Video: The Saints

The Saints were the main rock group in Ladysmith in the mid to late 1950s. Former members Art Dowswell and Bob DeClark talk about their Teen Town dances.

Three men are sitting at a table in the Ladysmith Legion Hall. They have memorabilia and photos from a group called The Saints.

(Music)

[Rob Johnson] Why did you choose the name The Saints? Because you weren’t Saints.

[Art Dowswell] Well, we thought we were. We thought we were all pretty good, so we decided on the Saints. Right.

[Bob DeClark] Yeah. I think part of the influence back then was Bill Haley and the Comets. And one of their popular songs with the teenagers was When the Saints Go Rocking In and so that became our theme song, and it became our name. And so I played the drums, Art played the guitar, and David Bird played the piano. Merv Mawson was the trumpet player, and Gerald McGovern was the sax player.

[Colour photo showing five members of the Saints on Stage in the 1950s.]

[B.D.] Art and I were driving down here today, I said to him, “You know Art, I wouldn’t trade those years for anything. I think we were so lucky to just enter the rock and roll scene when we did with the guys that we had in the Saints and our high school friends. And it just turned out to be probably some of the best four or five years of your life.

[Photograph showing their record that was made at C-FUN radio station, plus a CD version.]

[B.D.] Ladysmith had, and I think Chemainus was included in the area, they had a Teen Town Association back then and so teenagers got together to just have a good time. And music and dancing turned out for us, turned out to be a way that we could provide some fun and entertainment.

[Black & white photo showing The Saints members holding instruments.]

[R.J.] You’re talk about it being clean-cut organization through Teen Town that had to have an effect upon that generation.

[A.D.] Pretty much yeah. They had an interest, they had something to do. Yeah, they weren’t just wandering around willy-nilly. They had a focus.

[R.J.] Because the dances were the key thing and then they had things like Teen Town baseball teams and stuff.

[A.D.] And the conventions and stuff like that, you know, so you all work to that common goal, eh.

[Newspaper Clipping showing The Saints performing at Teen Town Convention in Penticton, BC]

[A photo montage of The Saints performing.]

[A.D.] Three or four carloads of us left from Nanaimo, drove up for Friday night and the Saturday night bash. They had a huge Hall rented, and the place was just absolutely packed. The participants in the in the convention, they all just, when we started to play, they just all rushed up towards the hall or to the towards the stage, and we thought, we’re doing something wrong. We’re checking to see if our fly was undone or whatever, you know. And they were just so enthralled with the music. And the next night was even better.

[A slow pan showing the interior of the Ladysmith Legion Hall.].

[B.D.] This hall here is where we used to play, not every Friday, I don’t think, but probably at least two or three Fridays a month for the Teen Town Association, and always packed. Always a full house. And I got to say, no trouble. I can’t recall ever having any difficulty at our dances.

[A.D.] We would play here on Friday nights for Teen Town, and Saturday nights we’d head up to Nanaimo and play at Branch 10. Both places had stairs going up, and it was awful packing the gear up and down all the time, but we handled it. And Nanaimo had a really good Teen Town organization as did Ladysmith, so we enjoyed our time there, but it was a little more rough crowd up there.

[A series of black & white photos showing The Saints performing on stage, David Bird playing piano, Gerry McGovern (sax), Art Dowsell (guitar) and Merv Mawson (trumpet), and Bob DeClark on drums.]

[B.D.] We still have friends that we met from Nanaimo. Some of them married our friends, and you know, it was a great opportunity for us to branch out, and you know, get to be known a little further abroad with the Teen Town people in Nanaimo.

[Art points to a photo of himself with a guitar and David Bird on an accordion, at the front door of a house in the mid-1950s.]

[A.D.] This is how we got started. This guy here, Mervin,  David and I came to my parents’ house in Saltair, and we didn’t have a piano. I think I mentioned this before, but I had an accordion. I was taking accordion lessons at that time by correspondence, so I said to David, “Well, let’s have a practice at my house.” And he says, “You’ve got a piano?” And I said, “Nope, but I have an accordion. Well, we’ll make it work. So we came out and sat on the back of my dad’s car and played music, and practiced in the driveway.

[Photo of Merv, Art and David playing instruments while leaning on the back of a car.]

[B.D.] I think I told you at the beginning, I wouldn’t change those years for anything.

[Music]