Shops and Quadratic Equations Years ago a community with the population to support a shop had one. A shop might also be called a store and was run by a shopkeeper sometimes called a merchant. However, the term merchant has negative connotations carried over from the times of the early absentee fish merchants. In some settlements the shopkeeper might also be a fisherman or be otherwise employed and generally didn’t live in a mansion on the hill or a villa in the valley. In any case they provided a very valuable service by making the necessities of life available within the community. Unlike the absentee merchants, they were part of the community with the added burden of needing wisdom and compassion in dealing with their sometimes destitute customers. Over the years there were several shops of varying sizes in Bar Haven and Western Cove. I seem to recall vaguely that Jimmy Flynn on the neck had a little store in his back room from which he sold candy and some household items. In Western Cove there was a Co-op store that I believe was run by the Browne (Dore) family. To put it simply one had to be a paid member (think Costco) to take advantage of the lower prices made possible by bulk purchases of non-perishable food items, fishing supplies and coal for example. Glendon’s Cove, with only a half-dozen or so families didn’t have a shop. As for the harbour – Bar Haven – I have a few memories around shop related experiences. The Farrell family had a shop for a while in the 1950’s during the fresh fish plant operation. On one occasion our uncle Billy – I think he was our grand step-uncle - we never had an uncle or a grandfather that we knew and only one grandmother that we knew – send us over to Tom Farrell’s for a box of Purity Cream Crackers. We had fifty cents and the biscuits were about thirty-two cents. The snag was that Mr. Farrell was out of Cream Crackers so we asked what he had. He listed off Round Milk Lunch, Square Milk Lunch, Caraway Biscuits, Ginger Snaps etc and Home Assortment. We had never heard of Home Assortment before so we said we’d take them but they turned out to be “fancy” biscuits that cost forty-two cents plus one-cent tax. Being too shy to ask Mr. Farrell for something different we headed home expecting trouble for spending too much money. Surprisingly Uncle Billy didn’t complain at all. He was probably just as happy as we were to have some sweet biscuits. The most well known business in Bar Haven was of course the Wadman family business. It was strategically located near the school, church, post office and government wharf. My earliest memories go back to Mr. & Mrs. Wadman – Patrick and Mary Ann although I never heard them called anything other than Pad and Gran. My earliest memory of the Wadman premises goes back to the early 1950’s. It was election time and I happened to have gone along with Uncle Billy to Wadman’s stage where several men had gathered to tell wonders. Among them besides Billy were Pad Wadman and most likely men from the immediate area – Paddy Flynn, Mike Shea and and one or two others. A campaign boat came to the wharf and delivered some election material – sheets with the candidate’s picture etc. My recollection is that the candidate was Liberal and most or all of the men in the stage were PC. The memorable part is that they all went about the stage in a simulated arse wiping display with the candidates picture for toilet paper and all having a great laugh. The likelihood was that the candidate didn’t get their votes. Since all members of the Wadman family that I knew were at one time or another involved in the business, no one should be left out in the memory department. So for Mr. Pad it is the event above. For Gran it is the beautiful flower garden she kept by the side of the house. Although Mary wasn’t directly involved in shop activity she was the most important person in the group. She is the one who kept the house in shape and the meals cooked etc., making it possible for the others to concentrate on business activities. The person who would tend the shop most often and who was the face of the business for us little fellows was Aquilla. Whenever we could scrape up a few coppers we’d be off to the shop. Usually we’d have to go to the house first where we’d get to see the big grandfather clock and, if we were lucky, get to hear it strike the hour. Even though it must have been a pain at times having go through the shop opening process for the sake of a few jelly beans I don’t recall Aquilla ever having a complaint about it. Bill likely won’t remember this and for good reason. The boys his age, Aiden Browne, Pad Gaulton and others would be what they call role models for our age group so we woild be impressed by whatever they did or said. On this occasion Mom had sent us to the store for a jar of molasses sugar. Molasses sugar was the sweet molasses soaked sugar that settled to the bottom of the puncheon or tierce as it was called. To dig the sugar out of those oversized barrels wasn’t an easy chore. Before Bill started he let us know how how he felt about it by announcing that he’d rather piss into the barrel than dig out the sugar. But he did get our sugar for us. Bill would later go on to serve his country in a land much farther away than it is now at least in time if not in distance. As with Bill, you wouldn’t find Jack in the shop very often either. He was an outside man - you’d find him wherever maintenance was needed on engines, boats or other property. As I mentionrd previously, it was Jack who gave me my first job for money. More memorable was the occasion when I needing to get home from St. John’s. I had send a message home to be picked up in Arnold’s Cove at 5PM the next day. Trouble was the taxi that was to pick me up at 3PM didn’t show so I had to scramble to get a another ride, which I did but not until after 4PM. There was no way that I would get in Arnold’s Cove before 6:30 since the road from Ocean Pond to the cove wasn’t paved yet. Nor was there much chance that the boat was going to wait around that long. What a surprise when we approached the wharf a bit after 7PM , the Donald Diane was still there, my old man pacing back and forth the wharf and no sign of Jack. Shortly up he comes from the forecastle of a boat from Tack’s Beach. He had been talking to the crew members and forgot what tme it was. That was the first time someone elses talking that I didn’t even hear meant so much to me. An indication of Jack’s compassion and influence occurred in the eaqrly 1960’s when Wadman Bros. supplied provisions to a good number of businesses in Placentia with the Donald Diane as the main supply boat. The crew were the skipper, the engineer and a salesman – my old man Clar Browne who did the route twice a month or so. On the rounds Clar had one troublesome customer and feared for his safety so much so that on returning from what might have been his last trip he told Jack why he had to quit his job. Jack told him to go home for a few days, come back next week and that in the meantime he would take care of it. As the old man told it afterwards he had no trouble whatsoever with that customer from that day on. I have never been able to find out how Jack pulled that off. Finally the big boss. There’s no need to say much about Kevin’s business acumen. Over a few short years he brought the business from a one skiff, small store operation to four passenger and supply boats that I know of, suppling provisions to many other businesses and to supplying fishermen as required as well as providing a point of sale for their catches. I do have a couple of memories though. In the early 1960’s I needed to get to Arnold’s Cove to catch the train to St. John’s. The Donald Diane was going to Southern Harbour anyway so rather that detour to Arnold’s Cove it was decided that Kevin would pick me up in Southern Harbour to save time. What makes it memorable is that it was the first and only time Ive ever had a air ride in a motor car. I’m sure in the few minutes it took us to get to Arnold’s Cove the wheels touched the ground only occasionally and that was just to maintain air speed. My second recollection is from an earlier period – the mid 1950’s. This was a transitional period; large families, compulsory school attendance, high demand for teachers and one admirable teacher whose name I don’t recall. Quadratic equations or any other type weren’t the teachers specialty but Kevin knew algebra. I know because I was one of those sent down to the shop for Kevin to work out one of those algebraic equations. I recall he cleared a space on the counter by the side of the cash register and in no time had a half-page or a page of calculation ready to go back. There are two good points here; that he was willing to provide that service and that the teacher wasn’t too proud to ask. There are many other memories of herring being pipped, cod being culled , lobsters being sized and tonic wine being sold. No doubt you have some of your own too.
Posted on: Sat, 29 Nov 2014 03:36:02 +0000
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