The new school was a really big deal for the island. Funded by the affluent Powell River school district (a similar one was built in Van Anda), it was just the cleanest, shiniest and most modern school ever! An old photo shows the Parent Teacher Association at the time: moms, dads, grannies and others who just wanted to see it all go well. Education was seen as the gateway to prosperity and the islanders were bursting with pride. Many had helped to clear the land, prepare the yards and play spaces, and donate time and equipment. Committees arranged Sports Days, raised monies for film nights and decided what flavour of Freshie would be served. (Orange. Always. Orange.)

   

Personally, going to school was a thrill that has never quite left me. Charles Williams Elementary was a glorious new world. Most of us came from homes with linoleum floors, coal-oil lamps and outdoor toilets, but this new place had gleaming industrial flooring, flush toilets, hot running water, a drinking fountain and lights you just flicked on. A hallway ran the length of the building with the big kids and little kids in separate rooms on the left and the teacherage, toilets and a belching furnace room on the right. That’s where boys who swore or fought or challenged the teacher got the strap.

   

Grade one and learning to read was just the most amazing experience in the world. The little wooden chairs arranged in a semi- circle fit our

wee bums perfectly. The teacher brought out a giant book, Fun with Dick and Jane, and read a chapter a day, supported by phonics and those tricks teachers seem to know. The word “Look!” was presented with eyelashes and pupils in the two o letters to remind us. 

   

Then came the day we met “Father” on the page. He arrived home from work in a brown suit and felt fedora. Wow! No father we knew came home from work dressed like that. We decided he must be a father, not a dad or a daddy.

It was the first proof that there was another, strange world outside our little island, The school held the key and we were just starting to be let in.  -  Kate Hackett