Elmer spent the rest of the 1940s
helping to look after his parents' place and slowly clearing bits
of his own property, utilizing what he could for hay or grain,
and working out to make ends meet. Progress was very slow and
cash was scarce. Although a rural family that owned property could
maintain a high level of self-sufficiency through hunting, picking
berries, raising animals, and growing a garden, some cash was
required to pay for foods like flour and coffee and to buy new
farm equipment.
The
Matson's bill at the Jaffray store, paid annually, was $200to
$300. Elmer worked for other ranchers at haying time and cut Christmas
trees. He used a crosscut saw to cut firewood at $3.50 a cord
for the Jaffray school and worked on government road building
crews. He cut and hauled blocks of ice in the winter to be stored
in private icehouses, typically log buildings with two feet of
sawdust on the floor. The blocks were piled with a two foot gap
between the stack and the outside wall. Gaps between the iceblocks
were filled with snow and more sawdust was piled two feet high
around the stack. Two blocks of ice per week was generally used
by a household. Iceboxs were no longer necessary when electricity
came to Jaffray in 1954, so that job ended.
In the 1930s and 40s, many men
made money cutting Christmas trees on crown land. This was actually
illegal but the fine was so low that even if you got caught, you
could still make a profit. In the 1940s, the government began
to issue legal permits to ranchers to cut on crown land. In 1949
Elmer cut 5000 trees on his permit and sold them at sixteen cents
a bundle. "There were a lot of buyers," Mary says. "They
really wanted the trees. They'd give you whisky; they'd do anything
to get your trees. It was good because it gave us money we'd never
have had. And it was fast. You got it right away." Over the
years, the Christmas tree business became increasingly competitive
and permit holders began to fertilize and prune to increase tree
quality. Elmer thought the extra labour required was not worth
it and gave up cutting his own permit.
Progress on the land was slow
because everything was done by man or beast. In the case of the
Matsons, there was only one man, a small woman and a tiny little
girl. Families who had a crop of husky sons to work on the farm
had advantages that the Matsons did not.
