Bernard Holmquist Interviews

In 1987 my father was dying of cancer. I knew that little time was left to record a bit of my father's life story. I was living in the San Francisco bay area. When possible, my wife Jill and I would drive down on Friday evenings to the coastal town of Ventura, about a four and a half hour drive. We would stay the weekend and drive back on Sunday. Spending time with my father, was complicated by the fact that Jill's father, who lived near Grass Valley, California, about a two and a half hour drive from our home, was also dying of cancer.We would alternate between seeing my father and her father. Jill's father passed away first.

My father really did not talk about his dying. He pretended that he had a non-terminal disease. Perhaps he was just hoping for the best, but I think he just did not want to say good-bye, so we all pretended. I did ask if I could interview him during the Christmas holidays of 1987. I was not sure if he would agree to this because it may be admitting that he did not have long to live. He was, however, happy to be interviewed. I got the sense that without saying so, he was passing the baton, writing or speaking the last chapter of his life, which included telling me his story.

I remember my dad lying on the couch in the living room. I sat in a chair near him. Together with recording our conversations I also typed them on my computer, an early version of Apple's Macintosh. I believe it was a Mac Plus. You can hear the clacking of the keyboard in the background. I do not remember why I taped our sessions and also typed them as we spoke. Perhaps I was thinking that I would not have a second chance to record his life or rather portions of his life. If the cassette tape recorder did not function properly, I would at least have a typed copy, so I reasoned, probably.

My father died about five months after these interviews on April 23, 1988.

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