TRANSCRIPT

GB - George Bell, interviewee; MD - Marjorie (Bell) Dawson, interviewee; JA - June (Bell) Anderson, interviewee / LR - Lyn Royce, interviewer; WM - Wilma Morrison, interviewer

GB: Oh yeah, well we've got... Yeah, we had the Black Ball Team.

LR: Okay.

MD: No not that 1...

GB: I don't remember losing...

MD: I have another one...

GB: ...you got another 1... Yeah we played, I played...

MD: Thompson.

GB: ...for Thompson Products and, and, in Port Colborne.

LR: Okay.

GB: We used to get paid for playin' ball up there! You know...

LR: Okay. Now did you, did you play ball with Wes Washington?

GB: No, I knew him; we played football against him. He lived right back of me in Niagara Falls.

LR: Okay.

GB: We were neighbours kinda.

LR: Okay; okay.

GB: I lived on Greenland Avenue, he lived on Beaverdams [Road], in back; houses kinda faced each other.

LR: 'Cause we have some pictures of the Black Baseball Teams...

GB: Yeah, it would be a different 1.

MD: From Mel Nicholson.

GB: Yeah.

LR: Oh, no! It was Harry - Harry Harper.

GB: Harry Harper, oh yeah, Harry Harper...

LR: You played baseball with him?

GB: Yeah, we're all up there, the same ones...

LR: Okay.

GB: All the Harpers.

LR: I'm gettin' all my people mixed up - apologies! [laughs] I'm meeting you all at once and it's all blending together.

MD: You know, we used to have, uh, uh, singin' group.

LR: Okay.

MD: We were called the Madrigal Singers.

LR: Unhunh...

MD: And everybody's gone but me.

LR: Oh my gosh...

MD: In that picture and it's in the BME Church. Up on the...

LR: Okay. Alright.

MD: All of them... yeah...

LR: We'll take a look for it.

WM: There's a picture of someone else, isn't there? Oh, I think in the, in the book, in the Niagara's Freedom Trail book I think.

LR: Okay.

MD: They're all dead but me. But I don't know about the man, the guy...

JA: All of them are gone; you're the 1, you're the only 1...

GB: I don't remember losing a hockey, a ball game... We played against the Natives, up in Caledonia, and I still go up and visit a couple of them...

LR: Oh, that's great...

GB: ...We were best friends; I pitched for them, too.

LR: Okay.

GB: So, we had a great time. But the funny thing is, they paid you so much money if you win the whole thing. And our team went up there and we lost the 1st game, and then team from Smithville was supposed to come down, the guy had the equipment, I said, 'Where's your team?' He says, 'They didn't come. They must have thought it was cancelled.' So we put on the Smithville uniforms and won the whole thing! We were out the 1st round; [chuckling] put on and won the whole thing.