ODDS’N’SODS — The enigma of Nels Hansen

I first saw Nels Hansen when he walked out of the bush, near Kirkland Lake, Ont., one cool autumn day in the early 1940s.

He wore navy serge trousers, a double-breasted pea jacket, a navy peak cap square on his head, and a duffle slung over his shoulder — quite a contrast to the brown breeches and 40-day shirts typical of the bush camp.

Nels was a man of 60 or so, with the cherubic face of a Santa Claus (sans beard) — his cheeks were like two polished Snow apples; his eyes were crinkled into a permanent squint; and his teeth seemed always to be clamped onto a meerschaum pipe.

My father, who managed the Bidgood mine from 1937 until its close in 1949, hired him as a mucker.

“Hush, the news” was the catch phrase at our house, and my brother and I quickly learned to stop any noise and listen. It was wartime and the wireless came to dominate our lives; the news was almost never good.

The “boys” were all gone and the bunkhouses empty save one, which was full of older men. Most of them were veterans of the First World War, and they, too, hung on the daily news, reliving old battles each time a familiar place name came crackling across the airwaves. These oldtimers were full of brag and swagger about what they would be doing “over there,” if they had only passed the medical.

All but one . . . Nels Hansen.

The men were suspicious of Nels. He kept to himself and, although his English was adequate, spoke only when spoken to, and then only briefly.

Nels became almost an obsession with some of the men. Where had he come from? He claimed to be a Danish sailor, but speculation grew that he was a German prisoner of war who had escaped. He had no friends and received no mail. He seemed most comfortable secluded away in the sanctity of his room, mending his socks or polishing his boots.

About this time, Quemont Mining hit the news, and what a relief from the dreary news bulletins of bombings, blood baths and slaughter! Every day, the stock rose higher on the market, invigorating the town of Kirkland Lake. Residents forgot the radio and headed to the brokerage office instead. Dad sold too soon, as many did, but made a tidy profit nonetheless.

One day, shortly after Quemont reached its peak in value, I was in the office with my father, math homework spread out on his desk, when Nels’ timid head peered around the corner.

“Come in Nels, is there something I can do for you?” asked my father.

Nels stepped in and closed the door cautiously. He fingered his cap, searching for words to begin. We waited patiently. “I think I quit, boss,” was all he said.

“You do?” said my father, incredulously. “Well now Nels, you’re no spring chicken. Where do you think a man of your age would get another job? If you find the work too hard, I’d be happy to give you a surface spot more to your liking. Just tell me where it should be.”

“Thanks, but no, boss. I think I retire.”

“Retire?!” my father said in amazement. “Nels, when you came here you said you were flat broke.”

“I was boss,” Nels conceded, “but then I buy a little Quemont. She make forty thousand dollar, boss, so I just go retire to nice gentlemen’s hotel in Hamilton.”

And so off he went.

Several years later, my father received a letter from a lawyer in Hamilton. Nels had died, and the lawyer was trying to locate one of his co-workers at the mine. It seems this man had been in Hamilton visiting a relative and had remembered Nels; he therefore looked him up, and they had a brief visit.

When Nels died, he left all his money to the Harbour Light Mission charity — all, that is, but a few thousand which he left to his “good friend” — that miner who decided, perhaps on the spur of the moment, to drop in on him at his gentlemen’s hotel.

He may have been the only man who ever stepped out of his way to visit Nels during the many years he lived.

— The author is a resident of Markdale, Ont.