My- my grandmother lived close to where we lived there, right beside the river so that was like a second home to me. I pretty well spent the whole summer there with my cousins.

Interviewer: Did you ever go out too early when the ice wasn't thick enough? Speaker: Ah, no. ... We, ah, pretty well listened when the older ones, you-know, said it wasn't safe. ... Nobody ever fell in anyway. (laughs)

She was ninety-one when she died, yeah. So I had her with me, to look after her, and- but she most-- she- ah, up to eighty-nine she was pretty-well at home, winter time I'd bring her to Renfrew to wherever I was because she- after my dad died, um, he- he was- he was going to be eighty-four when he died, and, ah- so I have a long history.

Interviewer: Would you say it's maybe due to the fact that maybe farming is starting to change, that you're not getting the generational, you-know, the younger generation taking over the farms and continuing to farm? That's what happened in the old days. Speaker: Yes, yeah yeah. That has ended pretty well you-know there ah- and the other thing, there were, there were lots of- of ah bigger families I should say, you-know, and they didn't have access to education as- as much as they do now, you-know?

But ah, but it was pretty well the last water wheel that ah I knew, and now the Beales they used the water wheel for generating just their own electricity but ah, before it was supplying water- or electricity to Perth too, at one time.

And the ah- I was an avid reader, because ah, before the days of television and-that. Pretty well went through the limited book supply that ah, was there, so the teacher started bringing in books from her home library for me to access, and we also had a bookcase here that my parents kept well stocked with my dad's ah books ...

They had no other source of heat back in those days, before the railway came in and ah relied on a lot of firewood so this land that was just upstream from the town of Perth became a source and when my grandparents bought it, it was pretty well clear cut.

Interviewer: Was there a brothel? Speaker: (Laughs) Not that I know of, there was no brothel. But there were a number of apartment buildings associated with the original mills, and ah they've pretty well- the actually the cheese factory that was operated by my great-great grandfather Rich-Dale um was converted into an apartment building, and then in ah, the nineteen hundreds it was moved out and it's now a- a barn ...

Yeah, we had about thirty to forty head of cattle. So that was a lot of cattle and ah we used to- the boys used to milk them once in the morning, used to get in the bush and bring the cattle home and then at night it was pretty-well, the girls would help with the- yeah but um yeah why my hands are so big, my hands are bigger from milking cows, yeah.

... after I left um Barry's-Bay and left school, I went to work in the city, I went to Kitchener and I worked there at different numerous places, ah pretty-well all factory jobs. And I had a job as- working at the first Swiss-Chalet in Waterloo. First ever, yes. I remember when I- they- I got called and ah and ah they said that after I'd learned you-know pretty-well all the- everything and all that I had to learn and ah that I would be a good candidate for management.

Interviewer: Are there any big snakes? Speaker: Um- some of them, not really big snakes pretty well all garter-snakes and we've had milk-snakes and copper-snakes, we find copper-snakes and they actually are poisonous.

Yeah and the weather is pretty well the same as what it was in Ottawa and- or Kitchener and ah- yeah, and even my siblings, they're all moving back like Martin lived in Kitchener, Robert lived in Kitchener, we all lived in Kitchener pretty well. And we've all pr-- well there's only two that are still in Kitchener ... Now everybody else moved back so (laughs) we're all coming back.

They're putting in so many preservatives and different garbage in our bread and our food. And it's so addictable. So I'd like to start making my own, yeah. Yeah and I do a lot of baking, ask Tymmerah. We pretty well have everything homemade unless I don't have time to bake it, then we usually-

... I can remember is how my mom when she put it all on the table, how she had cooked it to the browning part of it, that's what I went by so I knew that it wasn't burnt and I knew that it wasn't raw. So I just pretty well went by memory. And that's where I basically learned a lot of stuff is by memory, I remember the way she did it so I just- she just passed it on to me, she didn't even realize.

My older brothers and my dad pretty-well took care of the dairy end of the farm, and I took care of the lighter end.

Like your dad pretty well did the l-- the final- shoeing of anybody that was shoeing horses.

iAnd my dad and, ah- and- and his brother had farms side by side, which (clears throat) my uncles- which would be my uncle now, his farm- his farm was the, ah- the original Farrington farm from pretty well back to the charter.

Interviewer: But the reason you de-horn them? Why would you de-horn them? Speaker: Oh, oh- ah, y-- you pretty well had to have cattle de-horned that were dairy cattle just for them to get in and out of the stanchion as well as to keep one from hurting the other. ... And, ah, whereas today the beef cattle seem to get along (laughs) a little better ...

Interviewer: What kind of meetings- were there- were there, like, farm association meetings? Ah- Speaker: Oh, pretty well everybody- ... Was on the same, ah, page, you-know? ... Political stuff was- I would say was pretty well left out. ... 'Cause all through them days, the whole country was blue. ... It never changed. And, ah, in them days they didn't believe it could ever change or would ever change 'cause why?

Back in them days when the creek just ran, nobody did no-- it was- the odd beaver dam showed up. The water used to pretty well pile up and then it would break- it would go around the corner of the beaver dam and then the beavers would be really busy and then somebody would trap the beaver and sell the pelt 'cause in them days they were worth something.