Item N-2003-014: 0012 - [Interview with Jean Piro]

• Sound recording

1 audio cassette (29 min. 59 sec.) : 0.4 cm, 10 x 6.5 x 1.2 cm

This audio recording features an interview with Jean Piro, a longtime Yellowknife resident. Piro discusses her arrival in Yellowknife and her initial job as a waitress at the Busy Bee Café. She reminisces about parties and dances held in the area, particularly at Negus and Con mining communities. She discusses telephone and radio services available in town, and her experience of raising children in Yellowknife’s early years. She shares her memories of the dairy farm and gardens in Yellowknife, and the difficulty in obtaining groceries and locally available goods, including meat and eggs. She speaks about former town establishments including the Arctic Rooms and the poker rooms in town, and the Moulin Rouge. She also remembers notorious Yellowknife residents Jake Woolgar and the Singing Swede. She discusses the opening of the road to Yellowknife from Alberta, and the disappearance of barge freighting that followed. She remembers the construction of the Catholic school, and the segregation of students that resulted. She also speaks about the changes in Yellowknife following the arrival of the territorial government in 1967.