South Peace Historical Society

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  • Table of Contents

    • Part 1: First Nations of the Peace River Region
    • Part 2: The Fur Trade Era
    • Part 3: Transportation and Communication
    • Part 4: Old Timers and the Price of Land
    • Part 5: Dawson Creek: The Story of the Community
    • Part 6: Mysteries, Adventures and Indian Legends
    • Part 7: Arts, Crafts and Recreation
    • Part 8: Agriculture
    • Part 9: Church Histories
    • Part 10: Schools
    • Part 11: Health Care
    • Part 12: Industries and Enterprises
    • Part 13: Policing the Peace
    • Part 14: Pouce Coupe, Rolla, and Other South Peace Communities
    • Part 15: Chetwynd and the Fort St. John Area
    • Part 16: The Alberta Peace
    • Part 17: Natural History of the Peace River Region
    • Part 18: Interviews with Old Timers
    • Part 19: Remembering Our Veterans

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18-099: Mrs. Wetherill of Lone Prairie

Interviewer: “Now ladies and gentlemen we have with us Mrs. Wetherill, who is the daughter of a gentlemen, who homesteaded, right here, at the Dawson Creek townsite, in 1916 – Mr. Wartenbe. Now Mrs. Wetherill settled further west, at a place called Lone Prairie. Would you tell us Mrs. Wetherill why you chose to go to Lone Prairie?”

“We had used our homestead rights in Saskatchewan, so we had spent two years looking for a place outside the Block where we could settle, and we chose Lone Prairie.”

Interviewer: “You must have been far away from the settlement at that time. What did you do for medical care.”

“We were far away from settlement. When we left here at Chases’ and Falks, except for Bill Rosenau at Progress, and there was a stopping place at East Pine. We didn’t have any medical care, only what we could give ourselves. We were very fortunate. The first winter we never even knew they had the flu until it was all over. We never were sick at all.”

Interviewer: “Isn’t that wonderful. Supposing there had been need of a doctor. How far would you have had to go to the closest one?”

“Well, when we first went out there, I don’t think there was a doctor this side of Grande Prairie. Until the doctor came in here to Pouce.”

Interviewer: “How about education then. If you didn’t have any doctors, I suppose you didn’t have any schools.”

“No, we didn’t have any schools. But our children were only small when we went in there. Johnny our oldest boy was three, and Alfie was one. But when they needed school they had correspondence until the end of grade four.”

Interviewer: “Thank you Mrs. Wetherill. Now about crops. You had stock, and did you have grain to feed them?”

“No, we just fed them wild hay at first. Later we ploughed up some land and sowed it to grain, for grain feed, but we had no way of threshing it.”

Interviewer: “What year did you settle there?”

“We filed in 1917, and we moved out there in ‘18.”

Interviewer: “And when did the first school come I that district?”

“It was 1932 when they built our first school.”

Interviewer: “Well thank you very much Mrs. Wetherill. That was wonderful.”

 

« 18-096: Hector Tremblay, Jr.

18-100: Mrs. Anna Willich »

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