April 16, 2024 • 36 mins
Pat Koch and an army of figurative elves respond to upwards of 30,000 letters per year that are addressed to Santa Claus and miraculously arrive in their town of Santa Claus, Indiana. No one is paying them to do this, they're just normal folks doing the right thing because they can. And Pat is officially the "Chief Elf" of the town!
Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/premium
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
When my kid was five years old from Memphis, back
when one of them was five. If they wrote a
letter to Santa Claus and put a stamp on it,
does it just get to.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
You, guys? Somehow does the Post office honor that tradition?
How does it work? That's how it works, no kidding.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
It works if it says a guy in the big
red suit. If it says North Pole, you know it's
that Christmas season. If we could be that way all
year long, wouldn't it be wonderful? I mean, everybody along
the way will add an address, will add PO Box one,
Santa Claus, Indiana. This past season we called from Thanksgiving
(00:47):
to Christmas over twenty three thousand letters.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
We'll see three thousand letters that have to be answered.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Yes, yes, and some years it's thirty thousand.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Cortney.
I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, I'm a father,
I'm an entrepreneur, and I've been a football coach an
inner city Memphis. And the last part unintentionally led to
an oscar for the film about our team. It's called Undefeated. Guys,
I believe our country's problems will never be solved by
(01:24):
a bunch of fancy people in nice suits talking big
words that nobody understands on CNN and Fox, but rather
by an army of normal folks us just you and
me deciding hey, I can help. That's what Pat Cook,
the voice we just heard, has done. Pat is the
chief Elf, believe it or not, of Santa Claus, Indiana,
(01:48):
a town that somehow got that name and somehow gets
tens of thousands of letters addressed to Santa Claus every
single year, and Pat and her army of elves have
carried on a legacy of responding to each of those
letters every Christmas. I cannot wait for you to meet Pat.
(02:10):
Right after these brief messages from our general sponsors, today's
episode is really going to be fun. It is after
(02:33):
having conversations about some really deep subject matter with addiction
and unwed mothers and tattoo removal and a lot of heavy,
heavy stuff we've talked about over the last few weeks.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
I'm really looking forward to our chat today.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
We're talking with miss Pat Cook from Santa Claus, Indiana
hat store. He goes way back and it's really interesting
and Pat, I just want to thank you so much
for joining me today.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
I'm glad to be here. Love to talk to people,
love to talk about the town. Really, I'm so in
love with the town and with the wonderful people who
bring joy to so many kids.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Well, you know, my first exposure to Santa Claus, Indiana
is just a street sign.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Really.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
I think there's an exit somewhere in Indiana, there's an
exit on the Interstate that there's a sign that says
Santa Claus, Indiana.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
If I'm not right, isn't that right? Yes?
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Yeah, So I was driving down the Interstate going to
sell lumber up in Elkhart, Indiana, on the way from
Memphis on my first trip up there twenty something years ago,
and I remember passing that sign, and of course I
giggled to myself, like anybody, my giggles, who would name
a town in Santa Claus, Indiana?
Speaker 2 (03:56):
And you know, it just it was kind of a
warm chuckle. And to be speaking with you.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
Now, So first of all, tell me about you, Tell
me about when you're born, and tell me about you know,
how you got to Santa Claus, and just give me
a little background on the pat world.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
Okay, I was born Patricia Anna in a little German
town called Maria Hilf, which means Mary Help. Very Roman
Catholic part of the world, very German. Was born August fourteenth,
nineteen thirty one.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Nineteen thirty one, you're at least forty.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Now, I am, yes, a little bit over.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
Nineteen thirty one.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Pat, you put the year out there, that's I'm sixty nine,
seventy nine, how old?
Speaker 2 (04:57):
That's ninety I need three or so.
Speaker 3 (05:01):
I'm ninety two and a half.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Wow, that is amazing. And I'm gonna tell you something.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
You know, an army of normal folks is audio only,
so people don't get to see you.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
But Pat, you are handling ninety three like a champ.
You look great. You don't look ninety three. I don't
know what ninety three is supposed to look like, but
that's not it.
Speaker 3 (05:21):
Oh that's right. I don't know either. I don't know
how I'm supposed to look or at so I just
knew me. No, I'm very fortunate. My mother was a beautiful,
lovely woman who lived to be ninety eight, had beautiful
white hair. Grew up there and to the Benedictine's sisters
from Ferdinand Indiana, who have a great beautiful monastery there
(05:44):
only about fifteen miles away where the teachers in the
grade school grades one to eight. So grades one to
four we're in one room. In grades five to eight
we're in another room. And we got an absolutely wonderful education.
We learned to read, write and spell, we learned to pray,
We learned and learned to spinging, singing German and Latin.
(06:06):
And I'm very grateful, grateful for that wonderful education. How
to write cursive, imagine that. And then I went to
Dale High School, which was also about ten miles away,
and it was actually just a it was not a
Catholic high school. I met some other people from other
religions and other walks of life, small Towndale, great basketball team.
(06:30):
Loved high school, loved every bit of it. Cheerleader on
the student council, all that stuff, got involved, had bunches
of meetings, had a lot of fun. Loved my high
school years. My mother and father they sort of let
I only had one brother and he was three years
older than me, so he graduated from high school and
(06:53):
joined the navy and left home. My dad had It's
hard for me to tell this whole story. But my dad,
dad had been in the navy for fourteen years and
had left the navy early because he had had that
he and my mother had had my brother, and he
went back to Mura Hill and saw the beauty of
a small town and decided to leave the navy and
(07:16):
come back to Mariah Hill. And that's what he did
in nineteen thirty So I was born. Then the year
later he had had a roadhouse in Chicago during Prohibition. Wonderful,
great stories they told about getting their beer cakes at night,
in the dark of night with men with guns, and well,
(07:37):
I had a childhood of being in My father built
the first tavern that they built, called the Diamond Tavern.
I have pictures of myself in front of that. I
don't know if that burned or I don't know if
he if they just demolished it or what. But then
he built the chateau because he had been in France
(07:58):
during World War One and he loved the chateaus. It
was a beautiful brick structure. It looked like a chateau.
So I grew up in a bar, pool room, and
dance hall, and that was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
I bet it was a lot of fun. It was
a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
I learned to play pool at a very young age.
My mother took me to tap dancing lessons. I learned
tap dance, so in the dance part of the room
of the chateau, I would dance, so people would throw
quarters and nickels at me. So I was an entrepreneur
from the very beginning. And of course I lived through
(08:35):
World War Two. I was born in thirty one, so
you're talking forty one, forty seven, and forty six. Saw
the soldiers coming home, sitting at the bar having a
beer and then seeing a flag in the window meaning
a gold star mother, and we lost a lot of
young men, a lot of young men. So I grew
(08:58):
up during that. But that was my high school days.
So except for being aware of rationing gas, rushing sugar,
rationing coffee, we had. My father then went to work
in Evansville as a shipyard supervisor because in Evansville, Indiana,
they made the LSTs on the Ohio River. You know
(09:20):
what the LSTs were?
Speaker 2 (09:24):
First? They were?
Speaker 3 (09:26):
What my first question.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
To you LST. I don't tell me.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
I really want to guess LST were I No, I
don't know it doesn't sound like an overly large boat,
so maybe recon boats.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
LST stands for landing ships tanks really, and they were
very large. They were made so that they had a
huge There is one still in Evansville that's on display
in his history Oracle LST. And my father accompanied them
(10:05):
to New Orleans and handed them over to the navy.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Are they the boats with the with the big thing
that flops down so the troops get in them, they
go to an assaulted beach, the front flops down and
everybody runs off the front office.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
They were at Normandy. They were at Normandy. They were
at Evil Regima.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
Yes, everybody that's watched the World War two movie has
seen those. And your father overseed the manufacturing, oversaw the manufacture.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
Of those, and my mother Christen, no kidding, that is wow?
Speaker 3 (10:37):
What is Yes? So the war came and Dad was
in Evansville, and so my brother, my mother and I
were running the chateau and we had to close. I
think it was ten o'clock. It had to be dark,
I know that. But so I spent more time in
the after school, I'd be in the chateau and it
(11:00):
was an interesting, interesting way to start your life. Then
I went to Dale High School, and somehow or other,
the sisters had put into my being a love for education,
a love for learning. I love to read, I love
to spell, I love to do English. Didn't like math
(11:21):
very much, but so I really wanted an education after
high school. Now that I was a girl, you know,
in nineteen forty eight, I graduated from high school at
the age of sixteen. Because three of us either did
grades two and three at one year, or we skipped.
We don't know. The other girl has passed away. The
(11:44):
other boy is a priest in a nursing home and
he doesn't know either. But we were all three good readers,
good spellers. I don't think we learned much math. But anyway,
I graduated of sixteen, and I thought I want to
go to college. My mom and dad had both had
six grade educations, really weren't very interested in that. So
(12:07):
I worked for a year to be a little older
to be able to apply to a nursing school. And
I tell this story to young women and boys too.
But for some strange reason, first I went into the
principal's office and said I'd like to go to college
because four boys in our class had gone to college.
(12:29):
No girls, are you? They went to Nana University and
I said I'd like to go to college, and my
wonderful principal, who was a good man, said to me,
why would a girl want to go to college. That
was the end of my quest for college. And I
really didn't think I had a chance, but I wanted
an education. So I went to Dale, got on the
(12:52):
greyhound bus by myself, which I have no idea how
I did that, went to Evansville, Indiana where the Sister
Daughters of Charity. I don't know, Bill, if you know,
they're the ones with the big wings, with the find.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
The big hats, big hats.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
They were in charge of that hospital. And I wrote
myself to nursing school. That was my beginning to I
guess my life.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
And now a few messages from our general sponsors. But first,
if an army of normal folks has impacted you or
inspired you to take action, I really want to hear
about it. Write me anytime at Bill at normalfolks dot
us and I'll respond.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
I want to hear about it. We'll be right back.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
The first year of nurses training made a lot of friends,
had a lot of fun, Big town of Evansville, INDWNA,
which is on the Ohio River, boating out to Duck Island,
doing a lot of fun stuff, but love nursing. The
beginning of the second year of nurses training, a very
(14:24):
charismatic priest named Father I knew his name, I forgot it.
In a big, long black cassock with a belt of
leather and sandals came in to give a retreat and
talk to us about our religion and about you know,
being Catholic and that sort of thing. And he was
(14:48):
so wonderful. He talked about serving and giving and not
thinking of south but thinking of others. And I was hooked.
And so I went home and told my mom and
dad that I wanted to be a sister, and I
wanted to be the kind of sister that ran that
hospital because they were fun. They weren't boring, they were fun,
(15:13):
They laughed, they joked, they were very professional, they were
very smart, they were very educated. And that's what I
wanted to be. And so I had to wait a
year till I was almost eighteen, got into the Daughters
of Charity and was sent to Saint Louis to what
(15:36):
they called the postulancy, and that was three months and
then a year in seminary at the mother House, beautiful,
beautiful building. A year of almost complete silence. We talked
only at recreation, which was twice a day. Big change
(15:57):
from this girl that was having a lot of fun
is training, dating and doing all the things young women do.
But I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was peaceful. I felt
like I was becoming someone I wasn't before. So at
(16:19):
the end of that year and three months, almost a
year and a half, I received the habit, which was
the big hat and the beautiful blue outfit, and was
sent to a hotel, New House of God in New
Orleans to complete my RN and then was spential Loyola
University part time to get a bachelor's degree. So I
(16:40):
spent about five years in New Orleans.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Loved it.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
Wonderful town, you know, the people loved the sisters. They
had been in that hospital. They had Charity Hospital, which
was a very poor hospital that took in very poor people,
and I did my pediatric experience there. Psychiatric hospital also
belonged to them, so it was just a wonderful experience.
(17:06):
But then I had a wonderful the Daughter's to Charity,
the head of the hospital was called the Sister Servant.
I think that's an amazing title. Servant. You know, she
was the servant of the hospital, the servant of the sisters,
the servant of the patients. And she was such a
role model to me. I just admired her. She was
(17:27):
once again, smart, fair, tough, absolutely knew her business, knew
how to. She said to me one time something I
never forgot. I'm not running a person at popularity contest,
I'm running a hospital. And she did that. And so
(17:48):
at some point after the five years there, I got
word that I was to go to Saint Louis University
to get a bachelor's degree in nursing full time. Did
that full time. Love that, loved it, loved going to school,
loved stayed at the mother House where there was prayer
and beautiful chapel. After that mission, which was mean, I
(18:09):
was sent to Chicago, Saint Joseph's Hospital in Chicago, whole
different world, whole different world. I was still, you know, eighteen,
know I was older that I was twenty by that time.
And that hospital, the Sister Servant was not like the
one had been in New Orleans. We worked so very hard,
(18:33):
moving beds empty and garbage, doing laundry. There wasn't as
much time for fun, if that's the right word. In
New Orleans, Sister Carlo said, let us go out into
Carter and buy somebody to look at Christmas lights. We
went out to lake concentrating and jumped in the water.
Things that gave us courage again to keep on going.
(18:56):
But that wasn't the case in Chicago. And one night
I got a call from somebody, and I know not who.
I can't remember that like it happened that my father
had had a heart attack at the American Legion, which
he founded because he was a veteran in Santa Claus.
(19:17):
Santa Claus American Legion, and they said my father had
had a heart attack and they had brought him home.
My mother was ill, my brother was in the navy,
and I was never The Daughters of Charity were never
allowed to come back home after they entered the Order.
It was a rule that Saint Vincent Paul made because
(19:38):
he went home to his father and mother one time
and then he hesitated to go back to his parish,
so he said, you will not return home ever. So
I was not ever supposed to go home but I said,
I've been taking care of all these people in New
Orleans and in Chicago, and I should be able to
(19:58):
take care of my mother and father. They were alone.
My mother wasn't well, and so I did that. I
left probably one of the hardest things I ever did
in my life. Really, it was just very difficult. I
loved the daughters, I loved nursing. It was a great life.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
It is amazing to me that from sixteen to twenty
you have more life than some people too, back in
their thirties.
Speaker 3 (20:26):
Came home on the train from Saint Louis to Washington, Indiana.
It was February and it was sewing like crazy. I
was wearing a It was I think Squad Valley. You
remember Squad Valley Olympics, right skiing yep. And I had
on a cap because we had practically no hair under
(20:48):
all of that.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
Had to go.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
Find some clothes, didn't have clothes, didn't know what size
of war, didn't know anything, didn't know about a hamburger,
didn't know much. But got on that train and my
mother said, I can't come get you, and Dad come
catch you. So we're going to send Bill. Bill was
built Cook Koch his family had a business in Evansville,
(21:15):
and his father had come to Santa Claus, Indiana after
he retired with a heart attack, to find out that
there's nothing in Santa Claus, Indiana for children. And he
had nine children, and he was a very good grandpa, dad,
wonderful man, very smart. Cook family is very smart. And
(21:38):
so he went to Santa Claus, Indiana and said, I
have to do something. There's to be something here for children.
So he built a very small theme park called Santa
claus Land, and it was built for small children. At
that time, his son, Bill had been in the Navy,
graduated from the Naval Academy, come back home, started to
(22:03):
get into the family business in Evansville, decided it wasn't
for him and asked his father if he could come
to Santa Claus and take over that little park. And
his father told me that he didn't think it would
make anything. It was just going to be a little
kiddy park. And so he came there in forty seven.
(22:23):
I'm pretty sure because grandpa started the park in forty six.
And so the man that my mother sent to pick
me up at the train station was that Bill.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Cook, who's who ends up being my husband. So you
grow up. Your father's a World War two, a World
War one vat. Then he's building the boats that we
used to go to Normandy and he would GiMA, you
(22:57):
want to learn and go to college.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
You end up coming a nun.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
Then you leave being a nun to take care of
your ailing parents, and you end up in lo and
behold Santa Claus and end up marrying the guy that
picks you up to take you to your parents' house.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
What a crazy story.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
So let's we were married forty years. He was sixteen
years older than me, and well, Natalie sitting here, they're
very smart. So my kids are really smart because I'm
married a smart man.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
But I think they have a pretty smart mob too.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
It was a great marriage because if you can't tell,
I'm the people person. He was the engineer, graduate, Naval Academy,
numbers guy, planner, dreamer. I was the down to earth
let's get this work done. We were a great team.
Speaker 2 (23:49):
That's an awesome story. We'll be right back.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
So you're in Santa Claus, and Santa Claus the city
who names the town Santa Claus.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
How did that happen?
Speaker 3 (24:17):
Well, you know, I started in a museum, so in
the museum you have to come see us. There is
the document eighteen fifty six. There was a postmaster in Fulda,
and he decided that this little town that my grandmother
called Santa Fe, Grandma Apollonia always called the town center Fee.
(24:40):
Now I thought it was she was wrong that in
my day we didn't correct our grandparents. So she was right.
It was Santa Fe. And we have a plat map
of the town of Santa Fe. Very rural, but it
was laid out in streets. It had creamery, a school,
a doctor and in residence, and it was a very
(25:04):
small town. So the guy from full to the postmaster
thought they need a post office, and he applied to
Washington City, it says up at the top of the
document for a post office, and gave the description, and
whoever looked at that said, choose another name than Santa Fe.
(25:26):
I don't know if they weren't very smart, or if
they didn't see the two ease, or what happened. But
there was already a post office called Santa Fe in Indiana,
so someone who I can't find out wrote Santa Claus
at the bottom of black ink. Were no computers, so
(25:47):
it's just it said Santa Claus, and that somebody marked
through that, and somebody wrote seed lick or sad lick
over here that was crossed through, and then somebody wrote
Santa Close with an eat, which is not correct. But
the magic of that whole thing is that the postmaster
who asks for that town to get a post office
(26:10):
called Santa Claus was named Nicolaus Fisher.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
You've got to be kidnaped like Saint Nick. Yep, it's
all that is.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
That is iriny of iriny. And so all this happened
in the mid eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
Yes, eighteen fifty six, right, Natalik again unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (26:29):
So now because of the United States Postal Service, this
little town in Indiana, Santa Fee becomes Santa Claus so
they can get a post office.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
But later when your dad's their letters start arriving.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
We are told that letters were arriving in nineteen fourteen,
but we can't find any document about that. But we
do have a history of the line of postmasters, and
we do have the original post office building, which was
a log building, and I have that moved on the
(27:11):
grounds of the museum. It is there, very small log
covered over now the logs covered over. But it was
a very small building with a fireplace and no bathroom,
so I'm sure there was an outhouse, probably a spring,
I don't know, but that's how they lived. So yes,
(27:32):
then Dad when he came home in thirty and built
the Diamond Tavern and then the chateau. You know, he
was very interested in the town and he would go
visit the postmaster at that time Martin James Martin. A
lot of people from that area were from Alsis, Lorraine,
which was sometimes under the fringe, sometimes under the German,
(27:54):
so they were actually Marten, but it got changed to
Martin in the United States. And my dad saw how
many letters they were getting that were from children to
the town of Santa Claus, and with his love for
now didn't put in the peace of why my dad
really got interested in helping kids and being Santa Claus.
(28:17):
When he was in the Navy and he was nineteen
years old, he was on a ship called the USS
New York in Brooklyn Navy Yard and they decided to
have a Christmas party for children, they called them disadvantaged children,
and they were preparing for the party and somebody in
command said, we need a Santa Claus. What will we do?
(28:40):
Somebody else said, there's a guy down in the engine
room that says he's from Santa Claus, Indiana. Why don't
we ask him? That was my dad.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
That's hilarious, isn't it.
Speaker 3 (28:55):
And I have the picture of him on board ship
in the worst outfit you ever in the life, the
worst beard you've ever seen, this artificial beer. But the
kids all around him just so excited and so happy.
And he told me, and it's in literature that he
made a vow to God that if he lived through
(29:15):
the war, he would be Santa Claus.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
And ends up living in Santa Claus.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
In Maria Hill, but spent most of his time in
Santa Claus. And that's when he saw the postmaster being
inundated with letters and said, I have to do something
to help these. This postmaster is so busy, he can't
do all of this. So he started picking up letters
and putting him in his car, taking around to schools,
(29:44):
to the sisters of Ferdinand. There's an abbey at Saint
Minrid Typing class Adale High School. Whoever could answer letters?
God letters, you know, it just became his passion. And
then he just started being Santa Claus more and more
and more and being more involved in that with going
to lead. He was a big legionaire. So he would
(30:05):
go to legions for Christmas parties and wait. He was
in parades in New York, Miami. He just flew in
a helicopter to in Annapolis, Hotoy, and I'll be sho.
He became famous. Really, he was on so many programs.
But he was such a veteran. He was such a
caring person, He was such a a he loved kids,
(30:29):
and he was Santa Claus then from nineteen thirty one
until nineteen eighty four when he passed away fifty three years.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Things are so much different today and handedly I've raised
for kids, and it seems like with more and more TV,
more and more social media, and more and more exposure
kids expectations and wishes and dreams are vastly different today
(31:02):
when I was only a kid, and I'm sure I
was vastly different than two generations before me.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Do you have a sense of what a kid's.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
Letter back in the nineteen thirties and forties to Santa Claus,
what they asked for?
Speaker 3 (31:22):
Yes, my father saved them. I have them at the museum.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
Amazing, What did they say? Give me a couple of
examples of your favorite.
Speaker 3 (31:31):
Almost tell you. This letter comes from Catherine, and Catherine
says that she's writing for her brothers and sisters. She
asks for gloves for John Mitten's first I can't name
the children, but it was gloves, underwear. Mitten sucks shoes.
(31:55):
And then she says, mama's fat, but she doesn't want anything.
And then she names all the children and they were
like twelve, eleven, ten, nine, eight, and she says, and
the others are dead.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (32:11):
And she says, I'm writing this for them, and so
if you could bring them something, I would be so happy.
And that letter is in a book that I have
co authored that's Letters to Santa from nineteen thirty on.
They're written on all kinds of paper. They're all like that,
(32:32):
asking just for the things they need, food, clothing. And
then it actually when you see the letters, it's almost
history because you can see how it changed eventually. Now
it's computers.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
Well, And I wonder when you think about that context
and people today that say they're broke or they're or
they really have they really are losing sight of what
people only a couple of generations back really suffered.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
In our country.
Speaker 3 (33:19):
Yes, but I think some people today are suffering like
that because they don't have the means that they would
like to have. My grandmother who stayed with when we
my moment Dad would be at the chateau, she spoke
German and she would walk out in the garden with
third night in the nineteen forties and she would say,
(33:40):
as he's new molchendo. That translates not well to it
is no longer nice here. So Grandma, who at that
time probably was in her sixties, thought it wasn't nice
in the forties. And I think that's that's culture, or
that's just the way it is. Things changed, and I
(34:01):
don't like that much change. I know that, he said. Yesterday, No,
last night, I was at a book club and this
woman said children have no respect these days. And I
stopped and I said, there are some children who don't
have respect. But two weeks ago, I was at the
(34:22):
local high school, lucky to be there when the sophomore
girls from the two high schools in our county, South
Spencer and North Spencer came together in a wonderful program
called Aspire, and it was done by the Chamber of
Commerce and some other organizations that they would bring in
(34:42):
professional women to talk to these young women in sophomore
classes in our high schools to give them an idea
of what they could do, that they can do things,
that they can get an education. And those young peop
this was a whole high school gym full of young women.
(35:03):
We're so respectful. So they listened, they took part, and
they moved around from table to table to talk to
a doctor, to a chiropractor, to a hairdresser, to a mother,
to a chef, all these different people so they'd get
an idea of what they might want to be. While
(35:24):
I talked to some children, there was one who wants
to join the FBI, there was one who wants to
be an engineer. There's one who wanted to be a mother.
And those young people, there are still those young people
in the world, and we just hear about the bad ones.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
I love that perspective.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
And that concludes part one of my conversation with Pat Cook,
and you don't want to miss part two that's now
available to listen to as the Chief Elf will warm
your heart even more. Together, guys, we can change the country,
but it starts with you. I'll see in part two
When my kid was five years old from Memphis, back
when one of them was five. If they wrote a
letter to Santa Claus and put a stamp on it,
does it just get to.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
You, guys? Somehow does the Post office honor that tradition?
How does it work? That's how it works, no kidding.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
It works if it says a guy in the big
red suit. If it says North Pole, you know it's
that Christmas season. If we could be that way all
year long, wouldn't it be wonderful? I mean, everybody along
the way will add an address, will add PO Box one,
Santa Claus, Indiana. This past season we called from Thanksgiving
(00:47):
to Christmas over twenty three thousand letters.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
We'll see three thousand letters that have to be answered.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Yes, yes, and some years it's thirty thousand.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Cortney.
I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband, I'm a father,
I'm an entrepreneur, and I've been a football coach an
inner city Memphis. And the last part unintentionally led to
an oscar for the film about our team. It's called Undefeated. Guys,
I believe our country's problems will never be solved by
(01:24):
a bunch of fancy people in nice suits talking big
words that nobody understands on CNN and Fox, but rather
by an army of normal folks us just you and
me deciding hey, I can help. That's what Pat Cook,
the voice we just heard, has done. Pat is the
chief Elf, believe it or not, of Santa Claus, Indiana,
(01:48):
a town that somehow got that name and somehow gets
tens of thousands of letters addressed to Santa Claus every
single year, and Pat and her army of elves have
carried on a legacy of responding to each of those
letters every Christmas. I cannot wait for you to meet Pat.
(02:10):
Right after these brief messages from our general sponsors, today's
episode is really going to be fun. It is after
(02:33):
having conversations about some really deep subject matter with addiction
and unwed mothers and tattoo removal and a lot of heavy,
heavy stuff we've talked about over the last few weeks.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
I'm really looking forward to our chat today.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
We're talking with miss Pat Cook from Santa Claus, Indiana
hat store. He goes way back and it's really interesting
and Pat, I just want to thank you so much
for joining me today.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
I'm glad to be here. Love to talk to people,
love to talk about the town. Really, I'm so in
love with the town and with the wonderful people who
bring joy to so many kids.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Well, you know, my first exposure to Santa Claus, Indiana
is just a street sign.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Really.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
I think there's an exit somewhere in Indiana, there's an
exit on the Interstate that there's a sign that says
Santa Claus, Indiana.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
If I'm not right, isn't that right? Yes?
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Yeah, So I was driving down the Interstate going to
sell lumber up in Elkhart, Indiana, on the way from
Memphis on my first trip up there twenty something years ago,
and I remember passing that sign, and of course I
giggled to myself, like anybody, my giggles, who would name
a town in Santa Claus, Indiana?
Speaker 2 (03:56):
And you know, it just it was kind of a
warm chuckle. And to be speaking with you.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
Now, So first of all, tell me about you, Tell
me about when you're born, and tell me about you know,
how you got to Santa Claus, and just give me
a little background on the pat world.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
Okay, I was born Patricia Anna in a little German
town called Maria Hilf, which means Mary Help. Very Roman
Catholic part of the world, very German. Was born August fourteenth,
nineteen thirty one.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Nineteen thirty one, you're at least forty.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
Now, I am, yes, a little bit over.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
Nineteen thirty one.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Pat, you put the year out there, that's I'm sixty nine,
seventy nine, how old?
Speaker 2 (04:57):
That's ninety I need three or so.
Speaker 3 (05:01):
I'm ninety two and a half.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Wow, that is amazing. And I'm gonna tell you something.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
You know, an army of normal folks is audio only,
so people don't get to see you.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
But Pat, you are handling ninety three like a champ.
You look great. You don't look ninety three. I don't
know what ninety three is supposed to look like, but
that's not it.
Speaker 3 (05:21):
Oh that's right. I don't know either. I don't know
how I'm supposed to look or at so I just
knew me. No, I'm very fortunate. My mother was a beautiful,
lovely woman who lived to be ninety eight, had beautiful
white hair. Grew up there and to the Benedictine's sisters
from Ferdinand Indiana, who have a great beautiful monastery there
(05:44):
only about fifteen miles away where the teachers in the
grade school grades one to eight. So grades one to
four we're in one room. In grades five to eight
we're in another room. And we got an absolutely wonderful education.
We learned to read, write and spell, we learned to pray,
We learned and learned to spinging, singing German and Latin.
(06:06):
And I'm very grateful, grateful for that wonderful education. How
to write cursive, imagine that. And then I went to
Dale High School, which was also about ten miles away,
and it was actually just a it was not a
Catholic high school. I met some other people from other
religions and other walks of life, small Towndale, great basketball team.
(06:30):
Loved high school, loved every bit of it. Cheerleader on
the student council, all that stuff, got involved, had bunches
of meetings, had a lot of fun. Loved my high
school years. My mother and father they sort of let
I only had one brother and he was three years
older than me, so he graduated from high school and
(06:53):
joined the navy and left home. My dad had It's
hard for me to tell this whole story. But my dad,
dad had been in the navy for fourteen years and
had left the navy early because he had had that
he and my mother had had my brother, and he
went back to Mura Hill and saw the beauty of
a small town and decided to leave the navy and
(07:16):
come back to Mariah Hill. And that's what he did
in nineteen thirty So I was born. Then the year
later he had had a roadhouse in Chicago during Prohibition. Wonderful,
great stories they told about getting their beer cakes at night,
in the dark of night with men with guns, and well,
(07:37):
I had a childhood of being in My father built
the first tavern that they built, called the Diamond Tavern.
I have pictures of myself in front of that. I
don't know if that burned or I don't know if
he if they just demolished it or what. But then
he built the chateau because he had been in France
(07:58):
during World War One and he loved the chateaus. It
was a beautiful brick structure. It looked like a chateau.
So I grew up in a bar, pool room, and
dance hall, and that was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
I bet it was a lot of fun. It was
a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
I learned to play pool at a very young age.
My mother took me to tap dancing lessons. I learned
tap dance, so in the dance part of the room
of the chateau, I would dance, so people would throw
quarters and nickels at me. So I was an entrepreneur
from the very beginning. And of course I lived through
(08:35):
World War Two. I was born in thirty one, so
you're talking forty one, forty seven, and forty six. Saw
the soldiers coming home, sitting at the bar having a
beer and then seeing a flag in the window meaning
a gold star mother, and we lost a lot of
young men, a lot of young men. So I grew
(08:58):
up during that. But that was my high school days.
So except for being aware of rationing gas, rushing sugar,
rationing coffee, we had. My father then went to work
in Evansville as a shipyard supervisor because in Evansville, Indiana,
they made the LSTs on the Ohio River. You know
(09:20):
what the LSTs were?
Speaker 2 (09:24):
First? They were?
Speaker 3 (09:26):
What my first question.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
To you LST. I don't tell me.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
I really want to guess LST were I No, I
don't know it doesn't sound like an overly large boat,
so maybe recon boats.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
LST stands for landing ships tanks really, and they were
very large. They were made so that they had a
huge There is one still in Evansville that's on display
in his history Oracle LST. And my father accompanied them
(10:05):
to New Orleans and handed them over to the navy.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Are they the boats with the with the big thing
that flops down so the troops get in them, they
go to an assaulted beach, the front flops down and
everybody runs off the front office.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
They were at Normandy. They were at Normandy. They were
at Evil Regima.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
Yes, everybody that's watched the World War two movie has
seen those. And your father overseed the manufacturing, oversaw the manufacture.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
Of those, and my mother Christen, no kidding, that is wow?
Speaker 3 (10:37):
What is Yes? So the war came and Dad was
in Evansville, and so my brother, my mother and I
were running the chateau and we had to close. I
think it was ten o'clock. It had to be dark,
I know that. But so I spent more time in
the after school, I'd be in the chateau and it
(11:00):
was an interesting, interesting way to start your life. Then
I went to Dale High School, and somehow or other,
the sisters had put into my being a love for education,
a love for learning. I love to read, I love
to spell, I love to do English. Didn't like math
(11:21):
very much, but so I really wanted an education after
high school. Now that I was a girl, you know,
in nineteen forty eight, I graduated from high school at
the age of sixteen. Because three of us either did
grades two and three at one year, or we skipped.
We don't know. The other girl has passed away. The
(11:44):
other boy is a priest in a nursing home and
he doesn't know either. But we were all three good readers,
good spellers. I don't think we learned much math. But anyway,
I graduated of sixteen, and I thought I want to
go to college. My mom and dad had both had
six grade educations, really weren't very interested in that. So
(12:07):
I worked for a year to be a little older
to be able to apply to a nursing school. And
I tell this story to young women and boys too.
But for some strange reason, first I went into the
principal's office and said I'd like to go to college
because four boys in our class had gone to college.
(12:29):
No girls, are you? They went to Nana University and
I said I'd like to go to college, and my
wonderful principal, who was a good man, said to me,
why would a girl want to go to college. That
was the end of my quest for college. And I
really didn't think I had a chance, but I wanted
an education. So I went to Dale, got on the
(12:52):
greyhound bus by myself, which I have no idea how
I did that, went to Evansville, Indiana where the Sister
Daughters of Charity. I don't know, Bill, if you know,
they're the ones with the big wings, with the find.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
The big hats, big hats.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
They were in charge of that hospital. And I wrote
myself to nursing school. That was my beginning to I
guess my life.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
And now a few messages from our general sponsors. But first,
if an army of normal folks has impacted you or
inspired you to take action, I really want to hear
about it. Write me anytime at Bill at normalfolks dot
us and I'll respond.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
I want to hear about it. We'll be right back.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
The first year of nurses training made a lot of friends,
had a lot of fun, Big town of Evansville, INDWNA,
which is on the Ohio River, boating out to Duck Island,
doing a lot of fun stuff, but love nursing. The
beginning of the second year of nurses training, a very
(14:24):
charismatic priest named Father I knew his name, I forgot it.
In a big, long black cassock with a belt of
leather and sandals came in to give a retreat and
talk to us about our religion and about you know,
being Catholic and that sort of thing. And he was
(14:48):
so wonderful. He talked about serving and giving and not
thinking of south but thinking of others. And I was hooked.
And so I went home and told my mom and
dad that I wanted to be a sister, and I
wanted to be the kind of sister that ran that
hospital because they were fun. They weren't boring, they were fun,
(15:13):
They laughed, they joked, they were very professional, they were
very smart, they were very educated. And that's what I
wanted to be. And so I had to wait a
year till I was almost eighteen, got into the Daughters
of Charity and was sent to Saint Louis to what
(15:36):
they called the postulancy, and that was three months and
then a year in seminary at the mother House, beautiful,
beautiful building. A year of almost complete silence. We talked
only at recreation, which was twice a day. Big change
(15:57):
from this girl that was having a lot of fun
is training, dating and doing all the things young women do.
But I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was peaceful. I felt
like I was becoming someone I wasn't before. So at
(16:19):
the end of that year and three months, almost a
year and a half, I received the habit, which was
the big hat and the beautiful blue outfit, and was
sent to a hotel, New House of God in New
Orleans to complete my RN and then was spential Loyola
University part time to get a bachelor's degree. So I
(16:40):
spent about five years in New Orleans.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Loved it.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
Wonderful town, you know, the people loved the sisters. They
had been in that hospital. They had Charity Hospital, which
was a very poor hospital that took in very poor people,
and I did my pediatric experience there. Psychiatric hospital also
belonged to them, so it was just a wonderful experience.
(17:06):
But then I had a wonderful the Daughter's to Charity,
the head of the hospital was called the Sister Servant.
I think that's an amazing title. Servant. You know, she
was the servant of the hospital, the servant of the sisters,
the servant of the patients. And she was such a
role model to me. I just admired her. She was
(17:27):
once again, smart, fair, tough, absolutely knew her business, knew
how to. She said to me one time something I
never forgot. I'm not running a person at popularity contest,
I'm running a hospital. And she did that. And so
(17:48):
at some point after the five years there, I got
word that I was to go to Saint Louis University
to get a bachelor's degree in nursing full time. Did
that full time. Love that, loved it, loved going to school,
loved stayed at the mother House where there was prayer
and beautiful chapel. After that mission, which was mean, I
(18:09):
was sent to Chicago, Saint Joseph's Hospital in Chicago, whole
different world, whole different world. I was still, you know, eighteen,
know I was older that I was twenty by that time.
And that hospital, the Sister Servant was not like the
one had been in New Orleans. We worked so very hard,
(18:33):
moving beds empty and garbage, doing laundry. There wasn't as
much time for fun, if that's the right word. In
New Orleans, Sister Carlo said, let us go out into
Carter and buy somebody to look at Christmas lights. We
went out to lake concentrating and jumped in the water.
Things that gave us courage again to keep on going.
(18:56):
But that wasn't the case in Chicago. And one night
I got a call from somebody, and I know not who.
I can't remember that like it happened that my father
had had a heart attack at the American Legion, which
he founded because he was a veteran in Santa Claus.
(19:17):
Santa Claus American Legion, and they said my father had
had a heart attack and they had brought him home.
My mother was ill, my brother was in the navy,
and I was never The Daughters of Charity were never
allowed to come back home after they entered the Order.
It was a rule that Saint Vincent Paul made because
(19:38):
he went home to his father and mother one time
and then he hesitated to go back to his parish,
so he said, you will not return home ever. So
I was not ever supposed to go home but I said,
I've been taking care of all these people in New
Orleans and in Chicago, and I should be able to
(19:58):
take care of my mother and father. They were alone.
My mother wasn't well, and so I did that. I
left probably one of the hardest things I ever did
in my life. Really, it was just very difficult. I
loved the daughters, I loved nursing. It was a great life.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
It is amazing to me that from sixteen to twenty
you have more life than some people too, back in
their thirties.
Speaker 3 (20:26):
Came home on the train from Saint Louis to Washington, Indiana.
It was February and it was sewing like crazy. I
was wearing a It was I think Squad Valley. You
remember Squad Valley Olympics, right skiing yep. And I had
on a cap because we had practically no hair under
(20:48):
all of that.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
Had to go.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
Find some clothes, didn't have clothes, didn't know what size
of war, didn't know anything, didn't know about a hamburger,
didn't know much. But got on that train and my
mother said, I can't come get you, and Dad come
catch you. So we're going to send Bill. Bill was
built Cook Koch his family had a business in Evansville,
(21:15):
and his father had come to Santa Claus, Indiana after
he retired with a heart attack, to find out that
there's nothing in Santa Claus, Indiana for children. And he
had nine children, and he was a very good grandpa, dad,
wonderful man, very smart. Cook family is very smart. And
(21:38):
so he went to Santa Claus, Indiana and said, I
have to do something. There's to be something here for children.
So he built a very small theme park called Santa
claus Land, and it was built for small children. At
that time, his son, Bill had been in the Navy,
graduated from the Naval Academy, come back home, started to
(22:03):
get into the family business in Evansville, decided it wasn't
for him and asked his father if he could come
to Santa Claus and take over that little park. And
his father told me that he didn't think it would
make anything. It was just going to be a little
kiddy park. And so he came there in forty seven.
(22:23):
I'm pretty sure because grandpa started the park in forty six.
And so the man that my mother sent to pick
me up at the train station was that Bill.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Cook, who's who ends up being my husband. So you
grow up. Your father's a World War two, a World
War one vat. Then he's building the boats that we
used to go to Normandy and he would GiMA, you
(22:57):
want to learn and go to college.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
You end up coming a nun.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
Then you leave being a nun to take care of
your ailing parents, and you end up in lo and
behold Santa Claus and end up marrying the guy that
picks you up to take you to your parents' house.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
What a crazy story.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
So let's we were married forty years. He was sixteen
years older than me, and well, Natalie sitting here, they're
very smart. So my kids are really smart because I'm
married a smart man.
Speaker 1 (23:28):
But I think they have a pretty smart mob too.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
It was a great marriage because if you can't tell,
I'm the people person. He was the engineer, graduate, Naval Academy,
numbers guy, planner, dreamer. I was the down to earth
let's get this work done. We were a great team.
Speaker 2 (23:49):
That's an awesome story. We'll be right back.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
So you're in Santa Claus, and Santa Claus the city
who names the town Santa Claus.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
How did that happen?
Speaker 3 (24:17):
Well, you know, I started in a museum, so in
the museum you have to come see us. There is
the document eighteen fifty six. There was a postmaster in Fulda,
and he decided that this little town that my grandmother
called Santa Fe, Grandma Apollonia always called the town center Fee.
(24:40):
Now I thought it was she was wrong that in
my day we didn't correct our grandparents. So she was right.
It was Santa Fe. And we have a plat map
of the town of Santa Fe. Very rural, but it
was laid out in streets. It had creamery, a school,
a doctor and in residence, and it was a very
(25:04):
small town. So the guy from full to the postmaster
thought they need a post office, and he applied to
Washington City, it says up at the top of the
document for a post office, and gave the description, and
whoever looked at that said, choose another name than Santa Fe.
(25:26):
I don't know if they weren't very smart, or if
they didn't see the two ease, or what happened. But
there was already a post office called Santa Fe in Indiana,
so someone who I can't find out wrote Santa Claus
at the bottom of black ink. Were no computers, so
(25:47):
it's just it said Santa Claus, and that somebody marked
through that, and somebody wrote seed lick or sad lick
over here that was crossed through, and then somebody wrote
Santa Close with an eat, which is not correct. But
the magic of that whole thing is that the postmaster
who asks for that town to get a post office
(26:10):
called Santa Claus was named Nicolaus Fisher.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
You've got to be kidnaped like Saint Nick. Yep, it's
all that is.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
That is iriny of iriny. And so all this happened
in the mid eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
Yes, eighteen fifty six, right, Natalik again unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (26:29):
So now because of the United States Postal Service, this
little town in Indiana, Santa Fee becomes Santa Claus so
they can get a post office.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
But later when your dad's their letters start arriving.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
We are told that letters were arriving in nineteen fourteen,
but we can't find any document about that. But we
do have a history of the line of postmasters, and
we do have the original post office building, which was
a log building, and I have that moved on the
(27:11):
grounds of the museum. It is there, very small log
covered over now the logs covered over. But it was
a very small building with a fireplace and no bathroom,
so I'm sure there was an outhouse, probably a spring,
I don't know, but that's how they lived. So yes,
(27:32):
then Dad when he came home in thirty and built
the Diamond Tavern and then the chateau. You know, he
was very interested in the town and he would go
visit the postmaster at that time Martin James Martin. A
lot of people from that area were from Alsis, Lorraine,
which was sometimes under the fringe, sometimes under the German,
(27:54):
so they were actually Marten, but it got changed to
Martin in the United States. And my dad saw how
many letters they were getting that were from children to
the town of Santa Claus, and with his love for
now didn't put in the peace of why my dad
really got interested in helping kids and being Santa Claus.
(28:17):
When he was in the Navy and he was nineteen
years old, he was on a ship called the USS
New York in Brooklyn Navy Yard and they decided to
have a Christmas party for children, they called them disadvantaged children,
and they were preparing for the party and somebody in
command said, we need a Santa Claus. What will we do?
(28:40):
Somebody else said, there's a guy down in the engine
room that says he's from Santa Claus, Indiana. Why don't
we ask him? That was my dad.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
That's hilarious, isn't it.
Speaker 3 (28:55):
And I have the picture of him on board ship
in the worst outfit you ever in the life, the
worst beard you've ever seen, this artificial beer. But the
kids all around him just so excited and so happy.
And he told me, and it's in literature that he
made a vow to God that if he lived through
(29:15):
the war, he would be Santa Claus.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
And ends up living in Santa Claus.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
In Maria Hill, but spent most of his time in
Santa Claus. And that's when he saw the postmaster being
inundated with letters and said, I have to do something
to help these. This postmaster is so busy, he can't
do all of this. So he started picking up letters
and putting him in his car, taking around to schools,
(29:44):
to the sisters of Ferdinand. There's an abbey at Saint
Minrid Typing class Adale High School. Whoever could answer letters?
God letters, you know, it just became his passion. And
then he just started being Santa Claus more and more
and more and being more involved in that with going
to lead. He was a big legionaire. So he would
(30:05):
go to legions for Christmas parties and wait. He was
in parades in New York, Miami. He just flew in
a helicopter to in Annapolis, Hotoy, and I'll be sho.
He became famous. Really, he was on so many programs.
But he was such a veteran. He was such a
caring person, He was such a a he loved kids,
(30:29):
and he was Santa Claus then from nineteen thirty one
until nineteen eighty four when he passed away fifty three years.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Things are so much different today and handedly I've raised
for kids, and it seems like with more and more TV,
more and more social media, and more and more exposure
kids expectations and wishes and dreams are vastly different today
(31:02):
when I was only a kid, and I'm sure I
was vastly different than two generations before me.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Do you have a sense of what a kid's.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
Letter back in the nineteen thirties and forties to Santa Claus,
what they asked for?
Speaker 3 (31:22):
Yes, my father saved them. I have them at the museum.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
Amazing, What did they say? Give me a couple of
examples of your favorite.
Speaker 3 (31:31):
Almost tell you. This letter comes from Catherine, and Catherine
says that she's writing for her brothers and sisters. She
asks for gloves for John Mitten's first I can't name
the children, but it was gloves, underwear. Mitten sucks shoes.
(31:55):
And then she says, mama's fat, but she doesn't want anything.
And then she names all the children and they were
like twelve, eleven, ten, nine, eight, and she says, and
the others are dead.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (32:11):
And she says, I'm writing this for them, and so
if you could bring them something, I would be so happy.
And that letter is in a book that I have
co authored that's Letters to Santa from nineteen thirty on.
They're written on all kinds of paper. They're all like that,
(32:32):
asking just for the things they need, food, clothing. And
then it actually when you see the letters, it's almost
history because you can see how it changed eventually. Now
it's computers.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
Well, And I wonder when you think about that context
and people today that say they're broke or they're or
they really have they really are losing sight of what
people only a couple of generations back really suffered.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
In our country.
Speaker 3 (33:19):
Yes, but I think some people today are suffering like
that because they don't have the means that they would
like to have. My grandmother who stayed with when we
my moment Dad would be at the chateau, she spoke
German and she would walk out in the garden with
third night in the nineteen forties and she would say,
(33:40):
as he's new molchendo. That translates not well to it
is no longer nice here. So Grandma, who at that
time probably was in her sixties, thought it wasn't nice
in the forties. And I think that's that's culture, or
that's just the way it is. Things changed, and I
(34:01):
don't like that much change. I know that, he said. Yesterday, No,
last night, I was at a book club and this
woman said children have no respect these days. And I
stopped and I said, there are some children who don't
have respect. But two weeks ago, I was at the
(34:22):
local high school, lucky to be there when the sophomore
girls from the two high schools in our county, South
Spencer and North Spencer came together in a wonderful program
called Aspire, and it was done by the Chamber of
Commerce and some other organizations that they would bring in
(34:42):
professional women to talk to these young women in sophomore
classes in our high schools to give them an idea
of what they could do, that they can do things,
that they can get an education. And those young peop
this was a whole high school gym full of young women.
(35:03):
We're so respectful. So they listened, they took part, and
they moved around from table to table to talk to
a doctor, to a chiropractor, to a hairdresser, to a mother,
to a chef, all these different people so they'd get
an idea of what they might want to be. While
(35:24):
I talked to some children, there was one who wants
to join the FBI, there was one who wants to
be an engineer. There's one who wanted to be a mother.
And those young people, there are still those young people
in the world, and we just hear about the bad ones.
Speaker 2 (35:43):
I love that perspective.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
And that concludes part one of my conversation with Pat Cook,
and you don't want to miss part two that's now
available to listen to as the Chief Elf will warm
your heart even more. Together, guys, we can change the country,
but it starts with you. I'll see in part two
Host
Bill Courtney
Popular Podcasts
40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season
Daniel Jeremiah of Move the Sticks and Gregg Rosenthal of NFL Daily join forces to break down every team's needs this offseason.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Bobby Bones Show
Listen to 'The Bobby Bones Show' by downloading the daily full replay.