Still Standing - Season 11 Episode 02 Glace Bay NS
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Short filmTranscript
00:01Here we are in Glacepay, Nova Scotia!
00:07On the eastern shore of Cape Breton, 30 minutes northeast of Sydney.
00:11How do you get here?
00:12Well, chances are you're west of here, so just drive east till your wheels get wet.
00:17It's about as east as East Coast Canada gets.
00:20Mainland Canada, I mean.
00:22Although, I know Cape Breton is an island, but...
00:26I mean, like, you can drive, although I guess you could drive to PEI, and that's a real island.
00:32No! Let me start over, let me start over.
00:36Off the east coast of Canada is Cape Breton Island, and on the east coast of that, the nicest town you'll find, I dare say, is this.
00:45The beautiful town of Glacepay.
00:49Coal mining began here in the 1720s.
00:52They burned coal from this area when they were building Fort Lewisburg.
00:55And the neighbourhoods, even in the area, are named after the mines that they're built around.
01:00Caledonia, The Hub, New Aberdeen.
01:04If they named neighbourhoods in Toronto like that, like, after the most important thing in the area,
01:09I think my building would be in Jiggly's Junction.
01:14Who's been to Jiggly's Gentleman's Club?
01:17When you grow up in a small town in Newfoundland, you see the people have a sense of humour about hard times.
01:26I turned that into a career and hit the road.
01:28Mr. Johnny Harris!
01:30Now I'm on a mission to find the funny in the places you least expected.
01:34Canada's struggling small towns.
01:36Towns that are against the ropes, but hanging in there.
01:39Still laughing in the face of adversity.
01:42This is Glace Bay Nova Scotia.
01:45In my life
01:47I'm told Glace Bay means Bay of Ice.
02:01And indeed, for almost 300 years, this town was very cold.
02:08This was the biggest coal mining operation in Canada at the time.
02:12A population of over 28,000 people.
02:15There were 12 coal mines operating at the same time.
02:19And the mines themselves were massive, following the coal seams out under the cold North Atlantic around 10 kilometres.
02:28To learn about the history of Glace Bay, I found a fellow from a coal family who could tell me not only about the heyday, but also about the minor setbacks.
02:44Pat Brewster!
02:49Pat said back in the day there was coal dust everywhere.
02:51In the wintertime, our snow wasn't snow white.
02:55There was so much coal being burnt in the town that sometimes the snow would be blacker than white.
03:01If you built a snowman in Glace Bay, that snowman not only represented diversity, but like the song, it actually had two eyes made out of coal.
03:14A lot of the kids who grew up around the train tracks would use their ingenuity to get coal and sell it to people.
03:23Pat told me when they were kids, they would sneak onto the rail cars in the sterling rail yard.
03:29We'd have to climb the trains.
03:31Yeah.
03:32We'd take our bags up.
03:33We'd fill the bags, tie them up with a string and bring them down the road to the customers.
03:38And they sell these bags to neighbours for 25 cents a bag.
03:42And I don't think you could call that robbing.
03:44I mean, he's helping out local families.
03:46That's not robbing.
03:47That's more Robin Hood.
03:48And for Pat and his buddies, I mean, what's the worst could happen?
03:53If their parents caught them, you know, maybe for Christmas to get a stocking full of coal, they'd go sell that.
04:00They'd gather up and sell these bags of coal for a little bit of pocket money.
04:04Pat said they'd use that for, among other things, maybe buying some tickets, coming to see a movie here at the beautiful Savoy.
04:11This is gorgeous. This is not a small town theatre. This was built back when the town was booming.
04:20Glace Bay was considered the largest town in Canada at one point. There were shops, there were grocery stores here.
04:27People would just cruise around these streets.
04:29He said commercial street.
04:31It was a huge hangout spot. It could be five to six hundred teenagers on this street, Friday and Saturday nights.
04:39And it would be rare if he'd seen a fight.
04:42Although he did say all the Protestant kids on one side of York Street and all the Catholics on the other.
04:52A lot of people from the Caribbean came up here in the early teens.
04:57They were recruited to come up to work in the mines and in the steel mills.
05:01As word got out that a good living could be made there, he said black workers got pushed out.
05:08Black miners got the shaft.
05:11When his dad was looking for work, they wouldn't hire him.
05:14The only work he could get would be a labourer down at the fish plant.
05:17Until my mother stepped up with one of her friends and they decided they're gonna go up to the mine manager's office and gave him a little help.
05:25His mom, with his older sister when she was a baby, marched over to the office at the mine and demanded that they hire her husband.
05:38She said, you guys brought black workers here.
05:40They have families who need to be fed and they not only hired him.
05:44He worked his way up.
05:45He was union rep for years and years.
05:50I think Pat's mom would have been a great lawyer.
05:53Do you know what I mean?
05:54Are you the victim of employee discrimination?
05:57To ensure you an equitable workplace, I will march into your boss's office with a baby.
06:09Ironically, you know, the trains that ran on Glace Bay Coal helped settle the West and from the West came oil and gas and that opened up an energy source that was more profitable.
06:25A few years later, there was a fire and shortly after that, the mines closed down for good.
06:34But it's incredible to hear that story and I'm glad I got to hear from Pat because I almost didn't.
06:39My producer was worried that this episode was going to be too long.
06:42She said, can we lose the interview with Pat Brewster?
06:45I said, I don't know, I guess.
06:47Then, boom, the door opens up.
06:48There's Pat's mom holding the baby.
06:55I paid a visit to the Cape Breton Miners Museum.
07:04What a job they did with that place.
07:09They built the museum over the head of the Ocean Deep's mine.
07:13One of the tour guides, Sheldon, I don't know if he's here tonight.
07:16Hey, there he is.
07:17There he is.
07:18Sheldon took me down there.
07:19You go down there and it's a whole new understanding of what that kind of work must have been like.
07:23The damp.
07:24The dark.
07:25So they're only digging out the coal, which has seams in between the rock.
07:31Where we were, it was only four feet high.
07:33Now, neither Sheldon or I are about to go out for the raptors, but even we were like sort of hunched over.
07:40And he said it could get even smaller than that.
07:42I saw a picture.
07:43You see two guys lying on their side, covered in dust with pickaxes.
07:48It looks more like a jailbreak.
07:53Good, good.
07:54How are you?
07:58Since learning how coal is no longer king around here, I decided I needed to find out what keeps Glace Bay afloat these days.
08:05I met a woman who not only told me to shut my trap, she showed me how I went down the lobster boat with fisherman Tracy Murphy.
08:18She's a third generation lobster fisherman.
08:22She said when she first went to work on the boat, her grandfather owned the boat.
08:26So out of respect, she went to ask him for permission.
08:28Yeah.
08:29When you went to him, what did he have to say?
08:31If you're only going to be able to eat for the winter, you're never going to get rich at fishing.
08:35I find, you know, there's different riches, you know what I mean?
08:38You don't get to see a seal every day or all the things I get to see.
08:42So, depends what you value as rich, I suppose.
08:45I mean, also, why do people bother getting rich?
08:49Why would somebody become a millionaire so they can own a boat and eat lobster all the time?
08:54She's already got that.
08:56My aunts, they would be embarrassed to take lobster for lunch or, you know, because it was like poor man's food.
09:03She said back in the day, lobster wasn't considered what it is now.
09:07The girls wouldn't take it, they would be embarrassed.
09:09Too embarrassed.
09:10Oh, yeah, yeah.
09:11To have lobster for lunch.
09:12Oh, yeah.
09:13You were embarrassed to take out your lobster lunch while all the other, you know, hoity-toity kids had their bologna sandwiches and their fancy canned sausages from Vienna?
09:27Thinking someone's poor for having lobster, that's a bit like, it's like, oh my God, look at that poor fella.
09:32Oh, the guy there with the tuxedo and the top hatch, big white mustache, looks like he can only afford half a pair of glasses, poor fella.
09:39The boys pulled some traps.
09:45We got at the lobsters.
09:49Oh, I can see one that's a big one.
09:52We got some keepers.
09:53Tuck them in.
09:54The first thing you do with them is you band them.
09:57You put some rubber bands on their claws.
10:00They have two different size claws.
10:02One is a big crusher claw and then like a longer, thinner, sharper pincher claw.
10:10And I said to Tracy, I said, did one ever get you?
10:12And she said, yes.
10:14And she said, the pain you experience if you get bit by a lobster.
10:19I've made sounds I didn't know was possible.
10:22Is that right?
10:23Oh, yeah.
10:24The lobster bites you, not pinches, because it's a more accurate, the amount of pain, that's a more accurate description.
10:31No one runs into a hospital going, oh my God, a Rottweiler pinched me.
10:35Sometimes they come out and they're all shooting across the floor and one will grab another one and just cut its claw right off.
10:44No.
10:45So you put the rubber bands on their claws because all the power in the claws for closing, not for opening.
10:51So you get two bands, then it's like a bass player.
10:54It's in two bands, but powerless.
10:56The ones that we pulled were not very feisty.
11:00Tracy said it depends on the time of year.
11:02They're kind of more docile in May.
11:04Come July, when the water warms up, they're just click, click, click, click, click, click.
11:08If the temperature of the water rises at all, the females will get fierce.
11:13I thought, my God, I'd hate to be a male lobster who flushes the toilet while his missus is in the shower.
11:19You can tell the difference between the males and the females.
11:23The males have bigger claws, but the females have a bigger, wider tail, which, you know.
11:32Like a bigger tail, but hard.
11:34Yum.
11:35To catch the lobster, they bake them.
11:46There's a spike in the trap, and they'll put mackerel or redfish on there.
11:50Although, Tracy said she's got friends who are fishermen.
11:53They'll stick a peck of McNugget sweetened sour sauce.
11:58That seems more dangerous.
12:00If the females can get vicious over a little bit of warm water,
12:03now you're going to trap one with McNugget sauce with no nuggets?
12:08Measure them up.
12:11Too little.
12:13Too little.
12:15You measure them from basically the eyes to the start of the tail.
12:18And if that length is too short,
12:20Maggie goes.
12:21I sort of realize now why I never got any action on dating sites.
12:26Do you know what I mean?
12:27Just like, no, too short.
12:29Too short.
12:30Too short.
12:31Too short.
12:32Too short.
12:45Another tasty success story here in town.
12:47Cape Breton's best bakery bakes their buns here in Glace Bay.
12:52I'm talking about McFadgens.
12:54I had a chat with Darren McFadgens.
12:56They make wonderful gingerbreads, beautiful buns,
13:06but they are best known for their fabulous fruitcake.
13:10And funny enough, that was my nickname in high school, beautiful buns.
13:20Fruitcake is such an enigma.
13:22It's a mystery.
13:23It's such a curious taste.
13:24I feel like whenever I eat fruitcake, my brain is trying to figure out if I like it or not.
13:29Fruitcake sometimes hit and miss with people.
13:31Did you like it when you first tried it?
13:33No kids ever like fruitcake.
13:34Eventually, when you start eating it, it's really good.
13:36If you want to get your kids to try fruitcake, just tell them there's rum in it.
13:39The alcohol burns off anyway, so it just leaves the flavor.
13:44McFadgens Bakery has been making fruitcakes in Glace Bay since 1948.
13:50Darren said he started working there when he was 11 years old.
13:53When I was a kid, you're holding the door open on windy days.
13:56You're helping customers out with the bags.
13:58If it's a busy day, you're shoveling the parking lot on snowstorms.
14:01That sounds to me a little bit like the fate of one of the bad kids in the Willy Wonka story.
14:07You get to spend every day in a place surrounded by cake.
14:12Oh my God, fruitcake.
14:15Now, McFadgens wasn't always called McFadgens.
14:20It used to be McFadgens.
14:23In the 40s, Glace Bay was probably about 60% Catholic, maybe 25 or 30% Protestant.
14:29We went to separate schools.
14:30We had separate stores.
14:31There were separate hospitals.
14:32Back in the day, the Catholic Protestant divide, that was a real thing.
14:37We were struggling to get a footing with the Catholic store owners and the Catholic churches
14:41and the Catholic dance halls and the Catholic schools.
14:43So my grandfather, he dropped the A out of the Mac and he turned us into McFadgens.
14:50From the English-Scottish Protestant, M-A-C, to Mick, the Irish MC.
14:58But they not only changed the name of the company, they also changed the name of their kids as they were having them.
15:08Mom and Dad, they had six boys.
15:11And three of us are MCs and three of us are M-A-Cs.
15:14And I said, okay, so the eldest three siblings are Mac and the youngest three are Mick.
15:20And he said, you think so, right?
15:23My brother Kevin was MC. Donald was M-A-C. Byron was MC. Craig and Scott were M-A-C. I'm MC.
15:29Although, maybe that's the best strategy. I mean, when we get to the pearly gates, if St. Peter asks you a Catholic or Protestant, he can claim dual citizenship.
15:36So we have our dark deluxe with pecans, our light deluxe with pecans, our light deluxe with marzipan, our dark deluxe with marzipan, 33% fruit, our dark with a 33% fruit, and our light with a 45% fruit.
15:53This is the fruitcakiest of all the fruitcakes.
15:55It is.
15:56Yeah.
15:57His fruitcake, I think I loved it. I taste spices and nuts and rum. I'm like, oh, this is great. Then it's like green cherry. What the hell is, how did that even, what is a green cherry? How did it get green? Do I like this? I'm not sure. My brain needs more evidence. I got to keep eating more fruitcake. Try to figure it out.
16:15Not bad.
16:16Yeah. That's very good. I think you've won me over. I think I like fruitcake. Never would have thought it.
16:24When he was showing me the fruitcake, Darren, he pronounced marzipan, he pronounced it marzipan, and I can prove it because I got it on film.
16:35I love film. You hear film in parts of Newfoundland. I cracked up our first day here, someone pulled up in the car, saw all the cameras, and they're like, what are you filming?
16:44You know, folks, not all queens wear crowns. In fact, around here, they often wear full-face modular helmets. We met on the beautiful beach by Schooner Pond. They were standing side by side by side by side, throttle queens Kelly Harding and Lindsay Reynolds.
17:13They told me about the Marconi Throttle Queens. This is a women's group of ATV riders who get together and ride the trails around Glace Bay and beyond.
17:26I moved here three years ago, and I never really knew women that drove. So I drove with men. We were at a trailblazers meeting. They said they'd like to get the women involved. So I started it.
17:39And we cleared a bunch of trails. We did a lot of work. The first ride that she organized, she was worried. She was like, oh my God, is anybody going to show up?
17:50I said, like, I'm going to be so embarrassed if nobody shows up.
17:53She figured if they had five bikes, it would be successful.
17:5728 bikes and 36 women showed up and I had no clue what I was doing.
18:01You're next, brother.
18:02Of course, women want to do that kind of thing with each other.
18:11I call it my wind therapy. Like, you know, when I'm feeling down, you get out there and the wind's blowing in your face. It's just so therapeutic.
18:19You can talk about stuff at the end of the day with other women that you're not maybe going to talk about with me. You could complain about your husbands or your wives or your complain about anything from your partner to your pap smear, you know, right?
18:40Even little things like like pee breaks on the runs. We stop more often and a little longer.
18:46Not only that, we feel like we have to go three kilometers into the woods. We don't want our bare asses hanging out, you know, the backside.
18:54For men, it's easy. I mean, being on the train, it's like being in the bedroom. You just whip it out. A minute later, you're done. No fuss.
19:02But for women, it's not comfortable popping a squat in the woods, especially around a bunch of hairy arse fellas.
19:09I don't care how easy going you are. You're never going to see a woman who's like, oh, Dougie, I saw you that time. You almost flipped that bike.
19:17Oh, no, I saw that. You had it up on two wheels like that. I thought you were going over.
19:23Oh, I saw it. I got it on GoPro, I think. Yes, I got a GoPro on the front of my bike. I'm not absolutely sure if it was actually filming.
19:39Here in Glace Bay, where lobster fishermen carry on the tradition. Not as dangerous as coal mining, true, but stay clear of those claws till you get them in the pot or it's the lobster taking bites out of you.
20:01St. Peter, don't you call me because I don't know which last name to give you. Should I use Mac or Mick?
20:12Miles into the deep, dark mine, they'd meet the coal face and jackhammer it at least a mile beneath the seabed of the deep, dark North Atlantic.
20:23On the east coast of Canada, their legacy lives in Glace Bay's sons and daughters where miners went down and came up from the ground and the sun rises up from the water.
20:34Thanks for coming out, everybody. You've been amazing. Thanks so much.
20:39It brought out everything about coal mining. I thought it was beautiful.
20:56When I was in high school, there were still three and four hundred kids on commercial streets on a Friday night.
21:04Fruit game!
21:05It was pretty surprising to see Johnny Papa Squad on stage.
21:21Two Cape Breton thumbs up there, baby.
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