The Lansdowne Letters: Imagination and Inventiveness Equal Barreling

Never underestimate the imagination and inventiveness of kids.
Set them loose in their environment and watch
what they come up with to entertain themselves.

I don't know who thought of the brilliant idea of barreling,
but surely it was the Ojibway boys;
for I, certainly, 
and Roy, unlikely, 
would not have conceived of such a thing.

Some of Dad's Ojibway Boys

Lansdowne House, Northern Ontario, 1960

Photo by Don MacBeath 

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

Current thinking is that judgement is not fully developed
until twenty-five years old.
Well, I'm here to tell you that it is definitely not developed
by seventeen or eighteen years old.

Barreling was one of the most exciting and dangerous things
I have ever done and perhaps one of the stupidest.

Judgement

Pixabay

Quoting my twelve-year-old self:
"As the mud disappeared we turned to other amusements.
Looking around we saw only the dried up slope
between the nursing station and the playground,
the grassy spot at the bottom,
and several hundred empty oil drums.

Oil Drums:  Hauled in and Out by Tractor Trains

An early cat train in Alaska.   

A tractor pulling sleds of fuel drums, somewhere between Anchorage and Fairbanks. 

It appears there is a second tractor following. 

Credit: Mr. Floyd Risvold, USC&GS, 1923

Wikimedia

We looked no further.
Seizing ten drums apiece, 
we lined them up several feet apart
at the top of the slope.

Then with a whoop,
we flung ourselves unto the barrels
and rolled down the slope.
We looked like logs bumping down a conveyer belt.

Logs on a Conveyer Belt

Painting:  Lumber Industry, 1934, oil on canvas by William Arthur Cooper

Flickr: Cliff   License

  
We did not sound like them, however.
We shrieked, screamed, laughed, and groaned.
What fun as the end of the ride approached!

We did a very unloggish thing.
Gathering our nerve,
we somersaulted off the drums
and rolled to the side
as ten, heavy, huge drums lumbered quickly by. 

What a thrilling game! 
Needless to say, our mothers soon put an end to this!"

Rolling Over Barrels

pixabay.com

Can you imagine?
I remember the thrill, the taste of death,
as I flung myself face down and straight out on the first oil drum,
and the rush as I flew from barrel to barrel.

As I hit each oil drum, it began rolling down the hill,
gathering speed as it went,
closely followed by the oil drums I had already rolled over.

Those steel drums were hard and unyielding,
and I can still feel my chest and hipbones banging from drum to drum
and see the purple-blue bruises the drums raised.

We flew so fast!
Before we knew it we were shooting off the last barrel
and rolling to the side,
completely aware of what ten 45 gallon oil drums rolling over us
could do if we did not get out of the way.

And did we go down the hill one by one?
No!

It was much more exciting to have two or three of us
lined up side-by-side at the top of the slope
and throwing ourselves on the oil drums at once!

That meant twenty or thirty oil drums barreling down the slope
between the nursing station and the school,
and two or three of us splayed out on the ground,
gasping for air, and congratulating each other on being alive.

Our undoing in this exhilarating drum sport was the nurse, Mike O'Flaherty.
We managed to enjoy ourselves for several recesses before we were caught.

I'm sure we only got away with barreling as long as we did
because it took so long to round up the 45 gallon drums,
roll them up the slope, and line them up at the top just so.
We couldn't get many runs in during our short recesses.

Rolling Oil Drums

Ground crew rolling drums of petrol to Hawker Hurricane Mark IVs of No. 6 Squadron RAF,

during refuelling operations at Araxos, Greece.

Date:  between circa 1944 and circa 1945

Wikimedia

At some point Mike happened to glance out a nursing station window
and saw what was going on.

He was likely pausing in his work for a quick cup of coffee
like my father, blissfully ignorant, inside the school.

Mike came flying out of the nursing station
and brought barreling to a screeching halt.

He marched us all into the school
and told my father that this dangerous activity must stop immediately.
He made it graphically clear what could happen if one of us got injured
and just how ill-equipped he was to deal with it.

And for good measure he paid a visit to my mother
and the mothers of the Ojibway students
and repeated his graphic tale of broken bones and crushed heads.

And that was that!
No more barreling in the spring of 1961.

 

Roy and Me ~ No Fear!

School Photos, Fall 1960

When I look back on my childhood and remember
some of the escapades my brother, sisters, and I got into,
I wonder that we ever made it out alive.

But we did and, dangerous or not, I wouldn't have missed
the excitement and wild joy of barreling for anything!

Till next time ~
Fundy Blue



On the Shore of the Annapolis Basin
Smith's Cove, Nova Scotia, Canada
July 24, 2016
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue
All Rights Reserved

For Map Lovers Like Me:

Location of Lansdowne House

Known Today as Neskantaga

Wikipedia