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Thanks Ellis! Being missed by good friends is one of the joys of living.

The same is true for being missed by bullets and other things people throw at us, eh? (as we say in Canada).

THE RIFLE SHOTS MISSED ME BY "---6---" inches"
But seriously, this reminds me to tell the story of what nearly happened to me one Saturday, in the Spring of 1942--I had turned 12 on Jan. 14 of that year.

By the way, in the days before confederation with Canada, which took place in 1949, Newfoundland (NL) was a colony, and it was run like a business--a prosperous one for the rich importers and fish merchants of Water Street, St. John's, especially the few who ran the corporation. They were the haves. But the vast majority--those who worked for low hourly wages, were among the have nots. Labourers who earned $5.00 for a ten-hour day were considered lucky. The chair of the corporation was the governor. He was from London, England.

HEALTH AND EDUCATION
The health system, such as it was, was a fee-for-service one. Naturally, most doctors were among the well-to-do. Hospitals, for the most part, were the responsibility of the Catholic and Protestant churches. So was the education system. I went to a school run by the United Church.

THE ROCK
The population of NL at the time was about 225,000 people. Most lived in the small towns and out ports--some along the rugged south coast had no roads, only boats. They were located, mostly near the ocean, along the three coasts. St. John's (then about 45,000) is the oldest incorporated city in North America. The merchants there controlled all businesses from there to the northern tip of Labrador (twice the area of the island of NL).

Most families lived in do-it-yourself homes. Being good carpenters and boat builders, they built everything they could with their own hands.

At 7, when we started to build our home, I was expected to be a go-for and a helper--a "master" at sawing and driving nails--for my father and three older brothers--who were also were miners, when there was work. They were also fishermen, carpenters and mechanics, as needed.

In summer of 1938--the year we moved, from and old and rented shack of building belonging to The Company, into the still-unfinished two-story house, the older brothers of my younger sister and I were 18, 20 and 25. An older sister, 22, had married. What fond memories of www.bellisland.net which was then about 10,000 people. 2,100 were iron ore miners! It is 9 miles from St. John's and was second in size to it. We even had two movie theatres and, of course, radio.

BTW, I also helped my brothers with the boat-building, fishing, tending the salmon net and hunting, especially for salt water ducks. Fresh meat was scarce. We even hunted young gulls.

Back to what nearly happened to me in the Spring of 1942--a bright and sunny, early Saturday afternoon.

In the late Spring, when it became warm enough, it was the custom for home owners to get ready for summer by fixing any winter-damaged roofs--commonly covered with rolled-roofing--only the rich could afford shingles. To make repairs easier to do, most roofs were designed to be relatively flat--this meant there we no cluttered attics. Very few homes had a full concrete basement. We started by digging a cellar. Invariably, in Spring the roofing had to be covered with a warm, nice-smelling pitch-black tar. I had the enjoyable job of tending the fire to heat the tar bucket.

That done, my next job had to do with the fences. This meant white-washing the paling fence around our goodly-sized property. What with black roofs, bright-red trim, white or pale yellow clapboards and bright white paling fences many houses became proud things of beauty in the bright summer sun. Modern acrylic paint has sure improved on this.

In the Spring of 1942, as I was white washing the paling fence--the one facing the neighbour to the north of us, and across the lane from us, shots rang out. Zip!, Zip! Zip! Zip!...several bullets hit the fence just about six inches from my head.

Immediately, I turned around and there was Happy Jack, standing on his porch steps, shooting his rifle--like guards on stages coaches in the old movies. Even when he wasn't drinking, as long as he had a chew of tobacco, Jack appeared happy. This time, however, he was as drunk as G&# @#%$ fool--no skunks, or squirrels that I know of, in NL--as he brandished his trusty 22 repeating rifle. Immediately, I ducked and ran for the house.

I should mention that, when he wasn't drinking, Jack had a good-paying job as a time-keeper and paymaster with The Company, DOSCO--the iron-ore mining company. He was a happy-kind of drunk--one of the several well-known ones in the area.

Obviously, that day he was so drunk that he out of touch with reality and was oblivious to the fact that I was white washing our fence. He was actually aiming to shoot cats.

OBVIOUSLY THE CATS WERE NON-KOSHER ONES
In his drunken state of mind, Jack's shots were simply intended to get the cats--attracted by the blood dripping from a pig he had slaughter that AM and had hanging on a tri-pod in his yard. This was about 300 feet from our fence. But, there is a happy ending.

HAPPY ENDING
Thank G-0-D, Jack missed me. He also missed the cats.

There is also an EPILOGUE--one tinged with sadness--in the next post
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BTW, In my last post, I forgot to include the following and VERY INTERESTING HISTORY OF THE CANADIAN CONNECTION with PCC:
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http://pasadenacommunitychurch.org/beliefsfaqs/church-history/