The Badger Riot (25 page)

Sacred Heart! Would that Sister Mary Agnes ever shut up? She'd been wailing for the past half-hour. Not even Mother Superior could get a word in edgeways. At times, the nuns were a big responsibility for the priest. Mother Superior oversaw them and she deferred to him in matters of household expenses. Things normally ran along smoothly, but from time to time there were bumps in the road that were hard to know just how to deal with.

The six teaching nuns taught religion, history, music, literature, algebra, geometry, arithmetic, geography and social studies. They had all been at it a good many years. All except Sister Mary Agnes. She was new. Their old history teacher, Sister Mary Augustus, had recently passed away.

From the first day they brought in the new nun, Father Murphy had an uneasy feeling about her. Call it the Irish in him, but he could sense something unstable about the woman. She was the Bishop's niece, sent there by the Bishop himself, so he couldn't put up any objections.

The school had children from grades one to eleven, with twelve to fifteen students in a class. Sister Mary Agnes took over the grade sevens. There were several big boys in her class, rowdy rambunctious young fellows whose last thought was to learn anything.

Since the strike had consumed Badger, the Catholic boys, like the boys from the Protestant school, played hooky more often than not. No matter how much Father Murphy preached to them all, it didn't matter. As far as they were concerned, they were loggers too,
and had to be in the thick of what was going on. They couldn't understand the danger of being youngsters among angry, desperate men. They had never known fear and they refused to recognize it now.

Sister Mary Agnes, being from Grand Falls, the headquarters of the A.N.D. Company, had no sympathy for the loggers, and was no match for the boys whose fathers were strikers. They refused to do their homework, didn't listen to what she said, and left her in tears every day.

One morning, totally frazzled, she dared to speak out. Father Murphy wasn't present when it happened. He sat in on the nuns' classes occasionally, but he had other responsibilities as well. He heard all about it afterward from several sources, however, including from Sister herself.

She'd told Phonse Sullivan's boy, Bernie, that he looked like a ragamuffin, just like the fellows on the picket line. Bernie, all twelve years of him, said that was because he belonged on the picket line with his father. Sister Mary Agnes told him those men ought to be ashamed of themselves, leaving their good jobs because they were too lazy to work, and standing around all day doing nothing.

That did it. The boys went crazy. Threw their books at her. Terrified, she crouched down behind her desk so she wouldn't be struck. Then the whole class just got up and left, with Sister running behind, ordering them to come back.

When Mother Superior had finally taken Sister Mary Agnes away, Father Murphy was faced with the task of pacifying a mob of angry parents.

“Excuse me, Father, my daughter came home from school today because everyone walked out of class. She says they had to follow the strikers' sons or else.”

“I'm sure it's a mistake, Father. The nun was within her rights, I'm sure.”

“Listen here, Father, my boy is a good learner. He's not mixed up with that crowd that chases around after the strikers.”

“By the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Father, those men on the picket
line are not lazy! No sir! They're fightin' for their rights. How dare she – that relative of the Bishop's – speak to the youngsters like that? What's the world comin' to?”

Phonse Sullivan also had his say. “Now listen here, Father, what kind of stuff is that to teach our children, huh? Here I am out there all winter, freezin' me arse off with the police breathin' down our necks. And now a teacher, and a nun to boot, goes and says things like that to our youngsters. 'Tis enough to turn you, Father. Enough to turn you.”

It went on and on and got louder and louder. The priest told them that Sister Mary Agnes would be leaving. That quieted them down somewhat. What he didn't tell them was that all the nuns were leaving and the school would immediately close down until the unrest was over. The orders had come from the Bishop himself.

What would be the end of this? Only God knew. Father Murphy went to his church to pray for the people of Badger and for the loggers.

Alf Elliott's daughter, Amanda, was fourteen and in grade nine during the autumn of 1958. She heard her parents talking about a union being organized to help the loggers get better pay and better living conditions in the woods camps and it didn't interest her at first. But some of her friends' fathers were loggers, and the young girls talked among themselves. Those in the know said the men were going on strike, but others weren't quite sure what it meant to be on strike.

There were many things happening in Amanda's own world. She was becoming a woman and her childhood was being left behind. Her mother talked to her about strange new things, like sanitary napkins and what they were used for. She even sent away to Eaton's catalogue for a brassiere for Amanda.

Elvis Presley, the American rock and roll idol, was all the rage. Amanda and her friends were no different than other teenagers all across North America as they oohed and aahed over him and his music. Television had recently come to Newfoundland and was broadening young people's view of the world.

And then, suddenly, in January of 1959, things changed. Many strangers were seen on Badger's streets. Loggers from the outports poured into the town to support the union. The words “strike” and “IWA” were on everybody's tongue. Reality hit, and even young people were jarred out of their safe little lives.

School life wasn't the same either. The principal, Mr. Summers, who was also the teacher for grades nine, ten and eleven, didn't seem to notice if someone was shooting wads of paper with their slingshots or using their huge World History book to hit a person in front of them over the head. He often absented himself from the classroom, something he had never done before the strike occurred. The boys would go wild then, jumping over the seats, tormenting the girls, seeing who could swear the best – or worst – and everyone talked in a classroom where, at one time, it was so quiet that you could hear a pin drop. Everyone shared news of the strike. The kids considered themselves experts on what was happening.

February came, and the strike was becoming violent. The young girls saw overturned cars in the streets and angry men standing around fire barrels. However, no one ever bothered or threatened them, and they were allowed to walk freely about the town. Susan Foote and Madeline Sullivan had fathers who were on the picket lines. Susan hadn't seen her father since the trashing of the woods camps on the seventh of February. He'd been carted off to jail with many others, but hadn't come back home when the rest were released. Her mom said that he was sent off to a prison farm out in Salmonier, but Susan didn't know why. No one ever explained things to kids.

Amanda's younger friend Madeline was part of the big Sullivan family. Her father, Phonse, and her Uncle Tom, even her Aunt Jennie were strikers too. Madeline was pretty sure the strikers would win their fight.

As the town became more unruly, Rod had a mind to send Ruth in to St. John's to stay with their daughter, Audrey. Since the episode in the camps almost a month ago, tension had become so bad that some Company personnel were afraid to let their kids go to school.

Every Company employee and contractor who stayed in town had a police car parked outside their door. Ruth went out every now and then and offered them tea and buns. She was like that, kindhearted. Sure, all Badger was like that, or was like that at one time, before the strike. Now everyone was afraid of everyone else. Rod could understand the loggers' position, but the town itself was paying a high price.

They were having supper. It was the beginning of March and the evenings were starting to get longer, but you still needed the light on to eat supper. Rod's father used to say that by the middle of March you could have your evening meal in the daylight. He would plan his winter around that event, every day getting a bit longer, a sign that winter was loosening its grip.

Looking across the table at his wife, Rod said, “Ruth, why don't you pack up and go in St. John's for awhile? See Audrey and the girls. I'll wire a message to have Richard meet the train.”

Ruth got the teapot from the back of the stove. She'd cooked pea soup with dumplings for supper; it was one of her husband's favourite meals, even though he always complained afterward that it made him gassy. They were finishing off with a bit of fruitcake and tea. “What about you, Rod? Will you be all right here in the house?”

“My dear, don't worry. I've lived here all my life. What can happen to hurt me in little old Badger?”

Next day, Rod went off to the Canadian National Telegraph office and sent a telegram to Audrey.

“Good many people leaving town, Rod,” said Alf Elliott, as he carefully counted the words of the telegram.

“Yes b'y. Badger has become a rough place these days. When this strike is over, I wonder if it will go back to the quiet way it was.”

“I wonders the same thing. That's fifty-two cents, Rod my son. I'll send one of my kids over with the reply, when it comes through.”

“Thanks Alf, I'd appreciate it. I'm hoping to get Ruth out on the train tomorrow evening, if I can.”

The telegram came back:

ST. JOHN'S MARCH 5, 1959
MR. ROD ANDERSON, BADGER, N.F.L.D.

RUTH IS ALWAYS WELCOME STOP PLEASE ADVISE WHEN ARRIVING STOP

RICHARD FAGAN

Ruth was excited to be off to St. John's by herself, even if she was worried about leaving her husband behind.

The old St. John's railway station was a bleak place. Lining the walls, wooden seats offered hard invitations to the backside. Constable Richard Fagan chose to walk around as he waited for his mother-in-law to come in on the morning train.

Others waiting to board the train or to meet someone eyed him warily. People were always on guard when they saw a police uniform, thinking that the officer might be there to pick up a prisoner or arrest someone.

Richard had been on the night shift: eight hours of drunks, family squabbles, one robbery and one accident. He had told Audrey that he would go to the train station on his way home and pick up her mother. His wife and their two little daughters were at home waiting to see her.

People began to stir and drift toward the back door of the waiting room. Through the window he could see the train easing its way into St. John's station. Most railway stations had the tracks running by the main door, but in St. John's the front looked like an imposing Victorian mansion, which Richard thought was the idea when they built it back in the 1890s. You came in through the front door and the train sneaked along the back where a door opened out on the platform.

As he stepped outside he thought about faraway Port aux Basques where this train started, and all the little places in between, like Badger, where his in-laws lived which was his wife's hometown. Richard never ceased to be amazed about the largeness of the island of Newfoundland.

He saw Ruth being helped off the train by the conductor, and moved forward.

“Good morning, Momma Ruth. Did you have a good trip?” Ruth reached out and hugged him. “Richard, how nice to see you. And you in your nice uniform too! Yes, the trip was fine. My first ever alone, you know. I had a sleeper and slept all the way from Gander to Whitbourne.”

Richard installed Ruth in the front seat of his car and stowed her baggage in the trunk. “So this is the new car, Richard,” Ruth said, patting the dash in her affectionate way. “Audrey wrote about it.” She looked out the window at the miserable March weather – dirty snow on the ground and drizzly rain looking like it was about to turn to freezing. “When the summer comes, you all will be able to go for nice drives outside the city.”