File: macdougalljim06-oh-parishpicnics_M.mp3
Speakers:
JM – Jim MacDougall
KP – Curator Ken Perlman
JM: All the country schools used to have dances in the summertime to raise money for to support the schools. I played for quite a few of those.
KP: Who were some of the other fiddlers who played for these dances?
JM: Elmer Robinson would be one. Elmer Robinson was the fiddler when it come to old time dancin' and square dancin'. He was probably the one I looked up to. I can remember down in our parish they used to have, well they still do have those parish picnics. And when I was young they used to have what they called a dancing booth, they had a platform probably about half as big as this room [the room is about 7 x10 meters] and it was a good level floor, and they had walls with trees; they'd just go and get hardwood trees and put them all around, and put a tarp over the top. And they had an old pump organ in the corner, and they had a fiddle player. And they charged 25 cents for a couple to go in and dance. So this was in the afternoon, Sunday afternoons. The boys would all go out and get a girl, and pay 25 cents to go in and dance, and there'd be Elmer Robinson and Ralph MacLellan playin' on the organ. And I can remember goin' down and goin' around behind, and sittin' and layin'down right beside where they were playin', and spendin' most of the afternoon there just listenin' to the music. (laughs) Forget the picnic! And I was tellin' Elmer one time. I went home from the picnic one time, and the next day I went out to my father's workshop and I got a big shingle and I cut the shape of a fiddle out of it. And I got an old stick and I sat down on the block there and I was playin' like this [pretends to play], and I said, "I was Elmer Robinson for about a day." (laughter)
KP: How old were you?
JM: Oh, I'd be 8 or 10 years old, probably.