The Lansdowne Letters: Happy Thanksgiving

This is the Thanksgiving weekend in America,

and it is my favorite of all the American holidays.

It's a time for family and friends to get together, 

share a bountiful meal, and reflect on the blessings in life.

Today I am especially grateful for the gift of sight.

Terry and I had cataract surgery on Monday, 

and we are both recovering well.

I didn't realize that my eyes were that bad!

I can't believe how sharp and vibrant the world is

after having just one eye fixed!

Eye surgery has made it difficult to write this week.
Consequently, I am sharing parts of two previous posts
about my father's Canadian Thanksgiving
shortly after he arrived in the North in the fall of 1960.

Flying was on my father's mind as the holiday weekend arrived.
Until he flew into Lansdowne House from Nakina,
my father had never flown on a bush plane.
The small sturdy workhorses of the North fascinated my father, 
and he enjoyed watching them land and take off.
Even more, my father loved talking with the pilots.

The View from a Norseman

on the Way to Lansdowne House

Photo by Don MacBeath

September 13, 1960

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

Have you ever flown on a small plane?

I have a number of times.

It's a noisy, vibrating, raw experience,

and the trees, rocks, and water sliding below

look starkly, solidly real.

Taking off isn't the hard part for me.  
It's the landing!

Two skis on ice, two floats on water, or in the belly of a seaplane, 

it's mesmerizing to watch the ice or water racing at you

as the plane closes in to land.

Oh thank you, God! always flashes through my mind

when the plane slows in a splash of water or in a rooster tail of snow.

Austin Airways Norseman CF-BSC 

canavbooks

Bush flying can be treacherous,

and I have never forgotten my father's 1960 Thanksgiving letter. 

I think of it every time I fly in a small plane.

Friday, October 7, 1960 

My father wrote:

Hi Everyone:

Here we go on another Lansdowne Letter.  

I hope that it will be more interesting than the last one.

I had a very bountiful mail this week:  
five letters from Mother, five from Sara, 

two from Louise (daughter), and one from Grammie.  

I had a wonderful time reading and answering them.  

I am greedy, perhaps next week I’ll do even better.

Today was wonderful, a veritable Indian summer!!  

I went about all day in shirtsleeves.  

The lake was just like glass, not a ripple on it.

I was amazed when I talked to the Austin Airways pilot 

and found out that it is very dangerous to land

on the lake when it is as smooth as it was today.  

When it is real glassy, 

it is almost impossible to tell 

where the air ends and the water begins.  

After I was talking to the Austin pilot, 

I watched Harry Evens, 

a pilot for Superior Airways, landing.  

He glided just about two miles 

about three feet above the surface of the lake.  

Even after a long glide like this, 

he misjudged and landed 

about 2½ feet above the surface.  

This may sound strange, 

but it actually happens.

Norseman Taxiing

Wikimedia  edited

The pilot does everything he would do on landing, 

except actually touching down.  

After he has cut down the motor, etc., 

the plane just drops like a brick 

and bounces several times before it really lands.  

This can really jar your back teeth,

if the pilot lands about ten or twelve feet above the surface.

Touchdown!

Wikimedia

They had a bad accident last year at Armstrong 

when one of Superior’s pilots misjudged the water level 

and tried to land about ten feet below the surface.  

He went right in!!  

Two days later they managed to get his body 

out of the plane which was at the bottom of the lake.

Northern Ontario Lake

northernontario.travel/sunset-country

Some more of our furniture arrived yesterday: 

a nice large bookcase. 

Our little cottage is beginning to look quite homelike.  

I would not mind living here with Sara for the winter, 

but it would be pretty crowded if I had the whole tribe up with me.

This is the start of the long Thanksgiving weekend.  

Three whole lovely days with no Indian children to worry about.

As I said in one of my previous epistles, 

I love them all, but at times it is nice to love them from a distance.

I don’t know if I told you 

about Maureen making curtains for us, or not; 

but she did, 

and it is the most wonderful thing to have curtains, 

especially in our bedroom.  

She made café curtains for our bedroom, 

and now she is making full- length curtains for our front room.  

We just bought some printed material from the Bay, 

and she whipped them up on her electric sewing machine.

Dad and Uno's Bedroom

Photo by Don MacBeath

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved 

The reason that we wanted the curtains 

is because of the insatiable curiosity of the Indians.  

They are always looking in the window, 

and this begins to bug you after a couple of weeks.

Considerable difficulty was encountered 

when I tried to explain to the children 

why there was going to be no school Monday.  

They just could not seem to grasp the idea of Thanksgiving.

The First Thanksgiving in America ~ 1621

Wikimedia

I took over some of my books
and spent most of this afternoon 

reading them stories and poems about Thanksgiving.  

I told them about the first Thanksgiving in the New World.  

I suppose it is ironic for the poor creatures 

to have to talk and think about Thanksgiving,
because the poor creatures have so little to be thankful for.

The First Thanksgiving in Canada ~ 1578 

Martin Frobisher in Frobisher Bay

filmatidmare

Well, I guess that just about ties her up for today.  

Will be back again tomorrow.

Dad Typing His Nightly Lansdowne Letter

Photo by Uno Manila, Fall 1960

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All rights Reserved

When my father my father went north in 1960,
he made some wonderful friends.

One of his closest, Father Ouimet, might seem unusual
for someone with strong Baptist roots nurtured in a Green Gables world.

A Prince Edward Island Boy

My Father, circa 1930

(most likely his grandfather's home in St. Peter's Bay)

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue
All Rights Reserved 

St. Peter's Bay

Prince Edward Island, Canada

flickr ~ Steve Elgersma  license 

The teacherage for Dad's school had burned down, 

leaving him with only two options for a place to live

in tiny Lansdowne House.

He could live alone on the mainland

in an empty forestry building,

or he could share a two-room cabin

at the Roman Catholic Mission

on a small island nearby.

Living at the mission cabin 

had advantages over the forestry building:

electricity, cold-running water,

and meals at the rectory;

but, it required commuting

back and forth to the mainland

in a canoe or on snowshoes. 

My father chose the cabin

because he couldn't bear 

the thought of living alone.

The Father's Island with Roman Catholic Mission

Lansdowne House, Northern Ontario, Canada

Dad's cabin is below the wind charger between the church and the rectory (right).

Photo by Father Maurice Ouimet,  Probably 1960

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

So this Prince Edward Island Baptist 

suddenly found himself sharing daily meals 

with a French Canadian Oblate priest,

a French Canadian Oblate brother,

and his Finnish-Ojibway roommate Uno.

The Kitchen in the Rectory

Lansdowne House, Northern Ontario, Canada

Father Ouimet (center), A Sleepy Uno and Brother Bernier (upper left and right)

Chicago Bill (pilot) and Mr. Baker (prospector) 

Photo by Donald MacBeath,  Fall 1960

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

Father Ouimet and Brother Bernier belonged 

to a Roman Catholic religious community called 

the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate,

and they welcomed Dad into their home and lives.

The Oblates have been serving in Canada since 1841,

dedicating themselves to working among the poor.

Many, like Father Ouimet and Brother Bernier,

lived in the north among the Aboriginal people.

source

The steamboat St. Emile:  an Oblate Order Mission Ship

on the Lesser Slave Lake

Wikimedia

Dad quickly became good friends 

with Uno and Brother Bernier, 

but the friendship he struck up 

with Father Ouimet was especially close, 

and Father Ouimet remained friends 

with him and our family over the decades.

Father Ouimet was known and respected

throughout Northern Ontario and beyond.

Pilots, prospectors, scientists,

surveyors, stranded travelers, and others 

visited or stayed at his rectory

during his decades in Lansdowne House.

In my research I have tracked down information

about Father Ouimet's hospitality and work,

but it's had to find much about him as a person.

Occasionally my father shared little stories

that showed the human side of this dedicated priest:  

his humor, his interests, and his personal challenges.

Here are several anecdotes written by my father:

10/7/60:

I have my Bible up here; in fact, I have two with me, 

a King James Version and a Catholic Bible.

  

The Father was over to our house the other day

and spotted it right away.  

He was quite surprised to see

a Protestant with a Catholic Bible.  

I told him that I was thinking once 

of being a Baptist minister and thought at the time 

that I should know something about the opposition.  

He got quite a laugh out of this term.

  

He also was quite amused when I told him 

how I cornered the Bishop at Rotary 

and asked him where I could get one.

10/17/60:

We had a rather unusual Thanksgiving dinner at the Father’s.

We had fish and chips, 

but they were well done and were very tasty.  

The fish was deep fried in batter.

The other day we had goose.

The Father was out hunting 

and shot a huge wild goose.  

It was delicious.

The Father made some rice dressing 

for it from an old French Canadian recipe.  

He has a cook, but the Indians don’t know
and won’t learn how to make dressing.

Canada Goose

flickr ~ Heather Paul  license

He has an awful time with this cook and her tea.  

The cook insists on boiling the tea 

and won’t listen to the Father.

Whenever the Father tries to tell her 

how to make tea correctly, 

she gets real huffy 

and tells him that she is older 

and has been making tea longer than him 

and therefore knows more about how to make it.

  

Things have now reached the stage 

that there are two pots of tea made for each meal, 

one for her and one for us.

9/29/60:

Father Ouimet was laughing at my worrying 

about the mail being one or two days late.

He was telling me that 

when he went to the bush 

the first time in 1940, 

he was at a mission on Hudson’s Bay 

and received his mail twice a year; 

once in February by dog team 

and once in the summer, 

about August, by steamer.  

The first year his mail missed the dog team run, 

and he had to wait till August for his Christmas mail, 

including a Christmas cake that his mother sent him.  

The cake was in fine shape though, 

because she had used lots of fruit and wine 

when she was making the cake.

Long after my family left the the North,

Father Ouimet and I exchanged occasional letters.

It has always amazed me that this 

French Canadian, Roman Catholic priest

took time from his heavy duties to write to me.
I wish I had been able to share a Thanksgiving dinner with him.

For Map Lovers Like Me:

Lansdowne House, Ontario, Canada

Wikimedia

Lansdowne House

Surrounded by Water

© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue

All Rights Reserved

Credit: Lansdowne House and the Father's Island, 1935,
Credit:  Canada. Dept. of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
Library and Archives Canada / PA-094992