KAREN:  So in the '50s when you were doing all this before you really had training.

CLARA:  Uh-hum (affirmative).

KAREN:  How did you take care of people?
 
CLARA:  Just come natural, I guess.  When you had a sick baby, you know, you just -- they have a fever, you know, they need to get the fever down.  I don't know. 

It just -- my mother, a lot of people used to go to her in Kalskag and in Aniak.  She -- she picked up quite a bit from my dad, he was from Minnesota.  And she learned a lot of, you know, what she brought back with him.  So it just -- I don't know.  It just came natural, I guess. 

KAREN:  Can you remember some of the kinds of things you had to deal with, treat people for? 

CLARA:  Well, babies having high fever.  At one time there was a baby and there was just a big storm, blizzard, planes couldn't fly.  No way to get ahold of Bethel. 

And this kid, I don't know how old he was, maybe six or seven months old, and real croupy cough, and didn't know about croup then, so what I did was set up a pot of boiling water and sit under a tent with a blanket over us, and get him steamed that way. 

And his fever would come up, and then you give him -- at that time we were giving aspirin.  Didn't have Tylenol then.  And get too hot and just cool -- cool sponging, wiping down, cool rag, keep his temperature down. 

It's -- it's really hard, especially with young parents, their first child, and this -- it seemed like it wasn't helping.  And but we just have to hope it does. 
And turned out next day they -- it was -- the weather was good enough to fly to Bethel, and the mother took the baby down to Bethel. 

And people getting cuts and just cleaning them up, wrapping them up, and changes. 

There was one guy that was opening up a pressure cooker, he didn't wait for the steam to go down, and he was hammering the -- the handle to open a cupboard, and a neighbor of his heard a big boom, and looked out his door, and there was steam coming out of this house, he thought it was a fire.  And he ran over there and here this guy got all burnt from the steam. 

And so it wasn't far from our house, he took him over, so I had to clean his burns and -- and dress them.  He would have to come to my house every day for -- for dressing change.  His arms and hands, blistered.  So just -- just keep them clean and aspirin for pain. 

After -- after going to training, they gave more -- more supplies and medication.  The first guide book they gave me was about maybe a quarter of an inch thick, and now the Community Health Aide CHAM involves two books, about three inches thick, two to three inches thick. 

KAREN:  Each.

CLARA:  Each, for their, you know, guidelines and stuff.  Medications and how much to give.
 
KAREN:  Well, that's why I'm wondering about the training and how you learned how to do --

CLARA:  And the little book -- uh-hum (affirmative).  And the little book was just like for otitis media, what you do, a common cold, headache, earache.  Just, you know, those main things that we knew about then before all the other complicated stuff come out.