And right here where this um tin shack is used to be a dance-hall. And ah they had- in the early years there'd be dances pretty well every weekend. They used to have some famous bands like The-Inkspots come up here. And ah, place was just a-buzzing out here.

Speaker: F-- Forty-five minutes. Interviewer: Oh yeah? Speaker: Thirty if you punch it.

Interviewer: Yeah, something about your house being like a bathhouse or-something. Speaker: No. Within- in the street here, this- this p-- this street or what I call Slab-Town, there was the quarantine house. Interviewer: Okay. Interviewer 2: (inc)

Speaker: ... were quarantined and polio was contagious and they took a li-- ah, th-- a casket in the house and- and put a child in the casket, took him to the grave yard and buried him. It was a t-- it was terrible, terrible thing eh? That's what I meant by quarantine house, that what I was telling Rob, eh? Interviewer: Yeah. Speaker: And ah, and I can remember w-- at that time there was a lot of mumps, eh? It's contagious too, eh? So when you had been diagnosed 'cause when you- you look- you started to look like a chipmunk, eh?

Speaker: Say if you- if you think about it today, um, but- say if a guy got mumps, or something that was contagious, in a mining camp, what were you going to do with them? You-know, you had to keep them away from- you couldn't leave them in a say, ah, a bunkhouse- Interviewer: Mm. Speaker: Where there's the men who worked a-- in the mine and-stuff, eh? So they had what they called a quarantine house. I don't know exactly where it was, but I read about it and it was here in this- this place they called Slab-Town and if somebody was quarantined like if- I don't know if- you- you just don't have that experience of quarantine-

Speaker: Well, the house was so cold that we used to wrap ourselves in- in, ah, a blanket around th-- the Quebec heater. Interviewer: Wow. Speaker: And the Quebec heater, we used to l-- load wood in from the top and ah, it used to go full blast and, ah and ah, the hea-- and if- if you dropped the blanket or if you let the fire go out in the Quebec heater then it got real cold in the house.

And I used to really get razzed because- well everybody in King-Kirkland's related. Oh ju-- just a minute now. I- I'm not quite related to everybody but let me think. I had four relatives in Canada and then when I got married, I suddenly had four hundred more (laughs). 'Cause my wife's family is all around here (laughs).

Then in sixty-nine or the fall of s-- well the fall of sixty-nine I got the nomination for the reeveship which was the mayor's job at that time.

The only other member of councillor mayor or reeve that's alive besides myself is Jonnathan-McDonald.

It was American force that ran this base at Raymore and they recruited people like my father was in the airforce during the war and ah, people like Les-Burke who was the reeve of the town ...

So he decided he was going to go out on Larder-Lake in the wintertime, and ditch Speaker: And I've actually talked to quite a few people about it. Including the reeve of Larder-Lake, who's like a hundred years old. Interviewer: The reeve? Speaker: Like he's like the mayor.

Yeah and ah I worked in a- in a cage, it was kind of a metallic do-- well it was. A metal door. And it was getting kind-of old and rickety and you could force it open with your hands you-know. But one day I didn't lock my drawer when the inspectors were there. I g-- I got a note for this (laughs).

Speaker: Yeah so it ah but it- it was old- it was- it was prison-like and home-like at the same time. Because it was so dark and- you-know so old and rickety.

Speaker: It's not like this will happen then this will happen and then I'll do this (laughs). Duh (laughs). Um- Interviewer: What's your basic plan? Speaker: If I can get t-- if I can get to an oil rig, go to an oil rig.

I don't know who we were playing, and this was in Sarnia ah she must have really aggravated this girl and- and she punched her in the hand-shake and ah then started a ruckus in the hallway with like just verbally cross. And I couldn't figure out what was going, all the sudden the other team started yelling over us, and I "Wah whoa. Why are they yelling at us?" And somebody said, "Oh so-and-so, punched one of them in the handshake."

... you're supposed- you're supposed to be an example to those girls on the bench and- a good example I should say, a good example to those girls. And he just- he just completely wasn't. No, no that- and that was this year's- yeah. We had we had ruckus- ruckus in Matheson.

Anyway there was a um bad- bad bear (inc) and-everything, so they were coming in on- on everybody trying to find food (inc) Kirkland too. And ah we were in one of the cottages and he started raising a ruckus and ah sort of different (inc). I stepped outside and I looked and there's this great big bear.

Just- just raging, you-know what I mean? You can just feel him like- and ah basically with me, something was happening in class- wasn't really disturbing or ruckus but they were like, "Na-na," nitpicking at him-

Interviewer: Okay. Do you remember when your family, I guess maybe your parents first got a car? Speaker: Mm, as far as I can remember, they always had one. ... my father had one with a rumble-seat. Interviewer: What's that? Speaker: Ah, the seat is outside. At the back- at the back. ... It um- it was out- it would close up at the back and then you open it, and there was a seat. And so when you were- you were out in the open, sitting. But it was just like a back seat. But it was at the back of the car and out in the open. ... My brother and I used to sit in there. Interviewer: Yeah? Why is it called a rumble-seat? Speaker: You-know, I-don't-know. ... Maybe because it was a rough or-something (laughs).

... it was a special occasion that you got a case of beer, which probably was about eight or nine dollars in those days. And ah- or you'd have a- s-- mickey of rye and then when we got a little more affluent we switched to scotch. And now I don't like rye, it gives me a headache.