| Note |
- Frederick Hurd Gunter . A Vancouver Newspaper article entitled 'Berefit of Home and Breadwinner in a Day' the following article was summarized. Fred Gunter was a carpenter and had been steadily employed ever since coming to this city (Vancouver) two years ago. He is a native of Bear Island, N.B., which province his wife also comes from, Before coming to Vancouver, the business where Mr. Gunter had been employed burned and then his home also burned. He had intended to come west and bearing up well under the unexpected blow, he said good-bye to his wife and little ones in August 1910 and left to seek his fortune on the Pacific coast. Working hard all winter, he saved up enough to bring them out, his wife staying for the meantime at her own home. After they came here, they continued to save a little and he bought a 33-foot lot in South Vancouver, making a cash payment and paying a little by instalment. This is the lot on which their tent was situated. Mr. Gunter was collecting honey from beehives on his lot when he was stung badly and was taken to Vancouver Hospital where he remained in a coma for almost a week. Doctors were not able to help him and he died. Early Sunday morning between 1 and 2 a.m., a neighbor was awakened by Mrs. Sadie Gunter in night robes, crying that their tent was afire. In a few minutes many of the colony of tent dwellers were on the scene, but the fire had enveloped everything and only a few trunks containing their clothing could be removed before the whole fabric and the furniture were reduced to ashes. Mrs. Gunter had been up with the baby, who had been sick. The lamp glass had been broken and a candle was being used. While she was in one part of the tent, the candle became over-turned and set fire to the bedclothes where the little girl was sleeping. In a minute everything was ablaze. The boys could shift for themselves, but the little girl did not realize the danger. Mrs. Gunter had her six month old baby to look after, but Albert, the eldest boy, ran in and rescued his sister in the nick of time. The little family slept the rest of the night in improvised beds at a kind neighbor's place. There are four boys, the eldest, Albert being 13; Louis is 10 and Freddie is 4. Lawrence, the baby is six months old. Viola is two years and a half. So small are they that the eldest hardly realizes their calamity. 'we are moving again', shouted Freddie to a friend, as he viewed with joy the carting away of their smal belongings. Now the children play around the yard beside their temporary home wondering where their papa is, while within Mrs. Gunter (is wondering) what is going to become of them., for with her baby, she is unable to go to work and earn the amount to keep the wolf from the door. Mrs. Gunter wired Leverette Gunter, Fred's brother, in Bear Island who wired them the money for the family and the body to be returned to New Brunswick. Three months after Fred's death, his father, Judson died.
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1872 - 1912 (40 years)
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