Interview with Fred Barns

Now, what is your full name, Mr. Barns?

Fred; Fred S. Barns.


Whereabouts do you live now sir?

We're at 12135-107 Street, right by the industrial airport there; where all the noise is. (laughs)


When did you first come to the city?

We came in Christmas of nineteen-five. I was about 5 months old.


So you start right off with your junior days and your school days. Let's start off right in school. Where did you go to school?

McKay Avenue, up on the hill up there, you know. Up on 105 th Street and 100 th Avenue, I guess. No, it'd be 99 th Avenue, I guess it is. We lived on the sidehill down here on 6 th Street. It used to be number 238, 6 th Street. Before the Parliament buildings were built, or anything like that.


This [Kinsmen Field House] is a good place for this 'do' here [City of Edmonton Archives oral history collection event], because this was a old part of town, you know, the old sawmill was here, and the ferry was right across here.


Right. Right. Can you tell us a little bit about your school days?

Just school days...


What did you used to do when you weren't in school?

Well, we in those days, we couldn't run around like the kids do today, you know. You had to stay home, pretty well. No, we used to play down around the riverbank down here. We played at the old fort. We used to play... us kids played cowboys and Indians, you know. Dig caves in the bank down here. Come down and scramble over the old City of Edmonton steel rail used to be docked right here. Things like that. Lots of bush around. Camping out, things like that.


When you got a little older, did you travel around much in the general area of the city?

Oh yes. Been around... We used to go to... my uncle had a farm out [? unclear]. We used to go duck hunting when we got older, with Dad. We went around quite a bit.


How did you travel?

Well, Dad had a horse and buggy, in those days, and then we had an old Chalmers, an old brass-bound deal. (Laughs) Those smooth, white tires, you know. Yeah. Went in a slough up by Morinville duck hunting. Went right off the road there, right into a slough. Tough going, around those days.


OK, how about your social life when you got into your teens? What sort of things...?

Well, didn't do too much. Just [? unclear] a little dancing, go to a show. I went to normal school, and I taught school for a while. But we didn't do too much. My people were pretty stout Methodists. We couldn't get out and fly around, you know, like as we would have liked to. (laughs)


OK. How about the house you lived in? Do you remember much about it?

Oh yes. It's still over there. It used to be 238, 6 Street, it's 9714-116 th Street, now, 106 th Street, I mean. I took some pictures of it here about a month ago.


OK. Are there any experiences you remember from the first part that kind of stand out in your mind?

Well, I'll always remember the flood. When the 5 th Street Bridge here nearly went out, and all this sawmill stuff [went all the way?] down the river. We had a ball then. We went down on the flats and used the, uh, wooden sidewalks, you know, we were floating around. We'd pull ourselves over in front of a house and then holler for help and they'd come and rescue us. We spent all day getting rescued! (Laughter)


OK. Do you remember at all how some of the districts in the city got their names, you know, like this is Walterdale Flats, after...?

Well, this was the sawmill operator. Walter's mill. I don't think it had anything to do with the brickyard that used to be up the other side of the High Level there. It was the mill; I think that's the chap. They lived down here... and I don't know, I think they... I'm not sure if that was their brick house... that they lived in that house or not. I'm not sure about that. But they lived here.


How about some of the other areas?

Well, Calder, that was named after Mr. Calder. Over here, where we used to go skating, there used to be a big slough out here, the south...


McKernan.

McKernan, yeah. Used to be McKernan Lake out there. We used to walk over the river and come up there skating. [Things?] are all named after people, I think, as far as I know. I don't know anything about the new ones. But McCauley district, named after Mr. McCauley. And I think they were all named after people.


OK. Do you remember how you heated your home in those days?

Oh, sure. We had a coal furnace, and hot air, in the one house. We had steam heat in another house we were in, a little steam boiler. Always coal. Until way on when the gas came in, in what, '29 or '30 or something like that. Yeah. We went out to Viking, when they first struck gas. I'll never forget that. [They] lit the first flare out there. We went out in a train, and hired a cutter, and went out there, and boy, that was quite a sight. Well, then we got gas not long after that. They had it in town.


Right. Did the First World War play any sort of a role in your life at all?

Well, I sold more newspapers that morning than anybody else around the place, I'm telling you. Extra [? unclear] you know. [? unclear] old enough, probably about nine. Sold all kinds of papers. I'll never forget that. (Laughs)


OK. How about the sporting activities? Do you remember much about those?

Well, used to play baseball at school, and we used to go down here and watch the baseball at Diamond Park. I can't remember the name of the team! We used to go to the hockey games, when they had the old Eskimos. And things like that.


All right. Do you remember anything at all about farming or business in those days? The methods, or...?

Well, sure, I worked on farms when I got older. Worked on a dairy farm just out of town here, and worked different places. I was in the insurance business for 5 or 6 years and sold insurance. But mostly in the country. Used to go out to Thorhild, and places like that. The business was pretty good. Everybody had a lot of fun. I think we had more money then than we have now. I mean you could do something with it, at least.


What sort of business was your Dad in?

Well, my Dad was in insurance, had an insurance agency here. He started the Mutual Life of Canada here. He was in that business for forty years. He was on the school board here for 23 years...and they haven't got a school named after him yet! (laughs) I've been working on it, though!


OK. What do you like about today in the city better than those days, or vice-versa?

Well, I don't know. I think it's getting too big. It's nice, things are more comfortable. I mean, you have nice heat, and nicer places to live in, in a way, but I think we had more fun in the old days. I think that's what's the trouble with kids today. They haven't got anything to do, you know? Where can they go? They can't go out and [duck?] a couple of blocks away and take some potatoes and build a fire and roast 'em, and things like this. We used to come down fishing in the river, go swimming, all this sort of thing. There was always something to do.


That was before there was typhoid in the river.

That's right. Before pollution. (laughs)


OK. Thank you, Mr. Barns...