CHAPTER 10 
     
    
   
   
    
     LL/ew/Iyn’s factory 
     
    
   
   
    
     ane Llewellyn was the childhood friend of Muriel Allen 
     
     MacKenzie who came to Boughton Island every spring. 
     
     Muriel says that Jane’s arrival was a big annual event for her. When 
     
     interviewed in May of 2004, Jane, now Mrs. McQuarrie, recounted 
     
     lsland happenings that she remembers. She and Muriel were both 
     
     born in 1917, Muriel in January and Jane during the summer of that 
     
     year. Both were Islanders by adoption, Muriel born in Halifax, Nova 
     
     Scotia and Jane in Sturgeon, PEI, Jane‘s interview with me in May of 
     
     2004 attest to her clear memory. Her love for the ideal conditions for 
     
     a good, clean life there was very evident. Never did she see a sign of 
     
     drunkenness. She never heard any swearing or unseemly behavior. 
     
     Jane Llewellyn’s father owned a lobster factory on the North shore 
     
     of the island, just inside the cove formed by Boughton lsland sand spit. 
     
     The factory was very close to the edge of the bank and a ramp ran to 
     
     the shore. The lobsters moved from the boats to two-man carriers and 
     
     up the ramp to the factory. Inside was a huge furnace set right on the 
     
     ground attached to piping to the boilers. Great piles of wood had to be 
     
     readied before the season opened. 
     
    

    
     Jane’s family usually moved in before Easter. There was always 
     
     work to be done on fixing up the shanties, or the cookhouse. Operating 
     
     a packing plant at a remote location required a lot of planning. Many of 
     
     the boats and gear were owned directly by the factory operators. Dories 
     
     came in by train to Georgetown from Nova Scotia. An area was set aside 
     
     to work on the engines for the fishing boats, all part of the equipment 
     
     owned by the operator. Barrels of supplies from Georgetown were 
     
     “smacked” to the island throughout the season. A smack was a larger 
     
     engine-powered boat used to deliver supplies or in later years collect 
     
     lobsters from the boats on the lobster grounds. The supplies required to 
     
     house and feed two dozen or more plant workers and fishermen were 
     
     significant. Jane‘s mother ran the cookhouse and fed as many as 60. 
     
     Coupled with this was the fact that Georgetown was six miles away by 
     
     boat. In later years her father was bothered by visitors to the Island 
     
     during the off-season raiding his supplies. A large cook stove, weighing 
     
    
   
   
    
     hundreds of pounds was one of the casualties of the raiders. 
     
     BB