Our resident journalist, Yolande House, and Kate Souldice, the Ex-pert of the team, met with Hubert "Red" Friel in the Assembly Hall of the Civic Center on Aug. 7, 1997. He had prepared some interesting stories to tell us about the exhibition:
	What's the administration of the Ex like?
	All right, lets go back many years ago. As far as I know and can remember, the first [general] manager here was a man by the name of Mr. McMahon, second was J.K. Paisley, then there was Herbert Hook McElroy, who was probably the finest show manager in North America in his time and since. Then there was J.K. Clarke who had trained under Mr. McElroy for many years. He was an office boy when the Exhibition offices were in The Ottawa Journal building. And Don Reid replaced Mr. Clarke after his death, and Don had a wealth of experience in politics and business in Ottawa, and he was a good manager. Then he was replaced by an ex-city employee by the name of Bernie Colterman. His contract ran out, and Cheryl McBain is now the Acting General Manager. And she seems to be adequate as far as I'm concerned. At one time the Exhibition staff consisted of four or five people in the office, now I notice there's many more in there. I'd like to go back and tell you now about some interesting people that employed this show, Lansdowne Park, if I may. There was Bob Hope, Ernie Ford, Red Skelton, Paul Anka, Bobby Getola, Andie Williams and the Osmond Brothers, Liberace. And now this is something that a lot of people don't know, Carey Grant was a stilt walker on the stages here. He was brought in from England by a man by the name of George Hammond, who used to produce all our grandstand shows. He was out of Atlantic city in a New York office. Carey Grant was here, and, at that time, his name was Archie Leach. I'll tell you a personal story, if I may. I was only a little boy, about four or five, and my mother had a friend. Years ago everybody used to rent rooms around here because trailors weren't around then. Carey Grant was staying -- Archie Leach was staying at a lady we called Aunt Ethel's house, and my mother and I were down there one day, and Archie Leach gave me a nickle, I was only four or five, so my mother repeated this story to me many years later. Everytime we used to see Carey Grant on T.V. or movies, they'd say, "You should give that guy his nickel back!" I thought that would be interesting for you. Another thing, when we were young fellas, my time was spent hanging aroud the fair grounds. I almost grew up in this park. But like most of the other guys, I would sooner be trying to get work in one of the joints on the midway and grab a few dollars. Or sell exhibition tickets - in those days they were pre-sale, and they were sold on the streets. But a lot of the kids used to get a job leading cattle in those days. We had a lot of cattle here. They were unloaded at the Isabella yards which was where the Queensway is now. And for each cow, or whatever you led out here, you'd get a quarter. And they'd jump in an old flat bed truck and wheel you back there, and you'd go back and get another one. So, I figured, those guys are making more money then I am. So, I went to work with them one day. And I get a little heffer or something, I don't know, I don't know one cow from the other one, never did, and I'm leading him down O'Connor Street, and he's giving me a rough time. I'm a little squirt, and this little guy belted me right up onto a veranda on O'Connor street. It was judge Alan Fraser's veranda on O'Connor and Strathcona, and he rescued me from the cow, he took the cow down off the walk and gave it back to me. There's some interesting people that have been around this fair grounds in my years around here. Some interesting names, would you like to hear some names?
	Sure.
	Jake the Snake, Pete the Cheat, Six Toes, Boom Boom, Cutie Pie, Fats, Tiny, Chimy, Pugy, Montreal Red, Ottawa Red, Lemon Head, Omaha. Those are just some of the names that I can remember of carnival workers and roustabouts. In those days, there were many churches. We have one on the grounds now. In those days, there were fourteen of them that went down Devon Road over there. They all came in here to the Ex, and they did well. But you've got to realize. in those days that I'm talking about, it was only a six day fair. We opened on Monday, we closed Saturday night. A little different then it is today [which is a ten day fair]. We had many great exhibitors here. The Manufacturer's Building has gone back to it's original name, the Aberdeen Pavilion. A lot of exhibits in there and big companies. There was A.J. Freeman, Murphy Gampbell, Bryce and Green, Reed's Furniture was in there at one time, R.P.T. Robinson Pinkle and Taylor. And they were all, a lot of them were glassed-in exhibits, and they were beautiful like Star Whitman's, and a lot of them were walk-in exhibits. That building, one thing about it, not today, but in the old days, no matter what door you walked in, if you went in and you were looking for the R.P.T. exhibit, you could see it from any door you went in. It was one of the greatest exhibit buildings in North America. It's been a hockey rink. it's had all kinds of things in there over the years. And you mentioned Howick Hall, the old Coliseum. It consisted of the main arena and the attached buildings. There was a hitching room, and there was eight barns. There was a K-barn and there was a heavy horse barn. Underneath, in the basement of it, was the sheep and swine stables. It's a shame that we don't have those exhibits today. The reason we don't have them is that the buildings have been torn down. And I think they were torn down prematurely. That's my own opinion. There's many things that I could tell you about the exhibition. That I grew up in this park. I was brought up on O'Connor Street and Adelaide Street, Holmwood Avenue, and my mother and father lived on these grounds for many years. But people think I lived there, I never lived on these grounds - I guess I lived on them, but not really. And when I came home from overseas, I landed here, on these grounds, and it was like they brought me right home, almost. The other guys had maybe another couple hundred miles to go, but they brought me right home.
	Was that during the war?
	After the war.
	The second world war?
	Well, certainly not the first! (laughter). During the war, this place was taken over by the department of National Defence. They trained their troops in here. And before the First World War, I don't remember this, but I know of it, before the First World War, there was a fire station in the old grandstand. And they had kept horses here then, and horses carried the rigs and hoses. And the dogs were around and that's why my father always had a feeling for dalmations. I think that's why, 'cause they were the firehouse dogs. But that's going back further then my time. I can't remember that far. But I can remember the first show I ever saw here, the first carnival I ever saw here was owned by a man by the name of Max Linderman.
	What year was that?
	Well, that would be in the thirties, and I was a little boy. And he had a partner. Mr. Linderman was a Jewish man. And Mr. Bergen, his partner, was an Irish man. Their midway, the Bernardi Greater Shows, was transferred to the name World of Mirth in 1933, and Mr. Bergen ended up with the whole show after Mr. Linderman passed away in 1944. And Mr. Bergen had a partner by the name of Bernard Bucky Alan out of Boston, who was around here for many years showing. They had an agent who was an advance man. He was quite an interesting man. His name was Gerald Snellens. The agents in those days were different type of people, they were Broadway type of people, out of New York. They were all a bit older than the agents you see now. They were interesting people. And even with the show out of New Jersey that we had in here for years, Amusements of America, they still didn't have the type of agents that World of Myrth had. They were all old type of rides people. And in the old days we used to have the United States army band here, playing in the bandshell, it was a beautiful bandshell. Before that we had a great band leader, great musician by the name of Creatore.
	I read about him.
	Yeah, great. And he used to come here and talk about people -- the kids today with the long hair, well, his hair was long in the thirties. And we used to draw an awful lot of people just to see his band perform. In those days, we had a fashion show, we had highland dancing, we had a baby show, judging of babies. We had a baby nursery.
	(Laughter at the baby show comment.) Interesting addition. On looks?
	Health and looks and everything. Doctor's used to operate it. We had a lady there, her husband was Dr. Gibson, and his wife used to look after our day nursery. Like, people that worked on the midway had little kids, and there was no city day nursery then. She (Dr. Gibson's wife) would look after the nursery. In fact, my late wife looked after it the last few years that we had it, that was quite a long time ago. One thing about the exhibition as I remember growing up as a kid -- a lot of kids that I grew up with are doctors, lawyers and Indian chiefs today, because their mothers and their fathers were able to park cars on their lawns during the Ottawa Exhibition. Those kids were educated because of that. The coal was put in the cellar because of that. That's where the money was made. And this was an ordinary neighbourhood, they were all good hard working, God-fearing people, lived over there. I was brought up over there and I 'aint went wrong yet, and I'm 75. But it hurt me when our city fathers took away the parking priviledges. We're geting it back a little bit at a time but not enough. That is my personal opinion, not an opinion as a director of the Exhibition. I have another opinion. After the Second World War, the Central Canada Exhibition was given a 25 year contract to operate Lansdowne Park year-round. They were given a grant with the money that the Department of National Defence had paid to the city to restore the buildings. Well, with that money and the money we made in future years, we did more than restore the buildings. We built the new wing [of Howick Hall]. If it [the new wing] hadn't been torn down, we would still have a very fine agricultural fair. Very fine. We built the McElroy building, during the war the General Purpose building was burnt, there was a hanger-type building put up there, a temporary building, and it lasted there for many years. It was a temporary building, remember this, and it was only torn down last year, and was put up in the early fourties, a temporary building. The wing was put up in 1955, I believe, and it was torn down nine or 10 years ago. Why, I don't know, because it was still a building that we could still have agriculture in, have a good show and everything, which is part of the exhibition in my opinion. The city will operate Lansdowne Park today at a big loss to the taxpayer. The exhibition never did that. The exhibition put money into restoring the, as they called it, the Cattle Castle. I still can't call it that, I still call it the Manufacturer's Building. But that's progress. Maybe I'm getting old and grumpy, I don't know, it's just that nothing stays, nothing is forever as we all find out. But I really don't think the city has done right by this fair. I was at the Calgary Stampede this year, there's parties in every office building because there's so many people going. We need more help from the city.
	Well, that's true, too, because, years ago the CCEA used to get permission to put up streamers on the streets, and all the newspapers were lined with ads for stores about Ex week.
	I used to send a truck out here, come to work at midnight, and they'd go out all night and do what they called the white-way poles with sheilds that we used to put on all the busy streets. I used to take my crew and go in a car, and the guys would be working off the back of a truck. We'd work all night doing that.
	What did you do exactly?
	Hang white-way poles with shields for the Central Canada Exhibition. And I'll say there were even French and English signs in those days. And I'm going back to before, 'cause I came here to work in -- after I came home from overseas, so -- '46 I came to work here. And I stayed here 'til 1970, and then I went to Montreal but I came back five years later, '75. Then somebody talked me into running for this board, I don't know why. (laughter)
	In the 1930s, it was still pretty much an agricultural fair, but how much of it was carnival-like?
	Carnival? You asked me a good question. We had, monkey shows, midget shows, ten-in-ones, now you're going to ask me what's a ten-in-one?
	Yeah.
	That's one top with ten events in it. Like they'd have a bearded lady, a fat lady and a sword swallower and then maybe an illlusion show and a few things like that. Girl shows --
	Strippers?
	Well, they were supposed to be.
	It was a different meaning between then and now.
	A little bit. Then you used to have a wrestling show down there, and a boxing show. And they'd challenge anybody in the crowd. The guy's name was Campbell, I remember, funny how that comes back. Gene Campbell his name was, and anybody in the crowd that wanted to challenge him and if you'd last a round with the guy, you'd get a hundred dollars.
	He was a wrestler?
	Boxer. And Eddie Carl jumps in the ring, and he cleaned the guys clock one time, and Eddie Carl was a lightweight champion. He was a local guy. We had some really good shows. And then you would have a lot of what we in the carnival industry call ding shows. The reason we called them ding was because, you didn't have to buy a ticket for it, they dinged you. You'd throw a dollar in the jar or something as you walked in. There was lots of side shows. Today you don't see side shows. I don't know of any shows that have them, Conklin probably has some in the States, but the last one I saw was siamese twins, and that was in London, Ontario.
	So, would you say it was about 50/50 then, carnival and agriculture?
	Oh yeah. And there wasn't as many rides then. I want to tell you, you're going to see some great rides here this year.
	I'm really looking forward to it.
	Not that we didn't have good stuff before, but you know sometimes a change helps.
	We hope. So it seems like there has been a decrease on the focus on agriculture over the years and an increase on the carnival aspect. And right now, would you consider it mostly a carnival?
	Definately.
	Okay, so would you call it a carnival now? Or is it still a fair?
	No, I would call it a Central Canada Exhibition. It's not a fair, it's a Central Canada Exhibition. The national exhibitors are what we need, and the international exhibitors. Even at any exhibition or stampede or fair today, you don't see the exhibitors. Look out there (pointing to fair grounds), that was filled with farm equipment, farm machines, but not today, it doesn't seem to be the trend. Now, maybe the smaller country fairs. And there's a big difference in an exhibition and a fair. Can I tell you an interesting story that I didn't live through but I know of?
	Sure.
	The Colliseum building, there was an explosion, and it was an over-heated boiler, and it blew, and it was during the Winter Fair. In those days, they called it the Fat Stock Show, and it was a great winter spectacle. Everybody dressed up in tuxedos and long dresses to go and see the horse show. When this thing blew -- I think there's pictures around here but I don't know where they are today -- there was all kinds of chickens killed, and there was a horse that was hung right in the beams in the Coliseum.
	I read a bunch of articles from that period, about that explosion.
	I have some stuff at home, that, if you call me someday, you can come up and see it, but I just didn't unpack it. The City took over the parking priviledges, I think, it really got bad when I first came on the board in '79, but they had been reduced before that, but it really got bad. And a lot of people made good money off of that. The City contract, we talked a little about that, it was a 25-year deal that the exhibition got and the city fathers in their wisdom, as I said, took it away from them, and took the management over to the city. These people that were brought up in that neigbourhood, there's still some of them live over there, and they want the parking.
	So, the parking during the exhibition -- people can park on their lawns and they charge them?
	Well, you'd have to ask city hall, but I think that they've rescinded a bit this year and you can park on certain streets and in driveways, but not lawns.
	Right, they've cut off a lot of the parking in the last decade or so, so you couldn't park anywhere, there was no parking on the lawns, it just made it impossible for people to come here.
	Can you girls excuse me?
	Sure. Thank-you very much.

[Back] [Don Cherry] [Don Reid] [Hubert 'Red' Friel] [Claude Bennett] [Cheryl McBain]