A Young Boy’s Journey to Manhood: An Ancestral Move
Becoming a Man
Becoming a Man
Jack Middlebrooks, my Great Great Grandfather was born in
1900 to Emily and Harper Middlebrooks. He was one of eleven children, two of
which died as children. Jack, being the eldest living son, had great
responsibilities, even as a child, to his mother and younger siblings. Jack’s
Father Harper did not provide for the family and left for years at a time to
‘work’ but never sent money home. As a result, my Gredad was forced to fill his
Father’s shoes. At the age of 10, he left home and travelled North to the
logging camps to work as a cabin boy. One of his main responsibilities, besides
making beds and cleaning, was checking the beds for rattle snakes. By the end,
he had collected a box filled with their rattles. Jack worked long hours there
and would return home after several months, while sending money to his Mother
in the meantime. Of course his meager earnings were never enough. One memory
Jack has told members of my family is that he ran into his Father once, who
reported that his Mother and siblings were doing fine at home. However, when
Jack returned home, he found that his Mother had just given birth, and the
younger children were trying to make a soup out of dandelions. His Father had
never sent any money home. After finding them like that, Jack walked 20 miles
to the nearest store to buy them food. He would have walked the same road that
I often travel to get to my cottage. Its stories like these and my family
history that makes me so thankful for everything I have, and everyone I have.
Being a Man
With a wife and infant son of
his own, Jack found himself struggling once again. While Jack loved living off
of the land, with his small farm and his hunting and trapping, sometimes it
just wasn’t enough. On those occasions Jack once again had to return to
logging. According to a study done for the Muskoka Watershed Council this was
common, ‘land was acquired from native populations by treaty and to supplement
meager farm income, settlers often worked in the logging camps in the winter
months.” ( (Muskoka Watershed Council, 2012) . In 1924, with his
wife and baby, Jack travelled up the French River to spend the winter working
in a logging camp. He remembered that once you were up the river, it would
become too icy to travel back until spring. Upon arriving to the camp and being
assigned their 10’ by 12’ cabin, he learned that there were not enough cabins
for all of the workers. As such, he was forced to share the cabin with his brother
and his wife who had also come to work at the camp. So, the put up a sheet
in-between the two beds and spent the winter in very close courters. Apparently
it would get so cold that they had to sleep with a lantern under the sheets to
keep the baby warm. While Jack missed his home, this was an economical
necessity.
