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Some may say that we are a disfunctional family, but in reality every
member of the family chooses their own destiny, with never ending guidance and help from the father and mother.
Actually we are a very close knit and loving family, with something
like the motto "one for all, and all for one".
This is not to say that we never had our
ups and downs, like all families do, but somehow we managed to stay together.
As the family
grew, so did the family bond grow.
We are an average family with varying interests. They
say there are no two children alike, and that certainly applies to our family. All the children are now grown up, and
have left home, except for the youngest member of the family. He had the misfortune of having been diagnosed with having
Leukemia, on December 7, 2001. He will not be able to work again for a whole year.
All
the children are honest and hardworking, just like their father and mother. Both Herb and Rose, enjoy working with and
helping people.
Rose enjoyed working at banks, and worked the longest at the Bank of Montreal,
and retired from there, on September 15, 1995. She especially liked helping elderly people that were having problems
with their banking. She also trained all three of our daughters to work in the bank. Two of the daughters, left
the bank, but one stayed to become a manager.
The advantage of having a mother that
worked most of her life in the bank, is that she can give good banking advice to the children. Rose has done this, and
especially with her youngest son who now has Leukemia. By now, he knows more about banking and ATM machines, than I
do.
Herb loved helping the children, even after he retired. This is a carry
over from what he did all his life. From a very early age he learned to work with and support his fellow workers and
the average person. The first person to teach him this was his step-father. Herb did not understand at first,
what his step-father tried to tell him, but later on in life his words came back to him, and Herb realized what he meant.
Herb then made a career of it.
This way of life was set in stone, after a Superintendant
once told Herb that "you think you cannot be replaced", while Herb was doing his regular work, and did not do or say anything
to provoke this boss. He was just having a bad day, somehow.
It was not long after
this that Herb became involved in Unions. He believed in the rights of workers to work safely, earn a good wage and
to retire with a good pension. He firmly did not believe in 10% of the citizens, controlling the other 90%.
When he worked in the Post Office, he became deeply involved in union activities. At first there was only
an "association" representing the workers. Most of the bosses in the Post Office at that time were ex-officers from
World War 11, as were those who were running the "association". There was a lot of favouritism then, and your job
depended on how well you suck-holed up to the boss.
Well, this is one thing that Herb would
never do for anyone, but he believed in doing an honest days work, and survived the period of favouritism. He realized
early that the association had to go, and that a full fledged union was required to protect the workers and their jobs.
Not long after that Herb and a number of other employees, with the same concerns, organized the first Union
in the Post Office. After a number of years this union became one of the best, and the most democratic in the country.
After helping to organize, Herb's main union activities were to represent the workers in Health & Safety
and in Workers Compensation until his retirement.
Because of his integrity, he was respected
by both the Union and Management.
| Herb giving Union course on WCB |
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| Coffe break during WCB course |
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I am now retired, and have changed my lifestyle almost completely -- from that of a steady worker, to one who loves to
enjoy outdoor nature, like touring, camping, fishing, etc. One thing that I did not give up from my work days, was my
computer. I loved to write and the computer made it so much more creative, interesting and challenging, as compared
to the old typewriter.
I was.born in Muenster, Saskatchewan on October 11, 1930, which is in about the center of the province.
It was a grain growing type of living that they had there, mixed in with raising cattle, pigs, etc. There were seven
children in our family.
We lived a mile west of Muenster, and about 4 miles south. Our one-room country school was another mile west, and
about another 3 miles south. We would walk to school, ride horseback, or drive a buggy in summer, and a caboose in winter.
I recall going to school at times in winter, when the snow was so deep, that you couldn't even see the fence posts, on the
sides of the road.
As a youngster, I was responsible on the farm to round up the cattle twice a day, by horseback -- like a cowboy.
My horse was medium sized, she was not small like a pony, nor big like a farm work horse. My horse's name was Sally,
and we were almost always together
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Watching the Northern Lights
was really a beautiful sight to watch as they danced, twisted and turned
in the northern, night sky.
But of equal beauty, and less talked about was the cold winter night
scene of bright "moonlight" glistening off the frozen waves of crystalized snow banks. Often
it was almost as bright as daylight.
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Just Like A Movie!
Watching the awesome Northern Lights, was a favourite past-time when we
were young and living in the central and northern prairie provinces. Another beautiful site was watching the bright
moonlight glistening off of frozen snow banks.
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I handled all the local union's Health & Safety problems, and everything that related to Workers Compensation
-- for over twenty years, and it took me about five years to finalize all the WCB claims and appeals that I had after I retired.
For the first ten or so years, it wasn't too bad, because I was the only one in union and management that new
anything about it. Finally, after I kept on winning more and more appeals -- management sent some specialists from Ottawa
to train the management personnel, and after that things got harder and took longer to do.
The last several years were hard, and contributed to my decision on when I should retire.
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| The only photo of me and my horse Sally |
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