The Emersons - An Interview with Ray, Part Three

Ed's Day Wednesday

Dear FOLKS,

Each Wednesday I continue to share family information that was provided by my late cousin Edwin J. Ostrom. We now focus on stories and anecdotes regarding Ed's maternal grandparents, Reinert Immanuel Emerson and his wife Dora Elisa Nilson, numbers six and seven on Ed's Ahnentafel report. We have learned of the records found for Reinert that I wrote earlier as a report. You can see this report by clicking here.

In recent weeks the memories have included those of their children Ruby, Geneva, Lola, Ole, Alice, Ivene, Vivian and Verola. These you can read through the following links:

• Ruby's story by clicking here
• Geneva's story by clicking here
• Lola's story (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two) by clicking here
• Ole and Alice's stories were combined here
• Ivene's story (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two) by clicking here
• Vivian's story (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two) by clicking here
• Verola's story (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two by clicking here
• Ray's Interview (Part One) by clicking here, and (Part Two) by clicking here.

The interview takes a deviation from the format of the previous stories. In September, 2007, cousin Ed traveled to Alberta, Canada to get better acquainted with his Canadian relatives. In particular, Ed spent four days with his Uncle Ray Emerson. During this visit Ed taped numerous conversations and upon his return home, he transcribed these conversations. 

Today we'll begin Part Two of this interview. This isn't intended as a tutorial on how to conduct a taped interview. Cousin Ed does share some good ideas on how to "document" the conversation. He didn't appear to follow along with a set of published questions for an oral history interview, but I am sure he had some questions already formulated that he wanted to ask and I expect he had these written down. Then too, as you'll see, occasionally his Uncle Ray takes the lead in the conversation and suggests changing the visit by wanting to go to the shed to find something or requesting they stop for a while. It is fun to witness the exchanges between these two individuals.

IMAGE: Aerial view of Ray Emerson's farm dated 1984.
The lower portion of the photo shows the "bush" that
homesteaders of that area had to clear to make the
land workable. Photograph from the Edwin J.
Ostrom family collection.

Ray Emerson Stories - Part Three

Told on tape to his nephew, Ed Ostrom 

September 11 thru Sept 14, 2007

Ray Irwin Emerson b. 1912

It is now the fourth and last day of Cousin Ed's visit to tape an interview with Ray Emerson. Ray is Ed's maternal uncle. Ray's sister was Ed's mother, Alice Emerson. We begin where we left off with part two. The date is now September 14, 2007 and it is early morning. We are at 0' of Tape-Side A [tape labeled 9-14-2007]. To explain the format of this interview, as an example ... 123’ represents the location on the tape for reference. Brackets around text represent [edits by Ed]. Text in italics, comments by Darlene.

Begin side A tape dated 9-14-2007 - 0’   

118.  Bacon and Mush

Ed:  This is September 14^th, 2007. It’s Friday; about 8:30 in the morning. Ray is making some bacon and I’m making mush and we are beginning to eat breakfast.

119.  Slept good last night

Ed:  So how did you sleep last night?

Ray:  Well I slept good, for sure. The night before I didn’t sleep at all. [The evening before Ray and I visited Wayne, Olive and Russell at Wayne’s house. Wayne is known for his famous super strong coffee. Olive served me bottled Canada water. I didn’t drink any coffee; if I drink coffee after 9 a.m. I can’t sleep. Ray said he should have known better than to drink coffee that late.]

120.  Ray’s Shingles

Ed:  How are your shingles?
Ray:  Well they are a little better. But they are so awful sore. My side is so sore.
Ed:  But the doctor’s report was good.

Ray:  Well, not too bad but he said that I might keep that marking, I might not lose those spots from the shingles. I’m getting too old I guess. Yah, well we better get going with this breakfast. [Ray is standing at the stove cooking bacon.]

Ed:  I have what to come?

Ray:  I said, you have all this to come with age too. That’s for sure.

Shingles is a viral disease, characterized by a painful skin rash on individuals who once had chicken pox. More information may be found on the Internet. Read about it on Wikipedia here.

121.  Canadian Bacon

Ed:  Well, you look like you’re cooking that bacon pretty good.

Ray:  Well it’s cooked. I’m just cutting it a little smaller. Ya. 17’ 

Ed:  So are you a pretty good bacon maker?

Ray:  Oh, I don’t think so. Oh, we better get busy and eat here.

Ed:  [Ray is standing up putting bacon in the frying pan.] It’s Canadian bacon I assume isn’t it?

Ray:  Well ya, lately ya. [sounds of plates, frying pans and filling glasses with milk.]

121.1  Ray said ask.

Ed:  Could you say that again about finding or helping or you said if you can’t find something just ask?

Ray:  25’ That’s right. Oh yah. ay?

Ed:  If I can’t you’re welcome to home..?

Ray:  Well sure. Just make yourself at home here. If you can’t find something you ask. Or I ask.

122.  Ray’s Flat

Ed:  28’ Ray is talking about that property. So what was that??

Ray:  The lease we had to put the cattle on down by the river south here. We would leave a little grub there and when somebody come along they would help themselves. We didn’t know who it was and they would leave a little money on the table.

Ed:  Did they call it Ray’s flat?

Ray:  Well, ya, ya. It was the first flat and I think it is, they still refer to it as Ray’s flat. ya.

Ed:  Ah, what flat.

Ray:  Merle’s, Merle’s flat.

Ed:  Who is Merle?

Ray:  Well they used to be there. 36’ It was the father and two boys but now there is nobody on there. He passed away I guess and…I don’t know,…Well the boys went into the army and..

123.  Tail was off?

Ed:  A cow came back and the tail was off?

Ray:  Yah, the tail was completely off.

Ed:  So how does that work? You put the cattle on the lease land and they come home?

Ray:  Well, yah when the wolves attacked them they, ay they come back home and one of the cows had the tail completely off. 42’

Ed:  How do you know it was a wolf that did that?

Ray:  Well, it wouldn’t be anything else. I don’t think it would be anybody else would go in and cut the tail off. 45’ Another guy had some cattle in there too. And he had a cow you could see innards, inside her kind of guts and stuff. She kept running and as she run, the wolf kept slicing and you could see her innards from outside. He took her home and she was full of maggots ay. He used coal oil and got rid of the maggots and I think he saved her. But you could imagine?….

124.  Beliefs

Ed:  What you believe… you can only believe part of what? 

Ray:  Ya of what’s being said. Yah, you can, now days you can only believe but part of what they’ve  said. That is true though you know.

125.  Wolf Management

Ray:  57’ I had problems when I run cattle down there too. But then we ah, I bought a couple of old horses and stuff and done some poisoning so we were bothered with wolves quite a bit. They killed some of our cattle but not very many, very few. So it kept me on the run for a while I’ll tell you. The cattle smelled, I suppose the scent of the wolves or something and I’d try to leave them but they would follow me wherever I went. But they were scared ah. Oh, I tell you those wolves put fear into everything.  They are wicked when a pack of them come in you know. They have a beat ay so about every ten days they’re back again. They seem to run in a, like a certain territory they hunt in eh and they make that circle about every ten days. So about ten days you can figure they’ll be back again. 69’ I found one [dead?] wolf, I would have found a lot more but they wander away into the bush and you don’t find ‘em. I found a bear and one wolf and then of course there were crows and stuff like that. The trouble with strychnine is that you not only kill wolves, you kill everything, birds and something that feed on the carcass of the horses I had taken down there.     

Ed:  Did they die too?

Ray:  Oh, yah.

Ed:  Oh you killed ‘em?

Ray:  Well, I shot the horses.

Ed: Cause they were poisoned?

Ray:  Well, No. I shot them. I wanted to use them as bait.

Ed:  Oh got yah. And then you put bait inside them?

Ray:  Yah, well then I put strychnine in ‘em. 78’ Well, you see what I did I shot ‘em and as quick as I could I sliced ah, like the hind quarters and you get a gash where the blood would kind of seep in and then I poured strychnine in these gashes eh and then of course when they got that they…. But you were desperate. They were running your cattle and killing your cattle and what are you going to do? That’s what is your living, ay.

Ed:  Were you ever chased by a wolf?

Ray:  85’ No. 

Ed:  Did you ever see one… alive..?
Ray:  Well, I’ve seen ‘em there.

126.  Ray’s Flat

Ray:  One time we had that first little cabin on the flat above the river there. There was a herder there that was supposed to be kind of herding the cattle eh. We were sitting and watching and we could see wolves on the other side of the river, going up the river. And I could see 3 or 4 wolves. 90’

   Yah, I made lots of miles on my saddle horse Mack I tell you. Now them guys, they drive it with vehicles ay down there, a lot of it, these bikes they use them now. But me, I used all saddle horses. At first the other guys used to haul their horses in a van, haul ‘em part way and then they’d use ‘em but I always rode straight from home here to the lease land. 96’ Oh yah it kept you pretty busy because you were trying to do your own work and then you were trying to run wolves down there. I tell you it kept you busy running around, for sure.

127.  Strychnine

Ray:  Then of course you pour strychnine in and it kind of goes back in there thru there, it goes, you know thru the whole carcass, eh. 

128.  Drought

Ray:  In the early years it was kind of dry and we ran out of water here. We depended upon the sloughs so when the sloughs went dry we had to have water for the cattle. I knew about this little flat down south along the river there so we gathered up between the neighbors the odds and ends we could of animals, and then we took them to the river. We had to haul water for our threshing horses from the river down south from here. But that was east you know down here, there was a road down here, but south there wasn’t. You had to go take the cattle to the water. So the reason we started to put cattle down there was on account of running out of water here. Now we’ve got these big dugouts like the one you were fishing in here. We have a year around supply now. But if we have three or four winters of not much or no snow we’d be out of water again. 117’ So you always like to have a good spring run-off huh, because that is what feeds water to the dugouts. [Ray said, “Now I got the hiccups.”] 120’

129.  Experiment

Ray:  With animals, we would try this; we would try that, ay. Try to make them well again and then of course do a little experimenting. I guess that’s the way everybody has done it, ay. Try it and if this don’t work we’ll try that and if that don’t work we’ll try this other. That’s the way it still goes ay. Oh ya.

Ed:  …even with modern medicines.

Ray:  Oh yah. Sure. They use you, kind of like guinea pigs, Yah. 128’

130.  Moose chase pet dog

Ed:  130’ [Ed and Ray are eating breakfast. Raymond came over for a visit. He wasn’t too interested in talking on tape.] Raymond said right outside of his yard [He lives next property south to Ray.] A moose was chasing his dog. I asked Raymond if the dog was worried. He said the dog wasn’t too happy about being chased by a moose.

Ray:  They are wicked with their feet you know.

Ed:  Oh really.

Ray:  They strike with their front feet ay and boy if they hit ‘em, they sure fix ‘em, that’s for sure. And then if there happens to be a quite a bit of snow the dog doesn’t get around so good ay. They sink to their bellies in the snow so they are not able to run as when there’s no snow.

Ed:  I can see that. Whew!

Ray:  Oh ya. I know out here one time there was a moose after a dog and boy she pert near got him too. They strike with their front feet and they are wicked ay. They can sure strike. 142’

131.  Ticks Kill Moose

Ray:  145’ Lots of things happen over the years. When moose get kind of tame and picky, they come right around the yards. Ticks are awful on ‘em. I know there are lots of moose that just get killed with ticks you know in different years.

Ed: Ticks kill moose?

Ray:  Oh ya. Well they suck the blood out of ‘em ay. They just keep on sucking the blood. Animals get so weak they just can’t make ‘er any more.

Ed:  Have you find a moose that’s dead from ticks all over it?

Ray:  Well...

Ed:  Have you ever seen that?

Ray:  Well, yah when we used to hunt moose and stuff, you know later in the year 157’ There would be a lot of ticks in some of ‘em. But then in certain times of the year there weren’t any.

132.  Horseflies

Ed:  Do you get horse flies up here?

Ray:  160’ Well yah we’ve had horse flies. But now we don’t use horses much anymore so we don’t have to be bothered much with ‘em.

Ed:  Oh, horseflies won’t go on cattle?

Ray:  They don’t bother them too much. They do some but I don’t think they’re a real menace.

133.  Mosquitoes

Ray:  164’ It’s so much better now because we don’t have mosquitoes. They were terrible in the earlier days. You had to make smudges out there for your cattle and then they were running thru the bush and they were lame. Oh they were terrible the mosquitoes.

134.   Bed Bugs

Ray:   …and bed bugs. Oh, we had lots of bed bugs in the earlier days.  

Ed: My mom talked about bed bugs.

Ray:  Oh sure. But then when we got that DDT, that fixed the bed bugs but it done a lot of bad, a lot of other things. They found out it was kind of a wicked thing. Ya.

Ed:  Well how did you know you had bed bugs?

Ray:  They would be in the bed springs. When you go to bed at night…you’d feel ‘em. James and I had been down to Ruby’s in North Dakota, eastern North Dakota. Ole had bought an old model T car when he worked down there for our brother-in-law Morris who had married Ruby. We picked up the car and were bringing it back up home. We stayed in a hotel there and we were itching and we couldn’t figure it out. We turned on the light and here these bed bugs were just a going up the walls to beat the band. 184’ Yah. That was awful. Oh those bed bugs. We had ‘em here in the earlier years too. I know ‘cause I slept upstairs in Ole’s old log house of ay and they sure as hell bothered you. Then DDT come along and it got rid of the bed bugs but they found out it done a lot of other things. I think it’s completely banned now. [Alice sang a nursery rhyme about bed bugs?] Isn’t it Raymond? [Ray’s son Raymond is visiting his father.] DDT? I don’t think you can buy it anymore.

Ed:  So what did you do prior to DDT?

Ray:  Well, they used coal oil on bed bugs but they were a real problem. Sleep with bed bugs didn’t work very good. You never had that experience?

Ed:  I don’t think so.

Ray:  Well that’s pretty good. 194’ Ya we know all about ‘em.

Ed:  Holy cow. Would sometimes you just sleep thru it and not even feel ‘em or they’d wake you up…?

Ray:   uuhhh.. They’d wake you up. They weren’t very comfortable. You tried to sleep with them and that’s all you could do. 

Ed:  Would you and your brothers all get them at once or??

Ray:  Well, when all three of us [Ray, Ole and Pete Anderson] came up here we all slept in the same bed. 202’ And what we had for springs is little round poles eh. and then we sewed some old gunny sacks together and filled it with old dry grass. That was our mattress.

Ed:  Say you had bed bugs and you felt ‘em and the other two didn’t, would you just wake ‘em all up?

Ray:  Oh no. They would probably sleep a little harder and didn’t bother ‘em so much.    

Ed:  Would they bite you?

Ray:  Oh ya. 212’ Oh sure. They’d suck blood out of you, uh. If you got too many you had no blood left though. It was you or the bed bugs.

Ed: How’d you get rid of ‘em prior to DDT?

Ray:  Well, we used a little coal oil but you tried to use it to get the eggs ay.

Ed:  Would you spray the coal oil around?

Ray:  You’d use a rag and wipe it on ‘cause we didn’t have much sprays neither, in those days eh. Well now you’ve got pumps and different spray cans when in the early days you didn’t have that.

Ed:  Did that stuff stink?

Ray:  Stink?

Ed:  Ya stink, smell?

Ray:  Stink, Oh it all had a smell and bed bugs had a real smell to ‘em too. 223’

Ed: Oh ya.

Ray:  Oh ya

Ed:   So which was worse, the smell of the bed bugs or the smell of the coal tar?

Ray:  Well that was a question mark! Ya, whether you preferred the bed bugs or the stuff you put on ‘em… But then the DDT came along and sure…that fixed the bed bugs I’ll tell you. And then they found out that was dynamite so…They outlawed it after a while. 231’ 

IMAGE: Bedbug, Cimex lectularius;
photo provided by Wikimedia.org.

[click here]

135.  Lice

Ed:  Did you have lice?

Ray:  Oh ya. ya  they were…

Ed:  Where was the lice?

Ray:  Well the head lice 233’ Ay. I still think the authorities go to school and find lice in some of the kids heads, don’t they… yah. I’m sure they still have a problem with that…

Ed:  Did you have it?

Ray:  Oh I suppose I did…

Ed:  How’d you get rid of those?

Ray:  It seems to me it was coal oil that was being used there for that ay. 238’ Pour coal oil on your head, I suppose. What was worse the lice or the coal oil, I don’t know. But there are so many of those things and that was so many years ago, it’s kind of hard to remember exactly how it was.

136.   Wish Raymond told a story.

Ed:  246’ Come on here Raymond give a little of your experience up here. [Ray’s son Raymond has been listening the entire time. He is at the other end of the kitchen listening to Ray talking.]

Ed: [To Raymond.] Do you have any hunting stories or….??

Raymond:  ???

Ray:  ..but otherwise he could tell you all kind of stories.

137.  Smoking

Ray:  There would be a little card out of Bull Durham ay and that card would be hanging out in front of the shirt pockets. Bull Durham smokers, eh. I never did smoke at home much. Ole, I think, was the one that smoked the most and the longest. 

Ed:  Did any of the girls smoke?

Ray: Well they did. They tried it like all kids you know on the sly. 256’ You, you gotta try it you know. Yah, I suppose you did that too, ay?

Ed: Oh of course.

Ray:  Oh sure ah. 

Ed:  I smoked grass. 

Ray:  Oh that grass yah,

Ed:  As kids we’d light a skinny hollow piece of dry grass, take a puff and a flame would shoot right down your throat.

Ray:  Oh ya, there ya go. There are different ways. Kids are kids eh.

138.  A real Play House

Ray:  What kept us kids occupied so much at home was the boys would come over and we’d play in that big Barn. There’s a picture of it there in the living room. That was our playhouse. Cables stretched across to hold the barn together and keep the walls from spreading, ay. 265’ We’d practice and walk those cables. We’d fly thru the air on the rope slings we used to put in the hay. We tied the ropes up, up tight and then we done all kind of stunts on the ropes. Oh people usually would come, quite a bunch and watch us doing stunts. Oh that was a real playhouse. Then we dug tunnels in the hay mow eh. Other kids would come over and you’d sneak around just like a bunch of gophers eh in these holes we had all over. 273’Oh ya.

139.  Moose tracks beside you

Ray:  One night there was a guy who had slept out in the bush in his sleeping bag and it had snowed that night. When he got up in the morning he was covered up with snow. Then he noticed there were moose tracks that had just about run over him. Well you know the snow was maybe 6 inches. Well, if that moose had ever stepped on him it would be pretty rough. 285’

140.  Bushed

Ray:  A guy had a plane come and pick him up in the spring. He’d be out there in the winter all by himself. Guys say, when you get like that you get ‘bushed, ’ and then all in life you want to do is stay in the bush by yourself. Everything is company to you when you are out: the squirrels and the birds and all the different animals. When you are living alone like that in the bush they all mean something. 293’ Now they don’t mean anything when you got other people around. But when you are alone like that, the animals and the birds and all that, mean so much more. They are company.

141.  Company

Ed:  299’ Is a wolf company?

Ray:  Oh I don’t know. We haven’t been bothered with them too much except when dealing with our cattle. Otherwise we haven’t had too much trouble with ‘em.

Ed:  Now what you said was beautiful but I would be concerned about wolf or bear. I’d be just scared, flat scared.

Ray:  uh…

Ed:  I wouldn’t do it by myself.

Ray:  …yah. You have a rifle with you. I did get a wolf in my sights one time but the gun had a habit of shooting high and when you shoot in a hurry you get a little more bead than you should ay. I just shot over him because I was standing up along a little hillside and I saw a duck fly right over him. Then you get so dog gone disgusted at the end of your day. 

Ed:  Did you ever shoot a wolf, actually shoot one?

Ray:  No.

Ed:  Have you Raymond?

Raymond:  Nope.

Ed:  Any of the relatives?

Raymond:  I think Wayne got one.

142.  Wolves

Raymond:  Yah Wayne got one out of that bunch that was down south there. One night he got one. 319’

Ray:  Oh he did eh?

Raymond:  He said the other wolves dragged it off.

Ray:  Oh is that right?

Ed:  What, did you say they ate it?

Raymond:  I don’t know what they did with it.

Ray:  What the heck would they do that for?

Raymond:  I don’t know. Maybe it was one of the…??

143.  Bear Bite Story

Ray:  Well, what about that time…the guys went down and a bunch of them were sleeping in their sleeping bags when a bear came up and…was it Dale or?

Raymond:  Yah, grabbed him by the head.

Ray:  Grabbed him by the head.

Raymond:  The bear tried dragging Dale out of there on the head and Terry socked him in the nose. Got him off though.

Ed:  Oh, that’s the bear bite story.

Ray:  327’ Yah. 

Ed:  I think Wayne somebody wrote that story.

Ray:  It could be yah.

Ed:  Twyla or somebody wrote that.

Ray:  They probably did yah.

Ed:  The bear bite story.

Ray:  They likely did because that was a quite a thing.

There was a bunch of ‘em that slept in line out in the open, and you see, well sleeping bags whatever they had…eh.

Raymond:  331’ Well, there was a guy in Greely, that ah. It was Grand Prairie, Grovedale, remember he got between that grizzly and her cub.

Ray:  Oh!

Raymond:  … and he killed her with his knife.

Ray:  Well, you fight for your life. We always had one of those hunting knives in a scabbard on your belt ay. And all you do is pull ‘er out and protect yourself. So if you had a knife you were alright or helped anyway. 339’ In general you were alright, but it sure helped.  So in this case that’s what happened eh?   

Raymond:   Well he was a bow hunter and he was going out scouting ay and he happened to get between them.

Ed:  Do you know that, story could you tell it.

Ray:  No I don’t…

Raymond:  Well Dorman could tell that story because he lives in Grand Prairie.

Ray:  Oh. Are you going to see Dorman?

Ed:  Yes, what I’m going to do. Ah, let’s see …. 346’ [Raymond gave Ed a shoe box of veterinary stuff dated 1943 with a receipt signed by Stuart Ditch. He asked me if I would give it to Dorman. I’m going to Dorman’s house tomorrow.]

The source of this article is an unidentified, undated newspaper article; assume published in  May, 1998.

Eaglesham man receives 33 stitches in bear attack.

   Dale and Terry Emerson of Eaglesham fought off a bear attack while camping at the Four Mile Creek Grazing Reserve south of Eaglesham, but not before the 200 pound male bear gave Dale 33 stitches in the head.

   The brothers were camping out on the weekend when the bear attacked Dale in the face while sleeping. Terry said the attack happened so fast.

   “We were just camping overnight and the bear came in while we were sleeping and bit my brother. He started screaming and went into his sleeping bag and the bear was on top of him. We just started yelling at the bear and I hit him on the head. He then backed up and with all of us yelling, he ran off into the bush,” said Terry.

   Dale was taken to the Central Peace Hospital where he received 33 stitches. Fish and wildlife were notified of the bear attack and went into the site to try to capture the bear.

   “We actioned our bear team and wildlife officer Dave Robertson of Grande Prairie immediately attended the scene,” said Superintendent of Fish and Wildlife in Peace River, Ron Martel. Snares were set and we did in fact capture a brown bear Monday morning at the attack site. It was identified as the attacking bear by the Emerson brothers and the bear was destroyed.

   I’m pretty pleased with our fast response in capturing this bear,” stated Martel.

   Martel added that it is not unusual for a bear to attack, especially at this particular time of year. “They’re just recently out of hibernation and of course, they’re hungry. I understand some food was stored nearby and that’s an attractant to any bear – especially in the spring when they’re just out of hibernation. That probably drew the bear right into the immediate area,” explained Martel.

   Emerson said they did have food stored where they were camping, but the bear didn’t touch the food.

   We had all our food there and usually a bear will go to that first,” said Terry Emerson. “But it didn’t touch our food.  We had been swatting mosquitoes all night and we were really surprised that it got in without us hearing it. The first thing it did was come right to us,” said Emerson.

[The brothers in this article are grand-nephews to Ray Emerson.]

 ++++

Man kills grizzly with knife
Bowhunter attacked by mother bear; cubs still on the lam

by DEREK LOGAN Herald-Tribune staff
Friday August 17, 2007

Grande Prairie wildlife officials are on the lookout for three orphaned grizzly bear cubs in the wooded area south of Grovedale following an attack Wednesday evening that left their mother dead and a bow-hunter recovering from serious injuries in the QEII Hospital.

The hunter, a man in his 30s, encountered the mother grizzly and her cubs just before 9:30 p.m. while he was scouting locations in an area near Secondary Highway 666 and Range Road 73 for the upcoming bow-hunting season.

The man defended himself using a hunting knife and was able to get away despite suffering serious arm and elbow injuries.

The mother grizzly suffered three stab wounds inflicted by the hunter’s knife and succumbed to her injuries, said Alberta Fish and Wildlife spokesman Darcy Whiteside. Her body was found 30 yards from where the attacked occurred.

“She died pretty quick,” he said.

Fish and Wildlife believe the three bear cubs are still in the area. If they are caught, they will be taken to a more remote area.

“Traps have been set up Thursday but they haven’t been caught as of this morning,” said Whiteside. “We’re telling people in the area to definitely phone their local Sustainable Resources Development office if they do spot the bear cubs. They believe the cubs are very young – they’re this year’s – so they are not going to be that big of a hazard. They are going to be trying to find food.”

Anyone who sees the cubs or other bears in the area are asked to phone 538-5265 and not approach them.

Whiteside said as hunting is nearing, Fish and Wildlife are reminding hunters to use caution when they are in the South Wapiti area.

“We’ve had a number of bear reports in the area ... so it’s a reminder to be careful out there and really be aware of your surroundings,” said Whiteside. “Talk to be people in the area if you are in a place that you are unsure of because there might be wild animal activity in the area.”

Around this time, food such as berries are starting to blossom and the bears are feeding on them to put on the pounds before the start of winter.

[The above article tells of another bear-human incident that occurred just prior to Ed’s visit to Eaglesham.]

144.  Bushed

Ray:  347’ It’s something these guys that go out and spend all winter all alone, we always refer to them as getting “bushed” ‘cause they just like to be completely alone. They live with the wilderness ay. Yah, you tell them you are “bushed.” I guess we really didn’t get bushed that much.

Ed:  Did you ever get bushed?

Ray:  Well, no not too much.

Ed:  How about you, Raymond, did you get bushed?

Raymond:  No.

Ed:  Well down in the states if you’re ‘bushed’ that means you are ‘tired’.

Ray:  358’ Oh I see. That’s the meaning to it.

Ed:  It’s not often anymore you hear the word ‘bushed.’ 

Ray:  Well with bush here, they went out to live in the bush all by themselves so we called them ‘bushed’ ay. They spend all winter by themselves. They get ‘bushed’ ay and well you do, I guess, because you talk to nobody only to yourself ay. Those guys got pretty good at talking to themselves. 364’

Ed:  How about you? Did you ever do that…talk to yourself? 

Ray:  Oh I suppose I have, ya while hunting or something. It didn’t work out so instead of just thinking about it you talked about it to yourself. You are company. You talk to yourself as company. I guess.

145.  Dreams

Ed:  How about do you dream, do you have dreams?

Ray:  374’ Oh yah.

Ed:  What do you dream about?

Ray:  Well, it could be anything. Some stupid stuff too. Some awfully stupid … Have you ever had any stupid dreams?

Ed:  Oh they’re all stupid. Do you ever remember any?

Ray:  Not right off hand. But I remember some of them were quite stupid.

Ed:  How about you Raymond? Do you have any dreams?

Raymond: [Raymond is yelling for his dog Tuckie.]

146.  Tuckie

Raymond:  ‘Tuckie?’[You can hear it on tape. Raymond is yelling out the back door for his dog. Raymond yells again.] ‘Tuckie’?

Ed:  Oh, is that Tuckie?

Ray:  That’s Raymond’s dog.

147.  Snow on the grain

Ray to Raymond:  So are you going to try to swath some this afternoon?

Raymond:  ??? [shrugs]

Ray:  Oh sure. It’s getting later every day. You never know, we may get a snow-storm one of these days and then you are going to have trouble. It’s bad enough now. 388’ I remember some of those years we got a snow storm and the grain fields just lay flat.  What a time to get it off eh. 390’

Ed:  Snow on your grain before it’s harvested?

[It’s been a very wet year around Eaglesham and the grain in the field had not ripened as of mid-September, 2007.   Grain has been showing a moisture content of 30 when it should be 12.]

Ray:  Ya, swaths and stuff. It snows on your crop and it just lays flat ay. The snow has been coming down up in the mountains. You know not very high up there’s snow.

148.  Snow on the road

Ed:  Will I see it on the way back?

Ray:  Well, ya I expect you will ah.

Ed:  On the road? 

Ray:  Are you going thru Jasper?

Ed:  Ya. Will it be on the road?

Ray:  Well, they are getting snow. I suppose it won’t be on the road now. But I bet you won’t be looking very high up in the mountains and you’ll see er. Jasper is kind of high there too. ‘Cause I remember I was there one time and boy it stayed there overnight and there was quite a bit of snow on the ground there in the morning. No, you never know, that’s for sure.

149.  Dreams

Ed:  Dad dreamed he died…

Ray:  Oh?

Ed:  …Before he died. I was over like this in the morning and he said, ‘By golly, I dreamed I died last night!’ He said those words like he was singing.

Ray:  Oh, yah, I suppose you can dream of anything.

Ed:  He told that story, on tape, that was one of his stories.

Ray:  Is that right? 410’ He dreamed I died, ay.

150.  Alice visited Ray

Ray:  Yah, it’s so funny cause it don’t seem like it was that long ago that they were up here, ay, Alice and your sister and her husband. Time flies. When we were younger we were out to that area. We traveled quite a bit, ay. But you know when you get older you don’t do that anymore, ah.

151.  Ray’s family Seattle Trip, July 8, 1948

Ray:  We went out to Seattle that one time when Raymond was quite small. We had that big get-together in Seattle [Washington] there. I suppose you were in on that. I think I have some pictures of that too.

Ed:  I was there.

Ray:  Oh, you likely are and Raymond…

Ed:  That was 1948.

Ray:  ‘48 ya.

Ed:  July 8, Dora and Reinert’s 50^th Anniversary.

Ray:  Ya, you see it’s a lotta years but it don’t seem that long but…

Ed:  I was 3 ½.

Ray:  You were 3 ½. Yah you see. There you go.

Ed:  You were a bit older. 428’

Ed to Raymond:  Do you remember that?

Raymond:  Oh ya.

Ed:  I barely remember that.

Ray:  Well, you should. Raymond, where was it we camped one night? And you guys [Ray’s kids] were just like a bunch of calves. You were cooped up in that car and here we got to this place by Old Faithful, and there was a kind of a campground there.   So we camped there. We turned our kids loose there and running. Where people had picnic baskets and blankets out and stuff they darn near run right over ‘em. Oh it was just like you turn calves loose. Did they go! 440’ One time we went someplace and it said on the sign, there were supposed to be some mountain sheep. We stopped and we went out to look and there was a kind of a cliff there, ay. A lot of time the mountain goats live and work on cliffs anyway and holy cow here they come running and I thought they were going to run right over us. So we were busy as hell driving kids out, I’ll tell you. Yah, they didn’t enjoy that trip a darn bit, I don’t think. They had to be out running. Cooped up too long didn’t work very good and then they got car sick too, throw up and the cars were kind of a mess. 453’ They stunk a little.

Ed:  How many days did it take you to get to Seattle?

Ray:  I think three days or more. We stopped and spent the day in Kelowna [Canada]; I believe. Some of these places you get so far away you’re not completely sure just where you are. I’m glad we traveled with the kids as much as we did in the early days. 463’ Things were tough, we didn’t have much money, but we got around and saw a few places with the kids anyway.

152.  Elsie found hiccup cure

[Ray is having a case of hiccups]

Ray:  Do you know what’s good for hiccups?

Ed:   Ah?? Very seldom. [I thought Ray said, do you have hiccups.]

Ray:  No! Elsie asked the druggist one time. 470’ He said, “Hold your breath for two minutes.” Sure… I guess that would fix ‘em. I don’t think there’s a man alive that could hold his breath for two minutes, ah.

Ed:  That would end his hiccups …and his life...

153.  Early Roads

Ray:  480’ In the early days we made roads wherever it was easiest to cut through trees and windfalls. In the low places we used to corduroy ‘em lay one piece of tree over the soft spot right next to the next one. It was awful rough when you come to it with a wagon because of all the bouncing over the rough trees eh. That was our bridge. We laid them on the ground because it was soft ay. Your wagon would sink and you would have quite a time so we corduroyed the soft spots.

To learn more about corduroyed roads, read here.

Ed:  Did Hwy 49 exist?

Ray:  No

Ed:  It wasn’t there?

Ray: Oh, no, no. There was no road out there at all. The first trail was a little easier. It ran right across my land here. It came through here and then across the field that was down further south like at Raymond’s. There was a rental on there on the first place where some early settlers started. They went through my yard here, they just cut through wherever it was easiest you know to get through. We tried to get to higher ground too and miss as many soft spots as we could.

Ed:  ‘Cause you had wagons?

Ray:  Oh yah, wagons and horses sure. Sure, and then at first when you started out you walked. 512’

154.  Snowshoes and Skis

Ray:  And those snowshoes I showed you, I walked on them when the snow got too deep. 515’

[Note: Actually Ray and Ed searched his sheds for an hour or more, trying to find his snowshoes. They could not find them. Ed would love to have a photo of his snowshoes.]

Ray:  Then we got into skis. It was pretty hard to go through with skis when you got into a bunch of loose snow ‘cause you sank so much. When the snow stiffened up you could go pretty good. 519’

155.  Finding your land

Ed:  How did you find the corners of your land if everything was solid trees and bush?

Ray:  Well, you would look for old cut off trees. That was a clue. That’s the way you try to find a property line. Then you could find a corner mound. 527’

Ed:  There was a mound?

Ray:  Oh, ya. They had their mounds on each property. There was an iron peg and it was numbered on there what section it was. I don’t know if there are any of them around now but it would be nice to show you one of those mounds. I’m not sure just where they are now. They are pretty well gone now and not many are left. There were 4 holes and then a mound of dirt ay. 535’ They had an iron pin in there that had numeral numbers of what land description that was. Like the NE of 36, 77 or 78. See Ole is in 78 and I’m in 77. Hwy 49 is a township line. We are in different townships.

Ed:  Were all the corners marked or just maybe one or…?

Ray:  There was none in the center.

Ed:  In each corner of each quarter?

Ray:  Yah, I think there was. I’m not entirely sure now but anyway, what you first did when you were looking for land was to find a corner. From that you would have an idea of what you were getting, what your quarter was like ay. 552’ We’d make a kind of a square and then identify the property line. Then we’d start staking ay. That way you could go pretty straight, ay. You would take a stick and point the end and, because the stick was white, it would show up pretty good through the second growth poplar. Then you would keep on going, sighting back making a straight line. We did that for fencing and to find the corner mound, because there was no mound in the middle of the section. 564’ For the next fellow, some of these parcels aren’t totally true because they missed the intersection a little bit. Then the other man took a little of your land. That’s what we consider a property line.

Ed:  Some of the fences are not quite on the line?

Ray:  Well I know some are not because when you get to the middle of the section the other one he’s probably over here and the other one he’s over here so they’re about a rod off away. [a rod is a 16’ long measuring device] I’ve never got into any trouble over property lines. I guess if a man was mean enough he could do it but it was a little too much work to solve that. I don’t think anybody wanted that.

Ed:  How far off do you think some of these properties are?

Ray:  Well up in the center of section 33 I think it’s probably about 8 feet off.

Ed: Oh that far?

Ray:  about 8 feet. It’s not that much off. But that’s not a concern now. It’s a line ay. You’ve owned it for many years and are probably on the other fellow’s property but it’s considered the line now. It’s a good thing because otherwise you’d lose friends over that all the time ah. 594’

Ed:  When you buy a piece of property do they survey it?

Ray:  It was surveyed before we came ay.

Ed:  So it’s close enough.

Ray:  Oh, ya.

Ed:  Ya.

Ray:  The surveyors went through earlier. They had surveyor camps and they surveyed it. were surveyed, when we came here the countryside was already surveyed. Back then it was easier to follow the lines because it was newly done. But now you can’t see the old survey lines. They are all gone eh. So you don’t see them at all. I think I had one of these squares on the farm here.  I made a square out of 1 x 2’s. I think they were edgings that we had. I had a nail in them to get a square, to get it just so. Then you put that on top of a post and sight lining up the two nails, like you were sighting over a rifle. 615’

Ed:  Yes.

Ray:  And then you start staking. Eh.

Ed:  So that’s how you did that. How long were these squares?

Ray:  Well, about 2 feet, maybe 2 ½.

Ed:  And then you cross measure to make sure…

Ray:  Oh sure so that it was square.

Ed:  And then away you go.

Ray:  Oh sure that’s what we started with, sure.

Ed:  And then sight along the two nails...

Ray:  And then once you got a start, you’d go back and start shooting back. then we’d clean off the end of the stake ay, of a poplar maybe 4 or 5 feet high ay and then take an axe and slice each side and fix the top so you had kind of a white so you could see pretty good. Oh, ya, you could see that pretty good and then you kept on going and kept on staking and you come out pretty good.   You missed it a little but a lot of the time you didn’t miss it much. 639’ That’s how a lot of this stuff was done but that would take a long time. How would you know where your line was and the next guys land was unless everything was staked out and your fence line was figured out? What you wanted to do was to fence it anyway you had it on the line and if you got over on the other guy’s property and he complained too much you had to move the fence. 653’ Here we were not too far off the center even though there was no mound in the center of this section.

Ed:  Oh I got ya. Oh, in the center…

Ray:  Ya.

Ed:  Oh I know what you are saying. Was there a mound at half a mile or none?

Ray:  Yes, half a mile.

Ed:  Oh I see. You had to find the opposite corner.

Ray:  Well ya.

Ed:  Oh.

Ray:  If a mound had 4 holes on it, well then it was true. But if it was a mound with only a ring around it of dug up dirt, then it was untrue. The numbers on the stake told you this is the way it should be, so many rods one way or the other. That’s the way you would measure out to get your true corner. Many mounds weren’t true because of rain or too much water or swampy ground that hindered them so they couldn’t get just right where the mound should be. 683’ Then they dug a mound and it wasn’t a true mound.  It told you on the stake where it should be. They used all these roman numbers, like X, L & M’s.

Ed:  Did the surveyors place an iron pipe at each of the four corners of each section?

Ray:  700’Yah.

[End of side A; Tape dated 9-14-2007]

[Begin side B; Tape dated 9-14-2007]

Ed:  …0’ of ah tape ‘um and it’s 11:30, and it’s September 14, 2007 it’s 11:30 in the morning. This is Ed Ostrom and I’m sitting at the kitchen table with Ray Emerson, born January 1912. He is describing how far do you go out to find the corners of your quarter section and what you use to measure with.

Ray:  We used to make what we called A, A’s ay. We used lumber about 1 x 2’s thick. Then you make an “A” shape and that was 8 or 8 ½ feet and you sharpened the ends a little. We left one leg a little bit longer than the other one so you could whittle it off. That had a kind of a nice shape to act as a handle. Then you swing it from place to place and keep counting. We measured our land with that. [Sounds like a surveyor’s bipod, an instrument still in use today.]

Ed:  You made a big divider?

Ray:  Yah a divider. An A, you know, and then you just got the other. You would put a cross piece board to make it solid ya. Then you would just keep swinging it ay. And counting as you went and two of them 16’ was a rod. You see…

Ed:  You made it easy.

Ray:  Well sure.

Ed:  Clever.

Ray:  Ya, well that’s the way you measured and it worked good too. One man could measure with an A. A steel tape required two men, each holding an end. In the early days we didn’t have the 100 feet or more tapes they have now. 

Ed:  So that’s how you find the half a mile…?

Ray:  Well sure.

Ed:  You go out there a half a mile.

Ray:  You go so far on that straight line and then we’d figure out that’s where your land ended.

Ed:  Then you’d shoot a square?

Ray:  Yah, a square, sure. 26’ You point it the other way…

Ed:  And then you’d repeat it. Amazing.

Ray:  You then come in from the other side to the center, ya.

Ed:  From the other side…

Ray:  Ya.

Ed:  And then where it intersects…

Ray:  Then when you found what you thought was the corner you would make a peg or just or something to mark the corner.  Because if you were trying to do some fencing well that’s where your corner post would be. 33’

Ed:  That’s intriguing.

Ray: Oh ya. Down a mile here we have a lease but on the other one I put up a long pole with a flag on it so you could see it and then you could bee-line right for that. Then you kept staking with those points in line. It’s just like you’re shooting with a rifle bead, ay.

Ed: Oh ya.

Ray:  Beads ay. Sure that’s right. We could make a pretty straight line. 39’ At least that’s the way it was done and it’s still there, so…

Ed:  How did you know it was 8 feet? Did you have a measure?

Ray:  Sure, a tape measure. I don’t know how much.

Ed:  Did you have a steel tape or what was it?

Ray:  Oh, it was probably on a [carpenter’s] square. In those days you didn’t have as many of those tapes as now. Then you had rods. We didn’t have that much to measure with.

Ed:  Well what did you get the 8 foot with?

Ray:  Well we’d use a square, a 2-foot square. 2, 4 ,6 and then 8.

Ed:  Oh, you used the old fashioned square?

Ray:  If you can read the square, it will tell you any cut on there if you know how to read all the little numbers on there. Some of the guys were smart enough to read those numbers. They can make any cut you know. You make one cut and then another angle cut and a two way cut eh. It tells you on the square if you know how to read the square. 53’

Ed:  Did you know how to read it?

Ray:  No, I didn’t. I figured it out though but not right away. I was never able to read the entire square. A lot of those guys came over from the old country, those guy were trained, especially from Norway. Heck, they were either carpenters or blacksmiths.   Like old man Larson, that was his trade. I think he was both a carpenter and a blacksmith.

Ed:  Did he build boats?

Ray: 60’ No, he built houses and stuff, not boats. They didn’t need boats to start out with. We didn’t need boats to start out with.  Probably some place we should have had ‘em, but we didn’t.

Ed:  Did you ever build a boat, or try to?

Ray:  No. But there were some guys that built the old boats, yah.

Ed:   Back to that A survey tool. Then would you keep that A, the 8’?

Ray:  66’ Oh, a lot of times, oh sure.

Ed:  It’s a valuable tool.

Ray:  I used to have one hanging up. It should be still around somewhere.

Ed:  Oh, ya?

Ray:  But to find it would be hard and then it could have got destroyed too. I’m not sure. I had all that stuff down there and you keep it of course from one time to another. You just keep swinging that thing and it worked pretty good. If you had a tape you’d have to have two men. This way you could measure your land alone.

Ed:  And it won’t rust.

Ray:  Oh, sure. It can’t be ruined by moisture.

Ed:  You’d ruin a steel tape by dragging it in the mud but not your A.

156.  What if? 

Ray:  76’ I often wonder if I had of stayed back in North Dakota, what would I have done there? I couldn’t have got started in the first place. But up here we got a $10 homestead but it was $10 homestead of bush and windfalls. But in a minute you could grow a little garden. It all helped and some years James and I could only break 5 or 10 acres. 

157.  McCormick 1020

[Assume it’s a 1926. The 10 refers to the horsepower on the drawbar and the 20 to horsepower on the pulley. McCormick Deering is the predecessor to International Harvester. For an image see source:  http://www.davidkusel.com/farm/tractor.htm.]

Ray:  First James brought up that 1020 McCormick tractor that he and my brother William had in North Dakota. James and Stuart Ditch shipped it along when they came up here. 85’ We started breaking land with that and it had an attached old wooden beam breaker plow. I used to ride on the seat of that plow and keep kicking the roots and stuff out because she’d plug. We would go through those ash piles and I was the guy that got the dirt, aye. Of course the guy on the tractor got ash dust too when we went through these big ash piles. That dust wasn’t very healthy. 90’ 

Ed:  Did you say ‘dust’?

Ray:  Yah, dust of the ashes from the pile of wood and trees we burnt. All that wood had to be burnt because otherwise you’d have brush piles all over the place. You’d go and pick the roots after you had broke the land. Roots were stacked just like the stooks. You’d have piles of roots all over a field. When we’d drive out, we’d go and burn ‘em. Oh there was a lot of work in this for sure. But we were young.

IMAGE: Grain sheaves stacked into stooks;
photo provided by Trish Steel
on Wikimedia.org. [click here]

158.  Healthy air up here.

Ray:  The air was really pure up here, yah. Healthy air up here.

Ed:  I noticed.

Ray:  Fresh air. 

Ed:  Oh, clear.

Ray:  Yah, yah.

159.  What if? 

Ray:  So I don’t know. If I stayed back in North Dakota what would I have done? How would I have got started aye. But here with a lot of hard work you had a little bit of a chance. I think we were fortunate too because we were healthy, otherwise it would be pretty rough.

160.  Careful

Ray:  I was lucky. I was careful, aye, I suppose. 108’ You could get killed logging out in the bush. A lot of ‘em were killed by falling trees. But I took a lot of chances. I’d go in there and try to drop a tree but instead it would hang up on another one. I’d walk up this tree that was hanging onto the another…and with my axe cut branches…and then cut the one that was hanging up.  Then that tree would fall. But just as that tree started to fall, I’d jump to the standing tree and catch it and then climb down it. I took a lot of chances. But I’m lucky it worked out anyway. 116’

161.  Photo of log piles

Ray:  I was looking at all my pictures and I don’t know where and the world it went to. I had some I’d like to show you of the log piles just across the road here at Ole’s place.

Ed:  I didn’t see those.

Ray:  No. But I was looking for ‘em and I can’t find ‘em. 120’

Ed:  Maybe Elsie can find ‘em.

Ray:  But it’s too late now.

Ed:  Well.

Ray:  That’s the trouble uh?

Ed:  Well, I’ll have to make a trip back up here.

162.  Must Return

Ray:  Yah, you’ll have to.

Ed:  I’ll have to come back up and you can find ‘em all and I’ll scan ‘em.

Ray:  Well I thought I had ‘em all here but… Oh they are here somewhere but when you go over things and go through albums.   We have so many albums, which one are they in? 124’

Ed:  Oh yah.

Ray:  You know. So it takes a lot of time. Then I go through them and somebody looks and then somebody else looks at ‘em and they put them in other places. Oh you know all about that. Sure.

163.  Ray’s First House

Ray:  I had a picture of my first house ay…

Ed:  Oh I didn’t…did I scan that???

Ray:  No. 

Ed:  You have it?

Ray:  Oh sure. It was picked up and I sold it to the Legion in town. They bought it.

Ed:  Your house?

Ray:  First house, ya.

Ed:  Is it still there?

Ray:  No.

Ed:  Oh It’s gone? But you have a photo?

Ray:  They moved it out. 

Ed:  But you have a photo of it?

Ray:  Yah, I’ve got a photo of it somewhere. You’ve got to stay another couple days here.

Ed:  [laughing] I’ll be here through, till next summer.

Ray:  Well, you should, ya. 135’

164.  Joe Holloway

Ed:  Can you tell that one?

Ray:  Sure. 137’

Ed:  That bachelor.

Ray:  Joe Holloway was his name and he was a moonshiner. Course he come over home [North Dakota] to visit or was supposed to visit with dad. I suppose he had a little shot of moonshine. Mother would be pretty wild about that one. Yah, that’s for sure.  She had no use for him. 142’

165.  Respect

Ray:  We trapped for many years. You couldn’t make a dollar any other way. There were lots of rats [muskrats]. There were a couple of Merle boys down on the river. We had an agreement, that’s yours and that’s ours. It was pretty good. We respected each other’s territory. We would not go into their territory and they wouldn’t come on ours. That was about the only way to get a dollar or so, to make a little bit of money. 152’

166.  Bluff

Ray:  155’ One time quite a few Indians came onto our trap line. We were camped there. I was pretty bold. I went up there and the guy could have whipped the hell out of me. He said, “Go to hell.” But I bluffed him off.

Ed:  Did you say you “bluffed” him off?

Ray:  Bluffed him off, yah. 159’

Ed:  How’d you do that?

Ray:  Well, ‘cause I told him that was our territory and they ought to get the hell out of there. And ‘by cracky’ they did. Indians knew all the areas in the country that was good for trapping. Those Indians were good outdoor campers. The white man learned a lot from the Indians too. I trapped with this guy Rod McClaren. He grew up with the Indians from someplace in Washington.

167.  Breakfast

[Ed and Ray are eating breakfast. The tape has sounds of lips smacking and grunting, umm, and spoons and bowls clanking in the background.]

Ed:  When you have good food like this, it gives you a whole energy boost.

Ray:  Oh yah.

Ed:  Umm…

Ray:  179’ It’s good. That was nice of you to come up anyhow, that’s for sure. Because you know, we just don’t get there. If your Dad was living we’d sure like to go once more and see him. If it wasn’t for you kids visiting, we’d never got to know you so good, eh.

Ed:  Yah.

Ray:  People are more familiar with those of their own age, eh?

168.  Old People

Ed:  I love old people. 168’ One time I had a girlfriend, Oh she was cute, Cindy Malone. 

Ray:  Oh.

Ed:  She was the first one that ever told me she loved old people.

Ray:  Oh, is that right?

Ed:  She liked to listen to them talking. I remember that.

Ray:  Look at how many are just the opposite. Heck, they don’t even know they are old, eh. They don’t know anything.

Ed:   Look at how well you’ve done. You have all your fingers…

Ray:  Oh yah. That’s one thing…

Ed:  You are doing something right. Another thing I notice is the similarities of you, my dad and his 1^st cousin Harvey were all in their late 90’s I can think of right off that I taped, and when they told stories and they could be really awful stories, like shooting something, there was this little giggle.

Ray:  Oh ya

Ed:  So right on the surface is a little bit of humor…

Ray:   yah.

Ed:   And Harvey was over 96 when he died.

Ray:  Oh.

Ed:   And dad was almost 96, and that’s remarkable and you here, you’re going to be 96 soon.

Ray:  Yah. 

Ed:   You’ve done something right.

Ray:  Well, I don’t know…

Ed:  Is it your attitude??

Ray:  yah

Ed: So to me it’s quite valuable to have the voice of you speaking.

Ray:   wow.

Ed:   …And so to read between the lines, what did you do, to grow, to be able to age this long, and have all your faculties…??

Ray:  Got you. That’s pretty good of you because so many young people say, 211’ “I don’t care what he said, Oh he’s old, he’s old now, don’t you know.’ They don’t think old people know anything.

Ed:  Well.

Ray:  Today they are smart, eh? 214’

Ed:  Yah, they’re smart.

Ray:  Yah, in a way, I guess. They’ve got a good education but some of them they ain’t so smart, eh? 216’   

[Sounds of eating. Clinking of bowls and silverware.]

[End of tape dated 9-14-2007; Side B. 216’ and end of taping session between Ray Emerson and Ed Ostrom in Eaglesham, Alberta, Canada.]

I want to thank Cousin Ed and his family for helping to bring these stories to us. This interview with Ed's Uncle Ray has been very enjoyable and very informative of not only Ray's recollection of his life with his parents and siblings on the family homestead in Torning Township, Ward County, North Dakota but we also are gaining insight on the life and efforts to homestead in northern Alberta, Canada. Hope you too enjoyed this post and that you have a good week. See you next time and thank you for stopping by.

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