Legacies Project Oral History: Victoria Loomis

Thu, 01/16/2020 - 9:23am

When: 2020

Victoria Suane Milton was born in 1933 and grew up in River Rouge, Michigan. Her mother was of French creole background from New Orleans. In 1938 her father, Samuel B. Milton, founded one of Michigan’s first Black-owned hospitals, Sidney A. Sumby Memorial Hospital. He was also the first Black Wayne County coroner. After getting her BA in social work from the University of Michigan in the 1950s, Victoria returned to work at Sumby Memorial Hospital in purchasing and housekeeping. She and her husband John Loomis had six children, including a set of triplets. She passed away in 2021.

Victoria Loomis was interviewed in partnership with the Museum of African American History of Detroit and Y Arts Detroit in 2009-2010 as part of the Legacies Project.

Transcript

[00:00:09.87] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Yeah, that'd be great.
[00:00:11.35] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: So here we go. Say your name, hon.
[00:00:14.21] KAT THURMAN: I'm Kat Thurman.
[00:00:15.55] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: I'm Margaret Edwartowski.
[00:00:17.35] TOMMY DIEHL: My name is Tommy Diehl.
[00:00:18.66] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: And you two say your age. Go ahead.
[00:00:21.57] KAT THURMAN: I'm 14 going on 15.
[00:00:23.77] TOMMY DIEHL: 15.
[00:00:24.97] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: All right. Then we'll get started in just a minute.
[00:00:26.83] KAT THURMAN: OK.
[00:00:29.10] VICTORIA LOOMIS: So Tom, Margaret--
[00:00:31.23] KAT THURMAN: Kat
[00:00:31.65] VICTORIA LOOMIS: --and Kat.
[00:00:32.62] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Mm-hmm. You know when to start, Tommy.
[00:00:34.05] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK.
[00:00:38.64] TOMMY DIEHL: This is an interview for The Legacies Project, for which students gather oral histories and put them into an archive for future generations.
[00:00:51.11] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Did you read the [INAUDIBLE]?
[00:00:54.46] TOMMY DIEHL: Announced-- you can--
[00:00:56.94] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: It's time to turn off your phones.
[00:01:00.53] TOMMY DIEHL: It's time to turn off or to silence cellphone, pagers, or anything else that beeps, chimes, or make noise.
[00:01:07.82] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Do you have a phone on you?
[00:01:09.59] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I might have one in my purse. You know, I don't, because I charged it, and I left it at home. [LAUGHS] So that takes care of that. No.
[00:01:17.21] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Then the second part.
[00:01:19.19] TOMMY DIEHL: You can call for a break at any time that you want one. Also, please remember that you can decline to answer any question, or end the interview at any time for any reason.
[00:01:32.04] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Thank you.
[00:01:36.43] TOMMY DIEHL: I am first going to ask you some simple demographic questions. These questions may jog memories, but please keep your answers brief and to the point for now. We can go into more detail later in the interview. Please say and spell your name.
[00:01:55.16] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Victoria Suane Loomis-- V-I-C-T-O-R-I-A. Suane-- S-U-A-N-E. My maiden name, Milton-- M-I-L-T-O-N. My married name, Loomis-- L-O-O-M-I-S. That's my full name-- Victoria Suane Milton Loomis.
[00:02:12.15] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: [INAUDIBLE]
[00:02:14.11] TOMMY DIEHL: What is your birth date, including the year?
[00:02:17.65] VICTORIA LOOMIS: November 29, 1933.
[00:02:20.87] TOMMY DIEHL: How old are you?
[00:02:23.34] VICTORIA LOOMIS: 76.
[00:02:26.81] TOMMY DIEHL: How would you describe your ethnic background?
[00:02:31.07] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I'm black. My mother was from New Orleans. She was French creole. My dad was from Washington DC.
[00:02:45.14] TOMMY DIEHL: What is your religion, if any?
[00:02:48.77] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I was Christian and Catholic. But generally, I go to Renaissance Unity Church.
[00:02:57.17] TOMMY DIEHL: What is the highest level of formal education you have completed?
[00:03:02.54] VICTORIA LOOMIS: University of Michigan college degree-- bachelor of arts.
[00:03:06.15] TOMMY DIEHL: Did you attend any additional school or formal career training beyond that?
[00:03:13.01] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Currently, I'm at Wayne County Community College taking art classes.
[00:03:19.15] TOMMY DIEHL: What is your marital status?
[00:03:21.37] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I'm a widow.
[00:03:23.95] TOMMY DIEHL: How many children do you have?
[00:03:25.99] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Six.
[00:03:28.51] TOMMY DIEHL: What was your primary occupation?
[00:03:33.41] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Social work was my occupation. I also was a travel agent and a hospital buyer.
[00:03:41.26] TOMMY DIEHL: At what age did you retire from working?
[00:03:46.13] VICTORIA LOOMIS: About 67, 68.
[00:03:54.38] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: I think you skipped the siblings question.
[00:03:59.88] TOMMY DIEHL: How many siblings do you have?
[00:04:03.20] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I had one brother, but he's not living.
[00:04:12.55] TOMMY DIEHL: Now we can begin the first part of our interview, beginning with some of the things you can recall about your family history. We will start with family naming history. By this, we mean any story about your last or family name, or family traditions in choosing first or middle names. Do you know any stories about your family name?
[00:04:38.99] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, yes. My grandmother, or my mother's mother-- her name was Victoria. Her last name was Suane. It was a family name. When she married my grandfather, it became Victoria Suane Porche. My mother named me after her grandmother. So actually, my middle name, Victoria Suane, is a family name. My mother married Samuel Milton-- Dr. Samuel Milton-- and that became my maiden name.
[00:05:11.58] TOMMY DIEHL: Cool. Are there any naming traditions in your family?
[00:05:16.25] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Yes, everybody's named after everybody else in the family. I have a daughter Suane. I have a niece Suane. I have a granddaughter Suane. And everyone in my family-- they always name everyone after someone in the family.
[00:05:32.06] TOMMY DIEHL: That's nice.
[00:05:33.36] VICTORIA LOOMIS: It's fun.
[00:05:35.48] TOMMY DIEHL: Why did your ancestors leave to come to the United States?
[00:05:41.15] VICTORIA LOOMIS: They were born in the United States.
[00:05:42.79] TOMMY DIEHL: OK.
[00:05:48.06] VICTORIA LOOMIS: My mother-- I said that before-- was born in New Orleans, my dad in Washington DC.
[00:05:57.73] TOMMY DIEHL: What stories have come down to you about your parents and grandparents?
[00:06:04.58] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, let me think. Do you want me to go in detail about my family history, or just family stories?
[00:06:17.17] TOMMY DIEHL: Some important stories.
[00:06:18.32] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, actually, my father's family, being born in Washington DC-- they were released as slaves from Baltimore. And I did remember meeting a great, great aunt years ago when I was just a little kid. And she had been, at one time, a slave and released in Baltimore. I do know that.
[00:06:41.84] My grandmother used to work for the US Mint in Washington DC. She used to make money. I thought that was exciting. She made money. I don't know how they do that now, if they have the individual people running the machines. They probably do, but I'm not sure.
[00:06:57.83] And my grandfather was an art teacher. And he also used to work on the B&O Railroad. I don't think it exists anymore-- Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. It used to go between Ohio and Baltimore, Maryland. He used to work as a chef on the railroad in the summertime. And then he taught school, of course, in the winter.
[00:07:21.04] TOMMY DIEHL: Any more distant ancestors?
[00:07:23.90] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, my mother's from New Orleans. French creole-- the French came into New Orleans many, many years ago, and intermarried and intermingled with black people. And that's how they created-- well, it's like-- what would you call it? They became-- they called them creoles. They're mixed half black, half French-- usually a little Spanish. And they're just called creoles. It's-- I don't know what you-- well, they're black, but they just call themselves French creoles.
[00:08:00.08] TOMMY DIEHL: Any special events you guys celebrated, such as Mardi Gras?
[00:08:04.61] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Mardi Gras always, in New Orleans. I have a picture of myself as a little girl, about five years old, in my Mardi Gras costume. And they're very proud of being creoles and proud of being from New Orleans. And they're great cooks, and they like to have a lot of fun. And they speak French. My mother spoke French before she ever spoke English. She didn't learn English until she went to school, and they would make the kids speak English in the classrooms. So she spoke French all her life fluently.
[00:08:41.13] TOMMY DIEHL: That's nice. Do you know any courtship stories?
[00:08:49.31] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Not really. I just remember my mother always talking about how she met my dad, who was at medical school at Northwestern University in Chicago. And she met him there in the Alpha house. And she was always very proud of that. And she was at a junior college in Chicago at that time.
[00:09:08.72] My dad went to Brown University on a scholarship. Now, this was in the, what, 20s, which was almost unheard of, to go to Brown University. His brother also went there. And then to go to Northwestern University was also quite unusual. He was very brilliant. He was a philosopher. And then he went on to, of course, become a medical doctor and surgeon.
[00:09:37.45] TOMMY DIEHL: How did your grandparents or other relatives come to meet and marry?
[00:09:42.89] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Pardon?
[00:09:43.37] TOMMY DIEHL: How did your grandparents and other relatives come to meet and marry?
[00:09:48.59] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Come to meet and marry? Well, my mother's sister-- well, my mother's family migrated from New Orleans to Chicago looking for work. Her father was a barrel maker. At that time, they made all the barrels by hand. And he was a barrel maker. And they moved to Chicago when she was a teenager. And of course, that's how she met my dad in Chicago. And what was the second part of that question?
[00:10:20.57] TOMMY DIEHL: And any other relatives come to meet and marry?
[00:10:22.94] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK. Well, when my mother left Chicago, all her brothers and sisters followed her to Detroit. And so her sister followed her to Detroit and met a physician and married him-- a friend of my father's. And her whole family followed her and came to Detroit.
[00:10:49.40] And I think-- who else met someone here in Detroit? I think my uncle Roland met my aunt Karen here. And those are the only stories I really know. I do know that my father's sister from Washington married a doctor, and they both moved here and went up to Flint. And he practiced medicine there until he passed.
[00:11:21.13] TOMMY DIEHL: This summer camp at the YMCA was made possible, in part, by [INAUDIBLE] from-- it was made possible, in part, by a grant from a foundation that is interested in people's relationship to natural bodies of water, such as oceans, lakes, rivers, and streams.
[00:11:42.80] So throughout our interview, I will be asking you some questions about how you have interacted with water in each stage of your life. Since, right now, we are talking about your family history, I will ask you about what you know about how any of your family or ancestors related to the water.
[00:12:02.15] VICTORIA LOOMIS: That's an interesting question. Well, my father's family, being from Washington DC-- they had a summer home at Highland Beach, Maryland, which is very near Annapolis, Maryland Arundel Bay. West Point is there in Annapolis. And they had a family home in Highland Beach. And so every summer, we went to Highland Beach for the summer-- every summer without fail.
[00:12:30.53] And it was on the Chesapeake Bay, which, of course, is famous for shrimp, oysters, and, mainly, the Maryland crabs. And I would crab and fish, and we had a boat, and the house was on the lake. And so I loved the water. I enjoyed that experience quite a bit, and I'd love to have a summer home on the water.
[00:12:52.43] TOMMY DIEHL: Did anyone in your family make a living working on the water?
[00:12:57.38] VICTORIA LOOMIS: No, I can't say that they really did. No, not that I recall.
[00:13:03.11] TOMMY DIEHL: Did anyone in your family history have stories involving water that were handed down to you?
[00:13:10.02] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Not really, only crabbing a lot. And when we were down in Highland Beach, Maryland, we would go to Baltimore, and they would sell crabs by the barrels. And we would bring them home. And you try to put them in the water to boil them to cook them, and they'd jump out of the pots and run all over the house. And we had a lot of fun chasing crabs all over the house.
[00:13:30.94] TOMMY DIEHL: [INAUDIBLE].
[00:13:31.94] VICTORIA LOOMIS: It was a lot of fun.
[00:13:33.85] TOMMY DIEHL: All right. Well, that completes this section of questions about your family history. Thank you.
[00:13:40.07] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK.
[00:13:44.38] TOMMY DIEHL: This next part of the interview is about your childhood up until you began attending school. Even if these questions jog memories about other times in your life, please only respond with memories from this earliest part of your life.
[00:14:01.01] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Before school?
[00:14:02.34] TOMMY DIEHL: Yeah. Before school and leading up to school.
[00:14:06.44] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK, grade school.
[00:14:07.83] TOMMY DIEHL: Yes.
[00:14:08.23] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Mm-hmm.
[00:14:08.63] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK. Well--
[00:14:10.20] TOMMY DIEHL: Hold on.
[00:14:11.52] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK.
[00:14:13.22] TOMMY DIEHL: Here's the questions now. Where did you grow up, and what are your strongest memories of that place?
[00:14:21.32] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I grew up in River Rouge, Michigan. My dad was a physician and surgeon. And originally, when they married, they went to Kalamazoo, Michigan. And my dad practiced medicine there for about a year. His father came up to visit him from Washington DC, and found him, of course, in Kalamazoo, practicing medicine mainly with white clientele. And he said, you should be helping your own people who need medical help.
[00:14:54.45] And so they migrated to River Rouge, Michigan, which was a small, black, very poor community. And he built a little office. And we used to live upstairs over the office in River Rouge on Visger Road. He eventually put in four hospital beds, expanded the building on the ground floor. Because in those days, it was very difficult for the black physicians to be able to hospitalize patients.
[00:15:26.76] And I think, at Wyandotte General Hospital, they gave him one room that had four beds in it, or six, or eight-- however many-- like a ward. They don't have them today. But years ago, they would have hospital wards that would have six, eight, 10 beds. And that was the only place he could go to hospitalize his patients.
[00:15:46.67] And so he started building a small hospital. And I think he had four beds, as I said before. And we lived upstairs. That's a really strong memory. And I was also born there, upstairs over this hospital in River Rouge, Michigan. I remember that a lot.
[00:16:10.10] TOMMY DIEHL: What was the upper level of your house like-- home?
[00:16:16.04] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Really hard to remember. I assume it was apartment-like, because, as I said, it was over a clinic and an office. So it was probably small, like living in an apartment. It was an apartment. My mother used to cook all the food for the patients. It eventually expanded and became a 90-bed hospital. And they built a new hospital and everything over the years.
[00:16:44.41] TOMMY DIEHL: That's good. How many people lived in the house with you when you were growing up, and what was their relationship to you?
[00:16:52.14] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, as I was growing up, as a youngster, just my mom and dad, my brother. As I got older, my mother's father came to live with us-- but not over the hospital. That was years later.
[00:17:08.21] TOMMY DIEHL: What languages were spoken in or around your household?
[00:17:12.14] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Mainly English, and my mother would speak some French to me.
[00:17:22.04] TOMMY DIEHL: What different languages were spoken in different settings in the neighborhood or local stores?
[00:17:29.45] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Just English.
[00:17:34.07] TOMMY DIEHL: What was your family like when you were a child?
[00:17:39.11] VICTORIA LOOMIS: What was my family like? Well, hm. How can I answer that? Just a nice, loving family. We had lots of fun, and just like any family-- nothing unusual that I can recall, except, of course, living in the hospital. My dad was very involved with the community. And patients would pay him with guns, and knives, and chickens, and duck. And we had all kinds of animals and creatures everywhere-- a yard full of chickens, and so forth, and so on.
[00:18:20.60] TOMMY DIEHL: What sort of work did your mother do?
[00:18:24.03] VICTORIA LOOMIS: My mother-- she really didn't work, except to help with the hospital-- help my dad. As I said, she did all the cooking for many years there as it grew, until it got really large. Then they started to hire employees, and so forth, and so on.
[00:18:38.87] KAT THURMAN: Did you ever help out in the hospital?
[00:18:41.99] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, my dad would let me come sometimes and watch the surgery. I'd have to put on gowns and everything. This was when I was a teenager. Then I could come and watch people have babies and things like that. I didn't really help until I got older. But as a child, sometimes I could observe, which was a lot of fun.
[00:19:03.72] TOMMY DIEHL: What is your earliest memory?
[00:19:08.72] VICTORIA LOOMIS: In the hospital, or just as a child?
[00:19:11.92] TOMMY DIEHL: Earliest one, yes.
[00:19:14.45] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Wow, that's a really hard question. I can't say what my earliest memory was.
[00:19:22.77] TOMMY DIEHL: You said moving into the hospital and--
[00:19:26.57] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK.
[00:19:27.05] TOMMY DIEHL: Any before that?
[00:19:30.14] VICTORIA LOOMIS: One of my memories was, of course, when-- we moved three or four times. When we lived on Holford Street, as I said, I remember my dad brought home these ducks one day that a patient had paid him with. And I remember them being all over the basement running around.
[00:19:46.97] And I remember, once, they bought us a Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs-- a little-- they looked like real little people. They were little things that stood up this tall-- little statues. And they were all the different little people in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. And I really remember those quite vividly, for some reason, because they were probably as big as I was.
[00:20:09.57] TOMMY DIEHL: Yep. Hm. And by statues, you mean, like, ornaments?
[00:20:17.98] VICTORIA LOOMIS: They stood on the ground.
[00:20:19.56] TOMMY DIEHL: They stood on--
[00:20:20.01] VICTORIA LOOMIS: You'd have them in the backyard.
[00:20:21.29] TOMMY DIEHL: Oh, OK.
[00:20:22.05] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Yeah. I remember getting burned once. My mother had put a pot of coffee high where I couldn't reach it. It was an electric percolator. And of course, I grabbed the cord, trying to make a swing. And it poured the coffee all over my back. And I remember my dad treating me every day. When I went to school, I'd have to come walk to the hospital, and he would treat my back. And of course, it's nice and smooth, and you don't even see a scar today.
[00:20:53.45] TOMMY DIEHL: Good. What was a typical day like for you in your preschool years?
[00:21:02.58] VICTORIA LOOMIS: My preschool years-- I can't really remember, but I always remember being a happy child and having a good time. I remember our parents took us almost everywhere they went in those days, probably more-- I don't know if people do that today, too-- take their children. I remember doing a lot of things with my parents. And so I was used to being around older people and was very comfortable with them. And we just thought they were just somebody else. Everybody was your aunt in those days.
[00:21:39.52] TOMMY DIEHL: What did you do for fun back then?
[00:21:44.13] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Jump rope all the time. We didn't have TV until I was a teenager. So we would listen to the radio. And our parents and my dad's brother also eventually moved to-- he started a medical practice in Inkster. We'd go there every Saturday or Sunday, and they'd cut out all the lights.
[00:22:07.19] And they had a lot of scary shows on the radio then, like the Inner Sanctum and-- oh, I forget. A lot of scary movies. And he'd cut out all the lights-- shows, not movies-- radio-- and make us sit and listen to all these stories in the dark, and we'd be so scared. I remember that very vividly. But there was no television.
[00:22:28.65] TOMMY DIEHL: Did you have a favorite toy?
[00:22:32.72] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I really can't remember a favorite toy.
[00:22:36.40] TOMMY DIEHL: A favorite book, or books?
[00:22:41.12] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I loved Little Women. I don't know why I loved that book so much, but I just absolutely loved it. I must have read it over and over again. Whenever the movie comes on television, I have to watch it again. I still love that story.
[00:22:55.03] TOMMY DIEHL: Where did you get the book Little Women?
[00:22:58.49] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I don't know. I guess my mother must have bought it for me.
[00:23:02.07] TOMMY DIEHL: Any other entertainment?
[00:23:04.73] VICTORIA LOOMIS: All we had was the radio, and ourselves-- each other-- and friends, jumping rope in the front yard, on the street. And you'd play hopscotch, and use chalk, and make all kinds of little games on the sidewalk. That was big fun.
[00:23:21.79] TOMMY DIEHL: OK.
[00:23:23.64] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I remember watching my grandfather kill the chickens.
[00:23:26.86] TOMMY DIEHL: That was fun?
[00:23:27.79] VICTORIA LOOMIS: It was fun. I guess it must have been fun, because I remember it. Because he would take the chickens, and they'd swing them around and swing them around until they'd break their neck in a circle. And then the chickens-- then they would chop the chicken's head off. But the chicken would keep running around and running around for the longest time with no head. Try it sometime. Or go somewhere with someone who has some chickens in the backyard. You'll see I'm telling you the truth.
[00:23:51.85] TOMMY DIEHL: Well, my friend made a chicken drink soda once.
[00:23:54.84] VICTORIA LOOMIS: A chicken drink soda?
[00:23:56.48] TOMMY DIEHL: Yeah. They can't burp.
[00:23:58.58] VICTORIA LOOMIS: They burped?
[00:23:59.27] TOMMY DIEHL: They can't.
[00:23:59.93] VICTORIA LOOMIS: They cannot?
[00:24:00.80] TOMMY DIEHL: Yeah.
[00:24:01.84] VICTORIA LOOMIS: You're kidding.
[00:24:02.98] TOMMY DIEHL: They explode.
[00:24:04.76] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh, you're kidding.
[00:24:06.05] TOMMY DIEHL: I'm not. My friend told me about it [INAUDIBLE].
[00:24:09.62] VICTORIA LOOMIS: They explode from the soda?
[00:24:10.97] TOMMY DIEHL: Yes.
[00:24:11.44] VICTORIA LOOMIS: From the fizz.
[00:24:12.28] TOMMY DIEHL: Because they can't-- yeah.
[00:24:13.88] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Really? That's funny.
[00:24:15.65] TOMMY DIEHL: No. Were there any special days, events, or family traditions you remember from your early childhood years?
[00:24:26.60] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, we've always had a large family-- lots of cousins, lots of nieces and nephews. And we always had a lot of big family dinners, especially on the holidays. Those are the only traditions I really remember. My mother liked to cook, and she was a good cook. And every Christmas and Thanksgiving, everybody would come to her house for years and years and years-- come to our house, because she had a big home, eventually. And that's where everyone would gather.
[00:24:59.51] That's about the only real tradition I remember, and, of course, naming everybody after everybody else. One of my children is named after my mother's sister. One's named after my husband's mother. One was named after an uncle, and one, of course, after my dad. And we just named everybody after everybody else. That was probably our biggest tradition.
[00:25:24.59] KAT THURMAN: What was your favorite dish that your mom made?
[00:25:27.77] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh, my goodness. That's a really tough question. What was my favorite dish? I was a real picky, finicky eater as a little kid. And I can't really remember. Of course, I loved her apple pie. She made a wonderful apple pie. And I can make that pie. And whenever I make it for anyone, they just rant and rave about this pie, and it's always the best one they've ever had. So I guess apple pie.
[00:26:00.01] TOMMY DIEHL: Now I'm going to ask you questions about your relationship with natural bodies of water during your earliest childhood years. Now, what is your earliest memory of a body of water, such as ocean, or lake, or river?
[00:26:16.91] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, of course, I remember Chesapeake Bay outside of Highland Beach in Baltimore, Maryland, where we went every summer. Then I have an aunt-- one of my father's sisters bought a home in Atlantic City. So we'd get to go to Atlantic City. And I really remember that very vividly. I was on the boardwalk when the war ended-- World War II-- and that was great, great fun.
[00:26:43.13] And of course, the Pacific Ocean-- or is it the Atlantic? I'm sorry, the Atlantic Ocean is where Atlantic City is. So I remember the Atlantic Ocean and Chesapeake Bay. And of course, the Great Lakes in the state of Michigan-- I remember those vividly. And also, Canada has a lot of lakes in it, too. Some of the Great Lakes are in Canada, too. So--
[00:27:09.47] TOMMY DIEHL: Did your family engage in activities involving water when you were a young child?
[00:27:15.32] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, again, just the fishing and the crabbing. And we had a big speedboat when I was a youngster down at Highland Beach, and a rowboat. And I used to row and drop a little string down in the water. And you have to hold the string really slow, and then a crab will come and bite that little piece of meat. Then you have to slowly pull it up really slow. And then you scoop a net up under him, and you grab him. I remember that very vividly.
[00:27:50.05] TOMMY DIEHL: Do you associate any feelings with water from this time in your life?
[00:27:54.62] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I think so. I really like the water a lot. And I learned how to swim down there. I used to love to swim a lot. And I've never been afraid of the water, ever, because of that experience-- being around it all the time. And I probably liked that better than living in Detroit. I loved being down there on the water.
[00:28:17.62] TOMMY DIEHL: Mm-hmm. The water's nice.
[00:28:19.54] VICTORIA LOOMIS: And I loved Atlantic City. You had the boardwalk. And I don't know if you've ever been there, but it's just a great place to go. It's a famous boardwalk that you go all along the whole Atlantic Ocean. For miles and miles, you can walk it.
[00:28:36.34] TOMMY DIEHL: I'll have to try that.
[00:28:37.78] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Yeah, you do.
[00:28:39.16] TOMMY DIEHL: Well, that completes the section of questions about your early childhood. Thanks.
[00:28:45.62] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK, you're welcome.
[00:28:50.08] TOMMY DIEHL: Now, in this part of the interview, we'll talk about your time as a young person from about the age that kids usually start school in the United States up until you began your professional career or work life. Did you go to preschool? [INAUDIBLE].
[00:29:09.27] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I don't think they even had preschool years ago, so I'm going to say no.
[00:29:14.51] TOMMY DIEHL: Did you go to kindergarten?
[00:29:16.02] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Yeah, I think they had kindergarten.
[00:29:18.81] TOMMY DIEHL: Where?
[00:29:20.61] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I went to kindergarten in River Rouge, Michigan. I think it was River Rouge Elementary School.
[00:29:26.30] TOMMY DIEHL: What do you remember about ti?
[00:29:28.65] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I don't remember a lot about it, really, except one thing I do remember about-- well, this would be elementary school, not kindergarten. And elementary school was that the teachers had great, big, wooden paddles that they kept on their desks. They really did. And they could really paddle you.
[00:29:46.23] They can't do that today. But years ago, the teachers would keep big, wooden paddles just like you'd see if you were-- Alpha or an AKA. You have to make all those wooden paddles, and you engrave them and everything. The teachers kept them on their desks, and they would use them if you got out of line or were really bad. They were paddle you with those paddles. That, I really remember.
[00:30:13.06] TOMMY DIEHL: Anything else you remember about elementary school?
[00:30:19.62] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I remember when I went to high school-- or maybe even part of my elementary-- I went to a Catholic school. I really remember the nuns in the long, blue outfits, and their white hoods, and their blue uniforms very vividly. We were scared of the nuns. I don't know why we were scared. We were really scared. They were very intimidating--
[00:30:42.12] TOMMY DIEHL: I'm sure.
[00:30:43.12] VICTORIA LOOMIS: --just to look at them.
[00:30:46.80] TOMMY DIEHL: Did you go to high school?
[00:30:49.05] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I went to a Catholic high school for two years. Then my last two years, my mom and dad sent me away to a private school in Ashburnham, Massachusetts. It was Cushing Academy. It was a co-ed school. My brother went to Williston, which was an all-boys school. So I went away to school for my last two years.
[00:31:10.83] That was the thing to do at that time with their group of friends. You sent your kids to preparatory school, they called it-- getting prepared to go to college. And they still have them. And I imagine a lot of people still send their children to preparatory schools. It kind of gets you out of the neighborhood and makes sure you don't get bad influences from other kids, or get involved in drugs. It kind of keeps you safe. So it wasn't a bad thing at all. It was a good thing.
[00:31:41.57] TOMMY DIEHL: What type of things do you remember about it?
[00:31:44.52] VICTORIA LOOMIS: About being away in high school?
[00:31:47.91] TOMMY DIEHL: Yes, either one.
[00:31:50.19] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I didn't like being away. It was OK, but I would rather have been home. And, well, it's a good education. I remember this school-- Cushing Academy-- was a predominantly all-white school. They had exactly two black girls and two black boys in the whole school. [CHUCKLES]
[00:32:13.06] And of course, another young lady was my roommate. I remember her name was Annie Laurie, and I always remembered that name because of the song "Annie Laurie." And she was a small girl. Her father, at that time, was the president of-- is it A&M College in Florida? Right. Her father was the president of that college. I remember her very well. But I never saw her again after that experience. So I don't know what happened to her.
[00:32:45.39] KAT THURMAN: Were you friends when you were roommates?
[00:32:47.61] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh, sure. You have to be friends with your roommate. Sure, we were good friends. It's just that they were from Florida. She was in Florida, and I was in Detroit, Michigan. And way back then, you couldn't travel a lot. At least, black people didn't travel a lot, because you couldn't stay in hotels hardly anywhere in the country. And when they traveled, they would have made contact with somebody's friend, and they always stayed at someone's home all along the way.
[00:33:18.76] And they didn't have money to fly. They drove. Most of our trips, as I recall, were all driving trips, except you could take the train. Once in a while, we took the train to Washington DC. But most of the time, you drove, and you stayed with friends or connections along the way. That, I remember.
[00:33:44.61] TOMMY DIEHL: Did you go to school or career training beyond high school?
[00:33:49.11] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I went to college-- the University of Michigan. When I graduated from Cushing Academy, I wanted to come back home-- be close to home. So that's why I chose to come back to Michigan to go to college. So I could drive home, or take the bus, or take the train from Ann Arbor to Detroit.
[00:34:06.87] TOMMY DIEHL: Yep.
[00:34:08.54] VICTORIA LOOMIS: And I loved the University of Michigan. It was great, great fun.
[00:34:12.27] TOMMY DIEHL: What do you remember about it from your time there?
[00:34:15.99] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, the year I went was the first year they ever allowed black women in the dormitories. Prior to that, they had a house for the women where they would stay. I can't think of the name of that house, but they had a house up on the hill near the hospital. I can't remember the name of that house where they housed all the black women-- a big house, because, probably, there weren't that many there.
[00:34:41.13] And the dorms opened up to black women the first year I was there, and I stayed at Alice Lloyd dormitory. And it was the first time I'd ever really been free, because I was at Cushing Academy. So I just had a really great time and made a lot of lifetime friends there. And it was very prejudiced at that time-- Ann Arbor was-- and Michigan, really.
[00:35:07.95] And the school would have all kinds of tests and stuff, and get couples to go to restaurants and see if we could go to beauty shops or barber shops, or certain restaurants-- trying to find out where you might have some problems with prejudice.
[00:35:25.86] And my husband-- prior to that, he was my boyfriend-- and I-- we'd go to restaurants and see if we could go in and eat and whatever. And sometimes you could, and sometimes you couldn't. And I do remember vividly you couldn't try on clothes anywhere in Ann Arbor and any of the stores. You could go in and buy things, but you could not try them on. Isn't that's something?
[00:35:49.35] TOMMY DIEHL: Yes, it is.
[00:35:50.79] VICTORIA LOOMIS: But it's true. You couldn't try on clothes in any of the stores in Ann Arbor. A lot of restaurants you couldn't go to. And some, you could. But of course, all those things have changed now. That's probably my most vivid memory. And we did make a lot of friends, black and white. My husband made a lot of Jewish friends, because all the guys in med school became his friends. And they were lifetime friends until he passed.
[00:36:16.34] KAT THURMAN: Did you pledge any sororities?
[00:36:18.96] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I did. I pledged the AKAs-- Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority. And my husband-- he pledged the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity. And of course, it's great fun when you're there. But once I left it, I never really participated a lot. Well, some people do all their lives, but I never did become really active after I left college.
[00:36:45.60] Although, I still acknowledge that I'm still an AKA. They had a convention in Detroit a few years ago, and I did go to that. And I still have a lot of friends who are AKAs. And every once in a while, we'll get together as AKAs, but not a lot. At least, I don't get together a lot.
[00:37:07.44] TOMMY DIEHL: Did you play any sports or join any other activities outside of school?
[00:37:12.42] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, when you were at Michigan, in those days, you had to take sports. That was part of your curriculum. You had to take, well, at least one sport activity a semester, or a couple in a year. I don't remember. I remember vividly taking field hockey, which I loved, because I played that at Cushing Academy. It's just like ice hockey, except you're on the ground running on the fields, trying to hit it.
[00:37:39.20] And I remember taking ice skating, because I couldn't ice skate, and I wanted to ice skate. And I took ice skating. And they have a huge ice skating rink in Ann Arbor for the college. And I remember that vividly. And I think I took swimming, too, because they had big pools. I remember taking swimming. You must have had to take one a year, I guess. I'm not sure. I don't think you have to do that anymore.
[00:38:09.20] TOMMY DIEHL: No. Not for me, at least. What about your school experience is different from school as you know it today?
[00:38:21.28] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Hm. I don't know if it's a lot-- well, the big difference in Ann Arbor that I know is, when I was there, I had one roommate, one room. We had a nice sized room-- very comfortable. And you had phones in your room. And they came and they cleaned your room once a week, and so forth and so on. And they provided a lot of nice perks for you.
[00:38:49.02] But today, my son, John, went to University of Michigan, too. Stayed in the same dorm I stayed in-- Alice Lloyd-- and he had four people in the room with him. They had gone from two to four. They doubled the sizes of-- I mean, the accommodations, because they have so many more students. And most of the rooms have four students in them, not two, as they were when I was in Michigan.
[00:39:14.67] Also, it's all co-ed. When I was there, dormitories were either male dormitories or female. Now, 90% of them are all co-educational-- co-ed dorms. And some of them have one floor boys, one floor girls. Some of them have same floor, boys and girls. So it's changed drastically.
[00:39:37.14] And when I was there, also, we had hours. We had to be in the dorm back every night by 10:00 PM-- on the weekends, maybe 11:30 or midnight. I'm sure there are no controls or no hours like that at all anymore. And if you were late, you had to not do penance, but you had penalties that-- where you had to stay in the dorm and couldn't go out for so many days, at night, or have to be in by 5:00 instead of 8:00, or midnight, or whatever it was.
[00:40:04.47] Because different nights of the week, as I remember, you had to be in at either 8:00, 10:00, or by midnight. And they'd punish you by not allowing you to stay out until 10:00, say, on the weekend if you had come in late on another evening. Of course, they don't have any control over students now. They can do whatever they want to do. But in those days, they had pretty tight control over what you did, which I think was really good. I got in a lot less trouble that way.
[00:40:38.18] TOMMY DIEHL: Yeah. Please describe the popular music during your school years.
[00:40:45.37] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Mm. I remember a lot of blues music and a lot of jazz-- more jazz, I guess, than blues. I'm going to say more jazz. And of course, rock and roll. No hip hop.
[00:41:02.82] TOMMY DIEHL: Did the music have any special dances associated with it?
[00:41:06.93] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, the twist was really popular. Or was it popular after school? I think that was more popular after I finished college. Oh, just the same old dances-- just the blues, dancing in the basement with the red lights on. And a lot of jitterbug at that time, and slow dancing, of course-- basically the same dances we have today, except now, they're more exaggerated. And you have hip hop, and you have rap today, which you didn't have before. But music just goes around and around, I think.
[00:41:46.02] TOMMY DIEHL: What were the popular clothing and hairstyles of this time?
[00:41:51.41] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh, hairstyles. I really don't think they've changed a lot-- hairstyles. The clothing was very-- has changed. But the hairstyles are all the same. There was a lot of teasing of the hair, and ballooned really high, high, high, and puffed up. And the clothing, of course, was very different.
[00:42:17.83] I remember mainly wearing a lot of poodle skirts-- the skirts with the big poodle dogs on them-- and things like that. The size of the clothing have changed. But I think the hair was a little stiffer, maybe. But now it's a little looser and softer. But then there was a lot of teasing and the hairspray-- puffed up hairdos.
[00:42:39.99] TOMMY DIEHL: OK. Well, we're going to wrap it up now, but is there any other small stuff you would like to-- important stuff you would like to say about high school or college?
[00:42:53.55] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, when I was at college, they had an Alpha house-- which, we were there all the time. The alpha's owned the house. And there were probably 100 black students at University of Michigan when I was there, so everybody knew everybody, of course. They would all meet at the Alpha house. And they had their own little group and network. And so you knew everyone on the campus.
[00:43:22.17] I enjoyed it a lot. I found it a lot of fun. I found the students-- all of them-- black and white-- pleasant and nice to be around. I made a lot of Jewish friends. I really don't remember a lot of them, except those that my husband knew-- the doctors he went to medical school with, because he would keep up with them. I didn't keep up with a lot of people except my small little black network. And most of those people, I still know today-- those that are living, which are probably most of them, still. A lot of them have passed, too.
[00:43:59.25] But I enjoyed it a lot. I had a lot of fun. I just loved University of Michigan. Never missed a football game, even though I didn't know what was going on on the football fields. But I just liked being there-- the crowds and just the excitement of being in Ann Arbor. The first time I ever had a hamburger was in Ann Arbor. There was a little place across the street from the dormitory, and my husband, John-- he was my boyfriend-- he took me over there to get a hamburger. I don't ever remember having a hamburger before.
[00:44:27.92] And they also had a pizza place, I remember, called Cottage Inn. They have some now in [INAUDIBLE]. I had never had a piece of pizza before. I didn't even know what it was. And of course, I thought these were the most wonderful creations in the world. And of course, I loved just being in Ann Arbor. It was just great, great fun.
[00:44:46.35] TOMMY DIEHL: OK. Well, thanks for answering our questions today. We appreciate it.
[00:44:51.63] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Thank you.
[00:44:52.80] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Yeah, we'll pick up where we left off.
[00:44:54.84] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK. All right. Thank you.
[00:44:57.20] KAT THURMAN: --yesterday?
[00:44:59.45] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, just a couple of the dances that we did-- they had crazy names. Like, you did the mashed potato, and you kind of mashed your feet around like a potato. And then you did the jerk, and you kind of jerked yourself around like they're jerking today. And those are two of the dances I remember.
[00:45:20.28] I remember everybody wore really, really wide skirts with the crinolines in them, and they were long-- about down to here. And they were really, really wide all the time. I remember those things. And they had a phrase called dancing on a dime, because everyone danced really close. You didn't dance like you do today-- way over here. You danced very close, unless you were doing the jitterbug. And they called it dancing on a dime. I remember that.
[00:45:45.90] KAT THURMAN: Any technology that [INAUDIBLE]?
[00:45:49.09] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh. Well, yeah, they didn't start TV until I was in high school. Before we had television--
[00:45:56.19] KAT THURMAN: Oh.
[00:45:57.05] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Lights went out. But they didn't go out in the room next door, did they?
[00:46:00.59] TOMMY DIEHL: [INAUDIBLE]
[00:46:01.96] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Huh?
[00:46:03.65] KAT THURMAN: Is there anything that you remembered after our interview yesterday?
[00:46:07.55] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I just remembered some of the dances. They all had crazy names. Like, you would do the mashed potato, and you'd mash like a potato. You'd do the chicken, and you'd do like this, like a chicken. And you'd do the jerk. You jerked around like this. And I remember they used to say, dancing on a dime. That's when you danced real close. They don't do that today-- with the lights down low.
[00:46:32.00] And I remember that we wore really wide, wide skirts-- wide skirts. And I told you about the poodles skirts. They had real poodle dogs-- not real, but big poodle dogs on the side of them that really stood out like decoupage, almost, on the skirts, and wide crinolines. And the clothes were really wide-- nothing tight and slinky. No tight jeans. Nothing like that.
[00:46:57.50] They did come out with a pant called capri pants, and I had a pair. And they were real tight. And they just came to here, like your pedal pushers today. And they called them capri pants. My grandmother wouldn't let me wear them. My parents bought me a pair, and I took them down to her house, to Highland Beach, for the summer. She wouldn't let me wear them. She told me I couldn't leave the house in them. I remember that a lot. [LAUGHS]
[00:47:19.40] KAT THURMAN: OK. Were there any slang terms, phrases, or words used that aren't in common use today?
[00:47:29.87] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I can't really think of any. One of my friends reminded me of the slang-- they'd say, everything is copacetic, which means, everything is OK. And they would say, see you later, alligator. And then the person leaving would say, after a while, crocodile. I remember that. I still say that sometimes. I say, see you later, alligator. And if someone knows the phrase, they'll say, after a while, crocodile. I think a song came out like that, too.
[00:48:01.52] KAT THURMAN: What was a typical day like for you in your youth time?
[00:48:07.32] VICTORIA LOOMIS: By youth high school?
[00:48:08.55] KAT THURMAN: Or just in your youth phase.
[00:48:12.79] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Hm. I can't really remember anything special. I used to love to go roller skating. All these little small cities out in River Rouge-- we had a big roller rink out there. They have the Northland Roller Rink out here now on Eight Mile. We had the River Rouge Roller Rink. And that was a place to meet and greet all your friends. And I loved going to the roller rink. It was a lot of fun. I specifically remember that-- going to the roller rink whenever I could.
[00:48:43.48] And other than that, my days were just like anyone else's-- just go to school and come home. We didn't have TV until I was, well, in high school, again. And we just went to school, and you came home, and you did your homework. You didn't hang out a lot. Parents wouldn't let you do that.
[00:49:05.69] KAT THURMAN: What did you do for fun?
[00:49:08.01] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Go to the roller rink. As a young teenager, I did belong to one club. They had a club for young girls called the Coet Club. It was something like a sorority, but it was for younger girls. But it was like a sorority at the same time. They would have parties, and dances, and things like that to do.
[00:49:29.34] And there were different organizations that had clubhouses. The Urban League was one. It was very famous for having a lot of parties in Detroit for black people-- the Urban League. We used to go to the-- what was the name of that? Paradise Theater. It's now Orchestra Hall. And it was an old theater in Detroit. They used to have a lot of the big stars that would come to the city. They'd all come to the Paradise Theater on Woodward. And that's now the very famous Orchestra Hall. Great--
[00:50:01.89] KAT THURMAN: Were there any--
[00:50:02.43] VICTORIA LOOMIS: --acoustics.
[00:50:03.74]
[00:50:05.22] KAT THURMAN: Were there any special days, events, or family traditions you remember from your youth?
[00:50:13.02] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Not really. I remember a lot of family traditions, except, as I mentioned earlier, we all named everybody after everyone else. That was a family tradition. Everyone's named Suane, or Amyre. Or, I have Uncle Alexis and a son Alexis, and Uncle Raymond and a middle name Raymond. And everyone's named after everyone. That was kind of a tradition. Other than that, a lot of good cooking-- things like that. No real strict traditions.
[00:50:48.00] KAT THURMAN: Did your family have any special sayings or expressions during this time?
[00:50:54.23] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I really can't say that I remember our family having any really special sayings or expressions. My mother had a lot of family dishes that she would cook. She'd make a lot of creole food-- creole shrimp and rice. And she'd make jambalaya, and she'd make gumbo-- things like that.
[00:51:20.95] KAT THURMAN: Were there any changes in your family life during your school years?
[00:51:25.48] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Changes? No, everybody stayed married and stayed together. We were a close family.
[00:51:33.65] KAT THURMAN: Were there any special days, events, or family traditions you remember from this time?
[00:51:40.00] VICTORIA LOOMIS: No. Like I said before, I just remember a lot of big dinners. We'd have big family dinners, and Christmas dinners, and Thanksgiving dinners. My mother would make a lot of creole food from family recipes from New Orleans.
[00:51:56.53] KAT THURMAN: Which holidays did your family celebrate?
[00:51:59.35] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh, same ones. They celebrate all of them-- Thanksgiving, Christmas, 4th of July, Easter-- all the holidays that they celebrate today. Today, we have more holidays than they had many years ago. We've added quite a few holidays.
[00:52:16.25] KAT THURMAN: How are holidays traditionally celebrated in your family?
[00:52:21.21] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Again, eating, eating, eating-- cooking and eating.
[00:52:25.79] KAT THURMAN: Has your family created its own traditions and celebrations?
[00:52:31.03] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Special celebrations just for our family? No, not really.
[00:52:36.07] KAT THURMAN: What special food traditions did your family have?
[00:52:40.09] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Food traditions? Again, mainly the creole food. And it's a lot of seafood, shrimp, rice, sausage, crabs. Special foods-- my mother used to make eggplant-- stuffed eggplant-- that was really good. There the lights go again. OK. We had a lot of food traditions in our family.
[00:53:07.27] As I said earlier, my mother was a French creole from New Orleans. And they cook very rich, spicy food with a lot of tomatoes, and garlic, and onions, and lots of shrimp, and crab, and okra, okra gumbo, and all kinds of gumbo. Gumbo's just a great, big pot of everything you have. You can make a gumbo.
[00:53:28.00] And a couple of my aunts in New Orleans owned a restaurant. And they were famous for their stuffed deviled crab. And you take a crab shell, and you cook up all this crab meat, and put a lot of spices and hot things in it. And you stuff the crab, and then you bake it. And stuffed eggplant and lots of nice things like that. So we had a lot of food traditions in our family. We did.
[00:53:52.37] KAT THURMAN: Were there any recipes preserved and passed down in your family from generation to generation?
[00:53:58.69] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Gumbo recipes, yes. Mm-hmm. Gumbo recipes, and jambalaya recipes, creole shrimp-- things like that. They were passed down. Cakes, too.
[00:54:11.92] KAT THURMAN: Are there family stories connected to making special foods?
[00:54:17.24] VICTORIA LOOMIS: No, no. My mother used to make hog head cheese, which I would never eat, because I didn't like to watch it. When I watched her make it, I never wanted to eat it, because it's really made from hog head. And they boil the hog head, and they pick out all the meat. And they make a gel. And they make it like a loaf, and you slice it like a lunch meat. I never would taste it. [LAUGHS]
[00:54:41.18] But she used to make that every Christmas. And she'd make eggnog every Christmas, which was really wonderful. I have the homemade-- I have that recipe. I make it once a year. We'd make ice cream every summer-- homemade ice cream. That was wonderful, too. I have that recipe, too. And I have a gumbo recipe, and an eggplant recipe. So I have a lot of recipes from my family.
[00:55:06.18] KAT THURMAN: When thinking back in your school years, what important social or historical events were taking place at that time, and how did they personally affect you and your family?
[00:55:20.07] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Historical events-- you mean nationwide historical? Well, let's see. When I was a teenager, lots of things were going on. My dad was building a hospital in River Rouge, Michigan. It was Memorial Hospital, which was one of the first black hospitals in the state of Michigan. Because at that time, the doctors had nowhere to take patients.
[00:55:45.66] And it was also World War II. I have an uncle. My father's brother went into the army and retired from the army. And I kept his army uniform for years and years and years. And it was kind of hip to wear army uniform jackets or wear the caps the soldiers wore. And I had a cap with lots of buttons and stuff all over it-- army caps. And Roosevelt was president-- Franklin Roosevelt. And he was just loved by everyone. And so it was a grand time. Everythi--
[00:56:22.78] KAT THURMAN: [INAUDIBLE]
[00:56:23.86] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I was going to say, they also rationed a lot of foods at that time. You had your food stamps not to get food free, but you were allowed, say, a pound of bacon a week-- things like that. Food was rationed during World War II. So you couldn't just go buy as much as you wanted, because there wasn't as much food, I guess. And they just had to share it with everyone. And so you'd get stamps that allowed you to buy so many pounds of butter a week or a month, and so many-- whatever. Food was rationed.
[00:56:54.72] KAT THURMAN: Now I'm going to ask you questions about your relationship with natural bodies of water when you were a child during the years often associated with going to school in America. Did your family engage in activities involving water when you were a child?
[00:57:10.83] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, they did. We had a couple of boats at Highland Beach in Maryland. We had a big speedboat, and we had a rowboat. And we were on the water all the time-- every day down at the beach during the summer. Yes.
[00:57:26.13] KAT THURMAN: Did you engage in activities involving water during your school years?
[00:57:31.73] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Just the same thing, just in the summer-- go down to Highland Beach in Maryland and enjoy that. And they had the Boblo Boat that would go up and down the Detroit River and across over to Boblo Island. I don't know if it's still running anymore, but it was just really famous in Detroit. You had to go on the Boblo Boat. And it was a great, big, huge boat-- big party boat. It would go across to Boblo Island, which was a big amusement park. And that was a lot of fun. I remember that.
[00:58:04.25] KAT THURMAN: Do you associate any feelings with water from this time of your life?
[00:58:10.71] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I just love the water. I love being on the water. I wish I lived on the water. I'd love to live on the water. I enjoy the water and water activities-- swimming, boating, fishing. Great fun.
[00:58:24.48] KAT THURMAN: That completes this section of questions about your school years. Thank you.
[00:58:28.56] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK. You're welcome.
[00:58:30.78] KAT THURMAN: This set of questions covers a fairly long period of your life-- from the time you completed your education, entered the labor force, and started a family, until all of your children left home, you and your spouse retired from work. So we might be taking a stretch of time as much as four decades.
[00:58:52.11] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK.
[00:58:53.59] KAT THURMAN: After you finished high school, where did you live?
[00:58:57.81] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I went away to University of Michigan. So I lived in Ann Arbor after I finished high school for four years.
[00:59:06.69] KAT THURMAN: How did you come to live there? Did you remain there, or did you move around your working adult life, and what were the reason for these moves?
[00:59:24.09] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK. Well, when I finished Cushing Academy in Ashburnham, Massachusetts-- that was my last two years of high school-- I wanted to come home. I came home, went to the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, which I loved a lot. And I stay there four years. And I didn't do a lot of traveling when I was in high school. I don't think I traveled until after I finished high school-- finished college, rather.
[00:59:52.08] And I stayed pretty close to home until I finished my college education, except for going to Highland Beach, Maryland. And I may have gone to Colorado with my parents once. I remember going to Colorado Springs. And I did a little skiing in upper Michigan and around Michigan while I was still in high school.
[01:00:14.72] KAT THURMAN: I'd like you--
[01:00:15.16] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I kept pretty close to home.
[01:00:17.79] KAT THURMAN: I'd like you to tell me a little about your married and family life. First, tell me about your spouse. Where did you--
[01:00:24.83] VICTORIA LOOMIS: My spouse.
[01:00:25.82] KAT THURMAN: Where did you meet?
[01:00:26.93] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I met him in Ann Arbor-- University of Michigan. And my parents knew his family, but I'd never met him. So I did meet him at--
[01:00:36.19] KAT THURMAN: --you to tell me a little about your married and family life. First, tell me about your spouse. When and where did you meet?
[01:00:43.88] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK, my husband's name was John Loomis-- John Lloyd Loomis. I met him in Ann Arbor when he was at University of Michigan in medical school and I was a freshman in undergrad school. And that's when we met. And we went out together my whole four years of college and had a lot of fun. And as I said, he was in med school. And we actually married his last year in medical school.
[01:01:13.00] And it was after that that I began to start to travel a lot. We married and had six children. Our first three years we were married, we did not have any children. We traveled. We lived in Europe, because he was in the armed services and was sent to Germany-- Karlsruhe, Germany. And we lived there for three years.
[01:01:36.23] And fortunately for us, we got to travel all over the world. So we went everywhere. We went to Germany, of course-- all over Germany-- and France, Spain, Italy. Where else did we go? Italy, France, Spain, Germany. We went to Denmark. We went that far, I think. I think that was-- that was a lot of traveling just to do all that.
[01:02:07.98] And I loved Paris, and I loved Rome. We went all over Italy-- Florence, Venice-- all over Spain. We went to Barcelona, Madrid, Granada, Cordoba, Seville. We went to Capri, Italy, and Naples. And any place in that area, we went to. If we could drive there, we went there. So we had a great time when he was in the army. And we lived there for three years, in Germany.
[01:02:43.06] KAT THURMAN: What was it like when you were dating?
[01:02:45.28] VICTORIA LOOMIS: When I was dating? Oh, wow. Well, at the University of Michigan, you couldn't go out at night, so you didn't get to stay out all night long. You were able to go during the week until, I think, 10 o'clock at night-- sometimes 8 o'clock. And on the weekends, you could stay out until midnight. If you ever came back late, you had to make up time the next time you went out. They would punish you by making you come back an hour early or whatever.
[01:03:11.47] So dating was kind of restricted and kind of tight. But we had a lot of fun, because whatever it was, we just really enjoyed it to the fullest. And it was exciting. We had a great time dating. We went to a lot of nightclubs in Detroit. That was an area where they had a lot of black clubs.
[01:03:33.04] And for example, they had the Flame Show Bar, Garfield Lounge. And they had a lot of big stars would come through those clubs. Sam Cooke-- I remember seeing him. And I remember seeing Della Reese when she was very young, and Dinah Washington, and Sam Cooke. Did I mention Sam Cooke? He was famous. I remember seeing the ink spots. And I remember seeing-- Aretha Franklin used to play a lot in clubs around Detroit before she became really famous.
[01:04:09.20] We would see Duke Ellington all the time. They had the Gotham Hotel, and my parents would go there for Sunday dinner. And I'd go there when I was married, too, sometimes. And he would be there. He would stay at the Gotham Hotel-- it was a black-owned hotel in Detroit-- when he was playing-- had his band here. So I got to do a lot of great things when I was dating.
[01:04:30.96] KAT THURMAN: Tell me about your engagement and wedding.
[01:04:34.26] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I had a great, big wedding. I had 10 bridesmaids and 10 groomsmen. And my parents had a big home on Outer Drive in Detroit. And they had a huge backyard, so the wedding was in the back-- the reception was in the backyard. The wedding was at a small Catholic church called Xavier. St. Francis Xavier Church-- that was the name of it. The wedding was really big, and it was all outside. I remember champagne fountains, and tents, and lots of exciting things. It was fun.
[01:05:13.96] KAT THURMAN: Tell me about your children and what life was like when they were young and living in the house.
[01:05:22.98] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, it was really, really busy-- lots of people, lots of kids going through the house all the time, because there were so many of us. We had six children-- triplets-- three of them were triplets-- and two boys and a girl.
[01:05:36.64] KAT THURMAN: Oh, lord. We're so sorry.
[01:05:38.47] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I'm going to backstep just a little bit. My husband's father-- his name was Lloyd Loomis. My husband's name was John Lloyd. His name was Lloyd Loomis. I'll back up to say that he was the first black prosecuting attorney in the city of Detroit. My dad was a physician and surgeon, as I mentioned earlier. He built a hospital-- one of the first black ones in River Rouge. He was also the first black Wayne County coroner for the city of Detroit. I meant to mention that to you, and I forgot.
[01:06:15.37] OK, and back to when I grew up. When we were married and had all these kids, we had a big house. We were the first black family-- or second, perhaps-- to live in Palmer Woods, which is a subdivision between Seven and Eight Mile off Woodward. And all the houses are big and old-- great, big, old home-- which we needed, because we had all these kids. And so the house was full of kids and full of people all the time, because all the children-- they always have their own friends.
[01:06:44.65] And I had an older daughter, my first daughter-- she was Isaure-- and then a son, John, then the triplets-- Suane, Amyre, and Alexis-- and then another daughter, Kitty. So everybody had their own little range of kids, all different ages. And everybody was doing something different. So we had a lot of fun. It was a good family home. And there was a lot of excitement and stuff going on all the time.
[01:07:08.86] We had a swimming pool, so everybody had to swim. So everyone learned how to swim. And it's amazing how quickly and how easily you can learn how to swim when you have a pool, because you want to jump in it every day. So all the kids became excellent swimmers.
[01:07:24.25] And then there was a-- not Black Sea Club. It was the Blizzard Ski Club of Detroit. I don't know if you're familiar with it. At that time, they had buses that would pick kids up in areas. They used to pick the kids up in Palmer Park, and they'd go skiing every Saturday. So everybody learned how to ski.
[01:07:41.38] And we did a lot of fun things. Once, we drove from one end of the United States to the other-- took all the kids one summer, took off about two months, and drove clear across the country from Detroit to California and back again. That was really a really great, exciting thing to do.
[01:08:00.59] And my husband took the summer off, and we all drove from Detroit all the way to Los Angeles, California. We stopped in so many states all along the way, all the national parks. Went all through Wyoming, and Colorado, and New Mexico, and California, of course. Went to all the major national parks-- the Grand Tetons, Yosemite, Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon. What's the name of the big park where all the monuments are carved with all the presidents' faces?
[01:08:38.42] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Oh, Mount Rushmore.
[01:08:38.80] TOMMY DIEHL: Washington Monument?
[01:08:40.09] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Mount Rushmore.
[01:08:41.00] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, yeah. Well, the Washington Monument's in DC. Mount Rushmore is in what state?
[01:08:47.02] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: North Dakota?
[01:08:47.68] VICTORIA LOOMIS: North Dakota, yeah. And it was just great, great-- a wonderful trip. And I really feel anyone who has an opportunity to make that trip should really do it. It was just fantastic. Route 66-- we did all that. [LAUGHS] It was a lot of fun.
[01:09:06.67] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Could you tell us, before we get started again, just so we have it on camera, who's in the photographs--
[01:09:10.94] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK.
[01:09:11.24] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: --that you gave us? Could you hand those to her, Tommy?
[01:09:14.38] VICTORIA LOOMIS: And also, something else I was going to tell you about when I was a young person that came back into my mind-- this is myself. It's a really, really old picture at the Mardi Gras. That was my Mardi Gras outfit one year. I went with my mom and dad to New Orleans to the Mardi Gras. And that was my Mardi Gras outfit.
[01:09:37.82] You got it? OK. This is my dad. As I told you, he founded Sidney Sumby Memorial Hospital in River Rouge, Michigan. That's him carrying his medical bag in front of the hospital. Years ago, all doctors always carried their medical bag. Today, they don't care them anymore. I don't understand that.
[01:09:55.96] But they don't. They don't carry medical bags, and they don't make house calls. And doctors always carried medical bags, because they always needed them to make their house calls. And they were full of all kinds of different equipment that they needed.
[01:10:08.98] And this is my mom and dad, and that's what French creoles look like. They're usually very pretty people-- sort of-- what's the word? Not swarthy looking, but olive complexion. Yeah. That was my mom. That's my dad. He was brown like I am. And this was myself and my husband a few years ago-- John Loomis Junior. He was also an MD-- also a doctor, as I told you. I thought you'd like to see some pictures.
[01:10:39.61] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Lovely, thank you.
[01:10:40.88] KAT THURMAN: OK, thank you.
[01:10:42.53] VICTORIA LOOMIS: You're welcome.
[01:10:47.03] [SIDE CONVERSATION]
[01:10:52.85] TOMMY DIEHL: You can go for a break any time that you want. Also, please remember that you can decline to answer any question or end the interview at any time for any reason.
[01:11:04.22] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK.
[01:11:06.62] TOMMY DIEHL: Tell me about your working years.
[01:11:09.57] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, my working years-- well, when I finished University of Michigan, the following year, I married. And then for a couple of years, I drove back and forth from Ann Arbor every day. I worked at my dad's hospital, and I drove back and forth every day for a year. Then my husband finished medical school.
[01:11:35.04] And I was a purchasing agent, and I did all the purchasing in the hospital. And I had to learn a lot about medicine and purchasing to do that-- all the drugs to buy, and all the food, and all the different types of medical supplies that hospitals and doctors need. That was a lot of fun. I did that for-- oh, I guess, three or four years. Well, actually, before that, when my husband was in the army, I didn't work at all when we lived in Germany. Then we came back from Germany.
[01:12:07.63] No, let me back up again. Before we went to Germany, I worked at the hospital in purchasing, because that's when I was driving back and forth. He was still in medical school. Then after that, we went to Europe for three years. Then when we came back. I went back to work at the hospital, again in purchasing. And I really worked there until I started having children, and then I was a homemaker for quite a few years.
[01:12:34.32] So I was really lucky in one way that I didn't have a full time working career. I was able to be a homemaker. But on the other hand, I would think I would have liked to have had a career. When I look back on it, I wish I did have a career and had a career to fall back on-- which, right now, I don't. But I did finish school in social work, and I suppose I could look into it and start a career again, if I chose to do so.
[01:13:08.18] TOMMY DIEHL: What did your family enjoy doing together when your kids were still at home?
[01:13:14.51] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh, well, we traveled a lot, as I mentioned to you. And we had a pool, so we swam a lot. And I think my husband spent a lot of time with his children. We just did a lot of family things. We had barbecues almost every weekend, and we had all the family. I don't know how I did that. But almost every weekend, we had big cookouts, and we had a lot of kids and a lot of family around.
[01:13:42.86] Most of our activities had to include our family, because we couldn't leave them anywhere. We had six kids, so we were always together. We always did a lot of family-oriented activities, mainly with relatives, some friends. We went to Martha's Vineyard quite a few times. We would drive down there with friends. And different people would rent homes down there, and we'd all be together for a couple of weeks. And that was just great, great fun. The kids loved that.
[01:14:15.98] What else did we do? You're really making me put on my thinking cap. We would ski a lot with the kids, because both my husband and I were both skiers. And we would go skiing around Michigan. There are four places right around here that you can ski-- Alpine Valley, and Pine Knob, and Mount Holly.
[01:14:35.69] And then every year, we'd go to upper Michigan once or twice. We'd go to Boyne Mountain, Shanty Creek-- different places like that. And we'd take the kids and ski. So there were all kind of sports activities, I think-- and eating and picnicking activities.
[01:14:54.04] TOMMY DIEHL: What were your personal favorite things to do for fun?
[01:14:58.79] VICTORIA LOOMIS: My personal favorite things-- well, I loved to go to parties. I was a party girl. I loved to party. And I was very social-- liked to see people, have a lot of fun. I belonged to lots of clubs that I still belong to. And mainly club-oriented, I think, except for the skiing. I like to ski a lot. Tried to play tennis. I took so many tennis lessons like you would not believe. Every summer, I'd take more tennis lessons. Never learned how to play really good tennis. But I did that.
[01:15:33.35] I also took two or three golf lessons-- had golf shoes, golf dress, skirt-- whatever. Never could really hit that ball very well, either. So I did swim. I did ski, mainly. But I did try to do other things. And as I said, I like to cook. So I was a really good cook. And I still do like to cook a lot. And I like to socialize. And I'm still in a lot of clubs.
[01:16:06.44] KAT THURMAN: What clubs are you in?
[01:16:09.28] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I'm an AKA-- Alpha Kappa Alpha. I'm in The Northeasterners, which is a national women's organization-- mainly black women. I'm in The Links, which is also a national women's organization. I'm in The Girl Friends, which is another national women's organization. I'm in The Dolls. That's another one. And I was in The Sophisticates, but I went emeritus. But I guess I'm still a member. They still send me notices all the time-- Sophisticates. And bridge, pinochle, cards.
[01:16:46.44] TOMMY DIEHL: Are there any special days, events, or family traditions you practice that differed from your childhood traditions?
[01:16:55.18] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, my childhood-- my parents weren't very oriented so far as outdoor activities were concerned. They were very social people, also, but mainly parties and clubs. But they weren't involved in outdoor sports. My husband-- he played tennis all the time. I tried, but I couldn't very well. And I told you the activities that I did. They didn't do all the outdoor activities that we do, but they still were very family-oriented. We had a lot of family activities-- barbecues, dinners, things like that-- all revolving eating and cooking.
[01:17:34.75] TOMMY DIEHL: All right. So please describe the popular music of your adult years.
[01:17:42.34] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Mm. That's hard for me to remember. I remember a lot of jazz-- a lot of jazz artists. They would come to Ann Arbor, and they'd play at the Hill Auditoriums, places like that. So we got to learn to enjoy a lot of jazz and blues-- rhythm and blues. Basically the same music you have today, except for hip hop and--
[01:18:05.36] KAT THURMAN: Rap?
[01:18:06.19] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Rap. But the music is not as melodious as it used to be. Well, there were more love songs, more melodies-- things like that-- than there are today, I think.
[01:18:29.46] TOMMY DIEHL: What were the popular clothing or hairstyles of this time?
[01:18:34.80] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, the hairstyle I really remember is the beehive, they used to call it, when you wore your hair really teased up high, high, high, and stiff as a board. And I used to wear my hair like that all the time, and I thought it was just wonderful.
[01:18:47.67] I'd go to the beauty shop every week and get my hair teased. You couldn't comb it until you went back again. It would stay like that a whole week. It would stay real high, and real stiff, and all puffed up. And I thought it was great. But today, all the hairstyles are more casual and more natural.
[01:19:08.86] TOMMY DIEHL: Do you still like the beehive hairstyle?
[01:19:11.10] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Not really. [LAUGHS] I've outgrow it.
[01:19:17.77] TOMMY DIEHL: Can you describe any other fads or styles from this era?
[01:19:23.82] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh, not really. I did tell you about all the wide skirts, and the poodle skirts, and real wide dresses. Clothes weren't as tight as they are today. We didn't wear blue jeans like we do today. We wear blue jeans today like an outfit. Morning, noon, or night, we can always put on blue jeans, and be comfortable, and feel dressed up.
[01:19:46.62] I don't remember ever wearing blue jeans as a young person, not nearly as many pants. We didn't wear a lot of slacks. We wore skirts and dresses most of the time. Today, I wear pants all of the time. Hardly ever do I put a dress on, unless I'm really dressed up-- just the opposite.
[01:20:08.94] TOMMY DIEHL: Were there any slang terms, phrases, or words used that aren't in common use today?
[01:20:20.60] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Some of this, I'm trying to remember. I remembered a couple of them yesterday that I described to you, like, see you later, alligator, and, after a while, crocodile, and-- what else did I mention? Copacetic-- everything's copacetic-- means it's fine. I really can't remember a lot of those phrases. If I do, I'll-- if they come back to my mind, I'll shout them out to you.
[01:20:46.58] TOMMY DIEHL: We already asked some of these questions.
[01:20:48.86] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: OK.
[01:20:49.32] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Yeah, we did.
[01:20:49.82] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: You can skip them. Mm-hmm.
[01:20:54.88] TOMMY DIEHL: All right.
[01:20:58.25] VICTORIA LOOMIS: One thing I meant to mention the other day-- or maybe I should wait until the end.
[01:21:02.27] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: [INAUDIBLE]
[01:21:03.19] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK. When I was growing up at home as a teenager, my parents decide to build a home-- a larger home. And so they wanted to build it on Outer Drive, which is-- River Rouge is on this side of Visger Road. And on this side of Visger Road, Ecorse is right here. Southwest Detroit is right here. And you go down a few blocks, and you come to Outer Drive. Then Lincoln Park is right there. Lincoln Park is right here, Ecorse is right here, and Outer Drive is right here.
[01:21:38.85] So my parents bought some property on Outer Drive. But it just happened to be on the Lincoln Park side of Outer Drive, not the Ecorse side. So my grandfather, my mother's father, went and purchased it for them. He was very fair, and he wouldn't have been recognized as being a black person. And evidently, they weren't able to buy it themselves. So my grandfather bought the property for them.
[01:22:03.21] But when they started to build it, they had a horrific time trying to get a builder's license. They had to go to court for about a year and spend a lot of money in order to get it-- the city of Lincoln Park to give them a builder's license. And that was a really big thing at the time. It was in the newspapers and whatever. It was a really big deal.
[01:22:23.94] But eventually, they finally won the court case, and they got the license. So after they got the license to build the home and started to build it, the city of Lincoln Park refused to bring the water lines over to the property. So they had no water lines at all, and they had to dig a well and bring their own water into this house for years and years and years.
[01:22:45.65] And finally, after they lived there about 20 years, the city of Ecorse, on the other side, extended their water lines, and they finally got water from the city. But for years, they had to pump-- bring their own water into the city, because Ecorse wouldn't let them use their water. And my mother had done a scrapbook on that, but I couldn't tell you where it is now. It's somewhere, with all the newspaper articles. But it was really a big, big thing.
[01:23:15.48] TOMMY DIEHL: All right. Well, that completes this section of questions about your working years.
[01:23:22.36] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK.
[01:23:23.73] TOMMY DIEHL: Thank you.
[01:23:24.70] VICTORIA LOOMIS: You're welcome.
[01:23:26.23] TOMMY DIEHL: This set of questions covers a fairly long period of your life-- from the time you entered the labor force, or started a family, up until the present time. What was your main field of employment?
[01:23:48.08] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I worked mainly at Sidney Sumby Memorial Hospital in purchasing, mainly-- occasionally, when needed, in administration, and also in the housekeeping. I actually helped the housekeeper do rounds all over the hospital to make sure everything was nice and clean and as it should be-- things like that. Purchasing of equipment, food, medicine-- everything. That was most of my working life. I did teach for a short time later, in my later years, but just for about a year-- not long. I was a teacher and just taught for a short time.
[01:24:27.17] TOMMY DIEHL: How did you first get started with this tradition, skill, or job?
[01:24:32.75] VICTORIA LOOMIS: With the job at the hospital?
[01:24:34.25] TOMMY DIEHL: Yes.
[01:24:35.58] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I had a degree in social work, so I was a little knowledgeable, and-- somewhat knowledgeable from Michigan. I had a degree in social work. And I just have to assume-- I can't really remember-- that they had a need for someone-- for a purchasing agent at that time. And that's how I kind of fell into the job.
[01:24:54.83] And I would learn by visiting other institutions and seeing how they set up their purchasing departments, and seeing what kinds of records they kept in files, and how they place their orders, and how they did their inventories, and so forth, and so on. So I was sort of self-taught through learning from other people--
[01:25:17.28] TOMMY DIEHL: Do you remember--
[01:25:18.22] VICTORIA LOOMIS: --and other hospitals.
[01:25:19.22] TOMMY DIEHL: Do you remember what exactly got you interested in this work?
[01:25:23.41] VICTORIA LOOMIS: A need, more than anything-- just the need-- someone needed to do the job, and I needed a job. I was just married and living in Ann Arbor, and working every day. My husband was not working. He was in medical school.
[01:25:37.28] TOMMY DIEHL: OK. Describe the steps of the process involved in your job from start to finish. What raw materials are used?
[01:25:53.75] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I didn't really use raw materials in purchasing. You just have to learn what the needs of the institution are, and then you have to find a source and be able to keep records to know when you need to resupply and purchase new goods, or if they want to try something different. It's sort of a self-taught position.
[01:26:17.94] TOMMY DIEHL: Have they changed over time?
[01:26:20.84] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I would imagine so, by computer now. And this was before computers.
[01:26:30.96] TOMMY DIEHL: What specific training or skills were needed for your job?
[01:26:36.92] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, as I said, it was self-taught-- just common sense and an education. You had to be able to learn all the different types of equipment and supplies-- medical supplies-- that are needed in an institution, learn what your institution uses most of the time, and find suppliers for it at a decent price.
[01:27:02.44] TOMMY DIEHL: What technology changes occurred during your working years?
[01:27:07.15] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, now, the hospital did become computerized toward the end of my working years. They became computerized. And at that time, people were very resistant to all these new changes and learning how to run the computers and all. But they had people that would come in from, I guess, the companies that made the computers, and they would train you constantly until you learned it.
[01:27:32.98] And so the billing was all changed from hand billing and hand records, all computerized. And I never computerized purchasing. When I retired, they had not gotten into that. They were just beginning to use computers in billing departments.
[01:27:55.33] TOMMY DIEHL: How do you judge excellence within your field?
[01:28:00.74] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Within my field, how would I judge excellence? Well, the only judge would be your ratings from the institution. If they approved of how you were doing the job, that would be the only judge-- is if they felt your work was satisfactory or not, and if you were able to supply them with their needs when they needed them.
[01:28:26.11] TOMMY DIEHL: What do you value most about what you did for a living?
[01:28:31.18] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I was helping people, which I think was valuable. And I enjoyed interacting with people. And mainly, it was helping people, helping the institution--
[01:28:46.10] TOMMY DIEHL: OK.
[01:28:47.06] VICTORIA LOOMIS: --assisting the needy.
[01:28:49.66] TOMMY DIEHL: Anything else?
[01:28:53.46] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, as I remember, at that time, people had a lot of needs, and not myself so much. But if you were, say, in my dad's position-- a doctor or anyone that was knowledgeable, and had access to moneys, and so forth, and so on, then you could act-- for many people, you were not only, say, their employer, but you were their banker. You helped them with their banking and their-- oh, what can I say? You were like a mentor to many people that did not have the skills or the knowledge that you did.
[01:29:34.56] And also, the hospital trained a lot of people. We trained, say, nursing aides how to be nursing aides, and how to help people, and what to do. And you'd train, say, laboratory assistants. You trained X-ray assistants. A lot of training of people who were not knowledgeable was involved in an institution like that. And you brought a lot of good to your city, because you trained people to go out and find other jobs, if they needed to, give them a good job, and make them knowledgeable.
[01:30:05.49] And we trained doctors. They were in an internship program there for physicians. And you just brought a lot of good to your community-- kind of branched out and filtered into the community in many ways.
[01:30:25.92] TOMMY DIEHL: Tell me about any moves you made during your working years and retirement before your decision to move to your current residence-- home.
[01:30:36.88] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, we always lived in the city of Detroit after we left River Rouge. The only time we ever moved was when we lived in Europe for three years when my husband was in the army. Otherwise, we were in Ann Arbor, then in Europe, and then in Detroit. And we've been here since.
[01:30:56.39] TOMMY DIEHL: How do you feel about your current living situation?
[01:31:00.52] VICTORIA LOOMIS: My current living situation? Well, it's fine. I don't have any complaints. I'm very fortunate. I've lived a pretty fulfilled life, I think-- I feel. Now my house is too big. I need to downsize-- find something smaller.
[01:31:24.11] TOMMY DIEHL: This set of questions covers your retirement years to the present time. how did family Life change for you when you and/or your spouse retired and all of the children left home?
[01:31:39.26] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I'm living alone now. My children are all-- I have a daughter in Chicago, one in Brooklyn, two in Detroit, and a son in Detroit-- in Ann Arbor. He lives in Ann Arbor. And my house is empty now, so I guess I do have the empty nest syndrome. But I'm pretty busy all the time.
[01:32:03.65] And my husband passed, of course. But I'm always doing something. I'm not lonely at all. I'll put it that way. I think I have a pretty busy life and pretty fulfilled life. And thanks to the social outlets that I have-- and so I know a lot of people, have a lot of friends. I'm in a lot of clubs and organizations. And so my life is still pretty busy.
[01:32:29.41] TOMMY DIEHL: OK.
[01:32:30.22] VICTORIA LOOMIS: When it's not busy, I get worried. [LAUGHS] Then I wonder, what am I going to do? And I like to stay busy. I feel better when I do that.
[01:32:38.70] TOMMY DIEHL: What does your family enjoy doing together now?
[01:32:42.77] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, now I have grandchildren. And we do the same things we always did. Most of our family interaction is-- during holidays, always, we're at someone's house. Sometimes we usually take turns-- go to different houses during the different holidays. And everybody comes to potlucks and brings different dishes that are their specialty. And still a lot of family activity and interaction.
[01:33:15.45] TOMMY DIEHL: Are there any special days, events, or family traditions you especially enjoy at this time in your life?
[01:33:25.33] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Not anything different, really. We still do the same old things. We don't change very much. All our traditions have pretty much remained the same.
[01:33:39.49] TOMMY DIEHL: When thinking your life after retirement, or your kids left home up until the present, what important social or historical events were taking place, and how did they personally affect you and your family?
[01:33:55.46] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, most of my children have all married, so that you gain a son-in-law or a daughter-in-law that you have to learn to know, and be friends with, and enjoy. And then, of course, you get a lot of grandchildren, which are loads of fun. They're almost more fun than your own kids, because, as everybody always says, you can kiss them and give them back to the parents.
[01:34:22.95] So it's just the same lifestyle over again, just at a different level-- a little slower paced, because you don't have all that full responsibility that you had before. But it's good. I like it a lot. I like it almost better.
[01:34:38.01] TOMMY DIEHL: You do?
[01:34:39.32] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, you don't have all the work and all the responsibility. They can come spend nights with you when you want them to, and then you can send them home when you're ready.
[01:34:47.69] TOMMY DIEHL: That's nice.
[01:34:49.04] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Yeah, it works.
[01:34:52.58] TOMMY DIEHL: When thinking back on your entire life, what important social, historical event had the greatest impact?
[01:35:00.95] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Of my entire life, the greatest historical event-- well, I suppose the greatest historical event would have been my mom and dad building Sidney Sumby Memorial Hospital in River Rouge, Michigan. And I remember once, Governor Romney, I guess it was at that time-- George Romney-- every year, he'd come to the hospital. He'd go through all the patient rooms and shake all the patient's hands. That's what politicians used to do then when they were campaigning.
[01:35:34.55] And I remember him very well, and my mom and dad having pictures made with him. I remember once, my parents having pictures made with Harry Truman. That must have been in DC somewhere. And my brother, years ago, was the head of the NAACP-- started the chapter in River Rouge. And I really remember he got the big baseball player-- what's his name? It's on the tip of my tongue. Robinson. What's his first name?
[01:36:07.71] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Jackie Robinson.
[01:36:08.40] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Jackie Robinson came to River Rouge and spoke at an NAACP banquet, and my parents had a little party for him at their home. And I really remember meeting Jackie Robinson. To me, those were historical events. And of course, as I said, the building of the hospital and my parents trying to build their home on Outer Drive-- those were important memories.
[01:36:33.90] I also remember the theater years ago in River Rouge-- you have to go and sit upstairs. You couldn't sit downstairs as a kid. And it didn't bother us. We just went on upstairs. It wasn't a major issue to us at all. And things like that. And my parents used to sit in on a lot of desegregation projects, and I remember all those kinds of things. But it was just part of our life.
[01:37:00.38] KAT THURMAN: Did you participate in the Civil Rights movement?
[01:37:04.41] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I did not. At that time, I think I had six kids, and I was probably being a homemaker. But I do remember we were on our trip once, and we were in Washington DC. And it was the same time that Martin Luther King came and spoke-- his famous speech in DC. And we were at a hotel there somewhere. And I said, oh, let's go and hear Martin Luther King. And my husband said, oh, no. It'll be too many people, too crowded. We didn't realize what a historic occasion it was at that time.
[01:37:38.97] And I also remember, I have a cousin from Atlanta, and she married. And I went to her wedding reception in Atlanta. And I was staying with her and her family. And that Sunday, after her-- I guess her reception was that Saturday. They happened to belong to the church that Martin Luther King had founded-- Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.
[01:38:00.69] And so we went to church on Sunday, and we saw him preach. And then they had their social hour in the basement after church. And we went downstairs and went to the social hour. And I met him and shook his hand just like I was shaking your hand, not, again, realizing what a moment that was in my life until after it had happened.
[01:38:22.11] But he was a very commanding personality, and that when you would talk with him, and he would shake your hands, he would stare right in your eyes. And he was almost spellbinding. So it was quite a thrill to remember it now, to have done that. Those are some of the most memorable things that I recall during my lifetime, and, of course, having six kids and a husband.
[01:38:53.76] TOMMY DIEHL: What family heirlooms or keepsakes do you possess?
[01:38:59.19] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Keepsakes-- mainly a lot of pictures, more than anything else. I have a couple art pieces of my mother's that she liked a lot-- statues or something like that. And I have-- some of her furniture I have that I use in my living room now that I liked. As I said, a couple of pictures. I have some silver-- a lot of silver things. She liked those kinds of things-- sterling silver tea set I have of hers-- small but not really big, big things. I guess that's the biggest thing. Many photos.
[01:39:41.96] TOMMY DIEHL: OK. Thinking back over your entire life, what are you most proud of?
[01:39:50.81] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Most proud of-- well, my family, I suppose-- my family, my children, and my grandchildren. I think that's what I'm most proud of.
[01:40:04.58] KAT THURMAN: Did you say you were the first group of African-Americans to be accepted to U of M?
[01:40:09.97] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I said, when I was a freshman of U of M, that was the first year they allowed black women to live in the dormitories. They had a separate house in Ann Arbor for black women. It was called the B House. I forget. There was a nickname for it. But it was just a separate home-- a big home on a hill by the hospital-- across the street from the hospital. And that's where all the black women lived.
[01:40:34.66] There weren't that many at University of Michigan at that time-- maybe about 15 or 20. And when I was a freshman at University of Michigan, it was the first year that they moved them out of the homes into the dormitories. That was in 1950-- I don't know, '52 or '53. I think about '52.
[01:41:00.64] TOMMY DIEHL: What would you say has changed the most from the time you were my age until now?
[01:41:06.59] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, I think technology has been a major change in the whole country and the world, because everything is computerized. And just technology has just developed so much. And I'm not computer knowledgeable. I'm trying to get there. I'm having a rough time. Haven't tried too hard.
[01:41:32.68] But just computers, and cell phones, and televisions-- all these things didn't exist when I was a little girl. And some of them are still-- they're still growing today, and changing, and evolving all the time. But we didn't know what a cell phone-- cell phones didn't exist until maybe, what, 20 years ago?
[01:41:54.26] TOMMY DIEHL: About the '80s.
[01:41:55.65] VICTORIA LOOMIS: There were no cell phones-- unheard of. And television-- when I was in high school, some of the first TVs were made. And it was just a big deal to sit around that TV. And it was all black and white in a great, big, huge, old box. But it was still wonderful.
[01:42:13.78] Just, technology has changed so much. It's changing the whole world. And what used to be a million miles away-- now, you can pick up the phone and talk to someone just like they're in the next room. So those are just fantastic things that we've been able to do. Going to the moon-- all of those things.
[01:42:36.34] TOMMY DIEHL: What advice would you give to my generation?
[01:42:39.67] VICTORIA LOOMIS: To your generation? Ooh, that's a really tough question. Advice would be to learn, learn, learn, and get as much education as possible, because without it, you're not going to be able to succeed in this new world that we're in. You have to be knowledgeable. And you have to be, especially, computer knowledgeable, know a lot of technology, I think.
[01:43:12.84] And as you know, the days of hands-on are almost gone, sadly-- but sad, but true. And every workforce, no matter what it is-- it's all done by computers, and man-made machines, and so forth, and so on. So if you can't learn all those things, you're in a lot of trouble in today's world.
[01:43:37.51] TOMMY DIEHL: Is there anything you would like to add that I haven't asked about?
[01:43:42.76] VICTORIA LOOMIS: I think you've covered everything pretty thoroughly. I think I've added all I could think of. You're jogging my memory quite a bit, and there are probably a lot more things I could mention. But I don't want to repeat myself, and I have to really put on a double thinking cap. You've done a great job.
[01:44:04.27] TOMMY DIEHL: Thank you.
[01:44:05.15] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Thank you.
[01:44:06.58] TOMMY DIEHL: Now I'm going to ask you some questions about your relationship with natural bodies of water during your later working years and retirement.
[01:44:16.49] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Hm.
[01:44:18.88] TOMMY DIEHL: Did your family engage in activities involving water during your labor working years and retirement?
[01:44:26.54] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, the only way I was engaged in water was taking cruises. I took a lot of cruises. Because as I said earlier, I was a travel agent, so I got to travel a lot. And as you get older, you begin to really love cruises, because you just get on one ship. You don't have to get off and on. You don't have to keep packing and unpacking and moving to move from one destination to another. Or you don't take to take a plane to get from one city to another, or a train, or a bus.
[01:44:54.20] You just get on a cruise ship, and it takes you-- you can cruise around the world, if you want to, and never have to get off the ship, and never have to pack and unpack, and stay in the same room in the same bed your whole entire trip. And I think that's what older people really love when they travel. And that would be my closest association to water. And you just love it. It's very relaxing. Lots of fun.
[01:45:19.07] KAT THURMAN: Where'd you go on your cruises?
[01:45:22.07] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Oh, I've been to many, many places on cruises. I've been on Mediterranean cruises, and I've been on Caribbean cruises, of course. So you get to go to all the Caribbean islands. And the Mediterranean cruises, you cruise the Mediterranean. I've been on a Grecian cruise. We'd go to the isles of Greece. And the Mediterranean cruises-- that include lots of Europe as well as Egypt. And where else? All over Italy.
[01:45:55.70] You can cruise almost all over the world. I've done the Mediterranean-- included Spain, Italy, and Turkey, I think. And the Caribbean include, of course, all of the islands. And I've been on a lot of Caribbean cruises and two or three Mediterranean cruises. I've never been on a European cruise where you just do Europe, although I've been on some that, as I said, include parts of Europe, but not all of Europe. But they're there if you want to go on them. You can go the whole world by water, if you want to.
[01:46:33.50] TOMMY DIEHL: Do you associate any feelings with water from this time in your life?
[01:46:38.93] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Today? Yes, I'd love to have an apartment right down on the Detroit River on the water. That's my goal.
[01:46:49.37] TOMMY DIEHL: Looking back over your entire life, what have bodies of water, such as oceans, lakes, and rivers linked to?
[01:46:59.66] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, they get me from one place to another, and they provide food when you fish, and crab, and so forth. They can provide food. And of course, a lot of water we purify, don't we? For drinking. So I think it's a big part of your life, water-- boating, swimming, fishing, recreation, travel.
[01:47:35.80] TOMMY DIEHL: How would you say your relationship to water has changed over the course of your life?
[01:47:41.62] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Wow. I think it's about the same, except, I guess, the older I became, the more I was able to do more on the water than I could as a young person. You're more limited as a young person in boating and swimming, of course, or fishing.
[01:48:00.91] But as you get older, you can do more things, like cruising and traveling on water, that you can't do as a young person, because it's not affordable, or you don't have the time-- you're in school, you're getting educated-- a lot of those things, you can't do until you're retired and you don't have to go to work every day.
[01:48:23.18] TOMMY DIEHL: OK. Well, that completes the last section of questions. Thank you.
[01:48:28.05] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Well, thank you. I've enjoyed it.
[01:48:30.72] TOMMY DIEHL: Me, too, and I'm sure everyone else did.
[01:48:33.39] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Good, good.
[01:48:35.55] SPEAKER: Can you do one last thing before we wrap up? Could you please--
[01:48:43.74] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: [INAUDIBLE]
[01:48:46.12] SPEAKER: We're going to have to wrap here. But if you can, before we wrap, do a quick-- look right at camera--
[01:48:52.61] VICTORIA LOOMIS: Mm-hmm.
[01:48:53.41] SPEAKER: --and say your name, age, and, "This is The Legacies Project." Would you do that for me?
[01:48:57.91] VICTORIA LOOMIS: OK. My name is Victoria Suane Milton Loomis. I'm 76 years old. This is The Legacy Project, and I was happy to be a part of it. Thank you.
[01:49:13.90] MARGARET EDWARTOWSKI: Thank you.
[01:49:14.80] SPEAKER: Appreciate it.

Media

2020

Length: 01:49:16

Copyright: Creative Commons (Attribution, Non-Commercial, Share-alike)

Rights Held by: Ann Arbor District Library

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Subjects
Creole Cuisine
Mardi Gras
Sidney A. Sumby Memorial Hospital [River Rouge]
Physicians & Surgeons
University of Michigan - Alumni
Britt House
Alice Lloyd Hall
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority
Cottage Inn Restaurant
Dancing
Roller Skating
Detroit Urban League
Paradise Theater
Gotham Hotel
Black American Singers
Skiing
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)
LOH Housing - Ann Arbor
Health & Wellness
Oral Histories
Race & Ethnicity
Legacies Project
Victoria Suane Loomis
Samuel B. Milton
Sidney A. Sumby
John Loomis
George W. Romney
Harry S. Truman
Jackie Robinson
240 Visger Rd River Rouge
Palmer Woods Detroit
Lincoln Park
New Orleans LA
Washington DC
Highland Beach MD