Speaker: He helped a lot when we were going together. He- when they did the threshing and-that, he would make the stooks. Now I'm jumping all around to different things I-guess. He would um, help up in the mow and-that- and they were- I was on the straw stack I-guess. Interviewer: Yeah, well your dad used to put the grain in the barn and then thresh it-

Speaker: A hot humid days like we had here last week. Interviewer: Yeah. Speaker: (Non-lexical sound), I don't miss being in a hay mow. Interviewer: No (laughs). Speaker: (Laughs)

And in the woodshed there was another- it's just the way the beams caught the barn and there was another sort-of hiding spot in there. And when you went out of the hay mow at the barn, you could get onto the barn roof. And there was these tiny little lightning rods that stuck- that would probably not hold five feet of pressure but we used to t-- tangle ropes to the tops of the lightning rods ...

Interviewer: What kind of adventures were there when the farm kids come for the farm vacations? Do you remember that? Speaker: Oh, y-- yeah, we'd play up in the barn, we'd make different hay mows or back to the Beaver-Pond or climbing trees or playing hide-and-go-seek.

Interviewer: In the barn? Speaker: Yes. And he said- well it hits your chest sort-of he said, but he come out of that and the cows got up after too. Amazing. And the s-- second time was up in the hay mow, then you drew the hay in a wagon and then you hitched a horse to the hay fork. You filled the fork with hay off the wagon.

But I don't have much else stories about the f-- I know we had a blacksmith shop.

Speaker 1: ...but sort-of recycle them, and um, put new feed in and stuff-like-that, and she has to do that for all of the horses, and then Speaker 2: Muck out Speaker 1: Yeah, she has- cl-- yeah muck out and then she has to take out Interviewer: Muck out? Speaker 1: Yeah, just like take all the pooh.

Speaker 1: ...and um, put new feed in and stuff-like-that, and she has to do that for all of the horses, and then Speaker 2: Muck out. Speaker 1: Yeah, she has- cl-- yeah muck out and then she has to take out Interviewer: Muck out? Speaker 1: Yeah, just like take all the pooh

Speaker 1: Yeah that 's right it 's mucking. Yeah you 're right. Yeah you 're right. Speaker 2: Mucking? Yeah and you 're ma-- and you- you did that.

Speaker: Mucking? Yeah and you 're ma-- and you- you did that. Interviewer: You were a mucker. Speaker: Yeah mucker and in summer-time bale hay and that 's tough work. Too bad some of the kids didn 't do it nowadays is a- they 'd know what work is.

Interviewer: What 's that called? Mucking? (inc) Speaker 1: Ah I don 't know? A cleaning shit. Speaker 2: Yeah that 's right it 's mucking. Yeah you 're right. Yeah you 're right.

He was a miner, a drift miner. And he had a bad habit after a blast. Instead of scaling before he started mucking, he'd walk in and try to get- get ready to- to drill where the guys mucking eh? And Gerard knew him and says "Andrew, you got a bad habit." And a loose fell on him. So- so- so then I called- I called my- the man I got working for me underground I called- he- and- and my leader was Gerard, another Gerard. And I said "Gerard, there's- go to the next level and see Gerard the shifter. Andrew got hit. Go give him a hand to get him out."

I guess you stay away (inc), but they're there drilling away there with the pluggers there, just wet. And they always drill. Um they'll blast here and they'll muck out here. They'll muck out and the water will run there and they'll drill up here right? Like- like this? Like the sh-- shaft is- is twenty-four feet or thirty-feet wide? So fifteen feet h-- he-- blast this out, and muck this out and then they'll drill this side.

And ah, today to be classified as miner, you can be- a scoop-tram operator, which is a mucker, you can be a driller, you can be a blaster, you can be a loader, uh, to load the roads, a pipe-fitter, ah, you can be all these things, but to me you're not- you're not a- a first-class miner, you're just- I had mentioned that earlier?

And the miners consider themselves miners if they drill and blast and they- they muck. They take the muck out. And, ah- like ah geologists underground and engineers are- are not considered miners.

Speaker: The most dangerous thing I've ever done in a mine. Taking down loose ground in front of us. Like when you drill and blast around, bush could be sixteen-feet wide. Ah, twelve to fourteen-feet high. And then you go and muck it out. Then there's loose ground above you. Interviewer: Oh my gosh. Speaker: And you have to get that down. Interviewer: How? Speaker: Well you muck it and then you rock bolt it. Y-- you muck and you rock bolt.

The most dangerous thing I've ever done in a mine. Taking down loose ground in front of us. Like when you drill and blast around, bush could be sixteen-feet wide. Ah, twelve to fourteen-feet high. And then you go and muck it out. Then there's loose ground above you.

Interviewer: Now you had mentioned earlier that ah your father's a miner. And ah do you um- do you remember any specific time when your father got injured or- ? Speaker: Way back when I was in grade-seven, and I'd be about ah- think I was about eleven or twelve-years-old, he- he was working on a mucking machine and he got crushed. And he spent about a year in Sunnybrook Hospital.

But you go down and you usually go in- sit down have a cup of coffee or whatever you want. Then you go into wherever you're working and do whatever you're supposed to be doing. Whether you're drilling or mucking or on the moulder pulling...

...the original roads were made through the swamps and-one-thing-another with ah, slush scrapers behind the horses and they m-- mucked it out and then they laid timbers down. They call it corduroy road and then they covered over with gravel.