Interview #27

Name: William Willcott

Sex: Male

Age: Sixty-five

Place and date of birth: St. Alban's, March 31, 1933

Education: Grade seven

Religion: Roman Catholic

Occupation: Logger

Number of children: Three

Names of children and where they live:

Randy - St. John's

Gail - St. Alban's

Shannon - St. John's

Phone: 538-3763

Date of interview: February 17, 1999

Place of interview: St. Alban's

Interviewers: Kerri-Ann Snook and Dale Willcott

William was born in St. Alban's on March 31, 1933. He has three children, Randy, Gail, and Shannon. His parents were born in St.Alban's , and they were Samuel and Gertrude Willcott. "It was very rough growing up as a child. It wasn't too bad I suppose, my parents never had much work, the old man just cut logs, and that old stuff." William said.

For fun, William had an old fashion slay barrel sleaves. He would use it to play in the snow. He would get up on the garden and slide with it. William played football, baseball, hopscotch, skating, and tiddly. He never played any card games until he got older. The only activity that he can remember doing with his family was saying the "Rosary" every night. He had a few chores to do like bring wood and water. "Our house was a lot colder back in those days, and you never had any insolation. Still, that was then and everybody's house was alike, pretty rough." William said.

Church was a very important part of his life because he spent a lot of time going to church when you went to school. "Everyone went to church back then. Nowadays the churches have even changed. They were stricter back then and nowadays you're not made to go." William said. "If somebody saw Father Hayes coming, they would have to get down on their knees right in the middle of the road and sometimes they would kneel down in water. He was very strict." William had to carry wood to school. "One day I never carried any, so Father Hayed knocked me up the side the head, drove me back to the mill to pick up some slabs. You were supposed to get a half of cord of wood a year but the old man never had any wood I suppose." William said.

William said school wasn't too bad, but the teachers were very strict. Gordon Perry was a strict teacher. "If you were bad, they would come to you with a stick on your hands, but we deserved it just the same. Teachers weren't that bad, we just did things we shouldn't have, like talking and carrying on. Mr. Everson had an arithmetic book about four or five inches thick. You could be as far as here to that tree away and he would throw it at you, slap you upside the head just for talking." William said. He went to school where the Warehouse 2000 is. William liked school, but hardly got the chance to go. When his father was in the country, he had to help his mother get wood and other chores. His father could be gone one week, two weeks, or even three weeks sometimes.

Christmas was really good when William was young. He would be with his parents when the older people would come and have a drink and sing some songs. He can remember once when he got a furry monkey and kept him for many years. He would get apples and oranges in his stocking. Beatrice Collier, Uncle George Collier's wife, she was the mayor of St. Alban's for a while. Uncle George, got married again but before that he ran Garland's Store. He would carry home barrels of apples and oranges that was a big treat back then. He would go to dances with his parents when he was a kid. "Never had too many dances, just occasionally like St. Anne's Day, Christmas, August 15th but I can't remember what that celebration was and St. Patrick's Day the halls would be open. Where the school was, the upstairs was a dance hall." William said.

"My first job when I was a man, at least I thought I was, was for Bowaters. I was eighteen years old at the time, I think it was in 1951. Never made too much money because you didn't get nothing for a cord of wood. It was all slave labour in them days. I suppose you got $2.00 or $3.00 a cord. Spent some of my money on a bit of beer, well homebrew was all you could get. I suppose we payed ten cents a bottle for homebrew, bought it from older people. Not mentioning any names, don't make no difference I suppose because they are all dead and gone." William said. "I worked up at camp three the first year. Bowaters had a couple of camps like camp one, camp two, and camp five up Benard's Brook. I wasn't old enough to work up in them camps. I can remember the first thing I ever bought, right plain. It was Levi Organ and myself, we sold George Hoskins some logs and bought a dozen oranges each. He had a store see, in there where Owen Hoskins lives now. I believe it was twenty-five cents a dozen."

For home remedies we would make molasses candy, use turpentine, iodine, and peroxide that were around in the stores. Many people died of Tuberculous back then, which was the bigger killer William ever saw. "Could have been cancer but we didn't know what cancer was back then." William said.

The road was the biggest change for William because they never had anything before that, just a foot path and they would walk everywhere. The road was just six or seven feet wide. "Confederation was a big change but nothing before that. The biggest change for me was when I was old enough to make my own money. We didn't need a lot of money back then. We only had kerosine lamps. You only needed a bit of food back then." William said.

William remembered that there was a Co-op on Birchy Point. Goodyear had a big store there that was before Bowaters came in. "They had people hired on out there. They also had a big barn out there. I can remember going to school and seeing the big horses. They would drink out of the brook over there by Eric Colliers. The hooves on them were just as big as Ray Willcott's horse up there. Pretty ones too, pretty colours. Well the men could walk right under their throats, I bet they were around 2000 thousands pounds." William said.

William recalled fishermen making their own nets because they had too. Men in the country would make their own snowshoes by hand. They cut most of the logs with an axe and then they would cut a hole in them to put a rope so you could haul them out of the woods. If you could get wood in Norwest in the winter time, you would haul them out with an ox or horse. There were only a few horses around. Uncle Harry had one and Jack MacDonald, and a few other people.

"I can remember the first moose I saw, that was out the River. I was with my father rabbit snaring." William said. "Good Lord, I thought it was a horse, I never saw anything like that before. The old moose ran off and the old man wouldn't kill the moose then because he was afraid he would get caught. They bred really fast, and there was only six moose in 1942. The old man seen his first moose on Witchesal Hill. They were frightened to death because they thought that a bullet wouldn't kill it, it was so big." "Well you can't go anywhere on the island now where they haven't laid a foot. They well breed well again this year because of the warm winter and no snow." William also said.

"I was in Upper Salmon by myself one day about seven miles in. It was raining that day, so I said its time to go home and cook supper cause the wife was working up to the school. The saw hit a little stick on the end and the saw came right out of my hand. The saw flipped back toward me and came down across my forearm and hand. Anyway I knew my hand was cut off, and I never even stopped long enough to shut off my saw. When she pitched, she was still going, but she pitched right side up. The rain was pouring, so I took a shirt and I had an old rubber coat. The old shirt was under a stump to keep dry. I put it around my arm and took my time and walked to my truck. When I got to the truck, she was facing toward Upper Salmon. So I had to get truck turned around and hope she would start. Then I got the truck going and I made little cuts until I got turned around. There was a little bit of blood around my hand. I tighten up the shirt as tight as I could get it and pinched my forearm between my knee and the door. I passed my brother coming out the road, he said, What the hell is wrong with him today, gone crazy. So I went to the clinic and the nurse said Oh My God. You got to go to Grand Falls. When I got to the hospital they looked at it, a big blood clot flopped out in the toilet and the blood started pouring out. The doctor said if you were afraid of blood or fainted, you would have died of loss of blood. Look you can still see the scar on my arm, it took forty-two stitches to close. When I wrapped the shirt around tight it was just like a pressure pad. Only for that I would have died on the way out. A doctor said I would have arthritis in that hand but it is the other hand that gives me the problem."

William reflected fondly on the past, and he is sorry so much has changed.