{"id":4749,"date":"2020-05-30T23:42:02","date_gmt":"2020-05-31T03:42:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=4749"},"modified":"2020-05-30T23:54:23","modified_gmt":"2020-05-31T03:54:23","slug":"episode-56-eywood-parst-two-the-immigrant-years-of-freeman-family-1905-to-1914","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/?p=4749","title":{"rendered":"EPISODE 56 EYWOOD PARST TWO: THE IMMIGRANT YEARS OF FREEMAN FAMILY 1905 TO 1914"},"content":{"rendered":"
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EPISODE  56    EYWOOD, PART TWO<\/div>\n

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Louisa (Bufton) Freeman with daughter Elsie on her one and son Frank by her side.<\/div>\n
Photo may have been taken in the Head Gardener\u2019s house at Eywood Estate.<\/div>\n

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In 1972, I asked mom to explain life as immigrants in Canada from 1905 to 1914<\/div>\n

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This is  Granddad and is gardeners\u2026ten men and boys and two horses<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
alan skeoch<\/div>\n
May  2020<\/div>\n

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There was always something strange about the Freeman farm house.  Something different<\/div>\n
from other houses as I remember.  And the difference, I now realize, was the picture frames<\/div>\n
and the photos fitted therein.  The frames  were hand carved by Granddad out of slabs of <\/div>\n
hardwood.  Then intricately carved.   As below.<\/div>\n
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\u201cHow long did it  take you to carve these, Grandpa?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cDid one ever winter for a few years?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cWho is in the frame?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s  to cook from Eywood\u2026your mother\u2019s godmother?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cI thought you hated Eywood?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cToo strong a word, Alan.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cbut you said you hated tipping your hat to Mr. Gwyer, the owner of Eywood.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cHate is  too strong a word\u2026let\u2019s say disliked.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cIf you disliked Eywood, then why spend your winter\u2019s  doing something<\/div>\n
that reminds you  of Eywood.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cAlan, there is the world of difference between a system I might dislike<\/div>\n
and the people working within the system.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t get it.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cSome of those people in service at Eywood became as  close to <\/div>\n
your grandmother and me as our family.   They became family really.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Winer\u2019s work beside the wood stove in Erin Township,  Wellington County 1930\u2019s.<\/div>\n

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Elsie Freeman\u2026hand made frame by Edward Freeman<\/div>\n

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The old Freeman farm house had reminders of Eywood on each  wall of the only room<\/div>\n
in the house that was permanently lived in.  The room with the big wood stove. The rest<\/div>\n
of the house in winter time was so cold that icicles formed in the rooms.   Just to got<\/div>\n
to bed upstairs we had to take a hot brick wrapped in paper.  The brick was heated in<\/div>\n
the wood stove oven.  <\/div>\n

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This was not the home of rich persons.  Yet the walls  were reminders that there was<\/div>\n
a place somewhere in England where rich people lived and  were served by servants.<\/div>\n
It was all  very confusing.<\/div>\n

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I thought Grandma and Grandpa came to a better place..Canada.  But the reminders<\/div>\n
on the walls told a different story.<\/div>\n

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Always in the back of my mind were these reminders  of Eywood.  A mystical place<\/div>\n
that I thought I would never see.  Time and  circumstances changed things for me.<\/div>\n
Remember this point.  I was born in 1938. I was  a teen ager in the 1950\u2019s.  I was<\/div>\n
an adult in the 1960\u2019s.  I was to become part of the luckiest generation of humans<\/div>\n
this world has ever seen.   I did not know it though.   Nor did  I know that in a few years<\/div>\n
I would find myself on the Eywood estate.  Not once, but several times.  I would<\/div>\n
arrive there just six years after the grand house was demolished by impoverished<\/div>\n
Brits.   I would  arrive just six years after the grand estate home was blown to<\/div>\n
kingdom come.  <\/div>\n

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What of  granddad?<\/div>\n

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\u201cWill you ever go back to Eywood \u201c<\/div>\n
\u201cNo.  We will never return\u2026burned  our bridges.\u201d<\/div>\n

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They left Eywood in 1905.  Sailed  to St. John, New Brunswick. Then train to Toronto.<\/div>\n
where  Granddad expected  his wife Louisa to stay  for a few weeks while he checked  out farming<\/div>\n
in Manitoba.  That was a non starter.<\/div>\n

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\u201cYou expect us to take Frank and Elsie to a remote wilderness  where there are no schools nearby?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cFor a while that will be so.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cAnd no hospitals.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cNot close.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cWell\u2026that is  not going to happen\u2026we are not going to Manitoba.\u201d<\/div>\n

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So grandpa bought a small garden farm in Etobicoke (exactly where Highway 427 sweeps  north<\/div>\n
today and crosses Burnhamthorpe  Road.).  He tried to grow vegetable then haul them to Toronto<\/div>\n
for sale.  Tough.  Poverty was getting close.<\/div>\n

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\u201cWe will sell the garden farm, Lou.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cAnd  do  what?\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cI have a  job as carpenter with the Temiskaming and Northern Ontario Railway.  Big things<\/div>\n
happening in Northern Ontario.   We will have a  cabin in Krugerdorf\u2026a village near Englehart.<\/div>\n
Start all  over again.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Around 1985 we drove north to find krugerdorf.  We found it.  All that is left of the<\/div>\n
railway village is this  sign.  As  I looked  at the sign, a black bear crossed the railway track<\/div>\n
some distant away.<\/div>\n

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This is the log cabin of Harry Horsman, a friend of the family in Krugerdorf.  His cabin is primitive as was<\/div>\n
the cabin belonging to Ted and Lou Freeman.  Theirs caught fire an burned to the ground in 1913 or 1914.  Fires<\/div>\n
raged all across Northern Ontario in those years.<\/div>\n

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Contrast the log cabin above with the majesty of Eywood Estate main  house.<\/div>\n

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The cabin turned out to be a rudimentary log cabin.  In the summers massive wildfires swept across<\/div>\n
Northern Ontario.  Granddad had to ride through at least one such massive blaze sitting on a flat car<\/div>\n
with forests burning on each side.   It was tough.  Then their own log cabin caught fire and burned<\/div>\n
to rubble.  They managed to save their one t treasure\u2026a small pump organ.  Music was a big <\/div>\n
part of their social life.  But they were burned  out.  So they moved\u2026fled\u2026 south.<\/div>\n
Grandma wanted something stable.  Not flashy.  For their money was  limited, very limited.<\/div>\n

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In 1914 Edward and Louisa  Freeman bought a small farm in southern Ontario.  Very small indeed.<\/div>\n
The 25 acre farm on the Fifth line of Erin Township, Wellington County, Ontario could hardly<\/div>\n
be considered a farm.  Jus to 20% of the land was swamp.  And the fields were oct strewn.<\/div>\n
rocks left behind  when the glacial ice retreated thousands  of years ago.  Rocks on the surface.<\/div>\n
Rocks below the surface.  But there was a brick house.  Well  really a brick faced house\u2026one brick  <\/div>\n
thick.   Really the house was  built like a barn.  Timbers rescued here and there from other buildings<\/div>\n
some of them scorched by fire.  No running water.  No indoor toilet than thunder jugs beneath the beds.<\/div>\n

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There was  a barn.  The builders must have thought  the site for a barn was ideal.  Between two<\/div>\n
swamps with ager inning through the stable.  No need to haul water.  Of course the idea was faulty.<\/div>\n
In  winter the water froze.  When water freezes it expands with force enough to crack and push cement<\/div>\n
foundations out of place.  The barn would not last the century but it would last the remaining lifespans<\/div>\n
of Ted and Louisa Freeman.  Room enough for a chicken coop and stabling for a few cows and a horse<\/div>\n
to two.  Small.   Self sufficient.  Survivable.<\/div>\n

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The Freemans set down roots.  Roots that took some time to get established because<\/div>\n
the Freemans were Welsh-English.  And Erin Township\u2019s Fifth Line was  overwhelmingly Scottish.<\/div>\n
There was no love lost between the English and the Scots.  Tensions dating back and beyond<\/div>\n
Robert the True and William Wallace were very real in this small  backwater piece of  rural Ontario.<\/div>\n

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Photo of the Freeman farm in  the 1930\u2019s as seen from the air.<\/div>\n

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\u201cWe were not liked  at first.\u201d<\/div>\n

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(Most locals could  not understand  why anyone would try to eke out a living on 2r acres.  An<\/div>\n
English family forced by  poverty to buy the small rock\/swamp parcel.)<\/div>\n
\u201cThey won\u2019t stay long..\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cWhat is  worst is  that they are English.  Odd  they did not get better land.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cMust be a reason.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cWait and see what happens.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Across the dirt road was the farm of Jean Macdonald, nest to her farm on south side<\/div>\n
were Jean and Janet McLean\u2026south of the Freeman farm were the Macecherns, then<\/div>\n
the Kerrs.  To the north was a  great wedge of forested swamp that had once been part of<\/div>\n
the new Freeman farm.  The land had been sold  to raise enough money to build the <\/div>\n
brick house.  Once the new Freeman house had been built the former owners found<\/div>\n
they no longer had a farm.  All of this  did  not bode well.<\/div>\n

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Did the Freeman\u2019s feel they had made a massive mistake leaving a reasonable comfortable<\/div>\n
life in the Gardeners House on the Eywood Estate for the near poverty of life in Canada?<\/div>\n
They must have but I never heard a word  of complaint as a boy spending many  free hours<\/div>\n
with my grandparents.<\/div>\n

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\u201cIt did not take lone for us to fit in.  A little tension at first.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cBut everyone was poor.  We made our own entertainment<\/div>\n
using the one room school for musical evenings.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cI played the violin along with Frank.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cYour grandmother played  the pump organ and she<\/div>\n
had a lovely singing voice.\u201d<\/div>\n
\u201cIn not time at all, we were part of the community.  Did not matter that<\/div>\n
we were English.\u201d<\/div>\n

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The Great War began in the same year the Freeman\u2019s bought the farm.  To pay<\/div>\n
for it, Edward  Freeman  took a job making eplosives in Toronto.  Elsie, Frank<\/div>\n
and his wife Louisa were left to do the farming.  With the money earned the<\/div>\n
mortgage was  soon paid in full.  I am guessing when I say the farm cost $6,000<\/div>\n
perhaps less than that.<\/div>\n

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From 1906 until their deaths in the 1950\u2019s,  Grandma and Granddad kept in close touch<\/div>\n
with the resident of Eywood.  No complaints.  Granddad even successfully encouraged <\/div>\n
two of his brothers and his sister to come to Canada.  They did not feel poor although they<\/div>\n
were poor.   But there was a  richness of  spirit in them.  A great joy of living on their own land.<\/div>\n
Security of tenure.<\/div>\n

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All the same it was wonderful to hear about the happenings on the Eywood Estate. The gossip<\/div>\n
of those still \u2018in service\u2019.   The letters from the Griffiths were a  kind of  touchstone.<\/div>\n

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Mercifujlly, both Grandma and Grandpa died  before the terrible news reached us.<\/div>\n
The Eywood Estate was gone\u2026the great house had sold everything right down to\u2019<\/div>\n
the floor boards and doors and windows.  All gone.  And the final catastrophe was<\/div>\n
the demolition\u2026with the help of explosives I was told\u2026the final demolition of the <\/div>\n
great estate house.<\/div>\n

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IN 1955, this wasalll that remained of Eywood mansion  house.<\/div>\n

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Odd fact though.  The rest of the estate\u2026the barns, the servants quarters, the dovecote,<\/div>\n
the park, the lake, the walled  gardens\u2026and the head gardeners red brick house\u2026all of these<\/div>\n
remain.  Mom..Elsie Freeman\u2026was born in that red brick house in 1901.<\/div>\n

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NEXT STORY:  PART THREE OF THE EYWOOD STORHY<\/div>\n

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BACK  THEN\u2026THE 1940\u2019S<\/div>\n

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(MY BROTHER ERIC AND  I DRESSED  AS WE DID BACK THEN\u2026ON THE FREEMAN FARM)<\/div>\n

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TODAY\u2026YEAR 2020<\/div>\n

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So here we are in the year 2020\u2026and the 25  acre Freeman farm has survived while thousands of<\/div>\n
other family farms have been gobbled up into larger and larger farms with fewer and fewer farmers.<\/div>\n
The average size of a farm today is over 500 acres.<\/div>\n

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We call our farm a farm but is  really not a farm.   Our income from the farm is<\/div>\n
miniscule.  So  small that we do not pay farm taxes.  We pay the much larger<\/div>\n
property tax of non farming rural residents.  No matter.  The farm has survived.<\/div>\n

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A wooden horse like this would likely have been present in Eywood.<\/div>\n

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NEXT STORY\u2026PART THREE OF EYWOOD. \u2026AS FOUND IN 1960<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
alan skeoch<\/div>\n
may 2020<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

EPISODE  56    EYWOOD, PART TWO Louisa (Bufton) Freeman with daughter Elsie on her one and son Frank by her side. Photo may have been taken in the Head Gardener\u2019s house at Eywood Estate. In 1972, I asked mom to explain life as immigrants in Canada from 1905 to 1914 This is  Granddad and is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4749\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanskeoch.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}