The Tupper Boys

About the Book

In the 1930's, when Hitler's Nazi party was growing in Germany, it also gained popularity in the Sudetenland, inhabited by a German-speaking population that had been added to Czechoslovakia in 1919. A minority group, the Social Democrats, became active in opposing that party. When Britain's Neville Chamberlain ceded the area to Germany in 1938 as the "Price for Peace," these people were in danger of incarceration or even execution. Of those who escaped, a number were able to immigrate to Canada.

Although none of them had any training or experience in agriculture, being office or factory workers in towns or cities of central Europe, they were admitted to Canada providing that they become farmers. A group of about 518 ranging in age from 1 month to 54 years were brought to Tupper, BC, in the Peace River District, under the supervision of the Canadian Colonization Association, a subsidiary of the Canadian Pacific Railway, to develop their own farms out of a virtual wilderness. This book is the story of their first five years there.

About the Author

The author was born in 1931 in the Sudeten area of what was then Czechoslovakia where he completed grade one in a German speaking school. Shortly after starting grade two the family had to flee when their home was shot at and had a hand grenade thrown at it by Nazi sympathizers because his father was a known anti-Nazi activist. After a brief stay in Bohemia, where he attended a Czech speaking school, the family escaped to Denmark where he completed Grade 2 in a Danish school.

In June, 1939, the family immigrated to Canada with some 518 others to begin farming in the then sparsely populated Peace River Block in British Columbia. He lived with his parents on the farm, assisting with the jobs of building it up from nothing in the bush till he finished grade 8 at the local rural school, then finished High School at Notre Dame boarding school in Dawson Creek. After obtaining his BA and completing the teacher Training program and later an Med at the University of British Columbia, he returned to Dawson Creek in 1955. He taught for 33 years, also serving in various administrative positions. The couple have one son, Thomas, now a musician in Edmonton. Walter retired in 1988 and still lives with his wife in the house they built in 1956. He enjoys gardening and plays tenor sax with the community band. He was and still is an active member of the community having served, among other things, as Chairman of the Library Board, President of the Music Festival, President of the Concert Society, President and Division Lt. Gov. of the local Kiwanis Club. He is presently a volunteer with the South Peace Historical Society and Archives.