Golden Tales

“Pick” and I grew up one concession apart from each other. We were around before the 401. We were born into an era where it was still all farming in our community. Rae and I were just coming on the ground as the starts of modernization were appearing.

A good number of the farming legends from around here had to get jobs at General Motors while they farmed just to keep their own land. I always thought I would be a farmer, but it was hard to make a living by then. I gave up on that and went into town to get a job.

When we were kids, the way the community would work together was something remarkable. Before the 401, my uncles would gather up all the grandkids, and we would shepherd these cattle up Church’s Road, or Trulls Road and take them across Bloor Street, and up the Prestonvale Road extension to these pasture lands. You’d have to run like crazy to make sure the cattle didn’t go onto someone’s lawn. That was our job… to keep them on the road. You had to be old enough to have some legs and some speed… otherwise you weren’t much use. But trying to outrun a heifer with a full steam is a bit of a trick.

Our generation had the best of it. A true farming childhood, and yet the modernization and new tech was starting to evolve... things changed like no other time in history. From horses, to cars, to airplanes, to rockets… we’ve pretty much taken it all in.

Keith and I went to a one room school, and we both had the same teacher for eight years. One year she had 54 kids in eight different grades. Miss Arnold was a very influential part of our growing up.

Keith’s dad and my dad used to cut wood in the winter. In those days, that was with horses. They’d go out at the start of the day and come back hauling logs. Then, they’d all get together with the old buzzsaws... great big wheels with the tractors spinning them. It was the most dangerous thing you could ever imagine, and you’d never get away with that now. 

 And yet those were great times. Three or four farmers would get together and they’d spend the day cutting wood. The next day, they would pack up and go cut wood at the next man’s farm. Those were good times of camaraderie and the farm community doing things together.

My grandfather owned the middle stretch of what is now Darlington Provincial Park. When the 401 went through, he lost all that land to the south. That changed everything. My dad quit farming when he was 75 or 80. I think he knew by that time, that farming in that part of the world wasn’t going to go on as it had.

When we were kids, we did all our work with horses. Nobody had a tractor. It wasn’t thought that was a hard way to farm... that’s just the way it was. There was no other way.

There was a horse man in Pickering by the name of Picov. My dad thought he’d like to buy some more horses, so they arranged between the two of them. They went out west to buy horses. They brought them home on a boxcar, from West Saskatchewan. A man came back with them from the West with a little saddle mare. He was there to look after the horses… fed them, let them off to get water and whatever they had to do.

The horses were let off in Port Hope and this man drove those horses loose. He drove them from Port Hope to my dad’s farm... four or five horses. Drove them across the lakeshore, through Newcastle and Bowmanville, all without ropes... completely loose.

And the peculiar part is that the little saddle mare never had a bridle or a bit in her mouth. He drove her with just a halter on. He had a rope from her halter in his left hand. He guided her by flipping the rope to the left if he wanted her to go left, and flipped the rope right to go right. 

I remember those horses coming down the lane and into the barn. 

I’ve lived here my whole life. I am sitting within three or four miles of where I was born. This is my home for more than a century.

David Down

Courtice | Enthusiastic keeper of Lloyd’s stories, very proud son

When I came along we had cars and all the modern things. But my thrill growing up was watching my dad just love farming. He worked at GM of course, but his passion was farming. So, I would watch him come home, change, and then head off to Uncle Carl’s to plow a field, or milk cows, or something like that.

The changes in the way my dad grew up compared to how I grew up are vast. But, the consistencies are the Down Family. There’s a great honour in being a Down. 

Whenever I would visit, I would go to church (at Ebenezer). Wally McKnight used to say “When are you going back home to BC?” and I would always say “I am home. This will always be home.” No question about it.

I grew up just outside Solina on my parent’s farm. It’s commonly known now as Knox’s Pumpkin Farm today, but then it was just a small dairy farm. I went to Bradley’s School, which was a one-room school. I went to Eldad United Church. A very typical rural farm kid upbringing.

The Women’s Institute in Solina used to sponsor the 4H classes for girls. As girls, we would do church programs together, like explorers and CGIT (Canadian Girls in Training) and church choir. All of those community things dramatically shaped me. They gave me a really good grounding in my own value system and how I wanted to live and shape my life. 

I was ordained in 1980. I decided I wanted to be a minister in high school. It was still a little unusual for women to go into ministry at time. Eventually, I went to Emmanuel College in Toronto, which was a three year program and a one year internship. The year I went, it was the first time that 50% of the class were women. It was a big transition time.

Rae Pickell

They used to have a couple’s club there. They also used to have what they called a “farm forum,” and they had a radio broadcast there. I remember taking the fields in sleighs when Courtice Road was blocked with snow, just in order to get to church.

Keith Worden

Courtice wasn’t much of a town then. “Ebenezer” was where I would tell people I was from. 

Lois Worden

When my children were young, we had a Sunday school program that regularly had 100 kids attend.

Lloyd Down

In my day, they used to have a shed at Ebenezer where you would leave the horses while you attended church. I can remember teams and sleighs coming in. We took it down in the 60’s.

David Down

Ebenezer was our “town.” All the turkey dinners, Mom and Dad going to couple’s club for years and years… It was the centre of the community, without question.