“When I started mining there were still a lot of old miners who used the V-cut method to drill and blast the face, and they still mucked by hand and used end-dump cars. When drilling with the V-cut, four powder holes were drilled into the face in a diamond pattern, all angling into the rock toward each other. When this was blasted the rock was blown from the center outward. When this method was in use, steel plates were put down for the blasted rock to land on because it was easier for the men to shovel the muck off those than to shovel off the floor of the mine. End-dump cars were hard to dump, and I learned to do it during the last few months that this method was in use. Soon after I started mining we started drilling bigger holes which went straight into the face. Several holes were drilled - closer together than with the old method. No steel plates were put down to catch the rock, because we also started using muck machines then. They were always bringing out new equipment and you had to change old habits. The old men were emphatically not going to change.

“While I was working in Quebec, I suffered a bad accident and was unable to mine until after the surgeries. When I recovered and went back to mining, I suffered a second accident, so I got out of mining for a bit.

“When we came to BC I worked out at MacMillan Bloedel for a while, then I got my blasting ticket and went back into mining. I applied at Western Mines and because of my past mining experience; I got work driving the Price Adit. Technically, we were not underground mining; the Adit went straight through the mountain from the outside.

“At Myra, the mined out drifts are back-filled so that there are not a lot of empty tunnels underground. This not only prevents cave-ins, it also prevents air blasts. An air blast is caused by compressed air that builds up due to moving and shifting of the rock walls and ceiling. When there is no place else for the air to go it will blast through a wall or a ceiling, which is horrendously dangerous. There was a tremendous air blast when I was at the Kerr-Addison; luckily I was home at that time. There was an old, abandoned mine right next to the Kerr-Addison and the compressed air inside blasted through the wall between the two mines. The blast was so tremendous it felt like an earthquake, the bottle of milk fell of the kitchen table. Our floor was not level so it rolled and we had to chase that bottle through the house!

“My favourite job in all of mining was driving a drift. I loved drilling. On a typical shift, we went in on a clean face, which means that we did not have to start by mucking out from the blasting done by the shift ahead of us. We used drilling machines called Long Toms, which were supported on pistons so that we did not have to lift them manually anymore. These were a lot easier to use than the old drills. On my first day running the new machines I was a little upset, because I had been taught on the Jackleg drill and I had to get the hang of this new one. With the Jackleg, we were taught to drill the collar-hole below the Jackleg so that we could blast an area low enough to lay our railway ties and rails with minimal cleanup. This new machine would not go down low enough, so the holes went in on too steep an angle, making the bed for the ties too deep. This was frustrating for me, but my partner showed me how to manoeuvre the Long Tom to get it down lower. Once I got a handle on it, it was a lot easier than the Jackleg.

“I had an experience with a cougar up at Myra Falls. The compressor up at the Adit broke down so my partner George and I hopped into a truck to get a new part from the warehouse. When we got to the bridge over the creek, we saw a guy fishing down there and I knew him; he was the guy who ran the commissary. I figured it did not take two men to get one part, so I got out and sat on the edge of the bridge to talk to my friend about the fishing situation. George came back along, honked the horn, and pulled up beside me and asked ‘So, what were you doing with that cat?’ Well, I looked around and asked ‘What cat?’ He showed me the imprint where the cougar had been lying in the sand behind me and had run away when the truck came back down the road!

“After work on the Price was done we went up to 500 Level in the open pit and started to drill a drift in the top. Shortly after I got into a kafuffle with the superintendent’s son, a grade foreman, over drill steels, so I quit. The Price Adit is now blocked off, where I had worked.

“After leaving Myra Falls I went up to a silver and galena mine up in the Yukon for a few weeks, and then I came home to Campbell River. I went to work with MacMillan Bloedel, tree thinning and swamping, but my previous back injuries forced me to leave that job. I then got a position doing the pool maintenance at Strathcona Gardens, which I did for many years, before I retired.”