Dugald Campbell –Memories of Ramsay Township and Almonte–Ministers Hunters and Schools

When Dugald Campbell was born on May 9, 1886, in Lanark, Ontario, his father, Donald, was 48 and his mother, Christinia, was 41 he lived in Almonte in 1901. He married Sarah Garret Johnston on September 10, 1913, in Vancouver, British Columbia. They had four children during their marriage. He died on August 17, 1973, in Vancouver, British Columbia, at the age of 87, and was buried there.

Dec. 12th, 1956. Editor of Gazette: ( this was written in the early 1900s)

The Sunday School affairs.

There were good ministers and priests as well—Rev. A. E. Mitchell, Rev. O rr Bennett, Rev. Chas. Daly, Rev. Dr. Chown, Canon Low, and the1 venerable old saint of St. Mary’s church, the late Father Foley. We had lots of other interesting characters in and around Almonte. Too many churches now have no evening service. There are scarcely any tea meetings or church socials such as we knew them

There were great hunters such as John Dulmage, Mack Fraser and others. There were some good baseball players—Chippy McGrath, Davy Hart, Hughie Clarke, Alex McGregor, the Grey boys, the Dixon boys, the Nagle boys and so on.

The school teachers—P. C. McGregor, W. C. Black, John McCarter, R. L. McDonald, all the McGregor girls, four of them, J. A. McPhail, J. W. Donnelly, R. E. Tasker and the inimitable Miss Armour, the teacher of French, and the classical headliner of the high school, Miss Margeret Thompson. No wonder the marks of the fellows and girls of those days were good, they had good and splendid teachers. I remember one remarkable character—Johnny Duncan. He was the ice man for years at the open air rink. He also built a boat for the Mississippi. It was quite a wonderful boat, but there certainly was no money in the venture, and its usefulness did not continue.

W. W. Pittard owned and printed the Almonte Times, always a hand set paper. Pitt was really something when the spirit moved, and that was often enough. The Gazette, under McLeod & McEwen, later James McLeod, and from then on to now, always had a good paper. It was always progressive, always Liberal and always considered sound.

The town band also was something unusual. Tom Brown wag leader, and he had a few of the following — Sid McLean, Bob Dodds, Andy Hill, Walter Scrimegeour and his son, Charlie, Josh McCallum, Alf Proctor and Ernie Proctor, and some of us kids were allowed to hold the music when the band played on the town square.

Recently the editor of the Carleton Place Canadian sent me a photo of the Perth Crescent lacrosse team of 1903. The Crescents were champions, and some one had routed out the picture and it was printed in the Perth Courier. In 1905, and it was really a great year under old Jimm y Porritt and Mike Gleason.

The C.P.R. were running wooden cars from Montreal to Vancouver what a difference from the modem ‘Canadian’ which crosses the continent now. Six days from Montreal to Vancouver, now three and a half days by rail; by air from Vancouver to Toronto now 11hours. Modern life has speeded u p greatly, but we ought never to forget that the days of the 1900 era were also good. The horse and buggy days were good days.

If you could just see some of the farm lands of western Canada, with their tractors and gas propelled machinery, scarcely a horse on the vast prairie country now at all. Times have changed and the wheat farm ers are taking off — wheat crops of 500 and 600 million. Down in the fruit valleys of British Columbia they take off several million boxes of apples per year, nearly everyone has their own home and their own car.

There are too many centralized TV picture shows in every home, most of them and no wonder there is world trouble. We are getting plenty of Hungarian refugees coming in air lifts over the Arctic to Voncouver these days, starving people, without any of the North American comforts, who are coming to us from hunted Europe.

Let us give thanks in Canada at this Christmas time for all the blessings which we enjoy. Let us be very sure that we deserve them because war clouds are gathering which are anything but good.