Westle Transcript

Date of Interview: October 2, 2001 in Prince George, BC

Interviewer: Shiloh Durkee
Transcriber: Shiloh Durkee

BEGIN SIDE ONE, TAPE ONE

S.Durkee: Today we’re at the home of Hazel and Robert Westle at 604 Burden St. and we’re going to be talking to both of them about what it was like to work for the CN and what it was like living in the community of Prince George.

S.Durkee: (Question directed toward Robert Westle) What I will do first is to find out when and where you were born if you can tell me a bit about that.

(Initial misunderstanding as to what the question was which was then clarified by Hazel)

R.Westle: I was born in 1914 in Blyth, England. [1]

S. Durkee: And when did you move to Prince George?

(Pause)

H.Westle: ’39 (Referring to the year Robert moved to Prince George).

S.Durkee: (Question directed to Hazel) And when did you, or where were you born?

H.Westle: I was born in Smithers. [2]

S.Durkee: And when did you move to Prince George?

H.Westle: In 1928.

S.Durkee: How far did you go in school and what is your background? Where did you work?

R.Westle: I just went to Gr.8 in school and I worked before that…I worked in sawmills and…

H.Westle: Farm. (Pause) He worked on the experimental farm.

S.Durkee: What was the experimental farm?

R.Westle: Experimental farm was (pause)…they ah…carried sheep and cattle and horses and experimented a lot in different grains and grass seeds and that. It’s out there… (Pause)

S.Durkee: Was that near Prince George?

R.Westle: Oh yeah…it’s out…I think the, um, Natives has got it now. 

H.Westle: It was out by the airport.

R.Westle: It’s out there…right across…the old highway…from the airport.

S.Durkee: Oh okay. So out east.

R.Westle: Yeah.

S.Durkee: And when did you start working for the CN?

(Pause)

H.Westle:  ‘49

(Phone ringing)

S.Durkee: 1949?

R.Westle:  ‘49

(Background noise)

R.Westle: Just a minute…I gotta think back… (laughing) my memory isn’t as good as it used to be.

R.Westle: I went to work on…a work train.

S.Durkee: A work train?

R.Westle: Yeah…as an engine worker.

S.Durkee: And that was when you started in 1949?

R.Westle: That was when I started…yeah.

S.Durkee: Engine workman…and so how long did you do that job for? [3]

R.Westle: Oh about…that job just lasted six months. And then I come into the shop; see that was an out of town, out of shops.

S.Durkee: Out of shops…

R.Westle: Yeah…on a work train.  And I just worked the six months and then an (indecipherable word) came into the shops so I come into the shops. Plus the wages was the same. (Indecipherable last words).

S.Durkee: So it was better when you went you went to work in the train shops?

R.Westle: Yeah.

S.Durkee: Do you remember how much you were paid?

R.Westle: Yeah, (pause) just gotta think…

S.Durkee: Just approximately…

R.Westle: Fifty-something an hour

S.Durkee: Fifty…? Fifty cents?

R.Westle: No…eighty.

S.Durkee: Eighty cents?

R.Westle: Eighty-two cents. I made eighty-two cents an hour.  I think that’s what it was.

S.Durkee:  Was that considered good money back then?

R.Westle: Weelll…regular wages were around a dollar. For uh…operators that operated machinery. And I worked as an engine workman for (pause) six months I guess.

S.Durkee: Sorry, a what watchman?

R.Westle: Engine…for six months…I try to tell you that it’s the same job…in the shops.  When did I go on as a helper Mom? (Question directed as Hazel who is in the kitchen).

H.Westle: (Initial words indecipherable)…probably next spring…indecipherable…was born?  In July? [4]

R.Westle:  (Pause) Yeah.

S.Durkee: You started out as an engine workman for six months on the working train… [5]

R.Westle: Yeah...and then I went into the shop as a classified labourer.

H.Westle: You were new to the shop in May as a classified labourer.

S.Durkee: Oh okay… and what does that mean to be a classified labourer? You did everything?

R.Westle: Yeah…you could…

H.Westle: Jack-of-all-trades.

R.Westle: Classified labourer could do anything. You could light the engine, you could steam up an engine…(Pause)

S.Durkee: Okay. And Hazel was saying when you started at the CN they had the steam trains?

R.Westle: Yeah…

S.Durkee: How long did they have the steam trains before….

(Pause)

R.Westle: I think ’72…(Pause) [6]

S.Durke: And then the diesel? Was it the diesel engines?

R.Westle: Yeah.

(Pause)

S.Durkee: And which ones did you like working better on…with the steam engines or with the diesel engines?

R.Westle: Oh, I enjoyed the steam engines because it was something new to me. I never worked with steam before and it was very interesting and I took an ICS course on it.

 (Pause)

S.Durkee: Before you started?

R.Westle: No, when I was there. And, ah, with that I got, I got what they call permanent…there was…it’s hard to explain. (Pause)

(Interviewer adjusting tape recorder)

R.Westle: I was a perm… a permanent on the job.  You can help out Mom, I…

H.Westle: What’s…what do you want?

S.Durkee: Oh, he was just explaining, uh, he had to take a course, an ICS course to work on a machine.

H.Westle: A machinist…

S.Durkee: A machinist…okay. (Question directed at Robert) So you would’ve taken that while you were working there…

R.Westle: Yup.

H.Westle: And then he took a course on diesels that the CN gave you.

R.Westle: And they went to diesel because the company gave us a course on them and it was interesting to me because I gotta a lot of diesel work in the

army and…(pause). I was very surprised when the company gave us a course on it every week. We had four hours or something on this diesel course…

S.Durkee: Every week?

R.Westle:  (Nod) And at the end, when we all wrote the exams in the end, I was the second highest! (Laughing)

S.Durkee: (Laughing) Oh! And that’s just because you’re…

R.Westle: Well I was very interested in it, that’s the main thing.  Um…actually it was (pause). Being the highest like that put me in a different category in the shop.  And I find I… (pause) and ultimately I got to be a supervisor.

S.Durkee: How many months or years were you working before you became a supervisor?

(Pause)

R.Westle: I don’t know…uh…six or eight months.

S.Durkee: Oh, so not very long.

R.Westle: Oh, not six or eight months…. six or eight years.

S.Durkee: (Laughing) Oh six or eight YEARS. I was going to say…!

R.Westle: (Laughing) But ah…I used to relieve the supervisors when they go on holidays. I relieved them. And of course when they retired, I went up steady. [7]

S.Durkee: Your wages…did they go up?

R.Westle: Oh yeah.

S.Durkee: Quite a bit?

R.Westle: Oh yeah. Well, they went up as much as…made as a much by taking a supervisor’s job as I would otherwise into the overtime I got. It all evened out. But as a supervisor it meant that I could stay home. I didn’t have to go out on the road anymore. I used to go out on the wrecks.

S.Durkee: Where did you go?

R.Westle: Wrecks on the…both ends between here and Smithers and there …oh…town west of here.

S.Durkee: So you would have to go out when there was a train wreck?

R.Westle: Yeah…but by taking a supervisor’s, I could make just about the same as I would (indecipherable) because I didn’t have to work (laughing). [8]

S.Durkee: (Laughing) Well that’s always nice!

(Robert made a comment indecipherable on tape here that he didn’t work harder just because he was a supervisor. They all had to work hard regardless of one’s position)

S.Durkee: So you…

R.Westle: I saw the last of the steam engines. And of course, then the diesels come.

S.Durkee: What was better about the diesels?

R.Westle: Well, the oil. The oil was cheaper and then they could shut down a lot of the water stations on the way. [9]

S.Durkee: Were these just freight trains or were these passenger trains as well?

R.Westle: Both…yeah, at that time, both. I was almost ready to retire before…before they gave up the passenger service.

S.Durkee: When did they give up the passenger service?

(Pause)

R.Westle: I can’t remember. I know I…. (asking Hazel) When did the passenger service come part of its own?

H.Westle: (Asking her visiting son Frank Westle who also works for CN) Frank, when did VIA rail come in?

R.Westle: Hey?

H.Westle: I’m asking Frank…when did the VIA rail come in?

(Pause)

H.Westle: It was after ’71 when it was CN…It was CN when I went through to… (trailing off)…

F.Westle: The late 70s.

S.Durkee: In the late 1970s…and when did you retire? (Question directed to Robert)

H.Westle: He retired in ’79.

R.Westle: ‘79

H.Westle: He came out of the army with a mechanics course that he took (indecipherable)…helped him some. [10]

S.Durkee: So that’s how you learned to work on the trains is your training in the army?

R.Westle: Yeah…

H.Westle: Some of it.

S.Durkee: And then the rest was on the job?

H.Westle: Yup. Yeah…he just learned it on the job.

(Pause)

H.Westle: He didn’t take an apprenticeship…he just learned it and they advanced him on that but Frank did an apprenticeship.

S.Durkee: Was it more common back when to just get trained on the job?

H.Westle: My dad did in 1919, he was CN too. 

(Indecipherable-quiet comment by Hazel)

S.Durkee: So it wasn’t known as the Grand Trunk Pacific when you started was it?

(Interviewer repeating the question for clarification)

R.Westle: No. No.

H.Westle: It was the Grand Trunk until 1919 and my dad came out to Smithers when the CN bought it out. So that was October of 1919.

S.Durkee: That was a long time ago! (Question directed at Robert) Can you describe what a typical day would have been like, what time you started in the morning, what your duties were…. [11]

R.Westle: (Laughing) (Indecipherable first word) I mostly worked a swingshift. I used to work Friday afternoon, Saturday days, Sunday days, Monday midnight and Tuesday midnight and I would (indecipherable).  I kept Wednesday, Thursday off cause at that time I was quite active in the Moose Lodge and their meeting was on, on a Wednesday. That’s why I took it.

S.Durkee: And was that the same for quite a few years?

R.Westle: Oh yeah. And the foreman he, he was taking the snow off the roof and he fell off the roof and he broke his hip (laughing)…so I had to, I took over for him while he was um….six months that I was put in full charge.  It was a good experience. A little more money, good experience.  I could’ve moved, was going to move to Boston Bar but the certain (indecipherable) that was on told me not to. [12]

S.Durkee: Why?

R.Westle:  For one thing the kids would have to go to high school by bus on the highway and the other thing he said Boston Bar wouldn’t be there very long. It was a forest town. But I enjoyed my work at the railroad; even after I got to be supervisor I got along very well with the men.  The men was always, always my friend. I never forgot my days when I worked with them as an ordinary workman.  That was the trouble with a lot of people in there…a lot of fellows when they got bumped up, promoted to foreman, they think they were better than the rest. I never, I never had that (indecipherable) and…(pause).

I used to go out on wrecks with the wrecking crew…see some awful sights; one, my wife’s brother was killed. On one was jacked and one wasn’t so I went out. I went out and they brought me right back. He was a fireman on the railroad…they’d a…somebody opened the flush gates up on the top of the hill and a rush of water down took out the bridge. [13] (Pause)

S.Durkee: Where was this?

R.Westle: Just up the strip there, just west of here. I forget the name this…it was west of here anyway…between here and Endako. 

H.Westle: What was that?

R.Westle: What was that washout (indecipherable)…?

H.Westle: In ’54? Well they... (indecipherable) shouldn’t have been there…one of those government guys went up and blew the beaver dam on Aberis Lake and

flooded the road and the railroad and everything else and washed out the tracks. (Pause) And it cost him his life. [14]

(Pause)

R.Westle: But where was it at?

H.Westle: Mile 29.6 to be exact. 

(Pause)

S.Durkee: That was when you were working as the classified labourer or was that…

R.Westle: No, working on the machines.

S.Durkee: Okay.

R.Westle: And they sent me out there and of course they brought me right back in. I didn’t know why. They sent him out (indecipherable)…when I got in…he didn’t die right away…two days in the hospital. They didn’t expect him to… (pause) [15]

S.Durkee: That sounds like it was one of the worst aspects…

R.Westle: That’s the worst. (Pause) Yeah, that’s the worst.

R.Westle: I didn’t go out on lots of wrecks after.

H.Westle: Oh yeah…she’d been out on the 19, ah, that was the 19, he’d been out on the wreck when the 21 went in the ditch. (Pause) That’s the number of the engine. [16]

H.Westle: That was the number of the engines.  They wrecked all three. Now Harold Willis walked away on the 19. (Indecipherable)

S.Durkee: (Question directed at Robert) When you became a labourer you didn’t have to go out on the track or you didn’t have to go out to these wrecks anymore?

R.Westle: No. When I became a foreman, supervisor, I went out to a few. A supervisor, some supervisor, had to go.  When they brought in the ruling of the car foreman, the foreman of all of us, so we didn’t have to go but sometimes we’d go anyway.

S.Durkee: When you were supervisor, what time did you have to go to work at and when did you come home…

H.Westle: 4’o clock to 12.

R.Westle: Didn’t make much difference (chuckling). Still on, I was on (pause), on… I was the afternoon shift and went on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Thursday and Monday, Tuesday afternoons, or midnights yeah.

H.Westle: That was the last ten years (indecipherable)

S.Durkee: Were your duties the same everyday?

R.Westle: Pretty well. Well, most things, was uh, them days we didn’t do too much on the wrecking; like the units that had been in on the wreck we didn’t do too much. It was mostly keeping the engines going, that was in use. (Indecipherable)…. most of the wrecking jobs. But it just consisted of straight maintenance (long pause) but ah, in the end, when the maintenance, when we went t’ change a head, a cylinder head, we didn’t change the cylinder head, we changed the whole thing. So, the cylinder and the crankshaft or the crank, yeah… connecting rod, we changed that all in one. Way before we use to do it separate and it was, it was a job of getting the proper tension from the connecting rods (pause) 33, 31 pounds square inch…

S.Durkee: Thirty-one pounds to…

R.Westle: A square inch. That’s the power width they had to be for the special line torque.

S.Durkee: It was a big job?

R.Westle: Yes, oh yeah lots. Oh yeah lots of stuff. It was a fair job. You gotta take connecting rods…

H.Westle: My original pass here (looking at an old passenger train ticket) says ‘77/’78/’79…would that be when…’77… would that be when the VIA come in?

R.Westle: Could be Mom.

S.Durkee: Oh you still have some of the old…

H.Westle: Oh, this is still good. Still good…but I have another one and I can’t find it. Cause it’s good and somebody could use it.

S.Durkee: (Question directed at Robert) When you were supervisor, how many men did you have working for you?

R.Westle: Oh…different shifts.  16, 17…

S.Durkee: Were there a lot of different ethnic groups working?

R.Westle: No, no. Mostly all Canadians. 

 

END OF SIDE ONE, TAPE ONE, BEGIN SIDE TWO

(Please see “Interview History” as one particularly memorable story was lost at this point)

S.Durkee: So we were just talking about some of the changes in Prince George and you were saying the sawmills…

R.Westle: Yeah well, the sawmills come in, there was just one big sawmill here, when I first started… was Alexander’s, big sawmill down in the catch. You know what a catch is? That the other side of the Nechako River, that’s the big…where the Nechako meets the Fraser.  Across the Nechako there, there was Mackenzie… (Talking to Hazel)… Mackenzie’s, they had a big sawmill there.  And they used t’, used to float the logs down the Nechako River and they had the big sawmill there and the slabs, when the slab that was cut on each side of the log, they cut them into 16 inch things and they piled em’ up and sold them for firewood.

H.Westle: At Alexander’s mill.

R.Westle: Yeah.

S.Durkee: (Directed at Hazel) He was saying there was just one when he first started.

H.Westle:  And then there became 400 after the war. [17]

S.Durkee: Now was that good for the railways to have all the sawmills come in?

R.Westle: Oh yeah! The railroad then was the mode of transport. There wasn’t the truckin’ that there is today. There was some truckin’ but not as extensive, there wasn’t as big as the railroad (next word indecipherable), cheaper transportation for long hauls.

H.Westle: Yeah.  (Directed at Robert) You were working on the railroad when it flooded that time.

R.Westle: Yeah…yeah.

H.Westle: Even the station flooded.

S.Durkee: Oh! The station here in Prince George?

H.Westle and R.Westle: Yeah…

H.Westle: Yeah, well it used to…

R.Westle: My brother and I, well Hazel’s brother, and I got a boat (chuckling) and we rode the boat all down George St., across the tracks, up in behind the railroad, all through the catch rode the boat and brought it back.

H.Westle: In ’36, the houses had water as high as the back of the chesterfields on the lower part of George; there were watermarks on all the houses…

R.Westle: The big flood was before I started but they had one afterwards that we couldn’t work in the shop because the pitch, where the engine used to go over and we’d get underneath, they’d fill up with water so…(Pause)

S.Durkee: (Directed at Hazel) I was asking him what were some of the biggest or most significant changes that he remembers in Prince George while he was working on the railroads and he brought up sawmills and whatnot…

H.Westle: Well, sawmills started before he actually went to work on the railroad. But uh, sawmills was the biggest change…

R.Westle: I think the museums’ got the old turntable haven’t they?

F.Westle: (Son) Yeah, I think they have dad. And the old station.

S.Durkee: The old Penny…

H.Westle: We used to take all the kids down and take for a ride on the turntable.

R.Westle: (Laughing) Go down there and I put them all on the turntable. Oh they thought that was great!

(Pause)

R.Westle: It was on a balance, turntable was on a balance so it was easier to take the kids cause they got on and hold them in the middle so there was no reason for anybody to get hurt.  The kids used to come down one school after another for a ride on the turntable. It was usually my job to turn (chuckling).

(Background talk)

R.Westle: They use the “Y’s” now.

F.Westle: (Son) Hey?

R.Westle: Said they use the “Y’s” now.

S.Durkee: The Y?

R.Westle: Yup…

H.Westle: A “Y”.

S.Durkee: A “Y” …oh, okay.

R.Westle: They go up, across and down and change the engine, turn the engines around.

(Pause)

S.Durkee: It seems like you started a trend in your family cause you worked for the C.N., and Bob (another son) works for B.C.R., and you worked for… (directed at son Frank)…

F.Westle: C.N.

H.Westle: And my Dad C.N. C.N. fed me all my life.

R.Westle: It was through her brother (referring to Hazel’s brother) that I got started on the C.N.

S.Durkee: When you were working then for the C.N., did you ever feel in danger of losing your job or was it always a very secure form of employment?

R.Westle: No, at that time they were hiring. They weren’t really laying off, so I was very secure. (Pause) I was laid off the worktrain; I went out on the worktrain as an engine watchman and another guy that had the job, older than me, he bumped me so I worked long enough to secure a seniority number. Ah, oh I don’t know whether it was, whether it was a benefit. I went down the working in the rock pit, hauling rock. I worked in the pit; I went working as a powder man on the rock gang. (Chuckling) I made more money at that then I did at the railway.

S.Durkee: And when was that?

R.Westle: ’49 or ’50. Spring of ’50.  (Pause) I learned to use a jackhammer, set powder….(Pause)

S.Durkee: Do you recall how much money you made doing that?

R.Westle: I think it was 92 cents an hour. Wasn’t it mom?

H.Westle: What?

R.Westle: When I was on the rock job…

H.Westle: I don’t know but your first cheque was $117 clear. For two weeks. That’s the only thing that interested me. I cashed the cheques. (Laughing)

S.Durkee: And do you remember how much you made as a supervisor?

R.Westle: Oh…

H.Westle: About, probably 40…(indecipherable)

R.Westle: Was just about the same as I was making otherwise but I had to put in all the overtime to do it. 

S.Durkee: So you ended up getting more?

R.Westle: Right…

R.Westle: Once I worked in the rock pit, it was six days a week. Railroad was still working six days a week.

(Unfortunately, background noise of clock is hindering ability to hear Hazel explain how the workweeks alternated between five and six days a week)

H.Westle: They gave up one day in the hungry 30’s (indecipherable) …at five days a week…then they would have six days back…and then work the five days…this is there way of doing to get their time back from their…(indecipherable). [18]

S.Durkee: In the 1930s?

H.Westle: Ah, well, they gave it up in the 1930s.

S.Durkee: Oh, okay, so would’ve been before…

H.Westle: That was before his time. But then it was in his time that they got it back, that day and then they went (indecipherable).  But now there was two strikes, one in 1919 and then in 1950. 

S.Durkee: The strike in 1950, do you remember how long that went for?

R.Westle: About a week…it wasn’t…only just about a week. 

H.Westle: It don’t last too long when you tie up the whole railroad!

S.Durkee: So you went on or there was a strike so the men could get a raise?

(Pause)

R.Westle: Well, we lost out on that. The trainmen went on strike the same time and they took a percentage. When they took a percentage, we lost out.  They were the big winners.

S.Durkee: The trainmen.

R.Westle: Yup. The trainmen.

S.Durkee: So you mean then that the labourers lost out on that one? [19]

F.Westle: (Son) Well, the differences between the wage percentage, they got less than the trainmen who got more. Wage rate was quite a bit higher.

S.Durkee: Is there anyone today that is still alive that you worked with that…

R.Westle: Oh yeah…

(Lots of talk about who is still alive that worked for CN as possible contacts – please refer to tape)

H.Westle: The CN has a meeting every second Wednesday in the month…but if you want to know anything about it, phone George Storm.

S.Durkee: Storm…S.T.O.R.M.?

H.Westle: Yup. And he would tell you because he’s (indecipherable last word). And he can tell you how many members we’ve got (indecipherable few words), retired CN men are alive. [20]

S.Durkee: Retired…I’ve heard that there are a lot of retired CN men in McBride today. 

R.Westle: Quite possible.

H.Westle: CN farmers…

R.Westle: There’s a lot of railroaders was farmers too. Cause they retired, they stayed there.  There’s a, there’s a lot of retired railroaders right here. Max Kostyshyn…

H.Westle: But George would give you a list of all the retired CNR’s in…They even have one BCR…but he passed away… (Due to background noise, the rest of Hazel’s sentence is indecipherable).

S.Durkee: We’re almost finished but is there anything else that you feel that we didn’t talk about or…?

R.Westle: (Shook his head)

S.Durkee: Looking back on your career, are you happy with it? Was it a good career?

R.Westle: Oh yeah!

H.Westle: …Interestingly, it was the most stable. It gave us that steady cheque.  Besides that, it gave us a big paycheque.

S.Durkee: So do you like travelling better by car or by train?

R.Westle: I’d sooner travel by car.

(Laughing)

END OF INTERVIEW

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