Yellowknife (Jun 23/06) - Ted Allison remembers the early days when there were two hospitals, Yellowknife was only Old Town, and the gold mines hired talented fastball players to ensure a winning season.

It was 57 years since he first arrived in the city and on June 16, he returned.

"It's changed a million per cent," Allison says.

"I didn't recognize anything except Frame Lake and McNiven Beach - the old swimming hole."

His friends were some of Yellowknife's finest - with famous names like Dr. Bickford and Dr. and Mrs. Stanton.

His boss at Negus gold mine was the first magistrate, John G. McNiven, father of his best friend and fraternity brother, also named John McNiven, from the University of Alberta.

It was during the summers, when he was off school, that he and the young McNiven would come up to work in McNiven's gold mine.

He did this from 1949 to 1952.

"In those days, all the mines had their own baseball team - there was the town team, Giant Mine team, armed services team, and our mine, Negus."

Allison says all they did was work and play fastball. His team, called the Negus Hogans, were the champions.

His position was catcher, and Allison was even scouted by the Dodgers one summer to come to their training camp. He was then asked to sign on to the Little Rock Arkansas team for $3,000 a year.

"It was a lot of money back then," Allison says.

"But, I didn't think I'd get picked for the Dodgers."

He also tells a story of when he and his best friend took McNiven's sister Jane and the surveyor's daughter out to Tartan Rapids to go fishing.

"I looked up and I saw a big black bear between us and the girls," Allison says.

"So we grabbed the girls and got them in the canoe and were shoving off and the bear came in after us.

"I grabbed an axe and to my knowledge the bear is still wearing the axe to this day."

Allison says he imbedded the axe right in between the bear's eyes, and the four of them managed to escape.

Allison's time working underground as a miner was hard work.

They had two weeks in and two weeks off.

"I drilled, loaded, blasted and set the charges myself," Allison says.

He also shovelled all the ore into cars and hauled it away and dumped it after separating the gold from the extra rocks.

Allison and McNiven were pretty big men as a result of their time working in the gold mines.

"I went from 190 pounds to 235 or 245 pounds my first summer working," Allison says.

McNiven describes Allison and his friends as being wild, full of fun and crazy.

"Ted is still very smart and witty," McNiven says.

After his wild, days of youth in Yellowknife as a working student miner, Allison became a respectable dentist in Calgary.