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Still fixing cars after all these years

Mike Warwaruk, the youngest of three children was born in Romania in 1932. Here is his brief story. Mike's father was born in Austria and his mother was born in Romania. His mother was the oldest of 10 children; she was actually a mail order bride.
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Mike Warwaruk poses for a photograph in front of the Little Prince train station at The Exploration Place.

Mike Warwaruk, the youngest of three children was born in Romania in 1932. Here is his brief story.

Mike's father was born in Austria and his mother was born in Romania. His mother was the oldest of 10 children; she was actually a mail order bride.

His parents and his two older siblings were living in Red Pass Junction when his mother decided, for reasons not really known, that she wanted to go home to Romania for a visit. She was seven months pregnant when she packed up her two children and left for Romania; Mike was born in Romania two months later. She eventually returned to Red Pass Junction with her three children.

Mike's father worked for the Canadian National Railway (CN Rail) at the Red Pass Junction Station which was originally built at the junction of the Grand Trunk Pacific and Canadian Northern Railway lines at Red Pass, B.C. Red Pass lies somewhere between Tete Jaune Cache and Jasper, Alberta; the Red Pass Junction Station was closed in the early 1980s.

The family lived in Red Pass until 1940 when his father eventually ended up in Chilliwack with CN Rail.

Mike said, "I graduated from Chilliwack Junior Senior High and I foolishly signed up for an apprenticeship as an autobody tradesman in 1950. I signed the apprenticeship contract and was paid 11 cents an hour because, as they explained it - they were teaching me the trade. I couldn't live on those wages so I quit the job and went to work in an auto body shop in Prince George.

"People I went to school with started their own auto body shop and they hired me so I left Chilliwack in 1952 and moved to Prince George. I was hired at $1 an hour and I thought that I had won the lottery.

"The automobile industry became a big thing at the time. They were being mass produced and everyone wanted a car. There were manufacturing jobs followed by autobody work.

"I worked for the Kallweit Autobody shop on Second and Dominion until I decided to join the RCMP. I qualified, signed a five-year contract and they sent me for my training at the Regina training depot in Regina, Saskatchewan.

"Going back to 1932: when my mother returned to Canada I was a new born baby. I entered Canada as a British subject because at the time Canada was just on the cusp of becoming a sovereign nation. To make a long story short I joined the RCMP as a British subject.

"I found out in a big hurry that the job was just not for me. The training was from 10-12 months long and after eight months I wanted to quit but I had the problem of a signed five-year contract. I was told that I had to serve it or buy it out. To buy it out would cost me $1,700 so I sold my car and used the money to buy out the contract.

"I went back to Prince George and worked for Shield Motor Products at the GM dealership. In 1957 I went to work at Prince George Motors, in 1960 I worked at Northgate Autobody and in 1971 I moved over to Schultz GM at the Pontiac dealership.

"I started my own company in 1975 as the owner and operator of Yellowhead Collision on Opie Crescent. I did a lot of work for the Insurance Corporation of BC (ICBC) and when that work slowly wandered off into the sunset I closed the company in 1984.

"I have fixed cars for the past 65 years. The only difference now, in my retirement, is that I don't get paid to do the work."

Mike met Victoria Marie Velestuk in 1953. Victoria was born in Broadview, Sask. She grew up and went to school in Vernon and Chilliwack and moved to Prince George in 1953. Prince George was booming and Victoria and a girlfriend decided to move to Prince George to make big money.

Mike said, "I ran into her downtown one day and she thought I was my brother Mike so she spoke to me. We got that all straightened out and we got married three years later.

"Victoria worked in the construction office for the Pacific Great Eastern Railway until the children started to arrive and then became a stay at home mom.

"We lived on Cuddie Crescent next to the potato farm owned by Harry Osborne in South Fort George. We were still living there when the area became known as the City of Prince George.

"We watched the construction of city hall, the fire hall and the many sports facilities. We loved to attend the hockey games at the coliseum and we knew who sat where. The city was small and we respected the unwritten rule that no one else sat in the seats of the regulars."

Mike and Victoria had three children; Michael (Beverly), Tracy Marie and Allison Catherine (Jeff) Taylor who in turn gave them two grandchildren and one great grandchild.

Mike said, "My wife loved her family and everything that went with it. Birthdays and special occasions were very important to her.

"Sadly, she passed away on December 28, 1999. I just want to say that she was the last person to be buried in Prince George on the last day of the last week of the last month of the last year of the last decade of the last full century."