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6.
The sleeping place was built of log walls, with boards on the roof. There
was one door in the end. Inside, the side walls and the back end had double deck
bunks built with poplar poles. A big box stove stood near the door for heating the
place. Hay from the stables, just placed on the poplar poles, was used to sleep on.
There were no mattresses in those days.
At that time I was 28 and the home ties were strong. I had only spent a couple
of weeks in the camp when my two younger sisters wrote and asked me to try and
get home for Xmas. I left camp long before daylight one morning, rode into
Dauphin with the logging team, got paid at the office, and bought a ticket home.
I did get a return ticket, intending to return West in the Spring.
The Winter of 1906 was spent at home, tending the stock, which all had to be
stabled and fed and watered, and the stables kept clean. We also had to get out
the usual pile of hardwood logs and draw them home to be cut into stovewood in
the Spring . This wood was to be sold for ready cash when needed and some for
burning at home.
As Spring drew near, I remember being all alerted and preparing to return to the
West but was unaware of an accident that was to happen and disappoint all my
plans for the Summer.
We prepared to cut the hardwood logs into wood. Uncle Tom had set up his
sawing machine which was driven by a five team horse power. The neighbors
gathered to help handle the logs and the wood. The morning was cold and frosty.
Father stood on the horsepower to drive the five teams. He was wearing a snug
fitting pair of wool lined mitts. Everything was going along merrily -- the power
was conveyed from the horse power to the saw by a revolving "Tumbling rod."
This heavy rod, perhaps 14" in diameter, ran across wood blocks to keep it up off
the ground, with slots cut in the blocks for the rod to run in.
About 9 o'clock that morning the tumbling rod jumped out of its slot and was
bouncing around on the frosty block. Father did not stop the horses but stepped
down between the teams and caught the frosty rod in his hand to pull it back into the
slot. But alas -- his warm mitt seized the frosty rod and jerked him down. To save
himself from being twisted down, he jerked his hand free of the mitt, but his
thumb divided at the joint and stayed in the mitt, The thumb cord snapped farther
up his wrist and tore out of his arm. It was a very painful injury. The doctor came
and sawed off the joint, then drew the skin over the end of the bone. Where the cord
pulled out of the arm was the sorest, and it ached and pained for weeks afterwards.
Father was 61 then and with the shock and what he suffered, it made him look
ten years older. With the crippled hand, he was never again able to stand any
hard work. So, when father was hurt, I sold my return ticket to the West. We
went on and put the crop in, and I was there to take the crop off, too.
However, having seen the rich and fertile land in the West, so level and adapted
to farming with machinery, I lost interest in our hilly land so full of stones.
I rented out the farm that father had given me, and I again made preparations to go
West. Father bought me a good new trunk, and my sisters, Annie and Edith, fitted
me out with mitts, socks and blankets.
I was well prepared now and took the train early in September of 1906. I was
soon in Saskatchewan, working at the thrashing, driving a stock team for my
cousins, and hauling sheaves to the thrashing machine at Sintaluta,
Saskatchewan.The days were long as we worked from daylight till dark. But the
time soon passed, and by October 20th, the thrashing was finished.
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