Salt Spring Island Archives

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Audio

Isabella Point School

Kathleen Rathwell

Accession Number Interviewer Mary Davidson
Date Location
Media Audio CD
ID

214_Rathwell_Isabella-Point-School.mp3

otter.ai

26.04.2023

no

Unknown Speaker 0:00
So I was, I wasn't quite sick. I remember. I was 12

Unknown Speaker 0:13
I was there. And I remember the first thing I was given was a box full of letters. And books. Follow the words. And I couldn't find these letters. They were so elusive. I think it was first book. Great One raise hands and some chicks. That sort of thing. Who is your teacher that risk grace. Grace, Grace, tr O. P. To patient?

Unknown Speaker 0:52
Was she Young?

Unknown Speaker 0:55
Not particularly as far as I can. Those days. They were like, aunts, uncles, but we didn't have all my mom's roses in England and we never got to see them. We never had grandmothers and grandfathers. We were all brought up by mom and dad. And all the neighbors.

Unknown Speaker 1:18
So when you started school, Mary would be there.

Unknown Speaker 1:22
Yes, she was a school first couple of years. Anyway, she was there.

Unknown Speaker 1:30
How many kids would be in the school at that party?

Unknown Speaker 1:35
That's where the big crowd of 27 There's a lot of people at school in those days. The Destro folks and we had double deaths. We used to have this as big once in a while.

Unknown Speaker 1:55
And did you have a lot of Blackboard space?

Unknown Speaker 1:57
Not no say no. We had one Blackboard as far as I remember. And a big picture of a Viking ship on the top of this framework waking always thought that I could still see

Unknown Speaker 2:14
a picture of the royalty king or queen

Unknown Speaker 2:21
I don't know we had King George the fifth. It could have been their idol. The teacher put up a lot of pictures in the classroom. Oh I guess due course you did. All kinds of things used to do we had after some time we had a table sand table we used to do graphs and pictures. atlases. Water flow flowing systems. Sandy well anyway. Remember

Unknown Speaker 2:56
you have a globe and a map.

Unknown Speaker 2:58
Oh yes man. And the maps might have been on the wall. We had

Unknown Speaker 3:05
a huge learn quite a bit. We had one little cupboard that had all this stuff in the bank and the teacher had a desk and a couple of drawers and

Unknown Speaker 3:15
chairs and the floor was boiled. It was one stove in the middle. And we had to screen out the heat didn't just sit there had to go out and around.

Unknown Speaker 3:34
And we had a wall where to fasten to the to the school at first and then then we got a building put on the end of the school

Unknown Speaker 3:50
side as you come in the front door you came in and there was a bench on that water bucket and to go and get water up the road back and

Unknown Speaker 4:05
dip it in, bring down and was on the fence

Unknown Speaker 4:11
with Did you all have your own cups and differ in the pail and remember whether or not the zipper and the pail may be basins and mice use the carbolic soap like boys soap it does matter when it was made up a shoe or just chewed away. Put us under the patient we didn't have any so for goodness sakes, put the patient upside down and that kept them there. So in the winter,

Unknown Speaker 4:46
in the winter was warm enough.

Unknown Speaker 4:51
It was dark. We didn't have lamps, all lamps it was just one side of the school was The Windows see, yes, there was four or five of them. They opened halfway open. The whole thing open Jesus was a cloakroom here and then we went in there, but that wasn't there when we first started. That was a very small space 27 kids.

Unknown Speaker 5:25
So in the wintertime, you had no electric lights left had to work from whatever came in the window. And typical school dance

Unknown Speaker 5:40
never gets closed. You walk to school. You walk home and yet it was opened at nine o'clock. Those 330 The clock was it? Three o'clock in the wintertime was half an hour at least earlier.

Unknown Speaker 5:58
Did you carry a lunch?

Unknown Speaker 6:00
Oh, yeah. Oh was carried. It's too far to go down. All that way. Was a half a mile it was downhill. You didn't have any time to do anything else if you're just climbing up

Unknown Speaker 6:12
now. Oh, right. And and you were saying that when you have a concert, started off in the school, and then you went down to

Unknown Speaker 6:20
Christmas and Christmas. We had parties and we had sort of performances, shows or things. And after a long time, he had music and being held and used to come and play teach us of music singing. We had little Oregon Oregon and this appears at first I think we had it and she was it was up there and say that she brought the accordion to she was able to play that. That was a big accordion was her brother's is one that Jarrell when he was gone. She had choose to play that. So you had a good music teacher. When we did when we had I don't remember the teachers. I think Mr. Smith when he was there on the short time though. He was only there from September to January. Christmas time. Last sailing, sailing episode here, Mr. Knight. Mr. Knight was a teacher at Burger King and Mr. Smith was our teacher. That was after let's see. We had Miss Pfeiffer for three, four years or six years or something. Then we had systemization I guess you know, I've heard the name relative of grants. And we had we had Mr. Smith. Well. I was making that time

Unknown Speaker 8:09
when Mr. Smith no and

Unknown Speaker 8:11
Mr. Barnes. He had one late he had polio at one time and they've won a tour and he had a big platform on one foot. Something like another friends and then anyway you miss Bollinger and filled in Mr. Smith, Miss pottenger and she came she was living in Seminar arm or someplace after she left us. She was married and she got to have a we had Miss Mrs. Brand. That she was one of the first time she ever came to anything. She started Isabel point Vistaprint and then she left. Last classes of hers were at a point. She had a rosary work time. And she came and left

Unknown Speaker 9:23
when she taught quite a few of the schools

Unknown Speaker 9:28
but those were the days when she was beginning and ending. Anyway, after her we had Miss Ripley against

Unknown Speaker 9:37
sometime along there. You must have had Mrs.

Unknown Speaker 9:39
heifer. Oh yeah, Mississippi. She was there when I was doing correspondence. But she managed to teach Edrick Perel, peril, mathematics. It was loud afterwards. They found out that she was doing this when supposed to do but When she came to us, she came from the high school. She was quite different to what she was when she matured quite a long way, when so strict and she went until hard.

Unknown Speaker 10:18
Stop and have tea that mom and dad and she had babies. She had children, mom and dad used to look after the kids.

Unknown Speaker 10:28
And they grew up and was looking after them. Anyway, I can't remember too much about this. But we had bowl games that we played NTI over four corners, pushing in the corner when it was wet. We play rises all the way down school hill all the way down to Ruby's place.

Unknown Speaker 10:50
There's a picture of the called Isabella point with a lot of the Hawaiian people as a teacher, as one of the boys is receiving certificates.

Unknown Speaker 11:08
Certificates No, I can't say I have

Unknown Speaker 11:12
wondered if it's the was a school there before the one that you

Unknown Speaker 11:17
know, this was originally this was the only one but before you started, there wasn't anything between them. Well, they started 1910 or something. I think the first school of 19 for 1910 or something

Unknown Speaker 11:37
I think it opened tonight

Unknown Speaker 11:42
well, I think the same school. Same one, one school, one, one room school. So it was there for a while. Well 40 years it wasn't too bad. No, actually,

Unknown Speaker 11:59
that's very good. And you must have had some good times that you have a school picnic every year.

Unknown Speaker 12:07
I guess we went different places we went, we went on nature. Nature walks and we went we I can remember going someplace rather. It was a cliffside down like that was wild lilies, Chileans and stuff. On the left hand side before you get to be the point. We went up the hill, then the staff logging, people logging around the school grounds. We used to go and talk to the loggers for lunch. They were at lunch, we carry their lunch with us. We went up the fence line past the school towards our police. Our police used to go as far as the school and we went and got over the fence and took the council when we were small, we didn't have cows forever. We started with goats 3031 or something. When Ruby was little we had goats.

Unknown Speaker 13:10
So goats and sheep so when you have the cows though, you herded them home on your way home from school

Unknown Speaker 13:18
because they were up there in the back woods you know you can hear the bell ringing Yes. Time to go home and school was over by the time we got home otherwise as long way to come all the way home.

Unknown Speaker 13:33
So did you enjoy going to

Unknown Speaker 13:37
schools we did I don't know what state school when we went went home we used to have to to get wood for the kitchen stove and we used to go down the ravine and then all of us all the trees that had died off stock. They weren't very big. They take them up to the house, drag them up and post them as poles and then whack them on the on a block until they broke. Right. That needs to be down there. We used to do that until we got bigger loads. The lots of woods went up woods at home. Lots of times. Mum used to bring that lunch up to us and leave us to go first with that. Make fires clean up rubbish. Dumps on burns dumps leaves to have them be candlesticks is the burn

Unknown Speaker 14:43
on the water. We used to pile up this trees clearing and making pasture lands 1000s Well, they lost the load on our plates. That was times

Unknown Speaker 15:01
so it's cleared musical berry picking in summertime where the wild berries are, because they don't have to be now compared to what it used to be. I know there's no logging done. Nobody wants any logging

Unknown Speaker 15:21
flag laws and all these lovely wildlife. No comparisons

Unknown Speaker 15:32
Well, we had them. We had picnics on the beach. We had picnics on the waterfront. Waiting around, monks way we used to go to Beaver points. Fish roll over there and fish. We didn't always have lunch engines. After while we did, we had Toad their official date.

Unknown Speaker 15:56
So you were saying when when they sold guns, then they burned it down.

Unknown Speaker 16:02
cleared it up anyway. I don't know what the question here.

Unknown Speaker 16:08
No, you've been away in the war.

Unknown Speaker 16:10
And then 43 I went away. I didn't come back and forth until I was here. 10 months old. Remember walking up and down in Vancouver? Because I got there in the morning. not expected to be there until night. Mother came over on the new season. Ferrets from Sydney is the last trip on the way home.

Unknown Speaker 16:40
And I remember feeding my daughter pureed pear. And she never had any more because we need it. After that day, that was on the last boat. remember being on the train from Victoria to Sydney

Unknown Speaker 17:01
rolled on that train

Unknown Speaker 17:02
putting me as the last one that was fixed to the shutdown and we got new hands.

Unknown Speaker 17:12
So how did you get over to Sydney on the earphones?

Unknown Speaker 17:14
No, no, no, we had the launch.

Unknown Speaker 17:18
Oh, the last launch? Yeah, it

Unknown Speaker 17:21
was last just for a while and then it was it was quality college. Last one.

Unknown Speaker 17:29
I believe when mum came to teach a beaver point came along. And that would be 1920.

Unknown Speaker 17:39
Really wish in those days that we went

Unknown Speaker 17:43
to so you went over there and then you got the train?

Unknown Speaker 17:48
Back again, I guess I don't remember anything. But getting off the train. Just getting off the train at Sydney. That's all I can say. And I think it was the last trip. Seems to me the last trip fairy in the last trip. I don't know if it was it was it seemed it seemed to me. It was about six. See that between eight and 622.

Unknown Speaker 18:22
I don't know how long. It's sitting. I just know she came in the last 20

Unknown Speaker 18:30
years to go in the morning. Come back tonight. We used to anchor our robos out. So it didn't have to go all the way to the war to get off where we picked up there on the way out. And at the Ross to reach this top at the rock. That's where the way to stand on the tide. And women would come into the room. Yeah, well that's. So that must mean several different theories.

Unknown Speaker 19:02
And it wasn't a fairy it was

Unknown Speaker 19:06
you could have come all the way from COVID all the way around somebody else's launch, because they went running all over. If it was, oh, there were several lessons. I don't know everybody had votes in those days. traveled and votes just to private launch might belong to somebody over the view

Unknown Speaker 19:29
that she could never remember to tell me the names of the people. She just knows it was

Unknown Speaker 19:37
when we used to go places with poets. They used to take trips. We went to middle harbor I can remember going through the past there. Boy they will try to be a river. And that's when when we used to have picnics over there. And that was Brian and the people up value is counted against the tenant with a tendency and I don't know how some of them are there was quite a bunch of mom and dad, kids

Unknown Speaker 20:21
we used to go with the tennis on Sunday.

Unknown Speaker 20:26
They're the ones who are over there where Jones, England

Unknown Speaker 20:33
originated.

Unknown Speaker 20:43
cottages campers, they've said quite a lot people go there and then they have tennis courts and three three tennis courts.

Unknown Speaker 20:53
So a lot of the young people in Salisbury went

Unknown Speaker 20:57
well, you were a special special people on Sundays. I don't know. I think they used to come down I know we were allowed to play we were when we begin.

Unknown Speaker 21:14
So they were fair fairly reasonable about it didn't matter who you were. If you feed yourself, you could

Unknown Speaker 21:22
go they used to have a kitchen up there and we used to have food pavilion.

Unknown Speaker 21:33
Now, did the church St. Mary's Church have social events?

Unknown Speaker 21:40
I can't remember them once in a while and have a picnic now.

Unknown Speaker 21:47
When you were a kid, you don't remember having

Unknown Speaker 21:51
I don't remember anything but going to church. My mother started saying the Oregon she used to play your mom. Oh, yeah. She and this is falling.

Unknown Speaker 22:05
Now Palmer is that

Unknown Speaker 22:08
she used to be I mean she's a teacher at Beaver point. Yeah. Good many years. Mrs. Patterson used to tell me about it.

Unknown Speaker 22:23
Yeah, I got quite a few pictures of these points.

Unknown Speaker 22:31
You don't know where they are. We have all different types of people.

Unknown Speaker 22:40
So I think I have a picture I don't have it here is a picture of a church picnic because the Reverend

Unknown Speaker 22:49
was up against No, no. I used to come down to St. Mary's. St. Mark's and St. Mary's are the only ones and I don't know what St. Paul's how early it started.

Unknown Speaker 23:04
The night 211

Unknown Speaker 23:08
for including the beam. It couldn't have been because I was there when I've seen it. I've seen that St. Paul's to build another one. Not them. It didn't burn down until I was 19 Maybe 30 something

Unknown Speaker 23:26
built in 19 That's more like a kind of picture with 911 on it. So I guess it was

Unknown Speaker 23:33
originally started. Yeah, well. I was in the hospital there and I remember church being there. And I remember it's piping I don't know what I went into to see it. long winded pipes. Stokes used to have strung along like this. This is what we figured started the fire and got too hot like most diku to be repoint screw that diva point call. We played tennis. Badminton was a polished floor was slick as you call it, polished floor and it was devilish hard to stand up on and the short ceiling was much higher than the room and playing badminton when you have to keep the bird down and chased after it move fast you know,

Unknown Speaker 24:35
as low as this is favorite point.

Unknown Speaker 24:39
We've played badminton after that bird

Unknown Speaker 24:45
Yes.

Unknown Speaker 24:47
Funny thing was that, that that word efforts, they didn't know how it happened to disappear You know why it's burned? It burned because there was too green grass and that's what burned.

Unknown Speaker 25:09
That seems to be what causes a

Unknown Speaker 25:10
lot of Otago farms. Yeah, well barns with a barn. I can remember seeing that going. And that was just, they just brought in the hay. And that was to green. I suppose maybe they were rushed in the day. And because of the phone rings,

Unknown Speaker 25:27
Yes, probably. This has caused many, many barn fires,

Unknown Speaker 25:32
the way that we used to have to go up in the hayloft in our own place. Mum, Dad used to put his arm down in the past and we move it all shifted, all shifted back and forth, before it got onto the heap. And so all of it all down. First. There's quite a bit of neck. fixes. Done it so long.

Unknown Speaker 26:01
Yeah, I don't know if people don't know all we say. When I was in Surrey, there was there were usually several forest fires.

Unknown Speaker 26:13
See, we used to put the most haystacks. I still make hay if I get a chance because I hate to lose it. The good thing is I haven't found anybody that wants to, you know, give it away. Come and get it. That's what I wish.

Unknown Speaker 26:34
There must be somebody with horses love to

Unknown Speaker 26:38
very much. I used to come. When Ruby used to come up. I had a job to get her to come up with her machine and then she could cut it. But she she and Gary

Unknown Speaker 26:52
had it for me. Make it come up. Mrs. King used to come up with a truck. Truck and they feel we feel it up more than once. And Harvey used to come and take it down to movies. She'd used it

Unknown Speaker 27:16
I took it to Tony Lutens place when she was doing Hey there.

Unknown Speaker 27:22
She's still doing Hey. They offered to take it, stuffed it in bags and took it to the Amanda

Unknown Speaker 27:41
Lake

Unknown Speaker 27:48
Rhododendron a bunch of things now, needn't bother with Well, I think five after five