The following transcript of Jim Vanderbeck’s interview on · The following transcript of Jim...

The following transcript of

Jim Vanderbeck’s interview

on

Memories and Music (broadcast May 20, 1976)

was created by

Videoplus Transcription Services

in 2013.

00:00:00 Track starts.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, now neighbours, we've got quite a story for you today. We hardly

know where to start or where to finish, but I suggest you pull up your

chairs because-, and listen closely because we've got quite a yarn going for

you today, and I don't think you're going to want, want to miss a bit of it.

Now our, our guest today on Memories and Music, is Jim Vanderbeck.

Now, Jim, when did you retire from Inco?

JIM VANDERBECK: In-, last year, in June-, no July.

DON MACMILLAN: July of..

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah.

DON MACMILLAN: ...last year. And how many years had you spent with the company?

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, I started in '46.

DON MACMILLAN: That gives you in the neighbourhood of about 30 years...

JIM VANDERBECK: About...

DON MACMILLAN: ...or so, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: ...about 30 years-, 29 something.

DON MACMILLAN: Okay. Well, now to get-, let's start at the start. Where are you from?

Where were you born?

JIM VANDERBECK: I was born in a little place called Riley Brook, New Brunswick, which was

56 miles north of Fredericton.

DON MACMILLAN: Okay, and in what year?

JIM VANDERBECK: 1915.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, now that kind of establishes things a little bit for us. Now this name

of yours, this Vanderbeck, I find kind of interesting. What-, is it Dutch or

something like that?

JIM VANDERBECK: It's a Dutch name, and the closest translation-, I spent some time in

Holland during the war, and the closest translation from the people over

there, is a direct translation would be from the brook of stream-, probably

a canal man or something.

DON MACMILLAN: Beck meaning brook or canal, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah. That's what they told me anyway.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, now, did not you tell me that you, you believe your ancestors came

to that part of the world about the time that the Acadians were expelled

from Quebec, or from Nova Scotia?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yes, they came up from the Hudson River Valley to take over the land that

the Acadians had been evicted from. I mean, it wasn't my people that

evicted them. I mean, it was a land grab or something like that. I don't

know what it was, but...

DON MACMILLAN: Well, I think it was due to the war or something, or was...

JIM VANDERBECK: Due to the war...

DON MACMILLAN: Eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: ...or something like-, yeah.

DON MACMILLAN: They, they moved them down to...

JIM VANDERBECK: Mm-hmm.

DON MACMILLAN: ...Louisiana where they call them Cajuns down there.

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah. And...

DON MACMILLAN: Okay, so-, so your ancestors came up then from the Hudson River Valley?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, and settled in the, the Restigouche country.

DON MACMILLAN: And what year are we talking about? Around 1700 or something...

JIM VANDERBECK: Seventeen thirty...

DON MACMILLAN: ...eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: ...four, that they...

DON MACMILLAN: Boy, that's going back a...

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, it's, it, it...

DON MACMILLAN: ...a while, isn't it?

JIM VANDERBECK: ...it went back a, a long way. There's a quite a story, and my father, or my

grandfather, I would-, yes, my grandfather, he was the sole survivor,

supposedly, I mean the story'd been given to me of the great Restigouche

fire.

DON MACMILLAN: Uh-huh. I've heard of it now, but I've...

JIM VANDERBECK: Yes.

DON MACMILLAN: ...it's a long time ago.

JIM VANDERBECK: They burnt the whole settlement, that settlement that they were living in,

and his mother, the last thing she was ever to do, she tied two logs

together, tied him on it, and shoved him out in the river, and somebody

picked him up downstream, and that was the origination of my family,

my...

DON MACMILLAN: Your-, well, I'll be darned. What year was that?

JIM VANDERBECK: God knows. That would go...

DON MACMILLAN: That would have been back in the...

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, if my father was...

DON MACMILLAN: ...early 1800s.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...my father was an old man when I was born. My father...

DON MACMILLAN: Yeah.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...would be over 100, because...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...he was an old man when I was born. So...

DON MACMILLAN: Uh-huh.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...this would run back a long way.

DON MACMILLAN: I'll be darned. Well, I told you, friends, that we, we-, so we had an

interesting individual for a, for a guest here. Now, okay, Jim-, Jim

Vanderbeck, we've got you born in Riley Brook in New Brunswick, but

where your father-, what did your father do there?

JIM VANDERBECK: He was a tourist outfitter.

DON MACMILLAN: He'd been there quite a while doing that, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: He'd been 40 years in the business, not in there..

DON MACMILLAN: No.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...but as a young man-, he started as a young man on the Tobique and the

rest-, he'd been an old guide with the Restigouche Salmon Club, and many

famous people, he'd tell me about guiding the Prince of Wales, and the

Kaiser of this-, the Restigouche Salmon Club is the club in the world.

DON MACMILLAN: Oh, I see.


DON MACMILLAN: I, I didn't know that.

JIM VANDERBECK: And he was a guide for them for several years, and did, on his own-, I

mean he run...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...his business besides.

DON MACMILLAN: Okay, well, now-, but now, your father and mother, your family, did not

stay in Riley Brook. You...

JIM VANDERBECK: No, it got too...

DON MACMILLAN: ... moved somewhere.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...it was getting-, to him, it was getting too civilized, so he moved us up

into northern Ontario, in virgin country. We went first to Cochrane until

they built Nakina. They were starting to build Nakina, and then my father

established a headquarters, and that camp was started in 1924, and...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...I think it still...

DON MACMILLAN: In, in Nakina?


DON MACMILLAN: Now as you say, when, when your father set up there, there was-, it was

just a crossroads or something.

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, there was nothing there. There was no town, there was no nothing.

They were building it-, what the purpose of the town was, when they built

the cut-off between the Canadian Northern and the Transcontinental, and

this made the new divisional point.


JIM VANDERBECK: So we had-, well, the whole family, we were raised there, in Nakina.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, I'll be darned. Now your, your mother must have been quite a hardy

sort of pioneer type too, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: My mother was a, was a wonderful woman. I mean...

DON MACMILLAN: She was, she was a, a native New Brunswicker, was she?

JIM VANDERBECK: She was a native New-, no, my mother was a native of Newfoundland.

DON MACMILLAN: Newfoundland, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yes, she was...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...and so was her, all her people were from Newfoundland.

DON MACMILLAN: Right, now...


DON MACMILLAN: ...how many brothers and sisters did you wind up with in, in Nakina?

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, from New Brunswick to Nakina...


JIM VANDERBECK: I ended up with 10 brothers and sisters, which I am the sole surviving

member.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, I'll be darned.

JIM VANDERBECK: They died in various stages. Some of them died in the flu, and...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...the great flu of the-, in 1918...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...and so on, and they-, some of them grew up and they died off from

various causes, and...

DON MACMILLAN: Okay, but now, let's get back to, to Nakina, and we've got you growing up

there, and I think you told me you were born, I think, in 1915 or

thereabouts. So you'd start to school in Nakina around in...

JIM VANDERBECK: No, I started in-, I just started in New Brunswick, and...

DON MACMILLAN: You had just started...

JIM VANDERBECK: ...and, and then my father moved to Nakina and I was educated in Nakina,

all in Nakina. My...

DON MACMILLAN: Uh-huh. Well, now, what was the name of your teacher there?

JIM VANDERBECK: Oh, that's my brother-in-law, Jim Thompson.


JIM VANDERBECK: She married-, he...

DON MACMILLAN: He married an older sister then?

JIM VANDERBECK: He married my oldest sister.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, where's he now? Is he still alive, or...

JIM VANDERBECK: No, he, he was, he was schoolteacher there during Depression, and he

gradually educated himself and he became a university teacher. He was a

wonderful man.

DON MACMILLAN: Well...

JIM VANDERBECK: Very wonderful...

DON MACMILLAN: Good for him.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...man, yeah.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, now, well, now, Jim, I'm trying to get all this thing in some kind of

order here. You, you were guiding, you were acting as a tourist guide...

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, my father had the camp...

DON MACMILLAN: Had the camp there, yeah.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...and this is a different thing. There was no lodge.

DON MACMILLAN: Okay.

JIM VANDERBECK: You, you-, when a tourist came in, he came in on the train. There was no

roads in that country at that time. They come in on the train, and you were

given guides, canoes, cooking outfits, supplies, and you took off for the far

north, out to James Bay. I would-, by the time I was 15, I'd been out to

James Bay three times, and we did the Ogoki, the Squaw, the

Wababimiga, all these wonderful rivers. And...

DON MACMILLAN: Right.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...the fishing, it was unbelievable. I can...

DON MACMILLAN: Yes, yes.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...tell you one like river, one little river I think-, well, I know for a fact

today would be fished out. First time I ever seen it, I would say that, that

that I was among the first guide to take a Canadian tourist in on this river.

It was only 12 miles long, and it was a beautiful little stream. We-, you

flew in. That was the early days of the old planes-, it was an old H-boat,

and we flew in there, came down, landed at two o'clock. Loaded our gear

on, on the canoe, went down and found the foot of the lake, and by six

o'clock that evening, we had taken 12 trout, speckled trout, out of a pool

that weighed over eight pound.

DON MACMILLAN: Oh, ho, ho. All right, you fisherman, just listen to that. Now the thing is

too, Jim, you kept a kind of a diary what you were doing, and it wound up

with a book being written about you called...

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, you...

DON MACMILLAN: ...Trap Lines North. Is that correct?

JIM VANDERBECK: In the many years that I was there, in the winter, I used to trap. You had

to have something to do, and...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...during the Depression, we had-, everybody, the, the whole country,

town-, well, the whole of Canada was on relief, and my father, he didn't

believe in taking relief, so he packed-, he used to pack us all up, take us to

the bush. And we had lodges scattered around through the bush, and we

lived in there, all-, lots of free meat, lots of free fish, and I had my trap

down, my brother had his, my father had his, my sisters had their trap

down, and I thought this was quite the life, so I used to keep a diary, and

then as I wrote the diary, I thought it would make a good magazine article,

so I started keeping it in a little more detail, and it was in one of our camps

when I was guiding a tourist the following-, one of these summers. It was

Mr. Eppie Williamson, he was one of our tourists. He saw the books, and

he said he'd like to take them with him, and he took them down home with

him to the States, and he took them to Dodd and Mead. Dodd and Mead

Publishing, and they gave them to one of their authors, Steven W. Meader,

and he-, this is where this book came from, this Trap Lines North. It is-,

it's, it's a a true book. I would say 85 percent is facts.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, well, folks, I, I have the book, I have seen it, and it, it's quite a book,

and you tell me that you have-, it's been read around the world, that you've

got letters from Australia, New Zealand, places like that.

JIM VANDERBECK: Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of letters. The book went into, I

would say-, the last I saw, were 40 some thousand copies, and I was

looking the other day, it is in the public library. They, they locate, located

it, just-, they searched, and they did...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...find a copy, and it's in-, that was at one time an old school, in the old

sixth grade reader. I don't know if people listening to this, if they can

remember a sixth grade reader when the kids was going to school, there

was a story about a, I think either the 6th or the 7th, there was s story in

there, one of the chapters was about a big wolf, a witch wolf, that comes

out of the story of Trap Lines North.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, there, there you have it, neighbours. Trap Lines North, a story based

on a diary kept by our guest today, Mr. Jim Vanderbeck, and a book that

has received world-wide attention, and has-, as Jim is telling you, been,

been in school libraries right across Canada. Well, anyway Jim, we got to

push along here. Now we've got you doing this guiding work and

whatnot, and staying in Nakina till around about 1939, it seems to me you

spent a little while working at Dofasco, and then you joined the Army. Is

that correct?

JIM VANDERBECK: The tourist business, as a lot of people know, went to pieces during the

war, and I had to go south, so I landed up in Hamilton. I worked a little

while for Dofasco, and while everybody joined up, and I thought I'd like to

join up too and see a little bit of the...

DON MACMILLAN: Yes.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...see a little bit of the world and be paid for it.

DON MACMILLAN: Yeah. Well, that's one way.

JIM VANDERBECK: I, I love to do things that when I get paid for them.

DON MACMILLAN: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, you and me and lots of people, eh, so what outfit did

you join, or what unit?

JIM VANDERBECK: I joined the Armoured Corps, but I was trained and that in Canada,

Borden, and I was shipped overseas in...

DON MACMILLAN: What year'd you go overseas?

JIM VANDERBECK: ...'41, and I landed up in an armoured unit over there, but found out that-,

oh yes...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...and during-, I have to go back, because one of the tourist I had guided

had taught...

DON MACMILLAN: Yes, I like this. This is an incredible yarn too, folks, now listen to this

one. I mean, the-, what Jim is going to tell us about fitting snorkels on

tanks, and how he became a welder, but, but that's the story. Now what,

what's this about you becoming a welder?

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, I was guiding a man, and he, he worked for the Link Electric

Welding Company, which is the manufacturer-, the biggest manufacturer

of welders in the world, and he said, why don't you come down to

Cleveland and go to our school? And I wasn't doing anything one spring

between winter trapping and not trapping, and I went down and I took the

course, and came back. Well, anyway, then I went down to Hamilton, and

I got a job as a welder. I went in the Army, and I went in the armoured

corps, and they found out I was a welder, so...

DON MACMILLAN: That's it...

JIM VANDERBECK: ...pulled me out of there, and they put me in the Number One Canadian

Base Workshop, and of all things, which is hard to believe, I welded

snorkels on army tanks.

DON MACMILLAN: Okay, all you, you, you tank corps types. Here's-, this is the man who put

the snorkels on your tanks. This is...

JIM VANDERBECK: The, the snorkel was so that if, if a landing barge couldn't get close enough

to shore, the tank would get air...

DON MACMILLAN: Yes.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...so that it could go the few feet till they got, till they got on, till they got

on land.


JIM VANDERBECK: And I did that until the whole Army was waterproofed and snorkled, and

then they shipped me over to-, some time in-, I'm not sure, but anyway, in,

in '44, they shipped me to Belgium and I did a bit of time in Belgium,

Holland, Germany.

DON MACMILLAN: Now I like your story about being in the Canadian-, the Number One

Canadian Status Officers Unit or something. Now what was that...

JIM VANDERBECK: Oh, yeah, and I went to-, when I went to the, to the continent...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...they, they sent me to what they called a-, they said it was a, Number One

Canadian Base-, no, I'm sorry. There were-, it was Number One Canadian

Stationery Unit, Office Machinery Section.


JIM VANDERBECK: And they called it a static unit. Well, nobody could-, a stationery unit.

That was it.


JIM VANDERBECK: Nobody could figure out what a stationery unit-, and that's exactly what it

was. They issued...

DON MACMILLAN: Stationery.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...stationery to the whole allied Army, and we were the office machinery

section, and that's what I spent.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, your job then was, you've gone from welding snorkels on tanks...

JIM VANDERBECK: From tanks to typewriters.

DON MACMILLAN: ...to typewriters.

JIM VANDERBECK: Yes. I spent-, from tanks to typewriters. They used to bring their tank-,

their typewriters, adding machines, duplicators in in boxes where they'd

been hit, and you put them back together for them as best you could. And

I, I was the welder.

DON MACMILLAN: You know, I, I keep thinking on these shows, Jim, that I, I've heard

everything, but I haven't. I mean, we're-, this, this is a brand new one, so

here, this part of the war, you're, you're putting typewriters back together,

eh, that have been bombed out or something like that, and now at the end

of the war, you tell me that you...

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, I was the...

DON MACMILLAN: ...you volunteered for the Pacific.

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, I was-, we were stationed in Holland, and our officer said, you

know, how would you like to get back home in a hurry? So I said, I

would, and he said, well, he said, they're taking volunteers for the Pacific.

So I volunteered for the Pacific.


JIM VANDERBECK: And I came back, I went to an officer's training centre, and it didn't come

to anything, and I was demobbed in '45, the Fall of '45, and from there, I

took off for the bush again, but in a different thing. I went up, I was in a

diamond drill.

DON MACMILLAN: This was around the Timmins area, I believe, was it?

JIM VANDERBECK: In the, in the Timmins area.

DON MACMILLAN: Now we come to a very important part of this story. You met the young

lady up there right?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, I went-, was up...

DON MACMILLAN: What was her name?

JIM VANDERBECK: Helen Miller...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...and her father was an old miner came to Timmins in-, during the great

fire in Timmins. He's, he's an old shack captain.


JIM VANDERBECK: A lot of people remember what a shack crew was-, they, they-, he was, he

learned his mining in the old Moose River. A lot of you know...

DON MACMILLAN: We've heard about the Moose River disaster.

JIM VANDERBECK: Disaster, well, that's where he learned it.


JIM VANDERBECK: And he was-, he come up there, he fill in shack captain. He sank-, he was

the man that led the crew that sank the silver miller in Cobalt. And from-,

they sank several shafts around there, and they went to-, they went to

Timmins. Well...

DON MACMILLAN: Well, now your wife also-, this is your wife-to-be, had also-, she, she'd

been quite prominent on the radio, had she not? On...

JIM VANDERBECK: She had done a lot of entertaining. She had been in to Waldo when-, as an

entertainer in, the 30's...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...and she had a band, she had a band in there, and she did several years,

and till the war came along, and then she went...

DON MACMILLAN: She worked, you were telling me, as a, uh, in a munitions factory.

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, she made, she made fuses.

DON MACMILLAN: Which was not the safest job in the world.

JIM VANDERBECK: No. The, the job they had, many-, several girls lost their hands. It paid

well, but you had-, if you had a cool head and a good steady hand, you

were all right, so...

DON MACMILLAN: Well...

JIM VANDERBECK: ...anyway, when I...

DON MACMILLAN: Imagine that. Good for her. Now don't go too fast now. I mean, the-,

the-, as I told you, I talked to your wife on the telephone this afternoon...


DON MACMILLAN: ...and we were both back in radio, back in about those days, in different

parts...


DON MACMILLAN: ...of the world, but it was fun to talk to somebody back from those days, so

you-, we talked about the old days of The Happy Gang, and...


DON MACMILLAN: ...some of those people. Now, now this was a bit of a whirlwind romance,

was it not?

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, I was in-, I can't...

DON MACMILLAN: Did you meet, meet the young lady on a Wednesday, and marry on a

Saturday...

JIM VANDERBECK: I'm, I'm...

DON MACMILLAN: ...or something like that?

JIM VANDERBECK: I met her out one Saturday night-, or no, one Wednesday night, and on

Saturday, I married her. A lot of people said how come, how did you

know? I said, you should know. I said, I, it was...

DON MACMILLAN: You just knew...

JIM VANDERBECK: ...I just knew. I felt it.

DON MACMILLAN: ...this was right, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, and spent many, many happy years.

DON MACMILLAN: Great. I'm delighted to hear that...


DON MACMILLAN: ...and...

JIM VANDERBECK: She, she had a, she had a five year old son, and I loved him, and...

DON MACMILLAN: Yes.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...he was beautiful.

DON MACMILLAN: She was a war widow, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah. Mm-hmm.

DON MACMILLAN: There you have it, friends. The, the-, as we have sometimes said before,

the lightning can strike or something like that, eh?


DON MACMILLAN: Well, I'll be darned. So here we have you then, met on Wednesday,

married on Saturday to a young lady, who-, a widow, whose husband was

killed overseas, so where'd you go then? I mean, what were you doing

here? How did you set up housekeeping or what, what happened here?

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, we were-, we were on the diamond roads, and we travelled around

the country a bit, but it wasn't steady enough, so they were living in a

small place in Rouen, and I decided I would go to the west coast to see if I

couldn't start another tourist camp. I-, my father had intended to go there,

so I decided I'd go out and see what it was all about, and I still remember

the guy I was hitchhiking with.

DON MACMILLAN: Now tell me this-, now listen to this friends, and what a story. Go ahead.

Tell me the story.

JIM VANDERBECK: That was the wildest ride a man could ever have.


JIM VANDERBECK: This man had one arm cut off at the shoulder, and driving a stick shift car,

and between steering and shifting...

DON MACMILLAN: Yes.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...well we got as far as North Bay, and he said, Jimmy, I got to go to

Sudbury, and he said, I can do my business. If you want to stay with me,

he said, I'm going to the west coast, and we'll work our way out, but he

said, come on down to Sudbury, so I went down with him, and I got with a

bunch of the boys, and had a few, had a few beer and...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...everybody was looking for a job then. We're just out of the Army, so

some of them said, well, why don't we try Inco in the morning? I didn't

even know what Inco was. I knew it was a mining company, but anyway,

I went over with them, and-, with the boys, and I got on, at Coniston

Smelter.

DON MACMILLAN: Great, great.

JIM VANDERBECK: Changing, changing roof over the furnaces.

DON MACMILLAN: That was-, that would be kind of a rough...

JIM VANDERBECK: So I didn't stay too long.


JIM VANDERBECK: I didn't stay too long. I asked for a transfer. They gave me a transfer.

They said the only thing you can have is underground. So I went to

Garson, so we...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...we rented a little shack. There wasn't-, housing was bad, very bad in

Garson at the time, so we decided we'd build a house. Well, we were

making-, I was making $23 a week at that time. You weren't going to

build a very good house.

DON MACMILLAN: Not-, not too good.

JIM VANDERBECK: So somebody told me about the old O’Donohoe farm-, there was lots for

sale. I went down and I seen this old gentleman, and he took me up to see

his lots. Well, you know what the price of property is today.

DON MACMILLAN: I do.

JIM VANDERBECK: This man said, there's a beautiful lot. Nice little knoll, nice and dry, and

he says, I tell you what. I'll give you that lot for $50, which is

unbelievable, but he...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...he had inherited the land, and he wanted to get rid of it. He wanted to go

back west, and he was just about giving it away, and I had said-, I told

him, I said, I only got $10 to put down on it. And he said, I'll tell you

what, Jimmy, these lots are going to go up in value. Buy two. So I said,

okay.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, you, you must have been born under a lucky star or something here.

JIM VANDERBECK: So he gave me two lots for $5 down, two months-, what was it, two

months, two months and a half later, Inco or the City or the Town decided

to put water there. The lots shot up from-, up to $230, and by spring, they

were $1600.

DON MACMILLAN: So you're a wealthy man by this time, then, eh, by those standards.

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, I mean, for the-, when you come out of the Army, you haven't got

anything.

DON MACMILLAN: That's right.

JIM VANDERBECK: Everybody talk about what the soldiers got when they come out. They

didn't get anything. Few bucks...

DON MACMILLAN: Yeah, well, yeah.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...for buy a bed with, that's about all. Well, anyway, we didn't have any

money to build a house, and...

DON MACMILLAN: Mm-hmm.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...somebody told me, down on the old Coniston Road, there was a man

there had contracted to cut telegraph poles, and he had a bunch of culls,

and that's a, a bum telegraph pole that's-, they have holes in there, too

crooked or something like that.

DON MACMILLAN: Right, right.

JIM VANDERBECK: So I went down and made a deal with him, for the great huge poles. He

wanted all of $2 a piece, so...

DON MACMILLAN: You, you, you were still getting bargains. Go ahead.

JIM VANDERBECK: So, they were so crooked, so I cut them all up in lengths, and coming from

the bush, I knew how to use a broad axe, we hued them all, and we made

a, we made a foundation with them, made our posts with them, and made

the walls with them, and I had a big canvas. As soon as we got the walls

high enough we could stand up, we put the canvas roof on, we moved in.

DON MACMILLAN: Oh, good ahead.

JIM VANDERBECK: And then for a period of-, for a period of three years, we, we had what's

known as a payday house. Each payday, you bought a little more, and at

Christmas time-, and it took us three years to get it complete. At

Christmas time, the wife would give me a door, and I'd give her a window.

DON MACMILLAN: Great, great.

JIM VANDERBECK: So we had...

DON MACMILLAN: I love this.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...we had many-, there was one thing that used to stir things up a bit. There

was somebody had had a bear chained up, and he used to come at night,

and for some reason or other, he loved-, we had an old wash tub, under the

house, and for some reason or other, this piece of chain was still hanging

to him, and used to like getting in the wash tub and he'd go round and

round and round, and we couldn't figure what it was, till I came out and

here was this bear in there. So...

DON MACMILLAN: I, I, I once was in a summer cottage that had a bear underneath it, so I

know exactly what you're talking about. So how long did you stay in this

cabin?

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, we stayed-, it took three to-, three or four years, and then we decided

we'd go down the Barrydowne. Barrydowne was just opening up, and this

is unbelievable, but in those years, I bought a double lot in the

Barrydowne for $800, and I built...

DON MACMILLAN: That's hard to believe.

JIM VANDERBECK: ...I built a, a big home on it. It's still there and it's a really lovely home,

but schools were too far away, and I didn't drive a car, so we decided-, the

wife and I decided we'd like to get in close, so I, I can still remember her

putting the varnish on the trim when I come in. She was a little angry

about that. I sold the house right out from under her, you know, and I took

this part payment on an old house on Lloyd house.

DON MACMILLAN: I'll be darned.

JIM VANDERBECK: And it was right on the corner of Court-, of Lloyd and Carleton, and

there's where my second two, my next two children was born, after 14

years. My...

DON MACMILLAN: Is, is that house...

JIM VANDERBECK: ...my boy...

DON MACMILLAN: Is that house still standing?

JIM VANDERBECK: That old house is still standing.

DON MACMILLAN: I guess you could go by and take a look at it...

JIM VANDERBECK: I think that old thing...

DON MACMILLAN: ...right about now, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: ...I think was built out of, out of old lumber camps.

DON MACMILLAN: Maybe, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: You could see-, you can still see the corks. You know why...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...the corks was in the lumber?

DON MACMILLAN: Yeah, yeah.

JIM VANDERBECK: In, in the subfloor.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, I'll be darned. Okay, so now I'm trying to keep this in some kind of,

of order here. Now what happened-, how long did you live in that house,

and then where did you go?

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, at that time, Inco was rather unsettled. There was a lot of layoffs

and there was a lot of demotions, and we were being shipping from one

mine to another, and I was-, had been shifted from Creighton to Garson,

Garson to Creighton, so many times, and not driving a car, it kept me-,

well, I mean, I just couldn't live that way, so I decided I would go to the

furthest outplace, either Crean, Crean-, or not Crean Hill, either Levack or

Lawson Quarry. Well, after I tried the Lawson Quarry Road, in those

days, I turned back...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...and I went out to Levack, and...

DON MACMILLAN: You got hired on, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, I sold the old house on Lloyd Street, and I-, no, I just transferred.

DON MACMILLAN: Transferred, rather, yeah.

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, I bid on a job there, and...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...and the children, they were-, well, they were young, like, they, they

spent a little bit of time around there, but...

DON MACMILLAN: Well, now, wait a minute now. Tell me, now, Jim, that two points. First

of all, you mentioned a George Passi or something like that, who sort of

volunteered , unquote, you to be a welder or something.

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, that was George Passi. Many of the, many of the oldtimers will,

will remember him. He was quite a brusque man.


JIM VANDERBECK: Very good boss, and called me in one day. See I was working-, at that

time, I was working as a carpenter on the town site, and I liked my job,

and he called me in one day, and he said, I hear you say you're a welder.

And I said, I didn't say I was a welder. Somebody told you that. Well, he

said, I'll found out you are a welder, and George he takes a piece of steel

and he sticks it up under a table, and he said, weld that. So I put a bead on

it, and I haven't welded for, oh, quite a long time, and George, he's-, that's

all I want. He said, that's fine. I'm putting a job on the board, and he said,

you bid on that. And I was living in a company house at the time...

DON MACMILLAN: So you decided you would...

JIM VANDERBECK: ...and I decided I'd, I would bid on the job.

DON MACMILLAN: Yes, yes.

JIM VANDERBECK: And...

DON MACMILLAN: Yes, I can believe this. Well, now, Jim, we got to push along here, but

now...

JIM VANDERBECK: Now we can jump...

DON MACMILLAN: We got you in Levack and you're working there, but you sort of had a

hankering, you thought you'd be happier with your kids growing up in a

more rural thing, or in a...

JIM VANDERBECK: Well...

DON MACMILLAN: ...camp-type thing. Did you not buy a place on Manitoulin Island?

JIM VANDERBECK: We bought a summer camp first.


JIM VANDERBECK: And the, the children loved it there. They hated to come home, and I was

driving back and forth and, and I mean this business, trying to get them up

in time to get back for school on Monday, and, and after doing it for one

summer, and the kids said, why can't we live here?

DON MACMILLAN: Oh.

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, okay. It was rather-, it was an old hunt camp, right on Manitou

Lake, on Green Bay, and it was a beautiful spot. So I decided if they

wanted to live there, and they lived in the old place, and we gradually built

it up into a huge electrically heated home, and it was really big, and they

had a wonderful-, they had wonderful years there. They, they went to-,

they started high school to the new, new West Bay High School, and did

their-, got all their education there, and I never need worry about their

spending money. They started themself a truck garden and sold

vegetables to the, to the...

DON MACMILLAN: Well, Jim, I, I know. I mean, it was great for the kids, and they've turned

out extremely well, as I-, now, your daughter is, is working in medical

records. Is that right?

JIM VANDERBECK: She works in medical records in, in Memorial Hospital.

DON MACMILLAN: And a son, who has a bachelor of science. Is he not doing some research

or something with the Ottawa...

JIM VANDERBECK: He's doing some-, he's working in the lab...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...in Ottawa for the summer on a research team on something have, have to

do with blood. I couldn't tell you. It's quite an important thing in a way,

and he loves it. He's trying to make up his mind whether he's going to be

a doctor or research.

DON MACMILLAN: Research, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, yeah.

DON MACMILLAN: Great. And, and another son is in where, in Victoria?

JIM VANDERBECK: He's in Victoria. He's a, he's an engineer, and he does something for

Molson's.

DON MACMILLAN: Okay. Now...

JIM VANDERBECK: Or Labatt's. I don't know which.

DON MACMILLAN: Labatt-, one or the other. Well, we'll mention them both.

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah. Well, we'll give them both a plug.

DON MACMILLAN: Both a plug. All right. Now-, but you sold the lodge on Manitoulin.

That's pretty lonesome for your wife there.

JIM VANDERBECK: It was too-, after the, the children went away to school, there was no way

she could live there, and, and we were isolated, and the plough didn't

come right down to the house, so I sold it to Dr. Oliver in Sudbury, and he

has a very nice summer residence out of it. It's not a summer camp, it's-,

it's quite a place.

DON MACMILLAN: It's a year round place, right?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah, it's electrically heated, it's lovely.

DON MACMILLAN: Now, we have to shove-, push along now, here...


DON MACMILLAN: ...Jim. Now after selling this Manitoulin thing, you told me you tried

trailer living for a while, and didn't like that too well,.

JIM VANDERBECK: Oh, that's terrible.

DON MACMILLAN: And then you became a superintendent or something in an apartment?

JIM VANDERBECK: I was still working for Inco, and, and we just thought this idea of working

as superintendent, and we were working-, we worked two blocks, the

Summit...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...and the Park View, and after the Park View, we decided that it-, the pay

is very small, and so we...

DON MACMILLAN: You knocked that off, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: ...we, we just knocked that off, and we went to work-, we went to live in

a-, we live in a nice little block in-, on Paris Street.

DON MACMILLAN: Well,...

JIM VANDERBECK: We got, we got the biggest summer camp in, in the whole Sudbury area,

because Nippiwon Lake is right across the road.

DON MACMILLAN: Is it?

JIM VANDERBECK: So you can, you can put your bathing suit on, and go over and jump in the

lake.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, now, Jim, you have a theory, and I think a good one, that we're

speaking of pensioners now, or people about to be pensioned, you don't

think it's a good idea to-, at least it-, to just stop working, eh?

JIM VANDERBECK: Well, the thing is, anybody going on pension...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...he should think very, very carefully what he's going to do. He's-, he-,

his idea isn't going to work out because he's going to figure this wonderful

life, this business. You, you don't have to get up in the morning, you don't

have to do this, you don't have to do that. What you do after a while, you

quit doing anything.

DON MACMILLAN: Yeah. I, I saw an article in the paper by a fellow who won a million

dollars in this-, one of the Olympic draws or something, and I think the

headline on it, this guy said fine, he's got the money, but he said leisure

are his death or something like that. He said, keep working.

JIM VANDERBECK: Keep working.

DON MACMILLAN: Keep working...

JIM VANDERBECK: You, you must do something, like last winter now. I was pensioned...

DON MACMILLAN: But now, wait a minute. I-, I want to get this point in. You got back

working, and in fact for Inco, agricultural department. Isn't that right?

JIM VANDERBECK: Yeah. I-, somebody told me about it, so I put in a, I put in an application,

and I was accepted. I mean, gardening has always been my hobby.


JIM VANDERBECK: I don't hunt, I don't fish, I don't golf, so I thought, if I'm going to do

something interesting, take my hobby, and when you get paid for it as

well...

DON MACMILLAN: That's, that's living.

JIM VANDERBECK: Yes, that's living, and it's a wonderful. It's a wonderful gang, and it's, it's a

good department for, for an older man. We work-, we had a lot of

students, and in our gang alone, we run higher than 65 average age...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...in the gang. Now I don't think that any company that I've ever heard of

that does this, Inco hired pensioners. They allow them to go on this gang.

And these old men, I wouldn't have believed it, that men of that age could

turn out that much work.

DON MACMILLAN: Well, I'll be darned.

JIM VANDERBECK: And, and another thing, I have to give something to the students too. It's...


JIM VANDERBECK: ...unbelievable the amount of work these girls and boys can turn out,

especially the girls. The girls, they, they do a wonderful job.

DON MACMILLAN: Jim, I'd love-, we could talk here for another hour, but...


DON MACMILLAN: ...we, we can't do it. We just...


DON MACMILLAN: ...time won't allow us, and I want to say to, to our listeners that this

incredible story, this wonderful story you've heard today has been told to

us by Jim Vanderbeck, who retired in 1975 last year after 30 years with

Inco. Jim, I want to say that it's been a privilege and a pleasure to have

you as a guest on Memories and Music.

00:35:14 Track ends.

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