100 - Augustus "Gus" Meilleur - Mackey, Ontario
Posted by: 
scotian
N 46° 11.455 W 077° 49.053
18T E 282585 N 5119119
Augustus "Gus" Meilleur was born at Meilleur's Bay, one of 12 children of Joseph and Almira Moore Meilleur. Gus saw many changes in the area during a life time of logging, railroad work, farming, camp cooking and store keeping.
Waymark Code: WMC22N
Location: Ontario, Canada
Date Posted: 07/16/2011
Views: 1
On the occasion of his 100th birthday, excerpt from: Gus Meilleur – 100 years in the Ottawa Valley
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visit link)
by Judy McAlpine
Gus has had the good fortune of living through the terms of office of all 15 of Canada's prime ministers. He vividly remembers MacKenzie King and WC Bennett as "good men who boosted up wages when times were damn bad".
Born at Meilleur's Bay, one of 12 children of Joseph and Almira Moore Meilleur, Gus has seen m any changes in the area during a life time of logging, railroad work, farming, camp cooking and store keeping.
He can still remember helping out at the stopover place his parents ran almost a century ago. Teamsters from Pembroke en route with supplies for nearby lumber camps patronized the stopover. The 25¢ fee per team of horses was good money in those days and with room for 40 or more teams it brought in a living for the busy Meilleur family.
Those travelling teamsters also provided the family with a valuable link to the outside world. Their stories of local people and events help the Meilleurs informed of happenings outside of their isolated homestead.
Gus started logging on the Hawkesbury River at age 15. Later on, he and his brother George logged on the Ottawa and Petawawa Rivers. Log driving was tough work, and risky too – log drivers' graves dotted the rivers for miles up and down shore. Drives could last for three or four months but at a dollar a day it was a living. Gus recalls the Petawawa River as "the roughest river I ever drove. The river couldn't drown me – I could stand on any log".