An Inscrutable Man - my father

My father, Arthur Featherstone Priestley, was born in England.  As I stated in an earlier post about my mother, my dad met my mum in the Indian village of Aiyansh, near Terrace, in northern BC, where her father was the first 'white' missionary in the area.

Dad decided to settle in Aiyansh and built a house overlooking the mighty Nass River.

He also built a store to serve the Indians and settlers.  The supplies for the store arrived by boat and were hauled up the steep incline by means of a skid, which dad no doubt also constructed.

As well as having a large vegetable garden, catching salmon, shooting deer and moose, Dad did a great of trapping - beaver, wolf, otter, lynx, marten, weasel, mink.  I don't know who he sold the hides to, but his efforts paid off.   

He also provided all the wood for our cook stove and heater, using a whip-saw to do the job.

To add to these accomplishments, dad was made a Justice of the Peace and Notary Public, and Mount Priestley was so-named in his honor.

I still don't know why, in 1917, when  my older sister was only 6 years old and my brother Les was just 11 months, dad volunteered his services in the first world war.

He left mother to look after the store and care for the two young children, with the help of neighbours. Interestingly, dad served as a stretcher-bearer even though on home ground he was known to faint at the sight of blood. He was discharged from the army May 24, 1919.

Upon his return, he and my mother had two more children, my brother Ken in 1921 and then me, in 1924.

In 1927 we all paid a visit to dad's parents, who had relocated to Vancouver.  We must have attended the PNE because dad won a car!

However, dad didn't drive so he sold the car and we returned to the north until 1929 when we sold up and moved to Victoria.

Dad had many vocations.  He ran a second-hand store, an auction room and for many years worked for the hardware firm of McLennan, McFeely and Prior.  He was so knowledgeable that people would ask for 'Pop' Priestley to serve them.

My father didn't get a driver's license until he was 75 years old, when he became a bouncer (!) in a hotel/pub in Port Renfrew.

Dad lived until he was 100 years old.  He loved to play cards and golf and although he was a very insular person (you might say 'inscrutable'), he loved 'the ladies', especially if they were attractive.  He was not what you would call 'warm and fuzzy' and I certainly did not like the way he treated my mother.  There were times when I could cheerfully have strangled him, but he was my dad, and Father's Day seems like a good time to remember him, all his accomplishments as well as his foibles.