Obituary for Hardev Singh "Vic" Gill

Life Story for Hardev Singh "Vic" Gill

Hardev Singh Gill “Vic” August 2, 1939 – August 22, 2016

For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Rod or as dad would put it, his number two son; I am the middle of his three boys.

I can’t possibly sum up our father’s 77 years of his life but I hope by the end of this you will have a bit better of an understanding of who he was.

Hardev Singh Gill or Vic as everyone knew him was born August 2, 1939 at the Royal Columbian Hospital in New Westminster. Well…. actually…. he was born August 4th but when his father went to register dad for his birth certificate, months later, grandpa got the date wrong and put down August 2nd instead of the 4th. Dad was actually 2 days younger than he legally was.

Dad was raised in Queensborough for the first ten years of his life with his younger twin brothers Joe and Johnny until in 1949 when his father moved them to 711 Blue Mountain Street in Coquitlam where the family had bought five acres and our grandfather had built a house over the course of three years. When they moved in they started a small farm where they had a bunch of chickens and one cow. For the guys in blue at the back of the church, my grandfather was the original Egg Cartel in Coquitlam. My dad and his brothers all had chores around the family farm and part of dad’s responsibilities were that after school he had to walk the cow down the side of the road to feed it. Well, one day after walking and feeding the cow dad decided to ride the cow home. He got up on top and proceeded to shoo it all the way home. My grandfather caught dad riding the cow and ………. Well let’s just say that there was no more riding the cow after that.

Dad went to Mountain View Elementary School which was just down the road from where they lived and when he was older he played Lacrosse at the Smith box which is still in there today. Back in those days they didn’t have proper lacrosse pads and I remember dad telling me that they used to tape magazines to their arms for slash-guards. The lacrosse box itself had chicken wire above the boards and not chain-link like today so if you got checked up against them, you could get cut by the wire. During games, if you got to far behind and you knew that you couldn’t win, you started a fight. The reason behind this was that if there was a big enough fight the referee would stop the game and it would be called it a tie. My understanding is that dad’s Lacrosse team had a lot of tie games.

Dad’s mother passed away in her early thirties when dad was a teenager. Grandpa remarried and dad ended up with three more brothers, Robin, Paul and Peter. Six boys all in the same house…… Six GILL boys all in the same house. Wow… I don’t know how they did it.
Dad went to high school at Como Lake high and graduated in 1957. For his grad, dad wanted to drive grandpa’s Ford which was a big deal in those days but the problem was that grandpa had put his car in the ditch (I think in the winter before) and wrecked the body and the only way that dad was going to be able to drive his father’s car to grad was if the car got fixed. Grandpa and dad hatched a plan. The two of them drove to Seattle and picked up a used body and towed it all the way home on a trailer. Grandpa bought a socket set and a few wrenches and dad went to work tirelessly working on his father’s car. Dad told me that he remembers lying on the ground behind the old house on Blue Mountain in the pouring rain with the water running down his back wrenching on that car, changing the entire body over on to it to get it ready for prom. Dad completed all of the work in time and was able to drive the car to graduation. Grandpa also drove the car for years without an issue.

Our grandfather wanted his sons to follow more of the educational path rather than the sports path so after high school dad was registered at UBC…. Where he majored in Football and Basketball. His grades weren’t quite up to par so let’s just say that he wasn’t asked to come back for year two. I remember dad telling me that UBC was the only gym where he could dunk a basketball.

During the summers when dad was out of school and a period of time after university dad work at sawmills in port Alberni as well as his uncle Herman’s mill in Mission where he worked 64 hours a week on the “green chain” pulling double shifts Tuesday through Thursday saving as much money as he could for his cars. Dad, at one time, also worked at Lakeview Chrysler in New Westminster, where he was the Lot boy.

Dad loved playing basketball but after high school he couldn’t find anywhere to play and he found out that there was a group who played in the church gym. He found out that in order to play there that you had to be a member of the CYO (the Catholic Youth Organization), so he went and talked to the priest and joined the group. The CYO also put on dances and at one of the dances he was sitting with his a friend who also happened to be mom’s cousin. They were sitting down chatting, probably about cars, when my mother walked in with another girl and dad said to his friend “do you know who that is”? Well yes I do. That’s my cousin Dolores Rivard and her sister Denise. Well dad with his smooth talking way about him…….. okay, maybe not so smooth…. Anyway, he went over and introduced himself and soon had mom convinced that they should go out on a date. How could mom say no besides….. dad looked a bit like Elvis Presley.

Dad picked mom up for their first date in his fancy blue 46 Ford Coupe with big slicks in the back and a raked front end. They dated for about a year and a half and then were married on Aug 5th, 1961 and moved into the house next door to grandpa’s house where they lived for 3 years.
While living on Blue Mountain and before any of us kids were born the phone would occasional ring what always seemed to be the middle of the night. It would be one of dad’s brothers. Hey Vic, my car broke down can you come and…… and dad would get up and go help his brothers to fix or at least get their cars home. One time in particular, Uncle Johnny had borrowed a car from a friend for a second date with this beautiful girl, my aunty Caroline. Well, he was coming back from Vancouver driving on Highway 1 and BOOM the car broke an axle. Uncle Johnny had to hike to the nearest phone (because there were no cell phones back then) and called dad. I’m sure it went something like this. “Hey Vic, its Johnny. I know it’s late but I’m out on a date and the car that I borrowed broke down. Can you come and help me out?” Dad didn’t hesitate. He got out of bed, got dressed, jumped in his Volkswagen Beetle and came to his brother’s aid. He picked them both up and drove them to his house where he lent Uncle Johnny the car to get his date home. I’m not sure if my aunt made it home on time but it seems that story worked out alright. I’m also told that this was the first time that my aunt ever met my dad.

In 1961 mom and dad purchased land off of our grandfather and dad built their first home at 975 Smith. When they were building the house the district of Coquitlam actually had to push in a road from Blue Mountain to where the corner of Smith and Colinet are today so mom and dad could access the property and put in a driveway; that house is still standing today.

In August 1964, my brother Vic was born. Three years later in 1967, I came along and in 1970 Dave was born. I remember building snowmen in the front yard after the snow came in those early years, ice skating on Como Lake…. When was the last time anyone remembers skating on Como Lake? Dad also built a cabin on Burke Mountain in 1969 where we would spend what seemed like every weekend in the winter. The wintertime was truly awesome as a kid.

Every summer, mom and dad would plan our holidays, which were at least two weeks long. We drove and camped all around BC, Alberta and most of the western portion of the US, even driving right down to the US/ Mexico border where we walked across to Tijuana to go shopping for the day.

In 1973, mom and dad bought property out in the middle of nowhere,… north east Coquitlam, and built their second home. Our family moved in December of that year and the house wasn’t complete yet. I remember watching a black and white TV in the dining room while sitting on chairs from the kitchen. The floor was still plywood and the basement wasn’t finished either but we didn’t care. It was my parents dream home and we had 8 acres to run around and play on.

In case you didn’t know, dad was a pretty handy guy. He built Vic and I mini-bikes when we were kids, Dave was too young so he missed out on those. Dad built a dune buggy for hunting and I can’t count how many trailers of all sizes. When I bought my first car, a Volkswagen bug, dad had four engines and three transmissions in the garage in bits and pieces so my choice was an easy one for me. Dad showed me how to fix the little things that needed repairs like the brakes and shocks. Dad helped me turn that Volkswagen into a Baja Bug complete with a cut a rolled front end, engine, transmission and rear axle swap – dad taught it all to me. He also fixed Vic’s Datsun pick-up after a little woopsie on Lougheed Highway, rebuilt the top end of the engine on Vic’s Ford EXP after it overheated and warped the head, and he helped both Dave and I put lift kits on our 90s Toyota pick-ups. He really could do it all. Dad told me that when he was younger, his brothers would call him asking for vehicle advice or to help out with their vehicles. I remember uncle Robin coming to the house to work on his Datsun 240 z because dad had all the tools, uncle Paul coming to repair the brakes on his on his car and uncle Pete coming to work on the engine of the same Datsun 240 that got passed down to him.

Did I already say that dad could do it all, he really could…. and did. He engineered and built all kinds of parts, trailers, engine lifts and stands, bumpers, winch mounts and the front end loader on his farm tractor that still works like new today. There were also countless other pieces and parts as well. He always said “you can pay someone else to do the work for you but next time something breaks you’ll just have to pay again or you can learn how to fix it yourself and save the money.” Dad’s ability to design, build and fix things was just amazing. There wasn’t anything that he couldn’t fix.

Our dad was not an impulsive person but he did make one impulsive purchase in his life and most likely only one. A family friend, Rene Gamache, took dad out snowmobiling one day on Burke Mountain and before the end of the week dad bought himself an OMC Snow cruiser. It had 16 neck-braking horse-power and weighed as much as my first car. Dad could load mom and Dave onto the snowmobile seat with him and still pull a trailer with supplies for a weekend along with Vic and I all the way to the cabin.

A little later he bought a Yamaha with a 340 cc engine in it so mom could have her own sled and later, dad acquired another Yamaha from uncle Robin and then he sold his Snow Cruiser. We ran on the two Yamahas for forever… well past their prime and when they finally weren’t working as good as they should, dad being who he was, bought two brand new motors from Saskatchewan, had them shipped out and then he engineered the new engines to fit into the fifteen year old sleds. The engines were physically larger than the originals and stuck out from under the handlebars towards where the rider sat. The original Yamaha engines also came with two carburetors and dad didn’t like that so he modified the intake on the new engine to only use one carburetor. Now I might be losing a few people in telling this story so I’ll give you a bit of a comparison. Putting those engines in the old snowmobiles is like taking a ‘85 Hyundai Pony and jamming a small block Chevy into it. It can be done but it’s not pretty but boy did those sleds ever go after that.

Years later, Dad graduated to newer and easier sleds to ride but he always made at least one modification to them. He would take an old soup can and drill a couple of holes in it and them he would wire it to his exhaust pipe. You see, dad didn’t like cold beer so when he would go riding and he would get thirsty, he would pop a beer into the soup can, ride around for a little while and then stop and have his lukewarm beer or as he would put it “ room temperature beer”.

Just before dad married mom he was working Durand Machine Corporation and then moved over to Westcoast when it started. They had both been partially owned by the Sid Rooney and dad worked for him and his family for forty one years. I am told that he was probably the first employee of Westcoast. He was promoted to shop foreman at age 28 and he ran the shop like most managers did in the 60s and 70s; it was his way or the highway. He always took people at face-value though and gave everyone the benefit of the doubt…. The first time. If you didn’t work hard and get along with his right-hand man, Pete Conte, you were probably going to be down the road by the end of the week. Dad had most new workers figured out in the first two days but he always gave them at least a week to prove themselves; some worked out and some didn’t. If you worked for dad, you knew that you had to perform and it didn’t make a difference who you were or how long you had worked there. Everyone was treated the same and everyone had to earn their pay. Dad made some life-long friends there and the people who worked for the company and dad did so because they felt a sense of pride and ownership. Guys like, John Milner, Pete Conte, Andy MacElroy, Mike Jawanda, Jim Lam, Dan Winkler and Ken Wong. I know that there are others and I apologize if I missed a few but these were the guys who day in a day out worked their butts off for years…. For decades……for my father and the company.

Dad was labeled the East Indian Cowboy a guy who worked him in the later years at Westcoast – Brad Remillard. Brad said look, He drives a pick-up truck, wears a hat, listens to country music and likes guns and beer… he must be a cowboy. What Brad didn’t know was that dad was actually more of a cowboy than he knew. Not only did dad ride the family cow when he was a kid he also loved cowboy books and read every book that he could get his hands on and he also loved old westerns. Years ago dad told me that when he was younger and his father wasn’t at home that he took his father’s pistol out back of the house and put it over his arm just like in the western movies and pulled the trigger. The only problem is that in the westerns, no one really gets hurt. Well when dad pulled the trigger the flame came out of the end of the gun and burnt his forearm. He only shot that pistol once like that because it really hurt and my understanding is that grandpa never found out.

Anyone who knew our dad knew that he was big into hunting and fishing just like his father-in-law. Our family spent many weekends fishing and camping with our grandparents and one of our favorite places to go was Coquihalla Lake. We would drive up Friday night after dad got off work and drive the nasty gravel road from Hope all the way up to the lake. There was no such thing as the Coquihalla highway back then and the drive from Hope to the lake could take up to an hour and a half, not the 20 minutes that it takes today. We would stay at the Randall’s campground right on the lake and get up early in the morning to catch the best fish. In the evening, in our grandparent’s camper, the cards would be flying where a mean game of crib would be going on.

One time that we went up to the lake, it was just Dad, Vic and me, I think that it was a long weekend. Dad was helping Don Randall up on the roof of the new cabin that overlooked the big lake, it was beautiful cabin. The two of them were up on the roof putting the last of the sheet metal on and dad was pulling the sheets up on to the roof where Don could nail them down. Well, dad slipped on the metal roofing and came crashing down right onto the root of a tree and broke his heel. No one really knew that it was broken and so they wrapped it up and put ice on it and we went to bed that night. The next day, dad said that he hadn’t slept very well so it was decided that we would leave that day…. but dad couldn’t drive and Victor and I were still too young to drive. Don Randall’s daughter Sandi ended up driving dad’s van home. About two weeks later, dad was driving himself crazy and probably mom too so he decided that he would go back to work as soon as he could use his foot to operate the gas and brake pedal without too much pain. I think it only took another day or two and he was back at work on his crutches.

Mom and dad signed all three of us boys up for sports when we were kids something they encouraged us to do. During the season, Mom would head in one direction with Dave, Dad would end up taking me to my game and one of them would arrange a ride for Victor to get to his games. The following week they would switch it up so that they both got to see all of us play. When mom and dad’s grandkids started playing sports dad wanted to know who was playing, when and where and again mom and dad were fixtures in the arenas only this time, they didn’t have to worry about driving the kids all over the lower mainland.

When Dave and I built our houses on mom and dad’s property dad was there almost every day supervising, giving building advice and helping out where he could. He made a rebar fixture to bend rebar for the concrete forms, moved the bundles of wood closer to the houses with his farm tractor and graded the driveway. By the way, dad’s tractor which our grandfather originally owned is now 55 years old. Dad kept it going for all of these years and it still runs almost like new and we still have all of the owner’s manuals that came with the tractor when it was new.

Dad lived in Coquitlam for 67 years and he loved the city. Our parents have been living in this parish and coming to Our Lady of the Assumption church for 43 years. For the last number of years when dad would come to church he would say to mom “I’m going to pray for my brothers, my children and my grandchildren.” He constantly prayed for peace and harmony in the family and for the safety of his grandchildren.

The last weekend that I got to spend time with dad was when he and mom came down to our place in Birch Bay; it was the first weekend in August. He and mom came down and we celebrated dad’s 77th birthday and mom and dad’s 55th wedding anniversary along with Dave and his family. Unfortunately, Vic and Rucherit were unable to make it that weekend. We had lots of laughs, food and even a couple of beer. Dad was even able to catch up with an old friend from Durand, Dennis Johnson who he hadn’t seen since he retired 16 years ago. On the Saturday night we took mom and dad to Skagit Speedway which reminded me of when they used to take the three of us to Langley Speedway as kids. It was a great weekend and I know that dad loved every minute of it.

We planned to have mom and dad come back down to our place with my Aunt Georgette and Uncle Pat on August 21st, the day before dad passed away, but dad wasn’t feeling very good so he told mom to go without him. Just before they left the house that morning dad called Uncle Pat into the back room where he was watching TV. He said “Pat when you come home tonight, I’m going to show you my new vehicle that I bought” and before dad could say any more uncle Pat said “you’re going to show me your new Ford F150 pick-up”? Well dad was dumbfounded. He always thought that his brother-in-law didn’t really know very much about vehicles but we think that uncle Pat was just holding out on dad all these years to make him feel better. Unfortunately, dad never did get to show Uncle Pat his truck but he sure did like his new Ford pick-up that he bought on his 77th birthday just a few weeks ago.

Dad passed away, Monday August 22nd at 3:30 in the morning. He will be sorely missed by his family and everyone else who was close to him. Dad is back with his parents, his mother-in-law and his favorite hunting and fishing partner, grandpa Rivard, who I know that dad has sorely missed for the past 15 years. I can picture dad and grandpa Rivard right now. They’re hunting in the middle of nowhere laughing, joking and telling tall tales, having a great time…. Dad, if you don’t mind. Please don’t shoot all the moose, save a couple for the rest of us.