He's got five hydro poles going in the laneway up here and about the third hydro pole in, this cluster of bears all show up. So then he's figured it out. When he put in his hydro lane, eh, he pushed all the brush into a pile. Mother bear must've stayed in this brush pile all winter.

... anyway the moose are moving in and now the wild turkeys are coming in which is nice. Ah, and turkeys I think were here years ago Garrett but when the um- the big towers, the big hydro line went through, the electric power lines, they used the heavy duty insecticide and pesticide and the- ... And the D-D-T and-stuff. And that killed off through the food chain, that killed off a lot of ah um animals and birds ...

But my dad worked- he- he- and- and I don't know if you knew that, but my dad worked for Hydro, years when- before, ah, and- and when- when the br-- drew the hydro up to Scotch-Line, my dad drew that hydro line up to Scotch-Line, past where Christian-Dempsey's up is, he drew that hydro line up there with old Jace and Dolly, the match team, and we lived at ah, at Noonan's, over here, and- and ah- and ah- ...

Speaker 2: It's right across from the flour-mill. Speaker: That's that hydro thing now. Interviewer: Oh, that was a dairy?

Yeah, we skidded all our logs with horses pretty well until the latter years and then we had a- a different kind of machine. But, ah, yeah, so it was mostly s-- skidded out into open areas and those open areas happened to be hydro lines, corridors, that sort of thing- or farm fields or-something-like-that, so.

Yes well, most- most of, ah, the activity was around the beef cattle. Ah, we had beef cattle and we used to graze the hydro corridors a bit and- and, ah- so a lot of the work was involved in getting the hay crops in in the summertime and that sort of things, yes.

The- the main hydro line runs in front of the farm there. And all that steel was hung on the hydro line. Obviously they put the hydro out completely until they- until they got that off the line. I don't know how long the hydro was off. But certainly put the hydro out of commission. It was just like clothes hanging on the line to dry or-so and you-know these- one these big cables.

Um, after that they moved to a small double garage that was on a property on an old Colyer farm which is just in- it's now a subdivision ah just east of James-Street on Main-Street. But the eight to tenth house up, the other side of the hydro station would be where the open land and farm was that had the garage on it that they lived in. Then they moved over to Centre-Street, rented there for a while, Weatherall-House it was called.

But anyway, the big hydro poles wasn't in Maberly 'til nineteen-twenty-nine 'cause Harold-McMann often told me about ah, having a horse on the Bell telephone stretching wire. And that was in nineteen-twenty-nine these bigger poles went in.

Interviewer: Ah, and there- you mentioned there was a storm a few weeks ago? ... Anything happened nearby? ... Speaker: B-- ah, yeah, trees down on hydro wires and-stuff-like-that.

... the whole family'd go out and shovel together and um, you-know it- it- there was just massive snow. I would- (laughs) I would crawl through the pathway because there was too much snow that I would sink (laughs) and um, granted I was little. But I mean, you-know hydro poles aren't- weren't as tall as they are now. They were much shorter but to have the snow pushed up to it and shovelled up half way was not a big ordeal and um- ... I-mean, you don't get that kind of snow now.

And with doctors, I was very happy to hear Doctor-Mitchell, um- he was very kind doctor, um, a significant person in Almonte being, I-guess, eventually a mayor, but he was instrumental in starting the hydro plant. His house is right across from there and he had races horses.

... ah- I always called it Monroe's and- ... Whatnot. And then you come back out where the hydro line crosses, ah, at, ah, Giles' there. And then- ... The Middleville-road the rest of the way up.

And my son-in-law is a- he's a pretty sharp cat. So he come up with a sign that said Thicksson-Town, stuck it on the hydro pole and the population back then was- what? Twenty-one, I-think?

The first summer I worked in Almonte we had to go down, we went down to where the hydro line crosses, the power line, and then we turned left and went out away and around the back and come in- and come out at the Auld-Kirk and turn left at the Auld-Kirk and you're in Almonte.

I don't know what grade that was in, but we were coming down- I don't know what- did the tire blow or-something? I don't think it was winter. I don why we went into the ditch but all I could see was a telephone pole coming or hydro pole whatever it was, we just missed it. Went down over a bank and then- but we didn't roll, but ah, this was on there and I don't remember what happened, why we- whether it was a tire that blew-

But, no we didn't have any bathrooms and I remember reading by the lamp light. We didn't have hydro or- at first or-anything. I can remember being so scared when they put the hydro line in because I- (laughs) you-know, didn't know what this was all about (laughs).

Um, I spent ah ten years on municipal counsel here. And um, about ah eighteen years on the local hydro commission. Local health centre (inc) was on that for about fifteen, eighteen years.

..., but we've had some- lot of you-know obviously with these trees, they get older and they get butchered by trimming around the hydro lines which (laughs)- and then sometimes you just go and build a- put another one in right underneath it. Yeah (laughs). "Hey, want to do this again in twenty years, do you?" Yeah.

Interviewer: (Laughs) When did you get ah indoor plumbing on the farm? Speaker: We- we didn't get hydro until nineteen-forty-eight, and I- I wan-- ah I- I can't help but mention this um, I remember the hydro guy an come down through our farm, I was heading for school one day, and they came down through the farm, three men with long handled shovels ...