Novice in the North

Merritt Clifton was an environmental journalist and lived in Brigham, Quebec.

William Robinson’s Novice in the North follows the familiar pattern of most Great Depression memoirs: young man can’t find a job, eventually accepts one involving uncommon hardship, spends several years working his butt off for low wages while learning about life, and finally gets drafted to fight World War II. The identical outline applies to Everett Whealdon’s The Green Chain, for instance, set 3,000 miles away in British Columbia. But the likeness in stories reflects the archetypical experience of the times, not any direct mutual influence. And like Whealdon, like many other Great Depression survivors now putting their memories to paper, William Robinson did live through experiences worth recording, even if his theme isn’t unique.

Robinson’s job involving uncommon hardship was with the Hudson’s Bay Company along the shores of Hudson Bay itself. Beginning at York Factory in 1938, Robinson also worked out of Churchill and Repulse Bay as an assistant storekeeper — a job that involved a little bit of everything, from conventional store work to chasing dogsleds. Although his book’s back cover stresses his several hair-raising adventures, Robinson seems to have spent most of his time keenly observing the Cree of the York Factory region and the Inuit of Repulse Bay. His writing is most valuable for recording how they lived during their transition from traditional to modern ways, replete with details of diet, clothing, weapons, hunting and fishing techniques, social occasions; almost anything historians and sociologists might want to know.

The volume also includes an extensive section of photographs.