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It happened during my QL1 training at the Communications School at HMCS Naden in Esquimalt BC in the year of 1967.
There was a local watering hole at the corner of Esquimalt and Admiral’s Road (a very short stagger from the base) called the Tudor House (or the Tud’s). This would be the equivalent of the east coast’s Seaway Tavern.
It was commonly known that being under age was not that big of a problem; once you had established yourself with the bartenders you were not asked for ID again. At the time a young hairy1 could proceed to the Tudor with a dollar in his pocket, have 4 draughts and be able to tip the bartender a nickel each time as a beer was only 20 cents a glass back then.
On this particular night, there were 8 or 9 of us sitting around quaffing back some ale when three mates decided it was time to hit the rack2 . One of them had a vehicle and for some unknown reason left his car key’s with one of our crew and asked him to bring it back for him. Well, as you can imagine after a snoot full of beer the remaining six of us decided it was time to head downtown and enjoy the nightlife. We had buddies car, so we were mobile.
Unfortunately we never did make it downtown, I do not remember exactly where it occurred but as we rounded a corner buddy lost control and we smacked dead centre into an Oak tree. How we could tell it was dead centre, the headlights of that Blue 1957 Chevy were wrapped around the tree and pointing at each other.
Needless to say we all received cuts bruises, broken bones and the odd missing tooth. When the local constabulary arrived they called the paddy wagon and took all of us to the hospital for a check up. Those that were not hurt badly enough to spend the night in the hospital got to spend it in the drunk-tank, courtesy of the Victoria City Police.
Unknown to us, a reporter was present at the hospital and placed an article in the Newspaper the next day detailing the car accident and those involved including names and ages. Of course none of us knew that we had made the paper as at that age we were not very interested in reading the newspaper.
A couple of days later 4 of us (the walking wounded) who were involved in the accident headed to the Tudor for a quiet drink. When to our astonishment, our favourite bartender came over with a very serious look on his face and began singing (I KNOW HOW OLD YOU GUYS ARE – DOO DAH, DOO DAH). He proceeded to place the newspaper article on our table and said “The Jig is up you’ve been exposed”. It looked like curtains for us but to our further surprise he smiled and dropped our usual order.
To say the least, from that moment on his tips jumped from a nickel to a dime.
Note: The local defensive driving poster for 1968 featured the ill-fated 1957 Chevy and was also placed at the main gate in Naden as a reminder of the consequences of drinking and driving.
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