Begin forwarded message:
From: SKEOCH <alan.skeoch@rogers.com>Subject: Fwd: Andrew knows how to stop a TRAINDate: April 20, 2018 at 9:55:10 AM EDT
Begin forwarded message:
From: SKEOCH <alan.skeoch@rogers.com>Subject: Andrew knows how to stop a TRAINDate: April 20, 2018 at 9:30:10 AM EDTTo: Marjorie Skeoch <marjorieskeoch@gmail.com>
I CAN STOP A TRAIN, DAD!IMAGINARY CONVERSATION — REAL PHOTOGRAPH
alan skeochApril 2018“SO Andrew about 200 years ago these great flat fields were covered with thousands…even millions at one time…of great buffaloes.”“I haven’t seen a buffalo, Dad?”“Little wonder.”“What happened to them?”“We killed them by the thousands. One man bragged he shot several thousand in a single year. Another claimed he killed nearly 100,000 in his hunting days.”“Why would he do that?”“No good reason…just blood lust.”“Really…just for the fun of it?”“Well, by the 1870’s, there was a market for buffalo skins to make winter coats…so they skinned them and left the bodies to rot.”“Dad, I don’t want to hear any more about that…makes me angry.”“Me too.”“Why didn’t somebody stop the killing?”“A few tried.”“But why did it not stop?”“You are standing on the reason, Andrew.”“No, Dad, I am standing on a railway track.”“That’s one of the big reason for the slaughter of the buffalo.”“Railway tracks?”“Not tracks…railway trains. We Canadians wanted to bind our country together in 1867 and the best way to do that wasto build railways…the trains would move settlers to these gReat Plains and stop the Americans from moving northand taking the land. That was a fear.”“What about the Indians, Dad?”“Another reason for shooting buffalo. If the buffalo were shot by the thousands then the First Nation people would starveand not cause any trouble for the new settlers.”“History is awful, Dad.”“Do you want to hear more?”“No!”“Just one more bit of history?”“No! No! No!”“OK. I will shut up.”“Dad, how could you blame the trains?”“Are you sure you want an answer?”“Sportsmen rode the first trains…rich lazy hunters.”“So what?”“They shot the remaining buffalo from the comfort of their railway seats….just fired from the windows…”“NO!”“They did. That kind of hunting was even advertised as The Great Hunt.”“NO, I don’t want to hear anymore.”“Are you sure?” If that was true there would be lots of bones here beside the tracks. I haven’t seen any.”“That was a long time ago. The bones were gathered up by the first settlers…piled up in huge mounds right here beside the tracks.. then ground into powder and used as fertilizer.”“Dad, I hate trains, now.”“Not much you can do.”“Oh, yes there is…just watch me…I CAN STOP A TRAIN!!”Alan SkeochApril 2018(PICTURE of Andrew Skeoch taken several years ago in Saskatchewan)“DAD, JUST WATCH ME…I CAN STOP A TRAIN!”
Alan's Oeuvre
