OXFORD MISSISSIPPI

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Alpha Omicron Pi
Laura Reid

Kappa Alpha
Patricia Brown
Treber McGuirt
Ruth Miller

Kappa Sigma
Johnny Brown
Jean Foster
Sarah Frison

Sigma Chi
Willette Booker Mechille Ivy

Sigma Nu
Ethel Lockhart
Sandra Petties Georgia Wise

RETIRED
Verlean Caruthers
Fairy Bell Hewlett Mary Alice Lewis
Ollie Vaughn

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This project was made possible by a grant from the Mississippi Humanities Council

Project Contributors:
John Hunter Allgood, John T. Edge, Amy Evans, Mary Beth Lasseter and Kendra Myers

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Kappa Sigma Fraternity: Sarah Frison, Cook

“Well, I’ve learned a lot [working here], you know, because at first I didn’t know you could put salt in boiling egg water and make the shell come off easier, so I learned a lot of tips like that.”

--Sarah Frison

What follows is a portion of the original interview that has been edited for length. To download the entire transcript in PDF form, please click here.

HOUSE: Kappa Sigma Fraternity at The University of Mississippi
SUBJECT: Sarah Frison, cook
DATE: April 6, 2004
LOCATION: Kappa Sigma Dining Room
INTERVIEWER: Amy Evans

Amy Evans: This Amy Evans and it’s Tuesday, April sixth, two-thousand and four, and I’m at the Kappa Sigma fraternity house at the University of Mississippi with Sarah Frison, who is a cook in the kitchen here at Kappa Sigma. And Miss Frison, if you wouldn’t mind saying your entire name and your age for the record.

Sarah Frison: Oh, okay. It’s Sarah Louise Frison and age is—t—forty.

Okay, are you from Oxford?

Yes.

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Okay, and how long have you been working here at Kappa Sigma?

Um, eight years.

Did you work anywhere before coming here?

Well yes, I worked at the Holiday Inn, and I worked at The Gin. It’s a restaurant [in Oxford].

Okay, sure. I know about The Gin. So you’ve been in the food service industry for some time.

Yes.

How did you learn to cook?

[Short laugh] Just from different people and [short pause] cooking myself at home.

Was your mother a big cook?

Mother, uh-huh.

What kind of things would she make at home?

Well, she made like dumplings and mmm [short pause] casseroles, turnip greens—you know, all that old southern cooking. [Short laugh]

Mmm-hmm. And so do you think that you learned just by growing up…in that house, or did she really sit and teach you some of those things?

She—she—she really—she taught me a lot. And plus, like I say, when I worked at like at the Gin and a lady that—there was a lady that trained me lots and, you know. And plus, being here with Jean [Foster, another cook at Kappa Sigma] I learned a lot from here so—as the years—I’m just learning. [Laughs]

So when you got your job at The Gin did you want to be in the food industry and that’s why you applied there, or did it just kind of happen that way?

Well, it just kind of happened that way. But I did like cooking so, yeah, I’ll say I did.

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What is your day like here? What time do you get here?

I get here at nine and get off at six.

Okay. And are you responsible for all the meals with Jean [Foster] and Johnny [Brown] that happen in between?

Uh-huh. Yes. Kind of like do all the prepping and you know, helping out.

And what’s it like cooking for all these hungry young boys?

[Laughs] It’s fun. Nice. Exciting. Being around them.

Well, I—when I was talking to Jean [Foster], I was saying how she—since she was in the restaurant business too before at the Beacon, I was thinking how this must be a real different dynamic to be more of a nurturing role. Do you enjoy that?

Yes. It’s fun…I love it.

And so do you have anything that, um, you introduce in the kitchen when you’re cooking? Any—any special items that you like to make?

Well, not really. Ms. Gough, you know, she kind of [short pause] do all the menus and so we pretty much just go—go by what she, you know, give us—tell us to cook. So, not really.

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Well, what kinds of things have you learned, um, from like Ms. Jean [Foster], working in the kitchen with her?

Okay. Well, I’ve learned a lot, you know, because at first I didn’t know you could put salt in boiling egg water and make the shell come off easier, so I learned a lot of tips like that and, um, what else? Just different little stuff like that. Little small stuff that I didn’t know about.

Um, can you speak a little bit about how working here is different from working at the Holiday Inn or at The Gin?

Uh, yeah. It’s much different. The—the hours and, um, at—at the Holiday Inn I did like housekeeping [short laugh], and I hated that. So it was—being off on the weekend and holidays, you know. It’s--I didn’t have that opportunity at The Gin and at the Holiday Inn, so that’s why I like this so much better. And being off in the summer.

Yeah. What do you do in the summer?

Uh, I baby-sit. My sister, she’s got a two year-old, and I baby-sit for her.

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How have things changed over the eight years that you’ve been here already? Anything?

Well, let me see. [Short pause] Not much. The boys is getting—you know, they better. You know, like on—like, uh, the initiations and stuff. And, uh, when they, uh, haze and all this stuff. It’s—it’s much—you know, it’s—what I’m trying to say? It’s better, you know. They ain’t doing as much as they used to do. Like the drinking and partying in the houses? Seems like it done changed.

Are y’all usually around to see much of that when it’s going on? When pledges come through?

Uh, well not the initiation but like the—they used to have all like parties pretty much on the weekend, and we come in the next day like on Monday, the house is wrecked and—and see now—since--like in the last two or three years, you know, we hadn’t seen that. So they done changed all that. I guess. You know, that’s different. Sometimes you see them laying out all over the floor and—[short laugh] But, you know. Like I say, the last two or three years, all that been changed.

Do you have any, um, more personal interactions with any of the—the guys around? People that come back to visit you after years away or anything like that?

Yeah, it’s quite a few of them. One here today that was like an old member. He comes in every, like, once a month, come in and speak and so, yeah. Pretty much.

And I’ve also been hearing that y’all do some special dinners for the parents and things like that. Do you have many—much interaction with parents?

Well, we m—mainly just meets them like once a year or so. You know, we don’t—you know, we don’t see them that often or—Or when they are here, they’ll come in and speak and you know, tell them how nice everything is and tell the boys, say they really enjoy us and all that but—it’s maybe once a year we see them.

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So, um, what’s a typical day like when you get there in the morning at nine? What do you—what do you work on and—and do through the course of the day?

All day? I come in and start, uh, like working with the salad, making the tea, and then I’ll prep—help Jean. Fix, you know, fix the lunches. And fill up the line and help clean up the dining room and—and pretty much keep the line supplied. Up until two—well, one-thirty…Then we’ll break. Then start cooking supper around [short pause] two-thirty or three. So.

And do y’all have a, um, an item that you think that you serve the most of?

Yeah, chicken tenders and baked potato. [Laughs]…They love them! [Laughs]

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Do you have guys that come in the kitchen during the course of the day and ask you to make something or help themselves?

Well, they’ll come in and make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or, you know, get a glass of tea or an ice cream sandwich. But they don’t hardly ask us to make anything for them.

Yeah. What about in the middle of the night if they get hungry? Can they come down here or no?

[Short laugh] Well, I don’t think so. I think she [Ms. Gough] has the kitchen part locked…So I don’t think they can come in the kitchen and all at night. You know, once they eat supper at six, they can come in this part [the dining room] and study, but she pretty much lock up the—everything else. The kitchen and the pantry.

And do you know many other people, um, who work on campus and are—are cooks at sororities or fraternities?

Yeah, I got a auntie [Frankie Lewis] that works on the girl’s side. Um, quite a few friends work out here…And her daughter that works on the—at the Kappa Delta house. And—I know quite a few people since I’ve been out here. [Laughs]

To download the entire transcript in PDF form, please click here.