How The West Was Once Rob Smith A history of a history of west Olympia Music in this episode: Frog In The Well by Lucas Gonze used with Creative Commons license Paper Crowns by Ditrani Brothers used with permission. Sleep by Ronny Tana courtesy of 2060 records Swing Gitan by Ditrani Brothers used with permission. Feathersoft by Blue Dot sessions The following is a full transcript of this episode: Rob Smith: One thing I know about the last name Smith, is that it makes you hard to find. I've always seen this as a benefit, but now I'm trying to find a random Smith. Larry Smith. I've been thinking about this guy for several months now. Ever since I learned he helped write a book that's long been out of print. I found a copy of this book on eBay, bought it for $25. It's called How the West Was once a history of West Olympia. On phone: Hey, my name is Rob Smith, and I'm calling for a Larry Smith who used to be a English teacher in Olympia at Jefferson junior high school. And I have no idea if this is the right Larry Smith, but he wrote a book called With some students and I wanted to talk to him about that book that he wrote. So, if that's you, Larry, if you're the Larry Smith.. Rob: Here's what I know. Larry Smith was an English teacher at Jefferson Middle School in West Olympia. In 1974, his last year teaching at that school, he assigned his eighth graders a collective writing project. How the West Was Once is the product of that assignment. On the phone: Hey, my name is Rob Smith. I'm calling for a Larry.. Rob: The book is small. I'm holding it here it's about eight by five, and just under 100 pages, black and white. My copy has this blue binding material holding it together. The cover's yellowing and only slightly thicker than the books pages. It's clear it was made on a budget. And yet it's well done. Those hundred pages are full of accounts of life on Olympia's West Side, from the mid 19th to mid 20th century. It's not definitive by any means. Some of the stories read a little like legends, and there's a few cringy passages. But the book adds real personal color to the history of West Olympia, a place I learned, once known as Marshville. Ever since I got my hands on this book, I've been thinking about the people who wrote it. I wanted to talk to them. What sort of teacher takes on a project like this? A lot of what I like to do with my audio work is record stories of older people. I see it kind of like time traveling, or preservation at least, it struck me that that's exactly what this project was doing. 45 years ago, in book form. I pay for this service that I use to look people up. It's kind of amazing. You can get phone numbers, addresses, email addresses. The problem is there's a lot of false positives, old numbers, dormant email addresses. Most of the time, you're just reaching out to the wrong person all together. So I went to Jefferson Middle School, the place where this book was written over 45 years. ago, I talked to the principal. He'd never heard of the book. The one who worked there the longest, a woman at the front desk, said she must have just missed Larry Smith. She started in the late 70s. I was told to go see the librarian. She knew the book, had a personal copy herself, but didn't know what had happened to the teacher who orchestrated it. I called the district offices, talk to someone in archives. They had nothing. So I decided to go back to the book, knowing i'd have better luck finding one of the couple dozen students listed in the credits. The first page is a list of names. And at the top of the alphabetized list is Rick Aarts. AARTS. I looked him up, called him, left a message. He called me right back! Rick was great. We talked a while about the book. and what he remembered about his teacher. He said Smith left an impression Only had good things to say about him. I asked him if he knew what had happened to Mr. Smith. Rick remembered something about California. Maybe he moved there for health reasons. He couldn't remember. Rick didn't want to talk on tape, said he'd be a lousy interview. I disagreed. But he gave me another name. So I stopped bugging him. Ray Houser just turned 60 he was one of the eighth graders that put together How the West Was Once Ray Houser: I lived on Decatur Street, which was probably a block and a half from the elementary school, and maybe 8-10 blocks to the junior high. Walked to school pretty much my whole life - typically with my buddy Bruce and Rick and, you know, we built these and developed these relationships and it was back in an era where you could ride your bike anywhere you wanted and you coiuld stay out late at night and we'd go to the park and... It was a little Mayberry. Rob: Bella biagio was also a student of Larry Smith. Bella Biagio: I was considered basically, maybe the class clown. Just because I am who I am and I continued. (laughing) I just you know, I'm, you know constantly.. things make me laugh and everything's comedic to me. So sometimes that got me in trouble. Rob: Ray and Bella both remember Larry Smith as an exceptional teacher. Bella, who as an adult would be diagnosed with ADD found relief in his class. Bella: He was one of the people... if anybody, you know, you didn't think you were done. He... you know what I mean? I f you had that in your mind, that was completely eliminated when you were in his class. Ray: What was unique about Larry was, he was a younger teacher back then, and I was a younger student back then - and he really took a genuine interest in his students and knew something about his students and And genuinely cared about his his kids. Rob: I interviewed Ray and Bella separately on separate days, Bella: Even though I am who I am, and I have this personality and everything. I also am very insular and somewhat shy, Rob: But they both landed on the same word to sum up their eighth grade English teacher 45 years later. Bella: But he just, yo
