Retired welder and longtime truck driver Leonard Paquette was born in Slave Lake, Alta. in 1941. He is the eldest of the 18 children of Frank and Marie Adele Paquette.
His father Frank Paquette was born in 1918 and passed away in 1992 at the age of 74. His father worked in a sawmill, worked their trap line, hunted and fished and protected and provided for his wife and family of 18 children.
Leonard's mother Marie Adele (Loyie) Paquette was born in 1924 and passed away in 2005 at the age of 81. Besides all the other things a mother did back in those days to raise her family, she also contributed extra money to the household selling her hand knitted Siwash sweaters and by running a laundry service for the men working at the local sawmill. Laundry facilities back then were not very convenient like they are now but she diligently ran the business and kept the home running at the same time. She always had an extra plate for anyone who dropped by - which was often.
Leonard said, "I was just a kid when we moved from Slave Lake to Tete Jaune in 1946 so I don't remember many things but I do remember traveling in a covered wagon for the fall harvesting. My father had a good team of horses and used the team for threshing for the fall harvesting. The equipment was powered by steam engines and back then farmers helped each other all the time. My father cleared the land with an axe, everyone worked together and everyone knew every family in the area.
"We took the train to Tete Jaune where I went to school for two years. A few years later we moved to McBride where my father got a job working for Sig Harstead. I was just a kid but at the age of 11 I got a job at a sawmill piling lumber alongside all the big guys. It was something I wanted to do to make some money to help my mom and dad. Being the oldest in the family I always felt a responsibility to help out as much as I could. When I got paid I bought the things I needed and gave the rest of the money to the family.
"When we moved to McBride I learned many lessons from my father. I spent a lot of time with him because he always took me hunting and fishing. He taught us to help where we could, to respect the land and other people and he taught me to defend myself. I learned things from my father that I could not learn in school. I never had a lot of formal education mainly because there was no extra money for such things and I am not sorry about that at all.
"It has been tough over the years but it has also been good. I didn't get a lot of the schooling that I should have but I think the education I received, in order to get along in this world, is more than most of the kids in Grade 12 get these days.
"Jobs were plentiful back then and you could always find a new job that paid just a little bit more than the last one.
"My uncle George Cardinal talked my dad into moving to Prince George in 1954. We moved and my dad worked for Jeff Kahne at his sawmill in the old Nechako Road area."
They moved to Summit Lake in 1955 and Leonard worked for the Pacific Great Eastern railroad on the slash burning crew. He said, "It was hard work but the paycheck at the end was good.
"We moved back to Prince George in 1957. Prince George was just getting started when we moved here. There were lots of work opportunities and we ran into some racial discrimination. My father taught us to never go looking for trouble but he taught us how to handle ourselves if trouble came our way - and it did.
"There was always a job at a sawmill if you were a hard worker and then the pulp mills arrived in 1964. I hired on and got my welding ticket and I was on my way. My welding instructor was a pretty decent guy and he got me into construction jobs at the Intercontinental Pulp Mill. I had the opportunity to work for Finning Tractor but I stayed at Intercon instead.
"Prince George is my home even though I moved to the coast for a short time to work as a welder in the shipyard and construction industry. I went to Victoria in the '70s and worked at the Yarrow shipyard, the Victoria Machinery Depot and later I followed welding jobs from Prince Rupert to Endako. The companies did not supply housing, as promised, so I moved back to Prince George and I have been here ever since.
"I learned to drive a truck and I liked driving so I found work driving logging trucks for various companies. I hauled all over the states for other trucking companies and I saw a lot of wonderful country. I had a good driving reputation and jobs were easy to come by."
Leonard married Anna Mytting in 1965; they had three children; Ivan, Adele and Moavene. He has four grandchildren and one great grandson. They separated in 1973.
Leonard met Beverly Martin when he was working as a part time bouncer at the MacDonald Hotel. Bev said, "My sister and I went to the Mac and even though I was 24 years old Leonard ID'd me. We met him again the next day at a dance in Stone Creek. He was on the dance floor and I was admiring his cowboy boots. He approached me and said 'so you like my cowboy boots' and the rest is history. We were married in 1979. Leonard is not only a good dancer he was a great singer in a band and plays the guitar."
Bev Martin, one of 16 children, was born in Flin Flon, Man. in 1950. Her father was a heavy-duty mechanic and worked at the Dam in Grand Rapids, Manitoba until he had a heart attack. The family later moved to Chetwynd where her father first worked for Frank Oberle Sr. at his service station.
Frank Oberle Sr. later served as the mayor of Chetwynd and was elected as the Progressive Conservative Member of Parliament in 1972; he retired from politics in 1993.
Bev's father worked at the service station until he was well enough to go back to heavier work at the W.A.C. Bennett Dam.
Bev worked for her brother's income tax company in Chetwynd as his bookkeeper until he sent her to Prince George in 1974 to open his branch office called Centa Services.
Bev had one child, her son David who sadly passed away in 1989.
She worked as the bookkeeper for three Métis Associations and later worked for City Furniture doing their books. She retired when Leonard got sick with Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma cancer and now they are just trying to spend quality time together. They still go out and enjoy karaoke and are considering a trip back to the land of Leonard's roots to visit the elders and old friends.
Leonard is proud to say that he has status as a member of the Sawridge First Nation which is located at the east end of Lesser Slave Lake in Alberta near the town of Slave Lake.
He said, "We never had a lot of money and I wouldn't change how my parents raised me. I was always there for them when they needed me and I did my best to help them. I will never forget the Christmas when we were able to fill their house full of new living room furniture, a bedroom suite and a new television. It felt so good to see them happy about that gift."
