Interview: Robert Chafe

Robert Chafe on Just Being Kids:

"I remember when we were kids growing up, we would always have a game of rounders [baseball]. We called it rounders back then. We used to make a ball from old rags and we tie it up with twine, we used to play on the beach, and it was lots of fun. We used to go swimming up in First Pond and in the winter we would go sliding down the road, all the way down the road."

Robert Chafe on Go'ng to Town:

"We used to walk to St. John's back then, we'd walk on the old road then, Old Petty Harbour road, about 9 miles. My grandmother Mary (Babs) Stack would drive a horse and cart to St. John's she was a real business woman, she would go by herself and sell flowers and other things she would come home with flour, butter, sugar."

Robert Chafe on Fishing:

"I was about 15 years old when I started fishing, lots and lots of fish but not of a price, so in the wintertime I would go away to work, but every spring I came back home to go fishing again. I did that every year."

Robert Chafe on School and Church:

"When I was in School there was only 3 books or grades and that was as far as you could go, the school only had 3 rooms back then. Back then we would have to go to Church every Sunday, I mean, 'you had to go.' Very strict about that, and every night before supper we had to say the 'Rosary.' In our house anyway."