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We were only renting the Ffewelling Place. Bill had batched there for seven years, and now the owners had sold it so we had to move. We got the place north of the city and moved there one month before David was born. (April 1940, that was) I went back to Asquith for the birth, May 8^th, to the doctor and midwife who had looked after me all winter. The move turned out to be a bad one. The land was gravelly, the water was poor, and in the five years we lived there we never had a good crop. The war years were on and Bill had a few days work here and there in the city, but he was "frozen" to the farm, under the War Measures Act, and he couldn’t even leave to join the army. Not that he wanted to, but he would not have been accepted if he did. Food production was important. Arthur and Evelyn followed David into the world during those years. We acquired a few more cattle, pigs, chickens and turkeys, so we always had plenty to eat, but money was still scarce, and I grew to hate the farm life.

Then, toward the end of the war, one of the bosses from the Dairy Pool came to the farm and asked Bill if he would come and drive the milk truck for them. Pay was an unheard of $129.30 per month, so he took it. After he had worked for about three months, I made up my mind we were going to get off that farm somehow. David was soon going to go to school and the local school was shut down. Even that one was two miles away, so if it had been open, how could a six year old kid get there?  So we started house hunting in the city and found the place on Avenue I—the only one we could get with no down payment. We bought it in March and rented it out until the end of September 1945.

David, Evelyn, Johnny Geisbrecht, Arthur at Grace Ewen’s Farm

Then Bill went to the War Office and with Ted Geall’s help (his boss) he was released from the farm and we moved in on September 26, 1945. After we sold our cattle, horses, and everything else from the farm we had our down payment of $700.00, plus a little bit to buy a new stove and some second-hand furniture, including a sofa, our first. No washing machine. I still washed clothes on a washboard for another two years. Seven years and 3 babies, I washed clothes on a washboard and wrung them out by hand.

The Avenue I Gang

Arthur (about 2 years old)

The washing machine came at last. I was renting out rooms, and to make a little extra, I moved the kids into the back porch and us into the dining room and rented the front room our for the summer months at $25.00 per month. A man and his son took the room and I asked him to pay the whole 5 months in advance, not really expecting that he would. But after I explained about my need for a washing machine, he obliged. Then, armed with cash, I took off and walked the city, looking for a machine. This was just 2 years after the war ended and consumer goods were still in short supply. No luck. I got to Wheaton Electric at about 4 o’clock in the afternoon, exhausted, and when he too said no machine, I started to weep, and told him my whole story, showed him my cash, and he said, "Leave it with me. I’ll find you a washer if there’s one to be had anywhere." He was as good as his word and two days later he let me know he had one for me. It cost exactly $125.00 and they delivered it that day. That Inglis wringer washer lasted for many, many years. I stopped using it when Art and Gloria moved from the airport into a suite on 22^nd St., and sold me their automatic washer and dryer. Laurie was a year old (1962).

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