Hello,
It's most exciting to find you and your father. I was in St. John's to give a talk on Nov 7 about the photographer Edith S. Watson. I've been working with her story and images since the late 1970s, when I first heard about some prints from a house in Quidi Vidi. The story went that the house was being demolished and the workers found a box in a wall. In the box were glass plate negatives, which they recognized as being of interest andt took to a gallery owner on Water St. He printed sets from these negatives and sold them. I believe that your father is the gallery owner and the old photographs you refer to as one of the backbones of his business were at least in part these photographs. I've been trying to hunt him down ever since but until my talk, didn't find him. Then at the talk someone said that his name was Ron Mason, that he had died, and that he has a daughter living in St. John's. I'm most intrigued to hear and see more. Some people believe that I have those negatives, I don't nor have I ever seen them although I have seen some of the prints fromthem. I don't know what happened to them - or, indeed, how much of the story I heard is true. It would have been wonderful to meet you while I was there. However, it didn't happen, and now I'm hoping to explore that whole story futher. My email is above, my phone # is 416 691-8222, and the book that I've done around the Watson photographs is Working Light: The Wandering Life of Photographer Edith S. Watson. I hope you're intrgiued too and will be in touch.
Many thanks,
Frances Rooney

I have many albums of Mason family photos, belonging to your first cousin the former Stephen Clark son of Moira, since 1993 Stephen A. Norris.
Stephen is now in the later stages of Huntington's disease and is a patient in the Continuing Care unit of St. Mary's of the Lake Hospital , Kingston Ontario

We are growing some organic herbs and veggies this year.

Red Basil



Nufar Basil



Oregano and Thyme



Roma Tomatoes



Ripening Romas



Summer Vegetables

An August Tea Party at My House. Some copies of Moby's book about his tea restaurant in New York are on the table. Notice the Raku vase centerpiece, created by Erin McArthur.

Bon Anniversaire, Grandpa! Le temps passe vite, n'est-ce pas? La vie ici est assez mouvementée. Le printemps et l'été ont été à ce jour belle de Terre-Neuve.

Certaines mauvaises nouvelles: Grand-mère est à l'hôpital. Elle s'est cassé la hanche. Pour la deuxième fois! C'est aujourd'hui le fete de Jacob, ainsi, et je parle avec lui plus tôt. Il a déjeuné hier avec Mary et dit qu'elle est la pire qu'il a vu. nous espérons que bientôt elle va mieux.

Shannon et moi sont en train de préparer pour les visiteurs d'été. Nous avons un ami de lycée qui arrive dans une semaine, puis Gerry, puis les parents de Shannon arrivent. Il sera le 22 août avant de la maison est encore calme.

Encore une fois, Joyeux Anniversaire. Je t'aime et que vous manquez

Jack, Aaron and I visited Dad's grave this morning. He would have been 81 today. It was a beautiful morning and the cemetery felt very peaceful. I gave each of the boys a penny to throw into a fountain near Dad's grave and asked each to make a silent wish. It turned out that they both wished they could see their grandfathers again (Aaron actually wished he could meet Dad for the first time). The sad occasion was made happy by the beauty and innocence of my sons.

Rob

Today would be my father's birthday. He taught me a lot about gardening and flowers, which he loved. This slideshow, with music, is my way of saying thanks for all the flowers and all the memories and all the love.

http://moyak.com/ron/birthday2009/

Miss you, Dad.

Love Moya

Moya,
Reading your words to your father, looking at the photos you send to him, made me cry. It is like me missing my mother. I know it is hard and after six years I miss her deeply.
Best regards for you and your family. I wish you well.

From BC, Ely

I wish you had more visitors here.

Love you

I haven't owned a television for about 15 years, but recently I started watching Frasier online at Justin TV. It makes me miss my father that much more. I love you, Dad.

Hi, Dad:

I love you!

My father really liked windmills. He bought me one when he was in Holland in the early 1990s. Here's a windmill sculpture from the Guggenheim.



Always love you, Dad. Miss you.

Dad, it's been four years since you've left us. This morning, Jack, Aaron and I said a little prayer for you and remembered the hour of your passing. My boys have grown healthy, strong and beautiful over the years. Jack, who called you Grandpa Bobo when you were still with us, turns 6 on Saturday. We are having a great big party for him and his friends. Aaron, who never met you in life but who has heard much about you, turned 3 in December. Life is not always easy but the boys are a true blessing that I'm very thankful for.

There is a terrible snowstorm in Toronto today but we plan to visit you in the next couple of days. I hope you are warm and happy wherever you are.

Love,
Rob

Hi Grandpa,

I’m thinking about you today on this morbid anniversary. I don’t think about you often, and I’m sorry for that. I’m still in that young, self-absorbed stage of life. When I do think about you, I picture you bent over the oven on Waterford Bridge Road, pulling out a tray of all-spice cookies early in the morning. I remember you made so many cookies that we had bags upon bags of them in the deep freeze for weeks. And I remember you in your big orange coveralls that you probably got through your offshore work. No matter the season, planting bulbs, shoveling snow or trimming trees, you had those coveralls on. I remember you had them on when you built me a snow fort with a wooden ceiling and pillars to support it… I just want you to know that I have fond memories of you and I miss you. Love, Daniel.

I've had a difficult time getting over my father's death. When I read the following quote from Eleanor Roosevelt, I thought it might help others who read here.

"You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, "I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along." The danger lies in refusing to face the fear, in not daring to come to grips with it... You must do the thing you think you cannot do."

My father didn't live long enough to see Barack Obama become president, but I know he would be thrilled. He raised me with a healthy respect for civil rights, justice, freedom, and public consciousness. I remember he gave me a record album of Martin Luther King speeches. The accompanying book had the text of the speeches and photographs. One thing I thought as I cried my way through Obama's acceptance speech was that Teddy Kennedy lived to see a man like Barack take the presidency. When his brothers were assassinated there was a lot of speculation that their concern for freedom and civil rights, in part, led to their deaths. I am thankful that Teddy lived long enough to see their dream come true. I hope Caroline will play some role in the new cabinet.

Congratulations to the Obamas!

Miss you, Daddy.

I miss you, Dad. I thought you would like to see the Lady. Miss you very much.

Love Moya

Thinking of you, Dad, on this sunny Sunday afternoon. I am in the midst of reevaluating my life and deciding on what to do next. I wish you were here to talk and walk me through; a man who remade himself so many times and who had so many interesting careers. Love Moya

Hi, Tracy, I am glad you have found comfort here. My Father would enjoy knowing. Thank you. I hope in the days ahead, you will find your way through the darkness.

Thank you for posting the poems and thoughts about your father. As I prepare to inter my young sister with my parents, I found comfort and inspiration. Thank you.

My father really liked Easter. He always made sure to bring home many Easter goodies for us. He and Mom put together a great dinner each year. I miss those days. Happy Easter, Dad.

Thinking of you, Dad. Love Moya

I woke in the middle of the night a few weeks ago, sleepless and mindful. I thought about what had woken me and I realized it was a dream about my father and the birthmark on his arm. I tried not to get worked up but I couldn't stop myself from thinking of that birthmark and the morning he died. I need to look through the few pictures we have of my father and see if I can find one that shows his birthmark. It reminds me of my childhood. Love you, Dad.

This is the third anniversary of my father's death. These past three years have been very tough for me, even though I know my father wouldn't like to know how I've suffered.

I couldn't sleep that well last night and as I lay there I thought about how Dad must have been scared lying there all by himself, pressing a buzzer, waiting for help. I wondered if he knew when the pain came that the end was near. I was very close to my father but I didn't have a bad feeling. I actually slept through his death because I was still asleep when the phone call came.

I've learned so much more about these long-term care facilities since he died and if I let myself dwell on the details, I'm sure I would go mad.

Dad, my love for you is as wide as an ocean. I send you my love on this very sad day.

Thinking of you, Dad. Miss you lots.

Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: You don't give up. It's like driving at night: you can only see a little bit ahead of you but you can make the whole journey that way.

My father loved Newfoundland and the people who live on the island. He would have liked the following story.

A Tribute to Colour Blindness
Wednesday, April 5, 2006
By Danette Dooley,
Special to The Telegram

Lanier Phillips left St. John's on Saturday having shared, once more, his story of the kindness and compassion he encountered from the people of St. Lawrence over six decades ago - people, he says, who not only saved his life but also changed it completely. Phillips was the only African-American among the 55 people whose lives were saved when the USS Truxtun crashed off the coast of St. Lawrence during a blizzard on Feb. 18, 1942.

Had he not been aboard the naval destroyer on that fateful day when 101 people lost their lives, Phillips has no idea where life would have led him. There were only two options, he says: hell or jail.

The interview takes place in a small, bright, comfortable room in the bed and breakfast where Phillips is staying in St. John's.

His voice lowers to a whisper when he speaks of crawling under his bed as a young boy in fear of the Ku Klux Klan who were riding through the community shooting guns into the air.

"On one occasion, I could peep out through my window and see them beat this black man with whips. The hatred just rose up in me. And I had terrible ideas. But the people in St. Lawrence erased all of that. They cured that disease of hatred. It is a disease. And the best way in the world to cure that is with love and humanity. It's the best medicine there is."

At age 18, Phillips was one of four black mess attendants onboard the Truxtun. There was also one Philippine mess attendant, he says.

His earliest memory of the shipwreck was of being thrown out of his bunk.

"I landed on top of the rest of the mess attendants who were thrown out of their bunks. I thought we had been torpedoed. I just grabbed a pair of shoes, I don't know if they were my shoes or someone else's. And I ran topside. But it was dark and I couldn't see anything," he recalls.

Phillips' heart sank when searchlights shone over the area showed snow-covered cliffs and mountains. He was convinced he'd been shipwrecked in Iceland. Any black man to step on the land in that country at the time, he recalls, would be lynched.

"The storm was so bad you could barely see. The waves would just pick the ship up and slam it against the rocks. I went onboard a raft, but the other mess attendants were afraid to go over the side. I had looked at the men who were washed overboard from the waves. They were being crashed against the rocks close by. It was so terrific you could see body parts flying by. But I knew the ship was going to sink once it broke apart."

Philips said while the four other mess attendants were terrified they'd be lynched on Iceland shores because of the colour of their skin, he chose to take his chances.

"I told them, 'Gee, if we die at least let's just don't stay here and freeze to death.' Ice was forming on all our bodies by then."

That was the last conversation he'd have with his shipmates who refused to abandon ship.

"Just before we reached the land, the raft capsized and threw everybody out in the water. We were already wet. Now we were so numb we could barely move. It seemed like the heart rate had slowed down and you were very sleepy, extremely sleepy. You knew that all you had to do was close your eyes and it was all over."

By the time he reached the shore, still believing he was in Iceland, Phillips had convinced himself dying was a better fate than living.

"I decided to go in the corner and end it all. And I did. I went back into this little small cove. Not too much larger than this room. I got down on the ground but someone came and said, 'Don't lie there, you'll surely die.' "

Phillips, still covered in bunker C oil, was eventually taken into shelter with the white survivors, where the women of St. Lawrence worked to save each and every life.

Having grown up in a society where racism was as popular as slavery, the teenager was sure his life was about to end in some horrible way.

"When I got my eyes opened, I saw these ladies; they were massaging my body, getting the circulation going. I was completely naked and I was really afraid. Being from rural Georgia, it was a crime to be naked in front of white women - to even look at white women, or whistle at one, was a crime. Maybe you'd be lynched for it. And I was terrified."

As they cleaned the oil from his face and head, the women began to comment on the texture of his hair.

"I had a lot of hair then, and one of the ladies said, "This is the curliest hair I've ever seen." I said to myself, 'Now that's the end of me. They're going to throw me out in the ice all naked. I'm finished. I'm dead.'"

With every stroke of their wash cloths, the women continued to offer the frightened young man comfort, compassion and reassurance.

"One of the ladies had my hand and was trying to get the bunker C oil off me. It was like jelly. And she says, 'This poor fellow, I can't get it off. It's all in his pores.' That's the first time I spoke up. I said, 'It's the colour of the skin. You can't get it off. I'm black."

Sixty-four years later, Phillips words are still laced with the gratitude he felt for the women who continued to care for him, oblivious to the colour of his skin.

"They lifted my head up and they had a spoon and were giving me rum, I think it was rum. I had a hard time swallowing. They kept rubbing my throat and caressing my forehead and another lady kept rubbing my body and washing it off. I was just overcome. I had never heard such kind words from a white person before."

Phillips was eventually taken to the Pike home where Viola Pike put him to bed and began heating rocks and irons to place underneath the blankets.

"She said, 'I made some soup for you.' She lifted my head, but I couldn't hold the cup. My fingers were. I could hardly bend them. She just fed me like a baby with a teaspoon. And I was just overwhelmed."

When Phillips returned to St. Lawrence in 1988, the woman who'd help nurse him back to health had passed away.

"That house brought back a lot of memories and I felt so bad that she was deceased and I couldn't thank her."

Phillips says nothing he could do could thank the people of St. Lawrence for what they did for him. Nonetheless, he has started a scholarship and has donated financially to the community.

Growing up in rural Georgia, Phillips said he always knew his place as a young black boy. He'd attended school for about three weeks when the Klan burned it to the ground.

By the time he'd reached his teens, his mother had sent him to Tennessee to live with an aunt. That's when he decided to join the navy, though he couldn’t read or write.

"I wanted to get away from the south because I resented the racism and the discrimination. I resented the cotton fields and the cornfields. I resented the granite pits."

The role of black men in the navy at the time was to serve the white officers their meals, make their beds and shine their shoes.

"I guess what's why they called us mess attendants."

Phillips spent 20 years in the navy, becoming the U.S. Navy's first African-American sonar technician. He married and raised a family and continued working as a sonar technician in later years.

He has done many meaningful things in his lifetime. He's marched with Martin Luther King. He's fought for civil rights for decades. He's told his story about the people of St. Lawrence to anyone who would listen.

While the people in his hometown have come a long way over the years in eradicating racism, there's still a master-slave mentality there, he says. Those people never met the people of St. Lawrence.

"I know within my heart if I continue to resist the wrong of racism that, some day, I'll overcome. I know that today is better than yesterday. But I want tomorrow to be better than today, and there are people that still hold on to the plantation mentality, to not resist and not talk about it.

"But I'm going to talk about it. And I don't care whose toes I step on. Because it's wrong. We are all God's children and we're all human. If we could just learn to treat people like the people of St. Lawrence treated me, how sweet the world would be."

For a short video on Lanier Phillips, visit: The Ambassador of St. Lawrence