| Art Evans =~ aa History will

remember him

By G. P.

_ geven years ago death struck 5

down Arthur H.. Evans, the

man who led the Ottawa Trek of the unemployed in 1935 and who Symbolized in his Icadership the Tevolt of the people against. the | ‘hated Bennett government which, like the St. Laurent government loday, refused to. heed their de- mands. Here, a Pacific Tribune® Contributor writes of Evans after the style of Edward Ballamy, his

Setting the Socialist Canada of 0 our ulure,

Oo a day in February in the year 1988, a 12- -yeat , old Vancouver boy came ome from school mildly ex- Cited over a project present- _ £d to the class by his teacher. i He shouted ‘Hello Mom’ to & pleasant-faced woman sewing in the sitting-room, then let his Baze go quickly over a shelf of — KS. Not seeing the book he

_ Wanted, he asked for it. “Where's my “History of the

dian Labor Movement, om?”

“Grandad took it into his bed-

J SPDSHL, Ssrol Scniowh what day it is,

- don’t you?” ors: Hardy looked up from, her sewing.

“I sure do! ‘Teacher was tellin’ ’ us about ‘Slim’ Evans. Boy, Mom! ie), at sure was some man! He ay Was born just a hundred years

ett ‘He died when he was 56, tee weeks after Ne was knocked™ fae on Evansway. Teacher said syd to be Kingsway.” + “Ie you ae so much about it

Cee Johnny, why do you want he ‘History’ ?”

“There's a contest | on. The one

‘© writes the best essay on the

Trek To Ottawa in 1935 gets a

ok around the world in the ew atomic-propelled jet.”

} v Tae Something, John ny. nk you CAR win. it?”

en don't ; see sey, not. Grandad i a Slim’ Evans about as well ; Su anybody. With my ‘History’ - bet What Grandad can tell me; I

% rT cig) write the. best essay Ver.” PORK

/

Mrs, a

; “Atel Hardy etnted \affection- 7 Pies at him. “Better run in and

Grandaa) -about.‘Slim': . He'll s you Write your essay.” Then ie cautiously: “Don’t in- ‘8 Pt him too much, eh? Let feng A ramble through | his mind . “everythi you acting as if you knew that’ hing, eh? -He was part of history and gets a bit chok- ‘ Sat When he ene ee: of ‘Sue's x

pen

Aan. son? 2

all parts |

arrived in Berlin is the son of

ART EVANS

; ei ean Johnny. Hardy stepped into the hall, tapped on a bedroom door and walked quietly into the room.

““ffello, Grandad,” he said. ~» “Mom said you borrowed my

_ ‘History’.” “Your history!” his grandfath-_

er exclaimed. “Your history, I sure like that, you young rascal. All I see in it about you is your - name written badly on the flyleaf. “what do you want?” Johnny told him

“But what. did ‘Slim’ really look like, Grandad?” Johnny insisted after the qld mah had rambled on for half an‘hour. 4

‘ “Well, Siete he said closing

-ny—Pie-card artists’. t jaw of his, Johnny There was

his eyes. “He was a big man in every way. And his face, it was lean and full of humor when -he

‘talked to us but hard with hatred

for the ‘big shots’ as we used to call the politicians of those days.

| We didn’t have statesmen those

days, Johnny. As I was sayin’ though. When Slim ‘talked to

them, his eyes’ flashed his hate

for ’em: But it was ,his jaw that made everybody sit up an’ take notice. You just knew he wouldn't let you down or sell you down the river like so many of them ‘pie- card artists’ did in those days. That's” what he called ’em, John- But that

steel - that jaw of me — steel

ance

tempered in the fire of his ex- periences in the ITWW, the OBU, the CP, the WUL, the CLDL and other workers’ organizations he helped to build. All had their share in the shapin’ of —”

“Yes, Grandad,” Johnny inter- rupted, forgetful of the promise he had made to his mother. “I got all those organizations in the book. You tell me more about Slim.” , a5

“Who's tellin’ this? Me or ‘the book?” ““You are; Grandad.

better than the book.”

“All right then. rupt.”

You're.

“He worked here in Vancouver, didn’t he?”

“He sure, did. Y’know that old. Marine Buildin’ down town? You

_ go down there with me sometime,

_Bridge.

Tll show you somethin’. I’ll show

you hundreds of’winders in that.

buildin’ .as tight, ag snug, as

weather-proof as the day ‘Slim’

put ’em in.” ; } yhen can we go, Grandad?”

“We'll go Saturday. We'll drive over the, old Burrard Street Slim’ worked on that, too, Built forms for concrete. He worked on dozens of jobs—little and big. And there were mighty few men'who could touch him as a carpenter,

“He was a good carpenter, eh, Grandad?” :

“None better, Johnny.”

' “Teacher said he was a miner.” “He was, Johnny. None better.” “An, organizer?”

“None better. Knowing him was the biggest thing of my life.”

“You make me proud too, Gran- dad. Know what I’m goin’ t’do right now?”

“What?”

“Goin’ down to the Palace of Culture in Stanley Park. ad ;

“To study that big mural, eh?”

“Sure the biggest one. ‘The Trek to Ottawa’.”

“That’s the idea, Johnny. If you don’t win that essay contest, Tl take the hide off you.”

“Tll try hard, Grandad. Know what I’m goin’ t’do if I win that essay contest?”

“What?”

“Y’know that ine beats of Slim they built on the spot where he calied the Premier — what'’s-his- name — a liar?”

“I ought. to, Johnny. I helped

build it. What about it?”

“Well if I win that trip an’ get to Ottawa, I’m goin’ t’climb up that statue an’ sit on Slim’s

_ arm. Won’t that be fun, ‘Gran-

dad?” . “Tf you can do it, Johnny, I

Don’t ‘inter- ©

can't think of 4 better place to sit. Slim took the boys out of

the concentration camps and the camps never opened again, be- cause what Slim did was to put the skids under Bennett so that he just went to England and curl- ed up toes. Slim roused the peo- ple of Canada so much on that Ottawa Trek, Bennett was done for. The farmers fed the boys along the way, the trainmen Jet them ride, the people welcomed them, the —” ,

“Yes, Grandad. That’s all in the ‘History.’ What else can you tell me that isn’t in the book?”

“Let. me- tell you this. It’s * never appeared in any book. No- body but me ever heard it.”

“What is it, Grandad?”

~“I went to Slim’s funeral. All

kinds of people were there. Well, there’ was. a fine little man’ who had the same surname as that Premier Slim called —’”

“Oh yes, Grandad. You mean ‘OY Bill” Bennett. Teacher told us about him speaking at Slim’s funeral. She said ‘Ol’ Bill’) Ben- nett. said, ‘Deeds! not words. Fight! not. beg. March! not sit. Demand! not pray. Do! not. preach. Stand! not kneel. Organ- ize! not’—not—what’s that word I forgot, Grandad?”

“Philosophize?”

“That's it. Philosophize. Is that what you wanted to tell me about?”

“In a way, Johnny, but this bit of philosophy I want to tell you ‘about not even old Bill Bennett heard that day. As I said, there was a big crowd around Slim's grave. But standin’ in the snow, quite a way from the main crowd, I stood with a man after the funeral just before he got in a

big car. He was talking to a . bank..manager,.. This is what. he said: .

““Eyvans will live when R. B. Bennett is completely forgotten. I'll tell you why. Bennett‘s phil- osophy can be summed up into one sentence — ‘How much can Canada do for me?’ Evans—if he ever had time to formulate a Pphilosophy—would have said, be- cause he lived it, ‘How much can I do for Cana

“T get it, Grandad. ‘How much’ can Canada do for me?’ That’s * Premier Bennett’s epitaph. ‘How much can I: do for Canada?’ That’s Slim’s. I’ll remember to put that in my essay, too. Topeka Grandad.”

Johnny Hardy swung jauntily through the sitting-room to the kitchen. With the middle finger of his right ‘hand on top of the index finger, he looked at his mother. “In the bag, Mom. In the bag,” he said.

Scholarships the British gov't strove to deny

_ Whe first eight of a group of 25

Nigerian youth who will study in eastern Gy rmany’ on scholar- ships provided by the Free Ger- Youth . have “arrived

man Berlin. The scholarships. were awarded® in memory of the 21 ice

gerian coal miners murdered by.

police bullets at ‘Enugu, Eastern

_ Nigeria, on November ae, 1949.

iy

The. Slurdecs axes an ii _ day strike of. 6,000 African miners, ‘employed in Povernment. owned

‘mines under the direction of a The 900 policemen,

-white staff. who were rushed to the’ strike ‘scene shot the miners. without provocation. In addition to the

21 killed on the ‘spot, 51 workers, Not one ppolice:

were wounded. mian was hurt,

Among the Nigerian youth who

a slain miner. Others, from

pnt

f’ the colony, are the aes of de Ge ia in the Niger-

jan trade union and national ie Piepeidance movements. The stu-

_ dents range in age from 14 to

28, three of the eldest being themselves leaders in the Dae ation movement.

“Some of the students will study engineering, others m'edicine, |

science and agriculture, On their. arrival in Berlin, they told of

the many obstacles placed in their’

path to prevent them from get- '

ting here by the colonial admin- istration in Nigeria and later by British ‘colonial Officials in Lon-

oe BOS &

tae pte: “when me Nikers

ian Labor Congress, and student

leaders tried to raise funds to provide travelling ’ expenses for the» students, the campaigners were lheavily fined or sentenced to jail under an ordinance which bars Africans in Nigeria from

raising’ public funds.

The British - acon authorities

gave specific instructions that ‘the students were not to be given ‘passports. — placed on any African leaving the colony even to cro _into adjoining territory for any rea- ~ son whatsoever. Individual -pass- ports had to be obtained by. re- sorting to special measures. In some cases, the youth were forced to leave illegally. ==,

The first of the eight scholar- ship recipients arrived in London five months ago. delayed in Nigeria until two _ months later. Two were able to ~eatch a plane to Paris and travelled to Germany via Prague. All had to leave their -homeland under deepest secrecy. _

ape P

During their three-month stay in London, the students were sub- jected to intimidation and pres- sure when their destination leak- ed out. The colonial office sought legal advice in an effort to pre-

In fact, a ban was.

Others were; .

vent them ‘from continuing on to Berlin, A 14#year old girl stu- dent, who is still being held in. London, was arrested by the Brit- ish authorities, charged with vag- rancy and threatened with de-

tention in a “correction home” and deportation — although she

was received by rélatives as soon as she arrived in London. While she was under arrest, the police officials tried to persuade her to go back home or remain in RN ; land a study nursing.

Sir, John MacPherson, ‘gover- nor of Nigeria, frankly admitted — that the government was trying to prevent the students from — studying in Berlin. The British government feared, he said, that the students were going to the © German democratic ani for ; “ulterior motives.” A

PACIFIC: ‘TRIBUNE