Mahone Bay Old School_A Life and Times_Bob Sayer

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was the year he graduated, so they were his contemporaries. In a letter, written
1994, to Joan Foran, he names them with amazing accuracy and says, “Stuart
was a very good baseball pitcher…With him Mahone won the South Shore Championship
and went to Halifax to play the Halifax Academy at Sackville St….I went too…
They licked us… That year our hockey team also won the S. S. Championship.’
Photo: Courtesy Carolyn Kuhn
Edward Ernst
Athlete
Scholar
World Banker
Back Row, left of the ball team, stands
Edward Ernst [son of the “Lumber
King”]. At the age of 16, he graduated
from school to take a one year
banking course at Queen’s University.
He played for the university football
team and stayed on to graduate. After
New York University Graduate School
of Banking, he progressed through
the banking ranks rapidly. He was
promoted to the position of Executive
Vice president and General Manager
of the International Department of
the Bank of Montreal.
He became a bank Director, Chair of the Israeli-Canadian Chamber of Commerce
and President of the Export Finance Corporation of Canada. He was
an international banker of repute, leading delegations all over the world.
Above, Edward Ernst, Head of Delegation, meets with David Ben Gurion,
Israel’s Head of State. Carolyn Kuhn, Edward’s daughter, continues to live at
the family house on Main Street.
Media Coverage of School Sports
The Bridgewater Bulletin and Lunenburg Progress Enterprise regularly reported
on the town and school hockey and ball teams. There are even reports of the
grammar school ball team in Mahone Bay. Progress Enterprise, June 21, 1922:
The ball game between the grammar school teams of Mahone Bay and Bridgewater
on the parade grounds was interesting and amusing and resulted in another
victory for the local team. What was amusing? Presumably the term “grammar”
refers to a younger age group-junior high or elementary. Bobby Mader
remembers the term, believing it applied to grade seven and younger.
The paper also reported: …in a senior teams ball game against Chester, Joudrey,
the local star player, was hit over the ear by a pitched ball, rendered unconscious…
and is under doctor’s care.
Good sized crowds attended school hockey and ball. The county papers regularly
reported on the contests.
Tennis, Swings and Sand Pit
The same edition reported: At the regular monthly meeting of the School Board,
$50 received from the school lands commission was passed on to principal Langille
for repairs to the tennis court, a larger number of swings and a sand pit. Bobby
Mader remembers the swings and the sand pit. They were where the 1960s
extension was later built. He reports that the pit was topped up with sawdust
and shavings for pole vault.
The 1920s Come To A Close: Ulrica Strum
In 2000, Ulrica wrote to The Reunion Committee from St. Catherine’s, Ontario,
regretting that she could not attend. She sent some interesting comments
and some fine photos. Going to that province for Christmas, 2005,
this writer and his wife drove south and spent more than half a day with her.
Her school experience is very instructive:
An Out of Towner
She was born [1913] and raised in Mader’s Cove. So, like students from
Indian Point, Oakland, Clearland, Blockhouse and Fauxburg, she went to the
local multi-grade school for a number of years. On the next page is a photo
of the old school as it is to-day. The old toilet buildings, his and hers, are still
there. Ulrica walked up over the hill to the school. She finished grade eight
there before coming to Mahone for grades nine to eleven.