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Mary DowneyMary Downey was born in 1942, on Charles Street, in Port aux Basques, Newfoundland. Her father, Abe Mullins, worked at the Canadian National Railway, though Mary doesn't really remember what he did there. Mary's mother, Mary Savory, cleaned the stations at the CN, did housework, as well as cared for Mary and her eleven siblings. However, when Mary was still very young her mother left the family, and Mary went to live with her extended family in Codroy, Newfoundland.
As a child, Mary says she attended school in Tompkins, Doyle's, St. Andrew's and South Branch. She did manage to finish grade ten, which was a lot of education for a young girl back then. Mary remembers not liking her teachers; she said you got three smacks with the strap in the mornings before you went in, just in case you did something bad. Usually after finishing grade ten, young girls went to St. George's to finish grade eleven, then do the basic education program. They could then go on to teach. Mary tells us you had to be Catholic to attend. There were other places you could go to, but only if your parents could afford to send you. So, at the age of thirteen, Mary began to travel in the summers. "I went all over the United States and Canada...I went to Arizona. Tennessee, Boston and all these places. Every year I went further."
For fun and entertainment as a child, Mary says there was a lot to do in the winter, but not much in the summers. "In the winters, we could skate and slide, but in the summers, you had a lot of work to do...there was always fences to be put up and stuff like that." Mary says there were dances every weekend. The local boys would play accordions and fiddles, as well as the guitar. "The young and the old got together, everyone was mixed up...also, once a year the community held a garden party and there was always live music...as well as alcohol." Mary says people made their own beer (home brew), and made their own moonshine, and there was always plenty around. The legal drinking age was twenty-one, but has since been lowered to nineteen in Newfoundland.
There were no RCMP officers, but there were Rangers. "There was one stationed in St. Andrew's, and boy, was he stupid. You could steal the hat right off his head and he wouldn't catch you." Mary also remembers when you could leave your doors unlocked at all times, and not worry about being robbed.
There was a doctor in the area, but if he wasn't available, there was a part-time nurse. "You just made sure you didn't get sick." There were homemade remedies back then, and Mary remembers one in particular very well, it was for a sore throat. "They would whack the molasses and the liniment down your throat, and it didn't taste very good." Also, another ritual of the time was to burn sulpher in your house for nine days after someone died. This prevented the spirit of the deceased from coming back to haunt you.
There was no electricity or running water, so Mary says they used woodstoves, and they had to bring the water in buckets from a nearby brook. Laundry had to be done by hand, with washtub and sunlight soap. Mary says they also used kerosene lamps for lighting, until electricity came through about forty years ago. She says the first car didn't come through until the highway did, which was about the same time as electricity and telephones. This was all about thirty-five to forty years ago.
Mary says she did attend church, but she did her best to escape it when she could. She does remember that the Catholics weren't allowed to associate with the Anglicans. "The kids didn't care, as soon as their parents backs were turned, they were together again."
Mary's daily chores included whatever had to be done. The family kept their own animals. They had cows, sheep, ducks, geese and pigs. So they always had their own meat. They also grew their own vegetables. " We had potatoes, carrots, turnips and cabbage...it was always that way...we were self sufficient, but then when the highway came in, you could send for all that stuff." Meats were kept fresh by cutting out big blocks of ice, putting them together to form an icehouse, and covering it in sawdust.
Mary made most of her clothing. She would buy cheap material because she says, "It only got messed up after one day anyways." Mary says her house at the time was smaller and more compact but it was easier to keep warm. "Now you got a house to show not to live in." Mary feels that people today are a lot more materialistic.
Christmas time was different back then. It wasn't about how much you spent on things; it was about family and being close. "You might get some fruit, or something, not like they get today...now if they don't get a thousand dollars worth of stuff, its not Christmas." Mary says she sees a lot of changes between now and then.
At the age of twenty, Mary married a young man who she says was "Just an alcoholic." She went on to marry a second time to another man, who she says was a "Part-time carpenter, and a part-time alcoholic." Mary had six children, Mildred, Ada, Annie, Aidan, Gus, and Mick. She tells us that all of her children were born at home, by a neighbor. "It was a hell of a lot better than going to Port aux Basques hospital."
When asked about the changes between now and then, Mary says she sees a lot. "There's no convenience because now you got to have money, you got to have this and you got to have that. People who didn't see a dollar, year in and year out was better off then, than they are now. They didn't have any bills and they had lots to eat. They had bigger families." She says the community was a lot closer then, if someone had a misfortune or if something happened all the people would pitch in and help. "Everything got done...now, nobody doesn't help nobody...one time you could depend on your neighbors but now you can't. There wasn't so much greed and jealousy. Everybody had what they had and if you didn't have something, you could trade and barter...everybody would make sure you had your wood too, the men would go from house to house, they called it a chopping spree."
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Nina ButtonNina Button was born Port aux Basques on May 2, 1943, to Harold and Rebecca Sheaves. Harold was originally from Port aux Basques but Rebecca was originally from Cape La Hune. "She moved up here in her younger days" says Nina. Nina was one of eight children. She had six brothers and one sister.
While Harold worked Rebecca did housework and raised the children. Harold did part time work on what they then called "the lines", working on the poles and in his late years got a job with Canadian National Marine.
Rebecca did not work because she had such a large family. Nina can remember her mother washing clothes on the scrubboard and hanging it out to dry in the winter time. When it was brought in it would be "stiff as a poker." Nina also remembers coming in "frozen to death" in the winter time and putting her feet in the oven of the woodstove to get them warm again.
As a family they sometimes attended Anglican Church where there was a minister in residence. Nina can remember the current St. James Church being there when she was a child.
Nina went to St. James Elementary until grade seven. They had a very big class according to Nina, of about thirty. At one time they were split into two classes. Schooling was not really considered important. Nina had to come out of school to help her mother. She often had to give her parents all of her money for food but she didn't mind.
Growing up she had running water but no toilets; they had "slop pails' and "face and hand pans" for bathing. Laundry was done in a washtub. Their source of light came from kerosene lamps. Nina remembers her father lighting the lamps before it got dark in the evenings. One of the conveniences that Nina saw growing up was the telephone; they had crank telephones.
Chores were shared between Nina and her sister. Her sister did the upstairs cleaning while Nina did the downstairs and they took turns cleaning the dishes. On their days off they would have to do their chores but when the work was done they were allowed to go. Their home was furnished with things that were given and passed down from her grandfather to her father. When not doing chores they made their own fun by playing ball, riding bike, making snowmen in the winter and throwing snow balls and they went to the show, or movie as we'd call it today, for twenty cents. Other than that there wasn't too much to do, not like there is today.
Christmas as in most homes was a special time for Nina. They would usually get things like mitts, socks, panties, apples, oranges and a few candies. "We thought we had the world," says Nina. The foods that they ate during Christmas included turkey or chicken. You wouldn't see turkey at any other time of the year not even in stores. They would participate in traditions like mummering that was really fun. It was much different back then according to Nina, "Today you don't know who you're letting in."
Easter was also a special time for Nina. They wouldn't really get gifts for Easter then but they might get a few Easter eggs. The main thing that she remembers from Easter is that her father would go down to the store and buy a couple dozen eggs, cook them and see how many the children could eat. It was a competition to see which child could eat the most. The winner would probably get a dime.
Nina doesn't think that it was a hard life growing up. "I can't say we had a hard life," she says. "There's lots of times when didn't have very much. Probably had a bottle of peanut butter and mom made homemade bread that day and we'd have to do with that for supper, but we were happy youngsters. We had happiness, we got by." Nina says. "My parents loved us, we were happy."
Nina was lucky enough to have a hospital in town when she was growing up and Dr. LeGrow was always there when someone was sick or got hurt. There was also a post office when she was a child but it was in Grand Bay in someone's home at the time.
Even though Dr. LeGrow was always there, Nina remembers some of the home remedies that were used. For a sore throat you would apply Vicks vapour rub and then put a wool sock around your throat and go to bed. Also for a sore throat you could drink Buckley's Mixture. Molasses and vinegar were mixed together and ingested for a cough. "A lot of it worked better than some of the stuff you get today in prescription," said Nina. "But not all of it."
When Nina was twenty-one she was married to Richard Button by Reverend Leigh. Reverend Leigh wasn't from Port aux Basques but he was stationed there at the time. Richard and Nina had two boys that were both born by doctors in the hospital, one in Port aux Basques hospital and one in Corner Brook hospital, because Nina had to have caesarean sections. Richard worked in the ticket office at Canadian National Railway. They bought their groceries with cash at Shoprite, which is also where Nina worked. Shoprite was the only grocery store there then. In later years they opened up a Foodland.
One of the changes that Nina saw was the coming of the railway, which brought thirteen hundred jobs. There are probably thirty or forty men working there now, which cuts a lot of money out of the town. The railway is, of course, no longer a part of Newfoundland.
Raising a family was not too bad for Nina because she had a serving girl to help her. Nina also had the help of her mother-in-law; "My husbands' mother was well at the time and she lived with me in the winter time so she used to help with some of the work." Though she had serving girls Nina did have daily chores of her own such cooking meals, and she worked a lot. "I would clean when I was home," says Nina, "My husband was a wonderful cook." If he got off work before her he would start dinner or have it ready by the time Nina got home and he also used to bake things. One of the ways that Nina helped her husband while he was at work was to work herself. "When I worked I helped to pay some of the bills, things like that. It was help working."
Food back then was not like today. They had stewed meat and corned beef hash. "Children never even know what you're talking about today when you tell them you had such a thing for supper," said Nina.
Nina wouldn't change a thing about her growing up. The only thing that she would change about her life is how young her husband was when he passed away. Richard was only forty-nine when he died. "But those things you can't have." she says.
Life was much harder for women growing up back then; they didn't know the difference though because they couldn't miss what they didn't have. Life today is a lot different. Roles of women have changed now. Going to work wasn't heard of when Nina's mother was young, now it is so common for women to work.
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