The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Harry was born in Rossburn, Manitoba to Andrew and Frances who were originally immigrants from Europe. There were 11 children in Harry's family with him being the second youngest. There were six boys and five girls all sleeping in two separate bedrooms. The family lived on a farm in the Rossburn district and everyone pitched in with the work once they were old enough. It was indeed a "family farm"! During the years of the Depression the family survived quite well. As mixed farmers, they could supply themselves with all their vegetables, eggs, dairy products and meat, with the only purchases being sugar, salt, spices and baking ingredients. "During the war years," Harry stated, "my dad would trade meat and butter coupons for sugar coupons. As a family we picked a lot of berries which our mother preserved, and some of the berries we sold in town to put some money in our pockets." Harry also remembers "going to town with Dad in a horse and buggy taking bags of wheat to the grist mill to be ground into flour." "Our clothes and foot wear were passed along to our younger siblings. Mom would buy material and make us shirts, dresses, etc. Often she would make shirts from flour sacks. See 'Everything' P.# Con't from P.# "None of us received allowances like the kids of today do. We had no such luxuries as electricity or telephones. Everything was done by hand, literally, from the laundry, washing in a tub with a scrub board, hauling in wood for the cook stove and the heater to keep us warm on those long cold winter nights. We would often wake up in the morning to find the water pail partly frozen sitting on the kitchen cupboard." Harry stated that he went to a country school for grades 1 through grades 8, walking two miles every morning and evening. He said that "often in the winter the country roads would be blocked with 8 - 12 foot snow drifts and we'd walk to school following the tree tops, and on really cold days, our older brother or Dad would get out the team of horses and the 'cutter' and take us to school." Harry received his high school education in Rossburn and Strathclair and in the summer of 1953 attended Teachers' College (taking a crash course in teaching). "My first year of 'permit teaching' was in a country school near Shortdale, Manitoba. There were 34 students from grades 1 to 8. After my first day was over, I just sat in my chair and said, 'What did I get myself into?' and then I had a good cry!" Harry went on to say that his second year of permit teaching was at Lewis, Manitoba where there were only seven students with five different grades. It was during that time that Harry made the decision to pursue teaching as his career. Harry went on to say that while teaching in Lewis, Manitoba, he got sick and, since the roads were impassable at the time, he was taken by a CNR jigger to Elma and then from there by taxi to Whitemouth just to get to see a doctor. So, in 1955 he enrolled at Teachers' College in Winnipeg and upon graduation spent two years in a country school near Ninga, Manitoba, with only 12-16 students in grades 1 to 9. The only thing that bothered Harry there was the awful dust storms, so he decided to head north. In 1958 he took a teaching position with the Flin Flon School Division teaching grades 5 and 6 at Parkdale School for two years. Then he took the position as the Principal's relief teacher in various schools such as relieving Fred Kirbyson at Parkdale, Halmer Dahlberg at Terrace, Con Kerr at old McIsaac (near the hospital), Ruby Joyce and then Art Dinelle at Willowvale, and Art Dinelle and then Walter Bohonos at Channing. Principals in other schools at that time were Bill Bolton at Birchview and Neil McLennan at Ross Lake. Then in about 1961 Harry took the position of Principal at the Channing School. It was during that time that he met a young teacher named Eugenia (Jean) Basaraba at a teachers' bowling social. See 'Christmas' P.# Con't from P.# Jean was born in Ethlebert to Metro and Katie (nee Herman) Basaraba. The family owned a mixed farm. As well as growing wheat, oats and barley, they had cattle, sheep, pigs, chickens, turkeys, geese, ducks, and dogs and cats. They had horses for the field work until the tractors replaced them. The farm kept the family quite self-sufficient, with the various mushrooms and berries that they picked. Along with the frozen fish that was peddled by fishermen from Winnipegosis, they had a great and varied diet. "As kids we would snare the jackfish and suckers that swam in the creek by running along the banks to catch them!" Jean stated. "Dad had lots of pigeons in the barn and he loved the sound of their cooing but was not too pleased when they 'decorated' the horse harness!" Jean had no electricity during her childhood either, nor any indoor plumbing. They had to go one quarter of a mile just to get drinking water and water for the laundry. The clothes were hung outside to dry even in the winter. Jean said, "The frost on the clothes in the winter seemed to bleach the whites and made them smell very fresh, we had no need for 'Bounce'! "Heating was all done by wood burning stoves or heaters and often in the wintertime, we'd awaken to find our bedclothes frozen to the wall. Our lighting was by coal oil lamps and Dad would carry a hand-held lantern to the barn to do his chores." Jean stated that she attended a one room village school from grades 1 to 10, walking 2 1Ú2 miles to and from school everyday. She remembers her first car that the family bought being a second hand Model A Ford that had to be cranked to start. Their first radio was operated by dry and wet cell batteries. She laughs, "It didn't play too long before one or the other battery died!" Some of the programs that gave them hours of listening entertainment were: The Happy Gang, Fibber McGee and Molly, Ma Perkins, Pepper Young's Family, The Shadow, Don Messer's Islanders and the Grand Ole Opry. As children, Jean remembers the kids at recess playing such games as 'hop scotch', 'prisoner's base' and scrub softball in the summer and football in the winter. She went on to say that "our teacher was not intimidated from using the strap, often calling it her 'little helper'." Christmas concerts were a big event in the community and she stated, "We practiced for weeks before the final night arrived as it seemed that teachers were often judged by the success or failure of these concerts as if they had something to do with their teaching ability. We even had Halloween concerts each year!" Jean belonged to the 4-H Club, a sewing club where she learned to knit, crochet, embroider and sew, making her own clothes. The village of Ukraina Ñ where Jean grew up Ñ consisted of two general stores, a post office, garage, pool hall, CNR bunk house, a church, a school and a hall, as well as about eight private homes. People from the surrounding areas would come to catch the train that went through three evenings a week, as did the mail Ñ or to do some shopping and socializing. While growing up the main entertainment was visiting, playing cards, the occasional dance in which the entire family attended, or Western movies once a month starring Gene Autry, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans. See 'Valentine's' P.# Con't from P.# Jean's mother passed away when she was only 11 and then her maternal grandmother passed away two years later, leaving a huge void in Jean's teenage years. Her maternal grandfather stayed with the family the first winter but after that Jean's family consisted of her and her Dad. Jean's Dad remarried about 10 years later. The farm got electricity, telephone and television in the early '50s. Jean went to the Dauphin Collegiate and Technical Institute in Dauphin to complete her grades 10 to 12. She would travel home on some weekends by train. She went on to Teachers' College in Winnipeg and trained with such Flin Flonners as Art Dinelle, Richard Osika, Sylvia Newransky and Shirley Drinkwater. Jean worked for one year as a clerk-typist for the "Proof of Age" Department with the CNR in Winnipeg, then taught at Dauphin for two years, teaching business education, then moved to Fort Frances, Ontario for three years (Jean taught there along with Bob Fryer who was from Flin Flon) before returning to Manitoba to teach at Hapnot Collegiate in Flin Flon. In 1961 Jean boarded at the Peters' home on Windsor for awhile and then she moved into a suite at 56 Callinan. When she first started teaching in Flin Flon some of the staff were Ivan Hamilton (superintendent), John Wilson (assistant super), John Kines was principal, Glen Nichols was assistant principal, Dorothy Hayden was the secretary, teachers were: Neva Lockhart, Peg Hayes, Jean Creighton, Archie and Olive Thom, Dave Trainor, Claire Swainson, Wally Pindera, Bob Osborne, Brian and Estelle Hasker, Lawrence Halldorson, Gale McDonald, Lu McLeod, Sophie McDonald, Shirley Anderson and Isobelle Ketchen. Bowling was very popular in the 1960s at the Stag Lanes owned by Ernie Chocholik. There were at least two draws every day and sometimes even three. Jean bowled with Ed and Loretta Yauck and Al and Ruth Aplin, and that year they won the Commercial League championship. Jean also bowled in the Teachers' Bowling League, which we have already figured out! Jean met Harry at the teachers' bowling and he asked her out to a Valentine's dance, and Cupid must have been present because they married in 1963 and even though neither planned on staying here permanently, they are still here! Their first home was 70 North Avenue, then 93 Green Street. They bought their present home on Tweedsmuir in 1965 and raised two children there: their son Reece and daughter Karna. Jean taught part time at Hapnot and Northlands Community College in Creighton while raising her family. Some of the principals she worked for included John Kines, Clare Marshall, Gerry Dougall, Dennis Ballard, Bill Schoffer, Glen Smith, Harry Antoniw, Barry Bayne, Brian Wallace and Brian King. Harry stayed at Channing School for five years and then transferred to Parkdale. There he did administrative duties for 21 years just loving his job and working with the wonderful, dedicated teachers there. Some changes were made in the administration side of things and Harry ended up working his last five years before retiring as the vice principal at McIsaac (former Willowvale School). He retired in June 1989 after 35 years in the teaching profession. Jean retired in 1996 after working 13 years as a library technician at Parkdale School Unfortunately, as Harry states, "Our retirement did not start off on a happy note. We had taken our daughter Karna to Winnipeg to enroll at the U. of M. We had purchased a new van and on September 2, 1989 while driving home we were involved in a horrific two vehicle accident on Highway #6 near Ericksdale. The driver of the other vehicle died instantly and Jean underwent six hours of surgery, and then spent six more weeks in Winnipeg's Health Sciences Centre recuperating from her injuries. Myself, I spent a few days in the hospital at Ericksdale. "We had to cancel our trip to the East Coast until ten years later!" Harry went on to say, "Since our retirement we have travelled to Hawaii, Bahamas, Jamaica, Mexico, Vancouver Island and all of the Southern States, in the winter of course!" The couple is very active in their church, St. Mary's Ukrainian Catholic Church, serving on the executive. Harry is the treasurer and also the president of the Flin Flon Horticultural Society. They are kept busy each spring planting flowers in the Flin Flon area with other Horticultural Society members and volunteers. Harry calls bingos on Friday night for the Flin Flin Knights of Columbus of which he is a member. He also curls in the Hot Stove League, serves on the Flin Flon Parks and Recreation Commission and still does guard duty for the RCMP. Harry and Jean spend much of their time gardening, and picking berries and mushrooms. Wine making is also a hobby, making wine from freshly picked berries. When they get a chance they like to go fishing in the summer or winter. Jean is busy with volunteering at St. Mary's, the PCH and the Northern Lights Manor. Their son Reece works for the local post office and recently married Charlyn Sharp. Their daughter Karna is the manager of a school library in Monterey, Mexico. The couple have no plans of leaving Flin Flon. "This is home," they smile!3/16/2005
