Molly Justice – Murder
‘In ever loving memory of Molly Justice, January 18, 1943.’ Friday, January 18, 2013 marked the 70th anniversary of Molly’s murder beside a Saanich railway track. To mark the occasion my friend Jennifer and I placed a wreath and a card on a tree within feet of what I believe to be the murder scene, just north of where Darwin Road crosses the old CNR line (today’s popular Galloping Goose Trail). I grew up with Molly Justice’s slaying although it happened before I was born. But she was part of my family lore. How many times had I heard mention of her by my parents, aunts and uncles, how many times had I walked, wide-eyed, past the very spot where she bled to death, how many times had I begged for the gory details? But I’d had to wait until I...
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I didn’t encounter Canadian history in school until grade eight. Grade eight! By then it was far too late. Not even the heroism of Champlain, Wolfe, Radisson and Grosilliers–‘Radishes and Gooseberries’–or the Iroquois massacring missionaries could draw me back into the fold. From day one it had been cowboys and Indians in my comic books: Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Hopalong Cassidy, Red Rider, the Cisco Kid and the Lone Ranger. Every Saturday it was off to Yates Street, Victoria’s Theatre Row, for a weekly dose of Jimmy Stewart (still the best!), Randolph Scott, the Duke, Glenn Ford (I didn’t know then that he was Canadian), Richard Widmark, Burt Lancaster and others. Cavalry to the rescue When the bugle sounded and the Cavalry charged, it was to the adrenalin rush and cheers of a hundred young boys in the...
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