“When I drilled a round for three or four hours, blasted it, and broke it out I felt happy with my work, because it showed that I knew what I was doing - I had accomplished something.”

In the early 1970's, a time when mining was booming in Canada, Amedeo and Palma Russo were convinced by their brother-in-law to come to Paradise and start a new life with their family.

With a young wife and small children to feed, and a language barrier to overcome, Amedeo bravely entered the frightening new world of underground mining at Myra Falls.

Amedeo's Story

“I first went mining when I came here to this country with my wife, Palma, and our children. With four kids you have got no choice, you take a job where you can. I had not mined before that; back home in Italy I was a professional barber, cutting with scissors not clippers. That is the way I grew up with my old man and my three brothers. Every one of us was a barber because my father was a barber. My father was in the army during the war; after that he went to Belgium to work in the coal mines for two or three years, to make a few dollars. When he came back he was a barber again. There were six kids in the family, two girls and four boys, and all four boys worked with the old man.

“Palma and I met in 1965 and by 1970 we had three daughters and a son. We came here to Canada from Naples on March 14, 1972 and arrived in Campbell River on March 15, 1972. I started working in the Lynx mine April 11, 1972. Palma has a sister here and the plan was to come here for a few years and then go back; we never moved back.