skip to main |
skip to sidebar
WILLOWVALE
In 1950, my parents decided to build a new house on the lot they had acquired in the new neighbourhood of Willowvale. My father decided that he would build the house with help from Mom, Suzanne and me. Every weekend for the duration, we drove to Willowvale to work on the house. Except for the excavation of the basement, my father built it entirely himself. By 1952, when my parents decided to move to Edmonton after school finished, we had been living in the house for several months. Almost everything except the finishing carpentry had been completed.
I can remember spending a lot of time in the relative gloom of the basement helping my father with the plumbing. Mostly this involved just being there in case he needed me for something. He had a machine which put threads on pipes. I was amazed at how much pipe there was in a house, and how tedious and boring plumbing was.
Other things I remember clearly are my father's lists. All his life he made lists. He didn't particularly like doing chores, but neither did he approve of procrastinating. In this respect, he expected at least as much of himself as of others. His solution was to construct long lists with a reward - this was always reading - to be enjoyed upon completion of each job:
10:00 am - Put in bedroom storm window
10:15 am - Read
10:30 am - Put in dining room storm window
10:45 am - Read
11:00 am - Put in kitchen storm window, etc., etc.
It was a bit eccentric, but it was a way of getting the job done.
In the summer of 1951, when I was eleven, my Dad decided I was old enough to know the facts of life. One day when we were working in the yard at the new house, he took it upon himself to fulfill this responsibility. It seemed to take a very long time. While it went on, we were both terribly embarrassed. When he finished, I found I hadn't understood much if any of it. I remember a lot of big, unfamiliar words, and finding it hard to focus on what he was saying, because his embarrassment made me feel equally embarrassed. Still, I knew more or less what the topic was and appreciated his effort.
The decision to move to Edmonton in the summer of 1952 was made because my father feared Flin Flon could become a ghost town if known ore deposits were depleted without any new discoveries. Having invested in a new house, he was not going to put it at risk.
Before we moved, my father took me aside and told me I must not expect to be at the top of the class in Edmonton, as it was a big city compared to Flin Flon. I would likely encounter much more competition for marks following the move. Although he spoke in a very kind manner, I did feel anxious about what such a huge city would be like.
In the photos are:
1) The house my father built in Willowvale as it was in 2003 when my sister, Suzanne, visited Flin Flon.
2) Happy workers in Willowvale
3), 5) and 6) Various shots of Flin Flon.
4) 30 MPH speed limit with no snow clearance
7) My great-grandfather, Docithee Lamoureux and my grandmother's dog, Buster with me on one of our visits to Edmonton.
GRANDVIEW STREET
My Mom and Dad often went out on Saturday night, leaving Suzanne and me with an older lady to babysit. I've forgotten her name, but remember those nights quite vividly. Foster Hewitt would be on the radio announcing the hockey game, and my father would be whistling while getting ready to go out. I don't think I liked the babysitter very much, as I was unhappy anticipating her arrival and remember lying in bed unable to fall asleep.
My parents' best friends were Irene and Bill Stickney and Kay and George Kent. We usually had Christmas with the Stickney's. I remember envying their son who was about my age for the interesting gifts he would receive. On Christmas Day, he and his father would construct wonderful things with a Mecano set, for example, and I would wish girls could play with such things.
Bill Stickney had been promoted to an executive position with HBM&S and so was entitled to live in a company cottage. This was a mark of status in the town. When I was nine or ten, the Kent's also moved to a company cottage. My mother was unhappy about this. I think she felt my father had let her down by not getting a similar promotion. I remember her saying that the reason for his failure in this was his lack of ability to socialize and his refusal to join the Elks or Lions or to play golf at the Company golf course.
There may have been some truth in this, and with her two best friends living in company houses, I can understand her disappointment. On reflecting about it, I realized that my father was always a bit of a loner. I think he loved Flin Flon in the early days, when it was a rough and ready place with the many challenges a new town would have provided. As the town matured, however, the type of corporate life that likely developed within HBM&S would not have suited him. As well, company towns are notorious for being inward looking.
When I was older, my father expressed to me his disapproval of class privilege as it existed in Europe. Certainly, his life as a child would not have prepared him for the competitive life of a large corporation or given him the self-confidence and desire needed to succeed in that type of environment. He was not materialistic in the sense of needing possessions to enhance his self-esteem. Except for a big car, he lived very frugally.
It was important to my mother, on the other hand, to have a nice house and attractive furniture. She was not at all superficial, though. On the contrary, she was a very good person, strong and serious, always encouraging Suzanne and I with our school work and music lessons. However, social status was definitely important to her, perhaps because her grandfather who she loved dearly was a respected leader of Edmonton's French-Canadian community. Growing up in his house, she may have become accustomed to a certain level of social status.
It was about this time that my father decided to build a house in the new neighbourhood of Willowvale. My memories of my father before moving to Willowvale include him taking me on the mile-long walk to Phantom Lake. I felt it a great privilege to be going there alone with him. On another occasion, before I knew how to swim, he persuaded me to go down the slide on the dock, saying he would catch me before I reached the water. Then, to my horror, he let me go, intending I'm sure to cure any fear of the water I was in danger of developing. Of course, he was standing right there beside me as I landed in the water, but nonetheless, I got a huge mouthful and was very angry.
He would sometimes take me on a search for interesting rocks. Once we found a good-sized beautiful piece of quartz. He would pick up a rock and describe all its various components.
He was often moody, though I don't recall him ever raising his voice in anger. When he was in a bad mood, everyone became very quiet. He believed strongly in good manners, and would threaten my sister and I with being sent to a finishing school if we didn't improve our behaviour. We didn't know exactly what a finishing school was, of course, but we knew it must be very horrible.
When I was nine, my father bought a car and took us on a vacation. We went as far south as Salt Lake City, Utah, then to Vancouver for Uncle Albert's wedding. I didn't see Uncle Albert very often. He was a chemical engineer who worked all his life for Imperial Oil and lived far from us first in Port Moody near Vancouver and then in Sarnia, Ontario. I remember him being very warm, friendly, and easy to like. I loved his Christmas gifts, especially a beautiful Parker pen and pencil set, a lovely wooden pencil case, and the book Anne of Green Gables.
In the photos are:
1) Visiting Aunt Jacqueline and her children on our 1949 vacation: left to right are Aunt Jacqueline, Claudette, John, Madeleine, Suzanne, Annette, Mom, Dad, and Don.
2) Suzanne and me at Athabasca Falls on the same vacation.
3) Suzanne and me on a mountain outside Yellow Stone Park.
4) Uncle Albert with his dog.
5) My parents having fun.
6) My father with friends, or co-workers.
7) My father and me.
GRANDVIEW STREET
Grandview Street is where I spent most of my childhood until the family moved to Edmonton when I was twelve. It was a ramshackle street, probably typical of Flin Flon with its rapid unplanned growth. I remember the frequent chimney fires next door at the Blake's house and the manual pump for drinking water they had on their kitchen counter.
Further down the street lived a woman alone with her children. She was practically destitute. I visited her when I was eight or nine years old and was much affected by what I saw. I went home and got my Mom to donate things to help her out.
In the opposite direction lived a family that allowed their kitchen waste water to flow directly out of the house into what we kids called a slop ditch. It was quite disgusting to look at, as it had lots of food waste in it. One day, while quite a few kids were playing nearby, my sister Suzanne, who was only three, fell into it. The water was so deep that I was afraid she would drown. I stood there for a moment horrified, before I could control my feelings of revulsion and reach over to pull her out. Of course, she was extremely upset and cried all the way home. I was convinced I had rescued her from drowning. Only much later could I see the humorous side of the incident.
Also on the street lived the Eidt family, whose daughter Norma was a friend. When I went to her house, her father Garnet, who I liked a lot, made bread pudding. To make it, he would put a pan with pieces of bread, milk, sugar and raisins to cook in the oven. I remember not liking it, but I loved the set of books he had called something like "Lands and Peoples". I loved to go to Norma's and look at these books. They help to explain my love of travel. What made them so wonderful was the coloured photos, which for me were a great rarity. The only other colour I recall seeing as a young child was in a film at school about Canada's natural resources that showed salmon jumping in mountain streams.
Memories of my father on Grandview Street may help to give an idea of his life there. He frequently chopped wood for the furnace, stoked it every day and kept a big wood pile in the back yard. His job involved being outdoors a lot which he enjoyed even in winter. I remember that at some point his job with HBM&S became one of a civil rather than a mining engineer.
In the summer, he sailed his boat at Big Island Lake, eight miles from town. I don't remember how he traveled those miles before he got a car in 1949, but I know that he and my mother would sail there. Sailing was unfortunately brought to an end when they had a frightening experience, though no one was hurt. A big storm suddenly blew up when they were in the middle of the lake. The return trip had to be made by tacking. My mother believed she would die, as she couldn't swim. As a child, to deter her from going near the river bank on their farm, her mother had made her very afraid of drowning. Hence, her fear of the water and her decision never to sail again.
We continued to go to Big Island Lake, and my father considered building a cottage, but eventually sold the property instead. My father bought a car after the road into Flin Flon was built when I was nine. The eight-mile drive to the lake on a dusty gravel road seemed never-ending. The dust forced us to close the windows, and as the car took one curve after another, we lurched continuously from side to side. Inevitably, my small sister Suzanne would cry out that she was going to be sick.
Instead of a cottage, my father decided to build a garage. I was enlisted as his helper so I could earn half the money needed to buy my bike. My job was to hand my Dad the tools he needed. We didn't talk much. I just stood there until he would say, "Hammer", or "Chisel", or "Level". By the time I was ten, I was quite an expert on garage construction, only to become even more of an expert when, a year later, he decided to build a new house in the Willowvale neighbourhood.
Another memory of my father during those years was of him putting on his army uniform. He was in an essential industry so didn't get called up during the war, but instead was in the reserve army which held periodic exercises. Another is that one winter he used a wooden box and snow to make me an igloo which turned out to be just like those used by the Inuit. It was big enough to be able to go inside if we crouched down. We didn't stay long, though, because it was so cold.
My father also built me a play house. This provided many hours of fun. It was located part way up the rocky hill at the back of our yard, and so seemed to be my very own pretend home. I was probably bossy towards my sister, Suzanne, when she played there with me. We would make cookies out of mud that we mixed up and allowed to dry in the lids of jam jars. Then we would have fancy teas pretending to eat and drink using our child-sized set of dinner dishes made out of real china. There wasn't a lot of mud in this rocky area, but in the recesses between rocks we managed to find some that hardened very nicely into excellent cookies.
In the photos are:
1) and 2) Annette and the play house
3) Suzanne, aged seven or eight at our grandmother's house in Edmonton
4) My father in the snow with his tripod
5) Annette beside the wood pile, and
6) My father in what may have been his reserve army uniform.
LIFE IN FLIN FLON - FROM A CHILD'S PERSPECTIVE
As a child growing up in Flin Flon, my life would not have been very different from the life of any other child. My father went to work at the plant every day, came home each night, rarely went out on his own; my mother did the usual things, cooked and cleaned, made clothes on her sewing machine, read fairy stories to me, listened to the radio, picked cranberries and blueberries, went out to shop and visit her friends, and had a new baby, my sister Suzanne, when I was five.
What made Flin Flon different was its lack of road access, and its rocky topography. Getting away from the town meant taking the train, which my mother did almost every year to visit her family in Edmonton. As there was no bus service and few cars, children beginning at age six walked to school even in the depth of winter. The bedrock on which the town was built meant no gardening, sewer boxes built above ground, and the scarcity and expense of fresh fruit and vegetables especially in winter.
Children had a freedom that would be virtually unknown today. There was an outcropping of bedrock in the backyard of the bigger house on Grandview Street that my parents bought when I was two. This rock flattened out before descending to Ross Lake some distance away. At quite a young age, I was allowed to roam freely though this area, fortunately never falling down and injuring myself, though on one occasion being reprimanded for ripping a new dress.
I often went to a small stream of running water where a few willows and blue bells were growing. This became my very own secret place that was never mentioned to anyone. It was especially precious in that it was surrounded by acres and acres of bedrock. In summer, all the kids on our street played outside together. We had a game called Aunty Aunty Eye Over that involved, as far as I can remember, hurling a ball over a roof, then racing around the house trying to be the first to find it.
It was very cold in the winter, and the Northern Lights made beautiful shimmering patterns in the night sky. In the evenings, we took our sleighs, which had steel runners and a wooden cross piece for steering, up to the top of Hillcrest Avenue and sledded down in the dark and cold under the Northern Lights.
Because there were no telephones, I had to take a note to the babysitter on my way home from school when my parents wanted to go out for the evening. On one occasion in Grade One, we were doing splatter work which involved a tooth brush, a screen, some paint, and with the brush trying to splatter the paint through the screen onto a piece of paper. I was so involved with this that I failed to notice that Miss Dunning had come and taken my note. Later, in a panic I went up to her desk to tell her it was lost, only to be reprimanded for having had it in the first place as she returned it to me. Oh, the injustices of childhood!
Another incident involved two sisters, Carol and Joan Kent, daughters of my mother's friend Kay Kent. Their father was also an HBM&S engineer. We were at the Kent's cottage (my parents weren't there) and were given pumpkin pie for dessert. We would have been perhaps five, six and seven years old. Joan and I hated the pie, but Mrs. Kent made us sit at the picnic table until we had eaten all of it. To this day, I have never been able to eat pumkin pie.
In the photos are:
1) Carol and Joan Kent with me in the middle on a day when we had obviously been very naughty.
2) My sister, Suzanne, and me, aged 2 1/2 and 7 1/2.
2) The coat with fur trim which is my first memory.
3) My parents first house on Callinan Street.
4) My parents and me in front of the Grandview Street house.
5)My Mother with me as a baby.
6) My Sister Suzanne and me in 1946.
RECREATION AT FLIN FLON
Flin Flon, though a substantial town when my father arrived, was very isolated. There was a native community fairly close to the town at Cranberry Portage and a small town at The Pas about 60 miles away. Until 1949, Flin Flon could be reached only by train. It was very cold in the winter and darkness fell early. For a child who had known nothing else, living there would obviously require no adjustment. For an adult, though, it could be difficult.
Still, there were plenty of recreational opportunities, particularly if you enjoyed the outdoors. The Company, as it was called, created a beautiful beach at Phantom Lake, one mile from the town. Many tons of sand were imported, a footpath to connect with the town was put in, and beach facilities were constructed. I remember the change house and cafeteria, a huge roundabout, a picnic area set amongst birch and poplar trees, the beach itself, and a large dock.
The Internet site, www.flinflon.net, revealed that initially the beach was developed by volunteers, and only in 1943 did the Company take over. In addition to the facilities I remember, the Company also put in "expanses of grass, ... a playground area, ... and a dance hall, all gleaming white with red trim. A quaint bandstand provided a venue where entertainment and concerts were provided. Tennis courts were laid out in two locations. The landscaped grounds at Phantom Lake were accented by formal flower beds and stonework ledges, paths, and a pond."
For winter recreation, there was curling and snowshoeing. In summer, besides the beach at Phantom, you could, play tennis and sail a boat, both enjoyed by my father who purchased a lot at Big Island Lake where he kept his sailboat. As well, there must have been great fishing in the many lakes around the town.
On May 12, 1937, the coronation of King George VI of England was celebrated with a major event in the town: a parade with floats. From the photos, it was obviously much enjoyed by the inhabitants.
The first three photos above are of the 1937 Coronation parade, the third showing the winning French Canadian float which depicted the arrival in Canada of Jacques Cartier. The following photos are of Phantom Lake (courtesy of www.flinflon.net); my father's sail boat; my father sailing with friends; and, finally, the Flin Flon bonspiel of 1936 (a curling competition). If you right click on the photos and then open them in a new window (the top item on the list), they will enlarge, some to a full-page size.
FLIN FLON
After completing his engineering degree, my father took a job with Hudson's Bay Mining and Smelting Co. Ltd. in Flin Flon, Manitoba. Flin Flon is located on the Saskatchewan border about 850 km. from Winnipeg. It was here in 1915 that David Collins, a local trapper, discovered mineral ore. He gave it to Tom Creighton, a prospector. This discovery led ultimately to the development of a large mine and a town whose population grew from 5,000 in 1935 to 10,000 by 1950. The name Flin Flon came from a novel that either Creighton or some other prospector was reading at this time in which the main character was called Flintabbetey Flonanton.
After World War II, particularly during the Great Depression, thousands of people moved north to Flin Flon as the mine developed. Not only copper was found, but nickel, zinc, cadmium, and I think perhaps silver as well. Today, Flin Flon is a city, and HBM&S (now called Hud Bay Minerals Inc.) continues to be the main employer, with a large smelter at Flin Flon and big ore deposits at Thomson, Manitoba. Tourism has also become a significant part of the local economy.
Flin Flon is located on the Precambrian Shield which extends in a huge horseshoe shape around Hudson's Bay. It is an area of granite bedrock interspersed with many small lakes and bogs containing muskeg. Much of Shield country has coniferous forests, though at Flin Flon itself there were not that many trees. Because of the rock, the developed part of the city extends over a large area.
I'm not sure when my father arrived in Flin Flon. He left a photo (see above) of a strike that occurred there in July 1934, so possibly he arrived soon after his university graduation, which would have been in the spring of 1934. From various photos I've seen, his life there must have been enjoyable. He had lots of friends, a sail boat, and much outdoor recreation which I'm sure he loved. Unlike many if not most of the men in the town, he didn't work underground.
In the photos, from top to bottom, are the mill at the HBM&S plant; Schist Lake, typical of the many lakes in and near Flin Flon; my father on the left with his friends (I was surprised to see photos of my dad with a gun, as to my knowledge he never owned one); the 1934 strike; and, finally, two photos of Flin Flon.
