fe apy TERE ROE NEE STSens 2a

4 Terrace Review — Wednesday, June? 1989.

TED. JOHNSON: MEMORIES OF. AC

7 pare notes with his. son. and ‘they’ @

hn : When Ted Johinson was. a ‘put together the story of what.

young lad of eight, he and his

. younger sister lived with their : oo,

white father and Native mother on a pre-empted farm located at what is now the southwest cor- ner of the intersection of Johnson Road and Woodland Park Drive in the .Woodland

Park subdivision north of Ter-- |

race. They also kept a ‘summer’ - home” on a few acres of pre- - empted land about two miles to

the northeast, located near

Spring Creek on what is now © ie

called Merkley Road.

by Tod Strachan

But in the summer of 1914 (“it was a nice summer’’) Ter- race was much different than it is now. It was more wilderness than community, and in the area

of Johnson’s two homes there “were no‘ roads — only trails through the bush, It is with a picture of this setting in mind that 84-year-old Ted Johnson

tells the story of a summer when |

grizzlies roamed freely -in the area.

The Johnsons had moved to

their ‘‘Merkley home’’ for a few weeks during the summer to do

some berry picking. And: for ©

that part of their “holiday” it was a success. ‘“‘It was a good year: for them,” remembers Johnson.. ‘‘There were lots of huckleberries out there.”” But this holiday wasn’t going to be remembered for it’s good times.

Early one Saturday morning

his father, Albert, left the Merk-’ ley home to walk the two miles.

back to the farm in order to meet a neighbor who would be returning -a borrowed horse. Johnson explains that there was

“~plenty of grass for the horse to graze, but fences and water had -to be checked to be sure the animal would be okay. .

Even at 84, Johnson remembers that day well, It was between 9 and 9:30 when his. father’ headed down the trail while he did his best to cut down

trees with a hatchet. “‘I thought

I was clearing land for him,’’ he

says with a laugh. “With a little J

hatchet.”

A short time later, though, he heard some noises in the dis- > tance he had never heard before.

“T listened for a while, ‘‘ he says.

“But I just couldn’t make it

out." So he ran into the cabin

-for his mother and sister. : He

says his mother could hear the

noise too, but she wasn't sure of its origin either. “She told us,

‘Don’t go away from the cabin.

It might be wolves’,’’ He re-

members. And adds, ‘‘We

didn’t go very far from that cabin.”’

-. “Johnson says that he believes his mother was suspicious of the ‘source of the noise but never told the children. The next day around noon, however, she told them to get their pails. They were. going to leave their Merk- ley home and pick berries on their way back to the farm. And with that, they headed down the same trail taken a day earlier by their father. _

Ard they were a little over a ‘mile short of their destination

| when . ‘they found their father.

badly: mauled... “We. had our pails - full, I was ahead, and I

TED JOHNSON: They saved the foot... ha was lucky that way.

heard something ahead of me — |

kind of a gutteral sound,” says Johnson, ‘I didn’t know what it

was but my mother came up to

me and she recognized that it was my dad.’? He had been attacked by a grizzly, and al- though still alive, he was unable to move from the spot where he had fallen, His back and hands

‘were badly gashed and his right

leg was nearly severed at the ankle.

My mother told me to stay there while she and my sister

went for help, he recalls. Fred

Hampton was their Merkley neighbor living a short distance to the north. Waiting alone wasn’t easy for the eight-year- old son. behind every tree,’? he imag- ined. But it was only a short

time before she returned with‘

Hampton and then headed for the farm where there was a phone to summon more help.

‘1 couldn’t believe he’d get there so quick,”’ says Johnson. “He must have run most of the

way.” And he arrived prepared

as well. He had with him some

‘baking powder biscuits and a ‘flask of brandy. He recalls that

his father couldn’t eat but Hampton ran the quarter mile to the “north fork” of Spring Creek and ‘“‘mixed a little with the brandy”’ and that, says Johnson, is what he needed the

most: ‘‘He was dry. He hadn’t

had a drink in sometime.” By this time, his mother had

contacted Dr. Traynor, and he ~

and three or four volunteers had arrived on the scene with a buckboard to transport Albert Johnson to his farm. ‘‘He (Dr. Traynor) couldn’t do much for him. He had to go to Rupert because that leg had to be fixed up.”? Prince Rupert was the. nearest hospital at the time and that. meant an even longer wait for Albert Johnson, who had already suffered alone on the

trail for almost 18 hours. And,

‘We had to wait another day,” he says.

The elder Johnson was in the Prince Rupert hospital for sever- al months and was crippled for the rest of his life. Bone from the leg that had been bitten by

-the bear had to be removed,

explains Johnson, and, ‘‘One leg was two inches shorter than the other by the time they had finished with it. But they saved

the foot... he was lucky that way.” After his father had recovered

somewhat, he wag able to com-

“There was a bear:

-had happened to Albert John-

™ =6son on that’ Saturday. morning

iy

on the trail. As he walked down the trail

that morning, he approached a

spot where a row of four hem-

‘ Jocks hid any.view of.a windfall . behind. As he came abreast: of | the four hemlock, he heard a. “rustling noise’’ in the brush of the windfall and turned to. see what it was.

Johnson says. his father saw nothing at the . time but: now

believes grizzly cubs were play- |

ing in the windfall while the mother ate berries behind the four liemlock. And, “As he

turned, she let a roar out of-

her,” says Johnson. ‘He goes on

to explain that as Albert. heard ~~ the sound, he jumped ahead and -that probably saved his father’ s aa

life.

“She would have’ “mashed him right on top of the head if he hadn’t have,’’ says Johnson. ‘But she just caught him on top of the back of the head and put one clawmark right down the back. It was the full length of his back and it cut his shirt off.’’ He goes on to describe how his father turned to fight the bear

with his. bare fists and as a

result, “his hands were fairly well chewed”’.

. He says that his father by this time had decided that the bear was “going to get him anyway”’ but she wasn’t going to win without a fight. ‘“‘So he kicked at the bear and the bear took his leg right in her mouth,’’ says Johnson. “She chewed the leg right off just above the ankle... there was just the cords holding it. ?

Now seriously injured, the

father was down on his hands.

and knees, waiting for the final crashing blow. But it never came. Johnson says he believes that the cubs had wandered off by this time and the mother, no longer interested in the intruder,

wandered a away y with them.. oe from:10 wm: Saturday morning "

_ Albert Johnson was seriously: injured,. but alive. And he now . had to survive until help arrived, Johnson" says’ his’ father.’ was

“unable to move any distance but} he did ‘manage to prop himself. -up against a tree and found a

forked tree branch which - he:

place under the right knee — propping: up ‘the leg and stop- ping the bleeding. And he waited in pain ‘until help” ‘arrived _—

until 4 ‘pam. the next day. Lo Ted. Johnson, now a resident

of North ‘Kamloops, was- raised

‘and worked i in Terrace for many

years, ; In Terrace recently for a visit, he recounted for the Ter-

race Review several anecdotes of the lives of our pioneers, This is -

just one. of those stories and in the. coming months,. we'll share more of them with you.

‘Budget protesters - to ride the rails. |

- Contributed by |

. Mary Bowering » - Terrace Women’s. Resource Centre

‘Finance Minister Michael Wilson has said some things in tabling the federal budget that we. agree with, for example, “Valued. social programs, high standards of .living, economic opportunity, sovereignty at home, and respect abroad, responsible and responsive government — this is the Canada we must leave to our children.”

However, we disagree with his methods of achieving this goal. He chooses to: raise taxes which affect low and middle wage earners; allow tax write-offs for large corporations; reduce

spending on foreign aid, social : “advocacy groups, Crown Cor-

porations and regional economic development; and reduce the amount of money allocated to social programs for - example, unemployment insurance, na- tional childcare’ programs and federal contributions to provin- cial health and education pro- grams. We think these are poor and damaging attempts at a band-aid solution.

For long-term fundamental

- changes which would affect the 2 = ' quality of life in Canada as well _asthe deficit, we support instead — ‘the reorganization of our. "economic priorities to emphasize meaningful employment. which | cares for the environment, in-

come security, quality social ser- vices; and a fair and progressive tax system.

"The National Action Commit- | tee on the Status of Women, the - Pro-Canada Network, the Cana- —

dian Brotherhood of Railway Workers and more than 30 other national organizations are spon- soring a national campaign to “set the budget on track’. Trains left from Vancouver on

- June 4 and will leave Halifax on — ' June 8, scheduled to meet in Ot-

tawa on June 12. They will be stopping at major centers along the route to collect messages

from Canadian people totaketo —

Ottawa. Canadian citizens are encouraged to state their opposi- tion to the budget in a strong and unified voice.

In Terrace, since the train will not be stopping here, readers are encouraged to choose the aspect of the budget which affects them most and send their message by

June 12 to: Pro-Canada Net- . work, 904-251 Laurier Ave.,

West, Ottawa, Ont. K1P 5J6.

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