Today’s Letters: Hudson’s Bay Company’s history more than just a memory

I was an officer cadet at Goose Bay RCAF station that summer, working with the chaplains. The Grenfell Mission had a hospital in North West River and every July 1 had a festival to which came crowds of people from many spots, by water craft. At NWR and up along the coast where the Mission served small settlements, folk had made a variety of crafts and these were on sale on Canada Day to earn cash for the hospital. A number of us went the 40 or so kilometres to join in the festivities. I got one of those now-famous hooked picture/rugs, made with strips of silk stockings, a dog team pulling a sled among the Labrador spruce. I also had my first taste of smoked salmon.

The trading post served the communities on both sides of the river. I did not do business at the Bay Post, but it was right there, as in the picture, having a good day.

In late August, my supervising chaplain sent me to Frobisher Bay for a few days to serve the small Air Force detachment there. On an idle afternoon, another airman and I walked over to the Post, which was tiny as the picture shows. The white paint gleamed. The windows were not boarded up, as in 2016. My friend bought a tanned polar bear hide (why?) and I picked up a bone carving.