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Chester

Wednesday, January 17th, 2024

CHESTER

As I read thru Alex Kershaw’s Jack London – a Life it occurs to me that two of London’s most popular and acclaimed stories were about dogs. I was also a strong fan of dog stories and was almost always reading a Jack O Brien story like Silver Chief Dog of the North or something by James Oliver Curwood . Then I reasoned why read about them? We had a dog that was every bit as colourful and interesting as any dog of story: Chester was a big, brawling Chesapeake Bay Retriever that was our beloved family dog for about 15 years. We got him as a pup from the McQuarrie family who lived on the North Shore of Nelson near Gordon and Ramona Burn’s summer house off what is now Johnstone Road.

Little did we know that this innocent puppy would bring a rollicking life of good times and high adventure that had to be lived to be believed? Even now, I still marvel at the memories.

Chester became a large curly fellow who lived life to the fullest no matter where we lived. Life with Chess was one of constant surprise. One of the first was the realization that he hated cats. He didn’t just chase them, he killed them. When we lived on Kootenay Street, the old street car barns were next door. Feral cats hung out there and they occasionally wandered through our backyard. Chess was in vigilante mode and attacked when a cat showed. One day a smallish cat showed up and Chess chased him up small maple. As the cat paused to gloat, he forgot his tail was hanging down. Chess jumped up and grabbed it. Game over.

Chester also felt obliged to fight any dog he considered a challenge, so we had some wild brawls.

Chess was serious about these fights and some lasted a long time. A neighbour across the lake (Barbara Lang) had a large boxer who also didn’t mind a scrap. They tangled near Gram’s flower bed until they were absolutely spent. Beau (a white dog) was pink with spilled blood. I think Chess got the worst of it. He usually won the first parts of brawls from surprise. H e would charge his opponent bowling them over then go to work but when dogs survived the first hit, Chess could be in for a battle. In the end of this one Beau had Chess by the throat and would not let go. But Beau was holding on to the loose fur of Chester’s ruff doing no harm. Dad finally took the hose to the boneheads before they ran off to lick their wounds.

Chess also liked to eat and required a lot of food. Not long after we had Chess, a new Safeway store opened in Fairview. To mark the occasion, they had a dog food eating contest. Tommy took Chess to the contest that was no contest. They opened the cans of meat above the bowels and were going to spoon out the content. Chester’s meat came out in a one piece blob the shape of the can. Before it landed in the bowel, Chess has snapped it out of the air and swallowed it. He won hands down. Tommy was so proud.

Chess at the beach with Tom and Ross and Rod McKay

Chesapeake’s are one of the best water dogs and Chester was true to form. He was always in or around the water whether there was someone to play with or not. He would fetch his own sticks and rocks and dive for bottles or cans from the boathouse. The dog was interested in everything to do with water. He would swim across the lake and follow us to school even if Mom locked him in the house for an hour or so. When we lived at Kootenay Street he often followed us to church On one occasion on a snowy day around Christmas we just settled our seats near the front of the church when there was a ruckus back by the door I felt a stab of panic. Could it be? He was not around when we left in a second or two there he was, Racing down the aisle. Covered with an inch of wet now. Deliriously happy to find his family. He climbed over everyone in the row shaking and wagging his tail as he passed and licking the faces of people he knew. When he reached us he would sit quietly and pretend to be listening to the sermon until the service ended, then he would charge outside and look for a dog to fight.

Another winter pastime was hockey. He would play with us all day and never seem to tire. On one occasion, he noticed a small flock of mallards keeping a patch of water open by swimming around and around so it would not freeze

Chess charged and launched himself after the ducks. He swam around chasing them for a long time. We thought he might freeze. But he climbed and shook like it was a summer day then resumed chasing the puck as he turned white with frost and his feet bled on the ice.

When I took him fishing he would sit by the rod tip waiting for a bite then launch himself into the water to grab the fish which was usually swimming to freedom by then, Chess would swim in circles looking for it for the longest time. I should have left him home but didn’t have the

Heart for it besides he would eventually show up anyway

Tommy left ad Chess at Safeway openingin t 195? when Chess won a dog food eating cpntest

Chess was a dog with low impulse control. He was also a glutton.

In the spring I would take him walking along the west part of the beach where there were salt licks. We would get spring water Gram liked for her tea then cut up to the orchard and circle back home. The snow was melting and we found a dead coyote by the spring. I had a quick look and carried on. The carcass was in a state of decomposition. Indeed. I was almost home when I noticed Chess wasn’t with me. I

circled back and sure enough he had devoured the coyote maggots and all!

In summers we often had supper on the porch and food would sometimes sit for awhile unattended. This was too much for Chess. He grabbed both a turkey and a ham and ran for cover. Both times dad hacked him pretty good with a hockey stick but it hardly fazed him. Food was never left to sit again.

Another revelation was his hatred of squirrels. They seemed to know and relish in taunting him. There was a giant fir beside our driveway and a little red squirrel would dash out on the trunk and scold Chester to the edge of madness. He never got within reach of Chester but came pretty close.

In 1958 it was off to California and a new set of adventures. First we lived in Sunnyvale where Chester indulged himself with neighbourhood females. A poodle next door was the first victim so Chess-a-poos added diversity to the local fauna. He could not be contained there either even by a high fence. I watched him leap it one time. He ran at it and leaped high getting his front feet a bit over it. Then he pulled himself up and over.

Next stop was Los Altos where there was a ravine with a seasonal creek and some large oak trees with squirrels! Large California Grey Squirrels who delighted in taunting Chester. They knew where he rested beside a sliding glass door looking over the back yard. The squirrels would sneak right up to the door and chatter at the dog that was usually not asleep. He was waiting for his chance.

One day I left the door open and Chess got his chance. The pair of squirrel’s had a last taunt then headed for the oaks. Chester roared like a Lion but could not do any damage. One squirrel ran out on a limb above Chess lifted his leg then pissed on the enraged dog. I have never seen an animal go as Crazy. The squirrel panicked and ran further out. Chess leaped onto the branch ran right behind the rodent and almost caught him. The squirrel jumped on to the nearby fence and kept going. Chess was hot on his tail. but could not quite connect. One last lunge and the dog fell off the two by four fence top landing on his tail and breaking it.

That was more or less the end of the adventure. He got in one more battle with a big chow. He ran right into the dog’s garage where a lady was hanging clothes on one those collapsible wooden holders. The lady and the rack got knocked over and the chow got roughed up but it was a good scrap and the chow did well. I guess that’s when I realized that Chess was not indestructible. We went back to Nelson after that and he took up his old place sleeping by the fridge with one eye opened in case someone tossed him a wiener. Or he would go for walks with us but he wasn’t quite up to it. He would get too far then cry out in pain. We had to pack him back to the ranch. By then he was a real heavy weight and no one could carry him safely. It wasn’t long then,

good bye old partner I hope you are by a good lake in squirrel country where they are not too quick. I think of you often and miss every moment we were together. Sometimes I look for your tracks on the beach. They are never there anymore.

CHESTER

Little did we know that this innocent puppy would bring a rollicking life of good times and high adventure that had to be lived to be believed? Even now, I still marvel at the memories.

Chester also felt obliged to fight any dog he considered a challenge, so we had some wild brawls.

Chess at the beach with Tom and Ross and Rod McKay

Heart for it besides he would eventually show up anyway

Tommy left ad Chess at Safeway openingin t 195? when Chess won a dog food eating cpntest

Chess was a dog with low impulse control. He was also a glutton.

circled back and sure enough he had devoured the coyote maggots and all!

CHESTER

Little did we know that this innocent puppy would bring a rollicking life of good times and high adventure that had to be lived to be believed? Even now, I still marvel at the memories.

Chester also felt obliged to fight any dog he considered a challenge, so we had some wild brawls.

Chess at the beach with Tom and Ross and Rod McKay

Heart for it besides he would eventually show up anyway

Tommy left ad Chess at Safeway openingin t 195? when Chess won a dog food eating cpntest

Chess was a dog with low impulse control. He was also a glutton.

circled back and sure enough he had devoured the coyote maggots and all!

Posted in family, friends, Old Nelson | No Comments »

GRINGO TRAIL

Tuesday, January 16th, 2024

Gringo Trail

About the time winter starts to rear its head on the South Coast of BC, is when I start to yearn for the sun and some warmth and think about heading south on the Gringo Trail.

It starts slowly with a few vehicles leaking out of Vancouver and Vancouver Island spots like Hornby and Denman Islands. Then gradually picks up to the point where you think you may be part of a migration to the light. You start to see more campers, vans and old school busses filled with happy faces.

You are approaching Everett now almost in the shadow of Seattle. Seattle is one of the large Cascadian cities that seem to have retained some of its hippie flavor. I am not completely sure about this. It is more of a feeling than something you can weigh and measure. Vancouver once had a thriving counter community in Kitsalano but it has since been gentrified. Of the once strong BC Hippie Community there is little left. Nelson and the Slocan Valley are trying to hang on but the new people with money are closing in tearing down lovely older Nelson homes, putting in boxes and apartments and clogging the streets with cars.

In the southward stream, there will likely be some denizens of the Comet Tavern up on Pike Street and some from Pike Place Market Area.

South of Seattle, there are a number of small to medium sized towns that are much the same. They are usually set back from the I-5 and surrounded by used car lots, malls and gas stations with a few Big Box stores. Some of the downtowns are interesting. Think of Linden, WA but there isn’t much to them. Not enough to delay gringos hunting for the sun.

Portland is the next big town. My sister and her husband live out in Hillsboro, a suburb to the west that I always have trouble finding in a maze of freeways – no hippies here just Mexican families seeking the good life. But there are some interesting towns in the area. Some of my Bay Area friends from the old days spent summers in Seaside when it was an endless party. Eugene is another spot that attracts counter culture folk. People from the East Shore of Kootenay Lake go down for Rainbow Family gatherings. There are other towns where the Granola Gang holds sway but they are off the Trail. Like Hood River and Fairview.

The Trail follows the beautiful Willamette Valley south through some very productive land. I always wonder if some coastal BC birds that disappear for the worst parts of winter when the ground is frozen and snow covered, sneak down there until things warm up a bit. But I have seen robins in Nelson where there is frozen ground and snow for five months. The birds huddle together in a bushy tree and somehow tough it out. There is no mild valley for them to escape to

The Trail still follows Highway I-5 which is not the most interesting. Indeed. But as you approach Southern Oregon, there is another highway branching off at Grants Pass. In fact, there are several other routes you can follow to cut over to the coast. Highway 199 is the one I usually take. The Americans have classified it as a dangerous highway but the only thing I have experienced is someone yelling at me and delivering the one finger salute. I could not figure out why until I turned on the radio and heard a raging right wing radio broadcaster who told his lisisteners that Canada was a pinko country with a gay Prime Minister. Evidently Canada had not joined the fight against Iraq or made enough menacing noise about “weapons of mass destruction” I later learned that right wing radio ranters were quite common in the US and were not always held to the truth. I had always thought a Canadian license plate or flag was a kind of protection. Obviously not always.

Highway 199 comes out to the coast at Crescent City, CA. A not bad town and the start of a spectacular stretch of coast that goes on for most of California. This stretch is one I know well because I was a student at Humboldt State University from 1964 to 1968 and lived along this coast for many years from the Oregon Border to San Diego including Arcata, the home of Humboldt State. Life for students was very different then. Rent was minimal because I always lived with four or five roommates and we rented old houses or inexpensive student apartments. Tuition was around fifty dollars per semester and beer was about three bucks a dozen. I always had a job and a bank account. The football coach started a janitorial service so his players could have work. Few of them took the jobs but I and my roommates were happy to work them. I also worked for Coast Oyster Company and The Keg, a little hole in the wall pub but the best one I have ever been associated with. Every night was a feast of excitement and memorable adventure.

My first night at Humboldt was a good example. The party was rolling along pretty good when the staff pulled the curtains and locked the doors at 2 AM the legal closing time. We howled on. The Keg was owned by a character we called Junior. Sometime after three he snuck into a back room and stuffed a large hammer down his pants. “The girls will love this “he explained. Not long after he was cheek to cheek with a very young girl when a scream pierced the smoke-filled air and Junior ducked out the back door. The party was over.

There was a small pool table at The Keg. It was more trouble than it was worth. A small group of hippies often played there nursing their beer and not bothering anyone. Once in awhile they would play jukebox songs like Societies Child by Janis Ian. One night a bunch of Green Berets came sailing in and demanded the hippies give up the table.” We will be done in a few minutes” they said. The Green Berets were large and not in the best of moods, the Hipsters were skinny and underfed. “Your shrubs give up this table or get your clocks cleaned.” The big boys moved in and the battle was on. The Hippies whipped the big lads with ease. They were lightening fast and the Muscle Heads were way over confident.

Just another night at The Keg. I heard it has been sold and replaced by a fancy restaurant with table cloths, flowers and wine. It has been said that Junior has moved to Bellingham.

Not far from The Keg was an apartment building where my roommates and I lived. It overlooked the parking area of a hamburger stand. One afternoon Tom Spencer, our roommate got in line for some food. One us called down to tell the girl “There is a robber in your line up”. We carefully described Spencer and warned her to be careful because “he has been known to be dangerous. “I see him, I see him” she yelled”. Soon after a squad of Gestapo pulled in and logged Spencer into the Crowbar Hotel. We congratulated ourselves but before long the cops were back for me. Spencer had talked himself out of trouble and shifted the blame to us. I had an outstanding traffic warrant so I spent the night in jail and had to take a traffic safety course. Another roommate just dodged the bullet because he had scrapped with the Sherriff about a month before. Evidently the sheriff had forgotten and Spencer had the last laugh.

After Arcata and Eureka, Highway 101 becomes a very scenic by way. Spectacular groves of redwoods line the road. They surely are wonders of the world - the best of them is in the Avenue of the Giants. The redwoods exist in quite a narrow zone in southern Oregon and coastal California down to the southern part of Big Sur. They stick to the fog zone to dodge the heat and dryness of inland regions. There are some great coastal beaches and fern lined ravines where Roosevelt Elk are seen.

We are now nearing the Napa -Sonoma wine country. This is another beautiful area where the great writer Jack London once lived. I find it somewhat odd that he wrote about the harsh and deadly qualities of the Yukon when he lived in such a calm bucolic area. London was dogged by accusations of socialism which he freely admitted. He also drank his share of spirits which dragged him down eventually. I wonder if drinking also inspired him when he was at his best. Imagine the great story teller sitting by the fire sipping a drink and thinking of the northern trails and wolves howling at the shimmering northern lights

Then it’s across the Golden Gate to the towers of The City. Californians have only one city – San Francisco. No Californian will ever call Los Angeles, San Diego or some other pretender “The City”. San Francisco is the main city of California and the main city of the counter culture and many other movements. It is a beautiful city beyond interesting. However, when I last went out to Height Ashbury you couldn’t help feel it was somehow not real but staged by people who knew how to dress it up as the heart of Hippie Land. When I lived down The Peninsula in Sunnyvale, my high school friends and I would don suits and go up to strip clubs in The City. We would sometimes cross Broadway to the upper reaches of Grant Avenue to hear Beatniks beat their bongos and read poetry. We could have been seeing Kerouac and Ginsburg for all I knew. This is where it all started, where the Beatniks spawned the Flower Children. The terms Beatnik and Hippie were coined by Herb Caen who chronicled life in the city for more than sixty years. His column was termed a love letter to the city he called Baghdad by the Bay.

Just down the Peninsula is San Mateo. I was born there in St. Matthews Hospital in 1942. My Mom and I lived with Nana and Pappy Flynn and Nana’s sister Auntie Sanderson. Dad was away in the Canadian Army. Until he returned from the war, we would live in a wealthy district of San Mateo called Bay Wood. The house was located at 373 Parrot Drive and it was a beauty. “Pure redwood lumber” Pappy would say. Tom Flynn had made lots of money in the Nevada mines and was the President of The San Francisco Stock Exchange then. I sometimes rode in with him on the train. The house is still there as fine as ever. It is probably owned by a dot com millionaire now because it is in one of the most expensive neighbor hoods on earth. Pappy would be disgusted. He was very poor in his youth and remained frugal all his days.

After experiencing Sunnyvale and American Graffiti days where we cruised Fourth Street in San Jose just the way it was done in Graffiti, I signed on to Foothill College for a couple of years and worked at Bill Steffen’s Chevron, a garage out on Stevens Creek Boulevard. Foothill was one of the first community colleges. The Americans called them Junior Colleges and most students took advantage of them to get though the general education requirements: courses like English, Math and Social Sciences. You could graduate with an Associate Arts degree if you had enough credits. My folks were living in Los Altos then but myself and a few pals were living in an old house in Monte Vista we called the Sugar Shack. That was near the peak of the sixties. Watching our old TV one day we saw two of our roommates marching at Berkeley. Maggie had shaved herself bald and Mike was naked except for a Superman cape.

Bill Steffen’s was a neighbood gas station and we also did small repairs. We had a good mechanic but he was almost never sober. He kept a Mickey of WolfSchmits Vodka in his back pocket which he swigged from every few minutes. He would then take a swig of Squirt (a popular soft drink in the States) and mix it in his mouth. I tried it and was not quite up to it. Despite the steady input of strong drink, I never saw Jerry drunk. The rest of us at the garage imbibed at a nearby pizza house called Pagliachi’s. This became a solid neighborhood pub

Back down the Peninsula, we are still on the El Camino south of San Jose and edging into Steinbeck Country. The great writer once lived near Los Gatos at the edge of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Los Gatos is now part of Greater San Jose. And it is part of the Bay Area mega tropolis. You do not get the feel of Steinbeck until you get further south. He was born in Salinas and his best work is in his stories of his friends around Cannery Row including his pal Ed Rickets the great biologist who wrote Between Pacific Tides, a classic manual of inter tidal ecology. Steinbeck was plagued by various school boards and commissions that banned his books for reasons to do with socialism and suggestive content. He also favored strong drink.

Bob Ross and L went down on a hot late summer night after the onions were harvested and mounded up beside the fields. Their smell permeated the dusty air. The doors of the Gilroy cantinas were wide open and campesinos and their happy music spilled out onto the street.

Ross was from Salinas and knew it well. We had an ongoing debate as to where one could see the most deer. I argued for some of the east Kootenay hot spots like TaTa Creek where sometimes a vehicle would be held up for an hour or so while deer crossed the highway. Ross said the lettuce fields of Salinas Valley were beyond argument. I think he may be correct after we gazed at what seemed to be an endless herd of small coast black tails in the fields These deer live in a climate paradise (it might snow once or twice every thirty or so years but it will just be a flurry or two and no accumulation). There is no serious predation and ample food. On top of that, hunters often lobby for bucks only seasons. After the Salinas Valley, we are still in Steinbeck Country of low hills with grass lands and live oak there are some Digger Pine stands up higher. Many of the grasses are invasive weeds like brome, cheat grass, fennel and other junk that displaces native vegetation and is very flammable. Towns like San Luis Obispo, King City and Paso Robles come up. I like these towns. I am especially fond of Avila a small beach town of great beauty where I would often camp for a week or more when I was on the Trail. It is close to San Luis Obispo. We are now getting close to Southern California and Warmer Ocean water along with far too many people

I know almost nothing about this part of the state. We lived in Los Angeles for while in 1958 but all I can remember is the awful smog and wiping the car windows with a rag soaked in cleaning solvent to clean off the grease. I also remember Beer Can Beach and what a mess it was. A lovely beach littered with thousands of cans and other junk. I am sure it has been cleaned up by now some

The next thing I remember of Southern Cal is Pacific Beach. I guess it was part of San Diego or maybe La Jolla. We lived there in a small apartment just steps away from a great beach. My siblings and I would hit the beach early each day to watch old guys with metal detectors probe the sand for rings, coins and watches. Pacific Beach is a wonderful place. Mexico is just a few jumps away. Remember to pick up Mexican vehicle insurance in San Ysidro. Do not forget this!

I usually head down the Baja to the Mulege area on the Sea of Cortez. After a few days I take the ferry over to Mazatlan then go to San Blas and Puerto Vallarta. But you are on your own now – Enjoy.

Gringo Trail

About the time winter starts to rear its head on the South Coast of BC, is when I start to yearn for the sun and some warmth and think about heading south on the Gringo Trail.

In the southward stream, there will likely be some denizens of the Comet Tavern up on Pike Street and some from Pike Place Market Area.

The Trail still follows Highway I-5 which is not the most interesting. Indeed. But as you approach Southern Oregon, there is another highway branching off at Grants Pass. In fact, there are several other routes you can follow to cut over to the coast. Highway 199 is the one I usually take. The Americans have classified it as a dangerous highway but the only thing I have experienced is someone yelling at me and delivering the one finger salute. I could not figure out why until I turned on the radio and heard a raging right wing radio broadcaster who told his lisisteners that Canada was a pinko country with a gay Prime Minister. Evidently Canada had not joined the fight against Iraq or made enough menacing noise about “weapons of mass destruction” I later learned that right wing radio renters were quite common in the US and were not always held to the truth. I had always thought a Canadian license plate or flag was a kind of protection. Obviously not always.

Just another night at The Keg. I heard it has been sold and replaced by a fancy restaurant with table cloths, flowers and wine. It has been said that Junior has moved to Bellingham.

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WHEN I WAS A COWBOY AT THE S HALF DIAMOND

Saturday, December 9th, 2023

When I Was a Cowboy at the S Half Diamond (All my Heroes are Cowboys)

The year was 1960. I was in Grade eleven at Sunnyvale High and hated it. My friend Victor (Sonny) Simon was also a disgruntled student and his Uncle Merle Simon was buying a ranch in B C and offered Sonny and I jobs. He also offered a job to his girlfriend’s brother: Gordie Duke. Sonny and I were marginal cowboys at best but Gordie was a top hand : wiry, smart and tough.

Before we got near the ranch we had to sell a carload of Christmas trees that were cut on the ranch. We secured a lot beside the El Camino in Mountain View and set up a large tepee advertising “Royal Canadian “Christmas Trees. We bunked in the tepee and sold all of the trees at a dollar a foot. They averaged about six feet long and were beautiful. They came out of the rail cars still frozen and snow covered. People loved them.

After we cleaned out the trees, we headed north in Merle’s big Oldsmobile with summer tires. It was a cold rain when we left the Bay Area and by Shasta Lake, you could see flecks of snow on the windshield. By Southern Oregon it had switched to heavy snow and you could feel the Big Olds start to slip. At one point we spun doughnuts for half a mile or so and almost hit the ditch. This was near the small town of Chemult which is in a snow belt. Thankfully the snow let up before Spokane and it was clear to the ranch.

When we finally arrived there was a surprise. A big bull elk had fallen onto the ice of Premier Lake and could not get up. He had been walking on snow covered old ice where he got traction then moved out to fresh ice with light snow cover where he slipped and fell. We took a rope down to the far end of the lake where we looped it lightly around his neck and dragged him over to the old ice. He got up right away then charged me. I ran back to the new ice. As he followed, he fell again in the same spot. The ice had melted a bit where he had lain and he and I almost went through this time. We dragged him off again but this time he was too exhausted to get up so we left him. Later on he was able to get up and stagger into the woods.

Another revelation. The ranch had several cats that “sort of” lived there fending for themselves. They had a hard stretch when the boys were in California. They were huddled around the ranch chimneys probably hoping for a ghost of heat. They’re ears had frozen off !

It was very cold at the ranch in those days. The only heat was what we could muster from scrap lumber we salvaged from a little mill on the property. We had a fireplace and two wood stoves of ancient vintage. There was no insulation. One morning it was minus 52F at Bill Bush’s ranch just north of us and minus 11F in our frost covered bedroom.

The place was kind of a Dude Ranch that boarded horses for the winter. Technically we were not cowboys because there were no cows on the place. Just 40 or more horses. We were wranglers.

Apart from myself, Sonny and Gordie, there was another top hand on the ranch: Rad Hartwell a very experienced cowboy/ wrangler from down in the states. Rad and Merle were not around much that winter so we were on our own. We kept the horses in feed and water and rode them about two or three times a week. We had some great horses including a race horse named Prevail. She could run but wasn’t very sure footed and spilled occasionally. Only Gordie rode her and even he got dumped once or twice. My favorite horse was a little chestnut mare we called Square Dance. She loved to run and was very reliable.-an excellent dude horse.

We also had a big stud horse called Tom – a palomino with a white mane and a lot of spunk. He would try to kick and bite you. A horse bite can do a lot of damage. And Tom was very sneaky about it. Aside from horse duties there was not a great deal to keep us busy. Ron Kuppenbender would sometimes bring a group of Kimberley girls out to do some riding and help make supper. There were some grand girls in Kimberley in those days.

Once we found a stash of fancy liqueurs. Things like Creme de Minth, Creme De Cocao and Bailys Irish Cream. Of course we had to sample them even though we knew they were “dude “ drinks for the rich and famous and not for poor cowpokes. As the night progressed Things got a bit out of hand and someone decided that our hair was too long for hard riding bush cowboys. So out come some clippers and the massacre proceeds. We woke up in horror with pounding heads afraid to look in a mirror.

Sometime in February, it was time to get our animals off the range. The East Kootenay is often called the Serengeti of the north because of the abundant herds of big game. Deer, elk, Big Horn Sheep, Moose and grizzlies are hunted along with a few Mountain Goats. These animals depend on healthy winter ranges for survival. Horses, cattle and sheep graze out the-preferred plants and place a heavy burden on wildlife. Therefore domestic stock must skedaddle to free up the range which is often quite damaged from over grazing by the time wildlife get to it in late winter.

I think the situation is better now. Biologists like Ray DeMarchi and Glen Smith worked with the cattlemen’s groups to improve the range and more closely manage the animals.

Our horses were from two groups: Wasa and Canal Flats. This was invariably where they ended up and is was quite easy to herd them back to the ranch by following the old Stagecoach Road that ran from Cranbrook to Canal Flats There was a wild card however: the owner’s kids horses. Roddy Simon had a. large mare he called Wonder. She and her colt were hanging around Skookumchuck. We rounded them up and I volunteered to take them back to the ranch. Merle was trying out his video camera watching Wonder make a leap over a snow bank. She then galloped into the woods and bucked me off. I tried to catch her and get back on but she kept kicking and bucking. The colt was following along so a caught him and used my coat as a halter to get the two of them back close to the ranch which was several miles away through knee deep snow. Temperature was 15 below Fahrenheit degrees. Wonder got the whip when we limped back to the barn. She had been spoiled and would need a lot of riding before the dudes showed up.

After our adventures in the great Rocky Mountain Trench, I lived in Kimberley for awhile then back to Nelson and eventually we all ended up in California for a new round of adventure. I even ended up at another ranch at Mad River in the hills of Humboldt County. I never saw Sonny again but did see Gordie on occasion He ended up working on the tow boats (tugs) where he became very well known.

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Tom Burns One Tough Hombre

Thursday, November 30th, 2023

TOM BURNS – ONE TOUGH H0MBRE

Tom was born in the old Victorian hospital in Kaslo on December 27, 1949. The late 1940’s featured some very hard winters and 1949 was one. Rough enough to freeze both Okanagan and Kootenay Lakes. We no longer see such winters in BC .The last one was 53 years ago. We lived in Ainsworth the winter Tom was born. I think it was spring before he came home. Mom, Betty Olsen and I went to get him. He was very premature two pounds and change. The nuns kept him in a chick incubator until he was healthy enough to come home. I remember Mom and Betty laying him out on the dining room table and fawning over him. He was so small and we all realized it was a miracle he was here. His doctor told mother not to have high hopes for Tommy. Aside from surviving birth and early development he was born with cerebral palsy. CP is a group of disorders that affect movement muscle tone and balance. There is no cure The old Victorian Hospital in Kaslo.

After Ainsworth, we moved to Hillsdale, California for awhile when Nid was still very young. I don’t remember much except that the apartments covered a huge area and that one of the first malls was built nearby

Tom, Mom and Kath at Hilllsdale.

We went back to Nelson in the early 1950’s where Tom thrived. He, Kath and I went to St. Joseph’s school. Tom and I would sometimes cut class to go on walkabouts. A favourite target was Hood’s bakery near the bottom end of Stanley Street. We hiked down from Latimer by taking the trail from Cottonwood Canyon, past the Hatchery , then up to Kootenay Street where we carried on to Hoods. There were dozens of fresh loaves arranged on drying racks near the street. Tom and I would hollow out a couple of ends and fill them with peanut butter and strawberry jam. We then headed down to the hobo jungle at the mouth of Cottonwood Creek where we devoured the bounty with the help of the bums. The hobos told us wild tales of riding the rails all across North America where they were hard pressed to dodge the railroad cops. They said the bulls were quite dangerous and one guy relayed how he was dispatched one winter night on the frozen prairie where he was clubbed then tossed out to skid on his face until he skidded to a stop minus some skin.

After a great stint in Nelson, we moved to Hillsdale, CA. It was an ugly place and Tommy was very young. I doubt if h ever remembered very much.

California developers built a huge mall nearby that turned into a demolition derby. People were not used to parking in close quarters. They opened their car doors into the sides of adjacent vehicles until they got used to the new style of parking.

We were soon on the road again. This time it was the Nelson shuttle. We lived at 1002 Kootenay Street a small non-descript house that still stands. Dad and Grandpa added a bedroom for Nid (my nickname for Tom) and I. and the house survived the big highway upheaval of the 1970’s that took out some really fine places but our little hovel still sits there looking exactly like it did in the 1950’s

Our travels were not over. The parents announced that we were headed to California again. Dad was starting a lighting company where the streets were paved with gold. I was disappointed to leave but Mom was ecstatic and started singing California Here I Come before we left Nelson. We got a motel in Spokane and mother got herself several quarts of Lucky Lager beer to celebrate. We settled in a San Diego suburb called Pacific Beach, which was a great spot. We lived in a small apartment above a lovely California beach that stretched for miles.

Tom, Kath, Sue and I went down to the beach at first light to watch old men with metal detectors search the beach for watches, rings and coins. They found a surprising amount. Sometimes we would go down to Belmont Park for the rides. Other times we would go out on the pier to hang out or fish. We caught small fish, croakers and shiner perch. Once I hooked a small halibut and another time we saw a large manta ray leap free and fall back into the gleaming sea. Pacific Beach was a great place.

Our stint in Paradise was soon over however. We trekked north to the Bay Area and Sunnyvale. It was then a small agricultural community but just edging into the high tech era which would increase the population from about 5000 to 150,000 in a few years. It went from fields and orchards to malls, subdivisions and car dealerships seemingly overnight. It shocked me to see such a productive valley just flushed away without protest. It was hard to believe. In those days, Californians thought land use planning was a communist conspiracy or worse so the demise of the Santa Clara Valley was not a surprise.

Tom hardly noticed. He was busy playing Little League baseball, Pop Warner football or whatever was going on the streets. He was just a happy go lucky boy, glad to be playing sports and laughing all the way.

After a couple of years, we moved a few miles west to Los Altos a beautiful town at the edge of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Tom and Sue went to Homestead Elementary School while Kath was at Fremont High and I was at Foothill College. We had a big house with oak trees and Stevens Creek in the backyard.

Dad had a swimming pool installed. Tom dove in right away and hardly left as long as the sun was shining. He became quite the physical specimen adding lots of muscle and co-ordination.

He continued his love of sport, Dad often took him up to The City to watch professional teams. Dad was a football fan so they saw the 49ers which featured Y A Tittle and fans that would rain down whiskey bottles if things were not going well. It was dangerous to sit in the Lower Rows at Kezar. The Giants had good teams in those days with the great sluggers Willie Mc Covey and Orlando Cepeda. We often went up to the Cow Place to watch the Seals of the old Western Hockey League play the Vancouver Canucks or Seattle Totems. There were some great Players in the old WHL. Which was very close to the NHL The great Guyle Fielder played for Seattle. Phil Maloney led the Canucks and the Seals had Orland Kurtenbach, Moe Mantha and Eddie Panagabco. Tom would go down to the players’ bench before the games to get autographs. He listened to all the games he didn’t get to on the radio including those of the San Francisco Warriors where Wilt Chamberlin played.

In Los Altos, we were introduced to pool parties where neighbourhood and church groups would have backyard gatherings with food and a keg of beer.

The parties would flame out in the early evening and the half full kegs would sit outside for awhile. Tom and his rascal friends would find out where the parties were and dispose of the contents of the keg in a secluded area. No one ever caught the boys so they went about their business. Aside from the pool, we often swam in Stevens Creek reservoir which had a spill way that would flow in the spring months when it picked up a coating of filamentous green algae which was very slippery so we slid down the spillway to land in a big pool at the bottom.

In about 1965, the California Dream was over and it was back to Nelson for Tom and Sue. Kath went on to Gonzaga in Spokane while I hustled up to Humboldt State University in the redwoods of Northern California. Tom readapted to life in Nelson and was glad to see his old friends like Ross and Roddy McKay, Dale Jefferies and Dick Murphy. They moved into the old house at Burns Point which was about 100 years old. It was a summer home and not insulated so it as hard to heat in winter. Dad built a new house in 1967. Sister Sue still lives in it. People were starting to live across the lake now that a bridge had replaced the Nelson Ferry and a road had come down almost to the house. The McKays built a house nearby and many street hockey games were played near the end of the road. The Clum boys usually joined in and some real lively games resulted. Summers were consumed by swimming and water skiing at the beach or up at Jorgie’s where there was a store and small marina. Such luminaries as Blake Allen and Steve Ward were also part of Jorgies gang. Tom and the boys also built small forts and cabins in the bush and stocked them with essentials like chips and comics. There were many hikes up to Pulpit Rock and down to Grohman Creek.

Tom was now in high school and enjoyed playing on the` LV Rogers basketball team : The Bombers. He no longer had the option of watching big league sports like the Bay Area teams but we had some great hockey teams nearby in the Western International League. Tom and I watched countless games between the Trail Smoke Eaters, Kimberley Dynamiters and our Nelson Maple Leafs.

When Tom finished at LVR, he Ross and Rod McKay and Jack Carpenter worked for CPR in the East Kootenay. `Big time coal mining was starting up so the boys had lot of work and adventure.

After the CPR days, Tom went to Mt. Royal College in Calgary where he did remarkably well for a boy ‘not to have high hope for’. Then a rougher road came up. Tom transferred to UBC where they would not axcept many of his Mt. Royal courses and credits. Tom was completely unprepared for this and was devastated. He had some good friends in Vancouver so he partied for awhile then managed to graduate as a teacher.

He taught in Burns Lake, Fort St John, Bella Bella and in the Fraser Valley and Kootenays. He started teaching in Asia in the 90’s and had stints in China, Japan and Korea where he would travel when he did not teach. He was especially fond of Thailand and knew its beaches well. When he stayed with me in Lake Cowichan, he was known as Thailand Tom. In the early twenty thousands, Tom scaled back his travels and settled back in Nelson where his health issues began to slow him down big time. Eventually he booked into Mountain Lakes care home. He still got around a bit and enjoyed the friends he made there but his health was still sliding. Parkinson’s disease came into his life as did arthritis to the point where he needed a hip replacement. That was done in the spring of 2021. Tom never fully recovered from the operation and in mid June of 2021, he made his final trip.

Tom was loved in Nelson. Over 300 people posted their condolences on Facebook. Most of them spoke of Tom’s easy smile and how easy he was to talk to

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Gringo Trail

Tuesday, November 28th, 2023

TOM BURNS – ONE TOUGH H0MBRE

Tom, Mom and Kath at Hilllsdale.

We went back to Nelson in the early 1950’s where Tom thrived. He, Kath and I went to St. Joseph’s school. Tom and I would sometimes cut class to go on walkabouts. A favourite target was Hood’s bakery near the bottom end of Kootenay Street. We hiked down from Latimer by taking the trail from Cottonwood Canyon, past the Hatchery , then up to Kootenay Street where we carried on to Hoods. There were dozens of fresh loaves arranged on drying racks near the street. Tom and I would hollow out a couple of ends and fill them with peanut butter and strawberry jam. We then headed down to the hobo jungle at the mouth of Cottonwood Creek where we devoured the bounty with the help of the bums. The hobos told us wild tales of riding the rails all across North America where they were hard pressed to dodge the railroad cops. They said the bulls were quite dangerous and one guy relayed how he was dispatched one winter night on the frozen prairie where he was clubbed then tossed out to skid on his face until he skidded to a stop minus some skin.

After a great stint in Ainsworth, we moved to Hillsdale, CA. It was an ugly place and Tommy was very young. I doubt if h ever remembered very much.

Dad had a swimming pool installed. Tom dove in right away and hardly left as long as the sun was shining. He became quite the physical specimen adding lots of muscle and co-ordination.

In Los Altos, we were introduced to pool parties where neighbourhood and church groups would have backyard gatherings with food and a keg of beer.

When Tom finished at LVR, he Ross and Rod McKay and Jack Carpenter worked for CPR in the East Kootenay. `Big time coal mining was starting up so the boys had lot of work and adventure.

After the CPR days, Tom went to Mt. Royal College in Calgary where he did remarkably well for a boy ‘not to have high hope for’. Then a rougher road came up. Tom transferred to UBC where they would not accept many of his Mt. Royal courses and credits. Tom was completely unprepared for this and was devastated. He had some good friends in Vancouver so he partied for awhile then managed to graduate as a teacher.

He taught in Burns Lake, Fort St John, Bella Bella and in the Fraser Valley and Kootenays. He started teaching in Asia in the 90’s and had stints in China, Japan and Korea where he would travel when he did not teach. He was especially fond of Thailand and knew its beaches well. When he stayed with me in Lake Cowichan, he was known as Thailand Tom. He returned to Nelson n the early 2000’s and eventually booked into mountain lakes care home. His CP was now complicated by Parkinson’s and the after effects of a hip replacement. He tried his best to cope but his body was not up to it. In June of 2021 he made his final trip.

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ABOUT PAPPY FLYNN

Monday, December 7th, 2020

PAPPY FLYNN – A TRAVELING MAN

Pappy Flynn – A Traveling Man

Thomas Joseph Flynn, my maternal Grandfather was born in The Potrero Hill neighborhood of San Francisco on April 8, 1881. He died June 29, 1960 in Grass Valley California. He was said to be one of 13 children although only three survived to adulthood. The family lived at 610 18^th Street in the Potrero where his mother Julia ran a small neighborhood market. His father, Michael was a drinker and Pappy told me that one night he and his brothers way laid him as he was coming up the stairs to where they lived and knocked him down the stairs. Evidently, he never returned.

Potrero Hill neighborhood of 2020. In Pappy’s day, it was quite rural with fields of California Poppies on south facing slopes. It gradually evolved into a working class ghetto. These days it has become highly gentrified with a few rough spots. Recently an old, beat up house came on the market for 2.5 million. This has happened to many of the old neighborhoods of THE CITY as Californians like to call it. As far as they are concerned there is only one city in California – San Francisco.

Tom enlisted in the US Navy at Mare Island, CA in 1897 at age 16; his mother had to give consent. He was paid $9 per month. He was on the receiving ship USRS Independence until August 1897 (a receiving ship was an old semi-retired vessel anchored somewhere to act as a recruiting depot.) Next he was on the USS Adams until February 1898. The Adams was a single screw wooden hulled bark rigged steamer. She spent the fall of 1897 visiting ports on the West coast of US and Canada. In November the ship docked in Hawaii for three weeks. Next stop for the Traveller was the Cruiser USS Baltimore. They delivered badly needed ammunition to Commodore Dewey in Hong Kong and Mirs Bay. From there they

The Baltimore

sailed to the Philippines for some serious action. The Baltimore served with the US Asiatic Squadron under Dewey and took part in the battle of Manila Bay on May 1, 1898. She was the second largest ship in Dewey’s fleet and an important part of the attack which was mainly a duel with Spanish shore batteries. The only casualties on the Baltimore were caused by a single shell which rattled around the deck wounding 8 men. The Spanish Fleet was destroyed. The Baltimore remained on the Asiatic Stations convoying transports and protecting American interests until May 1990 when she sailed for New York via the Suez Canal.

Thomas didn’t go along. He was stationed on the USS Yorkton from June 1900 to April 1901. The Yorkton was a steam driven schooner rigged small cruiser classified as gunboat and patrolled the northern Philippines. With the Boxer Rebellion underway in China, she was sent to Northern China to assist in relieving foreign legations that were under siege from Chinese troops. Her landing force served ashore at Taku. In June of 1900, she assisted the Oregon in backing off a reef there then departed Shanghai and reached Cavite in the Philippines a week later. She resumed pacification duties there.

In February 1901, Thomas began suffering from vertigo and nervous prostration which became quite disabling. He also contracted malaria. He was honourably discharged in San Francisco and was awarded The Spanish, Philippine and China Badges.

He moved back to San Francisco and found that his nervous condition had rendered him unfit for manual work. His mother nursed him at home. Because of his inability to do hard work, he took a course at Heald’s Business College in San Francisco for six months then landed a job as a time keeper at Risdon Iron Works where he stayed for about 5 years.

About 1905, he moved to Goldfield, Nevada where he was a bookkeeper at the office of Webb Parkinson. He moved back to San Francisco about 1907. He married Mildred Hanson at San Jose in about 1909. He was living with Mildred in a tent outside of Bishop, CA when he had a stroke that left his right side partially paralysed. This condition lasted the rest of his days. He had to have his clothes custom made to accommodate his handicap.

In October, 1909 he was back living with his family in the Potrero working as a book keeper. Mildred is living in Los Angeles with her father and Thomas is now working as a stock broker. During this time he went for trips to Santa Cruz, to Nevada and to Williams AZ for his health.. He and Mildred were divorced on June 5, 1911. Shortly after the divorce, she married Fred Thomas and they operated the Bullard Hotel in Silver City, NM.

In May, 1913 he is in Winnimuca County NV in the mining business. In Dec, 1915 he is living in Reno and is Secretary – Treasurer of the Nevada Lincoln Mining Company. In January, 1913 he is engaged to Helen Sanderson of Adams, MA. They are married in Goldfield, NV Jan. 4, 1919.

Mother and Auntie going for a walk in Tonopah

In May, 1920 he is the office manager for Smith and Amann, a stockbroker’s office in Tonopah NV where he and Helen are living on Ellis Street. By May 1923, he is back in San Francisco at 364 Bush Street. By May 1925, he is a member of the San Francisco Stock Exchange. He is now living in San Francisco or across the bay in Oakland. In October of 1928; he sold his seat on the San Francisco curb for $47,000 which yielded him a profit of 31,000 in one year. He continues as a member of the San Francisco Mining Exchange which he continued to work with until late in life.

From the Nevada State Journal of October 22, 1928:

“Tom Flynn made quite a fortune during the Goldfield boom most of which he later lost and a serious sickness followed. He is credited with having made a bunch of money during the divide boom. Having learned a lesson from the Goldfield boom this time he kept his money and has been adding to his capital ever sense. He is widely known in Nevada and on the coast and has a high reputation for square dealing. Mr. Flynn has a reputation of being a very shrewd operator…”

It was also said that Tom Flynn had a hand in the development of skiing in the High Sierras.

In September 1932, he bought the Marshall Ranch in Grass Valley, CA. The ranch adjoined the Empress Mine. He became superintendant of the Rockland Mine near Yerington, NV. On May 12, 1920 his daughter Helen Jane (Elaine) was born in San Francisco. From family photos it appears she also lived in Oakland and Tonopah with Hazel her mother and her Auntie Helen who acted as a kind of secretary- executive assistant to Pappy.

The Flynn at 373 Parrot Drive, San Mateo, CA

By 1930, the family is mainly living at 373 Parrot Drive in the Bay Wood neighbourhood of San Mateo, CA. Pappy had this large and beautiful home built from old growth redwood lumber. It still stands as a testament to quality. This is the period when Nana (Hazel) and Pappy did a lot of travelling sometimes taking Helen Jane (my mother along). They visited Europe, especially Germany, The Orient, especially China and Japan and the Caribbean. But the Parrot Drive home was his pride and joy. I once lived there with my Mother while my Dad was away in the Second War. I was very young but remember having a garden of nasturtiums and marigolds and helping Roy the Filipino Gardner and my best friend. I can also remember going over to Halfmoon Bay with Pappy and up to the Stock Exchange in the City on the train. He introduced me to his friends and fellow workers and we had lunch at The Old Poodle Dog, a beyond ritzy restaurant. I also remember him taking me to baseball games and to visit merchants around San Mateo like Mr. Merkel at his cigar store. When I became older (about 12) Pappy, mother and I went to Alaska on the CPR boat The Princess Louise. This must have been one of the most early cruise ships on this run. Pappy provided me with lectures on the stock market and money management and many reminders on table manners. We landed in Prince Rupert, Ketchicikan, Sitka, Wrangell and Juneau and took the White Pass and Yukon Train from Skagway to Whitehorse. Of Course Pappy was fascinated by the old gold rush country and must have wished he was among the stampeders. He loved to travel and as he got older he would stick to more local trips. He came up to BC quite often. He loved to prowl around Ainsworth and Kaslo. They had also had their mining days and had lots of mining history. He also loved to fish and had a good split cane fly rod. I can remember him going up Woodbury Creek and hurting a leg clambering around on the slippery boulders.

The Flynn’s: My Mother, Pappy and Nana

Sometime in the 1950’s Pappy started to slow down. His ailments of the navy days and his stroke aftermath plagued him along with heart issues. He, Nana and Auntie moved to an apartment down by the El Camino at 321 Dartmouth Road about 1955. Pappy died on June 25, 1960 in Grass Valley which was a kind of haven for him. When he became under the weather he would sometimes go up and see Dr. Farthing, his long time physician who would place him in the hospital for a week or so until he was ready to carry on.

A curious feature of Pappy’s life was the lifelong argument he had with Veterans’ Affairs over whether or not he was entitled to a disability pension from his Navy Days. He even hired a Washington DC lawyer to act on his behalf as far back as 1903. By 1910 he was receiving a small stipend which was increased somewhat over the years. He never explained that he was a man of wealth and had no need for the stipend.

He was buried in Golden Gate National Cemetery with a 21 gun salute

Happy Days: Nana in the left foreground and Pappy the second man in from the pole with the white hair. They are on board a ship which was the main mode of long distance travel for many decades.

Ted and John Frederick Burns/2020

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A NOTEWORTHY MAN

Monday, November 23rd, 2020

A Noteworthy Person – John Burns – My Grandfather

John and his brother Bob at Pulpit Rock around 1920. Bob died in Humboldt Sask in 1928

John Burns (right) with his brother Bob at Pulpit Rock probably around 1920. Bob settled in Humboldt Saskatchewan where he owned a store. He died in 1928

John Burns was born on the 15^th of August, 1878 at Hopehill Road, Glasgow Scotland. He died June 14, 1962 In Nelson, BC from Cerebral Thrombosis (a blood clot which caused a stroke). He had a twin brother Walter who died a few weeks after birth. April 28, 1880, John his mother and brothers Bob and Harry sailed to Quebec on the SS Scandinavia. They arrived in Quebec City 0n May 13. They took the train to Gravenhurst, ONT where the group was met by his father. From there they took a covered wagon to temporary quarters in Dunchurch, ONT. Later, his father built a small hotel in Dunchurch where they lived until they journeyed west. Young John and his brothers had Scottish accents and even wore kilts at times. Of course the other children teased the boys as much as they could. It had no impact and John soon grew out of his clothes and accent.

He attended public school in a small log schoolhouse His teacher was Thomas Butler an old fashioned school master that provided a well grounded education in the basics. At the same time he was learning the skills of the country and could, ride, shoot, hunt and fish as well as his native friends. He also helped his dad with saw milling and freighting.

They remained in the Parry Sound region until the spring of 1897 when he went to Nelson with his father. They had to go via Spokane and the Nelson and Fort Sheppard Railway because the CPR’s Crowsnest line was still under construction. His mother Annie and Brother Bob followed a few months later and brother Harry came in 1901. John and his father were building contractors in the Nelson area for many years (operating as John Burns and Son). I never met my Great grandfather who died in 1916 before my father was born. I knew he was a big man (6 foot five) and a hard worker. But I knew my Grandfather. He was a very hard worker whose word was gold. When I knew him he was quite old and cranky long past his best. But he would crawl out to the wood shed to split kindling when he couldn’t walk, I offered to help him but soon learned that was one question you never asked this independent, multi talented man who had strong opinions on life and work. He reminded me of the great hockey player then tough coach – Eddie Shore. It was often said of Shore that his cures were worse than the illness so you never complained about anything lest it trigger a response from Dr. Shore. Mind you, looking back, I can see that Grandpa was way ahead of the norm and provided no end of great advice. And as a builder his work speaks for itself.

Nelson City Hall (Touchstones)

What role his father played in construction of the most prominent Kootenay Buildings is not clear but what is evident is that he taught his son well.

John Burns erected the Nelson post office / City Hall/Touchstones Museum, The Bank of Commerce, Mara and Bernard Block, Central School alteration, Hume School, Nelson Brewery, a number of houses on Carbonate Street, Hume Hotel upgrade, the Malone House at 1102 Front Street. The old hospital on Front Street, the first St. Josephs School, the old fire Hall. The government buildings in Rossland , Trail, Greenwood and Grand Forks. Then there is the Greenwood Post Office and the courthouse in Vernon as well as the Central School in Trail. He had 80 employees in 1928.

Around 1920, he built the first pool and hotel in Ainsworth where he also owned several houses and cabins including the cabin at Loon Lake as well as the Silver Ledge Hotel.

He and his father owned a lumberyard, a sash and door factory, and a brickyard. They owned the gravel pit behind the present high school (where large houses are now located). They had the Marble Head Quarry, another one across the lake from Kaslo and yet another on Granite Road. He sold the construction company to AH Green in 1929 but had one more task- the Civic Centre construction which he supervised.

He was a Nelson alderman in 1918 -19. After the Civic he and Rose pretty well retired to their North Shore home at Burns Point at the west end of Johnston Road and at their home in Ainsworth which they called “ The Wheeler” after A. D. Wheeler an important mining man in early Ainsworth.

In the 1960’s they moved to a small house they built at 212 Latimer in Nelson. He passed away in Mount St. Francis in 1962 at age 83.

Central School in Nelson

Nelson Civic Centre

Grand Forks Courthouse

John Burns at the Ainsworth Pool

By John Frederick Burns and Ted Burns

Nov. 2020

Tags:a very hard working man
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My Mother’s Canada

Friday, November 20th, 2020

My Mother’s Canada

My mother was born Helen Jane Flynn on May 12, 1920, in San Francisco. Her father was Thomas Joseph Flynn, a mining man in Nevada and Northern California and a shrewd investor who was once president of the San Francisco stock exchange. Her mother was Hazel Sanderson, a nurse who originally came from Massachusetts. Her parents became quite wealthy and built a large home on Parrot Drive in the Baywood neighbourhood of San Mateo, CA just south of San Francisco.

flynnfamcopy

Mother on left then Pappy and Nana Flynn

My mother had the best of all worlds. It was an area of great beauty with the gold hills of the East Bay cradling the bay’s blue waters. On the west were the Santa Cruz Mountains, Crystal Springs Reservoir and the Ocean Beaches at places like Halfmoon Bay. Mother went to private schools and took training in voice and comportment for a young lady of means. I doubt if such a life of privilege exists anymore. My mother even had her own play house which could happily house a small family today. She also had a number of suitors who took her to places and events frequented by the well off.

Baywoodgirl

Mom at home in Baywood

373parrotdrive

The Flynn Home at 373 Parrot Drive

Into this setting comes my father, a student at Santa Clara University down the peninsula from San Mateo and close to San Jose. Not exactly a poor farm boy, my Dad was from a different background and wildly different environment. Indeed. Dad was born in Nelson, BC in 1918 and was the son of pioneer builder John Burns and Rose Yvonne Swain, a Métis girl from Northern Saskatchewan.

Mother and Dad met at a party or dance at Santa Clara and were married in May of 1940. Now is when the story becomes more interesting. Remember that my mother was a California girl that had grown up with maids and gardeners and had been coddled by her parents and her Auntie who lived with the family as kind of an executive assistant to Grandpa Flynn. I wonder if Mom ever cooked or even decided what to wear on day to day basis let alone live in a cabin with a wood stove and shovel waist deep snow.

Dad

Dad as a young man

Not long after their honeymoon in Carmel, CA, the newlyweds travelled north to The Kootenay Region of BC, a place my mother had never seen but about which my father had likely waxed poetically. Her first views of Canada were shrouded by the low cloud and heavy rain so common in the month of June. What she could see of the country was burned off by a recent forest fire and the black spires and snags of dead timber were not exactly what the tourist brochures touted and probably contributed to a worrisome doubt: What have I done? Is this it? Her first views of Canadian towns though the misted windows of the car were of the Kootenay metropolises of Ymir and Salmo. Both had seen better days and some considered Ymir to be a ghost town.

Mom was likely much more impressed with Nelson which is a gem by all standards of measure.

They lived in a good house on the corner of Stanley and Latimer Streets but soon returned to California. I remember little of those years which must have been around 1943-44. I do remember that Pappy Flynn was very patriotic and conservative. He and Nana had a huge painting of George Washington in their ornate living room where people seldom went and I can remember him and Nana railing against Roosevelt and the Unions in the form of the AFL and CIO. In the yard was a tall flagpole and large flag that was kept clean and sparkling. I also remember Nana being an ace cook who gave me a small glass of beer with lunch and Auntie teaching me to read. Pappy Flynn had a good library of books by Brett Hart, Joaquin Miller and William Joseph Long – stories of the pioneer west

Then it was back to BC and Dad was off to the Canadian Army where he was stationed in England during the war. Mother and I lived in Kaslo in a small house on Front Street across from the wharf and where the Moyie (a beloved Kootenay Lake sternwheeler) is now parked. I have been told that Grandpa Burns built the house for her to live in. He did build a number of houses and other buildings in Nelson, Ainsworth and other West Kootenay towns.

Mother and I in Kaslo 1940’s

I was very young but remember the King George Hotel, and have vivid memories of the May Day celebrations where little Japanese girls in white dresses danced around the May Pole. I also remember the beautiful cherries that grew right on Front St. and were picked by everyone. These cherries were larger than the largest you see today. I was told their size diminished when the trees were infected by a pathogen from the ornamental cherries people started planting all over. The only business I remember was Eric’s Meat Market. Mother liked to shop there because he was very kind to her.

Then back to California once more where my sister Kathleen was born and I started school at St. Matthews. I planted a flower garden of marigolds and nasturtiums at Parrot Drive and helped Roy (the Filipino Gardner) in the main garden. I went to a baseball game with Pappy Flynn and up to his office in the San Francisco Stock Exchange. We took the train and had lunch at the Old Poodle Dog where uniformed waiters served ice cream in little silver cups and all knew Pappy.

It wasn’t long before we were on the way north again. I clearly remember that trip because of the strong heat in the Sacramento Valley. We stopped at a restaurant called the Nut Tree and at several drink stands shaped like giant oranges.

This time it was Ainsworth where we landed. Of all places I have lived, I liked it best. We lived in a house called The Wheeler which was built by Mr. A.O Wheeler, an important figure in the mining history of Ainsworth. The house rested on a flat bench above a short cliff by the lake. Uncle Jack, Auntie Helen and my five cousins lived next door in a large house built by the Giegrich family who ran the first store which was owned and operated by Pop Fletcher when we lived in Ainsworth.

But it couldn’t have been an easy place for mom. We arrived there at the beginning of a very hard winter. The lake froze. A path for the Moyie was kept open by the big tug the Grant Hall. We built a rink in the yard. Uncle Jack had played hockey in college. The winter was also hell for the deer. After stripping the fruit trees of bark, deer died in several places around town. There was a crusty snow that cut their legs so it was possible to follow them to their final resting places. We had a wood stove in the kitchen for cooking and larger one in the living room for heating. I don’t think there was insulation but Uncle Jack’s house had torn up newspaper in the walls which must have helped some. But mom did pretty well for herself. Auntie Helen helped her – Helen was a great cook and could have written volumes on country living. She and Uncle Jack ran the Silver Ledge and also had duties at the pool which Grandpa Burns had built many years before. Betty Olson stepped up for Mom in a very big way helping in every way she could. Mom’s health was starting to flag even then.

Mother and Rose Yvonne at Hot Springs Hotel in Ainsworth-1940’s

Ainsworth was an ideal place for kids and there were lots: Hawes, Lane, Turner, Fletcher, Isaacs. We roamed the country as we pleased. We swam all day at Uncle Jack’s beach in the summer then trekked our way up to the pool when the sun went down at the beach. The Burns kids all slept in little cots on the big front porch of the Wheeler. We told stories, read comics and watched lightening dance on the mountains across the lake. Sometimes we would go fishing with Dad or Uncle Jack up Woodbury Creek or Loon Lake and we often went over to watch George Hobbs come in from fishing in the evening. He often had some fine rainbows and Dollies to show us. George and Ruth Hobbs were kind of defacto grandparents to many of the Ainsworth kids. In fact, all elders were. We called them all Ma and Pa or Grannie or Grandpa. It has been said that it takes a community to raise kids. Ainsworth of those days was a prime example.

Ainsworth party: Top row – Jackie Fletcher, Flash Olson and Frisky Olson

Middle row: Brenda (Shadow Foot) Brown, Dorothy Hawes and Lynn Burns.

Bottom Row: Teddy Burns, Jeannie Burns and Peggy Burns

In the fall, dad and I would often go hunting. There were many varying hares (snowshoe rabbits) in the woods above Ainsworth so we shot lots as well as quite a few grouse. We always had trout and we shot a couple of deer at Peterson’s Ranch – a whitetail spike and a four point mule deer. Fall outings included huckleberry picking and harvesting apples. Dad and I also explored many of the old mines above Ainsworth. Both dad and Uncle Jack had semi active claims. One summer, we went on a holiday. We just crossed the lake to a place we called Honeymoon Bay near the mouth of Indian Creek. We only stayed for a few days because an obnoxious bear drove us off but I had the best fishing days ever fly fishing at the creek mouth.

The end of summer also meant school. There were eight grades and one teacher. Kids skipped quite a bit. If there was one kid in Grade 2 but 3 in grade 3, the Grade 2 kid became a third grader and so on. That’s how my cousin Peggy ended up teaching big Peace River Farm boys at age eighteen. Peggy was very bright and a good student but she got a few skips to ease her way. The teachers were Pat Currie and Margaret McDonald. They weaved magic for the eight grades in the one room school.

In the winter of 1949, my brother Tom was born in Kaslo. He was very pre mature and the sisters kept him a chick incubator for a long time at the Victorian Hospital. The hospital always seemed like just a big house to me but we were lucky to have it. There was also a doctor: Dr. Marion Irwin. There was another doc at Woodbury named Dr. Besecker. He didn’t practice but helped in emergencies. Despite Tom’s peanut size, mother and Betty brought him along fine after we finally brought him down from Kaslo. He had cerebral palsy but it didn’t slow him down until much later in life.

To my everlasting dismay, we packed up and went back to California once again. This time we didn’t go back to Parrot Drive and Baywod. We moved south for a few miles to the Hillsdale District of San Mateo and lived in a mega apartment complex which I hated. It was somewhat close to parrot Drive so mom spent a lot of time with her folks and the place was nice and modern. They built a huge mall near the apartments and are now in the process of re-purposing it. I do not remember much about Hillsdale where I learned to ride a bike and hung around with kids who are likely in jail now. Dad worked for Pacific Gas and Electric and things were OK but I missed my cousins and the green hills of Canada.

Kath at Hillsdale Apartments

I shouldn’t have worried because we were soon on the road north again headed to Nelson. This time we would stay for awhile. Dad worked for Gordon Burns at his Passmore logging and milling operation (TFL #3) and we lived in a small house at 1002 Kootenay Street well up the hill. His was a great place and I made some very good friends: Tom Ramsay, Gary Kilpatrick, the Goldsbury brothers (Freddie and Vernon), Dick Gelinas, Clare Palmer, Harry Cox, Muggsy Holmes and Gary Higgs.

Kootenay Street: me on left then Kath and Tom with Sue in front

When the highways were realigned in the 70’s, much of our old neighbourhood was lost. The Ramsay’s lovely big house at the end of Kootenay Street, The Gully behind it which destroyed our fantastic toboggan trail, all the houses in Cottonwood Canyon and upstream as far as Vancouver Street. There was a little neighbourhood in the canyon. Harry Cox lived there in a small house where Gary Kilpatrick’s grandparents (Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler) had lived earlier. Bill and Mary Vickers ( Mary was one of mom’s best friends) lived on one side of a big house while Neil McClenaghan lived on the other There was a trail that wound down to the fish hatchery and Dago Town. The Rosemont side also lost some good houses especially that of Mary and Bill Murphy. Just across the Rosemont Bridge, a tiny dirt road led to some old places where elderly bachelors held forth making elderberry and dandelion wine and reading outdoor magazines. Mr. Oliver had hundreds of Sports Afield and Outdoor Life.

On the Hall Mines – Ymir Road side of the creek there was the old Nelson Power Plant and another small neighbourhood where the Pond family lived. There was almost always a shinny game there in the winter and early spring and my grandparents built a little house there at the end of the road. Its address was 212 Latimer St. but you went in from the Hall Mines Side. Gram and Grandpa were old then and I would sometimes see Grandpa crawling out to the woodshed to split kindling. When I offered to do it he would rant and rave. If I was working in our yard, Gram would yell across the little gully between the two houses: “ you go fishing Teddy”. This didn’t please my dad so I seldom went until I had finished the job. Gus and Natalie Madalozzo lived in the little gully and grew a large field of excellent tomatoes.

Mother enjoyed living in Nelson. She had some good friends and she really enjoyed the loads of kids that hung round our place. She was a very social person and at her best when she was around kids –the more the better. Kids loved her. She didn’t fuss over spilled milk or dirty shoes and treated all kids as if they were her own. She baked platters of chocolate chip cookies that were inhaled by the rug rats. She a happy go lucky soul and loved to tease and joke. Her main target was my father. Mom had great sport making fun of his native heritage ( his ( mother was a Metis girl from the north). She would dance around the house making great war whoops. Dad would just smile because he enjoyed to see her happy. No offense taken.

My sister Susan was born in Nelson in 1953. In 1954 mom had a fifth child – Robert Michael. He only lived for a day or so. This was a very sad day for the family and especially so for mom. Her health started to decline after that. She was not a strong person at the best of times and having so many babies in a short stretch then losing one seemed to drain her. There were some huge families in Nelson in the fifties and many of the kids went to St. Joseph’s school with Kath and me. There were the Miners who had eighteen. Leo and Art Miner were good friends who I saw often. The Miller’s of Silver King Road had twenty. I was friends with Dennis and Dick. Dick is famous for falling off the top of the Nelson Bridge when he was working on it in 1957.

How those mothers ever survived is a mystery to me but I do know that the kids did a lot of the work and even parenting of the younger siblings. Even so, it must have been hard and it sure was for mom.

In 1957, the higher grades at St. Josephs were shut down and all the catholic kids older than about 15 moved to L.V. Rogers High School which was much larger than our little school at St. Joseph’s. But LV had the right idea. They had sock hops at lunch time and the teachers seemed more worldly and informed than our dear nuns at St. Josephs. Many kids hung around the Green Door, a little store with a jukebox just down the hill. The catholic kids mostly hung around together but I made some good pals at LV such as Jimmy Rogers.

In the summer of 1958, it was back on the road again destination California. Mom was over the top. She belted out “California Here I Come” all the way to Spokane. We got a motel near a park and the river and mom drank a couple of quarts of beer and serenaded the Spokane Valley.

Dad and his friend Dick Green had a business plan: peddling light bulbs in the Golden State. They had a huge warehouse full of lighting products which still may be sitting in LA.

The first stop was Pacific Beach a fine suburb of San Diego. We spent the summer in an apartment by the beach. The beach ran for miles and had a pier where you could fish and watch the sea. I just had a little spinning rod and caught croakers and tom cod. But I also managed to hook a halibut and get him to the surface. Other anglers rushed over with a huge treble hook on a rope. They lowered it down and tried to snag the brute but it dove down and broke the line. One evening as the sun went down; a huge sting ray leaped into the air and flopped back into the sea.

We kids were among the first swimmers on the morning beach. Old guys with metal detectors were even earlier. They found rings, watches and change. We looked at houses in La Mesa and Lemon Grove but ended up heading north to the Bay Area where we settled in Sunnyvale. Sunnyvale was an agricultural town on the cusp of a huge population boom. It leaped from about 5,000 in the 50’s, 50,000 a few years later then 150,000 plus by the mid 60’s. Thousands of hectares of some of the most productive land on earth was attacked by development and covered over with housing, malls and parking lots. It was astounding but no one raised a hand. Wetlands, orchards and farms were swept away and replaced by huge subdivisions with names like Lake Wood Village and Oak Grove Estates.

We lived on West McKinley Avenue and I went to Sunnyvale High, a large prison like institution with thousands of students. I didn’t care for it but made some great fiends there. Dennis Pippin and Jim Baer were some of my closest friends ever along with Dennis David and Dick Anderson. I graduated from Sunnyvale in 1961 after a sabbatical working on the S Half Diamond Ranch at Skookumchuck, BC.

Mom was in her glory in Sunnyvale. The Cherry Chase neighbourhood of West McKinley was very friendly with squads of kids. The neighbours had lots of parties and coffee gatherings almost every morning. The ladies would migrate from house to house in their Hawaiian Mumus or bathrobes then camp in the kitchens and gossip about the neighbours who weren’t present – Mom loved it.

After a few years we moved to a nearby community called Los Altos. It was a bigger house with a nice backyard with oak trees and a seasonal creek. We even built a swimming pool which dad and Tom loved. Tom became very strong from swimming. I had worked at Ampex Audio after high school but mom and dad bugged me constantly to upgrade my education. Most of my friends from Sunnyvale High had moved on to Foothill College, a two year community college just a mile or so up in the hills from our house at 2041 Fallen Leaf Lane. It was a lovely campus and when I discovered that most of my old pals spent most of their time going to parties and drinking beer at the Roundtable Pizza Parlour in downtown Los Altos, I felt right at home. To my great surprise, I did not partake that much and got good grades. I worked at a good job at Bill Steffan’s Chevron on Stevens Creek Boulevard. The gas station and shop were part of a small mall with a pizza parlour called Pagliachi’s which became a major hang out for my friends and me. For awhile’ I moved into an old house on El Monte Avenue we called the Sugar Shack. It was great fun until mother caught me in bed with my girlfriend one early morning. The party was over. She insisted I move home and register for the draft. Like her parents, she was a patriotic republican and rather straight in some ways.

In 1964, I graduated from Foothill and moved up to Humboldt State University in the redwoods where I graduated in 1968. In 1965, the family again packed up and migrated back to Nelson. While we were living in Los Altos, mom’s health declined further. She started to have serious back issues( she had fallen out of a tree as a girl) and had to be hospitalized occasionally. I wonder if part of the reason we went back to BC was the Canadian Medical Plan. One weekend in a hospital near Los Altos cost mom way over one thousand dollars. While in Sunnyvale and Los Altos, dad worked as a car salesman which I don’t think he cared for much. Back in Nelson, he did the same for awhile then sold real estate. We lived in Grandpa and Grandma’s summer home across the lake from Nelson. The house was very old (it once served as a powder house for Fred Hume’s hardware business and dated back to the 1890’s.) There was neither central heat nor modern appliances so it must have been hard for mom. There wasn’t even a road until 1959. Of course everyone loved it when it had boat access only. Then it was truly a summer home and only a few people lived on the North Shore across from Nelson. Mom and dad built a new house in 1967 and things got much easier for mom. But with the kids gone, there wasn’t much for her to do. I was still at Humboldt then, and later down on the Island, Kath was at Gonzaga and Tom was at UBC. Sue was still mostly home but mom was used to gangs of kids in her face. They rented the old ranch house until Sue got married and a new place was constructed where the old house was. Several young couples like Steve and Gerry Ward rented the old place and they provided great friendship for mother. But gradually that started to fade. Dad was more and more occupied by his business and mom became very lonely and inside herself. Her dad had died when we were still in California and she lost a very strong anchor. At some point mom began to take what she termed a muscle relaxant. It was in fact Valium, a benzodiazepine that becomes addictive if taken for more than a week or two. Mom took it for years and no one had the heart to try and stop or reduce her intake. The docs just renewed her supply when she ran out. Dad tried to limit her intake and was slightly successful but hated being her jailer. She had no other interests and would rarely rise out of bed. The drug had become just about her only focus. The family became increasingly concerned for her welfare but she continued to claim she was fine. At one point in the winter of 1987 she came downstairs to visit me and when she saw I was drinking a beer, she got excited and said “oh boy, let’s have some beers”. She sipped one for about five minutes then retreated to her upstairs bedroom saying she was too tired to finish it. Mom wasn’t much of a drinker but occasionally went on a toot. Mixers at hockey games were a favourite format but there were others. One time Sue and her good pal Patty Troyan were coming home from the drive in at Ten Mile when they saw the RCMP had someone pulled over on The hill on Johnstone Road (this hill is gone now) – it was mom. They asked the cop what had happened and he said “look at my car”! Mom and dad had a scrap so she went over town to Mother McKim’s and had a few snorts with Ruth and Red. When the cops pulled her over she was searching for her drivers’ licence and popped the car out of gear. It rolled down the hill and crunched the cop car. Dad was furious but he had infinite patience with mom and ended up having a good chuckle. To top it all off, mom was wearing a wild looking wig at the time. The cops must have been wondering what kind of characters live along this road. Sister Sue ended up working for the RCMP not long after the incident.

Tom and Sue both reported querying her about her health later on that winter expecting to hear a litany of complaints but she was very positive and forward looking. They were both pleased. A few weeks later, she must have been suffering big time pain. She took a huge dose of ASA and died in the hospital – she was only 67 years old.

To this day we have no idea whether she was suffering from physical pain or withdrawal from the benzo. I think it was probably both and that leads me to wonder: Is it better to give deeply addicted people what they need or try to limit their intake? Of course individual circumstances will vary widely and the decision will always be very difficult but I will say that I have concluded that for older people with very limited will power and poor general health, I would favour just letting them continue at least until a clear window of opportunity for progress opened.

I think the doctors of Nelson, agreed with me and left things to dad to try and deal with. At one point years before her death, Dr. Carpenter took over her case for some reason and managed to wean her. He sent her to a rehab centre in Penticton for a month or more and she came home absolutely her old self. I think she lasted about a week or two then she was back in bed with the pills. Constant motivation and support were needed to keep her upright. I think Dr. Carpenter managed to scare her into submission but in the long view, that wasn’t enough to overcome her needs

She had been taking Valium for about 30 years. Her doctor in Los Altos had started her on them. At the time they were very popular and widely prescribed for various nervous afflictions and it was quite some time before “mothers little helpers” were discovered to be addictive. For our family it was a hard way to learn. Indeed.

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SOME EARY BURNS DAYS IN CANADA

Friday, October 9th, 2020

Early Days of the Burns Family in Canada

In the early autumn of the year 1878, three young Scottish tradesmen born and reared in the City of Glasgow encouraged by glowing descriptions about opportunities in North America and discouraged by the lack of opportunity in their native land, decided to emigrate to Canada. They sailed from Glasgow to Quebec. The steamboats of that day took about three weeks to make the trip from the River Clyde to the St Lawrence.

The three youngsters were all in their early twenties. They were:

John Burns
Walter Leitch
James Macalister

The first two were Master Joiners and Foremen Carpenters and Maca

lister was a Master Stone Mason. Each has served apprenticeships of seven years.

Burns and MacAlister were married and each had three small children, the youngest a babe in arms. Walter Leitch was single but hoped to have a future wife join him in Canada.

Winnipeg was booming and was much advertised in Scotland. It was the proposed destination of the boys. You travelled by rail to St Paul, Minnesota then by stage to a landing on the Red River. There a small steamer went on to Winnipeg and Fort Garry. This was a long, hard trip through unsettled lands where hostile natives were sometimes present.

The first leg of the trip was from Quebec to Toronto where the young men were persuaded to drop Winnipeg and go on to the Parry Sound District about 200 miles north of Toronto. Settlers could obtain a grant of 160 acres there. At that time Gravenhurst was the end of the Grand Trunk Railroad. A stage ran from there to Parry Sound on the shore of Lake Huron’s Georgian Bay. At Parry Sound they were directed to take another stage to a small hamlet called Dunchurch some 27 miles to the north and located on a narrows between two lakes called Whitestone. They eventually took up lands on the Whitestone River 12 miles from Dunchurch. The land was heavily timbered and filled with game and the river had good edible fish. The Scots were all good riflemen and after they built a cabin for the winter managed to get by with what they could purchase, shoot or hook. The grant lands were taken up in the winter when there was considerable snow. It wasn’t until the spring melt that Burns and Macalister found that they had located on stony land not suitable for growing things. Agriculture was essential to the new settlers in a land where food supplies could be difficult to come by and expensive to buy. Leitch had better luck and his land became a productive farm.

In April of 1879, the wives and children of Burns and MacAlister arrived in Canada. John and Anne Burns had three boys:

Robert b March 1875
Harry b December 1876
John b August 1878

They took the train to Gravenhurst where they were met by the husbands and fathers who took them to the rough quarters at the pre-emption.

John Burns went back to his trade as a carpenter. He built a small hotel at Dunchurch. He and his wife operated it for a few years. The old country tradesmen of that period came prepared so Burns had brought a fair stock of tools. There was no woodworking factories near so most of the wood work had to be made by hand. Lumber was whip sawed and finishing was done by hand plane.

About two years after his arrival, John Burns built a small sawmill. It was steam powered and consisted chiefly of a circular head rig and a carriage. Logs were brought in by sleigh in the winter and by water in the summer where they were stored in a boomed off pond. The mill only operated when lumber was needed. Both lathe and shingles were made but there were no planers to dress the lumber. Good clay and lime were available so bricks could be made. Most buildings were log with stone foundations.

Macalister with an increasing family found it hard to make expenses so after a few years he moved to Parry Sound where he worked as a stone mason. He then moved on to Edmonton when the railway reached there and I lost track of him. His oldest daughter moved to Moyie where her husband was the superintendent of the St Eugene Mine until it closed down. This lady used to visit my mother in Nelson regularly before she left Moyie.

Walter Leitch who had the only good land managed to get a fair acreage under production. The logging camps provided a good market for his produce. He carried on until he got too old then moved to Toronto,

Parry Sound was well timbered with White ad Norway pine and fair stands of hardwood like maple, oak, birch, beech and ash and elm. There were numerous lakes connected by creeks and driveable rivers and this was very helpful getting the wood to market. In my very young days, white Pine was taken out as square timbers for shipment to Britain. Later on, the logs were floated down to Lake Huron then towed to mills on Georgian Bay or across the lake to Michigan mills.

Very few settlers in this district were able to make a living from their farming operations. Some add to their income by trapping. There is an abundance of fur in the region. Others work in the logging camps and on the river drives. Good mink, marten and Red Fox skins sold for a dollar and muskrats for 10-12 cents each. Beaver and otter are worth more but a lot of skill is required.

The three Burns boys all grew up in these surroundings. All had Scottish accents and wore clothes from the home country. Life was rather tough because of their speech and kilts. They soon lost their accents and clothes. Their parents never lost their accent. The boys attended a public school which also served as the church and recreation hall. The flooring, doors, windows and desks were all made of whip sawn White Pine smoothed with a jack plane. Volunteers built it all. The teacher was an old fashioned English school master (Thomas Butler) who taught the basics. He was good teacher and many of his students owe their start in life to his solid grounding taught in that little log school house. The majority of his students never got the opportunity to go further because there was no high school. But when Mr. Butler was through with them, they were well equipped to take their places in business life.

Boys of that era grew up early and had to learn to do things for themselves and assist their parents. Times were hard ad money was scarce. A boy of twelve was supposed to be able to do most of the work around the farm as well as attending school. The Burns were no exception. There were farm duties along with the sawmill and a livery and freighting business. At an early age the boys learned to be all around loggers, river drivers and sawmill men. They could drive a two or four horse team and handle any kind of boat in almost any kind of water. They could shoot, trap, hunt and snowshoe as well as any of their young Indian friends.

Summer recreation was canoeing, fishing, swimming and riding with some sports thrown in. In the winter, there was sleigh riding, snowshoeing and tobogganing. Our father had brought a pair of skates from Scotland so we were able to skate on the lakes. The skates consisted of a wooden base that the shoe fitted on. It had a screw on the rear that fitted into the end of a regular shoe and a skate blade fitted on to the shoe. There was just the one pair of skates for the three boys. Later on, cast iron skates were available but these were easily broken and not very popular. Finally, spring steel skates were made that clamped on to the sole of the shoe and tightened with a spring. These were much more convenient. The Indians wore deerskin moccasins so they clamped the skates to pieces of wood shaped like foot soles and cinched them tight with deer hide thongs called babiche. The natives could race with these skates but the white boys needed more ankle support especially on rough ice. (Uncle Harry was an avid hockey fan so perhaps this is why he goes into such detail on the skates of the day. I’m thinking that hockey wasn’t yet played in this part of Ontario. The time period he is speaking about would have been about 1885, Hockey historians seem to have agreed that the first games were played in Montreal around 1875. It is interesting that a similar game called shinty was played well before that in Scotland. When I was a boy, our pickup games on the ponds or on the street with tennis balls was called shinny)

There were plenty of square dances with sleigh parties. Music was supplied by accordions or fiddles.

The boys were all good swimmers, canoe men and riders. Their Indian friends made them bows and arrows, sleighs and toboggans from local hardwoods as well as birch bark canoes and snowshoes. They also supplied pants and gloves. Almost nothing was imported or made in a factory. The guns were mostly muzzle loaders from the old country.

The Burns boys were lucky to live near an English family with a library and a liberal lending policy. Grimm Fairy tales Robinson Crusoe, Rip Van Winkle and Arabian Nights were among the titles. Mark Twain had just published Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. These were greatly enjoyed on stormy winter evenings. The local boys were good campers and tried to imitate the Twain characters by floating on rafts and living off the land. Fish and berries were the main staples. Fish were cooked by rolling them in wet clay and baking them in campfire coals. Bass and pickerel were common and little equipment was needed to survive in the summer.

This was a way of life for youthful Canadians of the countryside. It made them resourceful, self reliant and healthy. When their time came for them to go out on their own, most were ready.

Logging Camps

Accommodations and food were very rudimentary for loggers and drivers in the late 80’s and 90’s. Conditions today are simply not comparable ( Uncle Harry was a logger all his life and owned and operated camps in Ontario and BC so he knows of what he speaks). Very little time was spent trying to provide comfort for the workers. Building walls were made with sometimes flattened insides and bark on the outside. The cracks were chinked and moss and often with a mixture of clay and a small amount of lime. Roofs were covered with logs of a uniform size flattened on one side scooped on the other in alternating fashion. The scoop roofs were designed to carry away water. The floors made of poles flattened on the top side with an adze to make them easier to walk on and sweep with the brush brooms of the day. They were seldom washed. The large building was heated by an open fire in the centre. There was a large opening in the roof which carried off the smoke and provided ventilation. The sky was visible in daylight. This fire was called a Camboose and all wet clothes were hung around it to dry on pole racks,

The bunks were made of small poles and were called Muzzle Loaders. They were all two bunks high and were entered from the foot because they were so packed together there was no room on the sides. Wool blankets were supplied but there were no springs or mattresses. The bottom of the bed was covered with cedar, spruce or balsam boughs or, if you were lucky, hay. As many as 50 men slept in a building and it was lighted by candles or coal oil lamps. The cookhouse was constructed the same way and was usually next to the bunkhouse. The space between them was sometimes covered to provide a covered walkway and storage space. The early camps had no stoves and cooking was done with bake kettles covered with coals or sand and assisted by a reflector or Dutch oven where pastry was sometimes prepared, an experienced cook was needed. But I have had first class meals cooked by the simple method.

Game was plentiful in the Parry Sound and Nippising area and in the 1880’s and early 90’s, it was customary for a camp to have a designated hunter on staff. He shot deer and used their tanned hides for mitts and clothes. He was paid 3 cents per pound for the meat and sold the other items to the camp. He was carried only in the cold weather between October and April so the meat would stay safe. The other supplies provided by the camps were flour, white beans, dried apples, mess pork and corned beef. There was also long, clear bacon called sow belly. No butter, milk, sugar or vegetables were supplied after freeze – up. Syrup was handy however and supplied in barrels.

In my early days in the camps, White and Norway pine were the only trees taken. They were logged with axes and the fallers were called Choppers. The pines were cut 10 feet above the butt. The butts were left to provide Shake. The White Pine was made into square or Waney timber for the British market and the Norway pine went to local mills.

About this time, cross cut saws came into use and trees were notched and felled

As they are now. This got rid of the system called Long Butting and saved a lot of clear wood.

Timber from the Baltic countries became popular in the British market and could be delivered for less so Canada had to look for other markets. A large portion of the cut went as saw logs then they were hauled by horse and sleigh to the lakes and rivers to wait for break up. They could then be floated to Lake Huron and find their way to the large mills in Michigan in places like Saginaw, Bay City and Alpena.

Logging was about the only industry in our district and about the only thing the boys could look forward to was a foreman or superintendent’ job. Or perhaps a manager if they picked up some education. Before they were too old.

Robert and Harry Burns were, like other boys loggers and river drivers when they were fifteen. Both became straw bosses or deputy foremen when they were very young.

Robert Burns, after a short time in BC with his father and brother John decided on a mercantile career and bought a small country store near Orilla. He later moved to Manitoba and Saskatchewan winding up with a general store in Humboldt where he died in 1928.

John was interested in building, and , after a few winters in the woods he worked with his father eventually going with him to Nelson, BC where they constructed several important buildings. John Burns Senior died in Nelson in 1916. His son carried on with the building business for many years building many outstanding buildings in the Kootenay Region. Among them is the Nelson Post Office later City Hall then Touchstones, Court House Canadian Bank of Commerce, Central and Hume Schools and Government Buildings at Rossland, Trail, Greenwood and Grand Forks as well as Court Houses at Vernon and Kaslo and the Greenwood Post Office.

. Also the Nelson Brewery, Mara and Bernard Block, St. Josephs School, a number of private homes: 411, 415 and 413 Carbonate, the old hospital on Front St and The Malone House at 1102 Front St. He also built the old fire hall. In about 1920, he constructed the hotel and pool at Ainsworth. He bought much of the township of Ainsworth and built the cabin at Loon Lake. In 1928, his firm had 80 employees, owned a sash and door factory, lumber yard, the gravel pit behind the high school and several marble and rock quarries. His last job was construction of Nelson’s Civic Centre a multi use public building with an area, recreation hall, theatre and library. It was built in the midst of the depression. He was a Nelson alderman in 1918-19.

Harry Burns stayed with the logging and lumber business. He took a course at Ontario Business College and parlayed that and his experience as logger, river driver and timber cruiser into management positions at Georgian Bay Lumber Company and Blind River Transportation Company where he was involved in both logging and railroad construction.

By 1906 however, Harry got an itch for new country. His parents and brothers had moved to nelson in the 90’s going in by Spokane and the Nelson and Fort Sheppard Railway. (later called the Great Northern and Burlington Northern)

The CPR Crowsnest Line was still under construction.

Harry was immediately offered a job with Western Canada Timber Co. at Gerrard, BC as assistant superintendent in charge of all logging. The timber was thick and easy to get out. The Gerrard town site was cleared and a new mills with a capacity of 110,000 feet a shift. A few very nice dwellings were constructed. Logging was done around the Gerrard Town site, at Poplar Creek and American Point Four Miles up Trout Lake. CPR ran a steamer from Nelson to Lardo three times a week and a train ran up the Lardeau Valley to Gerrard where a steamer (SS Proctor) continued to Trout Lake City. He also served as post master for Gerrard.

The First John Burns with wife Annie at 423 Silica Nelson about 1900

After this operation Uncle Harry worked in Vancouver for North Vancouver Sawmills and Cascade Wood and Coal. On the coast he also helped survey the boundaries of Strathcona Park, and owned part of West Vancouver. Back in the Interior, he had a mill and logged near Taghum then operated Tree Farm Licence #3 at Passmore in the Slocan Valley with his son Gordon. They also had a building supply store at 602 Baker Street in Nelson where his other son Bill was employed. He was a life member of the Kootenay Lake Hospital Board and the Nelson Chamber of Commerce.

Written By Harry Burns

Edited by Ted Burns (August 12/20) and supplemented by John Burns No. 4

Harry Burns Nelson house at Carbonate and Ward. Later owned by Littlewood then Bruce Ramsay

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THE RANCH

Friday, October 9th, 2020

BURNS POINT

THE RANCH

There was a time back before the wars when there was an effort to start fruit ranches on the hills around suitable spots on Kootenay Lake. Even before the Okanagan orchards began, Kootenay pioneers started to propagate fruit

The first white settlement on the North Shore across from Nelson began around 1890. Newlin Hoover owned all the property between the bluffs across from the mouth of Cottonwood Creek up to the James Johnstone Ranch. In 1903 he swapped five acres to J. Fred Hume so he could construct two lovely houses on it along with tennis courts and grape vines. Hume called this property Killarny on the Lake. Hoover lived in a brick powder house on what came to be called the Hoover Ranch then Burns Point.

In 1926, John Burns bought the ranch from Hoover or Captain McClian who may have owned the property ranch after Hoover.

The house had to be upgraded by adding two bedrooms, a bathroom and a porch. Access was by boat only. A road was far in the future. Grandpa Burns refurbished an old house on the Nelson side to park vehicles and store equipment. He maintained good boathouses on either side so crossing over was relatively easy. The family usually crossed over sometime in late April or early May as soon as things were thawed out. There were four kids now: Robert, J.W.(Jack), Jean Marie and James Edward (my father). They also had two dogs, a cow and chickens. Some of the crossings were not so easy.

Auntie Jean recalls trying to get Daisy the cow over on a barge. She refused so they had to herd her down from the ferry landing –e rough hike of two miles. Another time they were towing Mutt and Jeff (their two water spaniels over on a rough day when the towed rowboat flipped. Grandpa cut it loose and got the kids to shore. When he went back for the dogs the kids were wailing thinking they had drowned. There was a pocket of air in the over turned boat and the dogs were fine.

There was lots of fruit on the ranch – apples, plums, peaches several types of cherries, strawberries, currants and gooseberries. Grandma had a good flower garden and a vegetable garden. Fishing was very good before the dams, especially Corrra Lin. The boys set out night lines when they wanted a nice trout or two. Grandpa taught the kids to swim and was a stickler for water safety, Swimmers and boaters had to be aware of currants which were stronger then and the water was full of driftwood from sometime in early June to July. One time dad lost a good boat because he failed to pull it up high enough. The water came up and took it ‘down the rapids”. The rapids began less than a mile downstream near the mouth of Grohman Creek.

The 45 acre property extended up the mountain almost to Pulpit Rock so there was lots of hiking and exploring the woods and shores. The kids often hiked up to the reservoir(the spring that supplied water) and Pulpit Rock or sometimes over to Grohman or to the top of Elephant Mountain. An old timer called Coal Oil Johnny had a cabin by the reservoir. He sold coal oil in Nelson and worked a claim between the reservoir and Pulpit Rock where he had sunk a couple of shafts in the granitic bedrock. He never found anything, he bought the coal oil wholesale

When he died, Uncle Jack inherited the cabin. He and some pals went up there to smoke and unfortunately burned the place down

As the kids got older, they started to go their own way . Grandpa retired in 1929 and he and Gram spent more time in Ainsworth. The kids went to school in the states. Bob to Santa Clara then Colorado School of Mines, Jack to Mines, Jean to nursing school in Denver and Ted to Santa Clara. Bob was killed while prospecting on Lake Athabasca in 1933. He and two school mates cut across an open stretch of water in a canoe and were caught by a storm . Jack lived in Kimberley then Ainsworth, Jean married a newspaper man named Dinty Moore and spent most of the rest of her days in Sacramento, CA. Ted moved between Nelson, Ainsworth and California but ended up living at the ranch until his death in 1990

The ranch is no more. People live there including my sister Sue but there are only a few neglected apple trees and houses cover much of the orchard. Grandpa slowly started to let a few lots go in 1943 when Danny and Dee McKay bought a lot with Bob’s old cabin on it which they fixed up and lived in for the summers. More lots were sold but none from the ranch proper. That didn’t happen until the 1980’s. In a decade or so, all the lots were gone and the North Shore was just about unrecognizable. A bridge replaced the old Nelson Ferry in 1967 and a road was punched all the way down to the ranch in 1959. There was even talk of punching it though to Grohman because people were starting to live over there. If the job was easy, the road would likely be there now but there is lots of steep rock in the way.

When the bridge engineers were narrowing down locations, they looked at a crossing from about the lower end of Kootenay Street to Burns Point but the foundation materials were not suitable. We dodged a bullet there. The urbanization of the shore continues. People are not happy with the old summer camp environment any more. They want a big palace, lots of paved access and all the electronic toys. They live there year round and trash the peace of mind with roaring power boats, jet boats and the like. Many people are degrading the shores by trying to create the idealized beach. Building bulkheads and groynes paving backshores and nuking anything green that dares to grow where they wish the land to be manicured or bare. It seems like it could be worse because Johnstone Road has now become a favored real estate address and old seasonal cabins (if there are any left) will likely soon be replaced by New Age Taj Mahals

Tags:country life
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Rose Yvonne

Saturday, September 19th, 2020

Rose Yvonne Swain – Grandma Rose was born 28 November 1882? Near Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. She died on Oct. 10, 1964 in Nelson, BC from cirrhosis of the liver. She was buried on October 15, 1964 in Nelson

Rose’s birth certificate says she was born Nov. 28, 1883 at Prince Albert. This was information that she provided the Saskatchewan government in 1941 when she applied for a birth certificate. She couldn’t locate her baptismal record (I have looked unsuccessfully in every nook and cranny for it). Her cousin Panteleon Schmidt was her informant. She was probably born earlier. Her Mother married Rose’s stepfather 10.5 months before the listed Nov. birth date. When her mother married Elzear Swain, the marriage register shows her name as Caroline Schmidt so Caroline never married Ralph Nome who was Rose’s father. It was probably more convenient for Rose to give her birth date 10 months after her mother married.(There are several other mistakes on her birth certificate other than the name of her father and the listed birth date: her stepfather Elzear was not born in England but in Manitoba,. It says children alive of this mother were Edmund and Rose. Rose’s mother married Elzar in St. Laurent not Prince Albert). As for where she was born, John Mc Nab Ballendin McKay was a witness on her Scrip application. He says he was a neighbour when she was born. He homesteaded at River Lot Township 46 Range 26 W2 which is some 25 km SE of Prince Albert. Rose never knew her father or his parents. She probably didn’t know her maternal grandmother either as he was estranged from the family. However she lived in the same area as her maternal grandmother and some of her aunts and uncles so she had some family around. The Schmidt relatives called her Yvonne because there were three other Roses.

Not much is known of her early years.

She was only three at the time of the Rebellion at Batoche but her family was affected .Her grandfather Alfred, his wife Emelei and four children were taken prisoner when Fort Pitt surrendered and were held six weeks by Big Bear. Her uncle Modeste was a member of the Battleford Rifles fighting for the rebels. Meanwhile her stepfather and brother John were on the opposite side. Elzear was charged with treason and held for four months in Regina before being released. Elzear’s brother John was killed at the Battle of Batoche and buried sitting up in a mass grave (Indian style). Her stepfather claimed land at Pt 2 & 9 Township 45 Range 27 in 1883. This is near St. Louis, SK. In 1891 they were living in St. Laurent, SK. In 1891 her stepfather is listed as a farmer. In 1901 he is listed as a hunter.

In 1900 they were living in Havre, Montana where they went about 1898. Eight of her step siblings were going to the Fort Shaw Indian Residential School there. Fort Shaw was considered “The Queen of Montana Posts” and was used as an Indian School after being abandoned in 1890. She had 10 step siblings. A number of Canadian Cree together with a small band of Chippewa’s from the Great lakes area lived a semi nomadic life in this area. For many years they moved between Montana cities such as Butte, Helena, Great Falls and Havre and in and out of Canada. They tried to obtain a reservation but were unsuccessful as they and their leader – Little Bear- were considered Canadians. The U.S. government tried unsuccessfully to deport them in 1896. Eventually they joined up with Chief Rock Boy and obtained the Rocky Boy reservation south of Havre in 1916. In 1900 and received Scrip as a Métis. In 1901 they were living in East End, SK. In the 1901 census she is listed as speaking French and English but her mother tongue is Cree and her racial origin is Cree SB (Cree Scotch Breed). Years later as a senior she still remembered many Cree words and prayed in French. She was devout Catholic and went to Mass daily for many years. Rose remembered travelling across the prairies by Red River cart and using buffalo dung as fuel.

In 1906 she was censused at the Commercial Hotel in Maple Creek, SK working as a waitress. Her mother and siblings were also there. When Rose and John Burns were married in Nelson, the Daily News said she was from Lethbridge. She told me she had lived in the Milk River Country in Southern Alberta .Her engagement notice calls her Rosie, popular local girl.

Rose arrived in Nelson about 1908. One of her sisters travelled with her settled in Ymir where she worked at the hotel. She died in the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918/19 and is buried in Ymir. Both Cousin John and Dad and I have searched for her grave several times but there is no marker. Rose was working as a waitress in the Hume when she met her husband to be.

She married John twice. The first time was at the Anglican Church (a compromise between Catholic and Presbyterian?) then six weeks later in the Catholic Church.

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She enjoyed life as they became relatively prosperous. They had a nice home in town and a summer home on the North Shore. She could afford shopping trips to Spokane. It was said that if she wanted a piece of furniture badly enough, she would talk her husband into buying the house furnished. She enjoyed gardening and had a lovely flower garden at the summer home in Nelson as well as nice flowering gardens around the Ainsworth pool and hotel. She also had a big vegetable garden at their Ainsworth summer home along with fruit and berries. Rose learned to swim with her children at age 40 and learned to drive a car in her late 40’s. She was an expert seamstress and even made hats. She also loved music, dancing and reading. After her children were grown, she and John spent part of the winters in Vancouver. She took her daughter Jean to Saskatchewan to meet her relatives in 1917.

When John and Rose lived across the lake from Nelson, there was boat access only. They had boathouses on both sides of the lake and John kept a garage on the Nelson side. They had a variety of small boats – some with inboard motors, some were rowboats made at Walton boat works. The rowboats were beautiful and easy to row. They used to go over for the summer around April or May but would sometimes go earlier for a few days to get things ready. Gram loved these times and liked to make her tea from a spring on the property that was near a salt lick used by the deer. Rose was an outdoor woman long before the term became popular. She was not much for cooking and cleaning but she loved to hike. She often took the steep hike up to the reservoir ( the water supply which was a dammed spring up the mountain)or Pulpit Rock. She would take a cane she grabbed out of the bush and some fruit and head out. I sometimes went with her but could not keep up. She loved to tease me about that.

In their later years, John and Rose lived in a small house at 212 Latimer St. in Nelson. John was in poor health by then and was a bit hard to live with. When he died in 1962, Rose had a period of freedom. She bought a small record player and enjoyed listening to Elvis and other popular singers that John was not fond of. She also enjoyed reading and accumulated stacks of paperbacks beside the couch. Gradually her sight gave out – likely due to cataracts – and she died shortly after.

How much Indian blood did Rose have?

Her great great grandmother Nowananikkee was a Salteaux Indian – Rose got 6.25% of her genes.
If her great grandmother mother Marianne Genereux was Metis at 50%, Rose got 6.25% of her genes here.
If her father Ralph was white, Rose would have 12.5% native blood.
If Marianne was native, Rose would have 12.5% Indian blood
If her father was Metis at 50%, Rose would have 25% native blood via him for a total of 43.75% native.

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Elaine (my mother) and Gram on porch of old Ainsworth Hot Springs Hotel

circa 1940.

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Young Rose

John Burns

Ted Burns

Tags:girl from the North Country
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Grandma Rose

Saturday, April 18th, 2020

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My Mother’s Canada

Saturday, April 18th, 2020

My Mother’s Canada

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Mother on left then Pappy and Nana Flynn

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Mom at home in Baywood

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The Flynn Home at 373 Parrot Drive

Dad

Dad as a young man

Mom was likely much more impressed with Nelson which is a gem by all standards of measure.

Mother and I in Kaslo 1940’s

Mother and Rose Yvonne at Hot Springs Hotel

Ainsworth party: Top row – Jackie Fletcher, Flash Olson and Frisky Olson

Middle row: Brenda (Shadow Foot) Brown, Dorothy Hawes and Lynn Burns.

Bottom Row: Teddy Burns, Jeannie Burns and Peggy Burns

Kath at Hillsdale Apartment

Kootenay Street: me on left then Kath and Tom with Sue in front

When the highways were realigned in the 70’s, much of our old neighbourhood was lost. The Ramsay’s lovely big house at the end of Kootenay Street, The Gully behind it which destroyed our fantastic toboggan trail, all the houses in Cottonwood Canyon and upstream as far as Vancouver Street. There was a little neighbourhood in the canyon. Harry Cox lived there in a small house where Gary Kilpatrick’s grandparents (Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler) had lived earlier. Bill and Mary Vickers ( Mary was one of mom’s best friends) lived on one side of a big house while Neil McClenaghan lived on the other There was a trail that wound down to the fish hatchery and Dago Town. The Rosemont side also lost some good houses. Just across the Rosemont Bridge, a tiny dirt road led to some old places where elderly bachelors held forth making elderberry and dandelion wine and reading outdoor magazines. Mr. Oliver had hundreds of Sports Afield and Outdoor Life.

Dad and his friend Dick Green had a business plan: peddling light bulbs in the Golden State. They had a huge warehouse full of lighting products which still may be sitting in LA.

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Bob Burns

Tuesday, November 6th, 2018

Remembering Bob Burns

There are five people named Bob Burns in this family.

The first Bob Burns was one of the three lads that came over to Canada from Scotland in 1880. He is my cousin Bob’s grandfather. He lived in the Parry Sound region of Ontario then briefly in Nelson and finally in Humboldt Saskatchewan where he died in 1928.

The next Bob Burns was my father’s brother who was born in 1911 and drowned in Lake Athabasca in 1933. Uncle Bob was a geologist on a prospecting expedition when his canoe swamped. He was with two classmates from the Colorado School of Mines who also perished..

Then there is the subject of this note: my cousin Bob born in 1942 and died in a motorcycle accident in 2017.

The fourth is Gordon and Ramona Burns son Bob born in 1933. My only memory of him is how he defeated a character called the Lion who was supposed to be unbeatable. The Lion travelled with a fair and anyone who could stay in the ring for five minutes with him won one hundred bucks. Bob lived in his own space above the garage at Gordon and Ramona’s and I figured that was the coolest thing. He was a big, strong fellow (as the Lion discovered). He died in an auto accident at Christina Lake in 1959. He and his wife Irene had two boys: Gary and Gordie.

Then there is the subject of this note: my cousin Bob who was born in 1942 and killed in a motorcycle accident at Green Lake in 2017.

The fifth is my brother Robert Michael who was born in 1954 and only lived for a day.

Cousin Bob moved around quite a bit but we were always in contact more or less. He was in Nelson in the 1940’s and 50’s for at least some of the time. They lived on High Street and in Upper Fairview where as a little boy, Bob fell off his porch into a patch of stinging nettles. His Dad was Don Burns who slung beer at the Royal Hotel and sold furniture in Nelson. The war was not kind to his Dad who was a hard drinker. His mother May was a saint with unlimited patience which I am sure she needed every ounce of.

In the 1950’s, Little League baseball came to Nelson. Bob played for the Kiwanis team and pitched the first game. He was a long, tall fellow with a good arm. Bob and I rode our bikes around town and did a fair bit of swimming in those days but before long he was off to Calgary and I usually only saw him in the summers.

He and his family which by that time included his brother Doug would show up across the lake in their little Austin car and Don would unload a few cases of beer. He and my dad would sit on the front porch and down a few as Don lectured my brother Tom and I on the length of our hair. The family stayed at Lymbery’s cabins at Grey Creek and visited friends around Nelson, Ainsworth and Kaslo .

In the late fifties, Bob acquired a 1937 Chev and visited Nelson on his own in the summer of 1959. My folks had moved to California by that time and I wanted no part of it so I went to Calgary with Bob intending to join the army as he had done. I stayed with Bob’s family and got o know Calgary a bit. We visited the Kananaskis Valley and fished the Bow River but in the end the Army would not take me so it was California on the bus.

Bob thrived in the Army as a member of the Queen’s Own Rifles. He was stationed in Germany as part of a NATO force from 1960 t0 1962. In 1966 he joined the Calgary Police Service. As a rookie cop, one of his first tasks was to try and save a lady from a beating by her husband or boy friend. No sooner has he subdued the guy than the lady clubbed him with her purse and put him out of commission. In 1970 Bob got back to BC and joined the Delta Police Department. One of h is first jobs was to attend the terrible accident where a Russian ship rammed a BC Ferry near Active Pass. The ferry “looked like it was opened with a can opener’ said Bob. A lady who remained in her car on the lower deck was killed. Bob got married to a girl named Carol when he was in Calgary and I didn’t see much of him. They had two boys – Sean and Michael – who I met when they were young but haven’t seen since although Bob sometimes told me of how they were getting on.

After he and Carol split, he sometimes came over to Lantzville where I was holed up. I sometimes went over to visit Doug and him. Bob had bought a silver Corvette and we cruised around Vancouver looking for girls and drank at the Joe Capp bar on Broadway. Doug was working for DFO on marine patrols and got lots of time off so he was ready to party but our partying days didn’t last long.

Bob married Franca about then and helped start the Delta Police Band which took him to many places. He was the drum major and was really quite stunning in his dress and bearing.

Bob and Franca had a fine life together. They had two great kids – Bobby (the sixth Bob) and Michelle. They had some great houses and a camp at Green Lake. Franca was an avid hiker and Bob enjoyed fishing and hunting. The only real down incident was Doug’s death in 2007.

They had some great trips including one to Italy where they visited Franca’s family. Barbara and I went to their Green Lake Camp to cross country ski one winter and Bob and Franca sometimes rode their bike to Chilliwack to visit. Bob loved motor cycle trips and that is what killed him. They were close to home at Green Lake when a pick – up driver took his eyes off the road to reach for a water bottle on the floor and rammed into Bob and Franca. Franca was pretty beat up but recovered but that was the end for Bob.