Alex Gauthier and Melinda Plamondon

Alex and Melinda departed Morinville around June 26,1911 and arrived in Plamondon on July 6,1911. They travelled north on the Morinville Trail and hooked up with the Athabasca Landing Trail. At Colinton they turned east on the Lac La Biche trail.

They travelled with 5 children:

• Genevieve born September 5,1903
• Sinclair born September 22,1905
• Roselda born November 26,1906
• Clarence born May 3,1908
• Wilbert born May 11, 1911

In personal conversation with Lina Plamondon, she remembers her mother Roselda talk about her mother Melinda’s experience: “We travelled by wagon and a team consisting of an ox and a horse. The ox would often lay down and had to be whipped to carry on.”

In 1960 I was visiting with grandpa and ma in their home in Plamondon. Talking about the old days, grandpa said: “On the trail, very near to Grassland (as we know today) we arrived at a large swamp. We used buck saws to cut trees to form a ‘corduroy’ road on the trail. I can tell you it took a lot of trees! Man, that was a difficult part of our journey. To think of it today, that drained land is so fertile.”

Grandpa and ma continued talking about the sadness of losing my dad, Clarence, to cancer in 1945.