Saskatchewan lifestyles

History in the Medstead Community

'Ruby K. Hill Story
By Ruby K. Hill
On a bitterly cold night in January my dad went with a team and sleigh to get the nurse, but by the time he came back, I had already been delivered by Mrs. Alfred Egeland, a very good friend of the family.
My early memories are of our home at the Robin Homestead by the lake. Like most children, my early childhood was spent playing with the romping, biting puppies, with their eyes sparkling with mischief, or getting the kittens out from under buildings. I liked to watch the long-legged birds along the lake and to listen to the Killdeers.
One day when my mother and I were home alone, she decided to drive our Model T. She had never driven before, so she told me to stay at the house until she had driven the car to the top of the hill, She would then walk back for me. However, she never made it to the top, and I can remember seeing the car backing down and it seemed to be coming so fast. It ended up in the bush beside the road. To my knowledge she never tried to drive again.
One winter day mom and I had gone to church in the Robin School. During the service Dad came in and told us that our house had burned. A neighbor, Mr. Christofferson, had seen smoke and came to help, but not much was saved. He saw my doll on fire and threw it out into the snow. I still have this doll with its scorched head.
Soon after this I remember being at a gathering and seeing a bulky object in the middle of the floor. It was a new cook stove that the kind neighbors had given us.
After the fire we moved into a tall gray house by the railroad track. It was fun to stand by the fence, watch the train go by, and wave to the conductor who always acknowledged my greeting. One winter day while we lived here, a bad storm started. The snow was falling, and the gusty wind was piling the snow into drifts. Dad was away in Medstead. There wasn't a very big supply of wood in the house, so Mom and I went out into the tall dense poplars nearby, and gathered the plentiful dry fallen trees to use for wood. It was hard to see through the falling snow as we came in with the last armfuls of wood. We looked toward the tracks and saw a misty figure approaching. As it came closer we saw it was dad who had walked the railroad track from Medstead. We were so happy to see him. His mackinaw coat pockets bulged with a can of food in each pocket. It was a comfortable feeling that evening when we ate hot soup, and the old cook stove shed a welcome warmth.
When I was about five years old we were visiting at Comptons. There was snow on the ground but we were outside playing hide-and-go-seek. I hid in the sleigh box, and as I crawled out over the front, I slipped and fell and broke my arm. Mom and Dad had to take me by team and sleigh, through drifted roads, from Robinhood to Rabbit Lake, where Dr. Storey set my arm. They wanted to get an early start back home the next day, but they couldn't wake me up until it was very late in the day. I remember how indignant I felt when I woke up to find they had cut the sleeve of my dress to get my arm out to set it. That spring I was playing tag with the Walter Baker children who lived west of Robinhood. I fell and broke the same arm again. When Dr. Storey fixed it for me that time, he told me if I broke it again, he would cut it off. How I protected that arm for months afterwards!
My dad used to butcher cattle and sell meat. In the summer the meat was wrapped in white sheets and had to be delivered early in the morning. I remember going along with him in the Model T on one trip. We went to where they were building a road about six miles west of Robinhood and stopped at the cook shack. The lady gave me a nice cold drink, red in color, which now I would compare with "Kool Aid". It was my first taste of anything like this, and I thought it was very delicious. When we got home from delivering the meat, Mom had to soak all the sheets in cold water, then wash them on the scrub board, and get them ready for the next trip.
Learning to read was a great joy to me, but we had so very few books in those days. I had one book of Bible stories and it seemed that I could read it over and over and never get tired of the same stories.
My school days up to grade seven were spent at Guyhirne School. It was three miles away, and I would walk or ride horse in the summer, and go with the horse and cutter in the winter.
There were two railroad gates to open and close. I wasn't very big, so when I rode horseback in the summer, I had a hard time trying to get back on the horse. I would lead Sammy over to a rock or fence and just as I was about to jump on, he would move away, and I would have to start the procedure all over again. I finally managed the feat of opening and closing the gates without getting off the horse. Sammy used to shy at the partridges, stones by the roadside, or he would find any other excuse to shy if he were in the mood for it. Sometimes I would fall off and the horse would keep just far enough ahead of me to be exasperating, or else he would wait until I caught up to him and then he would run on again. Other times I was able to catch him and be on my way.
The early morning trips though, were beautiful. You could often see a white-tailed deer bounding away, hear the meadowlarks singing from their perch on the fence posts, and admire the beautiful flowers of spring; the crocuses, the yellow buttercups and purple violets.
One of the highlights of the closing of school in June was the annual picnic and dance. Great plans took place amid the green poplars across from the school where we used to eat our noon lunches. Helmie Miller and I spent weeks looking in the Eaton's catalogue to find material for new dresses. We sent for some pale yellow material with brown flowers, (voile) I believe it was called, and sure enough, we had these "twin" dresses made up for the dance. They had a ruffle at the bottom and reached nearly to our ankles. I guess we really thought we were the "belles" of the ball that night.
My teachers in Guyhirne School were John Warick, Muriel Lawson, Richard Prechtl, Esther McCarthy, Miss Shannon and Clive Dotten. Medstead School wanted to start a high school and encouraged grade seven and eight students to come into the village school. I didn't want to leave the country school, but it was one and a half miles closer, so I spent the next five years in the basement of the two-room school which is still present on the Medstead School grounds. My teachers at the time were Grant Fletcher, and Walter Hoge. The children would have their noon lunch at school. One day when Mr. Hoge went home for dinner, Jonna Miller and I played catch by catching the ball in Mr. Hoge's hat. We heard quick footsteps coming down the basement stairs and we just had time to put the crease back in the hat and toss in on the shelf, when Mr. Hoge walked in. He had come back early. We looked very guilty, but he never knew why - not until he reads it now!
Those were the days of catching gophers to get the tails to sell, and I caught my share. My gopher catching playmates were boys. Usually we would drowned out the gophers and my dog would "crunch" them when they came out of the hole, or else you had to use a stick to kill them. Later, Dad gave me some traps. However, now I was getting a little older and a bit more squeamish about killing them. My dad wondered why I always came home with broken traps and I finally had to tell him, that when there was a live gopher in the trap I would close my eyes and throw stones at the trap until the gopher was dead.
Once I was out on the ridge south of our place looking for crocuses, when I heard something clipping through the trees and then a whine in the distance. Someone was out shooting gophers, so when I realized it had been a bullet, my knees were shaky. I went home on the far side of the ridge, and didn't lose much time getting out of the firing line.
In my early teenage years what I liked most was riding horseback, playing the guitar, and rafting on our slough to check on all the birds nests among the willows. Nearly every year the rusty-breasted robin had it's nest in the binder and that was nice to watch until the ugly babies came out.
Once some friends and I hooked up two gophers with binder twine and put them in the slew. Could they ever swim!
During these years I belonged to the Guyhirne Home Craft Club, Swine Club, Girl Guides in Medstead, taught by Aileen Connor, and I went to Sunday School at Guyhirne School.
Have you ever thought you could get attached to pigs? Well, I did. After feeding them for months, and scrubbing them until they were pink to get them ready for Achievement Day, then having to part with them, was just too sad.
One year in home craft work I had to sew a dress, and do some knitting, etc, and hem stitch a tray cloth. The hem-stiching was a terrible chore. I think there were more tears than stitches by the time I was through. However, we had to go to the Farm Girls camp in North Battleford, and also take part in a questionnaire. Perhaps the work was rewarded, as I had a high aggregate which meant I had won the match, a book and a free trip to Saskatoon.
Belonging to the clubs meant camping trips at Birch Lake. A week with the Swine Club members and another week with the Girl Guides. When we were with the Guides, each day two girls had to cook, while the rest went on hikes. The day it was our turn, Margaret Tricker and I decided to cook rice. We got the water boiling and added several cups of rice. Lo and behold! The pot got full, and we had to get another one and "bail" out the half cooked rice to make room for the rest. The pot kept getting full, so we had quite a mess by the time we were done.
One day a couple of us went on a hike and came upon a house in the woods with a little "Goldilocks" playing outside. Later we found out it was the home of the Latimers.
On another camping trip we had put our tent on a hill, and a terrible storm came up. We all had to hang on to the bottom, so the wind wouldn't blow the tent away. It seemed a long time before the storm abated. There was a lot of screaming going on; almost as much noise as when the boys caught a bunch of frogs and put them in the tent. Thank goodness it wasn't mice!
Mr. and Mrs. Bender were about the first ones in our district to have a radio, the earphone type. It was a great treat to go up to their place, and each shared an earphone and listen to Amos and Andy programs.
Mrs. Bender was a lovely lady and could fry the best eggs. While I was going to high-school, I earned my first wages working at Benders. I milked the cows and did a few other chores, while Mr. Bender and Floyd went threshing. They gave me ten dollars, when they got back. I was rich for the first time! With my money, I bought a new coat, a pair of shoes for my self and a pair of shoes for my mother.
Mr. Bender, like his son, Floyd, was always ready for tricks and fun. One day he asked Mom if she would like a mother cat so she said, "I guess it would be all right". The next day, he brought in a box, opened it up, and out came not only the mother cat but also five or six kittens. Mom didn't know whether to laugh or cry. We hardly had enough food for ourselves, let alone a bunch of cats, but I was really pleased to have that many kittens to play with at one time.
Have you ever heard of anyone losing their shirt? Well, Floyd Bender did just that. A group of young people who were playing tag around our yard one evening, grabbed Floyd's shirt, and it was in shreds by the time the game was over.
When I was going to high-school in Medstead we had a Halloween party in the two room school. Upstairs the games were going on and downstair was the Chamber of Horrors. I was one of the Bluebirds wives, with a box over my head, with an opening in front. Someone took the visitors around and told them the usual horror stories. When they came to me, I was to flash the light on so they could see one of his beheaded wives. All went well until out of the corner of my eye, I saw some legs come down through the basement window. Everyone screamed and ran upstairs, but I couldn't get my head out of the box, and I couldn't navigate with it on. A kind friend finally came to my rescue, and then we too, ran safely up the creaky stairs. We finally found out the explanation of the invaders. There was a B and B Gang working on the track in Medstead. Seeing there was a Halloween party on upstairs, and the basement was dark, they thought they would crash the party by sneaking in through the basement window. I think they ended up being as frightened as we were.
When I remember Christmas concerts, I think of the long underwear we used to have to roll up and try to hide under our dresses. I'm sure everyone could see these big bulges but anyway we felt better. Some parents wouldn't even let their children roll up their underwear for even one evening, so we thought we were lucky.
I admire the ones responsible for taking a group of us by truck to Saskatoon, to see the queen. The children rode in the back of the truck which was covered by a tarp. I was the "littlest" and had to miss the fun of riding with the others and had to sit in the front. As we neared home after our long journey, my feet were hot and tired on the truck floor, so I slipped off my running shoes only to hear someone say,"Oh, I can smell cranberries". Carefully I slipped my shoes back on.
A memory that I and many others will have, is the hustle and bustle of threshing days. The golden sheaves were thrown from the loaded racks into the separator, and in a good year the golden grain poured into the wagon box. When Mom helped cook for the threshers at Jake Tollefson's, it was fun to ride with Jake as he took the loads of grain to the granary. At supper time there was always the teasing , laughing , and the clatter of dishes as the men sat down to eat supper amid the glow of the kerosene lamp. Usually the threshers were at our place about Thanksgiving time. After they left, my best memory was in having a mattress of fresh new straw. Mom would make our beds with the fresh sweet smelling sheets that she had put out to dry in the clean scented country air. My sister and I would then have a race to see who would get into bed first, between the clean sheets, on our "new" matress".

To be continued...