Joe and Gloria Smith Torres were photographed in their home by Jane Fulton Alt in March 2000 as part of the CITY 2000 photodocumentary project. Gloria was interviewed a month later by radio producer Andrea De Fotis, who was then CITY 2000’s audio editor. I prepared this text from the transcript of that interview and a follow-up visit in February 2001.
He’s on medication so he doesn’t shake. One of the problems is he falls. He can’t walk by himself. I have to support him, and that’s getting harder every day. He leans on me too much, and I’m afraid I’m going to fall. He can speak a little bit. I can understand him sometimes; sometimes I can’t. I try, but it’s hard.
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I came to Chicago from Wisconsin, when I was 17. I was kind of on my own. It was 1944. The war was still on, all the guys were gone. It was like a depression, all the people were depressed. I said, What have I got here? Let me go. And I took a civil service exam and I came to Chicago. I didn’t know east from west or north from south or anything. I had to learn. I worked for the government. It was the treasury bonds at the time. I worked at the Merchandise Mart–after I found it–and over at the other mart, the furniture mart, for a short time. After a while I decided that they weren’t paying me enough money and somebody said I should be a waitress, and that’s what I did, I ended up as a waitress. I had a husband and he was the father of my first three children. And he died in a car accident. Then I was a widow for five years. And then I met Joe. I was a waitress and he was a waiter at the Edgewater Beach Hotel.
Then I do the laundry. There’s always laundry. Sometimes I do laundry two or three times a day. And then there’s lunch. That takes a long time. Sometimes it takes an hour and a half to feed him. I have to hold him and feed him too. It’s a big job. Sometimes I lay down to take a rest. Then every once in a while, maybe twice a week, our daughter comes over after work to have dinner with me–and she comes on the weekend and we take him with us shopping. She feels it’s her responsibility, and I say, “No, don’t worry, we’re getting along fine.” We’re the two parents! She lives on the south side so that’s quite a jaunt for her.
