My Alberta Cousins
If you are ever looking for a quiet, picturesque place for a vacation, be sure to contact Mary. Located right on the Athabasca River with mountains on the horizon and a short drive from a soak in Miette Hot Springs – what more could you ask for!
Mary has a wonderful stable of beautiful horses and you can book a trail ride while you are there. Here Mary can be seen with her back to the camera preparing some horses and riders for their ride.
Railways are an important part of the history of Old Entrance. One of the original lines went right through the family homestead property that the B&B sits on. However, now the CN Railway line goes by on the other side of the river and I enjoyed the low rumble in the distance as the trains made their way along the track. In the photo with all the trees in the gallery below, you might be able to just make out the light colour of Via Rail cars in the very centre of the distant trees. You probably have to click on the photo to catch a glimpse.
Here are the other two cousins we met – Cindy LeClercq on the left and Marj Luger on the right. The 3 sisters, Cindy, Marj and Mary, are my 3rd cousins. I had travelled out to Whitehorse Creek Campground that day with Marj since it would be my only opportunity to meet Cindy. She had booked a campsite there for the week and couldn’t change the dates. It was chilly and rainy, but we had a good time chatting about our family tree while we ate supper under the hastily-erected tarp. We have a lot more family tree details to share with each other once winter arrives and we may have more time.
The previous day, Marj had toured us around to some of the historic family properties in the area. Cindy, Mary and Marj had a great grandfather named Henry Francis (Frank) Woodley. Frank was my 2nd great uncle. I’ll make our family connection clearer in a couple of minutes. Frank came out to Old Entrance from Ontario sometime after his wife, Selena, died in 1921. Apparently he decided to join his two sons, Roy and Earl, who were homesteading in Old Entrance, near where Hinton, Alberta, is now located. Roy and Earl had arrived there in 1911 as members of the survey crew for the railway.
Frank settled on a homestead across the Athabasca River from Roy’s piece of land. He built a home there for himself and it’s still standing today, although in not as good a shape as it would have been almost a hundred years ago! This is one of the places that Marj showed us – photos below.
In this photo from 1953, Frank is on the left sitting in front of his house. His great granddaughter Cindy is next to him and then Cindy’s mother, Mildred Luger, holding her son Alvin Luger.
So let’s connect the dots for you. You may recall I wrote a previous post about my great grandmother, Ida May Woodley. I inserted this photo into that post.
The man standing in the centre of the photo is Henry Francis (Frank) Woodley. The young woman standing beside him on the right is Ida May, my great grandmother. Their parents are seated in front – William James and Charlotte Regina Woodley. William and Charlotte are the great great grandparents of Cindy, Mary and Marj, and my great great grandparents as well. So they are our common ancestors and that is the family connection we have.
In the next post I will share more photos and information about the family history that we discovered, and what we found out about the relationship of the Woodley’s to the development of Hinton itself. Stay tuned!
One Comment
Tricia Armstrong
So interesting! I was hoping that there were more posts to come about your trip…and along came this one! The BnB on the Athabasca River sounds perfect. I’m keeping this in my “someday” file!