Ralph Bice, "Along the Trail", Along the Trail in Alongonquin Park with Ralph Bice

Rangers

[…]

Mark Robinson was from Barrie and I believe Bud Callaghan was from there too. They came on about the same time. Robinson I got to know very, very well. As a matter of fact, I would say next to my father, and maybe my uncles, I respected Mark Robinson. He always had time to talk to us young lads. The first year we were down there if we wanted something to do, we would go over to Mark Robinson’s camp. Those were the first summers I worked in the Park, at 14 and 15 years of age, and he always had time, it didn’t matter what he was doing, he could stop and talk to the boys.

Mark went overseas in the First World War. He was a Major in the 57th Battalion. He was wounded and since he was too old for trench warfare, they sent him back. He went back on the Park staff again and was once appointed Superintendent. Mark completed his term as a Ranger, ending up at Headquarters. He retired and lived to be well up in years, and I’ve always treasured my friendship with him. Incidentally, he has a daughter that has written books on Algonquin Park and Tom Thomson, and she and I were and are very good friends.

[…]

Now then there was a man named Alex Watson. Alex had been a Fire Ranger and camp foreman before he was made an active Park Ranger. It was about that time officials decided it was necessary to follow the railroads’s route through the Park and eliminate brush, close to the track, as there were too many fires caused by shooting sparks from the engines as they pushed up steep grades. Alex was in charge and I worked for him two summers. Now I never saw him on a drive, but he was considered one the best teamsters you could take in the woods and it was a treat to watch him using an axe. He didn’t have to go round a tree, whichever hand he picked up the axe in, he could use. Sometimes I pride myself on being an axeman, I’ve seen lots of others, but Alex Watson has to be the best axeman I ever saw.