(0:47:37) That was one thing I liked, your individuality. You had your station to look after. Your piece of ground that you basically looked after, but you always helped your neighbor if they needed help. You could use your brain and plan things. Like foot bridges and trail maintenance. You could plan all that and do it at the right time. You probably have fellows that go around, like Brian in Jasper. The trail man, backcountry manager. Brian Wallace. They probably have more fellows doing things like he did. Travel the backcountry. He and I went to school together. They sent me to different schools. Hinton was one of them. I spent a term in Hinton and Brian was finishing up his NAIT course there. And Peter Whyte…

(0:49:16) They are all memorable (in response to the question, what were some of the more memorable events of your career?) When you think of it there are little instances. A story I can remember that the wardens told me, Mac Elder was one of them. You know him? And Toni Klettl. He’s an Austrian, very competent in the mountains. One of his stories was, he used to be in charge of the Edith Cavell area. One day he was doing a foot patrol on the glacier at the foot of Mount Edith Cavell and a tourist came running down to him and said, “Come quick, come quick! My boy has fallen.” It wasn’t really a crevasse, a bergschrund they call it, a big crack between the rock and the glacier. So he went up there. This is Toni’s story. The boy had fallen and landed on a ledge, not too far down. He figured about ten or fifteen feet. He was unconscious, but he was laying on the ledge and his hand was out like that. Toni didn’t have any equipment with him, like a rope. So there were people gathering around. So he got some belts and hooked them all together. And he took some wool out of his jacket, he had a wool jacket and tied a loop in the end of the last belt, he tied a loop into it with this wool thread. Then he fished for the boy’s hand. He got his hand in the loop and he pulled it tighter and tighter and he managed to take the weight of the boy. He had some help and he pulled him up. Got him out of there. He probably wouldn’t have lasted too long. He was very cold and just a little guy. He wasn’t well dressed. It’s quite a story. But I believe it because Toni is quite versatile.

(0:52:03) Mac Elder (has) a bear story. He knows lots of them. This time he was hiking down the trail between cabins and he had a dog with him. He had a dog from the Walt Disney outfit which was making a story with a bear. It was used to bears I guess. Anyways he had this dog with him and all of a sudden a grizzly came out of the woods. And the closest tree Mac could find was kind of a spindly pine tree with spindly branches. He shimmed up that as high as he could go. And the bear got up on his hind legs. He said, “I couldn’t get any higher, my toes were there.” And the bear got her nose up in his toes. He said, “I could see the expression on her face change and she got down and took off.” Must have been the smell of his feet! I said, “Maybe she is used to your smell on the trail and she just thought you were part of the landscape.” Nobody knows. He gave the dog a what-for after that because the dog just sat off to the side and laughed.

(0:53:36) I spent most of my time in Banff with the guiding and all that (in response to the question, “In all the parks that you worked in, do you have a favorite?”) But I liked them all. Waterton I liked. They all have their own unique features. I didn’t think I was going to like Riding Mountain but that was the best place for me, because I was able to get myself set up financially for retirement. Some of the supervisors they sent out nowadays think they know it all I guess. One in particular in Riding Mountain, a Superintendent, sent me out to burn down the Grey Owl cabin. Did you know that there was a Grey Owl cabin out there? There is one there that he (Grey Owl) didn’t spend a lot of time at I guess. But he even had an underground tunnel right up into the cabin. He had a platform that raised up above floor level. The beaver would sit up on that platform and he’d cut up poplar branches for them in the winter to feed. He had them named and everything. Grey Owl, he’s quite a showman, an Englishman. Quite a history. So anyway this was his (cabin) and he had an Indian woman that would go out there. Carry his liquor, split his wood and whatnot. Anyhow this cabin was in pretty good shape outside, but the windows were all out of it and it was full of porcupine crap. So I looked at it. It happened to be on the trail from Wasagaming to Aggassiz ski hill right across the east side along that trail. So I thought, that cabin could be used for emergency shelter along the trial. So I got the area warden out and said, “Have a look at that, see if you can get some windows in. Put the windows in and clean out the porcupine crap, wash the floor down. Get some guys in there and fix it all up.” I think they got a stove in there too, that they could use. So they fixed it all up and I never said a word to the Superintendent. I don’t think he was very happy. The next thing I knew that naturalists got involved and the first thing we knew it was a national historic site. So I saved Grey Owl’s cabin.

(0:56:48) I still kept the wardens sending in diaries even right up until the end. A lot of the younger ones didn’t want to do it. A lot of them didn’t want to lie and say they were working when they weren’t, that sort of thing. A lot of useful information came in through the diaries I thought. He (Ed Carleton) took great pride in his diary, very neat…When I inspected the districts (which) I did every year. (I’d) go out on horseback (and) take a pack horse. You’d be riding along a trail in a district with a warden and I’d say, “Where’s that foot bridge you put in last spring?” “Oh, that’s just up around the corner here.” And he was proud to be able to show it to me.” Geez, he’s actually reading my diary.” Not Riding Mountain (that Gerry would go out on horseback with the district warden). I did have a pack horse there that I would use occasionally just for the fun of it. But I did start a trail system. It was one of my goals. When I first went there, there was some old logging trails, hay trails because they used to do that in Riding Mountain Park under permit. So I got the wardens together and said, “Where are some recognized trails that we could mow out or do something (with) because there is so much brush and grass and make some trails. Because people are beginning to get used to riding around the park.” Where before the only person you saw in the park was a poacher or a person with cattle in the park, (getting) hay or cutting timber…There is a little paper here from Onanole that says some outside people now are getting into building trails. “Horse Ride Celebrates 15 Summers” They are starting to ride horses in Riding Mountain Park. Make use of it that way.

(1:00:08) Oh yeah, (the warden service changed over the course of his career). Yeah, I think it has always been changing. We are losing the days of breeches and boots. Then we got into the mountain rescue. I was on one of the first big rescues where there were six or seven boys killed in an avalanche. Young boys at Mount Temple. I think it was seven. I was on that. We were up there in the dark on the mountain. First we could hear some of them whimpering under the snow. It was in a steep gully and there was water running down the bottom part of it. But then the big heavy snow avalanche came down. Some of the boys were in that space underneath. So they were still alive for quite a while.

(1:01:10) Then there was the Mexicans. Five Mexicans fell off the mountain at Lake Louise. Moira used to work at Lake Louise during the summer from university. When that happened, she happened to be looking through that big telescope (they had) for the guests. She happened to be looking through that and she claims she saw them come down. Those five Mexicans. And Hughie Jennings, you might remember his name there, he packed them out on horseback. He was working for Brewster’s up there then at Lake Louise. They had a corral and some horses. So people could go riding. Hughie was a good packer, but not a good writer. He didn’t make good scientific reports. A lot of the old fellows were that way. They just weren’t geared (for scientific reports). I wasn’t a scientific writer either but I managed to get by…