The following interview was with Sandy Julian in his home in the Millbrook First Nation, Truro, Nova Scotia on November 10, 1992. The interview was done by Dr. Trudy Sable, accompanied by Wallis Nevin, as part of a research project on Maritime baseball history for Dr. Colin Howell, Professor of History at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Portions of the research were later published in Dr. Howell’s book, Northern Sandlots: A social History of Maritime Baseball (University of Toronto Press, 1995).

Sponsorship for the Archiving of this interview was through the Mi’kmaw Native Friendship Centre, Halifax, N.S. with funding through the Department of Canadian Heritage, Aboriginal Language Initiatives Program.

TS        Do you know when baseball actually started on this reserve?  Do you have any sense of where it came from or who started it? Did anybody ever talk about that?

SJ        It started, I guess, when the young kids are, you know, it must be around the twenties.

TS        1920s?

SJ        Yeah, cause I remember when this ball game was on when I was old enough to know.

TS        So when you were a young boy, there were older people, or people in their nineteens and early twenties playing?

SJ        Yeah, because they told me, you know, like the old feller, he used to play with the town team and Frank Gould.

TS        From here?

SJ        From here but he moved down to Sydney, and he used to play with the town, you know, town team.

TS        The town team is Truro?

SJ        Yeah. They mix, just a mix at that time. Then we started up here. We got ball field going, just down the road there, you know. But then, the boys used to come up one time, we play here, or we go downtown, we play there.

TS        Where was the field in town?

SJ        We had a T.A.C.

TS        What’s that?

SJ        T.A.C. ground they call it.  (Atlantic? Athletic?)

TS        What’s that? T.A.C.? Truro Activity Centre?

SJ        Truro (Atlantic?) Centre, something like that (S.J. wasn’t sure). And the other one was the park. We used to play at the park. They used to have a Truro park alongside here (?) There wasn’t too many houses at that time. We used to play out there.

TS        So would you walk there or would you take the train into town?

SJ        No, we walked. It’s only about three miles. Take an hour though. There was no cars here–just the horses. Wasn’t too many. We had a horse. We had cows and horse. And Glodes here, they had a horse.

TS        Did people ride the horse or use it for farming?

SJ        More for farming than use of the transportation. That too… take people to town sometimes.

TS        In a sled or?

SJ        In sleds or wagons. Wasn’t too much horse driving at the time.

TS        So, there were people older than you that were playing when you started…

SJ        Oh, yes, yes

TS        You started in the 1930s?

SJ        No, I started, it must have been 1932 or something like that.  I was pretty young. That’s the time they started softball too, around ’33. I remember we went up to Cape Breton, Sydney, we played Labor Day tournament there. And we played there, then we went up in trucks, but it used to take about a day to travel there.

TS        About a day by truck? Because it was dirt roads?

SJ        Dirt roads and there was no trans-Atlantic. And we used to leave here in the morning and get there about 8:00 at night.

TS        What would you do if it rained? What if it was raining? Weren’t the trucks open?

SJ        Sometimes open, sometimes get newspapers and cover yourself up and dusty! (laughs)

TS        You mean you just huddled down with a newspaper?

SJ        I know that’s tough one time, we just pull forward here on the truck when we come back (difficulty to hear).  And it only cost us a dollar to go down and back.

TS        He would charge you a dollar to take you?  Sounds cheap now.

SJ        A dollar return.

TS        Who would take you?

SJ        Some truck drivers in like in Brookfield.

TS        Just somebody who had a truck?

SJ        He put little benches around.

TS        So you would actually hire him?

SJ        Yeah, we hired him. It used to be open, you know, just sides on the trucks. That’s the only time we went there. It was 1934 and we got the championship at that time too.

TS        You won the championship in 1934 up in Cape Breton?

SJ        Up in Cape Breton.

TS        In Sydney?

SJ        Yeah.

TS        Softball?

SJ        Softball that time.

TS        Do you know who brought softball onto the reserve or where it came from?

SJ        Well, we saw it in like sometimes in movies or something like that. That’s where it came from. Ball starts coming into, you know, in the general stores.

TS        So, you just picked it up?

SJ        Just pick it up like that. They got rule books, you know, to follow it. But since then it changed quite a bit too.

TS        But you said only the catcher and the first basemen had gloves (for softball) But for baseball, everybody had gloves?

SJ        Everybody had a glove. Sometimes they make their own gloves.

TS        Out of hide you mean?

SJ        Yeah, some kind of leather. Sew them. A lot of the boys used to do that.

TS        They’d make their own gloves?  Would they pad it with anything?

SJ        Oh yes, put some kind of padding. Like cloth or cotton batting.

TS        Did a lot of people do that?

SJ        Quite a few. Because some of them couldn’t afford it. They can’t afford. You be a rich man to buy own your own good glove like that cause the gloves wouldn’t last (?) (Inaudible) The money part is hard to get. Then we started playing back and forth in town, you know. Sometime we make a trip like Shubie (Shubenacadie [Sɨkɨpne’katik]), we play ball there with Shubie.

TS        The Shubie town?

SJ        Shubie town. Then like a young fella named Joe Paul used to play with Shubie; he used to pitch for them.

TS        He’d pitch for your team?

SJ        He’d pitch when we played them. He’d play with us when we go down there, he’d play with us. The other teams had their own pitchers. But he used to play with them, the Shubie team all the time. They had their own league themselves, but we didn’t.

 (Wallis Nevin from Sɨkɨpne’katik , who accompanied me on this trip to introduce me to Sandy, clarifies what Sandy is trying to say at this point)

WN     He (Joe Paul) played with the town of Shubenacadie (Sɨkɨpne’katik), not the reserve. When the Indians from Millbrook came to town, he (Joe Gould) would play on the Indians’ team against the Shubenacadie team.

TS        So he would play against his own team?

SJ        Yeah, he used to play against his own team because he played with us you see. He was an excellent pitcher. You know, we didn’t have much pitchers here.

TS        That was also baseball?

SJ        Yeah, baseball.

TS        So the town of Shubenacadie had a baseball team?

SJ        Oh yes, they had a good team. But Shubie Reserve didn’t have a team that time. Only Joe Paul I know was playing.

TS        The reserve didn’t have a team in the thirties?

SJ        No, wasn’t that much built that time.

WN     It was a small reserve. Only two or three families at that time.

SJ        Paul’s (inaudible – he and Wallis discuss the families there) Houses(?)come in later. Sacks (a family name) Elmsdale

WN     Did Elmsdale have a team?

SJ        I think they had a little team. Just Sacks and ? in Elmsdale (inaudible)

TS        What’s Elmsdale?

WN     Just a little settlement like Springhill.

SJ        It was set(?) next station to Shubenacadie  [I think he means the next train stop to Shubenacadie]

TS        It was near Shubenacadie?

WN     (Leo King? Inaudible) used to live there.

SJ        The Paul’s used to live there. Ball team, pretty hard to…some of the boys We had, to get to play. What cut us some fields. We had to fix them fields up and stay till nighttime fix it up. You can lose the ball quite a way, so you had to quite a size field (?) (difficult to hear)

TS        So, you had to clear the whole area and mow it?

SJ        Yeah, well we don’t mow it at that time. We had some grass growing, we just cut with a scythe.

TS        Did you have bases?

SJ        Oh yeah. Well we made the bases out of bags. Fill them up with sand and fill them up and             make them square. Potato bags we used to call them.

TS        Did you call them first base, second base, third base?

SJ        Oh yeah

TS        Did you ever hear any of the Mi’kmaw names for the bases, did you ever use those?

SJ        Well sometimes we used to use that against the white team. We might talk to them in Mi’kmaw, like first base (says Mi’kmaw word), and second base (Mi’kmaw word, and third base is (Mi’kmaw word) That’s what they used to call them. I know we could fool them sometime, they don’t understand. (He’s explaining how they could talk in Mi’kmaw and fool the other team)

TS        That must have driven them nuts. So, you don’t need all the signals?

SJ        No. If you want to walk somebody, you just tell them in Mik’maw. They don’t understand it. Some of the boys would say, “Hey, talk English.” But some of the boys are still alive here in town. We used to chum (?) around with, (?) come up here and play.

TS        You mean some of the people who used to play are still in Truro?

SJ        Yeah, and hockey players too. I played hockey quite a long while. Let’s see, I played for thirty years in the district league.

TS        Would you mind telling me about the Springhill people who came down and how often they would visit you (?)

SJ        Well, they had a team in Springhill Junction, they call it Junction, and we play on Sunday. They used to come down Saturday night when they came. They all hoboed down, and one feller maybe would take a ticket, he get on the train himself, they paid only what 50 cents to come down from Springhill. But one feller he had to pay, and the rest of the boys be hobo…

TS        They’d just hop the train…

SJ        Hop the train. Then they do that again when they go home on Sunday night, the night train used  to go back. And they hopped the train again and the other feller take inaudible) I guess there used to be quite a few of them, shunters that time, old fashioned shunters you know. Shunters, regular big train where they keep the coal. Where they keep the coal, they sit there… I forgot the name for it.

TS        You mean they would sit on the coal? That’s why they were so dirty when they arrived?

SJ        Yeah, dirty (inaudible) Cause I know the boys who used to come to my place and they all clean up and play ball and go back… It was great fun.  I think that old Benjie Brooks the last one.

TS        Benjie Brooks?

SJ        From Shubie, and his brother what’s his name?

WN     John.

TS        What were the names of the people from Springhill?

SJ        Pictous and John Levi.

WN     John Pictou, Levi Pictou, Leo Pictou and some Bernards.

SJ        Bernards, I don’t know what’s the name?

WN     Was it Bill?

SJ        Not Bill from Pictou, no not the one (Bill Bernard from Pictou)

WN     Peter.

SJ        Peter Bernard’s brothers.

WN     Peter’s still living there.

TS        In Springhill?

SJ        Yeah. Tommy (audible) used to be here. (inaudible)

WN     If Ben Brooks is still alive, he’d be almost ninety.

TS        Did they have a full team?

SJ        Oh, they had the nine people.

WN     Big Andrew Francis.

TS        He was from Springhill too?

WN     Yeah, he’d be over 100.

SJ        And Noel Paul and John Paul, they were brothers—they had a pretty good team…

WN     What about Mosie (?) Francis?

SJ        Andrew Francis’ brother.

TS        He was on the team?

SJ        Yeah.

WN     That was Frank Whitely’s uncle. (SJ says something about Frankie).

TS.      Would play up from Springhill. Sorry, if I repeat it, it so I can get it straight. (SJ: That’s o.k.)  I am talking back because sometimes I can’t hear on the tape so I sound like a parrot (laughs) because later on when I listen, I can’t always hear it.

TS        Do you remember who was on your team growing up, the people, who played what?

SJ        Yeah, we used to have…Eddie Cope, Steve Glode, Jean Meuse over here, Mike Martin, Peter Joe Paul, Stephen Paul, Andrew Paul, and the Glodes again, Derrick (?) Glode, — (?) wasn’t playing at the time.  We had over nine people.

TS        Did your father play as well?

SJ        No, he just used to umpire. Same with Old John Brooks, he used to umpire a lot. Frank Glode and Jean Francis. That’s the old bunch you know. That’s the oldest I remember. I was just the youngest one.

WN     Barney Francis, did he play? Jim’s brother

SJ        No, he used to come when we played (?). Sometimes he’d play with the Springhill team

WN     Oh yeah, Barney (Francis) played in Springhill. He was the runner. He had some sort of record run in the Pan-America games or something?

SJ        Same as Jean too.

TS        Did you ever play a game called “Old Fashion Ball” or “Sponge Ball”?

SJ        When you a young fella, you used to play that. Yes, “Raggy Ball” we used to call them. You make with yarn and all this stuff.

WN     You make your own.

SJ        …before he get to base he get hit, you hit him, he’s out. You couldn’t hit the ball too far too.

TS        Did you play that on the reserve or at school?

SJ        On the reserve and school too.

TS        Do you have any idea where that came from?

SJ        They used to say from the Indians. Maybe I’m wrong but that’s the way I used to hear it. Same as, what do you call it, carrying sticks?

TS        Lacrosse?

SJ        Lacrosse, yeah.

TS        I am trying to figure that out because the English have a game called “Rounders” where you run the bases backwards. Same thing and there’s no outs.

SJ        I don’t know how to play myself. I used to see it, not here, but in town and go to town (?) to see the game. They used to play in town.

TS        Raggy Ball. Is that what you call it.

SJ        Well, I call it, we used to get yarn and shore it up and…if you hit the ball anytime you just try to hit him. If you hit him before he hit the base, he’s out.

TS        And, there’s no foul ball, right?

SJ        There’s foul ball. If you hit the ball and it goes back in back woods (?) that’s a foul ball.

TS        In Chapel Island, there was no foul ball. So somebody would sit…here would be home plate and you’d usually go this way.  Well, they would go like this (gestures) just to trick them and they would hit it off that way and then run the bases. So, you did have foul balls?

SJ        Sure, but the foul balls doesn’t count. Just what the ball you hit (laughs).

WN     Did you guys buy bats, or did you make them?

SJ        Make them.

TS        You made your own bats? Out of what, ash?

SJ        Ash sometime, birch, yellow birch

TS        Did you make them yourself?

SJ        I made mine, a few of them. I used to make handles, ax handles and bats, even hockey sticks. That’s how we used to do it (here?) making hockey sticks and sell them. Go in the woods and get the wood, you know where it’s bent like a hockey stick?  You cut that and all that and (the mill?) and cut up the plank, and take the saw and the handsaw, you know the (long?) handsaw? — you cut that out same as a hockey stick.

TS        Did you put a  finish on it?

SJ        Oh yes, you had draw knife and you have to cut it out after its done (?)

TS        But in the thirties did you also make the bats as well?

SJ        Well yeah, we did some in the thirties, around ’34 starting some (hard to hear).  I was trying to keep my hockey stick along since…Sorry I didn’t keep them.

            (TS checks in with SJ about whether he wants to eat his lunch)

TS        When did baseball (referring to hard ball) stop being played here? Do you remember?

SJ        When they get that softball going. There wasn’t too many teams, ball teams, you see? Too many softball at that time. They might have one team in Truro now, and somewheres in Halifax, but they didn’t…since when they stopped, they stopped. They keep going, it didn’t stop right out but the keep going. Nowadays still playing.

TS        Softball?

SJ        Softball and hardball. Softball’s the most popular one.

WN     Did you ever go to New Brunswick to play baseball?

SJ        (Difficult to hear this section) No. I went to Springhill town for softball. We used to play those bosses (?).  You know all those bosses down there?  We used to play with them. And all them bosses…soft ball team. Because we used to go down there at the mines there in Springhill, and all those bosses used to be ball players too. (inaudible..the names of bosses?) They’re nice people.

TS        What I was going to ask you next was if you would say again about the uniforms, how you would stuff your socks and your “True Stories” and cardboard and moose hide, all your different things…?

SJ        For the ball team, the baseball team, we used to cut some moose hides, and we used homemade to cut them like that (he shows how they covered the chest) for protection. And same as shin pads.

TS        Out of moose hide?

SJ        It’s hard. moose hide is hard. Even used to use them for goal tender (in hockey) make them a little wider. But the ball team used to make them, specially catcher, you know. Catcher had to… Some people can’t get the moose hide, something like that?  People put cardboard or something like that in his shirt.

TS        Inside the shirt, underneath?

SJ        Yeah.  You know, that’s protection.

TS        Any player would do this?

SJ        Any player, or even the shortstop or something like that. You get the ball hit… it’s a pretty fast ball.

TS        And the “True Stories” (a magazine) you’d put in issues?

SJ        Yeah, we used to put them on — When We play hockey, some people used to put them on.

TS        That was a magazine?

SJ        That was a magazine…”True Stories”.  Catalogues, we used gift catalogues. (laughs).

TS        What about shoes? What kind of shoes?

SJ        Oh, we just use sneakers. Anybody can afford to buy (?). Pretty hard to buy (inaudible

TS        Did you play every Sunday?

SJ        We play every Sunday or every night. When we had a chance. Sometimes Sunday afternoon and Sunday evening. And every night because there’s no entertainment, no radio, or no T.V. or videos or gramophones. Wind them up and put a record on. But that time, evening you had no… anybody know how to play violin, we all go in there and listen to him. There wasn’t too many violin players. Maybe two or three and you go there in the evenings and just listen to music. Saturday afternoon used to go down and see a movie in Truro. It was only about 10 cents to go in.  (inaudible) You walk down there and walk back.

TS        At other reserves they said they had box socials—the women… did you have that?

SJ        We used to have box socials to raise money for our church or … We don’t make too much, maybe $10.00 or $11.00 bucks.  But we had a good time… a box social then a dance, you see.

TS        Did they help raise money for the baseball team?

SJ        No, sometimes we get to buy a ball or something like that but we used to chip in ten cents, five cents to buy a ball.

TS        Did you ever make your own ball?

SJ        Some of them did. But some of them, like baseballs, they used to put little ball of (inaudible) or a rock, some of them were lighter, heavier. And wrap it with leather and then wrap it up with yarn.

            (TS: I’m uncertain if these were two different processes — one wrapped with leather and the other with yarn if no leather was available. Needs clarification)

TS        This was for your regular baseball?

SJ        If you find good leather, you use that, but if you couldn’t…

TS        But more likely you’d buy one if you could.

SJ        But if you can’t afford it, you have to do that sometime.

TS        If you played another team..?

SJ        You have to buy the ball. (Possibly: “They’d supply the ball?”)

TS        They wouldn’t play with your rock ball?

SJ        Good chance they’d steal one of them too. (Laughter)

WN     Steal them from the other team.

SJ        Most used to mark their balls.

TS        Wilfred Prosper told me that the baseball team—I think it was Eskasoni—some people would keep their socks on all season, never change socks because they said it was good luck if they wore their same socks all season. Did you do that? (Laughter)

SJ        No. Well I don’t know maybe some do it if you got no other pair of socks.

TS        But you know, good luck things that you might do to bring good luck?

SJ        Sometime they say ‘good luck’, different things. Some people bless themselves….Any team, any sports you see it a lot of them bless themselves, something like that.

TS        Would they bless themselves or would they have someone else do it?

SJ        They bless themselves. You see some hockey teams or ball teams…

TS        But I’m talking about back in the twenties and thirties.

SJ        Well, they still do that too.

TS        Did the priest have anything to do with your team at all?

SJ        No. We had one priest here. He was good for baseball, softball, and hockey. His name was Father Francis from PEI. He used to come from PEI but had his parish down here. And he was Italian.

TS        Would he play with you?

SJ        No, he’d just coach. But he played with the other teams too.

TS        He’d coach your team though?

SJ        Yeah, but he used to play with the other team

TS        Which teams?

SJ        In town teams.

TS        But sometimes he’d come here and coach you?

SJ        Yeah.

TS        Is this in the thirties too?

SJ        Yeah, around thirties.

TS        (Asks about any special stories or people that helped them win and that he might share).

SJ        If you played a white team, you talk Indian to them, and say…just like coaching, and if they want something to do, you tell them so he’ll do it. Tell the people who understand what you say, how you coach them. Same as hockey, play different games, we’re always coaching them and talk to them in Indian. You fool the other people. We used to do that. We played jokes on them, taking pictures (?) or something, call a ball (?inaudible) play with them or you fool them some way.

TS        By speaking Mi’kmaw?

SJ        By speaking Mi’kmaw or doing something else. (explains how you might pretend to throw the ball, then (they?) start running, and then tag them).

TS        Did a lot of people come out to watch the game?

SJ        Yes, because people had no place to go. And I know this field over here, they used to fill right around like that. Over here, we had the ball field down below…you can’t see it now because it’s all grown up…but by the brook. The brook run around this way and the ball field down below. And just like a grandstand, side hill all around. They could see pretty good.

TS        So they’d sit on the hill?

SJ        Yes, sit on the hill. That’s a time a lot of people would come. Sunday afternoon, they’d all climb up because nothing else to do

TS        Did they go to church?

SJ        Oh they go to church Sunday morning but they didn’t have church Sunday mornings here. We used to walk downtown to go to church Sunday mornings. We had to walk down and back to go to church Sunday mornings. It’s a long walk

TS        And then play baseball?

SJ        Baseball. After dinner, we’d start playing. Some of the boys from town, they walk up and come and play. Some of them used to live around (eastern?) in Truro.  They used to come play ball and walk back.  And after supper they might come up again. It was great fun. I just got through playing myself not too long ago.

TS        Baseball or softball?

SJ        Softball. Same with Hockey. My son, we played together, and my grandson. I like hockey.

TS        Did you go to war? Did you join the army or anything?

SJ        Yeah, I was overseas. I was playing ball over there in Germany.

TS        Softball or baseball?

SJ        Softball, in Germany.

TS        Was there still a team when you came back here.

SJ        They had a little team, yeah. But all these young fellows (inaudible) but I played after I come back, and I played hockey.

TS        Was it mostly softball after the war?

SJ        Yeah, mostly softball.

TS        Baseball seemed to die down a lot after the war.

SJ        Yeah.  (Difficult to hear. SJ may say “In States it was alright”)

TS        Did people gamble on the games?

SJ        No, maybe sometime the championship games, I think they bet each other. Not too much, 50 cents but pretty hard to get money at that time you see.

TS        Did they have baseball championships or just softball?

SJ        They used to have… not championships…just play here, play there, and back. There was no cup.I would like to see more kids playing myself. I’d like to see more sports…ball or hockey or…My grandchildren start playing hockey now (inaudible)

TS        Old Fashion ball. Did that keep going or did that die out?

SJ        It died out.

TS        Around the war?

SJ        Before the war.

TS        I wonder why.

SJ        I don’t know. Everything going on before the war. They know the war going to start at any time. And before the war, everything was being rationed too (Begins to show pictures) That’s me up there. That’s my father and mother up top. 

TS        Was he a Julian too?

SJ        My father was chief here. Chief Joe Julian.

TS        And he umpired your games?

SJ        He used to…later on(?). That’s me…my wife and I, we got married 1937.

TS        Do you have any pictures of the early baseball teams?

SJ        We had some but I don’t know where they went to. When we moved from one place to another, when I bought this place after the war…We used to live at my father’s upstairs and then we me moved and I think we lost some baseball pictures (and some hockey pictures?).

            When we, young fellas, we just play ball. That’s all I remember, play ball.

TS        Did you play with the older people too?

SJ        I used to play with the older people because they take me. I don’t know, I was a good player or what. When I went to Sydney, I was only about 15. (Continues to show pictures hanging on living room walls.) That’s the Grand Chief, and that’s me over there too.

TS        Were you chief as well?

SJ.       No, I was councillor for 30 years.

TS       (looking at pictures) Who’s this?

SJ        Grand Chief. Donald Marshall. He’s younger. 1971

(Continues to show pictures and perhaps his father’s hockey award)

TS        I wish you still had the ones from the early baseball.  Those are the ones that are hard to find. There’s some in Chapel Island. But, you never went to Chapel Island to play did you?

SJ        We went and played there, well we just a pickup team for St. Ann’s Day at Chapel Island.

TS        You mean at the Mission?

SJ        Mission. Pick up team. But they had a good team on  Chapel Island.  Let’s see who had a team. I don’t know if Whycocomagh had a team or not. 

TS        Yeah, they had a team. Peter Pierro, he was on it.  Do you know him? He was on it. Whycocomagh.

SJ        Which Peter Pierro?

TS        I don’t know. 

WN     There’s a whole bunch of Pierros. From Wagmatcook?

SJ        They got short people there. Wagmatcook (difficult to hear, maybe Whycocomagh)

(SJ shows more pictures and one with him on a team and makes TS guess which one ishim. Then he plays a tape he had about alcohol taking over Native way of life with song in Mi’kmaw at the end. WN asks about his daughter.)

TS        Your father was chief of this reserve?

SJ        The chief for thirty-seven years, and he was constable, police constable from Sydney (?)

(Difficult to hear this section—mentions his mother who was a Googoo coming from Sydney (?)

WN     What was her last name?

SJ        Googoo. Stephen Googoo’s daughter

TS        From Sydney?  There are a lot of Googoos in Whycocomagh too.

WN     Some in Shubie.

TS        You two look as though you are ready to stop!