Fred McElroy, 72, of Texada Island spent his first working years serving in the Canadian military and now that he has retired he has returned, of sorts, to the fold.
When he became president in 2010 of Royal Canadian Legion, Texada Branch 232, he led a struggling, aging membership in a building that desperately needed work.
“The roof leaked, the furnace had to be replaced and the windows were single-glazed,” McElroy said. “So we surveyed the Texada community as a whole and asked if they valued having a Legion on the island. The answer was a resounding ‘yes.’”
To avert what had seemed like certain closure, and because service with Canada’s armed forces was no longer a requirement for membership, islanders started joining the Legion.
In 2010, the Branch 232 executive put a mortgage on the building in Van Anda and gradually installed new heat pumps and replaced the roof and windows. With the help of volunteer work parties and fundraising events, the work got done and the building exterior was repainted. The next projects are updating the washrooms and redoing the outside deck.
McElroy says his branch membership is now at 110, and it is still growing. “We’re not just a bunch of old, cigar-smoking veterans sitting around and drinking beer. Legions today operate as private clubs, but on Texada we’re as much a community centre as a private club.” He welcomes changes to BC’s liquor laws which will soon enable children to have dinner at the Legion with their parents.
Branch 232 offers Wednesday night dinners, Thursday cribbage, Saturday meat draws, bingo, weddings, celebrations of life and meeting space for community groups like Texada’s policing committee, emergency services and trade unions. There’s a pool table, darts and a large wide-screen television. It’s the venue for Texada Island Chamber of Commerce dinner meetings and annual events such as the summer “Fly-in fling” and Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day and Robbie Burns dinners. “We give back to the community, donating space to groups which need it and the community helps us out in return.”
McElroy was born and raised in the small town of Midland, Ontario, a village on Georgian Bay where his father retired from service with the Royal Canadian Navy during World War II. As a youth, he joined army cadets and later the militia (reserves), becoming a driver-gunner with the Grey and Simcoe Foresters, an armed regimental troop. He joined the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps in 1962, training as an army paramedic. “We learned how to plug holes and save lives.” Later, he ran medical and pharmacy supply depots in eastern Canada. He was never posted outside of Canada’s borders.
Following the merger of the country’s armed forces in 1967, the medical corps was disbanded. After a stint as a hygiene inspector on military bases in northern Ontario, he retired from the Canadian armed forces as a master corporal. “I did metalworking as a hobby so I went back to school and became a journeyman machinist. But I also learned that I like freedom and fresh air way more than smoke, oil and grease, so I decided to drive a truck instead.”
Before becoming a long-haul trucker, McElroy was an ambulance attendant-driver in New Denver, BC. “I liked it there but it was too upsetting to see bad things happen to good friends. Long-haul trucking was less emotional.” He was on the road 28 days per month, carrying everything from antique race cars to irrigation parts. He drove through all 48 lower American states and nine Canadian provinces, often accompanied by his wife Darlene Bates.
Finally, the long trips got to be too much and McElroy switched to driving charter buses instead, so he could spend more time at his North Vancouver home. He gave summer cruise ship passengers tours of Vancouver and took winter tourists skiing. He also carried Junior A hockey teams from the Lower Mainland to Powell River to play against Powell River Kings.
“We fell in love with the beauty of this area and we were looking for a place to retire,” he said. “One night en route to Comox the weather was fierce and the ferry was cancelled. We stayed overnight at the Town Centre Hotel and met a couple from Texada who were also stranded because of the ferry. They were Roy and Laurie McDonnell, and they told us all about the island so we had to check it out. We did and immediately I fell in love with the people, their warmth and hospitality. There was farm-fresh food at our [bed and breakfast]. And I just couldn’t get over the huge size of the trees.” They found a house they liked in Van Anda and moved to Texada in 2005.
Apart from the many hours he spends doing Legion business, McElroy also volunteers for Texada’s Sandcastle Weekend, the annual Fly-In, Run the Rock marathon and the biennial art tour, mostly driving.
