Salt Spring Island Archives
Interview with Joan Milner who ran a guest house, boarding house for BC Hydro.
Mother, acted as ears for Dr. Sutherland 1926-29. Dr Sutherland was deaf.
| Accession Number | Interviewer | Sue Mouat | |
| Date | 1991 | Location | Brinkworthy |
| Media | cassette tape | Audio CD | mp3 √ |
| ID | 145 | Duration |
145JoanMilner.mp3
MANUAL
?
YES
Susan Good
Transcript by Susan Good
Sue:I was wondering when the first time you came to the island?
Joan:I was 20. Mother and Dr. Sutherland went to boarding school together. When mother was Elizabeth Hardy and she was Eva Snowball. I can’t remember her maiden name. Snowball was her first husband.
Sue:He was in medical school too then?
Joan:Yes, She came out of University of Edinbugh and she was top of all the medical class. She was not popular with the men. They took a Liverpool practice. He looked after the men and she looked after the women.
So, then they had the Liverpool practice for some years and he was a highly strung young man and took to drugs. So suddenly one day he disappeared. Dr. Snowball which she was then, had a very bad breakdown. They took her down to London and the Harley street physicians said she only had 6 months to live. She had a brain tumour. So she said if she just had 6 months then I’m going to go and find my husband with a detective. So, between the detective and herself they found him at Bella Bella in the last stages of drugs with a very tiny practice. Just enough to buy his drugs and she buried him up there and took on his practice and it just flourished. She persuaded them up thereto build a hospital and she ran that. Then there was a British Naval training ship. Then one of the officers was taken off the ship to her hospital with TB and she nursed him back to health. He was a good many years younger than she was but anyway she married him. Then after a little while, a year, maybe 18 months, she thought, now this is no climate for Billie. Billie must go to a climate that is more acceptable for TB patients and she looked all through all the information she could get. The Gulf Islands was the most even climate in the world so she brought him to Salt Spring and opened her practice here. It flourished. She fought with the other one. The only other doctor that was here. You see there were two doctors here. I’m 86 now and I was 20 then. Whoever it was they didn’t get along at all. She drove a little box of a car. One of the very first ones. She drove right down the middle of the road and Lord help anyone that was in her way. They scattered. She really was a character.
I remember one case she had and you’ll probably know who it was. They lived on St Mary’s Lake. They had two little girls and they lived where the Mouats used to live looking down over the lake on the high side near the abattoir right near there. The big tall second story house there looking down over the lake. She had one daughter then she had the second daughter and after the first daughter, Eva said you “must never have another child. Your heart is on your right instead of on your left side and I will not be responsible for delivering you for any more children. Of course she had another child and of course Eva Maude did deliver her. She was a very clever doctor. She’s come from a very big practice in Liverpool to a very little place on Salt Spring. They were very lucky to have her.
Sue:That would be the Burkett family, I think.
Joan:That’s it.
Eva Maude in herself was a character. She was tubby and she wore three pairs of glasses pinned on her blouse and mother said she took them all off when she really wanted to see.
My father and Dr Sutherland’s husband died within 4 months of each other. Eva Maude and mother were 54 then and so she came to Vancouver and I was in Vancouver just starting in training when my father died in ’26 and my sister was still in England being finished. She was 4 years older than I and they sent her to England because she was going to live with her grandmother and three maiden aunts. They didn’t think that wild ? Joan would ever be fitting there so they sent me to St Margaret’s because there were no high schools where we were in the Similkameen. And then she came over and she said, Elizabeth, Joan’s in training, Marjories coming back with the thought of going in training and she said, I wish, I wish. I wish you’d just put your things in storage and come over to me and live for three years at least. I’m lonely and I really want you and the girls don’t really need you. She said let’s ? get their training over. So mother consented. She put everything in storage and she came over here and lived here for three years. She used to tell us afterwards when we were nursing, She said Eva Maude said half the people who went up there, there was nothing wrong with them so she said she’d concoct a bottle of water with a little bit of colouring in it and some peppermint or something and got along just fine.
She had a fetish for entertaining and all her goodies that she had at the entertainment were from the Bon Ton in Victoria and they were good. Mr. Bullock always came and Mr. Bullock stuffed his pockets with everything he could stuff in them and ate all he could eat and then they departed. And one of his
Well, Captain Best and I used to, if I was on holidays, used to do whistling duets. My father and I used to do whistling duets which was fine until I lost my upper teeth. That was the end of my whistling which was very sad.
Eva Maude had another thing. She had very, very tiny feet and I mean tiny feet. She took size 31/2 if she took that even. She had at least well over a hundred pairs of shoes. She changed them all the time and they were all beautiful shoes. She went to Victoria for her shoes or had them brought out.
It was very pleasant because there was so much Japanese help so really mother was a companion. Eva Maude was very deaf and she would not wear hearing aids, well, such as they were. She wanted to have a trumpet, yelling into her trumpet. Mother said she suggested that she go down and interview the patients and let her know because you could hear her blocks away you know she was bellowing and didn’t realize she was bellowing. So, mother used to do it and she got very interested and said she could understand why Joan and Margie wanted to go in training because of course we were interested. So, they got along very well and then at the end of the time when I was finished and my sister was almost finished mother said, no I must go home and make a home for the girls.” And Eva Maude did everything in her power to dissuade her. I will leave you everything I have Elizabeth if you will stay with me. The girls don’t really need you. But mother said, “yes they do”. I’ve had one trip back to England in the 25 years I’ve been out here and I would love to have stayed but I couldn’t. I have my only children, my daughters here, I had to come back she said. So she did. Well, Eva Maude was not amused but anyway they stayed very good friends and she moved to Victoria. She died in Victoria. What about her husband. Oh he died. She’s not buried here is she? I’m surprised she didn’t want to be buried with him.
Sue:Was he buried here? How much longer did she stay after your mother left?
Joan:Oh, a good many years. Dr Bryant, Dr Colonel Bryant as you remember that lived on the goat farm. When Eva had to go on a conference or something Dr. Bryant would come along. Mother and Dr Bryant got along very well indeed and became close friends and Ruth Maude was another one. After she went to Victoria, I can’t remember where she lived but she lived in a very, very nice home. Cherrybank. So I can’t really tell you any more than that.” Sue: Did her husband eventually die of TB?”
Joan:Oh yes he was too advanced. She did her best to keep him going. He died when my father did. He died at a relatively young age. My father was 54 but Billy Sullivan was definitely much younger. He was a naval officer . She was 8 or 10 years older.
Sue:She did practice on the other islands too didn’t she?” Joan: Oh yes, that was lovely. It happened when I happened to be over here holidays with my sister. She would rent a boat and we would go and she always dropped us off at the Halls on Mayne Island. We were there while she did the children, all the school children and then of course we’d get back on the boat and go to Galiano. I don’t remember her doing Pender but she certainly did Mayne and Galiano. She may have done the others but I wouldn’t be here, my holidays weren’t that long.
That was a real joy.
Sue:Did she keep a little office on any of the other islands? “ Joan “Oh no, no. She just worked for the department of health.
Sue:Do you remember what boat she used to come over on Joan?” It was a little boat. It was a taxi. S. “Oh no, I meant when you used to come over from Vancouver.
Joan:The Princess Mary. Dear old Mary. Lovely, dinner, crystal and full silver, napkins and dining service. $2.50 for a bridal suite, $.75 cents for a full dinner. I didn’t mind that it took 8 hours to get there. Oh I had a lovely cabin to myself with a magazine and the time to read it and not hearing the turkeys squawking.
S.:When did you take over the turkey farm?
Joan:1946
S.:Was that just after Archdeacon Holmes left the house?
J.:Yes, when we moved in he was moving out with all the things still there. Mrs. Holmes was still busy burning things in the kitchen stove so the so called furnace were just jam packed with things they didn’t want. He wanted us to take the chickens and you can’t mix chickens with turkeys. Arthur was at the back getting the incubators into the building there and I was in the front receiving furniture and the piano arrived and there were no men there to help me so I was at one end of the piano and the mover at the other and I wondered why my back went out. Oh, that was 46. And the washing was still hanging out on the front veranda and Mrs. Holmes was quietly going through her recipes. Oh that night, Willie Palmer was one of the wardens and I’ve forgotten who the other one was. Mr Price one of the Price boys and they were running up and down the stairs, there were a lot of books up there and it was wet and muddy and you can imagine what the house was like by the time they finished. Mrs. Holmes was never a good housekeeper at the best of times. So that night the Wilson’s, bless their hearts, who had been great friends of mother’s. Mrs Wilson called and said bring the children over and we’ll give you an early supper. Of course the children were exhausted by this time and so were we.
It cost us all of fifteen dollars to move everything from Galiano. I went to Galiano.
S.:Oh, you were on Galiano before this?
J.:I went to Galiano for 18 months before the end of the war. I just couldn’t stick the city any longer, I just hated cities..
S.:Did you raise turkeys on Galiano?
J.:Oh no, Arthur was in the army from the very first day he was an officer in the reserve army. He was called up on the first day of the war and he was in it until the last. He ended up in Shaunessy Hospital with frightful ulcers and eventually he lost 1/6 of his stomach. So I had to think of somewhere where he could calm down and be happy. Oh he wanted to go back into turkeys but I didn’t want him to go back.” Well he had been into turkeys before. We went into it in desperation because he was in to stocks and bonds. We lost everything we had in the crash and his job. There was nothing. I was nursing, the head nurse at the General in a male surgical ward. We could have lived on it quite happily but you weren’t allowed to nurse once you were married that was it, your husband was supposed to look after you. Well, he couldn’t. He just didn’t have it. So we went into them. Here was old Jesse Throsun. Real old countryman, you know, surrounded by turkeys said anybody with guts could make a living. So I had a little box of a car that wasn’t paid for either. But anyway, I drove Arthur out there and they just fell into each others arms. We stayed with them for 10 days and learned all about the turkeys. We started off with two toms and 25 hens, a box of a house that didn’t have a bathroom, had a sink fortunately and a cow, we had a cow.”
S.:Where was that Joan?
In Newton. You go up Scott Hill to Newton. That’s another story. And I thought when we came over here and I thought if I had a resort and Arthur could raise maybe 500 turkeys. Now, that would be retail and you know you never lost on retail. But of course we’re out west, They don’t know us in Ottawa so they refused to let the veterans out here that wanted to do that business. They let the veterans in the east do it but not us so we put all our money into this turkey business. So it was too late we couldn’t switch so I really resent that Ottawa. And I do because I think that he would never have gone downhill as much as he did. It was Mouat’s that saved our bacon because he worked for them for 8 years as well as running the farm and I had boarders, I don’t know what all.
S.:Did you have outer island children boarding?”
J.:Yes, I had a boy from Mayne Island for three years of his high school. He was an awfully nice boy, He’s a dentist now. I can’t remember his name. His mother’s name was May
S.:So you didn’t have adults you just had….
J.:Oh well, then I had paying guests and they were a pain in the neck. They wanted cups of tea or they wanted to hang their washing out or they wanted this or that or they weren’t feeling well so could they have breakfast in bed etc. etc. I didn’t have time. I worked just as hard outside as I did inside. So then of course what saved our bacon was when the Hydro went across and Des Crofton said this hotel was full and they tried everywhere to get places for all these people that were building the hydro so he came and said,” Joan and Arthur, you’ve got lots of bedrooms.” Well we had five bedrooms so he said,” Joan, would you consider taking some and to make some money.” So, I did for eight months I had twelve men.
S.:Did you have to feed them?
Feed them and lunches. It was a busy time plus the turkeys. Well, on the strength of it we sent the children out to boarding school. Ann was 13 and there were very, very undesireable boys getting much too, she was afraid of them as they never left her alone. So, school was not what it is today. Not by a long shot. It had either the has- beens or the ones that should have retired. They had one or two good teachers but when Miss Olson ran it during the war it just ran perfectly. Anyhow, our boy went out at nine. Both the children hated going of course, we hated them going. But we were very grateful afterwards. They both did well and I think they would not have done so well had they gone here. So, that was that. So right almost at the tail end around the last 6 months, Katy Marpole whose husband were the Marpole family that owned Marpole. Well, one of her daughters married Bell Irving. Well, Katy used to come when the Wilsons had boarders. All year. They used to play golf. When the 2 seasons were over the Freelys used to take over the Wilson house. They used to go to Welbury, they used to come to us. We became very close friends. Poor old Katy, she, well Monika died, Bell Irving. She died of cancer at an early age and Katy, she had a heart attack and Dot, the one who never had married who was in the tourist bureau had phoned and said “Joan, all Katy wants to do is come to you and I couldn’t possibly. I had 12 men in the house. Anyhow Arthur and I slept out on the porch. We had to because there wasn’t any room for us inside. I put another bed up in the playroom. I put 7 beds instead of 6 and Katy had a bed in what was Archdeacon Holmes study. It had a fireplace and of course Katy had to have her breakfast in bed every morning and of course one of them didn’t get breakfast.
She loved all these men. She would get into her brocaded lovely lovely clothes at night and be the queen bee. And the men loved her. They got the biggest kick out of her and she did them too.
Sue:I didn’t realize that the Norman Wilsons took boarders too.
Oh yes, they had to.
S.:It was in the 30’s when farming wouldn’t pay at all. Well some of their land was rented out to the James Seed Company too.” That’s right. It’s a long story too. Oh, Mrs Wilson was a treasure. Always had a cigarette hanging out the corner of her mouth but she was a very, very well educated delightful person Oh their library was gorgeous. She kept so many gorgeous books.
S.:I wonder what would have happened to those books?
I don’t know what happened. Well, I guess they went up in the fire. I was on night duty and I’d just got up when I called to Arthur. He was upstairs on a very damp dark day and I think it must have been in November. One of the Wilson girls, Lois Bride the one who had the son. Lois and her son had been in and well they’d gone out and left the fire going or had not put a screen on. The whole place went up. Well Arthur went over and saved a lot of the golf clubs but not all. Sue: the golf club had a room in the house” J. Yes. I can always see that house. It was a lovely old house, it really was.
S.Do you remember the year that the Wilsons moved out? Because it became a golf club in ’28 but I think they stayed on. I think they were still there when we came” No once they put in a bar in the golf club they didn’t have boarders. I can’t think of anything else about them except they were quite a family.
S.:I have never seen such wonderful hostesses as those girls” The flowers, the decorations. The flowers were gorgeous, the whole Harbour House was…The ambiance was so friendly. Well, you knew everyone. Sue: Well even if you hadn’t. I remember the first party I went to at Barnsby, the girls were so good to me.” I do remember one thing about.. when the islands started to get a few more people and very few when Nora and Zena Loginski came around for afternoon tea. And we had build a sundeck and we were sitting there which looked onto the road, you know, high up and Nora turned to Zena and said I don’t think Zena we will go driving again on Sunday afternoon. There are too many foreigners. I loved Nora and Zena. Zena lived with us. He was one of our boarders when he was engaged to Nora.
S.:Joan went on to tell me that Dianna had a very roving eye and was a bit tired of Adam. She went on to tell me some very libelous things about some people on the island some of which I took with a grain of salt.
145_Milner-Joan.mp3
otter.ai
05.03.2023
no
Unknown Speaker 0:03
Stop
Unknown Speaker 0:09
No, I was wondering when the first time you came to the island.
Unknown Speaker 0:12
What I was, I was confused. Because Mother, you see, and Dr. Sutherland went to boarding school together when mother was Elizabeth Hardy, and she was either snowball named she married. Did she married? No, she was either. Gosh, I can't remember her maiden name. Snowball was a snowball. But she came out of the University of Denver, top of all a medical class. And she was not popular with demand. No, they didn't do that. So they had a report, they chew, they took Liverpool practice. And he looked after the man she looked after the window. He
Unknown Speaker 0:58
was he was a doctor too. He was a doctor.
Unknown Speaker 1:02
So then I might be taught, Oh, well. So then they had the Liverpool practice for some years. And he was a very highly strung man, and took two drugs. So suddenly, one day he disappeared. And ducks Dr. Snowball as she was them had a very bad breakdown. And the Harley Street position said she they took her down to London, and said that she had six months to live she had a brain tumor. So she said, Well, if I've only got six months to live, then I'm going to go find my husband with a detective. So between the detective and herself, they found them at Bella Bella in the last stages of drugs, with a very tiny practice. Sorry, I've got the frog just enough to buy his drugs. And she buried him up there, took on this practice, and it flourished and persuaded him up there to build a hospital. And she ran that. Then there was a naval training ship, a British ship came around and one of the officers was taken off the ship to her hospital with TV. And she nursed him back to health was a good many years younger than she was. But anyway, she married. Then after a little while, oh, perhaps a year, maybe 18 months. She thought now this is no private for billing. So Billy must go somewhere where there's a climate that is not acceptable for TB patients. And she looked all through or was the only information she couldn't get was 15 miles on the Gulf Islands use the most even climate in the world. So Sharon Salzberg opened her practice here. It flourished she fought was the other one. The only other doctor they did not get along very well together and I can't remember his name but it'd be Dr. Beach. No, no. That was back to Doctor beach this time. We were busy there were too dark to beaches. No, this man was in the village Dr. Houghton Watson Houghton couldn't be there was a doctor Houghton 9986 No, no, it was 20 then, and he was here them so what's happening? Mathematics are my strong point. 8666 66 Well, that was just during the war. No, no, no. Where's the first? Oh, that was a 1926 Oh, twin. Okay. 19
Unknown Speaker 4:01
B. Dr. Lawson was here. Oh, he came after her, though considerably after her.
Unknown Speaker 4:07
While whoever it was they didn't get along at all. No. Anyway, even more it was the king or the queen, Clifton, whatever. Well, she drove a little box of a car was one of the very first ones and she drove right down the middle of the road and Lord help anybody that was in her way. They scattered. She really was a character. She was I remember one case she had you probably know who it was. They lived on St. Mary's lake. And they had two little girls and they lived where the mullet where the where the what was what was that? You know when they did the killing of the the avatar? Yeah, patois? Yes, right near there, the big tall second storey house. They're looking down over the lake but on the high side Well, this, she had one daughter. Then she had a second daughter and her Eva bought so that the first daughters, she said, You must never have another child in your heart is on your right. Oh, that doesn't have your left side. The birth said I will not be responsible for delivery new for any orange children. Of course she had another child. And of course you move on did deliver. She was a very clever doctor. Because she come from a very big practice in Liverpool. Very little place on salts. Yeah. And they were very lucky to have her. That would be the Berkut family. I think that's it. Yeah. That's the family, then. Oh, even more in herself was a character. She was Tubby. And she was very, she wore three pairs of glasses. And on her blouse, but mother said, you know she'd wear once you take them all off, but she really wanted to see and mother and her husband, my father and her doctor settlements husband died within four months of each other. They weren't even born and mother were 50 for them. And so she came to Vancouver. I was in Vancouver, just starting in training. When my father died in 2006. I sister was still in England being finished. She was four years older than I that they sent her to England, because she was going to live with a grandmother and three late nights and then take that wild heart and Joan, but ever be there. So I was steps of Margaret. Similkameen. And then we came over and she said Elizabeth Jones in training, Marjorie is coming back and going in training. And she said, I wish I wish I wish you would just put your things in storage and come over to me and look for three years at least I'm lonely. And I really want you the girls don't really need you. She said Let Conkling into training. So now they're consented. She put everything in storage came over here and she lived here for three years. But she used to tell us afterwards. You know, when we were when we were in nursing, she said you know evil mode. Hot people that went up there she said nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with them. So she said she'd concoct a bottle of water with a little bit of coloring in it such peppermint or something. And they got along just fine. She was also she had a fetish for entertaining. And she had all her goodies that she had at the entertainment were from the mountain and Victoria. And they weren't going well. Mr. Bullock always came to Bali. stuff, just pockets, everything good stuff at all. It could be that he departed. And so one of his card is his car. And off they went. But he went well. Kept the best. And I used to if I was on my holidays over here, and we've all had a party wedding whistling duets, my father and I used to do Western duet. So we did this with us. That was fine until I lost my upper teeth. And that was the end of my which is very sad. And you know, Eva Milan has another thing. She had very, very tiny feet and I mean tiny feet that she took three and a half. Or if she took that she had she had at least I would say she had at least well over 100 pairs of shoes. She changed them all the time and they were all beautiful shoes. She went to Victoria for her shoes, or she had brought out I don't know that was and of course it was a very pleasant because there was so much Japanese help. So the really the mother was a companion help and got interested in in that she was so deaf even though I was terribly deaf but she would not wear hearing aids well such as they weren't. She wasn't I have a Trumpet. Trumpet or mother said she suggested that she would go down and interview the patients and let her know because she said up here a box away. She was bellowing she didn't realize that alone. So mother used to do and receive are very interested in she could understand why Jelena Margie wanted to go in training we were interested in so they got along very well. Then the end of the day ended the time when I was finished and my sister was just about finished. Mother said now I must Gonna make a home for the girls. And even more. Everything under power to dissuade mother she said, I will leave you everything I have Elizabeth, if you will stay with me the girls really don't have mother said yes they do. I have had one trip back to him in 25 years I've been out here and she said, I would love to stay and she said I couldn't. I had my own children, my children here. I had to come back. She said yes, I must go back home. So she did while even while I was not amused but anyway, they stayed very good friends and then she moved to Victoria. died. She did. She's not buried here show. No, not tonight. No, no, no, no, I'm sure she What
Unknown Speaker 10:49
about her husband? Oh, he
Unknown Speaker 10:51
died. To me. It just
Unknown Speaker 10:53
was he buried? There did that. Was he very, very here. Oh, he is. Yeah, we're in St. Mark's. Well, she
Unknown Speaker 11:00
was mad. Because he was a naval officer would be inaccurate, too.
Unknown Speaker 11:08
I'm surprised she didn't want to be buried with him.
Unknown Speaker 11:11
Well, no, by that time, you see. I don't know. I'm not telling you that. I don't really
Unknown Speaker 11:19
know. How much longer did she stay after your mother left?
Unknown Speaker 11:23
Oh, good number of years. Dr. Bryant, and Dr. Cutting abroad. You remember that live? The goat farm when even more would have to go somewhere either on a conference or something? Dr. Brian would come up mother Dr. Brian just got along very well indeed and became close friends. And and roosts Lord was another one. Well that's the story. After she went to Victoria, of course, she lived in a I can't remember where she lived but she lived in a very very nice home. Cherry cherry backer cherry
Unknown Speaker 12:07
backyard down there St. Joe's.
Unknown Speaker 12:11
So I can't really tell you any more than that.
Unknown Speaker 12:15
Well, her husband did he eventually die of TB he was he 30 Yeah, yeah,
Unknown Speaker 12:19
yes, he did. Well, he was too advanced. To advance she did her best to keep on going back to the died. A relatively young man he was younger than my father was 54. But Billy Silva was definitely younger. But I suppose even called maybe eight or 10 years old.
Unknown Speaker 12:39
Well, she did the practice on the other rounds, too, didn't she?
Unknown Speaker 12:42
Oh, yes. That was That was lovely. That happened when I happened to be over here on holidays. My sister. She would rent a boat. And we would go and she always dropped us off at the halls our main island. Nancy was speaking up. And then we went there while she did the children's all the school children. Oh, I see what for oh, and then of course we've got back on the boat legal Galliano. I don't remember ever going to Pender but she certainly did meet him and she certainly did Galliano. But she may have done the others. But I I would I wouldn't be here because my holidays weren't that long. That was a real joy.
Unknown Speaker 13:28
Did she keep a little office anywhere on the other islands?
Unknown Speaker 13:31
Are we just doing Oh, no. Just working for the Department of Health or work for the Department of Health. I know that you have offices? That's why she used to definitely mothered me I would just be one at a time. I mean, either my sister would be over and holidays or I would be but we get come over at least I did for two of my three years training. The other holiday I had was otherwise I don't know. Pull anything else out of my old brain.
Unknown Speaker 14:03
Do you remember what boat choose to come over on Joan knows in the 20s? I don't know. Or the Mary or the charmer.
Unknown Speaker 14:16
But it was a little boat. Was a taxi. Once you went over no no. I'm saying when you came over from Vancouver. Oh Princess Mary.
Unknown Speaker 14:24
That'd be the Mary
Unknown Speaker 14:25
there. Yes. Dear. Oh, Mary. Tape. Lovely. Towels.
Unknown Speaker 14:34
Napkins. Crystal thin crisp.
Unknown Speaker 14:38
Oh, silver. Lovely. Sweet, I think was 250 for a bridal suite.
Unknown Speaker 14:46
I know 75 cents for a full dinner.
Unknown Speaker 14:51
was wonderful. I love it. I didn't mind if it took eight hours to go. Yep, there was what I was after when we were farming. If I ever got to Vancouver I was deadbeat anyways. Oh, have that lovely cabin to myself in a magazine and time to read it without hearing all the turkey Sparky. When did you take over the turkey farm in 1946?
Unknown Speaker 15:14
What was that just after Archdeacon homes left that house, or
Unknown Speaker 15:18
was this in fact, when we moved in, he was moving out to the new rhetoric all the things still they are Mrs. Holmes was busy burning things in the kitchen stove. So the kitchen stove and the so called practice were jam crammed at the top with all the things they didn't want. He wanted us to take his chickens. We can't mix chickens with turkeys. So Arthur was at the back of this delivery are getting the incubators into the building there. And I was in the front receiving furniture. Piano arrived and there was no men around to help me. So I was on it and the piano didn't move. It was at the other. I wondered why my back a while.
Unknown Speaker 16:15
Well, yeah, oh, that was 46 and that
Unknown Speaker 16:17
was she was still all hanging up on the front desk on the front rounder. and Mrs. Holmes quietly just going through her recipes and Oh, black night. And you could omit all willy Willy. Well, Willie Palmer Palmer was one of the wardens. The I forgot who the other one was. Mr. Price was one of the price. Well, they were running up and down the stairs from it. He had a lot of books up there and they come up and down and up and down, up and down those stairs and it was wet, muddy and you can imagine what house was like by the time they finished Mrs. Holmes really no great housekeeper at the best of times. So that night, the Wilsons bless their hearts who had been great friends, mothers, Mrs. Watson bonded she said Now bring the children over and we will give you a nerdy soccer track so So where are we? It costs us all of $15 to move everything from Galliano. I went to Galliano. Oh, you were on Galliano for 18 months. For the end of the war. I just couldn't stick the city any longer. I just hated cities. Well,
Unknown Speaker 17:28
were you Raising Turkeys on Galliano? No, oh, no,
Unknown Speaker 17:30
Arthur was in the army from the very first day he was an officer in the reserve army. He was called up the first day or he was into to last and that of course ended up showing us the very ill with pipe flow event meant for the last dollar but a sixth of his stomach. So I had to think of somewhere somewhere where he would come down and be happy. Or you want to go back to the turkeys which I didn't want him to go back to where he had been in Turkeys before the war. We went into it in desperation because of this. The stocks and bonds lost everything. We had a crash at his job. And there was nothing and I was nursing a head nurse and the general male surgical ward and I we couldn't have lived on it quite happily but you weren't loved nurse. Once you married, your husband supposed to look after you know, he just didn't happen. No. So we we set up a saw this advertisement on a Sunday problem section. And here's all Jessie's Russell, real or countryman, you know, surrounded by turkeys and save anybody with guts make a living. So I live in a box of a car that wasn't paid for either. But anyway, I drove Arthur out there and they just don't want to each other. Sorry. They just stayed with them for 10 days and learned all about the turkey. So we started off the two tongs and 25 hands, a box of a house that didn't have a bathroom. Fortunately, we got a cow. We had a cow.
Unknown Speaker 19:06
Where was that John? Oh, in Newton and Newton.
Unknown Speaker 19:10
Skok Hill. Yeah. That's another story that my history there with ice pop. And I thought when we came over here, I thought I could have a resort at night to good ways maybe 500 turkeys that would be retail and you never lost on retailers did this in the eye. And so, but of course, you know, we are out west they don't know us in Ottawa, so they refuse to let the veterans out here that wanted to do that business. They let him back Retford veterans in the East dollar but not us till we put all our money into this turkey is that it was too late. We couldn't switch. So I really resent that Ottawa. I do, because I think that he would never really gone downhill as much he worked himself to a fairly well, yeah, it's moments and poets that helped save our bacon, because he worked for them for eight years as well as we ran the farm. And I had borders. I don't know what all
Unknown Speaker 20:19
did you have outer island children boarding or Yes,
Unknown Speaker 20:22
I had a boy from Maine, for three years of his high school was an awfully nice boy. He's a dentist now. remember his name, but he just her mother's name was
Unknown Speaker 20:34
Mae. So you didn't have adults you just had. So
Unknown Speaker 20:39
then I had pain guests. And they were a pain in the neck. They wanted cups of tea, or they wanted to have no washing out. They wanted this they wanted that or they weren't feeling well put they have their breakfast in bed, etc, etc, etc. Enough time this I knew work just as hard outside was inside. So that then of course, what saved our bacon was the hydraway across this process. So this hotel was full and tried everywhere to get for all these people that were building the height. Yeah. So he came and he said, he said, Gentlemen, Arthur, you've got lots of bedrooms. We had five bedrooms. And he said, Would you would you? Would you consider John, would you consider taking? Make some money? Yeah, so I did. So for eight months. I had 12. Ma'am.
Unknown Speaker 21:35
Did you have to feed them
Unknown Speaker 21:37
feed the lunches. It was a bit
Unknown Speaker 21:43
cost plus the turkeys plus
Unknown Speaker 21:45
the turkeys. Well, I'm the striker. But we set the children out to boys and was 13. And there were some very undesirable boys getting much much too. She's afraid. And she said they never left her alone. And so if school was not what it is today, by a long shot it out either the hasbeens or the monster shouldn't retire at one or two good teachers. But Belinda Miss olton Radek during the war just well. Anyhow, we did our boy went out at nine well, both the children hated going, of course, we hated them going, but we were very grateful afterwards. Both have done well. And I think they would not have done perhaps as well with what they could get here. No. So that was that. So that raised almost at the tail end about the last six months. Katie Marco who's bought her husband there with the Marpole family owned MARPOL Well, she's one of our daughters married bellerby. Katie anyway used to come when the Wilsons had borders, they're all all year played golf. Then when the two two seasons when the free Lee's who's to take over the Wilson house they used to go to well break. And Katie always used to come to us. And we became very close friends. And poor Oh Katie she well Monica died. Monica Bella Ricci died of cancer. You know, quite early age. Katie had she mourned and she had a heart attack and daughter the one that never had married that was in the Tourist Bureau had phoned and said Joan, she's okay he wants to do is to come to you and possibly 12 in the house. And I slept out on the sun out on the porch we had to wasn't any work before. So I'm putting another bed up in the playroom. I put seven beds instead of six. And Katie had the walk was Archdeacon home study. That little fireplace and of course Katie had never breakfast in bed every morning. So she one of them did get ready for some events. You loved all these baths. Oh, she would get into her brocaded it oh, just about a lovely, lovely, lovely clothes. And just be the queen bee. And the man loved her. Just kick out over it. She didn't
Unknown Speaker 24:44
even realize that. Norman Wilson's took borders to Oh,
Unknown Speaker 24:48
yes. Oh, yes, they have to. What specially
Unknown Speaker 24:53
was this in the 30s when farming just wouldn't pay at all. was some of their land was to rent it out to the James Seed Company to
Unknown Speaker 25:02
yes it was. Yes it's a long story to the Wilsons. Oh, this as well. So it was a treasure scored by as you as a very, very well. Oh, she
Unknown Speaker 25:19
was a delight Oh, she
Unknown Speaker 25:20
was a very very well educated, delightful person. Their library was going to she had so many gorgeous books.
Unknown Speaker 25:29
I wonder what would have happened to those books.
Unknown Speaker 25:33
I don't know what happened. Well, I guess the middle of the fire. So see it was a golf club. Yeah. And I was on night duty when and I just caught up. When I called to Arthur, he was downstairs, who is on a very damp dark day and I think it must have been in November. And one of the Wilson girls Well, she was
Unknown Speaker 26:01
lowest bride surely.
Unknown Speaker 26:07
Oh, the one that had the sun fried
Unknown Speaker 26:12
was bribed by the sun. Oh, Allah was had a son to know I think was last year
Unknown Speaker 26:19
that wasn't her son had been in and while they got out, they left fire going or not protected. The screen. The whole place went out larger rushed over and saved a lot of the golf clubs. But not all he couldn't get in. A golf club had a room in the host did they? Oh yes. Because it was a golf club. Yeah. That I can always see that house was a lovely old house that really was a beautiful house.
Unknown Speaker 26:55
Do you remember the year that the Wilsons moved out? Because it became a golf club and 28 but I think they stayed on.
Unknown Speaker 27:04
Oh, they did that were there.
Unknown Speaker 27:07
Yeah, I think there was still there when we came
Unknown Speaker 27:10
they were still still no what's they put in a bar? Then they didn't have a golf club. They didn't have borders. Oh, I see. Yeah. Think of anything else? Except there were quite a family.
Unknown Speaker 27:31
Yes, but I have never seen such wonderful hostesses as those girls. Oh, flowers,
Unknown Speaker 27:39
decorations
Unknown Speaker 27:41
or house. Flowers were gorgeous. Hello palmerhouse Was I love just I loved it.
Unknown Speaker 27:49
Why did the ambience was so friendly? To everyone? Yes. Right. Even if you hadn't I remember the first party I went to at Barnes be the girls were so good to me.
Unknown Speaker 28:01
I couldn't remember one thing about the when the island started just started a few more. Very few. When Nora Zevon Karpinski came to the south. Yeah, we had built a sub deck and we were sitting there which looked onto the road which were high up you know, to said she said I don't think so. Um, we will go Sunday afternoon drive the good day. There are too many foreigners
Unknown Speaker 28:36
that lovely. Oh, yeah. I love New Orleans.
Unknown Speaker 28:41
Last year was one of our borders. Oh, was he when he was engaged?
Unknown Speaker 28:44
Oh, was he I would have thought he lived down at Blackbird while he was but that didn't work out.
Unknown Speaker 28:51
I can turn it on. Well Joan went on to tell me that Diana had a very rolling eyes by this time she was a bit tired of Adam to hit around. So that's why he moved up to their place and was eventually married to Nora from home
Unknown Speaker 29:19
he went on to say various great number or other libelous things about a lot of people on the island. I took with a grain of salt.
Unknown Speaker 29:33
McKenzie, you know If I hear one more time how I wore six top coats for fear of being hit by a musket ball. I'm gonna kill somebody. And who is it? Who's George Washington? I'd like to know who makes a fool of Samuel Adams who mocks Benjamin Franklin because other people can't exist without the history any more than a tree can without its roots. Everybody in the world understands this, except Canadians. You know this is a country that's fast losing any chance of becoming a distinct let alone a great nation this is a country but trade by its best as well as its west this is this is our country
Unknown Speaker 30:12
this is a country that I get talking tonight and you me
Unknown Speaker 30:21
I made my decision I did what was right well you don't have to look at me like that. Like
Unknown Speaker 30:28
what I'm not gonna
Unknown Speaker 30:31
speak because you're a bloody drunk and I did what was right clear Are you going
Unknown Speaker 30:49
enjoys heaven naked over cypress trees and long winding avenues up into blue mountains and cold wind and plain the snow glistening far below it writes a wind and flies all around
Unknown Speaker 31:34
Has anybody seen
Unknown Speaker 31:41
I opened his box just to make sure he was in it and while I was looking outside I try to catch him I tried I tried
Unknown Speaker 32:01
anyone my uncle John
Unknown Speaker 32:12
John Brown one he came from the country
Unknown Speaker 32:25
why What could he
Unknown Speaker 32:35
have Are you testing testing testing we go hasn't anybody
Unknown Speaker 32:56
said
Unknown Speaker 33:01
it. This happens all the time. I'm gonna my daughter's class they have a hamster. I do know that poem. Yes, I couldn't. It was a member of Aunt Rose and all that and it was mostly morpholino W O double Fely who said that to music again. This is I believe it's Hugh H who I'm guessing it's Hugh Hugh Fraser Simpson I believe and an English composer at the time. But we have some of the songs and hums of Winnie the Pooh comes from Yes. And logical really set this to music. I can read little bits that people will probably find familiar to set up these humps. Okay, the first one, how sweet to be a cloud when poo had fallen from the top of the honey through to the bottom in the quickest time that anybody had ever done it, he and he picked themselves out of the gospel
