Interview #71

Name: Mike Burke

Sex: Male

Age: 65

Place and date of birth: Grand Le Pierre, December 4, 1934

Education: Grade 8

Religion: Roman Catholic

Occupation: Carpenter

Number of Children: 9

Names of children and where they live:

Janet

Douglas

Colin

Gerard

Michael

Marina

Stella

Randell

Lenventus

Phone: 538-3614

Place of interview: St. Alban's

Date of interview: April 20, 1999

Interviewers: Carla Collier and Dale Willcott

Mike Burke was born December 4, 1934 in Grand Le Pierre. His parents names are Mary and William. His mother was from Terrenceville and his father from Conne River. His grandmother, on his dad's side, was named Catherine. Mike moved to St. Alban's after he got married in 1955. He said there was a lot of work because Bowaters was here. For entertainment growing up he played mostly soccer and hockey. For chores growing up, he worked mostly at the woods and brought a lot of water from the brooks for household use. The family would also go fishing and berry picking together. They worked together in the vegetable gardens.

Mike said they lived in a two-storey house. Mike had four sisters in his family. There were two families living there. His house was kept warm by two wood stoves because there was no insulation. There was a stove for cooking and a stove for heat.

Mike said school was just as good as what it is now. It was a one room school house. Mike went to school in Conne River there were about forty people in a class. Mike said, "The teacher was pretty strict, but it was good because once the students takes over, you are no good anyway." The last teacher Mike had was Aloysius Walsh.

Mike says that church was better back then, more then what it is now. He said everyone went on Sunday. Father Hayes was the priest and he was really strict, he was also the doctor and dentist. Mike said he helped people around the Bay. He pulled out teeth with just a pair of pliers. Mike said the most horrible sickness that was around was T.B. He said nobody knew anything about Cancer, so it might have been Cancer. He said that was the killer then. To treat people he said they used aspirin and cod liver oil. His grandmother would make up a medicine called "the seven swords." It was a combination of ground juniper, cherry bark, beaver roots and anything you could get from the ground. She would put it together and use it as a suave for sores. But they would drink the cherry bark liquid for colds.

Everyone got together for weddings back in his day. There were no invitations sent out, but everyone was invited. There would be accordion music, and cakes for dessert, homemade wine and beer for drinks. People were married early in the morning and they would celebrate all day and night. In the day, the kids would be served tea and cakes. The night was for the adults. Mike and his wife were married on Aug.16, 1955.

Mike worked in the woods cutting saw logs. He would use an axe and a rope, tow the logs out, tie them together and sell them to the sawmills. They would get food in return for their logs and if there was anything left over they would get some clothes. Mike said the food back then was really cheap, if you had $100 in food it would last you all winter long. It would be enough to feed a family of five or six. Mike said wild meat was not plentiful, there was a few caribou around, but not many moose. He went hunting occasionally in the winter time. The first moose he saw was in Conne River where the park is now.

For food, Mike's family had hens and sheep. Sometimes they would have ten or twelve sheep and twenty hens. They used the sheep's wool for mitts, socks, and sweaters. Most everything they had they made themselves.

The biggest holiday was the summer holidays. But when they were older they went in the woods cutting logs. He said there wasn't much time for play but they always had weekends off.

Millie Joe was the midwife that worked down Conne River. She was the midwife that delivered Mike. They have a clinic in Conne River named after her. While the men were working Mike said, the women did housework because the houses weren't as good as what they are today and there was more work to do. There were no vacuums, washers, dryers, and electric lights. They had to get their wood if their husband was gone, bring in their water, wash clothes on a scrub board and raise all the kids. Most people had large families back then, but now there is a lot fewer kids in the Bay and they are tearing down schools and they want one school for the whole Bay.

For Christmas, Mike said they didn't get much but there would be a lot of cake and syrup. Syrup was a big thing because they didn't get a bottle of pop growing up. They would get apples and oranges in their stocking and a few candies. For fun at Christmas, he said they would go visiting, mummering, and have dances.

For Easter, he said they never got any chocolate eggs but they saved the hens eggs for Easter. Mike said a lot of people would exchange, if you had a lot of eggs you would exchange for some potatoes from a neighbor.

St. Anne's day was a big day because it took a whole week to do up the church. They would even do up where the priest would land on the point. They would walk all around the church ground with St. Anne. All the people that worked in Conne Brook would come down out of it because they would close the camps. That was the biggest day for Conne.

The biggest change today, Mike said was everybody going beyond their means. "The poor trying to keep up with the rich. At one time, there were the merchants and then there were the poor but the poor accepted their situation. But now they don't accept it any more and a lot of people go in debt because of it." He said. He said Hydro also made a change, since then we have electricity.

Mike said there was always a post office on Birchy Point when he grew up. The postmasters were Mary Hunt, Martin Davis, and Jenny Collier. The first phone was the one out at the post office; it was a Government phone.

At one time, Mike said they would build their own boats and schooners and they would use a pit saw. One person would be down on one end and another person up a lot higher on the other end. One man would haul up and the other man would haul down. It was called a "pit saw" because one man would be in the pit.

Before roads you use footpaths if you needed to go anywhere you had to walk or take a dory. Walking or taking a boat was your only means of transportation.

Mike said that the winters were a lot harsher, there was a lot of ice. Sometimes there would be four feet of ice on the Bay. Mike said there is a big change in the weather in the last four or five years. During the winter time, everyone made their own skates, they used a piece of iron and a piece of wood. They would cut out the wood to fit the boot and tie it on your boot.

The main store that was around was Garlands and the Co-Op and then in later years there were little corner stores.

Mike said the best thing that happened to Bay d' Espoir is the fishery, because there is no wood work and there are no fishermen.

Mike had a lot of valuable information to offer us and he was a great help in preserving the past.