Ruth’s father, Stefan Stasiowski, and her mother, née Katarzyna Kazowska, on their wedding day, October 19, 1901; at the time of their marriage, the groom was employed as a weaver in a cotton mill, and the bride as a “sizer” in the sizing department.
“Well, they came from …Poland.”
Michalina “Ruth” Stasiowski at age two, 1923.
“I had a very good childhood, being the tenth – the last of the bunch I could say.”
Interior of the King Philip Mills, 372 Kilburn Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa 1920.
“My Dad worked in the King Philip … which was horrible, ‘cause I went to bring him a lunch one day, and I went in that weave room; that was horrible – the noise.”
Ruth posing in ballet costume, 1928; the photograph was taken by Gay Art Galleries, 44 North Main Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, the city’s leading studio.
“I guess I was the one that had the best of all of it because the older ones started to work and I was the baby and they – what my parents couldn’t give me, they gave me.”
Ruth posing in ballet costume, 1928.
“I took dance lessons.”
St. Patrick’s Catholic Church, 1598 South Main Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, as it appeared the year after its completion in 1889.
“I belonged to St. Patrick’s … my Dad had a fight with Father Dylla [at St. Stanislaus Church] and he stayed, but us kids, he put us in with St. Patrick’s parish.”
The Fowler Primary and Grammar School, 286 Sprague Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa 1920s.
“And [then] I had to go to Fowler School.”
Ruth when a girl, circa early 1930s.
“I was one of the lucky ones that had a good, good life. And I don’t know if, at that time, I ever appreciated it.”
Fall River Line Steamer Commonwealth, en route to New York City, circa 1930s; called ‘The Giantess of the Sound,’ she was launched in 1907 and carried 2000 passengers.
”Oh, yeah, that was beautiful. Ah, we used to go out for the waves, it was a picture to see it going by.”
Colonel Louis McHenry Howe, and his wife, née Grace Hartley, ‘Viewing the Easter-egg rolling from a second story window of the White House, April 22, 1935’; the photograph was taken exactly one year to the day before his burial in Oak Grove Cemetery, Fall River, Massachusetts. Howe was a close friend and chief ‘personal advisor’ to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, lauded as ‘“the man who made Roosevelt.’
“Yeah [I] hopped over that wall to see [the funeral] … We wanted to see the President. We didn’t care that they were going to put him in a hole. Who cares? And it wasn’t because of – they all felt bad, but … the President was coming down, and, you know, who saw a President around here?”
The Hub Clothing Company, 162 Pleasant Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, 1928; the store was one of the leading men’s shops in the city.
“The [boys] always got their clothes there. That was the place.”
Ruth’s father and brothers outside the family residence, 76 Globe Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa 1937. Standing, left to right: Stefan Stasiowski; his sons: Czesław “Chester” aka “Tommy” Stasiowski; Emil “Elmer” Stasiowski; Albin “Albert” Stasiowski; Frederick “Fred” Stasiowski; Bolesław “William” Stasiowski; Władysław “Walter” Stasiowski.
“I had six brothers that looked over me.”
B. M. C. Durfee High School, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa 1940.
“I graduated in 1939.”
Ruth posing with her father, Stefan Stasiowski, circa early 1940s; the photograph was taken in the yard of the family residence, 76 Globe Street, Fall River, Massachusetts.
“My dad [came] over here from Poland and … could speak English. In fact, during the epidemic of the flu, he was one of ‘em that went with the doctors to the …Polish families because they couldn’t talk [English], they couldn’t tell the doctor what was wrong, so my father was like an interpreter for the doctor.”
Ruth during her junior year at B.M.C. Durfee High School, Fall River, Massachusetts, 1937-1938; she is holding her high school pennant.
“I was the one that was able to graduate from high school.”
Ruth during her junior year at B.M.C. Durfee High School, Fall River, Massachusetts, 1937-1938; she is standing in the yard of the Stasiowski family residence, 76 Globe Street, Fall River, Massachusetts.
“It was a beautiful six tenement house. In fact, I lived there until I moved to Swansea.”
South Main Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa 1940s; S. S. Kresge Company, department store, on the corner of Pocasset Street, can be seen at the right.
“I worked at Kresge’s five-and-ten. I worked for twenty-five cents an hour … yeah. That was a lot of money!”
A window display at S. S. Kresge Company, department store, 71 to 87 South Main Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa 1930.
“After high school on a Friday we went to work at Kresge’s until ten o’clock ten … and then on Saturday we worked all day ‘til ten o’clock at night.”
Neon sign display, Hartley’s Pork Pies, 1729 South Main Street, Fall River, Massachusetts; the pies are a Fall River tradition.
“[Oh,] Hartley’s, Hartley’s Pork Pies.”
Ruth, as he appeared in the 1939 edition of the Durfee Record; the youngest of a family of ten children, she was the only Stasiowski sibling to graduate high school.
“I took the [commercial course].”
Ruth’s future husband, Joseph Napoleon Roger Soucy, called “Roger,” as he appeared in the 1939 edition of the Durfee Record; a fellow classmate, they were both members of the Commercial Club.
“My husband … I met in high school. He was an ‘R.S.’ and I was an “R.S.’, so we always sat in homeroom in front or in back of each other, and we would kid with one another … like when kids in high school.”
John Russell Hartley, as he appeared in the 1939 edition of the Durfee Record; he was Ruth’s classmate, called by the diminutive ‘Porky,’ or ‘Russ.’
“Oh, I knew ‘Porky.’ He wanted to take me to the senior prom and I wouldn’t go with him because he was too short.”
Ruth’s mother, Mrs. Stefan Stasiowski, née Catherine Kaszowska.
“She felt so sorry for me ‘cause … my boyfriend was going overseas. She says, ‘Why don’t you go and buy her a fur coast? Make her feel better?’”
Firestone Rubber & Latex Products Company, 172 Ferry Street, Fall River, Massachusetts; the plant was destroyed by fire on October 11, 1941, taking with it 15,850 tons of rubber at a loss of $12,000,000.
“Brother Bill worked in Firestone until it burned down.”
Interior of the vacant Laurel Lake Mill, Broadway, Fall River, Massachusetts, 1935; the photograph is one of a series taken to advertise the city’s surfeit of available factory space to out-of-town manufacturers. Ruth was employed at Joseph Chromow Company, underwear and sportswear manufacturers that later occupied this space.
“Mr. Chromow, it was on Broadway, the Globe. You know the mills on the Globe [Four] Corners?”
A group of bicyclists made up of Ruth’s co-workers from Joseph Chromow Company, underwear and sportswear manufacturers, 987 (later 951) Broadway, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa early 1940s.
“I started as a floor girl. I graduated from twenty-five cents to fifty-cents an hour.”
Cherry & Webb Company, ladies’ and misses’ ready-to-wear clothing, 139 – 149 South Main Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa 1940s.
“My mother always traded, the girls always got their clothes in Cherry & Webb. That was ‘the’ store … you wouldn’t go anywhere else.”
A group of Ruth’s co-workers from Joseph Chromow Company, underwear and sportswear manufacturers, 987 (later 951) Broadway, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa early 1940s.
“That was when I got out of high school. I went to work in a sewing factory.”
Ruth’s wedding announcement from the Fall River Herald News, May 3, 1947.
“The bride wore a candlelight ivory satin gown ....”
A postcard depicting Luke’s Lodge, Stafford Road, Tiverton, Rhode Island; Ruth’s wedding reception was held at this establishment.
“I got married on May 3, 1947.”
A photograph taken during Ruth’s wedding reception, held at Luke’s Lodge, Stafford Road, Tiverton, Rhode Island; the couple were married on May 3, 1947. Left to right: The groom’s sister, Mrs. Roland Vezina, née Irene Soucy; the groom; the bride; the bride’s brother, Albin “Albert” Stasiowski.
“When I was getting married, Nelson [Reed] Cherry was the one. When I got my gown … when I was trying on gowns, he was right there. They had a veil there, a long, long veil that was going to be in one of the trade shows, and [he] said, ‘No, that’s for Ruth. That’s for her, for her gown.’”
Truesdale Hospital Inc., 1820 Highland Avenue, Fall River.
“I stayed in the hospital three weeks. Now they do it in a day and you’re out.”
Front cover illustration from the International Ladies Garment Workers’ Union Home Town Union booklet, 1948; this publication was distributed to workers “in Fall River and vicinity.”
“And the union – I wouldn’t give you ten cents for the union. I am not a union person. I never was, and I never would [be].”
Back cover illustration from the International Ladies Garment Workers’ Union Home Town Union booklet, 1948; this publication was distributed to workers “in Fall River and vicinity.”
“They did absolutely nothing for these girls except take their dues every week.”
The Wampanoag Mill, 420 Quequechan Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa early twentieth century; Ruth was employed in this building in the 1950s, when it housed Joseph Chromow Company, underwear and sportswear manufacturers.
“And then I finally had my own little, little department where they used to put the buttons on and sew, and they examined the garment, they folded it, and it was shipped out.”
The Narragansett Mills, 1567 North Main Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa early twentieth century; Ruth retired in 1971 from Linjay Manufacturing Corporation, which was located in this building.
“And that’s where I ended it; at fifty, I quit. They can have it.”
The Ukrainian National Home restaurant, affectionately called ‘The Uke,’ 482 Globe Street, Fall River, Massachusetts, circa 1970s; the building was originally constructed as the offices of the Laurel Lake Mill. Ruth’s first factory job, as a ‘floor girl,” was at Joseph Chromow Company, underwear and sportswear manufacturers, located around the corner on Broadway, in the former Laurel Lake Mill.
“Oh, the Uke Club? Oh, the food.”
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