no longer breezing through this school work, he was past the review stage and now really had to work at his lessons. I had to read ahead and make sure I was ready for each lesson. I thought we deserved a reward.
By this time, our daily fare was monotonous, so I decided the time had come for a change. Having to spend more time indoors with Ricky I thought to put it to good use by preparing more elaborate meals. Up to now we had only had stove-top meals. But now I wanted to start using the oven for foods like casseroles or cookies.
Along with the fridge, a huge monstrosity of a stove had been sent. It took up nearly the whole side of the room. It was an old relic but it had an oven. One day I decided to make some hot biscuits to accompany our stew, so I lit the oven. It had a thermometer, but no oven control dial, and the oven wasn’t insulated. As the temperature of the oven rose, so did the temperature of that small room. I opened one window, then the other, and finally the door, wide. Now the oven registered the 425 degrees I wanted. I lowered the flame and popped my biscuits in, and turned, as I heard a voice call out, “Why is the door open?” Bobby stood in the doorway. I started to explain, then thought of my biscuits. I saw the thermometer now registered over 500. I took the biscuits out and left the oven door open to cool a little. “What are these things,” asked Bobby, poking at the twelve black cinders. “Shut up,” I responded. Just then Bob Sr. came in; it was supper time. I popped the rest of the biscuits into the oven and shut the door. I quickly set the table and ladled out the stew and went to take the biscuits from the oven. They had flattened out and looked like little plastic doll plates. We all sat down to eat, silently, faces lobster-red from the heat. So much for my first attempt at baking.
Figure 2: Bobby Restall’s map. Original size between borders: 16 5/8” x 12 5/8”.
On November 22, 1960, Dad wrote to Fred Sparham. He started with small talk and then indicated the direction that future work would take.
Our position regarding the place is this. He [Chappell] has promised us the place next year. It’s not in writing. We intend getting next year. Our plans for this next six weeks are to get after the treasure in the 118 ft. shaft and we are slow principally because, in our state (financial) we cannot take the chance of pumping day and night while we work down the shaft. …
I don’t know if I told you before but apparently Prof. Hamilton put a well-cribbed tunnel within three or four feet of where we feel sure the 118 ft. treasure is. I will close now. Will keep you posted. I’ll bet I am more impatient than you are, it’s just the most annoying thing in the world. If you get time, drop me a line.
Yours truly,
Bob
When Dad said that he would go after the treasure in the 118-foot shaft, he was referring to a shaft that was put down by the Truro Company in 1849 about twenty feet south of the Money Pit, as shown on Bobby’s map (see Figure 2). At a depth of 118 feet searchers tunneled towards the Money Pit. The water that usually floods the Money Pit broke through the earth between the Money Pit and the new tunnel. It flooded the tunnel and the new shaft, bringing with it the end of a yellow keg and other debris believed to be from the treasure. Dad and Bobby now believed that the treasure would have come to rest in that Truro Company shaft at the 118-foot level. That is where they planned to concentrate their search.
Winter in Paradise
CHAPTER 7
Winter presented special problems on the island. Groundwater continuously seeped into the Money Pit and froze, coating the sides of the pit and the ladder rungs with ice, making descent and ascent treacherous. On the beach, digging frozen earth was difficult and slow. Equipment parts and tools became fragile in the frigid air. The need to shovel snow was constant. Simply surviving the weather took a mighty effort.
The winter of 1960–1961 was the second winter for Dad and Bobby, but it was the first for Mom and Ricky.
Winter ’60–’61 by Mildred Restall
Winter really came to stay shortly after the New Year, 1961. The thermometer dropped down to zero at nights, often lower. During the day, it never once climbed above thirteen degrees for over six weeks. The bay froze solid. Ice began along the shore, and daily crept out further and further. Every morning after breakfast, I hurried down to the beach to see how close the ice was coming to our end of the island. Overnight it advanced fifty, a hundred feet. Finally we were completely icebound. The calm weather and zero temperatures had brought the severest winter in nearly forty years.
It was bitterly cold. We found birds frozen to death, one a great hawk. You could walk through the woods and hear tree branches snap like a pistol shot.
People on the shore skated over to the island and we could skate to the mainland. For the first time in living memory for some of the residents, there was ice-boating. Even cars could be driven over to Oak Island. Some of the younger set took to having car races on the ice. At night it was a sight to see … huge bonfires lit along the shore for skating parties. As far as you could see there were acres and acres of ice. It made one think of dog teams, huskies and sledges, fur-lined parkas and snow shoes. It was cold, bitterly cold.
The cold penetrated the thin walls of the shack. We had the heater on full blast, but even so I wore my snow boots all day while working around in the cabin. At night we sat on the bed with our feet curled under us; it was too cold near the floor. You froze from the knees down. From the knees up to the shoulders was fine, but the rest of you was too hot for comfort. Now it was too cold to do any laundry outside, so every day I rinsed out a few odds and ends indoors. With daily dishwashing, cooking, and laundry, the shack was very humid. This warm, moist air floated up to the ceiling, and as the sun moved off the roof it froze. Next day, when the sun hit squarely on the shack, this ice would melt. Starting at around 11:00 a.m. it would drip all over the place … on the bed, floor, even on Ricky’s school work. It began to collect around the bottom of the walls and freeze. By the end of February we had ice an inch or more thick all around the bottom of the walls and up to a height of two feet in some places.
It was so cold that whenever the door was opened, the outside frigid air swept in and collided with the warm, moist air at the open door and there they struggled, a huge cloud of vapour rolling back and forth in the doorway. So cold that when I threw out a pan of dishwater it bounced on the snow. More than once after throwing out water, I unconsciously reached for the metal door handle with my bare moist hand, and promptly snatched it away as I felt my fingers adhere to the metal.
How we stuck it out I’ll never know. I worried about Ricky, who was susceptible to ear trouble. But in spite of all the miseries of cold, and lack of conveniences, we were as healthy as horses. Not one of us got even the sniffles.
I went to the mainland only once during this cold spell. It was the day after St. Valentine’s Day. Fine powdery snow had fallen the day before, and everything looked beautiful and clean. It was bitterly cold, and the sun shone on the field of snow out over the bay, making it glisten and shine so that it hurt the eyes. Bob suggested that we walk across to the mainland and visit some friends. I quickly agreed that it would be nice to go visiting for a change.
We set out right after lunch, cutting through the woods in the deep snow that brought us to the large cove facing Western Shore, where we were headed. The days of snow, followed by bright sunny days, had caused a crust to form on the snow that covered the frozen bay between the Island and the mainland. As we stepped onto the ice, we broke through the icy crust and found ourselves walking in about six inches of snow.
Every step we took, we broke the crust.
