Protesting Medicare
Dad came to Saskatchewan for a month and practiced in Bienfait. He loved the town and the people, and the practice of medicine in Canada.
After his month of work he and some friends he met took a trip to Banff. He loved that too. He spoke about the bears coming right up to the car windows, and people rolling down their car windows or getting out of their cars to take pictures up close. You wouldn’t see anyone doing that any more.
Dad's pictures of the bears
While Dad was in Canada Mom and the children stayed for a time with Grandma Wraysbury. We rode there on the train, which was an adventure for us. Mom and Dad missed each other terribly while he was gone. I remember Mom was very sad. They used to send tapes back and forth and we loved to hear Dad’s voice on the tape.
Dad returned to England and after discussion with the family, he and Mom decided to emigrate to Canada. Their friends were shocked at their decision to leave security and everything they had built for themselves behind and move with 5 children to a far country. But Mom and Dad were adventurous, and off we went.
Dad was offered the practice in Bienfait. ( http://gent-family.com/Bienfait/bienfait.html )We moved there in January 1963. We came by plane. We landed in Winnipeg in the middle of the night in the middle of a cold spell. It was minus 30 or thereabouts. In those days, there weren’t the enclosed walkways to the airplane; we got out on metal stairs. Mom was at the back with Kathryn and as we descended the stairs was yelling “Don’t touch any metal, you’ll stick to it”. Our flight to Regina was delayed and we waited 5 hours in the middle of the night in the Winnipeg airport. One of Dad’s colleagues, also a British Immigrant, Dr. Eddie Miller, met us at the airport in Regina. He took us to the Hotel Saskatchewan, where we spent our first night in Canada. Because it was so cold and dry, there was lots of static electricity in the air, which we had not experienced before. When Mom reached for a light switch, sparks flew. Kathryn (age 2) was highly amused calling out “Ooooh Ooh”. Mom was not quite so amused.
Hotel Saskatchewan
We were shocked at the amount of food served in the restaurants. Our first order of pancakes amazed us. They were huge. We were used to “Skinny pancakes”, which were more like small crepes. Once when Uncle George and Grandma were visiting he ordered a steak and was served first. He though his plate was for all of us, and began cutting it up to divide around.
The next day Dad bought a 1956 Buick, and piled everything and everybody in and off we went to Bienfait.
The Buick
Our first home in Bienfait was three suites in a building on top of the doctor’s office. We rented from Mr. Pidlesaski(sp?). Mom was horrified at the to her archaic laundry facility which was an old wringer washer in the basement. She had left a modern washer and dryer set behind.
Pidlesaski Block and doctor's office.
The fourth suite was rented out to a single woman who worked as a nurse at the Bienfait Hospital. I remember she invited us all over to watch TV our first evening in Canada. We watched “The Beverly Hillbillies” and Hockey Night in Canada. We loved the Beverly Hillbillies but found the hockey incomprehensible. We had never seen ice before.
Beverly Hillbillies
When we first arrived in Bienfait, the phone system was still run by a switchboard operator in a building who connected calls by hand. One would crank a handle, and tell her who you wanted to speak to. She knew everyone in town, and sometimes would say "oh, they are over at so and so's, I'll put you through there". People had phone numbers, but never had to use them. Rural people were still on the party line, and had to listen for their ring. "Rubbernecking" (listening in) on other people's calls was a common pastime.
Bienfait had a large proportion of Ukrainian people. Many of these were older people. One day an older man asked Mom how many children she had. She responded 5. He said “You good woman”. Our family was no longer considered large. Many of our friends came from families of 8 or more children. One family had 12 children, all of whose names began with “D”.
These older people all had huge vegetable gardens. They learned that we loved corn on the cob, which was a treat for us because it would not grow well in England. They used to bring us sacks full of corn on the cob and other vegetables. This would be a hold over from the days when people would pay the doctor in kind, maybe a chicken or some vegetables.
Bienfait from the air
First winters in Canada. No snowblowers then
There is a story told about how Bienfait was named. It is told that when a French Railroad worker pounded in the last spike at the town location he said "Bien fait" or Well done in English. Another story is that two French whisky runners were being chased by US police and when they got over the border, in Bienfait, they said "Bien fait" (well done). Unfortunately the truth is not nearly so romantic. The town was named by the CPR after Antoine Charles Bienfait, a member of a Dutch banking firm that helped finance the railroad. The High School was named Weldon High School, in honour of the story.
Antoine Charles Bienfait
Bienfait was a coal mining town. Most of the men worked in the local coal mines, for minimum wage, then about $1.25 per hour. The town was very poor. The town and many surrounding company towns had been founded when the mines were underground. The work was hard and dangerous, and the men were exploited. In 1931 a union was formed and the miners went on strike. They planned a peaceful rally in Estevan. Unfortunately the authorities did not understand the peaceful nature of the protest and tried to break it up and it turned violent and three of the miners were shot by the RCMP. The story is that the doctors and nuns at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Estevan refused to treat one of the injured miners, and he died when he might have been saved. These three men were buried in the Bienfait Cemetery. A gravestone was erected with their names and “Murdered by RCMP” on it. This quote was later scratched out of the gravestone. It would be re engraved and scratched out several times. Finally a memorial was built and the quote remained. Bienfait had a poll in provincial elections and was the only one in the province that voted 100% NDP.
The Graves of the Slain Miners
The miners started a fundraising campaign, and the Bienfait Coalfields Hospital was built as a result of the event. There was still a lot of enmity between Estevan and Bienfait when we lived there. Many people refused to shop in Estevan. Dad said when he was practicing in Bienfait, there were people who refused to be treated in Estevan when he wanted to send them there if they needed some treatment he did not have available.
Strip Mining
Most of the men in Bienfait still worked in the coal mines, but they were strip mines by the time we lived there. The town was surrounded by these strip mines and the spill piles they left behind. The holes were left open and filled with water after the mine was done. Some of these "pits" as they were called became swimming holes. One near Roche Percee was fed by an underground stream and was quite nice. Mostly they were stagnant and smelly and dangerous as they were uneven and sometimes unstable. In recent years, there has been an effort made to reclaim the spill piles and fill in the pits, but when we lived there they were miles and miles of bare clay rock. It could be likened in some ways to a moon landing sight.
Tailings Ponds
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