Memory lane

We found an outfit in Toronto that will scan photographs.  There’s any number of them on the internet – I can’t remember why I picked this one, but I did.  Their deal is that they send you a flattened cardboard box which you assemble and fill with photos.  Whatever you can get in the box they will scan and return to you on a CD.  I think I paid just over $100 for the box and when I got the scans back there were 1,109 images.  So that’s about 10 cents an image – no way I can put up with the headaches of scanning for that much.  Actually I’d likely pay close to 10x in order to get good scans so its a really good deal in my opinion.

Last night I did some rough sorts on the images and I’ll post a few for your entertainment this morning. 

I have to start with the bears at the shack tents in Waskesiu.  Apparently when they opened the park one of the big attractions was that you could come to the lake and feed the bears.  How times have changed.

Gotta go with some of these just because they’re such good pictures – my uncle Harold (married to one of mother’s sisters) and my cousin Nancy – I’m guessing Harold’s 75th birthday party but I couldn’t say for certain.

My mother’s mother, Janet (Cairns) Dickey, mother, her sister Sadie Cox and her cousin Janet (Cox) Kessler.  Not sure who the brat is but it could me me I guess. 

My grandfather’s brother, Ernie Evans.  He and grandpa came to the prairies from Brownsberg, Quebec, survived the 30’s and established the Evans lineage on the prairies.

This isn’t a particularly good photo of either of them but its about the best that came out of this batch of scans.  On the right is my grandmother, Gladys (Paxman) Evans with her good (Liberal) friend Barbara Pavelich.  I expect the photo is on the occasion of Grandma’s 85th birthday.  Barbara was the remaining Liberal vote in their polling station after Grandpa & Grandma moved to town. 

I have few regrets in my life but one great regret is that we never organized mother & father to ride a cruise boat to Alaska.  We talked about it but just never got around to doing it until they were too infirm to make the trip.  This photo is from the beach at Mazatlan the year we took the trailer down and they flew down to meet us.  I think the trip was well outside mother’s comfort zone but – bless her soul – she made it anyway.  Father had a blast.

I don’t know for certain but I think these boats are pulled up on the beach at La Manzanilla which is just north of Barra de Navidad.  Barra has been in the news lately because a couple of BC citizens were murdered there under peculiar circumstances. 

And I’ll close with a couple of photos of some very special “Shellbrook friends”.  When mom & dad moved to Shellbrook in the early 1960’s Harold and Madeleine Collins sort of adopted them and welcomed them to the community.  We spent a lot of happy times in their yard in the Yankee Valley district southwest of Shellbrook as well as fishing from Harold’s freighter canoe with its reluctant Johnson outboard.

Again its not a great photo but its the one I have.  I assume this must have been a wedding anniversary or birthday party for the Collins.  The home in the background started out as a log cabin that Harold built when he homesteaded after WW-I.  I can still smell the smoky ambience that greeted you when you walked into the old cabin which became the living room for the home when they added the portion you can see in this photo.  Harold was a short man with the result that his doorways weren’t even close to high enough for me so in addition to the smoky memories I remember ducking a lot.