Freedom to Play: We Made Our Own Fun

INFECTED BY A RADIO BUG

only I had a saddle and, more importantly, if only I had a horse. Ah, well… Dad supplied the final item of my outfit—a rope. It was a new one and, full of twists, would not coil smoothly. I remember soaking it in a tub of water and then circling it between two posts to take the kinks out of it. Then, since I had found a brass “eye” among some old junk, this was spliced into it to give a genuine lariat or lasso. I used it for letting myself down from the barn loft, where I sometimes slept as though I were a hired hand. The Spanish words “lasso” and “lariat” had a nice Western sound to my ear and, dressed in my assembled outfit, I used them pronto on all occasions. I also bolstered my vocabulary with Spanish terms like remuda, arroyo and sombrero and particularly liked that language’s names for kinds of horses—pinto and palominos. When one of my cousins, another “cowboy,” came for a visit, we would ride the range together, horseless, running about like loping horses, playing Cowboys and Rustlers among the willow clumps of our pasture, our log smokehouse being the guardroom or jail for lawbreakers. We practised lassoing fence posts, drawing guns from holsters, and rounding up dogies. Whoopie Ti Yi Yo! INFECTED BY A RADIO BUG Rolland Lewis recalls life in the Point Grey district before it became part of Vancouver. On a number of occasions I have somewhat facetiously remarked that I had the good sense to be born into a “comfortable ” Point Grey family. My father was a small employer, about 20 employees at the peak of his business, in an industry which held up well when I was a child during the Depression years. Consequently, I had a secure, stable upbringing. During my young years, I did the usual boyhood things, such as play cowboys and Indians, build model boats, and play “scrub.” The content of our weekly play was often determined by the nature of the Saturday afternoon matinee for kids at the local theatre. 152 Freedom to Play Not until about age 11 did I begin to seriously make my own fun. About that time I was bitten by what was called the “radio bug,” and from that age onward a considerable part of my spare time went toward “radio.” Very quickly I learned the code, and practised it regularly with two of my friends who were also interested in radio. We built our own crystal sets, scrounging and adapting parts as required, and communicated locally in code using Ford spark coils run by whatever used dry cells we could acquire. This was highly unlawful, but we did not know this at the time. As one can imagine, this led to some interesting situations. When we used our spark coils as transmitters, they covered all radio frequencies for several blocks about our houses. Naturally, this interfered with broadcast radio reception, and although our neighbours were not sure of the cause, it did not stop them from accusing us kids of ruining their reception. One day my friend who lived across the back lane and I gathered all the old wire we could find, strung it between our houses, and hooked up earphones so we could talk. We did this the day that King George V died and the local radio stations ceased broadcasting in respect for the deceased king. Our phone rang all afternoon with the neighbours demanding that we take down our wire IMMEDIATELY as it had cut off their radio reception! Creating Their Own Equipment 153 Patricia and Rolland Lewis on a family fishing trip to Big Barr Lake, BC, c. 1930. At age 14 I passed my Department of Transport exam, and became an active amateur radio operator. From that time on my friends and I built legitimate radio transmitters and receivers, often from scrounged, begged, traded, or adapted used parts, and talked with other hams all over the world. But the real fun days were those before we became licensed amateurs, when we built our crystal sets and spark coils. A RADIO MADE FROM A RAZOR BLADE When young John Fedoruk found instructions for building simple radios, he began making his own. One of the fun things to do when I was a boy was to make your own radio. Although I did not know how a...