Posted by Just Wondering on September 2, 2008, 17:13:30
Chess by Mail Scarboro ON

As we wait for the message board to disappear, and I watch the flooding and disaster in the Southern U.S. and Gulf of Mexico caused by the Hurricane, it brings back memories of vast flooding right here in Canada. The year was 1950 and the place was the City of Winnipeg. I don't recall the buildup to the flooding. History says it was after heavy winter snow and heavy spring rain. Early in the morning we were awakened by pounding on the door. Someone had come to tell my father to help build the dam to stop the waters of the Red River. My father brought me and we went to build the dam. It was my introduction to hard work. I wasn't very old then and there are probably laws now that wouldn't allow that kind of child labour. I spent hours filling sandbags with a shovel. Hour after hour and I can recall my arms felt like they were falling off. Still, we kept working. Me and others filling sandbags and the grown men lifting them and putting them in place on the dike. Of course, the dam broke but I don't recall how long after we had finished working on it. It broke about 4 blocks from where we had been working. About 5 houses after ours there was a steep hill. The entire valley filled up to within the top quarter of the hill. Thankfully we were on the top of the hill. Our basement was about three fourth filled with water and we evacuated. Back to my grandparents house where we had spent the war years while the men were away. I recall going back with my parents to visit the house during the evacuation period. I don't recall how many days or weeks it was. The houses which were down the hill I mentioned in the previous paragraph, could only be visited by boat if they happened to be two story homes. The water level was higher than the windows on the first level of the homes. When it was over the cleanup wasn't very nice. When I see something like we are seeing in the U.S. with Huricane Gustaf, I feel for those people. Thankfully, reports say it wasn't as bad as was expected, but still it was bad.