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Interview of Iona Campagnolo
Description
23 March 2005
Iona (as in from the Hebrides) Victoria Campagnold (1932, October 18th).
Iona’s father’s (Frederick Hardy) family came from England, but his mother, Marianne Burn, was of Scottish descent. Her grandfather on her father’s side, Frederick Hardy, moved to Merritt, Canada, in 1910 and had three sons: Harold, Kenneth, and Oswald. He worked as a port engineer. She remembers Marianne being very strict and a perfectionist. They moved from Merritt to Galiano in 1913.
Her great-grandfather on her mother’s side, Findlay Alexander Murchison, left Scotland in the 1850s after the Clearances and went to America. He was from Ross-shire in the Highlands. He might have been affiliated with Clan Kenneth. There was never any heavy discussion about the family’s Scottishness, however. He ended up in North of the USA and lived there for thirty years. He married there. Her grandfather, Findlay’s first born, was also called Finlday Alexander Murchison. Findlay, the great-grandfather came to Galiano in 1882; he was one of the first settlers. He had an engineering background and laid out all the roads on Galiano island. They lived in Galiano for the rest of their lives. Her grandfather, Findlay, was 45 before he married a woman named Ethol. They had 7 children: Findlay, Colin, Gordon, Jean, Dorothy, Angus, and her mother, who was the eldest. The family lived on Galiano until her mother was 16. She then went to School in Vancouver. She then married Iona’s father and she (Iona) was born and brought up in Galiano.
Iona lived in Galiano for 6 years. Her father worked on the steamships to the Cannery. In 1940 he accepted the job of winter watchman at North Pacific Cannery, so they all went and lived in the Cannery. She remembers the society at the Cannery being very classist and sexist (women were for domestic use only). She also worked at the Cannery, putting lids on fish cans. She would sometimes work for 16 hours a day. She went to school there and remembers most of the students being First Nations and Japanese. She remembers how they (First Nations children) were physically abused for speaking in their own language. She also remembers the Japanese children and their families being taken away and interred in Greenwood when she was 10. It was at school where he gained an interest in aboriginal culture. Her time at school also fuelled her philosophy that Canadian political and social culture benefits from its diversity. For example, in present circumstances, Canadian soldiers who go into Iraq/Afghanistan do so with “a cultural knowledge” – that is, with a sense of respect.
Keywords: England; Ross-shire; Galiano;