Good night.
Chapter 5
The Glidewell Kitchens
Thelma Wood knew how to run a kitchen. As a child in Iowa, she had learned how to cook, farm style, and had been cooking ever since. At Glidewell she was more than just a cook. She was the overseer of the domestic side of the backside. She ran the mess hall and made sure housekeepers did their jobs.
Thelma was hired at the Glidewell Ranch to cook hearty breakfasts, the main meal at lunchtime, and a light supper in the evening. She cooked casseroles, soups, eggs, chicken, and pot roast. Grub is what the ranch hands called her cooking, “plain ol’ grub.” She prided herself in her good sense, hard work, and that she didn’t need praise to get the job done. So Thelma and her assistant, Billy Wood, who was also her husband, worked as a team to prepare the backside meals.
Thelma and Billy were an odd-looking couple who barely talked with each other yet moved through their jobs with efficiency and ease. Thelma was short and stout. She wore a farm-style apron, her hair neatly braided and pinned into a woven bun on the back of her head. Unfortunately she had an angry countenance etched into her chubby face. Billy, on the other hand, was tall and lanky, his face lean and angular. He had few teeth and no hair on his head and kept quiet when working. However, using his bushy gray eyebrows that grew in all directions, Billy said a lot without saying a word.
The two of them had come to Glidewell Ranch in 1927 after the backside (the racetrack, barn and stables) was completed. Thelma and Billy worked in a makeshift chuck wagon-type kitchen until the mess hall and kitchen were finished. Why they left Iowa, no one knew for sure. Thelma would only say they needed to breathe new air and be around new folks.
The first plate of food Thelma prepared for Maizie was chicken, sweet-potato mash, and gravy. Thelma didn’t like serving Maizie in her kitchen or letting her eat at the table but she kept it to herself. She and her Billy needed this job. So when she put food out for breakfast a few days later, she tamped her feelings down as she watched Maizie dish herself a plate of eggs, sausage, and toast and take a seat at the mess table with the other women who worked the backside. Thelma couldn’t be sure, but she believed the new girl might be colored. There was something about her.
One morning, shortly after arriving at Glidewell, Maizie took a seat next to two young domestics who worked the backside living quarters.
“So, Maizie, how do you like working with Mrs. Glidewell in that big ol’ house?” asked Josie.
“I like it, mostly. I’m learning about keeping an office tidy and filing papers. I copied a letter for Mrs. Glidewell. It was going all the way to New York.”
“Seems you got an easy job there, Maizie. Sittin’ down all day.”
“I’m trying to do my best, but I’ve a lot to learn.” Maizie went back to eating.
“Some of us wonder, ain’t you colored?” Josie took another bite of egg and smirked while she waited for the answer. Maizie hesitated, took a bite of her toast. Everyone at the table was quiet, waiting for her answer.
“Yep, I am.”
“Thought so. But where’d you get those eyes? Strange to see a colored with such blue eyes.”
“My mama had blue eyes. She was white. She the one who raised me.”
“Guess that is how you got them privileges. Right, Maizie? You mostly white with blue eyes, but still a bit colored, ain’t you?”
Maizie pushed her chair back from the table and stood. “I don’t recall blue eyes ever gettin’ me something special. Excuse me.” Her hands shaking, Maizie picked up her plate, placed it near the dishwashing sink, and began her walk up to the ranch house to Mrs. Glidewell’s office.
The moment Maizie was gone, the other workers at the table turned to Josie, shaking their heads. “That kind of talk could get you fired, Josie,” Claire, one of the other maids said. “If you want this job, you better not start fights. People could take sides and tattle on you to Mrs. Glidewell.”
“You gonna tell about me?” asked Josie. “ ’Cause I know stuff on you.”
“Josie, if I were you, I wouldn’t be talking bad about me. I heard what you do, sneakin’ around at night.”
Josie squirmed in her seat but went back to eating quietly.
The beautiful ranch house where the Glidewells lived was a good hike from the backside’s mess hall, kitchen, bunkhouses, and cottages. The main house had another kitchen staffed with a chef and waiter who both had worked with Mary Glidewell at the Colonial Hotel in Springfield. The chef, Philippe, and his assistant, Leon, were French—trained in Paris—and had come to the Colonial shortly after arriving in the United States. Mary, who had been the head manager of the hotel, brought the two men over to the ranch when the main house was finished in 1929. Working at the ranch was a good offer and a chance for a new experience. Besides, Philippe and Leon were partners in many ways, and living their lives together, away from judgmental eyes, was an opportunity they couldn’t pass up. Needless to say, dinners in the Glidewell’s dining room were very different from the grub that was served in the mess hall. On this particular morning, James and Mary Glidewell were enjoying a cheese soufflé when Maizie hurried past them on her way to Mary’s office.
“Come here, Maizie. Try a bite of croissant. Philippe made them this morning.”
Maizie hesitated. “I better get to my work. There’s a lot to do.”
“Oh Maizie, come, sit. We can talk,” said James.
Maizie raised her head. “Please, I need
