Page 3 - With Lottie Morrison from Gabarus

ISSUE : Issue 40

Published by Ronald Caplan on 1985/8/1

those feathers away to places where they'd manufacture clothes and such things. We used to buy wool, tons of wool, and send it to the Glendyer Mills (in Mabou ar? ea) . They would make it into material for men's suits and blankets and heavy mater? ial for coats and things like that. And al? so the yarn. We'd send the wool and they'd spin it, and it would come back in yarn. There wasn't a single thing that came ready-made, other than shoes or boots. (And I guess fishermen's gear?) Oh yes, ropes and everything. Paint. Everything-- you name it, we had it. (There was nobody else supplying Gabarus but your father.) That was the only store. That was the only post office, all that sort of thing. And he was really the banker, too. We had a vault. And people would trust my father, but they wouldn't trust sending it to the bank. My father was a wonderful man. He really was. When I think--he was such--Father was just filled with compassion and love. Eve? ryone loved my father. At one time, my fa? ther was sick when he was in his early 80s. And I said to him one day, "Dad, when you were sick, so many people came to see you, but I didn't "--I was a nurse at that time,' and I was home--"I didn't allow them to come to see you because you were sick." And I named the people who walked 4 and 5 miles through the woods, you know. And I said, "Dad, you have so many friends." And this is what my father said: "And not an enemy." And I thought that was pretty nice, for a man to be in business over 50 years,' and in politics too, he was a politician as well, and into everything. And another time I said to him--if you'd see the day? books we had, with the debts that people owed my father--and I said to Father, "Why don't you get some money from them?" And this is what my dad said to me: "You know, I never sued the widow, nor took her cow.''' That's the kind of a man he was. And he did--now we would call it social work. They had in the country what they called an Overseer of the Poor. A man was appointed to care for the poor people, see that they were taken care of. Well, my fa? ther was always at the head of that for the community. (People often say that the merchants took advantage of the people,) Not my father. I've seen people come out to the store in the early morning--those stores opened ear? ly--? o'clock. Seven till midnight. Never opened on Sunday, though. Key never went into the store door on Sunday. And perhaps the man would say his wife had a baby dur? ing the night, and, "We haven't anything Best Vfestern Claymore Inn p. 0. Box 1720, Antigonish, Nova Scotia B26 2M* Phone 863-1050 - Telex.019-36567 Lice'd Dining Room a'/lounge 52 Modem Rooms (3)

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