Another Dog for me.

Yes I decided to adopt an albinos pure white husky it even had pink eyes. This dog had been following me home every day for the last week and I managed to touch him a few times. I asked my grandmother can I keep him. Maybe he belongs to someone in the village she said. I said I asked a lot of people and they said they never saw him before. I went out and fed him some seal meat. Blacky was just tide about 20 feet away and the next thing I knew Blacky broke his chain. What a fight and I decided to step in-between both of them. Whity I named him, grabbed me by the upper right arm, the two teeth marks are still there today. Lucky my grandmother came out and helped. She tied Blacky up and I tied Whity. I tied Whity so that him and Blackys were about a foot away, nose to nose and when I fed them they were a foot away. Well to make this short it took a couple of weeks for things to calm down or who would respect who and yes Blacky was the boss he was the leader. Let me tell you I had two great dogs. The dog race was in two weeks and every day we practised and this was one hour of intense running, none stop.

Getting Ready for the Dog Sled Race.

This was in Feb. 1960 and my dog Blacky really became a big and strong dog. I had a lot of offers for him, even tourists during the summer asked if I would sell him. A man and lady that summer offered me $500. for him. I went to see my grandfather and asked him if I should sell him. He said it’s your decision, All I can tell you is the dog will last a lot longer than $500. and I thought about that and said no to the lady and the man. At the age of 3 years old he was 180 lbs. and standing up on his hind legs was 6 feet. His jet black fur shined in the winter time, I guess it was because of the seal meet and fat I was feeding him. When I say he was strong, well that 45 gallon drums of water at first it was half full. Now it’s full and I get on the sled to and that mile no stop back to the house. Also that winter I was lumber jacking every week end. My grandfather was paying $6.00 a cord cut, third of a cord, split and piled. I said will you give me the same thing and he said yes. I did this for five years, with an axe and buck saw. While doing all this wood cutting I always carried the 22 rifle and a role of snare wire. So rabbits and partridges were always on the menu at home. We had time to do all that, in those days and this was all fun for me and my buddies

Fishing Trip up to French River, Feb. 1959

This was a long walk on snowshoes and I was happy I brought Blacky along. Uncle Howard his friend Charles and I were on our way to French River to fish for big speckle trout. We even brought our fishing rods. All this was tied on the sleigh with our packsack and axe. Blacky was ready to go, I had tied a long rope to the back of the sled, this was to slow him down once in a while. This snowshoe walk was 24 miles return. It was very cold that morning at 5 o’clock and around the -35 but no wind. All you could here was crispy and crunch sound from under our snowshoes and the sled runners. We stopped once after two hours, to have a good drink of hot coffee and Blacky was eating snow. We arrived at French River at 9:30 and to my surprise the river was not frozen and the banks on the side were about 10 feet high. I told my uncle, I thought that we were going to fish on the ice, but guess that’s not it. He said no we are going to cast from the side and be very careful on the side that it does not break or you slip in. My uncle gave the first cast and he had one and it was giving him a good fight, I was just watching and a good 10 minutes to bring it to him without loosing it, because it’s out of the water for about 20 feet before you get it to you. We caught a reasonable amount in 6 hours fishing and all big ones, 4 to 5 lbs. The wind had picked up and that looked like storm coming in. Blacky started jumping and barking and wanted to go. Darkness had set in pretty fast. We tied everything on to the sleigh, put our snowshoes on, grabbed the rope and said hike Blacky. After an hour of walking we stopped and talked, we could not see a thing, and the snow was burning our eyes. We did know where we were and the only thing to do is was to follow Blacky, he was our guide. I remember looking at my watch and saw 10 o’clock that was at night, we had been walking for 6 hours and no sign of the village.

We stopped for a drink of coffee that was left. My uncle looked tired; I told get on the sled, Blacky will pull you for awhile, which he did. Then Charles did the same thing and I did also. Looked at my watch it was 2 o’clock and still no sign of the village. We all took turns on the sled and Blacky had no trouble with that. As I was going along 3 o’clock in the morning and I had school that Monday. The storm was so bad that we past in front of the village and did not even see it, that’s where my uncle his friend live, I live at the end of the island. Well let me tell when we saw the house we were happy and the lights were on also a Bombardier snowmobile parked in front. Yes a search party was ready to leave as soon as it was day light. They were all happy to see us safe and sound. I gave Blacky a great big hug and told him he was a good dog, so did my uncle and his friend Charles.

Ice Fishing in the middle of November 1958

It was around the 15 th. Of November Jud, Barry and I decided to go ice fishing at Maidmens Creek that’s an 8 mile walk return. Grandmother said the ice is not frozen all over, you have to be careful where you walk, not to fall threw the ice. My grandfather said, go and get 6 big nails in the shed, 6 inch ones and bring the roll of twine also. Which I did, then cut me three pieces of twine about 6 feet long. He tied a nail at each end of the rope or twine. When you put your coats on, put the nail and twine into each sleeve before putting it on. That’s what we all did, and he I hope it doesn’t happen but if it do fall through the ice, this will help you get out of the water and onto the ice. All you do is grab the nails and use them to pick into the ice and pull yourself along. We all understood and away we went for Maidmens Creek, pack sacks on our back, chisel and axe. The walk was great and in know time we were there. We made a couple of holes each, set in our lines that were baited with small pieces of salt pork. The speckle trout that we caught were all about the same size, one to one and half lbs and a lot of them, little to shy to say who many, our pack sacks were full.