Dancing In a Jar (11 page)

I’m feeling very well and full of energy. Don and I went to the dance in the church hall last night and we had a wonderful time. The hall is just above the two-room school, which is next to the church, and forms the activity and power center of town. This also includes the soccer field. Apparently, the only excuse accepted by the priest for missing mass is if you were playing soccer. Don has become quite friendly with the priest, which is highly surprising given his fondness for religion! But Father Thorne is an avid cribbage player, having learned when he was studying in Ireland. I have also discovered that Father Thorne had the first radio in St. Lawrence so Don has been catching up on Amos and Andy when I thought he was furthering his religious education.

I am happy to see him have some time off as he is working so hard on this mine. I am so proud of what he has achieved. If you could see those oxen pulling wagons of ore to the wharf you would marvel that any of this could happen. We celebrated with French brandy when the first boatload left the harbor. I haven’t been very happy with Walter Siebert but I will say he has worked magic in finding customers for the fluorspar. Don has a good crew of men now and they seem to like and respect him.

Ivah has written me about your summer plans at the Jersey shore and I’m so pleased Daddy will finally close the pharmacy for a few weeks and take a break.

Can I be a terrible nag and remind you about some wool for baby clothes? Don’t forget to make up a false receipt for very little so the customs officer doesn’t make me pay.

That’s all from our foggy end of the world.

Love,
Urla

St. Lawrence Corporation Ltd.
Room 1116, 120 Broadway
New York 5, NY

June 10, 1934

Dear Donald,

Happy to report that we are filling the orders as required and I’m working on some new contacts.

I’ve arranged with the Newpont boys to come in early July as you suggested. Fred has indicated that he was thrilled to keep you on there, and probably as manager since I suspect that Doc Smith will leave when I do. But of course the choice is yours to return to the U.S. as well.

I would hope to get five days of salmon fishing while I’m in that neck of the woods. Would you be able to arrange accommodation?

I’ll wait to hear from you before confirming my travel arrangements.

Best regards,
Walter

St. Lawrence, Newfoundland

June 28, 1934

Dear Dorothy,

How wonderful to get your news yesterday. We are all bursting with joy at the arrival of Edward Thomas and that you and baby are doing fine. I can hardly wait to see you both. Mother says it was all without incident, but I never trust her Scottish stoicism to accurately describe anything! I hope, darling Sis, that is closer to the truth than not.

I hope your doctor visits were a little easier than mine. Last week I
joined the coastal boat in its run along the coast of this peninsula to the town of Grand Bank where there is a small hospital and a doctor. I was nervous about climbing back on a boat, my first since we arrived. Mrs. G brought me down and before I boarded I could smell cabbage coming from the stack. That almost finished me, but Mrs. G gave me a squeeze and on I went. I’m determined not to look so weak in front of these strong women.

Don had arranged for someone to meet me and take me to the hospital and everything went well from there. The doctor says I’m healthy as a horse or maybe it was a house or a mouse. He is straight from Ireland so I am mostly taking my cue from how quickly he dismissed me. Then I was treated to pea soup, fresh bread and butter, and delivered back to the
Argyle
making its way to St. Lawrence. Thank God no one was cooking cabbage on the return.

Don was expecting a more elaborate report from the doctor, even a written one, but we have to remember having a baby around here is as ordinary as hanging out the wash. Plus the hospital is busy with so many cases of tuberculosis. This little country has a very high rate of what they call the white plague, or sometimes “consumption.” There is a big campaign to inoculate young ones, but I’m not sure they have control on things yet.

Anyway, I don’t want to taint this joyous occasion with any news of sickness. We are celebrating after all and Don and I could not be happier for you and Bill. We can’t wait to join you in the world of babies and no sleep.

Lots of love to you, Dorothy, and to baby Edward.

Love,
Urla

Oak Beach, Long Island

June 25, 1934

Dear Donald,

Well as you can tell we have moved down to the beach. Opening it up after all winter was quite a chore and your father seems more concerned over his Jeep than helping with musty rugs and furniture. But the flag is flying high and we are at home. Most of the families have moved down by now so we’ve enjoyed catching up after all winter.

It’s been quite hot already and I’ve been swimming every morning and evening to keep cool. I hope by now your dreadful fog has lifted and you are getting some warmth on your winter bones. Everyone here thinks you have gone to Greenland and I haven’t bothered to correct them. It isn’t that far away anyway, is it?

I’m hoping the change brings Pop out of the doldrums. He keeps going on about Roosevelt’s New Deal and will it finally translate into demand for his wrought-iron products. I’m afraid ARHEPO Gifts has not had a great year. I was hoping you could help us out, darling, by paying the property taxes on the beach house this year? They are due at the end of July and we could simply take it out of your account in Nutley. Let me know if this is okay with you.

Wish you could join me for a swim this evening. I see Robert Goldman from your engineering class from time to time. He tells me he has a good job in the city supervising some new transit system. Certainly there are more jobs on offer than when you left.

I must go and find your father for a sundown drink. Please give my love to Urla.

Love,
Mother

St. Lawrence Corporation Ltd.
St. Lawrence, Newfoundland

July 12, 1934

Dear Howard,

How wonderful to get your letter on the last mail boat. Mom and Pop have kept me up to date with your job hunt. You have to remember that being a new graduate in a tough economy is a mighty challenge, so don’t despair. Someone very soon will be looking for a business graduate from Rutgers with a handsome older brother. Keep a good stiff upper lip, kid, and don’t let the “come back next week” boys get you.

Yes, keeping house in this burg is great, and one never has any spare time on their hands to go motoring or anything. It is a case of get up with the birds, start the fire, carry the buckets of water, take out the ashes, rebuild the fire again, as it is sure to go out while you were doing the other chores, and then maybe you eat breakfast.

Spent quite a while today and built a chicken coop. Have bought one hen and I’m going to tie it up in the coop and leave the door open. We use the hen as sort of a decoy, and try and get some more. There is a law here that all hens have to be yarded now that the gardens are sprouting. But some of my neighbors haven’t heard of the law, heh heh heh.

Two rooms in the house are shared by an old lady and her sons. It is quite separate from us, but it brings me no end of entertainment. The old lady is half blind (one eye) and can’t hear a thing. The boys come into her place at night and make funny noises and she thinks it’s the radio. In the morning, she comes to tell us how much she enjoys the programs on our radio when of course we haven’t had the radio on. She is intriguing though: she is the center of the web of communications in St. Lawrence although she never steps outside her house. They have one hen, and she has it trained to come in the back door and lay its daily egg in the lid of an old trunk.
It saves her looking for the eggs that she can’t see, but her son doesn’t like the idea of leaving the door open, and so they argue over it all the time.

Our neighbor on the other side of the fence is a cousin to the above one and can neither see nor hear. The trucks have more trouble with her than they do with the cows on the road. She refuses to use her own lane as it goes out past her other neighbor who she doesn’t speak to, and so she insists upon using our lane. The worst of it was that her husband built a nice picket fence between our places, and every day she comes out and pulls it down, and every afternoon her husband rebuilds it, and not without quite a few misgivings, and believe me, Newfoundland misgivings are ones that invoke all the deities I ever heard of.

Around 5:00 pm every day, all of these characters forget their individual grievances and arguments and come into our kitchen to gather around the radio to hear a broadcast out of St. John’s called
The Doyle Bulletin
. This is an experience not to be missed. A local purveyor of medicines and confectionary provides the radio hour. He uses the hour to advertise but also to promote songs from Newfoundland. Included in the broadcast are announcements about individuals, so people gather around just to catch up on the news of someone who has been sick or traveling or whatever. “Mr. Percy Cavanaugh of Grate’s Cove would like to advise his family that his operation went well but he needs some clean pajamas.” “Mrs. Effie Walsh advises her sister that the train is late leaving Lewisporte but to keep supper for her anyway.”

Was out on a trading schooner to bargain with a captain who came down from Prince Edward Island with livestock. I want to buy a pig from him, but he wanted $6 and I can get them in Saint Pierre for $3. I am going to build a pen way up in the meadow, and the fellow next door is going to feed him. Please write us and suggest a name for it. I’m sure he will be a little black one, sex unknown, and if you can tell me how to tell the sexes apart please whisper it to me in your next letter.

This place is just alive at present with the migration of brown thrushes, and you can hear their twittering all over the place. We have plenty of robins, sparrows, finches, and some birds you’ve never seen such as bitterns and curlews. I hope you are continuing to paint the LBJs (Little Brown Jobs to this engineer). We have placed your wedding gift on our living-room wall and the two chickadees watch over us like hawks. Have you noticed how my jokes are sounding more and more like Pop?

That’s it from me for now. It sure was swell to get your letter yesterday.

More anon,
Donald

St. Lawrence, Newfoundland

July 21, 1934

Dear Mom and Pop, Howard and Edith,

The mail boat has just arrived and I was disappointed to find no news from any of you. That sunshine must have you all making hay.

I did receive my latest account balance from the Bank of Nutley and I see the withdrawal for the property tax at the beach. I’m hoping Howard can soon help with some of these demands now that he is graduated as I will have some extra costs that will weigh about eight pounds and need constant feeding.

Walter Siebert left yesterday after a ten day visit. I’m not sure how serious are prospects with Fred Foote and Co. On the one hand, they are looking at five or six operations on the island, so they are serious enough. But they spent a few days with government in St. John’s and I don’t think they got very far with their demand for lower tariffs on mining equipment and other inputs. We will see what they bring back to Siebert.

It certainly doesn’t help our cause that Roosevelt just fixed the price of gold at $35 an ounce. That’s a big jump from $20 and he is trying to make gold mining more profitable in the U.S. Good for him but bad for us trying to attract a buyer for here.

Anyway, the main purpose of Siebert’s trip seems to have been salmon fishing which was rather disappointing for me although I’m not sure he was much of an asset around the mine or the men. He wore fancy New England fishing attire all about the place, which makes me wonder if he had ever visited here before. We did enjoy four days on the Cape Roger river and caught some real beauties, including a fifteen pounder by Siebert. Yours truly did very well too and I brought some home for Urla, Mrs. G, Mr. Louis Michel, and of course Fr. Thorne. I’m keeping all my options open.

We had a wonderful fishing guide from a small community called Baine Harbour. I think Siebert was expecting slightly grander accommodation but he kept quiet about it. Our companion was Magistrate Hollett from Burin, a very learned man who chaired the Commission on the Compensation after the 1929 tidal wave. He had some very moving stories about loss and grief but also hard work and pure survival that left Siebert subdued for once. That color looks good on him and he should wear it more often.

That’s about all from me before I head back to work this afternoon. I’m finally able to shed the heavy oiled clothing and can enjoy the walk back to the mine. The water problem continues, but we have been able to sink a fifth shaft and can now access some very wide veins of spar.

Urla continues to bloom and is coaxing what she can from the garden. We need some of your hot sunny days to make it successful.

It would be wonderful to hear from my sister on the next mail boat. I understand I could hear her on the radio in the afternoon, but that’s not possible here, so she’ll have to write. Even busy opera stars still have family commitments!

As ever,
Donald

St. Lawrence, Newfoundland

July 28, 1934

Dear Howard,

Congratulations on the job offer. I haven’t heard the follow up but I imagine you only had to think a short time on this one. Nothing like working for your alma mater, and Rutgers is lucky to have you. Good work, kid.

While you are figuring out your salary and some other business propositions, listen to what some of the people here are facing as their business prospects.

We are in the middle of the fishing season here and you sure would gasp at the dories and the trap skiffs coming in with the cod. The price for fish is $4 a quintal. A quintal of fish is 300 weight of dried salt cod fish. Three hundred pounds of dried fish is the equivalent of 900 pounds of fresh fish, and salt costs about fifty cents for the quintal, along with all the work of drying and curing. So you can figure out for yourself just how hard a man has to work to make a living. The fishing season is actually a failure here this year, and some of these poor devils haven’t landed a quintal as of yet. Just imagine facing this hard winter with less than four dollars, and no possible way to get any money.