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We return to the Robinson story. This time, maybe without tangents. Only reading beyond will tell. Although, they have been informative and is that not what we want – information. Anyway, we left the Robinsons, Leslie and Edith, with their growing family as they moved from their “too small” cottage, once owned by Dr. F.H. Sutherland and wife Clara, to a “large home on side street, west of the T.A. Furniture Store”.
According to Peace River Remembers, it was the old Hudson’s Bay House, 9811-98 Ave. – near mouth of Pat’s Creek. “We moved in to enjoy the luxury of water from the tap, and soon, electricity.” They enjoyed the amenities offered by their new home until 1937, when they sold it to Brian and Grace Macrory to move to the West Coast, closer to a university centre to make it easier for their children to obtain a post-secondary education.
The Robinson’s “new home”, the Hudson’s and was no doubt happy to arrive at his destination Bay factor’s house on 98 Avenue was demolished in the mid-1980s. It had succeeded the original, built in 1904, which remains standing at 10007-98 St., behind Peace River Broadcasting and across from Third Mission Suites.
The 12 years the Robinsons spent in the Peace Country “were some of the best in my life”, writes Leslie. “Our young family spent their early years there and were surely the better for it in later life. All of them experienced sleeping out on our veranda of the former Sutherland cottage in weather far below zero.”
Dr. Leslie Robinson died in 1979.
As we continue with our characters and culture series, we are reminded communication, as one might imagine, has not always been easy. Back in the days before 21st century technology, it was more than simply pressing a button. It required a certain skill and perseverance – still does. To get to where we are now and to go farther requires creativity and ingenuity, coupled with skill and perseverance. As this scribe sees it, it also requires co-operation to be effective.
All of this leads to the next Peace Country personality/character, Frederick William Radford. He spent his working life transmitting and receiving information by making and breaking an electrical connection. Fred was a telegrapher doing just that for almost 50 years, when he retired in 1967. Asked by a Record-Gazette reporter what his feelings were leaving his career after so many years, he replied: “Not exactly sorry to leave. There’s other things besides work.”
Over those years, he saw several equipment changes, including from a single half-inch strand of iron wire to a speedy teletype with a 60-word-a-minute capacity to which he claims, “the world is an interesting place”.
His career began in the Peace Country with Dominion Government Telegraph (DGT) in 1919. He arrived in Beaverlodge, cold and hungry with a little caboose pulled by four mules. He had eaten a meal in Grande Prairie three days earlier that failed to agree with him. No doubt, he was happy to arrive at his destination. The hamlet, near Grande Prairie, was comprised of seven or eight buildings of which the telegraph office, according to Fred, was little more than a table, a key and a sounder – his tools of the trade.
He describes his telegraphy ethic: “I went strictly by the rules.” Commendable as that may be, that attitude was not without its problems. One time, he received a night letter from the RCMP detachment to the north warning Beaverlodge RCMP that a horse thief was headed in its direction and probably would pass through Beaverlodge that night. The thief was to be apprehended. However, the telegraph company rules stated that a night letter was not to be delivered until the following morning.
Acting accordingly, Fred followed the rules and waited until morning to deliver the message. By that time, as you might imagine, the thief was long gone. The RCMP was not amused. The experience was not without its teaching – rules are made to be broken when in the public interest.
From Beaverlodge, Fred went on to Dunvegan for a year, where he lived in an old Hudson’s Bay trading post rented by the DGT. “I had the whole blasted fort to myself and I was pretty lonesome there.”
After the Dunvegan sojourn, he took a break from telegraphy for a year, signing on with a survey crew on its way to Fort St. John and Fort Nelson. It was on his return to Dunvegan in 1922, he saw Peace River. It looked like home from first sight. Nevertheless, he continued to Dunvegan, where he stayed for another two years. Then, it was to Waterhole, near Fairview, for two years to establish the first telegraph office there. Next, it was Rycroft, about which he said: “There was nothing there, but me, railway track, and a boxcar station marked Rycroft.” A well-intentioned man suggested he stay around because a town would eventually emerge. “It wasn’t soon enough for me.”
Fred hightailed it out of Rycroft for Edmonton and Calgary where he spent eight years, missing the “more free and easy life” of the Peace Country, where he could be his own boss. Getting up and going where and when he wanted was important to him. “I felt I was being caged up after all that freedom in the North.”
The bustle of Peace River on his first sighting in 1922, with its theatre and train was amplified on his return in 1930. This time, he was a married man, with wife, Edith, looking for accommodation. The Radford’s first house, not originally intended for human habitation, required much attention before they moved in.
After five years with DGT in Peace River, Fred opened the ED & BC Railways (later part of Northern Alberta Railways) commercial telegraph office. The introduction of the commercial service gave DGT and its publicly-oriented service some competition.
Until 1946, the telegraph office was the only possibility for outside communication, except for the Royal Mail. It was June of that year the Peace Country was connected to the main Alberta Government Telephones network on a long distance line, bought as war surplus from the United States Army, which had been stationed in Peace River during the Second World War, involved with the CANOL Project about which we will learn later.
Prior to the introduction of long-distance capability, Fred’s office was always busy with many customers of the interesting variety. Col. James Kennedy Cornwall was one. A businessman, known for his boosterism of Peace River – river and town and his friendship with Henry Fuller Davis – Twelve Foot Davis. It was Cornwall, who honoured Davis’ request to be buried overlooking the Peace and Smoky rivers. In a Record-Gazette article, Fred says Cornwall was typical of the pioneers he knew at the time – outstanding men of vision.
Among his many memories of Peace River was the cold – the freezing cold of winter. He recalls putting a hot water bottle under his son’s (Robbie) bedding at night and finding it half frozen in the morning. From what we have learned over the past few weeks, the morning frozen hot water bottle was a usual occurrence in the early Peace Country winters.
Fred cites a further example of the cold, when his office would be -30°F in the morning. As a result, he would work quite a while before he could comfortably remove his winter outerwear. To illustrate the severity of the cold, he says, “The typewriter wouldn’t work and ink would freeze in fountain pens. A bucket of water that was kept in the office would be ice from winter to spring.”
We will leave Fred Radford with our warmest wishes in his freezing cold office until next Ponderings.
Sources: Peace River Remembers; Peace River Museum, Archives and Mackenzie Centre files; Fort Vermilion Mercy Flight of 1929, Alberta Aviation Museum, Edmonton; Record-Gazette
Beth Wilkins is a researcher at the Peace River Museum, Archives and Mackenzie Centre.
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