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1923 Storm

The storm was a north east gale that shifted to north. Joseph MacMillan, his wife and two children were living in a building at North Lake owned by Matthew and MacLean. There were not any sand dunes at this time; the tide came in and carried the building with its occupants across the lake at 9:20 P.M. to a field now owned by Kenneth Fraser. It remained upright.

Several planks were in the building and when the house came to a stop, Joe put one through a window and reached solid ground with one end of it. The family had to move upstairs as the lower floor was flooding with water. Mrs. MacMillan slid down on the plank first then caught each of the children as Mr. Mac— Millan passed them through the window and started them down the plank. He was the last to get out of the building.

It is told that a 6 x G post from the ground floor to

the ceiling gave away underneath and pinned a Raymond sewing machine to the roof.

The mill dam at East Baltic broke and the mill stream

bridge as well as Munn's Road bridge were washed away during the storm.

Jack Woods was working for Matthew and MacLeans and before he left North Lake that evening he put his wallet containing $100.00 in a desk in a building. The next morning Jack came back to find bits of the building everywhere. He exclaimed, "I have lost $100.00." "No, you didn't", replied Dan MacMillan. "I have picked it up." He returned the money to Jack.

Joe's brother, William (Billy) is Government Wharfinger for the Department of Transport at North Lake. He has care and control of wharves, Department of Transport, Properties and navi— gational Aids.

Train Stuck — Winter of 1923

The snow was piled into mountainous drifts and the nar— row gauge train, with Jack Hughes as conductor was stuck on the Elmira railway branch for 32 days. The heavy equipment brought from the mainland could not be used east of Charlottetown as-it was for a wide guage track. The mails were taken from Charlotte— town by horse and wood—sleigh.

Men worked around the clock shovelling snow in all kinds of weather for 25 cents an hour.