We are all familiar with the saying, “Every cloud has a silver lining.” Through my life, I have experienced troubled times but usually the event somehow gets changed around, and it becomes a happy experience.
The Depression Years in the larger Canadian cities and elsewhere during the 1930s affected everyone in one way or another. Some professional people managed to get along with a reduced income while tradesmen in our district were either on Working Men’s Relief or perhaps 10 days a month working for the Canadian Pacific Railway.
My Scottish parents had arrived in Winnipeg during the prosperous 1920s, with my father, a painter, being employed by the CPR. When the Depression years lasted longer than most people expected, the CPR kept a skeleton crew with their longest employees working 10 days in each month while the company maintained three daily shifts.
The newer employees, such as my father, were laid off.
There was very little help for anyone in Winnipeg until July 1931, when the federal government established Working Men’s Relief. In the meantime, most men and their families were trying to pick up odd jobs as they eked out a livelihood.
Once registered for Working Men’s Relief, my father worked in and around the city, doing whatever was required. In the summer of 1933, he was working at Polo Park.
During this period, my mom and we four youngsters returned to the city after enjoying a 10-day holiday at one of the Fresh Air Camps on Lake Winnipeg that were operated by the United Church or the Salvation Army, for under-privileged families.
My father met us at the CPR station, and I remembered seeing one of his eyes all inflamed and almost shut. It took no time for this itchy skin disease to spread to his entire body. Our family doctor at that time recognized and diagnosed his condition as Mustard Gas poisoning that had remained latent in his body from the First World War, until perhaps an insect had bitten him while working, and brought it all out.
With my dad unable to work, our family was taken off Working Men’s Relief and placed on Social Welfare. On Social Welfare, we did not receive the monthly vouchers for groceries, milk and bread as we had on Relief, but instead we were supplied basic food items such as dried peas and beans, delivered from T. Eaton grocery department.
We received a separate voucher for three pints of milk each day and very little bread. My mother received flour instead, and was able to bake wholesome bread, which we enjoyed.
Mother was a very good cook and baker, but her imagination to make changes in our monotonous diet was limited, as we had the same grocery items given each month, take it or leave it. Another difference between the Relief and the Social Welfare was that we had no clothing or shoe allowances.
There was absolutely no availability to have any money.
During the hot dry summers, with temperatures from 90 F to 118 F, my dad’s face was just one large open sore that was usually covered with lotion to allay the itch. My mother had to walk three miles to a certain downtown drug store for a small bottle of the lotion, although we had two drug stores close at hand.
One application of lotion on my dad’s face and the bottle was empty.
My father fought at Gallipoli and the Dardanelles, but as his skin was clear when he was discharged in 1919, he never received any pension from the British War Office.
We received no hamper during the Christmas season of 1935. Our name was not on any list, because of the late transfer of our family from Relief to Social Welfare.
During this Christmas, my brothers and sister, as well as myself, hung up our stockings on the back of a chair, expecting that there would be something in them on Christmas morning. There was nothing!
My older brother had a piece of wood in his stocking to remind him that he had not done his chore of bringing in the wood for the kitchen stove. My mother had placed it there so we would all have a good laugh.
Shortly after breakfast, the neighbor’s four kids came to our door, to see what we had received for Christmas. Mom invited them in and gave them some homemade bread covered with some of her jam, along with some cocoa. How they relished this treat. They only had store-bought bread in their home.
At school, the Gray kids were in the same classes as ourselves. They felt bad that we had not received anything, and soon left. About 15 minutes later, the four kids were back at our door, each of them bearing a gift. They told us that when they went home and told their mother about our plight, their mother asked each one of them to pick out one of their own gifts, and take it to our home, and give it to us.
What beautiful thoughts we all had that Christmas morning! I always remembered what Eleanor Gray gave me that day. It was a celluloid doll on a swing, that when you pressed the two fragile metal ropes, the doll did a somersault.
The Gray family were on Relief, but that Christmas their mother had taught her children a valuable lesson on sharing and caring.
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