00:14All right, let's start off with an easy question. What's your name?
00:19My name is Sharon Platt.
00:23So tell us a little bit about your early life. Like where did you
00:27grow up and where were you raised? I was raised on a farm in southern Saskatchewan,
00:36about 20 months from Oxbow, right along the U.S. border. And the interesting thing is
00:44the Manning family grew up in Carnduff, which is very close to my home. So my mother knew him.
00:50Then you, the Premier. Yeah, before he was Premier. But yeah, she followed his career.
00:57Yeah. So would you like to describe life on the farm there? Like the kind of things you would do
01:02there?
01:04Well, I got into as much trouble as I could. I was a wanderer, so I like to walk and
01:12I like to follow the farm truck, like where they went, where my brother and my father went. And so
01:19I
01:20would take off and take off to Pongo and I wouldn't tell my mother. And there was one time in
01:27which
01:29my twin sister, I'm a twin. So my twin sister and I were out playing by the dugout. And our
01:37mother called us in.
01:39And Sheila said, she went and I said, I'm not hungry, but I'll stay here and wait for you. Well,
01:45there's never no one to wait anywhere. Right. So when she came out after lunch to go and find me,
01:53she went to Mama. She's like, I can't find sharing. So it was the last time you saw her by
01:59the dugout.
02:00Oh, dear. And then that would create a lot of excitement.
02:04It did. And my dad got help look for me and he couldn't find me. So he decided they'd maybe
02:10have
02:11to drag the dugout. And just then my sister said, she's coming. She's coming. I see her.
02:18And I walked over to the neighbor's house to play with their kids. And their father took me by the
02:26hand and locked me. How many brothers and sisters did you have?
02:31There were 10 children in the family and eight of them were born before the war. And two of us
02:39were born
02:39after. So then you grew up into a teenager. How was that? I would say because we lived in a
02:46very
02:48remote part of the of the province, like far from Oxford. So I didn't have neighborhood kids to play
02:59with most of the time. So Sheila and I, we took school by correspondence because it was too far to
03:05school. And yeah, I didn't even know we were lonely. It was just good life. So this was like a
03:18one-room
03:19school kind of thing or? We started out with a one-room school, yeah. And that one was closer.
03:26But it closed after we were in grade two. So then we did correspondence for three years.
03:37So how would you describe your teenage years? Were you still making trouble then? Or were you still
03:44having some challenges? I never quit making trouble. That's a good answer.
03:51It was hard going to high school. It was hard. We went to school in grade six. We got started
03:59going
03:59on the bus. Till then we had home correspondence. My father was a teacher. She taught us.
04:07It was hard going into, especially for us because we didn't associate with other people very much.
04:17Yeah. And so to go into a big school and, you know, the boys weren't always kind to us and
04:26the teacher
04:27wasn't always kind to us. And school was hard. It was hard. Yeah. So you made it through school and
04:37then
04:37then what were you, what did you move into after school? Well, after graduating from high school in
04:46Oxbow, my mother encouraged us to go to bottom school because she was kind of concerned whether
04:53she had taught us enough. Okay. And so she wanted us to get an education at Briarcrest. So we spent
05:00three
05:01years at Briarcrest. It was very good. I had a, I didn't, Jill and I did a room together. So
05:07I had a very good
05:09roommate from North Dakota. We were very good friends and we had good teachers. We had like,
05:17I went there when Briarcrest was blessed with good teachers. And so it was a time of learning. Yeah.
05:27So then you did the school, you went to Bible school and then, then what did you move into after
05:31that?
05:35I started to take teachers education in Winnipeg and decided that I definitely did not want to be a
05:45teacher. So I quit. My, my daughter always says that's a dropout, but anyway, then I started working
05:57as a, as a nurse's aid and kind of got into, um, the health field, not, not as a nurse,
06:07but as those,
06:08someone taking care of the patients. And then I got, I had got involved with camp. I've gone for seven
06:16years to that camp and John went to other camps, but he came one year as a camp speaker.
06:25And we got kind of to know each other at camp, washing dishes together.
06:32Oh yeah. It's a nice romantic time over the sink.
06:36That's right. Yeah, it was. And so we, he was planning to be a missionary and, and I was always
06:45kind
06:45of interested was with my work at camp and that, of being involved in that as a missionary. So we
06:53made
06:53plans he was going to go to Bolivia. Okay. So, so you didn't, you didn't know John at all before
07:00you
07:00came to university and then, or went to Bible camp. So you came to Manitoba to go to university
07:07for as a teacher. And then you went to Bible camp one summer. Yeah. No, seven, seven summers. It took
07:15a
07:15long time for him to consider. Oh, so you went to seven summers. Okay. And then, then how long was
07:23your, um, courtship then after you met? Yeah. Close to a year. In between seven months and a year. Yeah.
07:30And then you got married and then, then you went married in Winnipeg. In Winnipeg. Okay.
07:38And then you, where did you live after that? In Arden. We lived in Arden for a good part of
07:46a lot.
07:48So in the town, we, at first we rented houses out in the community, like out in the farm. And
07:58then
07:58his parents moved away. Eventually we moved down to the, the town, the home farm. Yeah. And that was really
08:05good.
08:06We raised our children. We had a, a girl and a boy. Okay. And did John continue on, uh, speaking
08:15or
08:15these kind of things? He did. He's, he, he got involved in construction work and helped build the
08:22flat construction company. Okay. With his brothers. And, um, at the same time he did, he did speaking.
08:30Okay. At, at our church and, and also eventually at other churches because they asked him to come.
08:38They were very good years. Um, one of the memories was John baptizing about, what's that?
08:47He baptized, you have seven people in the river.
08:50Yeah. At the high sea river.
08:54But it's such a good memory. Yeah.
08:58They were willing to go out in that cold water. Yeah.
09:03So you did that in Arden. And then were you writing in those days as well?
09:10Yeah. Like I always through life, my whole life had episodes when I wrote, wrote more.
09:16Okay. That's so. I always wanted to write my mother's story. Okay. I think I have this right.
09:25This was the older generation in Scotland. So that was John Mitchell, or Muir, I'm sorry, John
09:33Yu. And then this was Gilbert Muir. And this was my father, Gilbert, but in cloak he's, he's burnt.
09:44Their father and mother. Yeah. And this is my grandma and grandpa.
09:48Grandma and grandpa. And then great grandpa. Great grandpa. And this is the great, great steels.
09:56Great, great grandpa. Great steel on the steel side. Okay. That's, and then this is their dog.
10:08So that would be your great grandma. Well, this is great grandma. This would be my grandma.
10:15Your grandma. Yeah.
10:17So when did you start into writing your mother's story?
10:21Three years ago.
10:22Three years ago.
10:23Three years ago. So it's been a long journey. So why is it important for you to tell that story?
10:30I think it's important to me because through the circumstances in her life,
10:38she could not go to a church. She couldn't go to a fellowship. And so she learned to worship the
10:49Lord
10:49behind a woven curtain where she, and then she would teach us. She taught me the Bible.
11:03Her family came from a strong Christian background, but some, some things said come on and disrupted that.
11:16It sounds like she has a lot of, she had a lot of struggles in her life.
11:21When she was born, she was born in the time of the early sectors. Yeah.
11:26So the family was just in difficult times. Yeah.
11:30And there was, there was quite a bit of illness in family.
11:36And we have to remember it was time the doctors weren't very, I mean, they always had a doctor,
11:43but it was a long way for us to go into there. And then also, farming was so different because
11:54they didn't have all that big sheet machines that farms up there. Yeah.
11:58They had, they had an ox with a plow behind it. Yeah.
12:04So this was in Canada? Yeah.
12:07So they were, this is the story of them in Saskatchewan?
12:12Yes. In the early time, like 1800s?
12:16That's when they would, their father, not her, she was born in 1902.
12:22But her parents and that they were, when they came over, when they came, they were
12:33very, they were very much affected by a pioneer life, the loneliness, the lack of materials,
12:44living in a sad house. And that's how my mother started her career.
12:51Yeah. So after three years of this journey,
12:57what would you say something you've really come out of that you've really learned through all,
13:03all these things?
13:04I think what I learned the most had to do with my faith. Because when things got really tough,
13:12really, I didn't know what the next step would be. I would, I would pray and God would just bring
13:19the
13:19answer. And it was amazing. He took, he took pity on me because he knew I needed a lot of
13:26help.
13:28And he gave me that help.
13:31All right. So what's the title of your book?
13:34Beyond the Woven Curtain.
13:36Okay. And what, what would be an overview of what happens in this book?
13:43I think, I think it's important to learn how the pioneers really struggled. But we have today,
13:50we owe a lot to those pioneers who struggled and faced all kinds of trouble, weather conditions,
13:59blizzards, floods, rust.
14:05That it was not easy existence. Our area, the southern part of Saskatchewan, was considered the worst
14:17affected by the depression. But the camp where the Canadian Sunday School Mission, they had a real
14:27heart for the people that were suffering, the people. Like sometimes wheat was down to nine
14:34cents, but that's what they got for. Yeah. But when the times got really, really tough in the depression
14:41years, then there were three, four people came every summer to just go and visit people that were
14:51depressed and ready to, well, some would be very depressed and ready to commit suicide. Others just
14:59left the farm and went north and left everything they had behind. So your book is going to be published
15:08by Friesen Press? Yeah. Okay. And where will people be able to find it?
15:18I'm not quite sure yet. Just we, I have some ideas where that'll take place, but they also offer some
15:25on
15:25Amazon. And I very much hope that my family, not just my own family, but the family of the 10
15:35children,
15:38that they will know what kind of life their mother, grandmother, mother and grandmother lived.
15:45So it sounds like you've written about a lot of struggle and hardship, or what are some things that
15:51you have found that have helped you through hard times in life? The importance of prayer. And I think the
15:58importance that even if you cannot go to a church, you can still fellowship with the Lord. And that's
16:07probably what I learned most from her. So what are your future plans for raiding? Well, I'm going to
16:14England and I'm going to Scotland. Yeah. And I'm going to raid this old castle that used to belong to
16:21our family centuries ago. Okay. Well, that'll be good. My daughter suggested I leave one of the books there.
16:31Well, that's a good idea. Because we talk about it. And then I have my family over there. So I'll
16:38leave
16:38the book for them. All right. Anything else that I should have covered? I think what's very, very
16:45important, and I hope it comes out in the book, is the fact that, and I don't know how to
16:52say it nicely,
16:53so I'll just say it the way it is. So often, churches who claim to be the body of Jesus
17:02Christ,
17:03and meet in a place where they honor and worship Him, can't get along with the people who are next
17:11door.
17:13And that's, to me, one of the big struggles for the church.
17:21And I think I saw that all my life because we didn't go anywhere, because we couldn't go. And
17:29that's, um, to watch the people around me, and how they reacted, how they, like the, the Bible does
17:41say that we're supposed to, above everything, we're supposed to show them one to another.
17:49And so you experienced shunning in your family. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Very much.
17:59All right. Sounds interesting. So if people want to learn more about all these stories,
18:03then they can check out your book. Yeah.
18:07And I'll be having a book launch that people can come to.
18:10Well, thank you, Callum. Yes, thank you. Very nice that you took the time to come in here.
