Bill Browridge | The Great Hurrah : Reception and New works

I was born with Club Feet and when casts were put on them to try to correct the problem, infection developed, and I was left at age three with badly crippled feet. I could not where skates or shoes. My parents turned to the only alternative - Deerskin moccasins.

Only once or twice in many winters, Mother Nature would give the lake smooth ice and warm weather. When these overlap you have a Joyous view of skaters old and young embracing this rare moment. Occasionally I have painted these large scenes of lake skating and I enjoy all the different participants, fast skaters and beginners, old and young.  I especially like this view, as if from a drone or airplane.

Sometimes in winter, Jackfish Lake would freeze and the town of Meota would have a skating Party.  Once we happened to visit a skating party and in the far distance the pavilion seemed to be the focus of all the skating activity.  I will never forget how exciting it was to see the gathering of people out on the frozen lake with the huge prairie sky overhead.

When watching kids playing pickup hockey you will often see several players going for the puck at the same time.  It becomes a battle to see who will emerge with the puck.  Often in pro hockey the player who emerges with the puck in these scrambles will be the one who scores. The word Triage comes from the hospital triage center where I have spent so much time over the years,  and where they try to decide who breaks out at the top of the list. 

Every winter, when the weather became cold we would wait for the farm boys to come with a tank filled with water from Picnic Lake.  It was quite an undertaking and would take several hours into the night to start the first flood which would eventually become gleaming ice. When the first tank arrived to flood the rink, some boys would be so excited they would climb up onto the tank. From there they would cheer on the farm boys as they filled their buckets and called to the horses to move forward while they spread the water onto the snowy ground.  This task would occur several nights to build up the thickness required for ice skating. 

This is a scene that always amused the kids at the rink. Once or twice it happened that one of the aggressive dogs would want to participate in the game and steal the puck.  We would call and demand he give it up, sometimes he would refuse and the chase would be on to retrieve the puck. But often it was a futile strategy and we would end up, minutes later, coaxing the dog back to the group and giving up the puck.

The defensive side of hockey by Goalies has always fascinated me, the forwards get all the glamor with all of the attacking mentality.  The defensive mind has to be a bastion of strength – you are usually blamed for the deciding goal.  Here is my version of the goalie making a glamourous save.  He is usually, mentally, the strongest player on the team.

One winter night my teenaged friend called, all excited, “We’re going shooting fish, do you want to come? We had a strange night while we were shooting fish with the other boys scrimmaging on the lake behind us. Later I found we were breaking the law - but it was a night I’ll never forget!

Sometimes when the prairie sun set early, we would build a bon fire to light the sky and keep us warm.  In this scene bright lanterns offer addition light on the ice and allow us to play into the late evening.

Girls were always part of the Rink Scene in Vawn and several of them liked to join in the scrimmage. And one of them was really good. She was always in the midst of the fray and would never back down.