1914 – 1924

I was born in October 1914 in North End Winnipeg¹, two months after Canada entered the First World War. The exact day of the month that I was born is not known because my father forgot to register my birth until sometime later. My parents must have thought I was born at the beginning of October, so they chose the first day of the month for my ‘official’ birth date.

I was a sickly child prone to pneumonia and spent a great deal of time in my early years in a hospital. My earliest recollection was getting off an elevator at the hospital crying in my mother’s arms. They put me in one of many cribs in a quiet, darkened room where children were asleep. I was made to understand that I had to be quiet so as not to wake the children. I stopped crying and listened to a hissing sound which I later thought must have been a heat register.

I have another vivid memory of the hospital. I was in a crib in a brightly lit room. A doctor came in, washed his hands and pushed the swinging doors open with his elbows. I now realize that I was in a crib next to the operating room. I was not familiar with elevators, heat registers or operating rooms at the time so I don’t understand, to this day, how I came to these conclusions.

I believe we lived on Redwood Avenue west of Arlington Street when I was born.²

In those days, most families kept a barrel under the drainpipe to collect rainwater. My mother kept me beside her in the back yard while hanging clothes on laundry days. One day when she looked around the garden I was gone. She ran toward the road in a panic and, as she passed the barrel of water, she heard a splash, saw two little feet kicking and pulled me out.

When I was a little girl somebody put a crystal radio³ near my ear. I heard music over the air waves for the first time. It was magic to me. I had no idea where the music came from, even to this day. Some years later when I heard a radio for the first time, I was told that there were little men inside the radio, talking, singing, and playing instruments. I believed it of course.

At the age of seven I recovered from my illness and was well enough to start my first day of school which was two city blocks from home.⁵ I loved fire drills because it meant getting into a tubular metal slide⁶ that took us out into the school yard in seconds. I also remember being in the maypole dance around a tall pole with coloured streamers reaching down to each child.

During my first years of school a dentist was assigned to check the students’ teeth. He asked each child which tooth was giving us trouble. I believe all or most of the children had a tooth removed. I just assumed I had to have one taken out so pointed to an eye tooth, only because it looked different than my others. The dentist didn’t check. He just took it out and then went to the next child. Fortunately, it was a baby tooth.

We moved to Burrows Avenue in 1924. That was the year my sister Alice was born.⁸ I was 10 years old. I went to Faraday School on Arlington Street.⁹ That was when I first realized that I was older than my classmates.

We didn’t have a clock in our classroom but there was a clock in the school hallway. One day the teacher asked me to go out to check the time. I remember how embarrassed I was because I never learned to tell time. I stood there until somebody came along who I could ask.

I never liked to ask questions because I didn’t want anybody to know how little I knew.

I was about 10 years old when I went to my first movie. When my hero got into trouble, I stayed to see the movie again hoping he or she would not make the same mistake a second time.

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¹ North End Winnipeg is the area of the city north and northwest of downtown. Return

² The 1916 census for the Bobowsky family records them living at 866 Redwood Avenue, Winnipeg, located west of Arlington Street.  The small, clapboard house at this address, pictured, might be the house Angela was born in (renovated), or a more recently built house on the same lot. The image is from Google Street View, 2020. Return

³ A crystal radio, is a simple AM radio receiver that was popular in the early days of radio. Return

⁴ Source: Google Street View. Return

⁵ The Bobowsky family moved to the second floor of a building at Selkirk and Main, above a bookstore where Angela’s father worked, circa 1916. Return

⁶ Escape chutes were installed in Canadian schools from the 1800s. Return

⁷ When Angela turned seven years old in October 1921, she lived at 576 Flora Avenue.  She probably attended the King Edward Community School, pictured, which was located two blocks from that address. Return

⁸ Angela’s sister, Alice Helen, was born on May 22, 1924. Return

⁹ Faraday School in North End Winnipeg is on Parr Street, several blocks from Arlington Avenue. It was constructed in 1922. Return

¹⁰ Source: Winnipeg Tribune, 25 August, 1922, page 5. Return