Patricia Cove - Chronicles of a Country Girl: Growing Up in Yonge Mills

Chronicles
of a
Country Girl

Growing Up in Yonge Mills

Patricia Cove

GENERAL STORE PUBLISHING HOUSE INC.

499 OBrien Road, Renfrew, Ontario, Canada K7V 3Z3

Telephone 1.613.599.2064 or 1.800.465.6072

http://www.gsph.com

ISBN 978-1-77123-066-7

Copyright Patricia Cove 2013

Cover art, design: Magdalene Carson

Published in Canada

All photos are from the collection of Patricia Cove unless otherwise noted.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from Access Copyright (Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency), 1 Yonge Street, Suite 1900, Toronto, Ontario, M5E 1E5.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Cove, Patricia, 1940-, author

Chronicles of a country girl : growing up in Yonge Mills / Patricia Cove.

Issued in print and electronic formats.

ISBN 978-1-77123-066-7 (pbk.).--ISBN 978-1-77123-151-0 (epub).-

ISBN 978-1-77123-152-7 (mobi).--ISBN 978-1-77123-153-4 (pdf)

1. Cove, Patricia, 1940- --Childhood and youth. 2. Yonge Mills (Ont.)-

Biography. I. Title.

FC3099.Y614Z49 2013 971.37304092 C2013-907977-7 C2013-907978-5

Two great women inspired me to write this book.
My mother was always my greatest cheerleader.
She is gone now but I know she would approve of my efforts.
Helen Hoover has been both teacher and close friend.
Her encouragement continues to inspire.
Thank you to both of these ladies.

The first writer I ever knew was my mother, although she was never published to my knowledge. She taught me that knowledge is power, and for that I am forever thankful. Through her, I learned to laugh at myself and to be open about those things that have caused me sorrow, as well as those that have given me joy.

While there have been many others who influenced my desire to write, I especially want to acknowledge Helen Hoover, a special teacher, who gave me the courage to keep on writing even when others discouraged me.

I also want to thank everyone at GSPH, especially my editor, Susan Code McDougall, for their encouragement. They are the ones who made my dream of being published come true. Its been a positive experience.

Thank you also to my children, who have supported me every step of the way.

While it may be just as Solomon said, Over and over again, everything is just the same, this is my take on growing up in rural Ontario; therefore, I thank every person who has read or listened to parts of my manuscript, especially Writers Inc., for their critiques and ongoing encouragement.

Finally, I wish to acknowledge all childrenpast, present, and futurewho feel diminished or lost in the flotsam and jetsam of life. I want you to know that the children of the 1940s also had dreams and faced challenges. They then took these experiences and made lives for themselves. This book is my gift to you.

I decided to write this book many years ago, and while I cannot guarantee I got all my facts straight, they are as I remember them. Ive probably omitted many details, but rest assured, reader, that I have tried my best to give an account that is as close to true as I could make it.

Much has changed in Yonge Mills since my childhood in the 1940s. The Yonge Mills of today has no post office, general store, blacksmith shop, cheese factory, brick yard, grist mill, or hotel, but these were all familiar and busy places when I was a child. Indeed, the sign for Yonge Mills on Jones Creek is quite a distance from the grist mill that gave the village its name. Many people consider Yonge Mills to be a ghost town, but it lives on in the memories of all who have called it home.

It came to me, several years ago, that children today are not aware of what we went through growing up in the 1940s, although, to me, its not that long ago. World War II, of course, presented some unique challenges. We had ration books that determined what kinds of foods most children could eat. That aside, if a foodstuff wasnt grown locally, it was rarely seen on our table. Oranges were a rare and delicious treat to me.

We depended on neighbours for help in emergencies. This made for close friendships that have lasted throughout my life. On the other hand, we had only a narrow glimpse of the greater world, compared to the open window that todays children enjoy.

I am in love with life. I hope that my lust for learning, my pure admiration for most of my elementary teachers, and my forgiveness, usually, for those who had the power to create a safe world for me but didnt, will spark a desire in others to put on paper their own experiences.

While not every experience is pretty, together, they make the special person that is you.

I stood on the hill, not wanting to move ahead, but knowing that I couldnt go back.

An onlooker would have seen a short, skinny girl with bobbed black hair and a look of uncertainty in her dark brown eyes.

I was thinking of my last seven years in the Yonge Mills School. Built in a little valley, it stood beside a gravel road, west of Brockville, Ontario. The main CNR rail line sliced through the landscape a few hundred yards south of the school.

The school itself was built of quarried, mostly grey granite. Four tall windows graced the west and east sides of the small building. A stone porch with a cement block above the door, labelled, Union SS #32 erected 1874, faced north. A large woodshed stood at the south end of the building, with a threeholer privy just south of the woodshed.

The Yonge Mills school as it looked in 2013. The old maple has been there since the early 1900s.

Mrs. Stanier, my first teacher.

To the schools northwest was the Gardiner place. Our daily supply of fresh water came from there. The older students took turns carrying it by bucket to the school.

To the northeast was the Hawes farm, and it was Gordon Hawes who started the fat iron wood stove each morning. Even so, it could still be very frosty when we students arrived. He probably also kept it going on long cold winter nights, so that there would still be some heat come morning. Gordon took down the storm windows in the spring and put them back on in the fall. He swept and mopped the floor when necessary, burned the garbage, and shovelled the walkways whenever it snowed.

That school marked my life forever. There was one teacher to handle eight grades. If the teacher was skilled, we all learned. If not, we marked time. It seems to me, as I look back, that an incredible amount of responsibility and power was placed in the hands of one person.