Listen while Inuk youth Mary Lampe-Saunders interviews Elder Ruth Powell. This interview is part of the Timeless Voices Youth Podcast Program.
Ruth Powell, an 86-year-old indigenous elder from Happy Valley Goose Bay, shared her childhood experiences, including befriending a black bear named Lucky and her grandmother's fear of the bear. She discussed her transition to residential school at 13, the challenges of learning English, and her father's mixed heritage.
Ruth recounted her life raising seven children, working in a hospital, and delivering two babies in one day. She emphasized the importance of hard work, family, and open communication in her 58-year marriage. Ruth also reflected on the significant changes in technology and lifestyle over the years.
Tune in for an inspiring conversation that honors the voices of the past while empowering the leaders of tomorrow.
For accessibility, transcripts are provided with every episode.
Read more about the Program here: Timeless Voices
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Music.
0:15
Welcome to Timeless Voices. These interviews were recorded in July, 2024 in this piece, you're gonna hear Mary Lampe-Saunders interview Ruth Powell. Ruth is an Indigenous elder at Long Term Care in Happy Valley Goose Bay. We spoke to her there. She is 86 years old. She grew up in Saltwater Pond close to Mulligan, between Northwest River and Rigolet first a warning. Ruth discusses her experience in residential school. Some of the topics she mentioned may be triggering to listeners. Anyone who may need support can contact the National Residential School line at 1-866-925-4419, you
1:21
What was your childhood like?
1:24
Great. I live with my grandmother because I had freedom. I never had no one else. Besides a beer. I had a pet beer. We used to fight too, the bear. I come back to and again when, when he come and knock me about 15 feet sometime, but it was good fun. I loved it.
1:58
How did you befriend a black bear?
2:01
Because I knowed where the cave was, and I got one small one, and took him home.
2:10
What was it like raising a black bear?
2:13
Great, yeah. I used to get fish for him in a net. Wow. I had a canoe, and I could go so far out. I couldn't go past certain places, but I used to, because there's a lot of fish to the black rock. And I used to feed him that. He used to come out with me, too. Yeah.
2:43
How old were you when this happened?
2:45
8 years old.
2:47
So what was your black bear's name?
2:51
Lucky, because he was lucky he had me and I had he.
2:58
What was your grandmother's name?
3:00
My family with Edna and John Michelin.
3:05
Did your grandma like your bear?
3:08
No, she was scared of it. I couldn't come near her, and she wouldn't come near me on because of the bear. We used to eat a lot of cherries too.
3:24
What was your grandma like?
3:27
She was a good woman, and she knitted a lot, and she donated to the poor people. She liked doing nothing and knitting. Sometimes she kept but she loved her prayer in the morning, we had kneel down and have a prayer before breakfast or anything, and the same thing in the night, before we go to bed, prayers. Sunday, we had more because it was the holy day. Yeah, we had, there was eleven of us in the family. I guess that's why they give me to grandmother and brother, Jim, was already in the dorm, and I went there, but I never knew, for two or three years. I was happy where I was. So when I were gone too long, another one, children, grown up, they wouldn't accept me. 'You don't belong here.' Butthat was all right. I never mind. I was used to it, but I never had my bear, the only thing. I missed that. And still, I go up to a bear. They won't, they wouldn't hurt me. Go up and looked at their eyes and you can look them down. See any animal, I bet you wouldn't try it. But you can always look an animal down, even the wild dogs they have outside. You look at one, and he would turn around and go. I've been in bear caves, and there's some warm and there's a seat around. I don't know how they do it but you can go in there and sit down and look at them. I've been went into and there's bears in there and I sat down watching once I'm getting up and that I wish I had camera. Then, yeah, nice pictures. Funny thing, you know, and they borns the child, sleeping. Yeah, I never know that until I was in the cave and one time and that she delivered bear, still sleeping. Mystery b'y. But I enjoyed it. I wasn't even scared when they woke up. Just kept watching them, and I walked out then.
7:09
And my little beer come with me wherever I went, he went. Besides in the house. Grandma, used to say, 'He's lucky, but if he come in, he'd be a dead duck.' And then when I was 13, they said I had to go to school, so I'll come up to North West in the dorm, and that's where I went to school to.
7:52
What did you think about going to school at 13?
7:57
Well, I never know of it. I used to talk all Indian there, and when I went to the college, I had to talked English, and they told me that everyone is English people, and I had to learned it, but I picked up Eskimo language before I picked up. I still can't talk English yet. I don't know why that's the hardest thing to pick up.
8:35
What was school like?
8:38
Bad and cold place that dorm was because we never had no stove for that, and we had to go outdoors and over the bank there to go to the outhouse, to use it, and b'y was cold in the winter. But I happened to have a good parents and good friend. My uncle George was the best. He used to bring me a comforter and a bear skin for getting out of bed, and that for a mat, and the time that the patient would take and cover herself up with the bearskin, but I had blankets and a quilt, and sometime I wake up and there's someone else in my bed to the foot or something.
9:38
How far did you go in school?
9:40
I went to Grade 9. I was lucky to get there. My father used to talk, He's Indian. His father was and his mother was a Newfie. He was from Cooley point Bay Roberts. She used to come fishing to Labrador, and that's how she got the father was Indian.
10:14
Did you learn anything about your father's culture?
10:18
Yeah, I know it now. I've got a paper, but my oldest son went through everything to get it what happened and that he never know til after he's dead that we found out his father's name. It was a Goudie, yeah.
10:45
Did you have any children?
10:47
Yeah, I got seven, five boy, boys and two girls.
10:53
What was it like raising your children in Them Days?
10:57
Hard in one way, but food was cheap then, yes, real cheap. Then you can buy a Coke and bag of chips and ice cream for 25 cents. Now, b'y, they gone haywire. You lucky to get a bag of chips now for 24 cents.
11:28
Can you tell me more about raising your kids?
11:32
Yes, it's pretty hard then, but I had a husband. He used to go to work. Yeah, I was better off married because it was a hard life with the nursing and coming home seeing my mother and that, and knowing my family was getting cancer and everything, and I'd be there? And yet, I had to work. I worked in a hospital for six years, and I had delivered two babies one day by myself, and I never knowed about where babies come from then, I sure know it now, yeah.
12:33
What was it like birthing two babies in one day?
12:36
Horrible when they were done, I felt their floor crying. Yeah.
12:47
How was it like working in the hospital?
12:50
Then you were good. It's horrible now, but it was good then, yeah.
12:58
What was it like?
13:01
Great, I used to, have to look after other, I was looking after children. And the one day Dr Thomas told me, would you mind going up and helping this lady the worst patient that dead, I said, dead ones? He said, Yes, you want that job? I said don't want it but I'll do it for you and I did it.
13:40
How many babies did you help birth?
13:43
I had to look after 12, and they were some was pretty cranky, but they got used to me, and I used to talk to them and that, and I had moose accordion I never know to play if I used to do it. And when I come in, they stopped crying and everything. And then just do a bit on that accordion. I met a fellow named Dave the other day. He said, Do you have your accordion? Not on me I said but I've it. And it's the red one. He said, Yes, yes, I've gotten down home North West. And so he wanted to see it, and I showed and he used to take it from me, and now he grow it up and still, still Dave said give it him. Let him have it. Remember me. And I gave it to him.
15:08
How did you meet your husband?
15:11
He had a cut on his forehead, and I would tend to it. And then his feet was bad. I used to have to clean them every day and put the ointment the doctor had and put on his feet. That's how I met him, doing his feet.
15:38
How old were you?
15:40
I was 25, when the first time I got married at common law, I was only 14. Yeah.
15:55
What was your husband like when you were doing his feet?
16:00
He was nice, talked about Newfoundland and everything, and how he growed up in that everything. Spoke about how he only had one girl in his life, and he was nice.
16:22
What was his name?
16:25
Alfert Debroius Powell andhe was from Newfoundland.
16:35
How long were you guys married?
16:37
58 years.
16:40
What's the secret for being married for 58 years?
16:44
Good it was horrible for a while, on the first living with the mother, but after a while, we came down, Got our house. We came down and seem happy ever since. If you see, my pictures over there, You's say we was happy? Yeah.
17:10
Were there any secrets to staying happy, or anything you did to stay happy for so many years?
17:20
Well, if either one of us got cross at the other one, we would sit down and talk it out, yeah. And then we'd be all right again. Good way to live. Yeah. No back secrets, and if you got secret, he'd tell me and I'd tell he. But that was hard on the first start. He said to me, we should sit down and talk about what bother us and then be better. Now I'd be done from that on. No back secrets.
18:21
How did the way you were raised shaped who you are today?
18:26
Because I was so darn tough with the bear banging me around, I think that's why I do all my work. I makes up my bed when I had the bath and that. I sweeps in the morning. I sweeps in the evening, same I do when I was small. My grandmother got me scrubbing two boards when I was four years old, teaching me and showing me how to wash my socks at the board. More and more getting my knuckles out. Washing the clothes on my own when I was small.
19:30
Through the years, What's been the biggest change you've seen?
19:34
Yeah, it's awful change. We don't need to scrub, don't need to wash clothes on the board. And now we got music we can listen to, or news, or anything. I was the first one that got TV in Labrador. I won it at bingo, American bingo. A TV and a radio. I never knew what the TV was, but I gave it to my cousin. Never known what the heck it was, I tried throwing everything on it, but never worked. So obviously I was invited there for dinner and next day. So I told him about it, he said, Give it to me. I get to work. And he never, but still, I told him he can have it, because I don't know what it is. The radio were good, but we could get outside the bed. But around here you couldn't get a thing, Not a thing. He's still got it over to his house. He's dead, but it's still home.
21:10
What is your advice for teenagers?
21:14
They should work more than they do one thing, yes, and they should honor their mother and father and be good to other people. That what I tries to do, yeah,