THE RECORD

September 06, 1995

BACK TO THE EGG

Suzanne Trevis

Although I didn't reach Gold River until the winter of 1966 (a relative newcomer, according to some) and I was only three years old at the time (a definite drawback when trying to recall certain events) there are a number of things that stand out in my head from the "Good Old Days."

I can remember arriving by bus in the pouring rain, an omen if ever I saw one, with my mom and my new baby brother. We stopped at the general store/post office/community centre (now known as the Christian Fellowship Church), while our luggage carried on to the dock. It was not a good sign.

My dad came from Prince Rupert for his new job two weeks later. He used to tell us how he arrived in the dark, and some time later, when leaving with my mother to purchase a much needed automobile, had quite the shock when he realized that the shoulder of the road was really the lake, and the road was little more than a cart track.

As I recall they were paving the road then in the summer of '68. There was no reverse gear on the car (the reason for the trip) and Mother was worried sick that one of the road crews were going to need her to back up for some reason.

I have another brief video clip memory of my mom's friend, Thelma, teaching mom how to drive. Her two kids, my brother and I all piled into the back of her station wagon, and they went driving on the logging road. (They must have been crazy!)

The mill was officially opened in September 1967 by Princess Margrethe of Denmark. I honestly do not remember that part, but they tell me it did happen. By then we had nearly one hundred homes and the first commercial buildings had been completed. There were the B.C. Telephone Company, the B&A gas station (now the Petro Can), the hotel, and several apartment units. August 1967 saw the 22 acre town centre completed and in September of that year they finished the elementary school. (Time sure flies, eh?)

Most of these things I obviously have no real recollection of, but I do remember many hours in the "old community centre library." Once the store moved out, they moved in.

We saw tons of movies in the hall that is now the church, and I was in the first preschool class at the back of the building with Mrs. Pope. That memory is very clear as well, but I think we will get into it more at some future date.

Gold River has a lot of history and memories that seem to be getting lost. Outside of those old, old-timers who are still daft enough to reside here, there are more and more people every year who do not know that the church was ever anything but a church, and who do not recall what a big event the loggers sports used to be in the field that is now Larch Place.

There were Bonfires and fireworks for Halloween (that was back before they started scheduling rain every year), and the A Frame Bridge when it was still an A frame bridge. They use the landmark names now without ever knowing where they came from, and we are only thirty years old. That was official last week, for those of you that missed it.

So, there you have it. Over the next little while I will attempt to enlighten those poor souls of you who are without benefit of actual memory or insight into the circumstance and events that helped to make our community what it is today. You do not know what you missed!