Agnes Emary

Agnes Emary with a plate created by Gwen McCarger, showing Sandon in the 1950s, which Emary gave to relatives of Johnny Harris when they visited in 2014. (Greg Nesteroff photo)

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You taught in Sandon? Yes.

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Is that what brought you here, or are you from here originally? No, I’m from Saskatchewan. My friend and I had both taught for four years in Saskatchewan, and then let’s move on. We came to BC. She had already changed her certificate to a BC one. I hadn’t. I went to summer school in Victoria. Then there’s always superintendents hanging around to book a teacher. I think about the only ones left were Sandon and one at the coast, which would have been all right too, except my friend was going to Creston. So then we could meet in Nelson, we thought.

 

What year is this? ‘52.

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Did you know anything about Sandon before you came here? No. [I went to a dance in Victoria.] This fellow I danced with said “Oh, you’re going where in the winter the sun never shines.” It’s the way the mountains were. You could see it on that side, but not where you were. Outside of that, I don’t think until I was going up to Sandon … came to New Denver on the bus, and that stopped at the Newmarket Hotel. The taxi driver was a Japanese fellow. He took me up. They were still using the old road. Then when I got partway up I could see a mountain beyond Sandon that still had snow on it. Here it was September. He said well, there’s going to be more snow on there before that disappears. Mr. Kiyono was a jeweler. He had a little shop for getting dirt out of clocks and watches. I don’t know to what extent. He died quite a whole ago but his son, Tad, is still in Nakusp. He was in my class when I came to New Denver. I didn’t have any Japanese students in Sandon. 

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What was your first impression of Sandon? I came from Saskatchewan and hadn’t seen any mountains until I started through Jasper, the Rockies. Then came around the Big Bend. Just about froze to death through Banff. Beyond that, I just stood and looked. You couldn’t see anything beyond the mountains.

 

Where were you dropped off in Sandon? I stopped at the Reco hotel. I was on the flume, the big wide boards that covered the [creek]. I thought ohmigosh. Can’t explain it really, the feeling it gave you.

 

Where was the school? Where the two-story town hall is. I was in the bottom and there was another teacher upstairs. She had 5, 6, and 7, I think. Maybe 8 took. But I had 1, 2, 3, 4 on the bottom.

 

How many students? About 24 or 25. Four grades. 

 

Where did you stay? We were supposed to stay at a Mrs. Towgood’s. I must have met her again sometime, because she said “You were supposed to be staying at our place, but then the mines ran out that my husband was working in, so we went to Nelson.” I guess then Alma took us in at the Reco hotel.

 

Both of the teachers? Yes. I think we shared the bedroom. That coatrack over there, my friend Teddy made it.

 

Teddy Kleim? Yes. The beds were like in the old western movies. 

 

Was the hotel in a good state of repair? I think it was probably all right. I don’t know whether it was part of the hotel where she had a hotel — Mrs. Harris, I’m talking about. Then she had the post office. Just a counter for that. And a telephone. I think it was all right. There was a big living room area where there was a card table set up for bridge. That’s usually where you found Johnny, her husband, sitting.

 

Do you remember the first time you met him? I suppose maybe when we had our dinner. He would have been at the table in a black suit. I don’t think he had a tie on. Then I believe he was a little hard of hearing. You had to raise your voice if you were talking to him. But he was a kind man. He just went along with Alma’s punches and rolls. 

 

Was he talkative or keep to himself? No, beyond the weather … that’s about all. If you asked he could tell you about some of the buildings there. It was all so new to me. “What’s that big rock out there with holes punched in it?” “Oh, that’s for the contests they had up.” I don’t know if they were July 1 or May 24, because they shared their holidays. 

 

I knew a little bit about it — enough to be curious — because my mother grew up in Nova Scotia and had cousins in the coal mines there. 

 

I imagine your students were all the children of miners? Yes, or the mechanic.

 

What mines were running? Violamac. I’m not too sure of the names now. Cody. The Silver Ridge on a small scale. At Christmas, we teachers were to raise the money to buy the gifts for a concert. I didn’t think that was right, but we did it anyway. I suppose it was Teddy likely that made arrangements for us to go to the camp at Cody. We went up there and to Violamac. I think those were the only two in big production. Of course, there was a dish on the table for miners to throw in. Could have gone to Disneyland and back again! Generous people. There may have been the Queen Bess, or were they just conversations? I’m not too sure. Silver Ridge was just prospectors, a couple, three guys there.

 

You took all of your meals at the Reco? What they were. Pretty slim pickens.

 

Did Johnny and Alma have anyone working for them? School started the beginning of September. Then we got up there after Labour Day. I don’t think the other girl was there yet. Mrs. Harris went off to Ainsworth Hot Springs and here was this dear old lady she had hired to look after things. I went in the kitchen. They had a Thanksgiving dinner. Nice big long table, white cloth, silverware to no end, you wouldn’t even know what to do with it. I don’t think it was silver, but anyway. Lots of dishes and cutlery, but not too much to go in them. Sometimes thought the cats got more to eat than we did. She had a pair of Siamese. 

 

We had a nice big dinner. I made an apple pie. I don’t know how I got it all done in one day. Johnny was sitting at the head of the table. “Where’s the cheese?” Says me to myself: “I don’t know anything about cheese.” “Apple pie without cheese is like a kiss without a squeeze!” [Laughs] I’d never heard that before. I thought that’s a saying from the United States, I guess. 

 

During the war [Japanese Canadians were interned] in Sandon. Alma had a couple of girls working for her then. She used to talk about how keen they were. When I got there she just had this older lady who was limping around, because she had sprained her ankle or something, and it hadn’t gotten better. She wasn’t young by any means. She had just phoned her daughter and was telling me that she would like to leave. Mrs. Harris wasn’t letting her go until such-and-such a time. I stepped in. I don’t know where I got the guts, but I said you just phone your daughter and tell her you’re coming. I had kind of figured Alma out by then.

 

What was your impression of her at first? Was she friendly or … No, she was business. I think she was always looking for dollars. That was pretty important. I suppose it was. We didn’t stay at the hotel all that time. Our rent was pretty close to half our salary, so then we started crying to the school board. [1] That office was in Slocan. The secretary came up to see us and check things out to see if there was a room above the school that they could fix up. He said “Johnny Harris lost most of his money on these old mines around here, and they’re trying to get it back.” I didn’t know anything about that part.

 

Johnny wasn’t able to work at all. I don’t know when he ended up in the hospital, but I went to see him. I think he was a little too far gone to recognize me.

 

How did you learn about Johnny’s past? I didn’t learn that much about him really. Later on you hear tales. People talk and surmise. 

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But directly from him and Alma you didn’t hear much? No. I did hear she was from Saskatchewan [sic] and her dad had a  …

 

Mink farm. … up in Northern Alberta. I guess that’s where Teddy was working too. They met and I don’t if there was anything between them. 

 

Johnny wasn’t able to do to much except play bridge, and Alma saw that there was always somebody, some of the old miners, would be batching, and she’d invite them in for a game of bridge. They’d know. Johnny’s sitting there and needs a game of bridge, and so do we. 

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I don’t remember whether we stayed two or three months and then went over the school. That’s where we were the rest of the year. 

 

Did you cook your own meals? Oh, yes. There was nothing to eat, really. If you had tuna or something, there was one tin for three or four people and the cats got two. One fellow up there — I don’t know whether he was a former engineer or what, but he was also staying there. Then he left. We were chatting later and he said “I can open a tin of beans myself for a lot less money.”

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Was there any other place to shop besides their store? No. But lots went back and forth to [New Denver]. That’s what happened after we went batching it. The next door neighbour did the shopping for us in town.

 

During the year you taught there, how often did you get out? Once in a while. Not all that often. I don’t really know even how we got down sometimes. There were a few young bucks hanging around. Some with vehicles. We got down to the beer parlour. I was anxious to get there because there wasn’t ladies bars in Saskatchewan where I was from, so I had to go to the bar here as soon as I could! 

 

At the Newmarket Hotel? Yes. Later when we started batching, we needed salt and pepper, so the first night I took a salt shaker — that’s all there was on the table to go with your beer. I thought to myself, that’s not very nice to do. You ask if you could have one because you’re batching.

 

Do you remember the name of the other teacher? Louella Prpich.

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Where was she from? Vancouver. She was formerly from Saskatchewan, her whole family.

 

But it her first year in Sandon too? Yes.

 

Do you know who your predecessors were? I don’t know if it was a Mrs. Lind or a Mr. McKinnon. 

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They both taught in Sandon? Yes. I can remember the principal down here telling me Mr. McKinnon … The ink used to come in the big bottles and then you filled the small ones up. He said he had one of those bottles painted blue. Then he had his drink in them! That didn’t happen when I was there and wouldn’t have known about it except … But I could understand if he was a young whippersnapper and being in Sandon, what was there for him? Maybe he had a problem before, maybe he got it when he was there. 

 

But it was an interesting place. I think it helped for me to have done those four years in Saskatchewan first. I visited with the families. The first school I went to in Northern Saskatchewan, the girls always wanted the teacher to go home with them on the weekends. Which was kind of nice too. [There were] Ukranians and Germans. I learned lots from them.

 

It was just the one year in Sandon? Yes.

 

Did you enjoy it, or were you aching to get out? Well, I wanted to get out. But I think I made the best of it because I learned lots of things from being up there. The miners or something would be happening, and that would be something for me to write and ask my mom about, because of her coming from Nova Scotia. 

 

So pleasant memories? Oh, yes. And I met lots of nice people.

 

Any of your students still around? Sure. The Swansons. Gail and Melburn. Melburn’s dad was the section foreman in Sandon. He had the four sisters that were older. I had three of them in my room when I first went there. 

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Did you have a supervising principal? I was that, because Louella didn’t have as many years experience as I did. I didn’t like to do it, but took it anyway. Just meant a few more forms to fill out that I had to learn how to do. Of course you were expected to go to the Slocan Teachers Association meetings. Then sometimes we’d ask to get a ride down. Teddy would take us. For track and field day, we practiced up there, and if we needed a place to jump, pits and what-not, there was always help around to make those. Teddy took us to the … maybe they were always held in Slocan, but that’s where we went anyway. We didn’t come home with any ribbons!

 

How many schools in the district? New Denver, Silverton, Slocan, Sandon. Were there others? At Retallack? No. Retallack was closed. They must have been mining there, but there were a lot of young Italian boys. They did that lots of times when they needed miners. Leola was Yugoslavian or one of the Eastern European … This Italian wanted to learn English so he came here quite often until she figured out that he was a lonesome young boy. 

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Did Teddy live at the hotel as well? Yes. He was a handy-andy.

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Anybody else living there? That fellow I told you about who moved out. I’ve forgotten his name. Then different mine inspectors who would come in for a day or two. I don’t know whether it would be Violamac or Cody that would want them. They would be there for a day or two. There weren’t that many, but some. Always somebody snooping around to see how rich those mines are, to buy some shares or something. Viola [MacMillan] was always pushing those.

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Did you meet Viola herself? Yes. They had property out here. My first husband, I met him up there then and he liked the way she cared for the mines and the miners. But some of the deals she tried to pull he didn’t think were all that great. George, her husband, was a nice fellow apparently.

 

What else do you remember about Teddy? He was a fellow with a big heart. After I moved out here and was widowed, I had my mom here. She died in ‘82. I brought her from Saskatchewan here. [Teddy] used to help out a lot. My sister and her son came and helped look after her. My neighbour Fran Martin looked after her because I was still teaching. Teddy had a big heart. Too big maybe. In the end, [Alma] walked over him. Again, that’s just gossip.

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The year you were there, was Alma in Sandon mostly or coming and going? She was there, because she had the store and post office. I don’t know whether she got anybody to do the laundry. I know there was nobody else doing meals. Pete Leontowicz was working up there somewhere. A lot of those guys batched in those old buildings. Olga Strebchuk worked for Alma. She died quite a while ago.

 

I don’t know whether you’re acquainted with those Norwegian sleighs. They go like the wind downhill. That’s what I learned after I got there. The first ride I have was Pete Leontowicz. He was back on the runners, and I was sitting in front, down the post office way, the Cody hill into Sandon. I was scared to death! Coming from flat land Saskatchewan. That was the only time I ever rode one of those! 

 

You must have been used to harsh winters, but what was that winter like? It wasn’t all that bad. It was bad enough. You needed winter coats.

 

But the snow load? Oh, lots of snow in the mountains. 

 

Did you have to do all the shovelling? Ole Swanson represented the trustees. He lived in Sandon. I think they probably had that wherever there wasn’t a trustee right there. They had a second man.

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Who would your trustee have been? I think at that time maybe Pat McCrory. Then the health nurse came quite often. Ruby Marsh was the health nurse. And Dr. Robinson. That was on the old road. When the water trickled down on the road and then it freezes, and Ruby had come along, I suppose it was February and March. She said “That will be the last time I come to see you.” Because of this ice across the road. That was enough for her. She wasn’t going over it. But it was good to have the nurse check, especially when you were a greenhorn. In Saskatchewan too there were no doctors handy, but lots of parents you could call on right away. The kids would have a horse at the school, and you could send them home to get a parent. Some of the tales I heard after of kids playing the barn, and breaking their arm because they swung on the thing where the harness goes … I never had any of that. I was lucky.

 

Any particular incidents that stand out in your mind? No. We were just one happy family. I think our first party at school was maybe Valentine’s. We had the episode with lice … Lots of shy kids. Lots, now that I look back on it, just needed help. Difficulty learning and you didn’t have time to give them undivided attention when you thought they needed it. There wasn’t that much information about it. 

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Was your student population stable? As long as the mines were going, yes. It was interesting when we had to raise the funds for Christmas. We went to everybody’s place in town. One couple in those old houses near the road, a grandpa and grandma who had a grandson at the school, you hear all about their story. There was a bootlegger lady. We went to visit her and got the long story about her daughters and the awards they won for their writing or whatever. She was a nice lady. Always had some lonesome miner in the other room having a drink.

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Did you fraternize with Alma later? No. Never had anything to do with her. When we moved down here, she maybe was in a time or two, but no. She was quite a few years older. I didn’t wear the red fox fur or anything.

 

Did you know her sister? No. Did I meet her once maybe? Or just heard quite a bit about her. She was from Vulcan. I know I was teaching here [in New Denver] when Alma came to tell me her sister had been killed. That was quite a few years after. Which kind of surprised me because we never chatted that much. I knew she had a sister. 

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Do you remember Gene Petersen? Yes. I knew Gene Petersen’s mom. Nice lady. Really strong Norwegian accent. And Maxinuks had the post office. He’s still here by the post office. Tony.

 

You came to New Denver after that one year? I wasn’t that old but — well, I was according to a lot of kids — but it was time. One year was enough for that. When you have to depend on somebody to get out. Of course I have a strong independent line. If I can’t do it myself, I don’t ask. 

 

Came out here and still taught primary grades? Yes. 

 

How many teachers in New Denver? Four in the elementary. Mr. Clarkson was our principal. He was a nice fellow. Marge Phillips was the Grade 1 teacher. 

 

Did you teach in New Denver the rest of your career? Yes.

 

Do you recall teaching Doukhobor children? I sure do. Like so many of them, they were home schooled and they had to be classified, or you had to find out which grade they would fit into. They moved the building in or resurrected one that was there and put those students. Then there was the toss-up, who was going to … oh, I want that. I thoroughly enjoyed that. After they closed that part, I had Grade 3s. Quite a few are in there. Nice kids. Never rattled any chains. I had the rhythm band one year for Christmas. But they wouldn’t have pots and pans, so I had this double boiler thing. Vera Malakoff used the lid of this point and it’s got little dings in it. Every time I use it I think of her and wonder how she made out. 

 

I subbed quite a bit after [I retired]. Not so much elementary but high school. I was kind of a disciplinarian. Didn’t want fooling around. I guess that’s why I ended up going to the high school classrooms. 

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Some of them said “Oh, I want you because you can get the work out of them.” I didn’t realize this of course. I had some little tricks I figured out. So algebra, what am I going to do with that? I’d put the equation on the board. Anybody going to come and start this out for me? Nobody. So I’d start it. And I didn’t know what I was doing. “No, that’s not how it’s done.” I had somebody do that right to the end. Principal thought I was pretty tricky. I thought I was pretty clever because some of those guys were pretty sharp.

 

What did you go into teaching in the first place? I finished school in ‘45. I did want to go in for nursing, but there was no money. I was a dirty ‘30s kid. You didn’t really feel it because everyone around you was pretty well the same. We always had something to eat and clothes on our back. Always something at Christmas and we were close enough to town there was company most often, somebody else around the table. I was a young girl, had to leave home. I kind of wanted to be a nurse, but you were on a long waiting list. So I thought I’ll go into teaching. I had aunts were nurses and teachers and looked up to them. I ended up applying for Normal School in Saskatoon and got accepted. That year, after the war, they were short 500 or 600 teachers. We got a choice. We could go out after six weeks training for four months and that would take you back into the normal school in February. And then there would be somebody they had kept in who had done the four months training that would go out to replace you. That was the scheme I was on my first year. 

 

First school? Meadow Lake school district. Deer was name of the school and my mailing address was Makwa. Just for those four months. 

 

After normal school? I went out in the country at Port Arthur. I was there two years. That was enough to stay in one place. You were really popular. It’s a farming area and young bucks came for dates and dances, and I loved to dance because we had lots of that at home. Little Pontrellis. Then I went over by Spaulding. It was still out in the country, a two-room school. After two years there I came to BC.

 

Where did you grow up? I was born in Melfort. My Dad and Mom packed everything on a hayrack and moved up to a homestead by Ponteix. Still five or six miles out, and my brother, who was six years older than me, was in school. He took a horse and toboggan, then when we kids got older and had to go to school Dad bought a farm near Ponteix. That’s where we went to school.

 

How many total siblings? Two brothers and a sister. I was second eldest and became the old mother hen.

 

Your dad was farming? Yes. Small-time farmer. 

 

Your mother was from Nova Scotia. How did she end up in Saskatchewan? I suppose Dad ended up being harvest worker from Quebec, eastern township. He ended up around Harris, Sask., south of Saskatoon. I think he went back in the spring. They had maple trees on the farm in Quebec. Mom’s maiden name was Atkinson and there were a million Atkinsons in Nova Scotia. They came over from England. A whole lot of Atkinsons came from Nova Scotia to Manitoba, and my grandpa was an engineer’s helper. He did that for a while near Winnipeg. Then there was a train at Melfort, so he moved there with his family. They got a dairy going and that was what the family did. Mother was the oldest. She worked away from home a lot. Just hard work. Helping in hotels and everything else. Served the first ice cream cone in Melfort, working for some druggist. 

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What was your maiden name? Parsons. 

 

So in Sandon you were Miss Parsons. Yes. And first year here.

 

When you came out, did you think you were moving to BC for good? I never thought about going back.

 

On playing the organ: When I first came to New Denver, the Sunday school was in the basement of Knox Hall. Mrs. Campbell was the organist, and she played for the first half hour, then she’d go over and play at the Turner Memorial Church. Then they were asking for someone to play the organ for Sunday school. There was another lady at the high school and it was a toss up, but I ended up being that organist. 

 

Did you how to play the organ? Just a little bit. I took a few piano lessons. I really hadn’t learned to play the organ. But I tried and practiced the hymns at home. I ended up playing the organ all over the place. Their organist retired and went to Victoria. So then they were without an organist. I ended up in ‘56 playing for the Presbyterian church. 

 

[She explains that she started hospice with Sue Davies, was long involved with the reading centre, and was an extra in the movie The War Between Us, filmed in New Denver, although you can’t spot her in the finished film.]

 

They wanted somebody to play the organ because there was church. I said well, I play, but with all kinds of mistakes. That’s what we want! So I went and played it beforehand. Didn’t need to be there, they recorded it. I ended up sitting in one of the pews with a big hat on. We ended up going to Sandon first because they were doing some shooting there. Clowning around while waiting.

 

On playing the saxophone: Learned here in New Denver. I always wanted to learn. So I finally got one. It’s still in the corner there. When Jill Fox was at the school here, I went and learned how to play. It was kind of fun. It was an E flat. I just loved those old pieces. I did take a few piano lessons. Wasn’t good at it. Didn’t practice. 

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On her family: In 1963, I married a ready-made family. I must have been a great mother because we’re still in touch. A boy and a girl. The girl was almost 12 and the boy was almost 8. The girl had four sons and they’re married with children. The boy married but the marriage broke up. There are two children.

 

On her home in New Denver: Lived in this house since ‘58. My first husband and I bought it. The whole block of land for $7,000. It’s been my ace in the hole when I started selling lots. Wasn’t like Johnny Harris who bought shares and went belly up. 

 

What do you remember about the Newmarket Hotel? You said the bus dropped you off there? Yes, in the lobby were all these boxes with keys in them. But I didn’t have to wait too long. But there were times when the other teacher and I would come back into town and we’d have to sit and wait for somebody in the lobby. Louella said we could take those keys. That doesn’t mean there’s anybody in those rooms. That’s what we used to do in the Klondike. If you needed a room and there was a key, you took it. Didn’t go down with me, so we just sat.
 

Do you remember when it burned [in October 1973]? Oh yes. My sister and I were getting ready to go on a trip to Ontario to visit relatives and [my husband] Glen was saying “Well you didn’t need to burn the bar before you left.” That was sad. Lots of old keepsakes and memories. 

 

When you were in Sandon was the Hunter-Kendrick block in use? I don’t think there was anyone in it. There may have been someone batching, but I don’t think so. On the end of that block was a store, Tattrie and Greer. The station was where the Swansons lived. 

 

The train was still running but there was no passenger traffic? Yes, it was still going, just come in to get loads of ore, I suppose. Art Forsythe was just a kid up there. 

 

How much longer did the Sandon school exist? The flood [of 1955 took it out]. 

 

Do you know who replaced you in Sandon? There was a Mrs. Bennett. Then another young girl and she didn’t hit it off too well. Then there was a Mrs. Ralph who came to replace her. She was retired and lived at the foot of the valley. When she finally did get away and didn’t have anybody [to replace her], the kids from upstairs brought their desks downstairs till they got it straightened out.

 

Other notes:

• Entrance to the school was from the creekside, with steps going up to the second story. Her class on that floor, and batching room on corner of third floor.

• When she was in Sandon, the Virginia Block was vacant. 

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[1] They settled on a rent subsidy. Agnes and Louella were each to receive $15 monthly as a cost of living allowance for the year “or as long during the year as they are required to pay $90 per month for room and board.” However, Agnes recalled they moved from the hotel to the school after a few months. Whether it was the pricey accommodation or some other reason, Louella quit by early December but was told her resignation would only be accepted if she found someone to take her place. In January, the board received her resignation and sent a copy to the teachers’ union “with a covering letter advising of the circumstances.” See Slocan school board minutes, held by Nelson Museum, 3 Oct and 5 Dec 1951 and 28 Jan 1952.

 

A profile of Agnes Emary based on this interview appears at: https://www.nelsonstar.com/news/new-denver-teacher-never-stopped-learning-4839624

 

Agnes Emary’s obituary: https://thenelsondaily.com/obituary/emary-nee-parsons-agnes-jane/