QAHN

The following short essay is the first-prize winner of QAHN's 2008 Hometown History Writing Contest. It was written by Michael Doucet, a fifth-grade student at Sunnyside Elementary School in Stanstead.

The Quebec Anglophone Heritage Network asked almost 200 schools across the province to have their students submit written accounts of their local history. Hundreds of students took up the challenge and produced pieces on local heroes, famous battles, stories of invention, and profiles of historic buildings. The board was delighted to read through such interesting and vivid accounts of our province’s rich history and, specifically, the Anglophone community’s contribution to it.

We are proud to say that each of the three winners hails from a different region in Quebec. They managed to find a unique aspect of their communities and provided us with both a background of their topics and an inspirational—or in one case, cautionary—story from them.

Michael Doucet, a fifth-grade student, wrote about his grandfather, Ralph Boomhower, who served as a police officer on the Beebe force. Through stories his grandfather told him, he paints a picture of a loving man who contributed greatly to building his community.

The second- and third-place recipients are fifth-grade students Oriana Guerrier-Freud, from Mount Pleasant Elementary School in Hudson, and Dayton Glover Kirby, from Harmony Elementary School in Chateauguay. The winning entries will be published in the May-June issue of QAHN's magazine, Quebec Heritage News. Michael will receive a cash prize of $150.


FIRST PRIZE WINNING ESSAY:

By Michael Doucet
Grade 5, Sunnyside Elementary School, Stanstead, Quebec

"MY GRAMPY THE POLICEMAN"

My Grampy was born November 11th, 1943. He was one of eleven children. They were not a wealthy family but they were hard workers. Grampy’s name is Ralph Boomhower. He went to school until grade six, then he had to quit so he could go to work and help support his family, this is his story.

After Grampy quit school he worked in a quarry in the summers and in the winters he did other jobs like construction and masonry work. By the time he was twenty two he was married and had two children. There wasn’t enough money, that’s when he decided to become a policeman.

He took part of his police course in Magog and the forensics part in Montreal. What was most amazing was that the course was in French and he only knew English then.

He was a policeman for the town of Beebe. Most of the time he worked alone except for special occasions. He was a policeman for about 12 years. In that time he caught bank robbers, broke up lots of bar fights at the Beebe Hotel and went to fires. There were a lot of high speed chases then too. Once there was a big fight with about 50 people and he and his partner had to get German Shepherds to help break up the fight. Another time he was scared because someone was drunk and tried to kill him with a tire iron. Still another time he was on a high speed chase and the other car smashed into the side of the police car, behind Sunnyside School.

Some of Grampy’s hardest times were like when he had to go to a car accident and five of his best friends died. Another time he found a new born baby dead in the Beebe dump. The hardest one was when he went to a fire and everyone got out but on one told them there was still a little baby girl inside and she died. When the found her she was right by the window and if someone would have told them they could have reached inside the window and got her out.

Grampy has lots of cool stories and he still misses being a police officer even though he got called names like pig, and people drove by and shot at his house. Today Grampy is retired, but he still works hard.

I am proud of him because, even though he only went to grade six, he worked hard and didn’t give up and he helped a lot of people, who are still his friends today.