Biography
Alberta Beaman Pugh was born in Buxton, Iowa, in 1917 to Archie and Julia Boyd Beaman. She was one of ten children. Her mother supported the family after her father was blinded by a dynamite blast while working in a coal mine. After moving to Waterloo in 1929, Beaman attended Grant School, East Junior High, and East High. She later got married (first to Richard E. Joyce in 1936, and later to Leslie Pugh), had children, and became a homemaker. Pugh had four children, ten grandchildren, 20 great-grandchildren, and 11 great-great-grandchildren. Pugh worked washing dishes, and later served as head cook, at the Elks Club. Alberta Beaman Pugh died in 2013 at the age of 95. Biographical information found in Pugh’s obituary as published in the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier.
Found in 1 Collection or Record:
Scope and Contents
Alberta Beaman Pugh and Shirley Joyce's interview focuses on Julia Boyd Beaman, mother to Pugh and grandmother to Joyce. Pugh discusses Beaman's work washing laundry for white families, as well as her own work as a child picking up and delivering laundry and pumping and carrying water with her siblings. Pugh speaks about not experiencing segregation in Buxton and says she did not see things like segregated water fountains or restrooms until she traveled to Alabama.Joyce describes accompanying Beaman when she did housekeeping work, remembering that she would help with dusting. She recalls that the white family her grandmother worked for treated her with respect (“They treated her more like one of their friends”), and that they would sometimes give her additional money, food, and secondhand children’s clothing. Joyce remembers that she and her grandmother shared meals with the family they worked for. She also mentions being able to use the restroom at the...
Dates:
2011-01-29
