Ray's Corner

Catching Rabbits and Managing Money

"... When we were kids why we didn't have the things to play with like they had around; we had to make our own play things and our own toys. And the country where we lived was rough and the neighbours wasn't too handy - lived too handy to us - so we always had to enjoy whatever we could ourselves, and build our own sleds in the winter time, bob sleds and hand sleds. And when we got old enough why we started setting rabbit snares and we'd set snares and  - we had a road went back in the woods about a mile - and we used to go back and set that road full of snares on both sides, oh, maybe a hundred snares. You could buy a coil of wire then for five cents, and a coil of wire at that time why would make you 20 snares. So, after we got the snares set up and then snow come why we'd take the lantern and hand sled early in the morning - oh, around quarter to six - and we'd run with the hand sled and lantern and we'd go back to the snares on the back end and we'd start in picking our rabbits up on the way. Well, when we got home we might have 10 rabbits, might have 15 or 20, and if we were going to school at that time we'd take them down to schoolhouse at noontime and then after school, why we'd run them down to Clementsvale - about three miles and and a half away - on the hand sled or bobsled, which ever was the best sledding at the time. And it was down hill quite a lot of the way and we'd coast down the hills and back, coming back, why we had to walk up most all of the way. And we'd take them to this feller that bought rabbits - and he'd give us ten cents a pair. Well, Mother would make out a little order - she'd want some pepper, salt, or ginger, something, and she'd make out a small order for herself and the rest was left over why we could buy some slate pencils or we could buy some more rabbit wire or whatever we needed without wasting money - she wouldn't let us waste it. Once in a while we could buy a piece of candy, you'd get, oh, two or three pieces of candy then for a cent. We might buy a cent's worth of candy, and if there was any money left over we had to take it home and give it to our mother and she'd save it for us. And this went on and on till we grew up...."