1978
Ken Bowes was just a farmer and carpenter living in Middleville who still used his team of horses when he plowed the land and tended to the sap in the Spring. Ken never thought of making miniatures, but when he saw the tiny wagons and sleighs made by Bruce White in the 70s he decided to make them too.
Like all of us he thought if someone can make something he could too, but it soon set in how tedious the work was and how many hours it took. After spending every extra hour on his new hobby Ken thought that he would record exactly how much time he was really devoting. In reality he spent 56 hours to make a tiny double work harness and 63 hours to build the wagon.
But devoting time to something you love was already in the family. His father James Bowes once spent half a day behind a yoke of a team of oxen plowing in Manitoba. It took time and patience to get used to plowing the fields like that and he said he felt like he was back in biblical times.
Ken like doing things the ‘old-fashioned’ way and born in nearby Gailbraith where he grew up working in lumber camps using the horses he loved to create hauling logs out of the woods. It was in his early occupations that he found out how much enjoyed working with wood, and he could square lumber with a broad axe with the best of them. This experience went a long way when he began to build log cabins and Ken personally built the family home for his wife Grace and his four daughters.
Those first miniature pieces that Ken made after all those hours ended up once being displayed in the windows of Duncan’s Barbershop in Almonte, Ontario and in the Spring you too can see some of his displays at the Middleville Museum. May Ken rest in peace.
Middleville Museum
Perth Courier
James Bowes was awarded the contract for the erection of a frame building and after a severe misfortune, having a great deal of the material prepared for the erection of the edifice destroyed by fire, the building was completed.
Information where you can buy all Linda Seccaspina’s books-You can also read Linda in The Townships Sun andScreamin’ Mamas (USA)
Come and visit the Lanark County Genealogical Society Facebook page– what’s there? Cool old photos–and lots of things interesting to read. Also check out The Tales of Carleton Place.
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