(0: 31:17) (Showing a photo) This is Bryant Creek cabin. You were there? It is quite a nice cabin. Nice view…Johnny Romanson made those, he carved those Indian heads (wood carvings).

(0:31:37) (Showing a photo) And this is our elk slaughter and buffalo slaughter. We had a few buffalo there. A display herd. They (the buffalo) would increase every year. We did this in Waterton and Jasper to keep the herd down to an exhibition herd. Otherwise they’d eat themselves out of house and home being in a pasture. This (showing a photo) is yearling buffalo we had and the meat was given to the Indians. That means a lot to them to get buffalo meat. They really appreciated it. Well, no (it was not always given to the Stoney Nation). We used to pass it around to different tribes and let them decide who gets it. I was an acting warden at that time.

(0:32:49) (Showing a photo) That’s skiing at Cuthead College. Oh yeah, (in response to the question, did you like to ski) I skied pretty well all my life.

(0:33:07) (Showing photos) There’s some photos of the Ya-Ha Tinda. Frank Coggins I think is one of those. That’s Fred Dixon and Ann Dixon. They were Ranch Managers then. Raising colts in those days for the wardens. We came out from town with a jeep to get through the mud holes to bring supplies for them in the spring. The road wasn’t all that great. I had water and mud right up to the headlights.

(0:34:13) Walter Perren again (taught the wardens at Cuthead College) and we taught each other certain things. Like some of the better skiers or more experienced avalanche people would teach the younger, more inexperienced…Yep, (looking at another photo) that’s Cuthead College and the hard working wardens!

(0:34:53) Three years (at Georgian Bay), no four years. Three years at Point Pelee. Then (I went) from Point Pelee to Jasper as the Assistant Chief Warden…Not too long. I think (we were there for) about four years in Jasper. (Then) they gave me a choice of Waterton, Yoho or Kootenay park as Chief Warden. I took Waterton, so we were on the road again to Waterton. Oh, I just liked it (in response to the question, “What made you choose Waterton?”). It is a compact park and its got everything in it that I was interested in; prairie, mountains, lakes, some boating on Waterton Lake. Terrible winds though. Pretty bad winters at times. Yeah, how long was I there? Not too long and then they transferred me to Riding Mountain.

(0:36:34) Have you ever been there? (to Riding Mountain). Clear Lake, Wasagaming. Well, I was there for 11 years as Chief Warden. I took early retirement (after) 25 years of service….No I stayed there (in Riding Mountain) because I bought land and built a house. I bought a barn and three quarter sections. I developed a cottage subdivision on some of it, like the one you were in outside of Banff (Harvie Heights). I remember when that was first developed. Bobby and I were thinking at one time that we should get a lot out there. Anyhow we were there for 14 years all together. It was just outside of the park gates where I was. Onanole was the town, really undeveloped…

(0:39:22) (Showing a photo) Here’s a ski school. You may recognize some of the wardens in there. Ted Baker, Jack Wolege, Fred Dixon, Gerry Lyster, a couple of Mounties, there’s me.. Oh that’s a mountie, and Al Moore, Bill Vroom is there, you’d know him…Frank Coggins…

(0:40:57) 1984 (Gerry moved to Penticton). It wasn’t me (that wanted to move), it was Bobby. She was having her breathing problems and what not. For older people to retire there (in Manitoba) there really wasn’t much entertainment. It wasn’t good T.V. and there wasn’t an awful lot to do. We had a nice home, built a nice house there. I bought the barn from the park. They wanted to get our horses out of the town site area. We had a beautiful big barn for the town warden’s horses. So the smart superintendent put it up for sale. Bobby put a bid in on it and got it. It was a big heavy duty barn. We got somebody to move it onto site for us. We had four horses and up to 12 head of cattle…

(0:42:49) Well I was pretty active on the lake when we first came out here, boating. I was in the Yacht Club. I joined the Power Squadron. I was in the Coast Guard Auxiliary here. I was Commodore here one year in the Yacht Club. No we haven’t (gone to any of the functions) for a long time. Moria (Gerry’s second wife) is a lifetime member too. We just haven’t gone. But we met a lot of people through the Yacht Club, up and down the valley…We had a boat that you could live on and you could stay at the Yacht Clubs as a visitor, providing that you were a member of a club.

(0:44:14) Everything (in response to the question “What did you like best about being a warden?). I think it is the comradeship, what do they call it? The Esprit de Corps with all the guys. Even now I find myself phoning different ones just to pass the time of day…There aren’t many people around here, or there haven’t been, that I can talk to about the warden service. You are going to be a bright light. You’ve been to Bryant Creek cabin and that was one of my favorite spots…

(0:46:12) What they’ve done to it now (in response to the question what did you like least about being a warden?) I was reading in that book where all the existing wardens lost their uniforms…so the ones that are the law enforcement people, most of them are new university trained people. So our old guy who could pretty well do anything out there in the bush is gone. We wonder how they are going to get all that stuff done?