HISTORY: Families and People: H | HUCKLE

Billy [William Isaac] Huckle who came from Ontario was one of the early settlers in Joe Rich. He acquired District Lot 4051 as a Crown Grant in 1921. His old roofless cabin still stands just above and to the north of the highway at Cardinal Creek. He was a bachelor who had a team of horses with which he cleared land, hauled out fire wood which he cut on his property and sold in Rutland. He cut hay in the bottom land beside Cardinal Creek where he had his barn. He planted a small orchard, but many of his trees did not survive. A few Yellow Transparent Apple Trees still struggle to survive beside his roofless cabin. He was apparently a sociable man who liked visitors and kept a clean and tidy cabin. Ellen (Black) Mark remembered him inviting the Blacks to his cabin for dinner one Christmas. It now looks so small that it is hard to imagine all the socializing that once took place in it.

When the Weddell children were still small, Gert would take them up to his then deserted property and shake the apples off the trees. They would collect them to make apple sauce. When the property was being logged some of the trees were pushed out with a cat.

In 1921, Billy Huckle sold a right-of-way to the Black Mountain Irrigation District for $240 to build the irrigation ditch across his property, but in 1922 the irrigation district minutes show that he was disputing the agreement. When water was finally running in the ditch, Charlie Philpott, Sr. was employed as the ditch walker. He suspected that Billy Huckle was siphoning off water from the ditch to irrigate his property. When he did catch this infraction taking place he decided to disregard it and put the water loss down to gopher holes causing water loss.

Although Billy Huckle was a bachelor, he apparently had an eye for the ladies. He attended the schoolhouse dances and on one occasion asked Kathleen Philpott to dance with him. The dance was a lively one known as “Strip the Willow”. It involved swinging one’s partner, and during the dance Kathleen, a strong girl, not only swung Mr. Huckle but actually threw him onto the floor. Later, when her mother said, “Kathleen, you really shouldn’t have done that to Mr. Huckle”, Kathleen replied, “You should have seen what he was trying to do to me”. As a bachelor, he had always cooked for himself and had worked in a candy store where he had learned to make candy. It was a standing joke amongst the girls that Mr. Huckle frequently asked one of them to come to his cabin so that he could teach them to make candy.

When Mr. Huckle was an old man, he sold his property and moved to Kelowna where he worked as a security guard at the Rutland Sawmill where Mara Lumber is today. Perhaps he was not used to the town traffic and still behaved as he had in Joe Rich. On December 20, 1945 while at his work, he walked out into the road and was struck and killed by a car. He was 67 years of age.

After his death, Huckle’s property was sold to the Highs who sold it to Jim Weddell. Jim logged it and ranged cattle there, but when the government gave up helping with fencing, he sold it to Elwyn Cross.

 

2004 Huckle's cabin