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Saturday 17 September 2011

The Daintrees of Dilke

Eliza Daintree prepares soup in the kitchen of the Dilke Hotel, 1946. Image source

“If you take a knuckle of beef, simmer it four hours, then throw in some barley, diced carrots, turnips, onions, celery, leaves as well, salt and pepper, you’ll have soup, but 10 to one you won’t have soup like Mrs. George Daintree of Dilke makes,” writes Marjorie Jones in her special to the Regina Leader-Post on March 8, 1946. “That’s her recipe for the kind of soup that has made her name a byword to the travelling public and she doesn’t mind giving it to you. ‘But,’ she says, ‘you can’t make a good soup by just having a good recipe.’ The trick is knowing in just what way to put those ingredients together, but she has been at it since she was 17 and she knows.”  Click here for full story

George and Eliza - A Love Story

Eliza Bruce Dewar was born in Scotland in 1884. She started cooking as a kitchen maid as one of 17 servants on a large London estate. At one time, Eliza took lessons from a French chef who taught her the art of sauce making. “There’s really nothing to French culinary,” she told the Leader-Post reporter. “It’s all in the seasoning.”

Sometime between 1900 and 1905, Eliza met her future husband. Charles Hall George Daintree, born in London in 1883, had been a Barnardo boy - one of the hundreds of "Home Children" sent to Canada in the1890s. George worked on a farm at Elkhorn, Manitoba for four years before returning to London to work, first as a driver of a furniture delivery wagon, and then in a pub. Perhaps George met Eliza (whom he affectionately called Isa) while delivering furniture to the home in which she worked, or perhaps they met in the pub. Whatever the case, the two fell in love. George returned to Canada in 1905, first to work on the farm at Elkhorn, and then to Saskatchewan, where he worked at the Bethune hotel. 

In June 1906, George filed for a homestead nine miles north of Bethune. He worked hard to prove up the homestead and once he received the land title in 1909, he sent for Eliza. She arrived in Canada in November 1910, and married the man she hadn’t seen in six years at St. Chad’s Chapel in Regina.

Happy Years at the Dilke Hotel

In 1921, after ten hard years of farming, George and Eliza decided to move to Dilke with their two children, Robert and Gwendoline. One of the greatest hardships the Daintrees faced on the farm was getting their children to school, four miles away at Kedleston on the shores of Last Mountain Lake. With their past experience in food and beverage service, they traded their farm for the Dilke Hotel, owned at the time by W. J. Hepburn.  

The Dilke Hotel, c. 1912. Source: Ploughshares & Prairie Trails (1982)
The two-story Dilke Hotel had been built in 1909 by John Henry Clifford and son who hired a carpenter from England to head the construction. The hotel had changed hands several times before the Daintrees took over the operation. The family settled in and operated both the Dilke Hotel and the general store in the village for forty years.

Gwen (Daintree) Bathgate provides the following account of her parents' experiences running the Dilke Hotel in Ploughshares & Prairies Trails (1982): “Their days were long for there was much to do in serving the travelling public, washing, ironing, bed-making  preparing meals, bread-baking, dish-washing, lamps to fill, [lamp] chimneys to shine and wicks to trim, and a large establishment to keep clean.  Everyone had their jobs to do. Grandfather [Robert Dewar] cranked the washing machine, Grannie [Mary Jane Dewar] ironed, made beds and did dishes; Mother was the cook; Father was the waiter and cashier.” The hotel was steam-heated by a coal furnace, and there was no electricity. Gasoline lamps were used on the main floor; kerosene lamps lit the upstairs. “I remember a table on the landing on which stood sixteen lamps,” Gwen recalls, “ready to be taken to a bedroom. It was a marvel the place wasn’t burnt.” In 1924, George purchased a Delco light plant and had the hotel wired for electricity.

The Dilke Hotel was a busy place in the 1920s.  Source: Plooughshares & Prairie Trails (1982)
Dilke was on the railway line between Regina and Colonsay, and in the 1920s four trains went through the village daily – two in the morning and two at night. Commercial travellers made good use of this train service during the winter. “It was not uncommon in those early years,” Gwen writes, “to see ten or more men, brief cases in hand, parading from the train to the hotel hurrying to the register to get the best room if they had not booked ahead.” If the place was full, a family member might have to give up their room, or travellers would double up. Business grew so much that by 1924 the Daintrees found they could not keep up. The hotel laundry was sent across to the Chinese laundry; later it was sent to Regina. Bread was bought and extra help was hired.

The Dilke Hotel became well known for its hospitality and for Mrs. Daintree’s cooking. “My mother never turned anyone away hungry” recalls Gwen. “Often she had to hurry a meal along for an early customer, or make an afternoon or evening lunch. On two occasions she was asked to feed passengers on a stalled train. Undaunted, she accepted the challenge, called boarders and family to action, brought out the food and went to work.”

During the forty years that the Daintrees ran the Dilke Hotel, it was more than just a place of business. It became a warm and friendly home, not just for the family, but for teachers, businessmen and students. Doctors and dentists used the hotel rooms to see their patients. Miss Marion Kyllo used the dining room for many years to teach piano lessons. Gwen recalls that the kitchen area was the social hub of the hotel. “I remember Mother, Grannie and the Aunties sharing a cup of tea with their friends,” she writes. “In here, too, Mr. Mortin brightened the afternoon once a month when he called to collect the phone bill and tease ‘the girls’ over a cup of tea. There wasn’t private home with a happier kitchen.”

In the fall of 1945, things got tough for Eliza Daintree. Her mother became seriously ill, and this burden, combined with the constant daily routine and Christmas celebrations, taxed her strength. One day in her haste, she tripped over the family’s big St. Bernard dog and broke her shoulder. Gwen and her husband moved in to help with the hotel operations while her mother recuperated for six weeks in the hospital. 

Eliza Daintree with her grandson, Brian Bathgate, and the family dog, Rough, 
on the steps of the Dilke Hotel, 1947.  Source: Ploughshares & Prairie Trails (1982)
The fall of 1945 was also the ninth year that the Daintrees catered to American hunters. George supplied a car for the hunters and either chauffeured them himself or hired a driver to take them to the hunting areas. One fall, the Dilke Hotel hosted seven different groups from the States, including a Virginian had come for seven years i a row to hunt fowl in the district. “They required a lot of attention and kept us busy from three o’clock in the morning until they went to bed at night so we decided not to have that many again,” Eliza told the Leader-Post reporter in 1946. “We have nothing fancy, just plain ordinary cooking, but they must like it,” she said.  

In the 1950s, Eliza’s health began to deteriorate. The Daintrees sold the Dilke Hotel in 1962 and retired to Regina where Eliza passed away in 1967. George became an active member of the Regina Senior Citizen Centre, and married again in 1971. He died in December 1980 at age 97.

After the Daintrees

John and Dorothy Smith bought the Dilke hotel from the Daintrees in 1962. The 26-year-old parents of four children under the age of seven found the experience of moving from Regina into an old hotel in dire need of repair a bit scary. For one thing, the hotel had no sewer or water. With the help of volunteers from the village and area the Smiths renovated the hotel and opened it – complete with a beverage room which opened its doors to women.  The Smiths continued to modernize the hotel over the ten years that they owned it. The hotel changed hands many times between 1972 and present day. 

In 2010, the Dilke Hotel was for sale for $98,000.  By then, there were eight guest rooms on the upper floor with a common bathroom. The rest of the second floor was living quarters for the proprietor. The main floor had a 64-seat bar, a kitchen and office. A 40-seat patio off the bar was used in the summer months.  

Dilke Hotel, October 2011.  Joan Champ photo

The Dilke Hotel, 2008.  Photo courtesy of Ruth Bitner
Dilke Hotel, 2010. Source: Google Street View
 © Joan Champ 2011




Friday 2 September 2011

Elkhorn Hotel at Morse

Elkhorn Hotel seen from Main Street in Morse, 1962. Walter Reed photo. Image source

Thanks to Kristine (Montgomery) Flynn for helping me with the research for this article, and for the use of her photographs.

The Elkhorn Hotel at Morse burned down twice before it finally put down roots. Jack Webster built the first Elkhorn Hotel in 1907 directly opposite the CPR station at the corner of Railway and Main. Three years later, in 1910, Webster’s hotel was destroyed by fire. Shortly afterwards, J. A. McAvoy came to Morse and erected the second Elkhorn Hotel which burned down in 1912. McAvoy was undeterred. He rebuilt the third Elkhorn even bigger than before, with steam heating, good lighting and the “finest sample rooms on the line” for commercial travelers.

Elkhorn Hotel, 1913. Image source
The Sodini Brothers - Charles and Brando - bought the hotel from McAvoy in 1913. Originally from Italy then Minneapolis, the Sodinis also owned hotels in Swift Current and Leader, Saskatchewan. While maintaining the good appearance of the Morse hotel, the Sodinis also enlarged the bar and put in a large stock of liquors. According to the Morse News, January 22, 1914, “This stock they kept increasing until it had attained the importance of being as complete a stock as carried by most wholesale houses.” Brando Sodini operated the Elkhorn for 25 years. His obituary in 1938 stated, “Brando, as he was best known by the travelling public and local citizens alike, was a great public-spirited  citizen, always ready to back any civic enterprise that was worthy of a name.”  His funeral service was held in the Elkhorn Hotel prior to the removal of his remains to Minneapolis for burial. Click to read obituary in Leader-Post  

During Prohibition (1915-1924), the Elkhorn Hotel was a place of some ill repute. On November 23, 1918, the Regina Leader-Post reported that the provincial police had raided the hotel at Morse and found several kegs of liquor “of the very worst variety of the Montana make.” Police also found all the necessary items for bottling the stuff in order to do a bootlegging trade. “The whole outfit was taken by the police,” the newspaper states, “and the proprietor [likely Sodini] was brought before the justice of the peace and fined $200 for transporting the liquor and $50 for having the liquor in a public place.”

Things hadn’t improved much by 1934. The Leader-Post reported in August 23rd that a disgruntled patron, William Bender, upset because he had lost some money in a slot machine at the Elkhorn Hotel, broke into the hotel the next day and stole the offending one-armed bandit. Bender was given a suspended sentence in RCMP court at Moose Jaw, when it was explained that he had returned the slot machine and all the money that was in it to the hotel. Click here to read full story Slot machines were banned in Saskatchewan in 1935.

Ken Doraty, the "Rouleau Flash"
Leader-Post, Apr. 4, 1933

In the early 1940s, the Elkhorn Hotel was owned by NHL hockey great, Ken Doraty. Born in Ontario, Doraty moved with his parents to Rouleau, Saskatchewan, when he was five years old. Doraty played hockey for the Toronto Maple Leafs from 1932 to 1935. Known as the “Rouleau Flash,” Doraty had a couple of major achievements during his NHL career. When the Leafs played the Boston Bruins during the fifth and deciding game of the Stanley Cup Semi-Finals in 1933, Doraty scored the winning goal at the 166:48 mark of the sixth overtime period. Click for full story  At the time it was the longest playoff game in NHL history – a record that has been surpassed only once. As a result of his history-making shot against the Bruins, Doraty was declared a hero of the Toronto-Ranger series. 

Doraty's other big hockey achievement came during a game between Toronto and Ottawa on January 16, 1934. He accomplished the rarest of all hat tricks in hockey history, scoring three goals in seven minutes and 30 seconds during the overtime period (in the days before sudden death overtime).

Knowing that his NHL career was coming to an end, Doraty bought the hotel at Morse in the spring of 1939. He operated the Elkhorn Hotel for a few years, then got into the billiards business in Moose Jaw. He coached the Moose Jaw Canucks in the 1940s, and a Junior Hockey League team that made it to the Memorial Cup finals in 1947.

Elkhorn Hotel, 2011.  Photo courtesy of Kristine Montgomery

On January 4, 2019, Amarjit Singh Dhanju – known to everyone as AJ – bought the Elkhorn Hotel. In addition to a menu of standard bar food, the hotel also offers a full Punjabi (Indian) menu for truck drivers – posted on Facebook. The bar features a pool table, VLTs, and, on occasion, live entertainment – everything from country bands to hypnotists.

An amusing review of the Elkhorn Hotel on TripAdvisor, August 23, 2017, reads: “The building is over a hundred years old, so it is no surprise that the floor in places resembles the hills and dales of the surrounding farmland. If you have a few drinks at the bar and head for the bathroom, you may wonder how many you’ve had as you navigate the floor.”

Elkhorn Hotel, 2011.  Photo courtesy of Kristine Montgomery

© Joan Champ 2011


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Saturday 9 July 2011

"Ladies and Escorts:" Saskatchewan Liquor Laws in the 1960s

“The most unfortunate feature of the present system is the social discrimination against women, who are looked on as incapable of making their own choices.This business regarding women and Indians, more than half the population, as irresponsible, should be ended.”
- Prof. J. M. Naylor, University of Saskatchewan, Star-Phoenix survey on Saskatchewan's liquor laws, May 8, 1958, p. 3 Source


When Jack Morrow and his son John opened the Shell Lake Hotel on November 15, 1957, only men were allowed in the beer parlour. On Saturday nights, while the farmers were enjoying each other’s company in the bar, their wives often had nowhere else to go. The Morrows made a tiny room in the hotel basement available to women where they could visit without disturbing, or being disturbed by, the men. [Pages of the Past: History of Shell Lake-Mont Nebo Districts, 1983, p. 423] There was a long-standing prairie conviction that women and the public consumption of alcohol did not mix. [James H. Gray, Bacchanalia Revisited, 1982] Saskatchewan beer parlours were men-only enclaves until the early 1960s, when provincial liquor legislation permitted mixed drinking in newly christened “beverage rooms.”

The issue of mixed drinking was briefly debated by the members of the Hotels Association of Saskatchewan at their 22nd annual convention in May 1953. Some felt that allowing women into parlours would create a “more polite” atmosphere and would cut down on drinking in cars. Most, however, were opposed. “If you’re looking for trouble, open ladies’ beer parlours,” one delegate said. Two women hotel operators stated that they felt “that the woman’s place should be in the home and also that they wouldn’t care to look after a woman’s parlour.” In the end, it was decided to leave the decision to “outside organizations.” ["Ladies’ Beer Parlors Discussed by Hotelmen,” in Regina Leader-Post, May 20, 1953, p. 4Click for source 

Gradually, the case built for more liberal liquor laws in Saskatchewan. Veterans of the Second World War had fond memories of spending a happy hour or two with their girls in English pubs or European bistros. After the war, Canadian women were only permitted to drink with men in Legion halls and private clubs. In 1954-55, Manitoba's Bracken Commission investigated the liquor control system and recommended that all provinces hold plebiscites and let people decide if they wanted to widen drinking provisions, including the opening of public drinking facilities to women. This was welcome news to Norm and Sadie Jacklin, owners of the Climax Hotel close to the US border. Many times an American husband and wife travelling through and stopping at the hotel would have to be discreetly taken aside and told about the Saskatchewan liquor law. [Prairie Wool: A History of Climax and Surrounding School Districts, 1980, p. 35] 

In 1958, calls for mixed drinking increased. Regina Police Chief A. G. Cookson, speaking to the local branch of the Associated Canadian Travellers in March, said that men-only bars encouraged rowdyism and vulgarity. “Inject a little dignity into beer parlours by permitting mixed drinking,” he said. “When women are allowed into the parlours it restricts the activity of men.” ["Police Chief Raps Saskatchewan Liquor Laws; Advocates Mixed Drinking, Special Club Licenses," Star-Phoenix, March 8, 1958, p. 3]  

Liquor Sales Outlet Inquiry 

Throughout 1958, Saskatchewan’s Liquor Sales Outlet Inquiry Committee conducted a short but highly energetic investigation. Guided by the Bracken Commission, its ten members visited liquor outlets in Manitoba, Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario and North Dakota, received 40 written briefs and heard 80 oral submissions from various organizations. The brief from the provincial hotels association showed it had softened its position. “Women are capable of looking after themselves,” said association president George G. Grant, “and should be allowed to take a drink along with men if they want to.” ["Hotel Association Brief Advocates Mixed Drinking If Liquor Laws Revised," Star-Phoenix, May 2, 1958, p. 3] On the other hand, Rev. T. E. J. Gibbon, chairman of the Saskatchewan Temperance Federation, expressed strong opposition to women in beer parlours. “There are many nice women who would like to have a drink, no doubt,” he said, “but there are many of the other kind, and it would provide them with a nice, warm office.” ["Temperance Group Gets Thorough Quiz as Liquor Outlet Probe is Launched," Star-Phoenix, May 2, 1958, p. 14]

In July of 1958, the committee released its detailed findings. Click to read full story  Three of the main recommendations concerning Saskatchewan’s liquor laws were:  Beer parlours should be improved; the liquor act should be more strictly enforced; and there should be mixed drinking outlets. During the brief debate in the provincial legislature, Attorney-General Robert A. Walker defined the beer parlour as “an outlet which caters to the lowest common denominator of depravity.” He supported beverage rooms with mixed drinking, believing they would end “the obscene kind of drinking” that is done in beer parlours. ["Bars. Beverage Rooms Debated," Star-Phoenix, March 17, 1959, p. 3] 

Liquor Licensing Act

On April 1, 1959, the Liquor Licensing Act established a process of local options votes whereby licensed dining rooms, cocktail bars, and beverage rooms could be established in Saskatchewan communities. Women were allowed into these new liquor outlets. Regulations required that hotel make renovations to convert their beer parlours into beverage rooms in order to accommodate mixed drinking.  Men-only beer parlours could continue to operate, but no beer parlour licenses would be issued to hotels not already licensed at the beginning of 1959. 

Local option votes were held in 195 Saskatchewan centres in November 1959. Surprisingly, the “dry” sentiment still ran strong throughout the rural areas of the province, and most of these communities voted “No” to the new types of liquor outlets. They would have to wait until 1964 before they could vote on the question again. ["Some Saskatchewan Communities Disapprove of New Liquor Laws," Montreal Gazette, Nov 16, 1959, p. 7] 

Leask was one of the few villages in the province that voted to allow a new liquor outlet in 1959. By February 1960, the Windsor Hotel owned by George Cuelenaere was operating one of the first beverage rooms in small-town Saskatchewan. The beverage room, which could accommodate 150 persons, had been decorated in shades of mocha, rosewood and aqua, with matching furniture. ["First Rural Beverage Room in Operation at Leask," Star-Phoenix, Feb. 11, 1960, p. 14] 

Barmaids 

In 1961, the Hotels Association of Saskatchewan debated a proposal to hire women to serve beer and wine in beverage rooms. At the association’s annual convention, a woman delegate “received a hearty round of applause when she said that especially in smaller places women should be allowed to work in beverage rooms because a wife could then help out her husband.” George B. Stewart, chairman of the provincial liquor licensing commission, expressed concern about what the hiring of barmaids would do to "the breadwinner of the family." “Put yourself in the place of a person who would be displaced by employing a female,” he said. Stewart urged that the hotelmen study the issue more closely before making any recommendation. Stewart was pleased with having women customers, however. “Permitting the ladies in has made for a much happier operation,” he said. “God bless the ladies for that!” ["Waiters May Be Too Costly, Regina Leader-Post, May 18, 1961, p. 4] Click for source Women were finally allowed to serve beer in Saskatchewan beverage rooms in 1965. They were not, however, permitted to serve beer in beer parlours unless they were wives of hotel licensees or unless they were hotel owners and operators themselves 

Improvements Noticed 

Fields of Prosperity: A History of Englefeld 1903-19
In the early 1960s, a study conducted for the Government of Saskatchewan by research psychologists Robert Dewar and Robert Sommer found that the drinking habits of residents in an unnamed small town had changed very little in the two years following the changeover from a beer parlour to a beverage room in the local hotel. “The dire predictions that the new beverage outlet would sharply increase drinking in the community have not been fulfilled,” the authors reported. 
["Opening of New Liquor Outlet Failed to Change Drinking Habits," Star-Phoenix, May 1, 1963, p. 3] Click for source 

A questionnaire distributed to 179 beverage room operators in Saskatchewan by the provincial liquor licensing commission found improvements in the pattern of drinking behavior, stating that the overall trend was to more leisurely drinking. This improvement was attributed to the presence of women “who are more moderate.” [Sask. Drinking Habits Improve, Regina Leader-Post, May 18, 1961, p. 4] Click for source 

In 1962, Stewart told the 31st convention of the Hotels Association that, prior to the passage of the Liquor Licensing Act three years earlier, “the people of Saskatchewan were the most uncivilized drinkers in the world.” Since then, he asserted, the overall standards of beverage rooms were “magnificent,” saying women had lent the new drinking establishments “an air of decency.” “The Liquor Licensing Commission will be happy when every beer parlour in the province is converted to a beverage room,” Stewart said. ["Act Credited as Drinking Habits Better, Star-Phoenix, May 18, 1962, p. 5]

Mrs. Pauline Sopatyk, Mrs. Olga Wutzke and Mrs. Buzzy Lutzer enjoying a drink in Saskatoon's first mixed drinking beverage room at the Sutherland Hotel, Star-Phoenix, January 6, 1960. Image source

It would take another ten years before the last “Men Only” bars disappeared from Saskatchewan. In the meantime, millions of dollars were spent by the hotel owners of the province making improvements to their guest rooms, dining facilities and licensed outlets. Ab Montgomery, proprietor of the Tisdale Hotel, spent $60,000 enlarging and renovating his facility in 1964. Most of the changes were to the beverage room. Carpet, acoustic tile and inset lighting were installed and a new entrance was constructed. New tables and upholstered chairs were added. [“Hotel Changes Cost $60,000,” Leader-Post, Nov. 17, 1964, p. 2] Joe and Bernie Kaufman, owners of the Ponteix Hotel, began extensive renovations to their beer parlour in 1961 to accommodate the new liquor laws. The result was a more pleasant beverage room that included a fountain, a large aquarium, and carpeting throughout. [Ponteix Yesterday and Today, Volume 1, 1991, p. 345]


Last Men-Only Bastion 

Vic Lynn, proprietor of the Warman Hotel, had to wait until 1972 to have mixed drinking in his establishment. Warman residents had consistently voted against mixed drinking in local option votes. Amendments to provincial liquor laws in 1972 changed the status of beer parlours. Lynn could finally take down the “Men Only” sign and replace it with a "Ladies and Escorts" sign. He had to make a few changes, increasing the seating from 50 to 100 and constructing women’s washroom facilities. The Warman Hotel just north of Saskatoon and the hotel at Marchwell southeast of Yorkton were the last two beer parlours in Saskatchewan that did not allow women to drink in their premises. ["No More ‘Men Only'," Star-Phoenix, May 25, 1972, p. 10]  

Warman Hotel, last bastion of men-only drinking in Saskatchewn. Image source
 

Here's a CBC video from 1972 showing the last day of men-only drinking at the Warman Hotel bar. Source: CBC Archives.

 © Joan Champ 2011


Sunday 19 June 2011

Indians in Bars: Saskatchewan Liquor Laws after the Second World War

First Nations people were not allowed to drink in Saskatchewan bars until 1960 -- the same year they were granted the right to vote. This is the sixth in a series of posts on provincial liquor laws and their impact on small-town hotels.  NOTE:  The term  "Indian" is used in this post, as that was the word most commonly used to refer to First Nations peoples during the period under discussion.

Several thousand First Nations men and women fought in the Canadian armed services during the Second World War. When they returned from overseas, however, provisions from the out-dated Indian Act prohibited them from voting, holding pow-wows, and drinking alcoholic beverages. They were not even allowed to drink with their former comrades-in-arms at the Legion halls across Canada. In the words of James H. Gray, “there was something patently ridiculous in a system which permitted an Indian to risk his life for his country but denied him access to a bottle of beer.” ( James H. Gray, Bacchanalia Revisited’ Western Canada’s Boozy Skid to Social Disaster  [Saskatoon:  Western Producer Prairie Books, 1982], p. 117)

John Tootoosis. Image source
From 1946 to 1948, a Special Committee of the Senate and House of Commons studied the Indian Act and heard a large number of opinions on the issue of Indian alcohol restrictions in Canada. In May 1947 John B. Tootoosis, president of the Union of Saskatchewan Indians, told the hearings that there might be some problems, but, he maintained, “the Indian would learn to handle whiskey.” Joseph Dreaver, former president of the Saskatchewan Indian Association, claimed that “the sooner the Indian has same privilege as the white man it will be better for him.” Dreaver, a veteran of both world wars, told the committee that Aboriginal soldiers drank at in military canteens along with their non-Aboriginal comrades, and he “found no difference between the Indian and the white man.” (Canada. Parliament. Special Joint Committee of the Senate and the House of Commons Appointed to Examine and Consider the Indian Act, 9 May 1947,vol. 4, p. 1071)  

Joseph Dreaver (2nd from right), c. 1944. Image source
In 1951, on the recommendations of the Special Committee, the federal government made a number of changes to the Indian Act, including an amendment which permitted Indians to consume intoxicating beverages in licensed premises. The catch was that their provincial government had to take the initiative and petition the governor general-in-council. The Saskatchewan government was not prepared to act. Premier Tommy Douglas, a non-drinker himself, was not in favour of drinking whether by whites or Indians. He knew there was a divergence of opinion about drinking among Saskatchewan’s Indian leaders. “Local chiefs knew only too well the disastrous effects alcohol had had in the past,” F. Laurie Barron explains, “and understandably they were not anxious to legitimize or broaden its use.” Hotel owners in Saskatchewan were solidly opposed to opening their drinking establishments to Indians. According to Barron, they were afraid that drunken Indians might cause violence and drive away business. (F. Laurie Barron, Walking in Indian Moccasins: The Native Policies of Tommy Douglas and the CCF [Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1997], p. 110)

Nothing was done until 1960 when Douglas set aside his own reservations on the matter and petitioned the federal government to issue the necessary proclamation. The province’s Indians were given the right to buy and consume alcohol the same year they were granted the right to vote. The following year, the Hotel Association of Saskatchewan proposed that Indian drinking continue to be restricted until an education program could be implemented to teach Indians about their rights and responsibilities involved in alcohol consumption. 

John Tootoosis, president of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indians, informed the hotelmen that many educational meetings had been held on reserves throughout the province during 1960 that were designed to help Indians understand the complexities of the new regulations. Bill Wuttunee, a Regina lawyer and member of the provincial committee on minority groups, stated that while most Saskatchewan hotelmen were co-operating well, a few had “completely disregarded the civil liberties of Indians.” Wuttunee believed that Indians, given time, would be able to handle liquor as well as anyone else. CLICK HERE to read "Hotelmen’s Proposals Get Criticism from Some Groups,” Regina Leader-Post, May 17, 1961, p. 3.

Tommy Douglas, 1945. Image source
The following year, Premier Douglas addressed the 30th annual convention of the provincial hotels association. He urged hotelmen to be patient in dealing with problems created by allowing Indians into licensed beverage rooms. “We are having this trouble,’ Douglas said, “because we are reaping the harvest of 50 years or more of making the Indian a second-class citizen. We are going to have to make up our minds whether we are going to keep the Indian bottled up in a sort of Canadian apartheid or whether we are going to let him become a good citizen.” He cautioned, however, that while the Indian had been given equal rights, he had no more right to break the law than the white man. “If he is drunk or causing a disturbance then he should be put out of the premises the same as a white man should. But he should not be put out just because he is an Indian.” CLICK HERE to read “Douglas Asks Patience in Dealing with Indians,” Regina Leader-Post, May 18, 1961, p. 42.

Racism in Hotels

It was not long before incidents of discrimination against Indians in Saskatchewan hotels began to occur. In May of 1963, for example, three First Nations people were charged with causing a disturbance when they were refused beer in the “white” half of the beverage room at the Edenwold hotel. Alfred G. Pfenning, the hotel owner, had introduced a “Saturday night rule” by which Indians were restricted to half of the planter-divided beverage room on Saturday nights. Two of the three people were fined $1, and charges were dropped against the third person. Provincial Magistrate L. F. Bence said the rule was unfair and bound to “rile” a normal person. The Criminal Code of Canada had sufficient provisions for dealing with rowdyism, he said. But to have restrictions based on a person’s race amounted to provocation. CLICK HERE to read “Segregation in Parlor Termed a Provocation,” Regina Leader-Post, May 24, 1963, p. 2.

Image source
In 1971, four Saskatchewan hotels were accused by the Federation of Saskatchewan Indians of discrimination under the Fair Accommodation Practices Act. Pubs in the Broadway Hotel at Leask, the King George Hotel at Kamsack, the Baldwin Hotel in Saskatoon, and a hotel in Prince Albert were alleged to have refused service to Indians. In the case of the Leask hotel, the beer parlor was divided into two areas, one with rugs and the other without. Indians patrons were not served if they sat in the portion with the rugs. An Indian woman said that she tried to sit in the white area three times and was told to move each time. At the Kamsack hotel, an Indian complainant said he walked into the white section of the bar and was told “we don’t serve your kind in here … you stink up the place.” 

In his letter demanding an investigation, FSI Chief David Ahenakew stated that while drinking might not be the most enlightened social endeavor, it was absolutely essential, “especially in such a milieu where defences are often lower and the cutting edge of racial tension more keenly felt,” that scrupulous attention should be paid to the basic civil rights of all Canadian citizens. CLICK HERE to read "Beer halls may face charges,” Regina Leader-Post, Jan. 6, 1971, p. 2.

Senator John B. Tootosis and David Ahenakew, c. 1975. Image source

Troubling Legacy

By the end of the 1970s, alcohol abuse was one of the biggest problems facing the First Nations peoples of Saskatchewan. CLICK HERE to read more. In 1978, Jim Sinclair, president of the Association of Metis and non-status Indians of Saskatchewan, stated that almost half of the natives in the province were “sick with booze,” and had severe alcohol problems. CLICK HERE to read “Alcohol Treatment Urged for Natives,” Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, July 20, 1978, p. 28. Things were so bad that Senator John Tootoosis, chairman of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indians' senate, stated in 1981 that he felt the reason the Canadian government had permitted Indians to drink in bars and buy alcohol was to allow them to kill themselves off. CLICK HERE to read "Fight for Rights, Indians Told," Regina Leader-Post, November 24, 1981, p. 4.


© Joan Champ 2011


Wednesday 8 June 2011

Carievale Hotel: A Love Story

O mistress mine, where are you roaming?
O stay and hear! your true-love's coming
That can sing both high and low;
Trip no further, pretty sweeting,
Journey's end in lovers' meeting--
Every wise man's son doth know
            -  Shakespeare, “Carpe Diem” (1st verse)

Railway Avenue, Carievale, c. 1910. Hotel is third from right.
From Autumn Leaves, Gilded Sheaves (1988)

Godson

William Decimus Godson and his wife Catherine (Kate) built the Shakespeare Hotel in Carievale in 1902, and opened it for business in 1903. Both William and Kate were born in England, and Kate had grown up near Stratford-on-Avon – hence the name of their hotel.

Kate and William Godson. From Autumn Leaves, Gilded Sheaves (1988)
The Shakespeare Hotel was a two-storey frame building on Railway Avenue, with an open verandah across the front. It had seven bedrooms on the second floor, two of which the Godsons reserved for their own use – one as a sitting room, the other as a bedroom.  The other five rooms were for boarders and travelling guests. 

The dining room on the first floor was a busy place, as the train from Brandon to Estevan stopped in Carievale for dinner. “In those days,” Decima (Godson) Horsborough recalled for the Carievale history book, “vegetables, meat and desserts were all served on separate dishes and placed next to the diner’s dinner plate… one thinks of all the extra dishes to wash!” The kitchen had a large coal and wood stove. There was also a sample room on the main floor where commercial travellers opened their trunks and displayed their wares to, and took orders from, Carievale merchants.

A liquor license was obtained for the bar, “a good form of insurance against slow business for any hotel,” Decima observed. Hotel staff included Mrs. Mullet, the cook, and the three Moore sisters from the Thunder Creek area who worked in the kitchen, dining room and as chambermaids.

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In June 1904, the hotel staff prepared a great quantity of baking for a Sports Day. Decima found the following list in her mother’s handwriting in the back of her cookbook: 222 plain cookies; 100 raisin cookies; 116 ginger cookies; 146 jam tarts; 100 doughnuts; 2 dozen apple pies; 1 dozen lemon pies; and 1 dozen rhubarb pies. Apparently, there wasn't much demand for pies at the Sports Day. Beneath this list, Decima's father had written, “39 pies leftover.” 

On September 15, 1904, ten days after his second daughter Decima was born, William Godson was accidentally shot and killed while on a prairie chicken hunting trip with a group of friends. He was buried in Carnduff. Kate Godson, with a newborn and a 17-month old (Kathleen Mary), took over the hotel.  She had never taken an active role in the management of the hotel before this, so her father, an innkeeper in England, came to help her. “Mother rented the hotel for some years – some renters were good, some not so good, and some dishonest,” Decima wrote. In 1906, the hotel was sold to R. T. Martin. Kate married George Taylor in 1907, and had three children with him. She died in 1946.

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Swayze

Mrs. Alice Izadora (Dora) Swayze operated the hotel in Carievale – now called the Empire Hotel – in 1916-17. Her husband, Herbert Swayze, father of her five children, was operating the hotel in Whitewood in 1911 when he died suddenly from a cerebral hemorrhage. Dora raised her children while managing hotels and rooming houses in Abernethy, Bulyea, Earl Grey and then in Carievale. In 1917, Dora married Herbert Haines, a miner from Bienfait.

Muldoon

Ford and Blanche Muldoon ran a first-class operation at the Empire Hotel from 1923 to 1930. Ford, a resourceful man, introduced many innovations, including a light plant in the basement – the first electric power in town. A few years later, he constructed a building at the rear of the hotel to house a larger electric generator and ice house. The plant not only provided power to the hotel – it also sent electricity to the Orange Hall, the pool hall, the barber shop, and three street lights on Railway Avenue. This generator also facilitated the installation of a Kelvinator ice cream freezer – the first refrigeration in Carievale – which no doubt proved popular with the young people in town. In 1929-30, the Saskatchewan Power Commission (later SaskPower) installed power lines in the region. The hotel’s plant was used as a backup during power outages. The power linemen all stayed at the Carievale hotel, and Ford and Blanche had to be up before dawn to feed the hungry crew. 

Once the Saskatchewan Power crew moved on, the hotel business went into a decline due to the Depression. After exhausting all other options, Ford and Blanche applied for a beer parlour license in 1935 – a last ditch effort to save their business. Despite the amenities that Ford and Blanche had brought to the town, the local voters went against their liquor license bid, and the Muldoons saw no alternative but to abandon the hotel in 1938.

Ford Muldoon (centre) surrounded by family, c. 1955.
From Autumn Leaves, Golden Sheaves (1988)

Kemaldean

The Empire Hotel had been vacant for two years when Joe and Niame Kemaldean bought it from Great West Life Insurance Company in 1940. The Kemaldean family had immigrated to Canada from Lebanon in 1924. They ran a store in Elmore, Saskatchewan, until 1934 when they moved to Carievale and operated a general store there. When their store burned down in 1940, the Kemaldeans, with their daughter Mabel and son Norman, moved their store into the dining room of the Empire Hotel. They operated a café on the west side of the building. 

Niame and Joe Kemaldean, c. 1960.
From Autumn Leaves, Golden Sheaves (1988)
In 1946, the Kemaldeans were successful in obtaining a liquor license for the Carievale hotel. They moved their store into the vacant barber shop next door, and made extensive renovations to the hotel before opening the beer parlour in the hotel in 1947. Norman Kemaldean worked as the bartender in the Empire Hotel from 1948 to 1977. He witnessed many changes, including the renovation of the licensed premises from a beer parlour to a beverage room in 1962-63 to accommodate mixed drinking. When Joe Kemaldean passed away in 1977, his widow Niame sold the hotel to Dwayne Lalonde.
What is love? 'tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies no plenty,--
Then come kiss me, Sweet and twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure
            - Shakespeare, “Carpe Diem” (last verse)
  

Post Script

According to comments below, sometime in the 2000s the hotel in Carievale was bought by a couple - Gerry and Teresa - from Carnduff. The couple gutted the hotel's interior with plans to turn the building into a gift shop. It appears the gift shop never opened.

Former Empire Hotel in Carievale - planned to be a gift shop in 2009. Google Street View
Former Empire Hotel in Carievale, 2009. Google Street View

© Joan Champ 2011