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SUMMARY: "The Hornby Collection" is an anthology of plays, documentaries, interviews and selected fiction for radio -- all written, prepared and produced in British Columbia. Part 1: "Idylls of the Church" fea;tures Sam Roddans's stories about his father, the Rev. Andrew Roddan of Vancouver. [T4303:0046] Part 2: "Region of Icebergs" is a play by Christopher Dafoe, in which a man on a ship entertains himsel;f with masks and false credentials. [T4303:0088];

The item consists of an audio interview with Edna Anderson recorded in New Westminster, B.C. on August 30, 1984.

Tape summary:
Track 1: Edna Anderson was born in New Westminster in 1918 and grew up in Queensborough. Her father was a blacksmith at Fraser Mills. She was an only child. Her mother was didn't work for wages, except during the Depression, when she worked as a domestic. She describes the kitchen as she remembers it when she was a child. They didn't have electricity or running water in their first years at Queensborough. Describes what a typical day was for her mother. Family had a garden and raised chickens for family consumption. Describes laundry production, shopping, canning, etc. She attended the Queensborough Elementary School until grade 4, and grades 5 through 9 were taken at Central School in New Westminster. She didn't attend high school due to the Depression. Took domestic science beginning in grade 6. Describes what they learned in both cooking and sewing.

Track 2: Continues talk on domestic science class. Talks about a girl's role in society. She married at the age of 30, in 1948. Lived in a suite in her parents' home.

The item consists of an audio interview with Christine McNab recorded in Victoria B.C. on August 9, 1983.

Tape summary:
Track 1: Christine McNab lived with her mother in a home provided by B.C. Tel in Saanich in 1920. Describes home, had to pump the water into the washroom tanks. She and her mother lived alone and ran telephone office, hired 8 other women. Went to Girls' Central and was taught by Miss Juniper. Was not impressed by anything she took, although says she did try the recipes out at home. At Normal School they took "Nature Study" and had garden plots, "a psychological garden". The classes there were not mixed. Summer jobs included filing, gardening and picking fruit. Teaching salaries dropped during the Depression, married women could not teach, and they were not allowed to have "bobbed" hair. Didn't think many of the classes in Normal School were very practical. Her first principal was a woman, she was shocked when she met her and she was wearing slacks!

Track 2: Church activities, organizational activities, worked for IODE and Teachers' Federation and Teachers' Association (fairly political). Worked for wages and working condition improvements.

The item consists of an audio interview with Lillian Williams recorded in Victoria, B.C. on July 12, 1983.

Tape summar:
Track 1: Lillian Williams was born in England in 1903 and came to Canada at age 8 1/2. She describes her home on Shelbourne Street and the daily tasks required in looking after a family. The family's social functions are discussed -- church functions, picnics; her mother belonged to many organizations. She remembers having difficulty adjusting to the Canadian school system. Attended Girls' Central, Oakland School, Victoria High and Normal School. Started teaching in 1921 at Mill Bay.

Track 2: Lillian Williams set up her own home in 1928 in the community of Glenora and had a family of six children. She describes the difficulties during the Depression. Returned to teaching in 1952 when her husband was injured in an accident. Compares her own childhood with that of her children.

PERIOD COVERED: ;1913;-;1955 RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), [197-?] SUMMARY: In a series of recorded reminiscences, Alfred E. Booth describes his travels on the B.C. coast, and in the Lower Mainland, Nicola and North Thompson regions; the Hope-Princeton Highway and the Boundary region; the Canadian Arctic (March 1955); coastal steamship travel; Kamloops to Calgary via the Big Bend highway; Alberta and N.W.T. oil and fields; Vancouver Island (especially its west coast and interior); the Lower Mainland; the Depression in the B.C. interior, and showing films in the relief camps. Throughout, Booth also discusses his experiences as an amateur and semi-professional filmmaker throughout the province. The second side of tape 5 discusses the senior's residence Booth was living in at the time of the recording, and includes some harmonica music performed by a friend of Booth's.

CALL NUMBER: T4029:0003 RECORDED: Ladner (B.C.), 1982-12-21 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Warren Cameron comments and reflects on his experiences as an infantryman in France in WWI. Military training very inadequate. Conditions in trenches. Equipment. Food. Killing. TRACK 2: Game Commission staff were political appointments. Recollections of bootlegging and bootleggers in Fraser Valley. Use of ships to transport liquor. Tunnel at Boundary Bay for liquor smuggling. Comments about two notorious hijackers -- Sowash and Baker. Anecdotes and comments about prostitute Pansy May -- "I'm a good woman", befriended by Mr. Cameron. Recollections of Commissioner Bryan Williams -- a "game hog", when he was re-appointed as commissioner he was tempted to fire entire staff as political appointees. A "good old guy". Comments about A.P. Cummings, the first game warden of Chilliwack. Names different wildlife in Chilliwack Valley.;

CALL NUMBER: T4029:0004 RECORDED: Ladner (B.C.), 1982-12-21 SUMMARY: [No content summary available for this tape.];

CALL NUMBER: T4029:0001 RECORDED: Ladner (B.C.), 1982-12-02 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Warren "Slim" Cameron discusses game law enforcement under the Provincial Police, 1919-1929. Game Department was a "political organization". Bryan Williams. Comments on A.P. Cummings, warden for Fraser Valley and early commissioners Gary Bolton, Jim Cunningham, Frank Butler. Indian trappers a problem in the interior. TRACK 2: Slim Cameron recalls his policy of enforcement during the 1930s. Recollections of bootleggers and their methods, graft, in Fraser Valley, Columbia Valley, and Ladner. Use of Provincial police to quell disturbances in relief camps and in Anyox miners' strike. Cameron's involvement in Bagley and Fawcett bank robbery. Tact in law enforcement. Story of pheasant poacher. Shooting "for market" pre-1913.

CALL NUMBER: T4029:0002 RECORDED: Ladner (B.C.), 1982-12-02 SUMMARY: [No content summary available for this tape.]

CALL NUMBER: T2370:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Obstetrics and gynecology, 1927-1975 (tape 1) RECORDED: West Vancouver (B.C.), 1976-02-27 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Introduction; education; parents; interning at VGH in 1933; the Depression years; setting up practice; West Vancouver 1935; difficulties encountered; payment method; treatments used during the mid-1930s, prior to antibiotics; public attitude towards health care in the 1930s; anecdote regarding a miscarriage in 1937. TRACK 2: Anecdotes regarding menopause, hemorrhoids, anemia patient in 1937; army career, 1942 to 1946; treatments used during the Second World War; first Canadian hospital to use penicillin in 1943; setting up practice upon return to Canada in 1946; 1948-1958, the effect of various birth control methods upon practice; social attitudes towards birth control; abortion; sexuality in the 1940s and 1950s.

CALL NUMBER: T2370:0002 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Obstetrics and gynecology, 1927-1975 (tape 2) RECORDED: West Vancouver (B.C.), 1976-02-27 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Discussion of the IUD -- history, use, etc.; changes in childbirth methods over the years; discussion of newer developments in the 1970s. Development of hospitals on the North Shore, pioneered by Dr. E.A. Martin; North Vancouver General Hospital, 1928; Lions Gate Hospital, 1961; discussion of medical staff; patients today; general health attitudes. [TRACK 2: blank.]

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Tuberculosis control RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-03-15 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Introduction; coming to Vancouver, interning at Vancouver General Hospital in 1927; becoming Second Assistant Superintendent in 1930; the Depression; becoming First Assistant Superintendent in 1932; first interest in tuberculosis; change to Tranquille Sanatorium in 1937; condition there, patients' attitudes, treatments. TRACK 2: Effects of the Second World War on Tranquille; opening Pearson Hospital, changes in treatment of tuberculosis from 1952 to 1970; changes in facilities from 1952 to 1970.

CALL NUMBER: T2354:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Industrial first aid in BC RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-03-02 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Early personal history; 1914 to 1929 lived in Nanaimo; went to Princeton to work in the coal mines; description of working there; 1935, went to Bridge River Valley above Lillooet; in 1937, came down to Duncan for a while, and left for Princeton again; back to Kamloops to work at Windpass Mine, a gold mine; some details of the life in each of these places; work camps and the Depression; uses of mules in the mines; went to work in Industrial Timber Mills for seven months on Vancouver Island; requirements for industrial first aid attendant at the time Mr. Mottishaw was in it at Windpass Mine; some accidents at Windpass; went to Zeballos in 1939 and worked as a first aid attendant; description of life and what he did there. TRACK 2: More description of Zeballos; the miners that were there; how the community lived; medical services available during the time he lived on Vancouver Island; "Thomas Crosby" one of the boats; Shantymen's Christian Association Hospital at Esperanza; Dr. R. D. McLean; Dr. Sharpe, Dr. Lewison; problems of delivering heath care; Reverend McLean's son drowned; communication and transportation; marriage in 1940; leaves Zeballos a few years later, around 1945; works as a first aid attendant at Kelly Douglas Distributors for one year; goes to work in foundry. CALL NUMBER: T2354:0002 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Industrial first aid in BC RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-03-02 SUMMARY: TRACK !: Foundry business in New Westminster working for four years; active in the Industrial First Aid Attendants' Association; December 1947 went with forest first aid; history of industrial first aid; starts 1932; late 1800s first, first aid committee formed to update workers' first aid program; composed 50% each of Workers Compensation Board and St. John's first aid; problem of getting a textbook and trying to arrange a program for mass interest; instructor exams come into being; Dr. Salsbury writes first industrial first aid book; a collective text begins on the revision; joins the WCB in 1943; becomes an official examiner; new book being written under auspices of BCB; first first aid; St. John Ambulance, 1964 to 1969; basis of change reviewed; how first aid training progresses and how they are graded; 1959 first instructors course. TRACK 2: Numbers of people changed; Sloan Commission discussed; oxygen therapy becomes adopted into industrial first aid; Tysoe report discussed; this gave WCB the authority to pass rules and laws concerning industry; problems faced by the WCB in trying for form rules and get authority; new areas being used to get industrial first aid across to the public. CALL NUMBER: T2354:0003 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Industrial first aid in BC RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-03-02 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Discussion of the reasons for updating information for the masses and the hopes of using modern media for teaching. [TRACK 2: blank.]

CALL NUMBER: T2013:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Health care and social assistance PERIOD COVERED: 1928-1960 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-20 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Brief personal introduction with a description of UBC in 1928 and the decision to go into nurses training at VGH in 1929; includes a description of courses, hours, and discipline; job shortages of the Depression years and the decision to study public health at McGill from 1931 to 1933; work in Family Services in Montreal; description of service; religious divisions, problems in Griffintown; juveniles and comparison with Vancouver; job offers and the return to Vancouver; out-patients at VGH in 1936, with a description of buildings, patients, dental clinic, staff, volunteers and cup of soup; joined the City Relief Department in 1937 and describes the staff under the direction of Dr. Jack Muscovitch. TRACK 2: Social workers and the medical section with mention of responsibilities and services; effects of the Depression on people, allowances, violent attitudes; reporters; unique service of medical section; doctors services and medical histories; post-war years; employment on the Sea Wall; mental assessments; placement program growth out of VGH overcrowding; problems in regulating; lack of staff; numbers of clients; anecdotes on persuading people to enter boarding homes; atmosphere at placement institutions; night school courses; private homes, problems associated with uprooting and adjustment of elder clients. CALL NUMBER: T2013:0002 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Health care and social assistance PERIOD COVERED: 1935-1976 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-20 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Conclusion of anecdote; role with alcoholics and Salt Spring Farm; hospital; drunk tank; need for a cleansing station; social life in boarding houses; sitting room regulations; recreation and; the role of volunteer organisations; effects of the Second World War and the reduction in staff; changes in public attitude; rise in young people on relief; increase in professional social workers; involvement in rationing and accompanying anecdote; changes in the services; dental plan; appliances; caseloads; increases in allowances; clothing allowances; nutrition services; referral resources; relationship with the Metropolitan Health Department; consultation, referrals, overlapping interests; geriatrics. TRACK 2: Gradual acceptance of geriatric centres; trends in services; attitudes of staff and public; customer orientation of building and furniture; medical aspects of the social assistance program; 60% of clients; promotes health problems; problems of single men; staff experiment living on an allowance; effects on social assistance and trend to younger people in the 1960s and 1970s; lessons learned about human nature with examples of New York and Sweden and the nature of Canadians; summary of medical program; services; abuse; payments.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): General practice in BC PERIOD COVERED: 1920-1976 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-24 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Description of early farming life in Alberta; elementary education at Sylvan Lake; high school in Red Deer; interest in medicine; attended the University of Alberta in Edmonton; first class that graduated in medicine in 1925; description of some of the classes; internship in Edmonton and then at Vancouver General Hospital; graduated in 19265; worked for one year with Dr. Walsh in general practice in Vancouver; bought a practice from Dr. Alvin in Ladner, 1927 to 1939; what rural practice was like; house calls; lots of fractures, maternity, lacerations; improvised stretcher in his car; effects of the Depression on his practice; payment in food rather than money; post-graduate work in Chicago and New York; practicing in Vancouver as a G.P.; decided he liked people too much to become a surgeon; Cook County Hospital and how he enjoyed these places; description of his office at 925 West Georgia; some interesting cases. TRACK 2: Continued description of some interesting cases; mention of obstetrician Dr. Will Burnett; comments on the Leboyer method of childbirth; midwifery's legal status; changes in medicine; antibiotics; surgery and TB; pneumonia; changes in medicine, mainly in interpersonal patient/doctor relationship; the advent of more specialised training; doctors today have a better study.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Practice and TB Treatment in BC PERIOD COVERED: 1923-1970 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-23 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Description of Victoria Square, Ontario, where she grew up; description of education in Victoria Square and Richmond Hill; reasons why she went into medicine; description of medical training; at the University of Toronto from 1923 to 1930; courses; discrimination; summer internship at St. John's Hospital on Major Street, Toronto; summer internship at Vancouver General Hospital; 1930 to 1931, first staff ward at Vancouver General Hospital as Dr. H.H. Pitts' assistant in the lab; did general histology; description of how lab changed over the years; job hunting during the Depression; Dr. Wallace Boyd and Dr. Bede Henderson working at the Vancouver General Hospital lab; went to Tranquille in 1940; being a patient with tuberculosis; the treatment of TB; got out in 1942 and stayed to work in the sanatorium; setting up a lab and working as part of a staff of doctors; worked there until 1958. TRACK 2: Description of duties at Tranquille; how the patient care was distributed; Burris Clinic in Kamloops; building of a new lab; trip to the east to study TB labs; involvement with TB traveling diagnostic clinics -- temporarily from 1952, and full time from 1958 until retirement in 1970; discussion of the purpose of the clinics as a follow-up to patients already diagnosed with TB; effects of the Second World War on Tranquille; greatest changes in medicine; advent of antibiotics; changing attitudes of doctors; how meetings were conducted in the medical profession.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): An early specialist in internal medicine PERIOD COVERED: 1911-1950 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-10 SUMMARY: Early background; education; McGill College of BC from 1911 to 1912; McGill University, 1912; discussion of medical training differences, then and now; humorous anecdote regarding F.J. Shepard, anatomy professor, McGill University, 1912; enlistment in the army in 1914; war experiences; discussion of work as a medical officer from 1917 to 1919; influenza epidemic, 1917; interning at VGH in 1920; fellowship at the Mayo Clinic in 1920; anecdote regarding the early days of the clinic; starting practice in Vancouver in 1930; the Depression; war breaks out in 1939; Dr. DesBrisay relates army career; in charge of medicine, Shaughnessy Hospital after the war; discussion about effects of antibiotics such as penicillin; Dr. DesBrisay relates two anecdotes regarding penicillin; changes noticed over the years; closing comments regarding his rewarding career in medicine.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): General Medicine and Public Health PERIOD COVERED: 1906-1966 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-04 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Personal background; description of father's early pharmacy in Kelowna; early Kelowna history; interest in medicine; medical training at the University of Toronto; description of a few of the women in class; internship at Vancouver General Hospital in 1932; went to Kelowna for five years; the Depression; Indian doctor; description of practice there; decision to go into public health. TR;ACK 2: Public health course in Toronto; war wound commission in Toronto; unit director of Metropolitan Health; Director of School of Health Services; community health projects; Mary Pack; Jericho Hill School; involvement with Community Chest; polio outbreak in 1952 to 1955; Director of Metropolitan Health.

CALL NUMBER: T2002:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Public health nursing ; a practical experience in involvement PERIOD COVERED: 1902-1950 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-02 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Miss Neen describes her personal and early educational background up to beginning nurses training in 1923; a description of life in the nurses residence, curfew and roommates; the emphasis of the course, lectures, duties, and Ward X; a statement of qualifications for nursing in 1923 and the size of the VGH class; a brief statement of jobs held after graduation; special nurse in Trail, Nanaimo and San Francisco; introduction to the Rotary Clinic, staff, location and an aside on relief. TRACK 2: More on the Rotary Clinic and treatment available for TB patients; isolation techniques, enforcement and placarding; a brief recollection of Dr. Norman Bethune and his visit to Vancouver; changes in the Rotary Clinic; association with VGH; amalgamation with Metropolitan Public Health staff in 1936 and changes in treatment with the introduction of PAS and streptomycin; a discussion of the effects of the Depression on health units; the growth of baby clinics; services, restrictions and time spent at; involvement in social work; referrals to out-patients VGH, Social Services; Children's Health Centres. CALL NUMBER: T2002:0002 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Public health nursing ; a practical experience in involvement PERIOD COVERED: 1940-1965 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-02 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Involvement in school health programs and an anecdote about Miss Elizabeth Breeze; activities in schools, examinations, iodine tablets, athletics; growth of mental health program and an anecdote about TB derangements and problem of civil rights and forced hospital admissions; public health nurse and changes in VD clinics; anecdotes of follow-up situations; Shanghai Alley at Alexander and Cordova Streets; Stella the prostitute. TRACK 2: A continuation of the story of Stella; the Stafford Hotel and the issue of money; Miss Neen took a supervisory course and McGill in 1947 and returned to coordinate the TB program; a description of the mobile TB units and their locations; the involvement at Oakalla, including the installation of the TB units; staffing and training, the hospital, problems, security, and an anecdote about arriving at the prison gates; anecdote about a Lancashire man as an example of the scope and involvement of a public health nurse; retirement in 1963 after forty years in service.

CALL NUMBER: T1986:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Director of Medical Services; Veteran's Affairs, Ottawa PERIOD COVERED: 1940-1976 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-03-01 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Goes to Ottawa as Director of Medical Services for Veteran's Affairs. Christie Street Hospital in Toronto from 1942 to 1943; what this position involved; how Sunnybrook Hospital started and the other administrative problems of the building; in 1950, he came to Vancouver and was Chief Medical Officer of Shaughnessy Hospital. Discussion of Shaughnessy and how he worked there; meeting Princess Margaret, Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip; John Diefenbaker, Louis St. Laurent; Danny Kaye and Bob Hope. TRACK 2: Discussion of the people he met; being awarded the OBE; conclusion of interview -- how medicine has changed, and prevailing attitudes in medicine today. CALL NUMBER: T1986:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Dr. T. Bain, Veteran's Affairs and Shaughnessy Hospital PERIOD COVERED: 1898-1940 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-03-01 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Born in 1898 in Huntley, Aberdeenshire, Scotland; schooling in Scotland; came to Toronto at 14; got job at Eaton's; enlisted in 1915; discussion of army life; training and overseas; in 48th Highlanders, 15th Battalion; went overseas in 1916, Vimy Ridge and Ypres; deciding to go to University of Toronto to take medicine in 1920; description of classes and classmates; interest in public health. TRACK 2: Graduated in medicine in 1926; then interned at Toronto General Hospital; lived at Knox College at the university; entered overseas service to examine immigrants to Canada; went to England; went to William Head on Vancouver Island; quarantine station; 30 cases of smallpox; how the Depression affected him and the people he saw; description of William Head and its purpose; stayed until 1939 and went to Vancouver to take over Shaughnessy Hospital; brief history of Shaughnessy Hospital; how he got his next position.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Cecil Pangburn : Lardeau Valley, 1928-1950 PERIOD COVERED: 1928-1950 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1980 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Cecil Pangburn came from New Brunswick in 1926. Worked in Salmo and Kaslo. Bought 900 acres in Meadow Creek. Describes neighbours. Bought John Deere bulldozer after World War Two. Describes horse logging along the Duncan River. Railroad removed in 1942 and a road was built. Moved to Kaslo and ran a transfer business before returning to Meadow Creek in 1947. Returned to Kaslo in 1951. Owned small inboard powered dory used for hauling freight on lake. Tried cattle ranching, 1947-1951. Worked for highways department in Kaslo during the Depression. In 1932 was sent up with bulldozer to carry supplies to Poplar Creek and Gerrard when heavy snow closed railway for six weeks. TRACK 2: Married in 1928. Describes logging operation. Stake mineral claim on Meadow Mountain. Trappers lived at Howser. Caught live marten to sell in Kaslo.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Steamboating on the B.C. coast PERIOD COVERED: 1920-1940 RECORDED: [location unknown], 1976-02-19 SUMMARY: Robert McBeath worked on the Union Steamship Company boats and on the dock as a shore mate. He was involved in union organizing. Recalls the Longshore and Water Transport Workers of Canada, Vancouver and District Waterfront Workers, Shipping Federation, describes how the Powell River branch of the LWTW precipitated the 1935 waterfront strike in Vancouver. Describes Depression conditions, winter tie-up, loading airplane spruce in Prince Rupert, hiring practices, Sailors Union of the Pacific, Federated Seafarer's Union, Firemen and Watertender's Union, International Longshoreman's Association, Inland Boatman's Union.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Bill White : women in the shipyards in World War II RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), 1978-08 SUMMARY: Bill White was president of the Boilermakers local in Prince Rupert during the war at the shipyards. Many women from the community entered the shipyards in 1941-42. Mr. White was active in defending women's rights to a job at the end of the war. In this interview, he describes conditions in Prince Rupert; the growth of the shipyards; battles between soldiers, workers and Native people; racism in Prince Rupert; response to the entry of women into the yards; attitudes towards the Japanese; anti-war sentiments; the no-strike pledge and the Labour Progressive Party. Mr. White was a member of the Trotskyist organisation at this time (1943). Women were brought into the Prince Rupert shipyards as helpers or improvers, after taking a several-months-long training course in welding. The helpers strung the burners' hoses, and the women were soon proficiently stringing their own hoses and cables. The shift would get off and drink at the Savoy Hotel; it became clear that women had been accepted into the yards when the crew accepted the women buying rounds of drinks. Women served as stewards in the union.

CALL NUMBER: T3628:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Jonnie Rankin : women in the B.C. shipyards in the 1940s RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), 1978-07-10 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Mrs. Rankin wrote a column for the newspaper of the Shipyard and General Workers Union during the war, describing the experience of women working in the shipyards. She has also been involved in the HREU, OTEU and the IWA. She was an activist in the Labour Progressive Party during the war. In this interview, she describes the motivations of women taking industrial jobs; hiring procedures; attitudes of men to women entering the yards; the transformation of the craft unions into industrial unions; childcare; political differences in the unions; Soviet women on ships which came into the yards for repair. TRACK 2: Piecework; shop stewarding; layoffs and women; work as a journalist for "The People"; the LPP; left-wing theatre; the IWA strike of 1946; organizing in the restaurants; women's auxiliaries; equal pay struggles. Women were unwilling to leave their jobs after the war ended; working had brought them self-respect and economic autonomy.

CALL NUMBER: T3628:0002 RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), 1978-07-10 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Mrs. Rankin worked in the IWA hiring hall and was involved in some of the early attempts to form the OPIEU from union employees (1947). [TRACK 2: blank?]

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Elizabeth Wilson : unemployed struggles in the 1930s in Vancouver RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), 1979-05-26 & 27 ; 1979-06-04 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Mrs. Wilson describes the conditions and the struggles of the unemployed during the 1930s. A meeting on the Cambie Street grounds was broken up by police on horseback with riot sticks. The organizers were deported. She worked for the CCF to build Dorothy Steeves' campaign. Inhabitants of Vancouver East were particularly militant, fighting evictions and assisting the less aware West Enders. Mrs. Wilson was forced onto relief; she had formerly worked as a waitress. After a demonstration at the Holden Building, Gerry McGeer read the Riot Act at the cenotaph (1935). Relief recipients all received the same marked clothing. Women received thirteen dollars a month on relief. Andrew Roddan, the minister of the First [United?] Church, preached to the unemployed and visited False Creek, and distributed loaves of bread to the shantytown of unemployed men. The Communist Party was central in leading the unemployed. TRACK 2: Women during the Depression faced great difficulties in controlling unwanted pregnancy. Many women resorted to abortion using knitting needles or slippery elm. Only one local doctor, Dr. Telford, dispensed birth control. The welfare system provided constant harassment of recipients by social workers. Deserted women were forced off relief and onto alimony, but most of their husbands never paid up.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Barbara Stewart : organizing restaurant workers during the Depression RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), 1979-06-17 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Barbara Stewart first radicalized during the Depression. She was present in Regina in 1935 at a citizens' meeting called to protest the lack of jobs and support the On to Ottawa Trek. She was swept into the streets with many of the crowd by the attacks of the police and RCMP. She came to Vancouver in 1936 without a job, and was placed as a domestic by the YWCA. She moved on to waitress at Kennedy's, where she was laid off for her union sympathies. She then worked at the Melrose and then Love's Cafe. Waitresses worked four-way split shifts at that time. She participated in job actions like the following: waitresses wore their aprons for six weeks without washing them, to establish employer responsibility for laundry. TRACK 2: Restaurant work was very hard; it required physical labour and long hours of work. Women faced sexual harassment on the job. Some restaurants even tried to exploit waitresses as prostitutes. Most women who worked did so out of economic necessity rather than choice. Bill Stewart was the business agent of Local 28 during the 1930s and early 1940s. Mrs. Stewart later took over as business agent, traveling all over the city for twenty dollars a month. A major struggle of the union was to change the laws so that employers would have to provide transportation for waitresses after dark. Mrs. Stewart as business agent was also a delegate to the VDLC; She went into houses to organize them, and worked on the White Lunch and Trocedero strikes.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Bertha Souderholm : fruit and vegetable workers organize at Websters Corners RECORDED: Maple Ridge (B.C.), 1979-08 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Mrs. Souderholm was active with Finnish community organizations in the Maple Ridge area during the war. The tape describes that community during the Depression; the cooperative movement; women's organization in the community; work and organizing at Berryland; women in the war industries; conditions in the fish canneries. Websters Corners, where she lived, had a long history of progressive organizing. Women in the Finnish community traditionally had their own organizations. Men in Websters Corners worked in industry, while women built and maintained the community. The Women's Defense League organized a defense of political prisoners during the 1930s. Later organizations gathered clothing for Finnish war relief. The unions in the 1940s established old age pensions and unemployment insurance; workmen's compensation, family allowance and medicare. The labour at Berryland was very difficult as there was little automation. Women were called in to work and received only an hour's pay if little fruit was available. TRACK 2: Women worked at Berryland on a seasonal basis, without the benefit of seniority to supplement their household income and pay taxes. Women tried to organise and several women were fired. A wildcat strike occurred later on and the union was established. This created a seniority system and year-round work.

CALL NUMBER: T3621:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Marion Sarich : organizing working women in the 1930s and 1940s RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), 1979-08-31 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Ms. Sarich was born in Princeton, BC and later moved to Saskatchewan, later returning to BC. She started work as a domestic at the age of thirteen for five dollars a month and then moved on to several different positions. She began organizing domestics in the 1930s and worked with the Housewives' League to get a charter from the AFL. The TLC could not decide which union should receive jurisdiction and the campaign died. Ms. Sarich then began working as a busgirl at the Trocedero Cafe, helping to organize it. The cafe was struck and she and her sister, Anita Sarich, were blacklisted, but the strike helped to initiate a campaign to organize the restaurants. During the strike they received extensive support from the public. She also participated in drives to organize Army/Navy and Woolworth's helping whenever organizers were needed, and taking no pay. TRACK 2: The HREU fought for special classes for women; equal pay, protection at night for waitresses getting off shift and requiring transportation. Ms. Sarich participated in pickets of restaurants which were guilty of unfair labour practices. She also supported the unemployed men in the post office. Local 28 tried consistently to join with the Bartenders local 626, but the latter refused amalgamation. In the 1940s she assisted in the organization of the Canadian Seamen's union, which later became the SIU (1948). CALL NUMBER: T3621:0002 RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), 1979-08-31 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Mrs. Sarich remembers Norman Bethune's visit to Vancouver; solidarity with Spanish orphans through the Girls Brigade to Aid Spanish Orphans. In the 1950s she became a postal worker and has been active in the unions. [TRACK 2: blank?]; CALL NUMBER: T3621:0003 RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), [date unknown] SUMMARY: [No content summary available for this tape.];

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Alice Person : rank and file -- women's issues in the wood industry RECORDED: Coquitlam (B.C.), 1978-07-28 SUMMARY: Mrs. Person has been active in the IWA. She moved to Websters Corners from the prairies during the Depression; got a job in the wood industry during the war; and was active in organizing her plant. She became a member of the plant executive. She discusses relief; agricultural labour during the Depression; the Japanese internment; working conditions in wood; organizing the IWA and her plant; equal pay for equal work; attitudes to women workers; struggles against layoffs after the war. She and her sister were in the first group of women to be hired on at Hammond Cedar in 1942. Mrs. Person, although told by co-workers that "girls don't need as much", decided that equal pay was a woman's right, and this issue became a primary motivation for her and other women to join the union. She feels that many workers were inspired by the IWA leadership. Mrs. Person served as a steward and a warden on the executive.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Anne Marshall : garment industry conditions in Vancouver - the ILGWU RECORDED: Vancouver (B.C.), 1979-06-11 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Anne Marshall was born in Regina, Saskatchewan in 1907. At the age of 14, she left there to come to BC and find work after her father died. She worked as a waitress and became sympathetic to trade unionism in 1924, during the Longshoremen's strike, through her contact with strike supporters at work. She then became a babysitter for the owner of Sweet 16 dress shops. He taught her to sew, and she began to work in ladies' ready-to-wear. She married in 1928 and stayed home until WWII when she re-entered the workforce. The organization of the industry had begun by then. Working at Jantzen, she was exposed to the Bideau piecework system for the first time, and became angered by the conditions which they imposed. She was laid off, but in the meantime was approached by the unions to organize the shop. The VTLC was spearheading the campaign at that time. The workers were organized into the United Garment Workers. Later she helped to lead the local over to the International Ladies' Garment Workers Union which she felt had better shops. TRACK 2: She became a full-time organizer for the ILGWU in 1946/47 and stayed in that position for 16 years. Central issues in her union were the protection and integration of immigrant workers; equal pensions for women; piecework; racism; wages and hours of work; policing the contract, insuring that people got lunch hours and breaks.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Anna Arthur : lower mainland BCGEA RECORDED: Coquitlam (B.C.), 1979-07-25 SUMMARY: Mrs. Arthur was born in Victoria BC; she graduated as a teacher during the Depression, but was unable to find work (early 1930s); she married and returned to the workforce in 1943. She began to work at the Boys' Industrial School as a special education teacher; the staff began to organise into the BC Government Employees Association, in order to have a say in teaching policy, wages and hours or work. They linked up with workers at nearby Essondale. Part of the demands made by women were for equal pay for equal work; this issue really involved Mrs. Arthur. The BCGEA workers faced many setbacks, including the hostility of employers and a refusal by the government to institute a check-off system. Anna Arthur was involved in organising the union, and was elected to the provincial executive in the later 1940s, representing the Essondale branch (1947-1949). Many of the issues concerned working conditions -- for example, the lack of decent housing for student nurses. Later, while working for the federal government, she became the local president of PSAC, organising for equal pensions for women and equal insurance benefits in the local.

SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): Anita Andersen : the Trocadero strike RECORDED: New Westminster (B.C.), 1979-[09-03 & 12] SUMMARY: TRACK 1: Mrs. Andersen was born in Princeton, where she and her family experienced the collapse of the Princeton mines (the Granby Mines) and the disastrous economic consequences. She was subsequently orphaned and moved to Vancouver where, as a very young girl, she worked for several families as a domestic; this was one of the few alternatives for working class women who needed a place to live, food and work, and who were basically unskilled. Her sister also worked as a domestic, and they both began to radicalize, due to the influences of the longshoremen's strikes -- and for Mrs. Andersen, her interests in Yugoslavian cultural activities. She came a busgirl and organised for the HREU at the Trocadero Cafe. The Cafe was struck, and a contract was eventually achieved, but the central organisers were fired and blacklisted, including Mrs. Andersen. She continued to work for the union until she moved to the Yukon in the 1940s. TRACK 2: Returning to BC, she worked for the Jubilee Summer Camp; as a cultural organiser the Yugoslavian community; and with consumer organisations.

CALL NUMBER: T3604:0001 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): IWA Women's Auxiliary of Lake Cowichan : [tape 1] RECORDED: Lake Cowichan (B.C.), 1979-08-09 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: This is a composite tape [i.e., a group interview] with five former members of the Lake Cowichan Women's Auxiliary of the IWA: Eva Wilson, Lori Belin, Lil Godfrey, June Olsen and Mary Greenwell, who were active in the Women's Auxiliary during the 1930s and 1940s. The women tell of their family and work backgrounds and their subsequent involvement with the union auxiliary. The women come out of very different backgrounds, some with strong trade union families (Nanaimo miners), and others from anti-union backgrounds. Most came to Lake Cowichan as young women who had married loggers. June Olsen, however, came as a teenager, grew up in Lake Cowichan, and joined her friends in the auxiliary. Conditions in the 1930s were primitive; couples lived in shacks without plumbing or electricity, the hospital was in Chemainus, and the road was terrible. TRACK 2: The Women's Auxiliary was pulled together in the 1930's by Edna Brown with the help of some of the organisers for the union. It helped to cut across the isolation that many of the young wives experienced, and to draw them into the struggle to organise the woods. The organiser went from home to home and to isolated logging camps, organising the auxiliary. Women were concerned with safety (because logging was and is an extremely dangerous business), as well as getting a better road to the hospital, and protecting and providing funds and cover for the union organisers. CALL NUMBER: T3604:0002 SUPPLIED TITLE OF TAPE(S): IWA Women's Auxiliary of Lake Cowichan : [tape 2] RECORDED: Lake Cowichan (B.C.), 1979-08-09 SUMMARY: TRACK 1: As the auxiliary developed, its functions expanded and it became the central instrument in creating a community at Lake Cowichan; providing social events, education, and political involvement; establishing the P.T.A., Red Cross, swimming lessons, theatre group, doing war support work, getting fresh milk into the town, organising a children's parade, Dominion Day and Labour Day events, a Lady of the Lake contest, and coordinating with other women's groups, as well as supporting the union's activities. The members attended conventions of the union and federated auxiliary in Vancouver and Eugene (Ore.), and were instrumental in forming auxiliary policy across the IWA because of the large numbers and success of their organisation. TRACK 2: In 1946, during the march to Victoria during the strike, the Lake Cowichan women marched in the front of the trekkers. In Victoria, they organised food and lodgings with other auxiliaries. In 1948, the Lake Cowichan Auxiliary split; the majority of its members went with the WIUC. These years saw some violent confrontations, for example at Iron River, where the IWA crossed WIUC picket lines. The women and their husbands were excluded from the new IWA auxiliary at Lake Cowichan after the WIUC collapsed, and some of them became involved in the co-op, while others later did support work for the IWA when their husbands re-entered the IWA.