A TRIP INTO YESTERDAY

By: Patrick F. Gushue March 7, 1990

 

Through the eyes of youth, the world is a mystery. Today lands of the North above latitude 46 degrees remain a mystery to the majority of North Americans.

 

Of the four European cultures to the North, three readily come to mind: American, Canadian and Quebecois. The fourth culture of the Isle of Newfoundland and the shores of the Labrador remains a mystery to all too many today.

 

A typical trip during the springtime of 1948 in Newfoundland is a choice of train, ship or overland by road in part. The island did not have a trans-island road system until the 1960's.

 

As a youth, my trip on what I later learned was the "Newfie Bullet", so called because of a lack of speed by which it took to cross the Island of Newfoundland, I watched spruce and fir trees pass by for hour after hour and once in a while broken by a house looking more like an oversized garage, in the middle of nowhere. Only telegraph wires broke the line of sight by their moving up and down into view, like a fast or slow moving wave depending upon the terrain we were crossing.

 

Inside the train there was excitement of travel and boredom of youth. Hour after hour, the same sight passed within view, both inside and outside, broken only by conversation, but, who speaks to a child who is tired of colouring books.

 

Later it was bedtime. The train car was transformed from seats to a series of curtained off space as porter's pulled at ceiling cupboards to bring down a bed, while changing seats into lower berth's. With the rattle of iron wheels upon iron rails, upon a railbed, a sound sleep was not far away for a youth.

 

Upon my mother awakening me, it was time to dress and depart the train. We were approaching either Port aux Basques or Avondale Stations.

 

After disembarking we awaited our luggage was removed from the baggage car. While at Avondale Station time gave me a chance to explore the station area. I ran along the wooden platform toward the front and steam hissing noise. The huge train engine, as big as many buildings nearby. The view looked like any small New England Village. The houses, barns and other outbuildings with hay fields as far as the eye could see, and beyond with evergreen forests. The dirt roads leading off to unknown places cluttered with horse and wagon, or buggy, carriage and dray. All without a vehicle in sight. Places like Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts and Kings Landing in New Brunswick are both the Avondale, Newfoundland of 1948.

  A WHALE OF A TIME AT BACON COVE, NEWFOUNDLAND

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Copyright 1998 - Patrick F. Gushue

Picture: Corel Gallery(tm) Magic 200,000

Music: Lots of Fish in Bonavist' Harbour/I's the B'y from Traditional Canadian Tunes in midi format