Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - Born in New York, he chose Canada. Another two years passed before he arrived on a remote island off the West Coast. Paul Kirmmse remembers Cortes Island in 1971.“I originally came here in January of ’71, looking for land. A guy gave me a job for the summer, beginning in April, serving coffee to the fishers and the loggers. There was a little cafe just above Mansons Lagoon, across from used to be the Barton store - which I understand is now the Cortes Island Museum. It was drug up the road and put in place to become the museum,” he says. Kirmmse tried a variety of jobs that summer. He bailed hay for Ken Hansen, on what has since become Linnaea Farm. Jack Parry hired him to bag oysters, in the era before there were oyster leases or trays.In the podcast above he talks about the beginnings of Cortes Island's oyster's business as well as anecdotes from Mansons Landing, Squirrel Cove and Whaletown.