Eighty-Three Years in McCauley, by Marion Robinson

My parents following their marriage in Chicago, Illinois, USA, settled in Edmonton, July 1912. Dad was a bartender so soon found a job at the Selkirk Hotel. They initially rented at McDougal Court, then 10463 - 98 Street (immediately north of the Canadian National Railway tracks). It was there I witnessed a serious livery stable fire causing the loss of some horses, and also where dad would take me to the Queen's Avenue school yard (south of the tracks) to play in the sandbox.

In 1925 they bought the house I currently reside in. The community was an area of small businesses, family homes, groceries, apartment blocks, several churches, three schools, three convents, pharmacies, a tailor, dry-cleaner, an elevator "Alberta Flour and Feed Co. (where dad purchased feed for the chickens in our back yard), a portrait studio, Moir and McKenzie plumbers, Jordan dance studio, Edmonton Technical School, Humphrey's music store. Our neighbor Mr. Baker gave piano lessons aided by Miss Scott who taught Spanish guitar.

On 107th Avenue, Miss McVey also taught piano; her father was a piano tuner. On 95th Street was the Patricia Gyro Park (the Gyro's had 9 playgrounds in 1949 (parks) in Edmonton. Children took to the slides, swings, sandboxes, teeter-totters, wading pool, while adults enjoyed lawn bowling.

Pavey Candies Mfg. and McGar in Bakery - housewives purchased the companies cloth, sugar and flour bags to sew kitchen curtains, dishtowels, pillowslips, etc.

Hook signs annually fabricated numerous floats for the Exhibition (now Klondike) parade. We faithfully gathered the trims for our playhouses. Capital Laundry on 110th Avenue. The Immigration Building at 10534 - 100 Street was teaming with new immigrants who had just gotten off the train before they started their new lives in Edmonton.

The vast expanse of land, formerly a Federal Penitentiary (the only penitentiary in Canada to own and operate a coal mine) was occupied by Chinese Market Gardeners. We would see them coming down the street, their pushcarts loaded with fresh vegetables. Across the street from us, Mrs. Smith, a colored lady ran a steam baths operation.

With few radios, no television, children played outdoors - riding bicycles, scooters, sleighs in winter. Games: anti-anti I over, hopscotch on city sidewalks, hide-and-go-seek, jacks (girls), marbles (boys), horseshoes for adults, baseball, picnics, picking wild fruits; choke cherries, Alberta wild rose petals, and saskatoons mothers made into jams and jellies. Also picking vegetables from our backyard and vacant gardens (the latter were rented at 50 cents a season) from the city.

In the evenings, after dusk, families and neighbors would gather on house verandas to watch the dazzling displays of aurora-borealis (northern lights). Those same verandas often featured brightly colored hammocks, very welcome for an afternoon siesta!

Milk and bread were delivered by horse-drawn wagons. Storekeepers also residents treated the horses to goodies - apples, lumps of sugar.

Neighbors were close --- sharing, helping others.

The 1916 prohibition law cost my father's job - mother went to work at Lafleche Brothers Ltd.; a tailoring firm established in 1906 (the 4th generation is currently operating the firm).