How people got to church in P.E.I.'s Bygone Days

Reginald (Dutch)Thompson's column The Bygone Days brings you the voices of Island seniors, many of whom are now long-departed. Thesetales of the way things used to be offer a fascinating glimpse into the past. Every fewweekends CBC P.E.I. brings you one of Dutch's columns.

Back in P.E.I.'s bygone days of 100 years ago or more, most people went to church, the spiritual and social centre of the community back then.

Present-day P.E.I. is home to many faiths, but back then the divide was a pretty clear dichotomy: Catholic or Protestant. And if you didn't show up on Sunday, the neighbours would be sure to ask questions!

But when there was snow in the fields and ice and mud on the roads, how did people manage to get to church on time?

They'd hitch up the jaunting sleigh and mare, perhaps travelling on a frozen river, or maybe travel by shank's mare (on foot).

Twice some Sundays

Elizabeth MacEwen was born in New Dominion on the West River in 1909. Her grandfather was on the board of trustees of the nearby Presbyterian church when it was built in 1925, she said.

Spring of the year when there was no sleighing and no car, I walked. Rev. Donald Nicholson

That church shared a minister with the church at Clyde River, she said. There were often services both morning and night on Sundays.

"You can't get people out to church once on a Sunday now, let alone twice!" MacEwen said.

The large church shed would be full of parishoners' wagons, she said. She recalled neighbours from Rice Point, the Lowther family, bringing both a double-seated wagon anda single wagonto church to accommodate their large family. Those would be replaced by a large sleigh in winter.

MacEwen also rememberedhaving homemade ice cream at a church picnic when she was a girl just like the ice cream scene in Anne of Green Gables.

No plows, no horse

Borden Mooney grew up and lived his whole life in Peakes, between Mount Stewart and Cardigan, and lived to be 87.

He was very active in the church, singing in St. Cuthbert'schoir for 75 years, starting when he was a boy. And he was in the church drama club, The St. Teresa's Dramatic Society, appearing in 24 plays over the years. He remembers many rehearsalstrying to keep warm in front of the potbellied wood stove in the church hall.

Mooney had fond memories of the original W.C. Harris-designed St. Cuthbert's Church in St. Teresa, where his fatherused to play the organ.

"He took me up there to keep me out of mischief," Mooney said of his dad. "I made a lot of trips up there."

When Dutch asked him how he got to church, he said, "Walk! For Chrissake, Jesus! I'd walk from here to St. Teresa's church to serve mass when I was eight years old! In snow.... No plows probably then, no horse."

'Awonder we weren't killed'

Mooney's father worked for the railway, and while the Mooney family might not have had a horse, he said they didn't always have to walk the two miles to church.

"We used to go to church here on the old pump car," he said. "My father, that was his only means of travelling.And you'd have bad roads in the spring, Holy Week and that, we'd take the pump car to church."

Not only that, but they'd sometimes put what he called a flat car on the rails in front of the pump car, and transport up to 15 people for free, with four of the most able men pumping.

They wanted me to be with the minister all the time, they were hoping I'd become a minister! I think they pushed too hard.Donald MacKay

It was uphill on the way to church, but the grade was downhill on the way back, and Mooney said they'd sometimes go as fast as 40 miles per hour.

"It's a wonder we weren't killed, yessir" he said with a laugh. His father eventually stopped the practice for fear the carwould jump the rails in its speed.

Mooney said some people used the railways as roads in the winter, which was a dangerous game if they happened to meet a train.

Walked 16 miles every Sunday

Alfred McGaughey of Bonshaw remembered tough times growing up on his family's farm, when there wasn't even a horse to hitch up to take to church.

"We originally used to walk to Kellys Cross, eight miles," to go to the nearest Catholic church, and then eight miles back homeagain, he said.

He later helped found a small church closer to home.

"We all went and cut lumber and worked free and built that," he recalled.

In many Protestant homes at the time, play or work of any kind was forbidden on Sundays, but not in Catholic ones, so local Protestants used to sneak around to play cards on Sunday, McGaughey said.

Harold Dunphy from Millview was known as a local wit. He said at his end of the Island that the Protestants used to put a bucket on top of the rooster to keep him from entertaining the hens on Sundays!

Getting the minister to church could be tough

Donald MacKay grew up in the Pleasant Valley-Breadalbane area of the Island. His family belonged to the United Church in Breadalbane, he said, which like many churches then and even now, shared a minister with a couple of other churches in the area.

"In the wintertime, we'd have ministers would have no horse some of them couldn't drive a horse, and some of them didn't like horses," he said. "Quite often, my parents would designate me to go Granville. Of course, they wanted me to be with the minister all the time, they were hoping I'd become a minister! I think they pushed too hard, probably."

MacKay's younger brother did become a minister, however, deciding on the calling when he was only five years old.

The Rev. Donald Nicholson had three churches in his charge every Sunday in Harstville, Glasgow Road and Hunter River.

He remembered a big shed at the church at Hartsville full of horses and sleighs in the 1940s right through till the 1950s. He drove his own horse and sleigh to preach during those winters, heading to one church for 11 a.m., then to the next for 3 p.m., and the last in the evening.

"Spring of the year when there was no sleighing and no car, I walked it," he said. "I'd walk to Hartsville, then I'd come home to Brookfield and have my dinner and walk to Glasgow Road, then if the road was open, I'd take my car to Hunter River for the evening service.... I couldn't do it today!"

He made $100 a month, but had to provide his own transportation. He had a P.E.I.-made Francis cutter sleigh "they were the best," he said and a car.

"We were never hungry," he said. Even the poorest parishioners would host the minister and his family for meals, he said.

Nicholson preached occasionally right into his 90s.

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