Learning social values as a youth
Esser remembers the influence of "Mash," his mother's sister, who married his father in 1935 and effectively raised Esser. She played a big role in teaching Esser that dignity did not require wealth and encouraged him to study the life of his ancestor by marriage, Thomas Jefferson. As he did so, he drifted away from his family's Republican Party loyalty.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with George Esser, June-August 1990. Interview L-0035. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
- FRANCES WEAVER:
-
Had Mash waited this long to say yes, or were they married before
1935?
- GEORGE ESSER:
-
They were married. He took that job and about a week later, it was
unusual, my father said, "I've got to go to
Middlesboro," which was an old coal town that really has a
fascinating history—it's a town in Kentucky right
across Cumberland Gap—"on Saturday and
let's all go." So we went down and we went to the
old hotel and had lunch, and after lunch, he drove up in front of the
Episcopal Church. My father got out and went in. He came back out and
the rector turned to have been in theological school with my
grandfather. So he opened the door to the car and looked back at Cary
and me and said, "How would you like to have a
mother?" Well, I burst into tears, and all of a sudden they
were worried. And I said, "No, I was doing it because I was
just happy about it." So we went in and there was an old lady
who was witness and they were married.
- FRANCES WEAVER:
-
Well, how nice, George.
- GEORGE ESSER:
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But that was twelve years after she came to take care of us and raise us.
So I didn't have what you would call a
traditional background in that sense. But I was very, very—I
mean, I admired my father and respected him. And I think I was probably
as close to him as anybody was, except Mash. But there's no
question about the fact that Mash was the person who probably had the
greatest impact on me, to whom I was really closest, I realize even more
as time goes on. Now, she didn't understand when I
later—the first time I voted for Truman it was a real family
crisis. [Laughter] But she
didn't understand everything I did, but exactly she had a lot
of responsibility for helping have a respect for everybody, an
understanding that people need an opportunity. That you can get up your
dignity although you have no money. That equity and fair play and
justice are important. She didn't understand very much about
law but she understood about fair play. She was just great in that way,
and I'm sure that that is one of things that had great
impact.
- FRANCES WEAVER:
-
She was also aware of her Jefferson heritage?
- GEORGE ESSER:
-
And she was always, I mean, it was in her line it came down, and she
would always say, "You don't live on that. You live
up to it."
- FRANCES WEAVER:
-
Well, that's an enormous influence on a young person.
- GEORGE ESSER:
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Knowing that, what I read about Jefferson had a real impact on me, too. I
don't say I have ever been a great scholar.
There's some things I read intensively, but I
don't, my son, John, is a much better scholar than I am.
I'm not a very good scholar. I tend to read too fast to be a
good scholar. But anyhow, I early understood that Jefferson really stood
for things that the Roosevelt administration stood
for more than the Republicans.