Steamer Trunk

One of the oldest thing we own is this steamer trunk of my mother's. 

She took it "up north" by train when - at the age of 19 - she started her teaching career at Preston Lake, in Alberta's Peace River country, the first woman to teach in that one-room country school. That was in the fall of 1938. If I remember correctly, her annual salary was $300.

What courage and determination, saying goodbye to her family in Edmonton and heading off on a 10-month contract.

Her home, while there, was a small "teacherage" next to the school. Her duties included teaching the assigned curriculum to grades one to eight - all together in one classroom - as well as arriving early to start the wood stove in the morning, so that the classroom was warm when the children arrived. At end of the day, she was also responsible for tidying up and sweeping the floor.

How did she carry that trunk? my son asks. It's heavy!

Porters - at the train station - carried it. Then local farmers, who had been tasked with picking her up at the station took her to her new home. It would have been extra heavy, full of teaching supplies, as well as personal items - everything she needed for her 10-month sojourn in the north.

Did her family use this same trunk when they came from Ukraine to Canada in 1928?

I don't know - I never thought to ask!