TRANSCRIPT

WW - Wes[ley] Washington, interviewee / LR - Lyn Royce, interviewer

LR: 'kay... So where... When you... left home, 'cause you were finished school, grown up, you went straight to work for the Post Office?

WW: Went straight to the Post Office. My mother turned around, uh, Russ Martin, he was, eh, uh, 20, 2293 Valerie [?] Street, he was an RCMP, Sergeant. And he turned around, he, he, he turned around was walkin' by the house one day, and he was talkin' to my mother. And, and uh, my mother says, uh, he says, 'Gee, I can get Wes into the Mounties.' So I says, 'Okay.' My mother says, 'That'd be good!' So he says, 'You go down to the post office, 500 Queen Street;' he said, 'y'go on upstairs;' he says, and that was the RCMP Office, above the Post Office. So, he said, 'ye get a, write a, write a test,' he says, 'and then I'll have you transfer out west where I am and train ye.' So, I went down there. There was the, the, the, the bank, CIBC, next door, and the post office and a little laneway in between. So I went in the side door and I went to go upstairs and the post office door was open. Vince Keegan, and um, uh, Johnny Mace, not Henry Mace, Johnny Mace and, and a few other posties, Russ Black and all these guys were there, and, and they said,'Where you goin'?' I said, 'I'm goin' upstairs to write an exam. I'm gonna join the Mounties.' 'N Vince Keegan says, 'Come on in and see the guys!' I went in, and that was the end of my story. I turned around, they soft-soaped me, they soft-soaped me and I was young and green, they says, 'You don't have to go! Look at this guy over here, you know this guy!' And so and so and so and so and 1 thing led to another and they took me in, pretty soon I was in the office, in the post office, talkin' to the post master, Feemester, and, and, and pretty soon I wrote a test and I got 97, and they says, 'Hey Wes, we get in touch with you tomorrow; you don't have to go upstairs.' So, I went home, they called me the next day, and that, that's the end of the story!

LR: ...that story... Wow; good for you, good for you.

WW: I put 33 years, 10 months.