Ida Maria Niemi was born in Alavus, Finland, on November 13, 1899. There are not too many people left today who can say that they were born in the 1800’s. Ida had two sisters, also born in Finland; Lydia, born in 1901, and Jenny, born in 1903.
Early in 1905, their father left Finland to come to Canada. He settled in Canmore and went to work in the coal mine. After seven years of letter writing, he finally convinced his wife, Hedvig, to come to Canada with their three daughters. In the spring of 1912, this little family left their homeland, never to return. It was a traumatic experience for them because, on the morning that they left Finland, the “unsinkable” Titanic went down. All of Hedvig’s friends and relations had tried to convince her to sail to Canada on the new ship, Titanic, but she had told them that an old ship was just as good. This was lucky for all of us, or we would not be here today.
There were many Finlanders in Canmore in the early 1900’s. They even had Finnish Hall, where they used to hold their dances and get-togethers. It was located somewhere in the area where “Mountain Shadows” is today.
Ida started her working life at the age of twelve. She only attended school in Canada for a few months and then she was needed to help run the boarding house. Her little sister, Lily, was born in 1913 and brother, John, in 1917. They lost their father to illness in 1928.
Ida met her husband-to-be in Canmore. He, too, had come from Finland to seek his fortune. His name was August Niemi so when he and Ida married, she was still Niemi! They went to Vancouver in 1929 and settled in a little hamlet called Barnet, just outside the city, Their daughter was born there in December of 1929 and they called her Eila, a Finnish name. August worked at Brittania Mines for awhile and then later for the Canadian Pacific Railway. Times were very hard in the hungry 30’s and Ida found some housecleaning jobs to help make ends meet. They bought a second-hand Singer sewing machine and Ida sewed all of Eila’s clothes. She did a beautiful job on that $10 machine and even did some sewing for the neighbours.
They moved back to Canmore in early 1940. August went back to work in the mine and Ida was happy to be back with her mother and sisters. Their son, Melvin, was born in 1942.
Ida and her sisters, Lydia and Jenny, were always busy doing things together. On the long winter nights, they would get together at each others’ homes and cut all the old worn out clothes that could no longer be patched, into strips so that they could make Finn mats in the summer. They also would get the raw wool from the sheep that some of their friends had in Trochu and they would wash and dry the wool and then would spend days carding it so that they could make themselves comforters. How warm and soft and beautiful they were! Every bed in those three homes and Grandma’s, too, had a home-made Comforter.
Ida’s husband, August, suffered a fatal heart attack at work on February 15, 1955. Ida was left with a thirteen-year-old son and no income. It was then decided that she and Melvin would live with her daughter, Eila, and her husband, Mike Dyrgas. Ida started to work at the old Canmore Hospital doing the laundry and the cleaning; on the cook’s days off, she would also do the cooking.
Ida worked at the hospital until 1973 and then house-cleaned for Dr. Rooks and Bev Ritchie. She also kept herself very busy crocheting and knitting. She would walk over town from Hospital Hill, sometimes three times a day. In the evenings, she and Jenny, Lydia and Kate Horydyski would play crib or go to all the bingos. She never had an idle moment.
When she was eighty-eight-years-old, she walked with Eila and Elke (her son’swife) and their two children up to Grassi Lakes. She had to stop a couple of times when we were climbing the stairs, but she did just as well as a lot of younger ones would do.
Ida loved to dance and sing, and I have a short piece on a video where she and I (Eila) are doing a polka in our kitchen; she was 93 at the time!
Ida doted on her family, especially her grandchildren, Darrel, Cory, and Caroline. When she got two great-grandchildren, she was in Seventh Heaven. She would sing Praise and Destiny, little children’s songs and poems in Finn.
Ida fell and broke her hip in March of 1994 and was never the same after that. She could no longer walk and could not remember things. She has been in the Extended Care Unit since April of 1994.
John and Maria Niemi, Ida and Jenny 1912
Ida, John and Jenny Niemi 1988, Ida’s 89th birthday
Canmore Seniors at the Summit, ed. Canmore Seniors Association, 2000, p. 213-214.
