Katrin Tchana on growing up in the Upper Valley and the sorting by class that happens in school

Katrin Tchana lives in the Upper Valley, in Lyme, New Hampshire. She’s a social worker, and currently works as a therapist. She grew up in the house where she currently lives.

In the latest episode of What Class Are You, reporter Erica Heilman sat down and talked with Katrin about her childhood in Lyme, and how that area has changed in her lifetime.

This interview was produced for the ear. We highly recommend listening to the audio. We’ve also provided a transcript, which has been edited for length and clarity.

Katrin Tchana: When I was growing up, there were rich people. I didn't think of myself as being a rich person. I thought we were the hippies, you know, we were just like the weird people. But I think that I definitely grew up, you know, with a very privileged childhood.

Erica Heilman: How?

Katrin Tchana: You know, like, I had riding lessons, I went to ballet lessons, I went to camp when I was in high school.

But when I was growing up here in Lyme, it was not a wealthy town. It was more subsistence farming. And there were a lot of people, I think, who really struggled just to make ends meet however. Like, the majority of people who I went to school with were really struggling, I think their families, just to get by. But we all lived together somehow, like we all — it was just a community.

But at some point, I think it was maybe high school, you start to recognize, "Oh, we have different options. I can go to college and you can't. I can get a car and you can't."

You start to see that you have different options, and that if I start to talk too much about all the options that I have, that your friends aren't going to like that, right? They're not going to want to be your friends anymore. Because, why should they like that?

Erica Heilman: Is there a story about something that happened, or a relationship maybe that you had, something that sort of pushed on the nerve of class distinction or class?

Katrin Tchana: I mean something I, somebody I think about a lot is my best, best friend, when I was little girl, lived down the road towards Orford from here. And we were just, I don't know, super tight. And then, when I was maybe sixth grade, fifth grade, you know, we would always be back and forth in each other's houses. And then something happened. I think it was in fifth grade. And I don't really remember, but I remember that I was doing a lot of theater, and I don't think that that was something that she was maybe interested in. But then when I think back on it, who were the kids who were putting on plays with me? It was like, all the rich kids. And then she wasn't. But then we stopped being friends, and then we went to different high schools.

A lot of kids from Lyme went to Orford or Thetford. I'm not sure which high school she went to. And I went to Hanover. And for a long time, kids in Lyme, you had to pay extra if you wanted to go to Hanover High School. That was part of it. You could go to Hanover High School, but you had to pay extra. So that meant your parents had to have extra money to go.

I remember my parents being really — or my mom and her partner being really gung-ho, like "No. We have to pay for all kids to go to Hanover High School if they want to," which is, of course, fair. But what she didn't see was the consequences of that, which is that then this became a town that was a sending town for Hanover High School, and then the property values went up, and then the people who were just living here for generations ended up selling their land, and now they couldn't possibly afford to live here anymore. And so that was the consequence of that decision, which I remember my mother was very adamant about that we had to do that. We had to make that change in the town. That policy changed, but it's had this huge impact on this town that I don't think she could have foreseen.

Erica Heilman: So it was essentially, "We need this to be fair," but making that decision meant that people couldn't afford to stay.

Katrin Tchana: Right. Exactly. All the people who grew up here, they just can't afford to live here anymore.

And I feel that way, like with this house, like if I can't afford to hang on to this house, my children, they're not even interested in coming back here. They don't even want to be here, but they're not going to be able to — they could never afford to buy into this neighborhood. I mean, we're not that rich, right? Maybe that's the difference between bottom of the rich and top of the rich pile.

And so many people that I grew up with are gone, and then there are just a few of us left in town.

Erica Heilman: And you think it's because of property values?

Katrin Tchana: Oh it is 100% because of — I don't think, I know it's because of property values, yeah. But there's still a lot of poor people here in the state, in the two states, and there's no place to live anymore, as this place becomes more and more attractive or appealing to people who have a lot of money.

Like if you look at all the different counties in the Upper Valley, you can just go like, "money, no money, money, no money." And the more that "money" kind of expands, then there's less and less places for the "no money." Where are they going to go?

This audio story was produced by Peter Engisch.

Have questions, comments or tips? Send us a message.