\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
High school meant grades 10 through 12, viagra<\/a> and for me it meant living in the town of Oak Lake. In those days, the 7 1\u00e2\u0081\u201e2 mile journey was too far to consider doing on a daily basis, especially by horseback. I boarded in town but came home to the farm when the roads were good, i.e. in the fall and spring. In winter I stayed in town. I boarded at the home of an elderly Scottish widow, Florence Williamson. She and her handicapped son, Alistair, had a home about 3 blocks from Oakwood High School and I had a bedroom upstairs. Mrs. Williamson, a wonderful lady, had the maiden name of Corbett. One day I mentioned the name \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Gentleman Jim Corbett\u00e2\u20ac\u009d to her. I remembered reading about Corbett as the last of the bare-knuckle 19th century fighters and a world champion at one time. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We dinna talk aboot that in my family!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she declared. She brobably was related.<\/p>\n A young man in his 30s came to Oak Lake and started a third grocery store when I was in high school. We already had Wallace Bros. and Anderson\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s at each end of Oak Lake\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s main street, but apparently there was room for one more. Schmaus\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Red and White store was near the post office and smaller than the other two grocery stores. Mr. Schmaus was musical and started a band \u00e2\u20ac\u201c or maybe just took over as leader of a moribund brass band as I am sure there were bands in earlier times in Oak Lake. Certainly there were instruments around and I ended up with a cornet, a compressed kind of trumpet. We had band practice on a regular basis, mostly playing military marches but also learning the odd waltz as we were often called on in the winter to play at the skating rink. We seated ourselves on the second floor of the rink\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s waiting room and opened the big windows to let out the sound which, unfortunately, also let in the cold. If it was a -30\u00c2\u00baF evening, the skaters were scarce and sometimes the valves on my cornet would freeze.<\/p>\n Our high school principal, Clarence E. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Curly\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Heapy was a wonderful teacher. First of all, he demanded respect. Actually, he never had to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153demand\u00e2\u20ac\u009d anything. It never crossed our minds to challenge him. Mr. Heapy had a Grade 12 education and had taken teacher training but not at a University level. But he was a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153natural\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and could teach a wide range of subjects. He often mixed subjects in a most creative way. I remember one day when he was teaching geometry and asking our class a question and receiving blank stares, he said: None, Brutus, none. Then none have I offended \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a Shakespearean quote that fit the situation. A bit of Julius Caesar with your geometry. On another occasion, when we were discussing the concept of pressure in science class, Mr. Heapy asked Telfer Scott to come forward. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Sliver\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, said Mr. Heapy (Telfer was skinny \u00e2\u20ac\u201c hence the nickname \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Sliver\u00e2\u20ac\u009d)\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 stand up on my desk\u00e2\u20ac\u009d. Telfer, quite taken aback, complied. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Now, Joyce\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, Mr. Heapy continued, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153draw a one foot square around Sliver\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s feet\u00e2\u20ac\u009d. Joyce (Strong) did as she was bid. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153How much do you weigh, Sliver?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d asked Mr. Heapy. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153About 130 pounds, sir\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, stammered Telfer. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Well, there you have it! 130 pounds per square foot!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I have never forgotten that example or the way it was taught.<\/p>\n The Oakwood schoolyard was ringed with trees \u00e2\u20ac\u201c mostly Manitoba maples and cottonwoods. At the far north-west corner of the grounds stood an old cottonwood tree, a tree Mr. Heapy passed every morning on his way to school, every noon hour when he went home for lunch and returned, every school day after 4:00. At the base of this tree was a pile of pipe ashes \u00e2\u20ac\u201c ashes from \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Curly\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Heapy\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s ever-present pipe. But he didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t allow smoking \u00e2\u20ac\u201c by anyone \u00e2\u20ac\u201c on the school grounds and he knocked the ashes out of his pipe on that old tree.<\/p>\n Today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s high school graduations are elaborate affairs. By contrast, on the morning of my last grade 12 exam in late June, 1949, I finished up the questions, threw my baseball glove in the back of Stuart Taylor\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s 1940 Plymouth and we drove to Fairlight, Saskatchewan, to play in a junior baseball tournament. That was it \u00e2\u20ac\u201c no mortarboard cap, no grad dance, no photographs.<\/p>\n Gordon Newton, my best friend to this day, moved to Oak Lake in 1947 when I started grade 11. I had other good friends too, like Mr. Heapy\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s son, Gerry, but Gordon and I finished grade 12 together and he went on to take Science at the University of Manitoba, staying in the University residence. I stayed out a year, harvested in the fall of 1949, took the train to Flin Flon\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 but that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s another part of this story. In the fall of 1950 I started University \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the Faculty of Agriculture and Home Economics and spent two years in room 239 of the Men\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Residence with my friend Gordon Newton. My last 3 years at University I boarded at the home of my classmate and good friend Carson Whyte \u00e2\u20ac\u201c out in Norwood, a Winnipeg suburb.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00c2\u00a0 High School High school meant grades 10 through 12, viagra and for me it meant living in the town of Oak Lake. In those days, the 7 1\u00e2\u0081\u201e2 mile journey was too far to consider doing on a daily … Continue reading