Tuesday, September 19, 2023

Tuesday Treasures

 Tom the backroads traveller hosts this weekly meme.


August 2023 - Whitehorse Yukon

Whitehorse has these great sculptures scattered around the city.


Again I had never heard of Edith Josie, but when we met our fellow tour participants, one woman was especially delighted that our flight from Inuvik would make a stop in Old Crow. She went on to explain about Edith Josie.





Edith Josie CM (December 8, 1921 – January 31, 2010) was a Canadian writer, best known as a longtime columnist for the Whitehorse Star.

A Gwich'in, Josie was born in Eagle, Alaska, and moved to Old Crow at age 16. She earned a living selling animal skins, which her father had taught her at an early age how to trap and prepare. In her later years, Josie contributed to a community website, oldcrow.ca.

Her columns began appearing in the Whitehorse Star under the banner "Here are the News". Generally, the news consisted of when the plane came and what it brought...who was out on the trapline...where the caribou were running...and what the berry season was like. Pretty mundane stuff until you realize that for a people with only an oral tradition, this material is really as complete a record of their times as possible. 
Edith began writing for the Star in late 1962, when Reverend James Simon and his wife came to town. His wife Sarah has been asked by Harry Boyle, then editor of the Star, to look for someone who would handle the job of “Old Crow correspondent.” Sarah Simon asked Edith Josie, because “most of the ladies had someone to look after them. Edith Josie didn’t have a husband to look after her, so I gave Edith the job.”

She wrote the way she spoke...in straightforward Gwichin-influenced English. 

The editors of the Star, after a startled double-take at the items scrawled diary-style on white stationary, decided that to edit Edith Josie at all would be to destroy her journalistic charm. The column ran whenever an airplane brings it into Whitehorse from the hinterlands. Its appearance was highly dependent upon the weather in the territory.

One of her first newsletters reported on the arrival of an Anglican Bishop and his wife to hold Easter services in Old Crow. Edith writes just as she talks.

"AT 1:30 THE SERVICE WAS ON AND SURE GLAD TO HEAR EVERYTHING ABOUT JESUS, WHAT THEY DID TO HIM ON GOOD FRIDAY."

Shortly thereafter she reported on the state of things at the “ratting” (muskrat trapping) grounds at Crow Flats, in muskeg country 50 miles upriver (south) form Old Crow.

JOHN JOE KAY AND HIS FAMILY AND DICK NUKON AND FAMILY CAME INTO TOWN FROM THEIR RATTING CAMP. THEY REPORTED NO RATS AROUND THERE BUT THEY SAY TOO MANY MOSQUITO. TOO BAD NO PRIZE ON MOSQUITO.

Edith lived in a two-room uninsulated log cabin at the east end of the village. The cabin was starkly furnished with a table, a couple of chairs and three beds pushed up against the rough wooden walls. It was heated by a wood stove that also is used for cooking, “and in winter it gets as cold inside as it does outside most of the time.”

Edith never married but she raised three children. For many years she shared her cabin with her two sons and daughter, her blind mother Mrs. Elizabeth Josie, her brother and his wife and their two children.
Like the other women in the village, Edith butchered and cooked the meat brought home by the men, dried spring meat for the summer, gathered berries, and tanned skins for sewing. She carried up water from the river and gathered willow branches for kindling. She was a faithful member of the Anglican Church and was active in the Women’s Auxiliary which played an important role in the community. She wrote her “News” at a huge plywood table.

 "Even now the spring has come cause it is daylight around 11 o'clock p.m. Pretty soon we won't use light for night time. Everyone glad to see plane every day. Even the same plane come in one day, they all have to go down to see what is going on and what come in on plane."

"ALBERT ABEL WENT UP RIVER SET TRAP AROUND DRIFT WOOD. HE CAME BACK. HE CAUGHT 9 MARTINS, 1 WEASEL. GEE, HE’S LUCKY MAN."

 Soon, the Edmonton Journal began running the News from Old Crow and, soon after that, the Fairbanks Daily News Miner took up her columns, all hand-written.

But times can be tough. Sometimes there was neither food nor money enough to make ends meet.

AT 8:30PM I HAD BABY BOY AND HE’S 6LB. MISS EDITH JOSIE HAD BABY BOY AND I GIVE IT TO MRS. ELLEN ABEL TO HAVE HIM FOR HIS LITTLE BOY. SHE WAS VERY GLAD TO HAVE HIM CAUSE HE’S BOY. I WAS IN NURSE STATION AND MISS YOUNGS SURE TREAT ME VERY NICE. MYSELF AND BABY I REALLY THANKS HER VERY MUCH FOR HER GOOD KINDNESS TO ME.

HELICOPTER BEEN TO OLD CROW AND WENT DOWN RIVER TO CAMP.

SINCE LAST WEEK ALL THE LEAVES ARE GETTING YELLOW. THAT MEAN AUTUMN IS COMING. WHEN THE LEAVES GROW GREEN SURE NICE BUT AT FALL TIME IT’S TURN TO YELLOW – MORE BEAUTIFUL.

Eighteen months later, Edith was solvent enough to reclaim her baby son Kevin, from Mrs. Abel.

She was the subject of a story, "Everybody Sure Glad," by Dora Jane Hamblin in Life magazine in 1965. In 1995 Josie was made a member of the Order of Canada. The National Aboriginal Achievement Awards, now the Indspire Awards, honoured Josie for her achievements in arts in 2000.

Click here to read her autobiography.



One hundred twenty miles south of the Arctic Ocean and eighty miles north of the Arctic Circle, the Yukon village of Old Crow straggles along a bluff above the Porcupine River. The 200-plus people who live there are mainly Loucheaux Indians of the Vuntut Gwich’in tribe – the “People of the Lakes.”




Old Crow is a village in transition these days but access is still only possible by air and, in summer, a riverboat named Brainstorm. At times, some of the men will leave the village to work in a mining camp but the life of the Loucheaux people has been much the same as it was a century or more ago. They pick berries. They hunt caribou for food, trap muskrats and martens and wolves for pelts to sell; in winter they put nets under the ice of the Porcupine River to catch the fish which feed the dogs which pull the sleds which take them to hunting and trapping grounds.

In summer, Old Crow is the hottest place in the Yukon, often reaching temperatures in the mid-30s C and infested with black fly. In winter the temperature can drop to -50 C before windchill. The sun does not rise at all for three weeks in winter; it does not set for two months in summer.













Monday, September 18, 2023

Monday Mural

 I'm linking up at Monday Mural


August 2023 - Whitehorse Yukon

Beside our hotel. The wall of Triple J's Collective (211 Wood Street - formerly the Yukon News building) that faces the Sternwheeler Hotel features a mural by Emma Barr, created in 2021.



Saturday, September 16, 2023

Coffee, Tea and Spice

 Linking up with Marg at The Intrepid Reader

September 2023 - Toronto ON

August 2023 - Whitehorse Yukon


Another very quiet week for us. John bottled his wine. He golfed and had a lesson. We went for mani-pedis. I got a haircut and spent some time roaming. I added to John's depleting Scotch supply. I repotted some plants.
The plumber came and replaced the gasket, saying he hoped that was the problem (cheaper) and not a bigger problem ($$$), like a leak. I am to keep him updated. These toilets are now grandfathered in our building. 
John completed his paperwork for his passport renewal, he still has to get the photos done.

These stupid news (???) stories annoy me. Family loses $7K Europe trip due to passport issues. They claim they travel every year and they didn't think to renew their passports!

I saw some very interesting sushi in a new store in Union Station. 
Kibo is a Canadian sushi chain brand offering high-quality, accessible selections of sushi and other Japanese food choices. We derived our name from the Japanese interpretation of “hope” (“希望” kibō), inspired by the power of sushi to nourish, to uplift, and to bring people together.




I did bake a delicious banana cranberry cheese cake which we had for breakfast.


While out I saw this group (6-7) of young Mennonite men, all in blue jeans, various plaid shirts, suspenders, hats and no phones!!!


Another sight I've seen recently is a older woman (grandmother?) young woman and two babies in a stroller. They have been begging around Union Station. Beggars are not unusual around here. But these look like travellers or the more pejorative term gypsies that I have only seen in Europe.

COOKING

We need to use up some stuff in the freezers.

Saturday spaghetti  and meatballs - the frozen ones. I'm not a huge fan.

Sunday hamburger patty, gravy, mashed potatoes, peas for me and corn for John

Monday wings and fries

Tuesday broccoli and mushroom quiche and salad

Wednesday leftover quiche with cheese biscuits

Thursday pork belly bites with salad

Friday steak, baked potato and broccoli.

WATCHING

WOO HOO season 13 of Great British Bake Off is streaming on CBC Gem! I have to wait to watch the final as CBC has it locked for Premium i.e. you have to pay for it. I can wait.

READING

Perfect Crime didn't grab me although it was a good storyline.

The Downstairs Neighbor definitely had my attention! I couldn't see where this was going!!

I tried getting into Truth and Other Lies but it just started too slowly and I couldn't like the main character, although her mother is even worse. I don't need/want any ultra-conservative characters.

I started  Paper Money. It's been years since I read Ken Follett (before the Internet). 

Friday, September 15, 2023

Weekend Roundup

 Welcome to The Weekend Roundup...hosted by Tom The Back Roads Traveler



1. Starts with "K"
2. A Favorite
3. KITCHEN - by Tom

Starts with "K"

KIWI


FAVOURITE


KITCHEN



Monday, September 11, 2023

Tuesday Treasures

 Tom the backroads traveller hosts this weekly meme.


August 2023 - Whitehorse Yukon

The beauty of travel is what you learn. I had never heard of the Canadian artist before.

This was on a street corner.


I remembered I had seen something about him when we were in the MacBride Museum.



TED HARRISON


Edward Hardy (Ted) Harrison was born in Wingate, County Durham, England to Charles Edward Harrison and Martha Harrison (née Thirlaway). He attended primary and grammar school in Wingate after which he attended West Hartlepool College of Art. In 1945, he interrupted his studies to serve in the Intelligence Unit of the British Army.

After a three-year tour in North Africa, he returned to England and completed his studies, earning a National Diploma in Art from West Hartlepool College of Art in 1948 and the Art Teacher Diploma from King’s College, University of Durham (now Newcastle University) in 1951. He then taught in Middlesbrough, England until 1957 when he taught at General Slim School, Cameron Highlands. While there, he was invited to paint a wall mural in the Perak Tong Temple at Ipoh, Cameron Highlands, the first European to receive that honour. He married Robina McNichol in 1960. In 1963, they left Malaysia for New Zealand, where Harrison taught at Te Kauwhata District High School, North Island.

In 1966 the Harrisons, with son Charles, returned to England where Harrison taught at the Wingate Junior School in the same classroom he and his father had attended as students. A year later, he became Art Master at Dene House. In 1967, the Harrison family moved to Wabasca, a small town in northern Alberta where he taught at St. Theresa School. The following year, he took a teaching position at Carcross, Yukon.

In 1969, Harrrison held his first Canadian exhibition in the Whitehorse Library. In 1977, he received his B. Ed from the University of Alberta. In 1980, Harrison resigned from teaching to paint full-time. The Harrisons moved to British Columbia, in 1993.

Born on August 28, 1926 in England. Died on January 16, 2015. Nationality is Canadian.



Click here to view some of his work.

Monday Mural

 

I'm linking up at Monday Mural


July 2023 - Toronto ON

Yorkville










MURAL UPDATE

2019 various editions.






Saturday, September 9, 2023

Caribou Coffee

Linking up with Marg at The Intrepid Reader

September 2023 - Toronto ON

August 2023 - Carcross Yukon


Saturday John went to get groceries. We wanted corn on the cob but it took three tries before he found some.
We lazed around as we are still recouping from colds we got on vacation. We did take Covid tests and they were negative. We're pretty sure John picked this up on the White Pass Yukon train when a group of late American tourists were quickly loaded into our car and they coughed the entire trip. 

Sunday friends came over to watch the air show from our roof. It was hot and clouds rolled in making it hard to see the planes.






People were lined up along the lake.






Monday was a holiday, Labour Day.

The rest of the week is a bit of a blur. John took the car in for maintenance, needed a new battery.
Did a Costco run. Met my BFF for a chin wag. 
John golfed Wednesday and Friday.
A trip to the post office to mail some postcards. 
John returned that cheap ($100) camera, it was a piece of junk, batteries couldn't hold a charge, photos off-coloured.
It was a hot and humid week.
I was gifted a mug by my BFF.


It matches my embroidery!



Royal York is decked out in red roses.



I thought she just had a backpack, turns out it was a bird cage...


John sent this from the golf course.





COOKING
Saturday corn on cob fresh sourdough bread

Sunday chicken divan

Monday hamburger stew

Tuesday rotisserie chicken nachos

Wednesday fish chowder

Thursday ordered pizza 850 Degrees

Friday steak and sauteed mushrooms, peppers and onions


WATCHING

I convinced John that he should watch Mad Men with me. He is enjoying it although there are a lot of rants from him about the way men acted!
 We also started Shelter. Mickey lives with a mother in rehab, a dead father, an annoying aunt and a new school in New Jersey. When a creepy old woman tells him that his father isn't dead, Mickey thinks he's losing his mind.



READING

I read A Serial Killer's Daughter recommended by Jinjer The Intrepid Angeleno . The incessant bible quotes and her talks with God didn't bother me either. But if you want to know more about the crimes you'll have to find another book. 

I started The Profession of Violence: The Rise and Fall of the Kray Twins. I gave up on it towards the end as I knew the outcome.

Friday, September 8, 2023

Weekend Roundup

 Welcome to The Weekend Roundup...hosted by Tom The Back Roads Traveler



1. Starts with "J"
2. A Favorite
3.  JOY - by Tom

Starts with "J"
JERKY






FAVOURITE
JAMES JOYCE Dublin Ireland





JOY
Austin Texas