waaaaaaaaay back, 1933 to be exact.
There was an 18 year old kid named Doug and his best friend named James. They had just graduated from their high schools and needed to make some money to earn enough to go to University, or spend the rest of their lives working on the farms of their fathers. Due to recession and hard times in their small town (I forget it's name) near Thunder Bay, Ontario; Doug and James decided to try their luck finding a job in the west.
Having no money or means of transportation to get there, the two good friends decided to hop on freight trains illegally and make their way to B.C.
Hugging his mom goodbye, shaking hands with his father and younger brother, Doug was on his way. Before leaving, he and James made a pact that they would stick with each other through thick and thin until they reached the west coast. Sewing a $10 bill to their briefs (emergency money) they crawled up to the train tracks at 3 in the morning just outside the freight station and waited for the first train heading west to depart. Within an hour and a half they crept aboard one of the cars and were on their way.
Things seemed to be easier than they predicted until they reached the Manitoba/Saskatchewan border within a couple of days. Then their luck turned. As luck would have it, there had been a prison break at the Stoney Mountain Penitentiary and the train they were riding was brought to a halt by the RCMP.
Trying to hide in their train car, behind stacks of iron rods, Doug and James were discovered, arrested and taken to the police detachment. After proving who they were and explaining their situation, they were led to the office of the chief of police later that night. Surprisingly the officers were sympathetic and bought them dinner and actually drove them back to the tracks in the middle of the night to help them sneak aboard the next west bound freight train.
By the end of the week, Doug and James had arrived in Jasper, Alberta. Reading the morning paper outside a diner they discovered that the provincial government of BC had established a law ordering the arrest of anyone coming into BC illegally, apparently there was an influx of young men coming to the west looking for good paying jobs. Doug and James had to unstitch the $10 bills from their undergarments and actually buy a ticket on a passenger train that went from Jasper to Vancouver. It was all the money that they had left.
Finally, after a couple of weeks of travel and sneaking aboard freight trains, the two had finally made it to the coast. Their first morning in downtown Vancouver, Doug and James shook hands and went their own way to look for employment, promising to meet back at the train station for lunch. Doug was unsuccessful in the morning, and returned to look for James. James never showed up.
Doug would never see James again.
Alone and with nowhere to go and with no money, Doug spent the next couple of nights washing dishes at a Gastown bar and restaurant, sleeping close to the water in Stanley park, underneath a makeshift shack that was housing masonry equipment for a "seawall" that was being built.
Eventually, Doug was able to phone his family back in Ontario and his father gave him the number and address of distant cousins who lived in New Westminster. Making his way to New West, Doug was greeted with open arms and his cousins found him a job alongside them, packing salmon in a cannery.
After a few months of good work and saving enough money, Doug called home again in mid-September. He was homesick and his family missed him too. He had to find a way back home.
During his time in the west, Doug had managed to befriend a wealthy girl who was accepted into university in Montreal and her father had purchased a car for her to drive and use there. Not comfortable driving there all on her own, Doug "volunteered" to drive her (like a chauffeur, she always sat in the back) all the way there. He didn't want any payment, he just needed a means to get home.
Road conditions in Canada were not as good at the U.S. back in those days, so they decided to cross the border and drive east through the states instead.
Each night they would stop in a city and the girl would pay for a room in an expensive 4-star hotel. Knowing that he couldn't afford a room in the same hotel, Doug would tell the girl he would drive to another cheaper hotel for himself and pick her up in the morning. Agreeing to this, the girl would wish him good night and be on her way.
Doug never did look for another hotel room; instead, he would drive to a nearby bar and buy just one beer (that's all he could afford) and gorge himself on all the free peanuts he could eat. Then he would go back to the car and fall asleep in the front seat, to wake up early the next morning, pick up the car's owner, and be on their way back home.
Eventually Doug made it back home with enough money saved to pay for his first semester of university, then he would earn a scholarship for the rest of his education and earn a teaching degree by 1938.
After that, Doug took some flying lessons and earned a pilots license, which would help him in WWII when he became an aircraft gunner and later a teacher to younger bomber pilots.
Doug went on to become a school teacher and developed a good career in the insurance world.
He was married three times, had two sons and three stepchildren, and numerous grandchildren and great grandchildren.
I learned all of this from Doug himself, who became a Fort Langley volunteer in the 1980's after he retired.
Last summer during the slow and hot weekdays, he and I would sit in the office of the Big House and chat about everything from his teenage days, to living through the war, to why Sophia Loren in her prime was much hotter than Angelina Jolie will ever be.
Doug Irwin passed away earlier this month at the age of 91.
I'm glad I got to know him.
