By Elinor Selig Roberts
PORT MEDWAY – I write short stories about my life that are now in a book Dis is How is Was and Dat's Dat, published in 2006. It features stories about Port Medway and the people there and my life until I was 16 (I'm now 85). Some people who have read the book, especially if they were born there, have contacted me.
Well, such a man now living in Middleton phoned me and here is
his story.
Earl Shute, now 92, was the son of the Baptist minister born in 1926 in the Baptist rectory. The family lived there until he was two years old and then they moved to other communities. When he was about 16, and living in Caledonia in 1942, he often came to Port Medway to visit. The reason for these visits is that he is was smitten with Edna Leamon Senter. She was born Nov. 24, 1926 - the same year that he was.
It wasn't easy to travel in those days, and sometimes he had to walk to Port Medway. He stayed at the Clements or the Meisners for the weekend. But after the summer was over, he realised that Edna was not interested in him at all. So, he stopped coming and went on with his life elsewhere.
While we were talking, I told him that Edna was my cousin and that she still comes every summer to her homestead in Port Medway. I asked him to get me a photo of him back in 1942. Then I went to Edna and got a photo of her at 18 years old. I started planning how I was going to get those two together.
In August 2017, Edna, my daughter Nancy and I drove to Earl's home in Middleton to visit. It was a real surprise for both of them. He had a black and white photo album of his father's from the 1920s of the family back in Port Medway that included some of him at two years old.
When he was born, his mother received a pillow embroidered with "Port Medway" on it from Mabel Minick from North West Cove. He still has that pillow in his living room.
We talked for an hour about older people in Port Medway, because I'm 85 years old and knew most of the same people. My mother Jennie Hubley was working for Mrs. Minick at that time. I took lots of photos that day for this story and sent some to Earl and Edna. God willing, we will all meet again next summer.
