Page 6B

The Castlegar Sun

Wednesday, April 5, 1995

WILDERNESS TRAINING

First aid course offered |

Submitted

Safety is no accident!

Having the knowledge, skills and confidence to deal with mishaps when you are miles from the nearest road is what wilderness first aid training is all about,

This spring, Selkirk College is offering two levels of wilderness first aid training through it’s Slo- can Valley Extension Centre

Standard Wilderness First Aid

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is ideally suited for backcountry travellers, geologists, and forestry workers, residents of remote areas and others whjo find themselves in environments where medical attention is diffi- cult to reach and where limited first {aid supplies are available Certification is acquired after 40 hours of training.

Essential Wilderness First Aid for Leaders is a 56-hour certifi cate course suitable for profes sional guides or educators.

Both courses are sanctioned by the Wilderness First Aid and Safety Association of B.C., a non-profit agency whose pur pose is to promote outdoor safe- ty training

These courses are instructed by Cathy Grierson, who operates Kutnaha First Aid and Safety Training in the West Kootenay

Grierson provides the follow- ing example to illustrate what the standard wilderness training is all about

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“Suppose you have gone for a day hike. The weather is splendid and you venture fur- ther than anticipated

“Soon it will be dark. One of your party loses her footing, falls and breaks her foot. She can’t walk out

“You assess your situation. you have a first aid kit, but you aren't sure how to use it properly

you have first aid training which depends on ambulance access, but now you are hours away from the nearest road,

“Or, you have the confidence and knowledge to proficiently deal with basic back-country emergencies thanks to your Wildemess First Aid tfaining.”

The Essential Wilderness First Aid for Leaders course starts. on April 23 and runs until April 29, 8 a.m. - 5:30 p.m. and costs $410.

The registration deadline for this course is April 7

The standard Wilderness First Aid course begins on May 3 and runs until May.7, 8a.m. - 5:30 p.m., and costs $225.

The deadline for registration for this personal level course if April 19

For course information or reg- istration, contact the Slocan Val- ley Extension Centre.

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The Way

Wednesday, April 5, 1995

The Castlegar Sun

Page 7B

Helping spring arrive in Castlegar last week were Ruby Marsh (left), president of the Castlegar unit of the Canadian Cancer Society, and Anne Zibin, the local chapter's patient services representative. They delivered. 16,500 daffodils (1,650 bunches) throughout the Castlegar area as part of their annual fundraising campaign, including several, bunches to The Castlegar Sun.

Student finally gets degree

Submitted

It was 18 years between class- es for Castlegar resident Joanne Caron, but that didn’t stop her from successfully pursuing a degree in Business Administra- tion from the Open Learning Agency's Open University.

Now living and working in Victoria, Caron said, “I'd been

out of school since I graduated ,

from Grade 12. Going back was very scary at first.“

Refore beginning her studies . . Ne

Castlegar,

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with the Open. University, Caron spent almost-a year working as a sales clerk in Trail and Castlegar.

“I'd gone as far as I could go and decided that I had to do something else. The pay wasn't very good and I didn't want to live in poverty.”

After earning her degree, she moved to Victoria where she is currently studying for her Certi- fied Management Accountant des- ignation and working as an assistant to the controller of a national furniture and design shop.

“At first I thought I would just get my diploma, but I'm really glad I got my degree,” she said. “I believe I am better grounded than

SUN STAFF PHOTO /Karen Kerkhott

students without a degree who are studying to become CMAs. I've also been able to put much of what I learned to use in my job. The computer courses and the courses on how to manage people have been especially useful.” ‘is of the Open Univer- nyone can take one of s because we have an open admissions policy. We don’t put the hopes at the beginning of the process, unlike the traditional system. We put barriers at the end of the course in the form of assignments and exams.” The Open Learning Agency was created as a public educa- tional institution in 1988.

NetSon Home Support gets $190,000 grant

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Nelson and District Home Support Services Society has been granted $190,539 to help provide services in partnership to surrounding communities.

Castlegar, Grand Forks, Kaslo, Nakusp/New Denver, Salmo, Trail and West Boundary will all benefit from the funding and will all be under the guid- ance of a local and regional advi- sory committee P

It’s expected that programs

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The program, known as Com- munity Action Plan for Children (CAPC), is a Health Canada- funded initiative geared towards helping local community groups address the needs of at risk chil- dren until the age of six.

In Canada alone over one million children live in condi- tions that put them at risk such as poverty, poor health, abuse or neglect.

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Pioneer Irving Oborne saw many changes

Irving Ewart Oborhe, a pioneer of Robson, being old and full of years, died in Richmond on March 12, 1995. Like Janus, the Roman god of the New Year, he stood on the threshold looking for- wards and back to two of the most rapidly changing and evolving centuries in Western history.

of Jessie and Frank Oborne, whose begin- nings go back to Sommerset in southwest Eng-

he was born on a farm near Kendell, Wisconsin, on Oct. 23, 1897. In 1908, drawn by widely advertised offers of rich fruit ranching lands in the West Koote- nay and its rich hunting and fish- ing, he moved with his parents, his youngers brother Wilbur, Lloyd and Gilbert and a boxcar full of farm equipment and ani- mals to the prospering town of Robson, then terminus for the Arrow Lakes sternwheelers.

‘The trip.on the CPR colonist car was a long and arduous one and grist for many stories later. He was, for example, responsible for keep- ing the family water flask filled on the journey and for taking his turn in the boxcar with the stock.

Since East Robson had ceased to be the CPR terminus and turn- about point after the building of the

When they got off the train, 11-year-old Irving, tired and con- fused, almost fell into the Columbia and was Saved for a further 87 years only by the alert- ness of his mother.

The family and effects were ferried over the Columbia to East Robson by the sternwheeler Bon- nington or by the faithful Minto. They then possibly stayed the night at the old Robson Hotel and finally settled on their long, 25- acré double strip of ranchland extending from the river to the second bench below the rock cliffs and about a mile up from the Robson townsite.

They set to work at once to clear the land for an orchard, planted apple and cherry trees in the spring, and built a big yellow house on one of the strips for the- family which grew to include Ross, in 1912, and Phyllis, the only sister.

Most of these early pioneer settlers along the lake were British, together with some Rus- sian, Italian, French and German. Only some of them were experi- enced farmers and only part of the land was suitable for cultiva- tion, but those who succeeded produced a rich harvest. This, the sternwheelers picked up by the car load (640 open boxes) on a daily basis and brought to the packing plant at Robson for grad- ing, packing and shipping to the prairies and beyond:

Irving at some point got a job with the CPR and then in 1917 he entered the armed services as an infantryman in World War I and was sent to England. However, his active military service was brief, for he contracted TB and was invalided home, first to a sanitarium in Balfour and then to ~Tranquille where he remained for over two years before returning for a long home convalescence in one of the upper rooms in the big yellow house.

Here, he used his sick-time for taking a number of special cours- es which he was able to turn to good use later. Ironically, his ill- ness may have saved his life for many of his comrades never returned from the bitter fighting in France

On learning that he had senior- ity with the CPR he re-entered the company’s service in 1929 as an express messenger on the Minto, running from Castlegar to Arrowhead, a period of his life he greatly enjoyed. He then trans- ferred to the mail cars on the pas- senger trains, a position which he held until his retirement in 1963.

I never met him personally, to my recollection, but I'm sure that I have seen him many times, standing correctly uniformed in the open door of the mail car as the train stopped in the Castlegar

station en route to Vancouver via a wildly picturesque but now aban- doned Kettle Valley line or dast~ ward to Edmonton and the Prairies.

It was on this later run that he met his wife, Stella, and his eulo- gy, prepared by family members, tells the story of this part of his life at his funeral on March 16, in Richmond.

“It was on a layover in Edmonton one weekend that ‘Obie’ (as he was known on the railway) had a pal set him up with a blind date, Stella Stethridege turned out to be the love of his life, but it didn’t start that way.

“Stella had her own beauty salon (quite a pioneer in her own right) and talked her new boyfriend into covering his already greying hair. He got sus- picious when she spent a too long time shampooing, but he married her anyway...after his orange hair grew out.

“Of course the honeymoon was back on the train—across Canada and by ship to Stella’s birthplace, the island of Guernsey in the Channel Islands.”

The young Obornes first set- tled in Edmonton where their first son Ross was bom, then to Nelson where their second son, Gary Ronald (after his mother's two favorite move stars Gary

OVER MY SHOULDER

JOHN CHARTERS

ovtiteter

Irving Ewart Oborne . . died March 12 in Richmond

Cooper and Ronald Coleman) arrived. In 1949 they transferred to Vancouver and after 10 years of city life moved to a quiet farm in Richmond.

Irving was a man of many tal- ents and much energy. He built his house and most of his furni- ture, played violin in the New

Conca i J " and at 80 played at seniors’ homes with a small combo. He

was a rock hound, a lapidary and silversmith, who made beautiful jewelry for his family and friends, as well, a skillful painter, particularly in oils.

On their little farm he, an excellent gardener, and Stella, grew their own food, raised their sons with loving care and good memories, and gave them a life- long joy in fishing and living.

Meanwhile, back on the farm

in Robson, Frank Oborne with the assistance of son Ross, who also worked at Cominco, contin- ued to raise fruit, particularly apples, peaches, and pears, until Frank's death in 1943. Ross ‘quit the smelter in 1946 and worked the farm full time until 1980, but sold the big yellow house and property in 1960 to he Flynns and moved to a smaller house which he had built on the other strip.

However, agriculture was declining in the Kootenays, the Minto was pulled off its run after 50 years of service, passenger rail service ceased, Renata and Deer Park were drowned behind the dam, the new highway was built, Waldie’s Mill closed and the pulp mill came in.

Life in this quiet, rural valley was changing irrevocably. Non- theless, the Oborne insistence upon quality remained and we could always count on Ross's Spartan apples, peaches and pears to be the best.

Ross sold the remaining proper- ty in 1980 and moved in 1983 to the more rural and familiar atmo- sphere of Ashcroft where he now lives, and the Oborne farm became one more page of local history.

“How,” I asked Eileen Jolly Babaeff, his niece and greatest admirer, “would you describe your Uncle Irving?”

“He was a handsome, distin- guished man, even in old age,” she replied, “but more important, he was always kind and loving, always impeccably dressed, always courteous and considerate

* and he loved to laugh. In brief, he

was a gentleman from the turn of the centuty.. They don’t make them like that anymore.”

The story of Irving Ewart Oborne is, in fact, the story of a nation, a culture and the nature of change, a milepost in time. As the eulogy says in the last paragraph:

“Few of us will ever experi- ence the changes in the world that Irving experienced-—from import- ing the first bicycle seen in Rob- son to $4,000 mountain bikes; from steam engines to monorails, from the Wright brothers to the Concord and men on the moon; from the wireless to fax machines and from pens dipped in ink bot- tles to computers.

Irving witnessed nearly a centu- ry of living—almost one hundred years of the most dramatic changes in the world's history.” Truly, it makes one and consider.

The saddest moment of Irv- ing’s life came with the death of his wife Stella in,1976. Today, as he wished, he lies beside her in Ocean View Burial Park. He was predeceased also by brothers Wilbur, Lloyd and Gilbert and is survived by his brother Ross Oborne of Ashcroft, his sister Phyllis Jolly of Richmond, and sons Ross and Gary.

Closing note: The big yellow house is being remodeled by Linda Miller as a “bed and break~ fast’: must visit it again.

My thanks to the family partic- ularly, Ross Oborne, to Ruth Waldie and to Eileen Babaeff for their assistance.

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