands would
many feet they had to go
when I got married my husband said, well,
went out with him one time, and my dad had the
his hands on my dad's wrists, and he said he
And when he got to the spot where the water was,
go up and down, his arm, and then tell them how
to get water, and it worked.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And this is in the 1950s or the '40s?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, no, I think '30s probably.
>> Linley Brinker: '30s and '40s, and then Grandpa kind of got out of
Peerless Pump after that.
>> Shirley Brinker: They moved here when I was six months old.
>> Linley Brinker: And you were born 1926, so I think they probably moved
to Fresno maybe after the holidays in early 1927.
>> Shirley Brinker: Because he bought the company, the Peerless Pump, and
then they were bought out by the Food & Machinery Corporation, and they
kept my dad on. And he was responsible for building the new building,
which is on the corner of...
>> Linley Brinker: Is that H Street?
>> Shirley Brinker: H -- well, no, it was on H Street, and then the next
one over...
>> Linley Brinker: G?
>> Shirley Brinker: ... by the Rainbow Ballroom, you know where it is?
>> Thomas Holyoke: It's on Broadway or Fulton?
>> Linley Brinker: Downtown, it's almost -- yes, it could be.
>> Shirley Brinker: It's west, it's before the railroad tracks.
>> Linley Brinker: I don't think it's Fulton, on the west side.
>> Thomas Holyoke: It might be Broadway down there.
>> Shirley Brinker: It was Broadway.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: It is Broadway.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: Did you bring pictures?
>> Linley Brinker: There's a picture right there, that's Grandpa. That's
Mom's dad [Laughter].
>> Thomas Holyoke: Wonderful.
>> Shirley Brinker: L.A. Horace [assumed spelling], Lloyd Alvin [assumed
spelling].
>> Thomas Holyoke: And he...
>> Shirley Brinker: His brother, he had two brothers, and they moved to
Fresno later on, and all worked for Peerless Pump Company. And it's still
next to the Rainbow Ballroom.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And he -- Father Lloyd did water witching for -- I
mean did he keep doing it for decades?
>> Shirley Brinker: I don't know how he...
>> Linley Brinker: Did he do that in the '60s or did he stop kind of in
the 1950s and just focused more on farming his own property?
>> Shirley Brinker: No, there was still -- he still -- well, Food &
Machinery Corporation bought the office there, and he stayed...
>> Linley Brinker: I think that was in the early 1950s is when Food &
Machinery came.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he stayed, and he stayed on, they kept him on,
and he was responsible for finding the new place for the building, and
it's still there on what is that street?
>> Linley Brinker: Broadway.
>> Shirley Brinker: Broadway and Amador.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Broadway and Amador, okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: Okay, Broadway and Amador.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: And then, my mother grew-up on a ranch, she said she
didn't want to live on a ranch again. And my dad started buying land out
at Five Points so that they never moved out there because [inaudible]
[Laughter].
>> Thomas Holyoke: So, oh, so your Father also did farming, himself, out
by Five Points?
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: The 1950s or maybe in the late '40s, dry land farming,
and then gradually put in the pumps.
>> Thomas Holyoke: After witching his own well.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, he started buying -- my mother didn't want to
live on a ranch or anything, but we never lived out at Five Points.
>> Linley Brinker: No, but he had the land out there.
>> Shirley Brinker: But he started buying the -- he said it was the
richest soil and the best place to grow cotton and what other kinds of...
>> Linley Brinker: Well, he farmed up until he passed away in 1977.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Do you know if it was mostly a cotton crop he grew out
there or...
>> Linley Brinker: Grew lots of cotton, grew wheat and barley.
>> Shirley Brinker: We had lettuce. We had -- what did we have?
>> Linley Brinker: Well, that was really Dad's thing. My dad started
farming with my grandfather the year I was born, he had a big heart
attack, and my mom was only child, and she had a new baby, and plus in
those days she was a woman, she wasn't going to be the farmer. So my dad
started working for my grandfather, and in the 1960s he started a seed
business, and that's when they started doing the lettuce for seed crop.
But Grandpa usually grew cotton and wheat, alfalfa.
>> Shirley Brinker: We moved from H Street over to...
>> Linley Brinker: That was the Peerless Pump Agency.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Just one more question about the water witching, was
this something that many people did or was he unique in that he could do
it and no one else did?
>> Shirley Brinker: I don't think there were any other well witchers, no,
but there were farmers that all over the west side that were just
starting to -- they were starting to build-out on that God forsaken land
[Laughter]. You could see the coastal mountains from there.
>> Linley Brinker: Before smog. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: And he and his -- he had two brothers, and they came
to work with him, and they came after.
>> Linley Brinker: Did Grandpa ever do any water witching on the east
side?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh yes, no, no, he did on the east side, too. When
they were installing a pump they want to know where the best place to
drill for water was, and...
>> Thomas Holyoke: Did he leave you his willow wands?
>> Shirley Brinker: Did he what?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Do you still have his willow wands, the willow sticks?
>> Linley Brinker: Do you still have the willow sticks? I don't think so
[Laughter].
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, no, I don't -- my husband -- I'm trying to think
what business his family were in, but...
>> Linley Brinker: They had a furniture store and apartments that they
rented.
>> Shirley Brinker: There were things that they rented, and he had to get
dressed up in a suit and tie every day and go to the store. They had a
furniture store, too. And my dad really needed someone else to be helping
him out, working on the west side. And he asked Dick's father, you know,
would you mind if Dick came here because I really need someone to work
there? And he had two brothers that worked in the furniture business and
rental, house rental. And so he just loved going out there, and he didn't
have to put a tie and a suit on and go sit in the store waiting for
people to come in. And he drove out to Five Points and thought that was
the neatest thing.
>> Linley Brinker: It was great.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he learned how to witch the wells.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Now you also talked about him being active in other
ways. In fact, you showed us that picture of your father with President
Eisenhower?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, here, my dad was called Mr. Republican. He had,
he was...
>> Linley Brinker: He was on the Republican Central Committee for ages.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, and when General Eisenhower was President, he
went back for the inauguration, and when General Eisenhower -- I have a
picture of him going to the airport to pick-up the general when he came
to Fresno. This is my dad, and that's General Eisenhower.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, so when President Eisenhower flew into Fresno
your dad got to meet him at the airport and pick him up.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, and he came here for speaking -- I can't
remember what the...
>> Linley Brinker: I don't know.
>> Shirley Brinker: But he was active in politics here.
>> Linley Brinker: He was also on the draft board. He actually drafted my
dad. [Laughter] It wasn't because he didn't love Dad, but it was World
War II.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he lived, his folks were four doors down from our
house.
>> Linley Brinker: Your husband, before... my dad.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, well, we had met him when my friend, a
girlfriend of mine lived across the street from us, two doors down, and
Dick's folks bought the house across the street from them. And they never
had mailboxes out on Van Ness and he met Nancy, and then Nancy said, oh,
I have a friend, a girlfriend. And she introduced us, because she had a
boyfriend, and she introduced us and from there he got out of the
furniture store business and house rentals, and started working with Dad,
Dad needed someone to go out there and...
>> Linley Brinker: That was in 1955, but you got married in '47, so he
had put in a lot of time with the furniture store.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: I think you should tell him about the story about
where you were on the day that Pearl Harbor was bombed, that was a very
interesting story?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, yes, he was sitting in the car.
>> Linley Brinker: I think you were down with your cousins in LA, and
Grandpa was always ready before anyone else, so he was anxiously sitting
in the car saying hurry up, hurry up.
>> Shirley Brinker: He was sitting in the car, and my mother's cousin
lived in Hollywood, and it was on the way up the Hollywood Hill. And my
dad was sitting in the car because we were going home then, and he was
listening to the radio. He said I have to get back there, because he knew
when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. And he called the men that worked
for him and said get down there and get those pumps out, they need to get
over to the railroad track. And he sent the pumps down to Los Angeles,
and they were put on the ships to go over to Honolulu to lift the boats
up.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Oh, really, so...
>> Shirley Brinker: And have you ever been to Hawaii? Did you go to Pearl
Harbor?
>> Thomas Holyoke: I've never been to Hawaii or Pearl Harbor. I do know
that when several of the battleships went down they had to be pumped out
to raise them.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, I've been to Pearl Harbor, and we went out on
the deck and looked down and there were ships still down there with the
bodies in them that they never brought them up.
>> Thomas Holyoke: The memorial, SS Arizona.
>> Linley Brinker: Right, but there were other ships that were close to
the harbor entrance, and Grandpa knew that they needed to keep that open.
And luckily, I guess, a lot of the ships were out doing some kind of
maneuvers or something, so they weren't all in port. And he said that
we've got to get these pumps over there so we can lift the boats up, so I
guess a number of them were okay and enough to be repaired so they could
be used still. And it's just kind of interesting because you could never
do that today, you know? And in those days -- here you'd have to go
through a bunch of requisitions, and someone would have to call you, and
everything, but he said, no, we need to do this.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor.
>> Linley Brinker: Right, but then apparently his pumps were on the ship
to Honolulu on Monday morning because this was on a Sunday -- on Monday
morning they were already on a ship headed to Honolulu, and I don't know
how long it took to sail there, four or five days, so that they were
there right away to lift those ships up and then they could repair them.
So I thought that was always an interesting story that Mom was in the
swimming pool at her cousin's house, and Dad is in Hollywood. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: They had a swimming pool. We didn't have a swimming
pool. They lived on the side of a hill, and Hollywood -- and my dad was
just sitting in the car listening to the radio because we were headed for
home, and he said he just knew that something was happening because the
Japanese were coming in over there. And then when they bombed Pearl
Harbor that's when he said, get in the car, and he phoned Fresno and
talked to the men that worked or some of the men that worked for him. And
said get down there, and they're going to need those pumps to raise the
ships.
>> Thomas Holyoke: So he knew immediately that his pumps would be in
demand.
>> Shirley Brinker: He knew, yes, but I don't know how he knew that it
would take pumps to lift up ships.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Who would have thought that the pumps would be put to
such a purpose? Not a bad purpose, but, so any other memories?
>> Linley Brinker: That was one that she used to talk about a lot, and I
thought that was always interesting that he was -- reacted quickly and in
a way that really helped the Army or the Navy, actually.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, the Navy.
>> Linley Brinker: And I think that was always interesting. The water
witching was interesting. I never -- he didn't really ever talk about
that as much with me, but I did hear a lot more about the Pearl Harbor
incident, and I know that he just loved farming. Nothing better than to
spend the afternoon out in the west side chatting with everybody.
>> Shirley Brinker: And my mother said she grew-up on a ranch, and would
never live there again on a farm.
>> Linley Brinker: Yes, Grandma didn't go with him. [Laughter] She was in
town.
>> Shirley Brinker: And, but he bought the Peerless Pump Company, Agency
in Fresno, and then it was bought by...
>> Linley Brinker: FMC.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, the Food & Machinery Corporation, and they kept
him on because the first building was over on H Street, and then he built
-- was responsible for having the building built where it is now today,
that was what year -- Pearl Harbor?
>> Linley Brinker: Pearl Harbor was 1941.
>> Shirley Brinker: '41.
>> Linley Brinker: And so, but he'd already had the agency since 1927, so
he was familiar with what his pumps could do.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he had people, farmers wouldn't drill a well, a
water well until my dad came out to witch it because he would take the
willow, branches from a willow tree, and he would walk around. And my
husband [inaudible] and he'd put his hands on my dad's wrists, and he had
this willow wand that my dad was holding on to. And he said he'd walk
around, and then he'd find a place, and he'd say this is where the water
is. And then he'd go up and down, and how many feet they were going to
have to go before they hit the water. And he was...
>> Thomas Holyoke: Fascinating.
>> Shirley Brinker: He was remarkable.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Did he pick -- did he always find his own willow
wands?
>> Linley Brinker: I guess so, I don't think that the willows...
>> Shirley Brinker: What was that?
>> Linley Brinker: Did he always find his own willow wands? I remember in
their old house on Van Ness there used to be a willow tree in the back
yard.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, no, he knew where the willow -- because he did
all the farmers ranches and he knew...
>> Linley Brinker: He must have had to bring the willow branch with him,
not everybody had a willow tree; they kind of take a lot of water anyway.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, and for a start, most of the ranchers were
here, and then they started in out at Five Point. And that's when he
bought land out there, and he just loved farming.
>> Thomas Holyoke: So it sounds like he was very -- a very fundamental
part in developing west side agriculture?
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, yes.
>> Linley Brinker: He was out there with some of the original people -Jack Harris was out there early on, and I know that the Dieners were out
there very early.
>> Shirley Brinker: We were...
>> Linley Brinker: Grandpa was out there with a lot of those folks.
>> Shirley Brinker: I think we had...
>> Linley Brinker: He sold a lot of land to the Britses [assumed
spelling] at one point and that's when they got started with land...
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, we had...
>> Linley Brinker: ... and farming because they were doing just the
fertilizer.
>> Shirley Brinker: They had 640 acres.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, at one point Grandpa had seven sections.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: But that was -- when he passed away we had two
sections of land.
>> Shirley Brinker: He had two brothers...
>> Linley Brinker: It's 640 acres more or less to a section.
>> Shirley Brinker: He had an older brother and a younger brother that
moved to Fresno, too, and then Peerless Pump Company, it's still next to
the Rainbow Ballroom. But my Mother, they never moved out...
>> Thomas Holyoke: She wanted to stay here in Fresno?
>> Shirley Brinker: She said she grew up on a ranch and she was never
going to live on a ranch. And the ranch she lived on in southern
California were like the west side, you know, it was really -- flat
and...
>> Linley Brinker: Covina was in the hay day of their citrus farming at
the time. It was before the citrus blight came and wiped out the
orchards.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: And then conveniently at the same time is the end of
World War II and they needed a lot of houses, so orchards went, houses
came in.
>> Shirley Brinker: But I don't know how he knew where to find water, but
he did.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Wonderful.
>> Linley Brinker: He didn't pass that trait on to you. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: No, my husband, before we were married, he lived four
doors down the street from us, and his family had houses and apartment
rental properties. And then the furniture store, so Grandmother had the
furniture store, and he had to get dressed every day with a shirt and tie
and coat and go down there and wait for the people to come in to buy
stuff. And my dad really needed someone else out there, and Dick said -my dad asked his father would you mind if I asked Dick to come? And he
said, no, it's up to Dick, whatever he wants to do. And he said, wow, you
know, he thought that was just the greatest thing to get in the car at
five in the morning and drive out there. And I said “I'm not going out
there.”
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, well, thank you very much for the memories here.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, thank you very much.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
[Pause] [Silence}
Brinker, talking about their grandfather Lloyd. Shirley Brinker, let's
just start with a little bit of your father's history, where is he from?
>> Shirley Brinker: He was born in Illinois, in Mount Carroll, Illinois,
and he wanted to move, well, the family moved West -- I can't remember
what year it was -- but, oh, probably ...
>> Linley Brinker: In the early 1900s because he graduated from high
school in Covina.
>> Shirley Brinker: In Covina, California.
>> Linley Brinker: And that would have been in the 19 teens, he graduated
from high school because they were married during the big -- my
grandparents, my mom's mom and dad, were married during the flu epidemic
-- isn't that 1918, I think? Because it could only be three people, it
was the preacher and my grandma and grandpa, because there was some kind
of law about too many people together. So they had spent his young
childhood, part of it at least, in California.
>> Shirley Brinker: And they met in Covina, California, and my mother
said, she grew-up on a ranch and she was –- she was never going to live
on a ranch again or a farm. And he -- I don't know how he got in -- he
was farming, ranching there, and then he moved to Fresno and they had the
Peerless Pump Agency [assumed spelling], where he bought the Peerless
Pump Agency in Fresno. And then Peerless Pump was later bought out by
Food & Machinery Corporation, and they kept my dad on as the head Manager
of that. And the first building was on H Street, and Food & Machinery
Corporation was a lot bigger company, and he bought the land for them on,
well, he arranged the rental, where it is now, next to the Rainbow
Ballroom. You know, downtown Fresno?
>> Thomas Holyoke: I do know where the Rainbow Ballroom is at actually.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, well, it's on the -- Food & Machinery bought out
Peerless Pump Company, and they kept my dad on as the manager, and he
hired all the people that worked there. And it grew, and then he always
wanted to be a farmer. My mother never liked to live on a ranch, but.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Dad do farming in Illinois, come from a farming
family?
>> Shirley Brinker: They -- He farmed -- Five Points...
>> Linley Brinker: When he was little, his folks, they were farmers in
Illinois.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, but I...
>> Linley Brinker: I don't know what they did in Covina.
>> Shirley Brinker: I was born in Covina. And my...
>> Linley Brinker: I know that when Grandma and Grandpa got married that
they lived in Covina at first, and they -- my grandma used to raise geese
and rabbits, wasn't it? For food, and Grandpa farmed.
>> Shirley Brinker: And it was the smallest incorporated city in the
United States.
>> Linley Brinker: Covina was.
>> Shirley Brinker: Covina, the year I was born.
>> Linley Brinker: Where they farmed was in that area, and actually they
stayed there for a long time. Grandma used to tell stories of how they
would catch the streetcar to go downtown Los Angeles and go dancing on a
Saturday night, and then they would come home and Grandpa would start the
irrigation in the furrow and he'd lay down someplace down the way, and
when the water hit him he knew it was time to get up and turn the water
off and go to bed. [Laughter] And so I know he was farming when they
first married, and she wasn't too thrilled with that. But then they had
the Peerless Pump and moved to Fresno, and then when they were bought by
Food & Machinery Corporation that is when Dale Crummy came to Fresno, and
he was also a big person at Fresno State. He's given a lot of money to
the campus, I know, and so that's how our family got to know their family
because of the Food & Machinery Corporation.
>> Shirley Brinker: And it's right next to the Rainbow Ballroom -- you
know where that is?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Downtown.
>> Shirley Brinker: It's still there.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Peerless Pump, that's pump manufacturing or?
>> Linley Brinker: It's a pump manufacturing.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Peerless Pump, I was just wondering?
>> Shirley Brinker: Peerless Pump, no, we sold pumps to farmers. And my
dad was a well witcher, then he would go out to the ranch or farm and go
around with the little wands, a little trick, and he would walk around
and tell where to start drilling where the water was, and he was a well
witcher.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Well, and this brings us to the main subject here, did
he do the water witching as an employee of Peerless Pump or would people
simply pay him to do that?
>> Shirley Brinker: He had – he bought the agency.
>> Linley Brinker: Yeah, he owned it, and then it was bought out by...
>> Shirley Brinker: And then Food & Machinery Corporation...
>> Linley Brinker: As the owner of it when he would sell a pump I think
that just came with it, you know, it was different times, you didn't have
contracts, you just shook hands, and say I'm going to come out and put
your well in for you and we'll charge you ...
>> Shirley Brinker: But there were farmers that wouldn't drill a well
until my dad came out to witch it, and he would use the – palm...
>> Linley Brinker: The willow tree.
>> Shirley Brinker: Willow Tree.
>> Linley Brinker: And you said one time that my dad, my mom's husband,
went out with Grandpa because everyone it seems like hocus-pocus, not
real, and he went with him. He said he could put his hand on my grandpa
and he said he could feel it kind of shifting a little bit. And then I
guess when you got to the spot where Grandpa said the water was then it
would do a different kind of pull, like so many pulls for how deep it
was, and it still seems like hocus-pocus.
>> Shirley Brinker: He’d go up and say how many feet it would be before
they hit water.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And do you know how he learned to do this?
>> Shirley Brinker: No, I don't. He was born in Illinois, and his folks
moved to California, and Covina -- you know where Covina is?
>> Linley Brinker: We were talking about that earlier, and I asked her if
her grandfather, my grandfather was...
>> Shirley Brinker: It was the smallest incorporated city in the United
States at the time.
>> Linley Brinker: I asked you if your grandfather had witched wells,
too? And you said that you didn't think so, but you didn't know how
Grandpa learned. I mean someone must have taught him somewhere along the
way. I don't think that that's something that you just say, oh, gee
[Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: You know, to take willow wands and go out and
especially on the West side, clear out at Five Points, so it was a
desert.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, it was originally dry land farm before they dug
the wells.
>> Shirley Brinker: And my husband went
he held onto my dad's wrist, he said he
wand, and like that, and then he'd find
he'd go up and down until how many feet
before they could hit water.
out with him one time because and
wandered around with his willow
the right place to go. And then
they were going to have to go
>> Thomas Holyoke: And was he usually right?
>> Shirley Brinker: Did he want?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Was he right? Did he...
>> Shirley Brinker: He was right! Oh, yes. And the farmers, well, all
around here, they wouldn't drill a well until my dad had come out to tell
them, witch the well to find out where the water was.
>> Linley Brinker: So he must have been pretty right. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes,
whichever -- and then he
willow wand and Dick put
could feel this pulling.
and then his hands would
many feet they had to go
when I got married my husband said, well,
went out with him one time, and my dad had the
his hands on my dad's wrists, and he said he
And when he got to the spot where the water was,
go up and down, his arm, and then tell them how
to get water, and it worked.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And this is in the 1950s or the '40s?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, no, I think '30s probably.
>> Linley Brinker: '30s and '40s, and then Grandpa kind of got out of
Peerless Pump after that.
>> Shirley Brinker: They moved here when I was six months old.
>> Linley Brinker: And you were born 1926, so I think they probably moved
to Fresno maybe after the holidays in early 1927.
>> Shirley Brinker: Because he bought the company, the Peerless Pump, and
then they were bought out by the Food & Machinery Corporation, and they
kept my dad on. And he was responsible for building the new building,
which is on the corner of...
>> Linley Brinker: Is that H Street?
>> Shirley Brinker: H -- well, no, it was on H Street, and then the next
one over...
>> Linley Brinker: G?
>> Shirley Brinker: ... by the Rainbow Ballroom, you know where it is?
>> Thomas Holyoke: It's on Broadway or Fulton?
>> Linley Brinker: Downtown, it's almost -- yes, it could be.
>> Shirley Brinker: It's west, it's before the railroad tracks.
>> Linley Brinker: I don't think it's Fulton, on the west side.
>> Thomas Holyoke: It might be Broadway down there.
>> Shirley Brinker: It was Broadway.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: It is Broadway.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: Did you bring pictures?
>> Linley Brinker: There's a picture right there, that's Grandpa. That's
Mom's dad [Laughter].
>> Thomas Holyoke: Wonderful.
>> Shirley Brinker: L.A. Horace [assumed spelling], Lloyd Alvin [assumed
spelling].
>> Thomas Holyoke: And he...
>> Shirley Brinker: His brother, he had two brothers, and they moved to
Fresno later on, and all worked for Peerless Pump Company. And it's still
next to the Rainbow Ballroom.
>> Thomas Holyoke: And he -- Father Lloyd did water witching for -- I
mean did he keep doing it for decades?
>> Shirley Brinker: I don't know how he...
>> Linley Brinker: Did he do that in the '60s or did he stop kind of in
the 1950s and just focused more on farming his own property?
>> Shirley Brinker: No, there was still -- he still -- well, Food &
Machinery Corporation bought the office there, and he stayed...
>> Linley Brinker: I think that was in the early 1950s is when Food &
Machinery came.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he stayed, and he stayed on, they kept him on,
and he was responsible for finding the new place for the building, and
it's still there on what is that street?
>> Linley Brinker: Broadway.
>> Shirley Brinker: Broadway and Amador.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Broadway and Amador, okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: Okay, Broadway and Amador.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay.
>> Shirley Brinker: And then, my mother grew-up on a ranch, she said she
didn't want to live on a ranch again. And my dad started buying land out
at Five Points so that they never moved out there because [inaudible]
[Laughter].
>> Thomas Holyoke: So, oh, so your Father also did farming, himself, out
by Five Points?
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: The 1950s or maybe in the late '40s, dry land farming,
and then gradually put in the pumps.
>> Thomas Holyoke: After witching his own well.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, he started buying -- my mother didn't want to
live on a ranch or anything, but we never lived out at Five Points.
>> Linley Brinker: No, but he had the land out there.
>> Shirley Brinker: But he started buying the -- he said it was the
richest soil and the best place to grow cotton and what other kinds of...
>> Linley Brinker: Well, he farmed up until he passed away in 1977.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Do you know if it was mostly a cotton crop he grew out
there or...
>> Linley Brinker: Grew lots of cotton, grew wheat and barley.
>> Shirley Brinker: We had lettuce. We had -- what did we have?
>> Linley Brinker: Well, that was really Dad's thing. My dad started
farming with my grandfather the year I was born, he had a big heart
attack, and my mom was only child, and she had a new baby, and plus in
those days she was a woman, she wasn't going to be the farmer. So my dad
started working for my grandfather, and in the 1960s he started a seed
business, and that's when they started doing the lettuce for seed crop.
But Grandpa usually grew cotton and wheat, alfalfa.
>> Shirley Brinker: We moved from H Street over to...
>> Linley Brinker: That was the Peerless Pump Agency.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Just one more question about the water witching, was
this something that many people did or was he unique in that he could do
it and no one else did?
>> Shirley Brinker: I don't think there were any other well witchers, no,
but there were farmers that all over the west side that were just
starting to -- they were starting to build-out on that God forsaken land
[Laughter]. You could see the coastal mountains from there.
>> Linley Brinker: Before smog. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: And he and his -- he had two brothers, and they came
to work with him, and they came after.
>> Linley Brinker: Did Grandpa ever do any water witching on the east
side?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh yes, no, no, he did on the east side, too. When
they were installing a pump they want to know where the best place to
drill for water was, and...
>> Thomas Holyoke: Did he leave you his willow wands?
>> Shirley Brinker: Did he what?
>> Thomas Holyoke: Do you still have his willow wands, the willow sticks?
>> Linley Brinker: Do you still have the willow sticks? I don't think so
[Laughter].
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, no, I don't -- my husband -- I'm trying to think
what business his family were in, but...
>> Linley Brinker: They had a furniture store and apartments that they
rented.
>> Shirley Brinker: There were things that they rented, and he had to get
dressed up in a suit and tie every day and go to the store. They had a
furniture store, too. And my dad really needed someone else to be helping
him out, working on the west side. And he asked Dick's father, you know,
would you mind if Dick came here because I really need someone to work
there? And he had two brothers that worked in the furniture business and
rental, house rental. And so he just loved going out there, and he didn't
have to put a tie and a suit on and go sit in the store waiting for
people to come in. And he drove out to Five Points and thought that was
the neatest thing.
>> Linley Brinker: It was great.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he learned how to witch the wells.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Now you also talked about him being active in other
ways. In fact, you showed us that picture of your father with President
Eisenhower?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, here, my dad was called Mr. Republican. He had,
he was...
>> Linley Brinker: He was on the Republican Central Committee for ages.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, and when General Eisenhower was President, he
went back for the inauguration, and when General Eisenhower -- I have a
picture of him going to the airport to pick-up the general when he came
to Fresno. This is my dad, and that's General Eisenhower.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, so when President Eisenhower flew into Fresno
your dad got to meet him at the airport and pick him up.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, and he came here for speaking -- I can't
remember what the...
>> Linley Brinker: I don't know.
>> Shirley Brinker: But he was active in politics here.
>> Linley Brinker: He was also on the draft board. He actually drafted my
dad. [Laughter] It wasn't because he didn't love Dad, but it was World
War II.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he lived, his folks were four doors down from our
house.
>> Linley Brinker: Your husband, before... my dad.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, well, we had met him when my friend, a
girlfriend of mine lived across the street from us, two doors down, and
Dick's folks bought the house across the street from them. And they never
had mailboxes out on Van Ness and he met Nancy, and then Nancy said, oh,
I have a friend, a girlfriend. And she introduced us, because she had a
boyfriend, and she introduced us and from there he got out of the
furniture store business and house rentals, and started working with Dad,
Dad needed someone to go out there and...
>> Linley Brinker: That was in 1955, but you got married in '47, so he
had put in a lot of time with the furniture store.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: I think you should tell him about the story about
where you were on the day that Pearl Harbor was bombed, that was a very
interesting story?
>> Shirley Brinker: Oh, yes, he was sitting in the car.
>> Linley Brinker: I think you were down with your cousins in LA, and
Grandpa was always ready before anyone else, so he was anxiously sitting
in the car saying hurry up, hurry up.
>> Shirley Brinker: He was sitting in the car, and my mother's cousin
lived in Hollywood, and it was on the way up the Hollywood Hill. And my
dad was sitting in the car because we were going home then, and he was
listening to the radio. He said I have to get back there, because he knew
when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. And he called the men that worked
for him and said get down there and get those pumps out, they need to get
over to the railroad track. And he sent the pumps down to Los Angeles,
and they were put on the ships to go over to Honolulu to lift the boats
up.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Oh, really, so...
>> Shirley Brinker: And have you ever been to Hawaii? Did you go to Pearl
Harbor?
>> Thomas Holyoke: I've never been to Hawaii or Pearl Harbor. I do know
that when several of the battleships went down they had to be pumped out
to raise them.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, I've been to Pearl Harbor, and we went out on
the deck and looked down and there were ships still down there with the
bodies in them that they never brought them up.
>> Thomas Holyoke: The memorial, SS Arizona.
>> Linley Brinker: Right, but there were other ships that were close to
the harbor entrance, and Grandpa knew that they needed to keep that open.
And luckily, I guess, a lot of the ships were out doing some kind of
maneuvers or something, so they weren't all in port. And he said that
we've got to get these pumps over there so we can lift the boats up, so I
guess a number of them were okay and enough to be repaired so they could
be used still. And it's just kind of interesting because you could never
do that today, you know? And in those days -- here you'd have to go
through a bunch of requisitions, and someone would have to call you, and
everything, but he said, no, we need to do this.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor.
>> Linley Brinker: Right, but then apparently his pumps were on the ship
to Honolulu on Monday morning because this was on a Sunday -- on Monday
morning they were already on a ship headed to Honolulu, and I don't know
how long it took to sail there, four or five days, so that they were
there right away to lift those ships up and then they could repair them.
So I thought that was always an interesting story that Mom was in the
swimming pool at her cousin's house, and Dad is in Hollywood. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: They had a swimming pool. We didn't have a swimming
pool. They lived on the side of a hill, and Hollywood -- and my dad was
just sitting in the car listening to the radio because we were headed for
home, and he said he just knew that something was happening because the
Japanese were coming in over there. And then when they bombed Pearl
Harbor that's when he said, get in the car, and he phoned Fresno and
talked to the men that worked or some of the men that worked for him. And
said get down there, and they're going to need those pumps to raise the
ships.
>> Thomas Holyoke: So he knew immediately that his pumps would be in
demand.
>> Shirley Brinker: He knew, yes, but I don't know how he knew that it
would take pumps to lift up ships.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Who would have thought that the pumps would be put to
such a purpose? Not a bad purpose, but, so any other memories?
>> Linley Brinker: That was one that she used to talk about a lot, and I
thought that was always interesting that he was -- reacted quickly and in
a way that really helped the Army or the Navy, actually.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, the Navy.
>> Linley Brinker: And I think that was always interesting. The water
witching was interesting. I never -- he didn't really ever talk about
that as much with me, but I did hear a lot more about the Pearl Harbor
incident, and I know that he just loved farming. Nothing better than to
spend the afternoon out in the west side chatting with everybody.
>> Shirley Brinker: And my mother said she grew-up on a ranch, and would
never live there again on a farm.
>> Linley Brinker: Yes, Grandma didn't go with him. [Laughter] She was in
town.
>> Shirley Brinker: And, but he bought the Peerless Pump Company, Agency
in Fresno, and then it was bought by...
>> Linley Brinker: FMC.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, the Food & Machinery Corporation, and they kept
him on because the first building was over on H Street, and then he built
-- was responsible for having the building built where it is now today,
that was what year -- Pearl Harbor?
>> Linley Brinker: Pearl Harbor was 1941.
>> Shirley Brinker: '41.
>> Linley Brinker: And so, but he'd already had the agency since 1927, so
he was familiar with what his pumps could do.
>> Shirley Brinker: And he had people, farmers wouldn't drill a well, a
water well until my dad came out to witch it because he would take the
willow, branches from a willow tree, and he would walk around. And my
husband [inaudible] and he'd put his hands on my dad's wrists, and he had
this willow wand that my dad was holding on to. And he said he'd walk
around, and then he'd find a place, and he'd say this is where the water
is. And then he'd go up and down, and how many feet they were going to
have to go before they hit the water. And he was...
>> Thomas Holyoke: Fascinating.
>> Shirley Brinker: He was remarkable.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Did he pick -- did he always find his own willow
wands?
>> Linley Brinker: I guess so, I don't think that the willows...
>> Shirley Brinker: What was that?
>> Linley Brinker: Did he always find his own willow wands? I remember in
their old house on Van Ness there used to be a willow tree in the back
yard.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, no, he knew where the willow -- because he did
all the farmers ranches and he knew...
>> Linley Brinker: He must have had to bring the willow branch with him,
not everybody had a willow tree; they kind of take a lot of water anyway.
>> Shirley Brinker: Well, and for a start, most of the ranchers were
here, and then they started in out at Five Point. And that's when he
bought land out there, and he just loved farming.
>> Thomas Holyoke: So it sounds like he was very -- a very fundamental
part in developing west side agriculture?
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, yes.
>> Linley Brinker: He was out there with some of the original people -Jack Harris was out there early on, and I know that the Dieners were out
there very early.
>> Shirley Brinker: We were...
>> Linley Brinker: Grandpa was out there with a lot of those folks.
>> Shirley Brinker: I think we had...
>> Linley Brinker: He sold a lot of land to the Britses [assumed
spelling] at one point and that's when they got started with land...
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes, we had...
>> Linley Brinker: ... and farming because they were doing just the
fertilizer.
>> Shirley Brinker: They had 640 acres.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, at one point Grandpa had seven sections.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: But that was -- when he passed away we had two
sections of land.
>> Shirley Brinker: He had two brothers...
>> Linley Brinker: It's 640 acres more or less to a section.
>> Shirley Brinker: He had an older brother and a younger brother that
moved to Fresno, too, and then Peerless Pump Company, it's still next to
the Rainbow Ballroom. But my Mother, they never moved out...
>> Thomas Holyoke: She wanted to stay here in Fresno?
>> Shirley Brinker: She said she grew up on a ranch and she was never
going to live on a ranch. And the ranch she lived on in southern
California were like the west side, you know, it was really -- flat
and...
>> Linley Brinker: Covina was in the hay day of their citrus farming at
the time. It was before the citrus blight came and wiped out the
orchards.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
>> Linley Brinker: And then conveniently at the same time is the end of
World War II and they needed a lot of houses, so orchards went, houses
came in.
>> Shirley Brinker: But I don't know how he knew where to find water, but
he did.
>> Thomas Holyoke: Wonderful.
>> Linley Brinker: He didn't pass that trait on to you. [Laughter]
>> Shirley Brinker: No, my husband, before we were married, he lived four
doors down the street from us, and his family had houses and apartment
rental properties. And then the furniture store, so Grandmother had the
furniture store, and he had to get dressed every day with a shirt and tie
and coat and go down there and wait for the people to come in to buy
stuff. And my dad really needed someone else out there, and Dick said -my dad asked his father would you mind if I asked Dick to come? And he
said, no, it's up to Dick, whatever he wants to do. And he said, wow, you
know, he thought that was just the greatest thing to get in the car at
five in the morning and drive out there. And I said “I'm not going out
there.”
>> Thomas Holyoke: Okay, well, thank you very much for the memories here.
>> Linley Brinker: Well, thank you very much.
>> Shirley Brinker: Yes.
[Pause] [Silence}