Michele LeTourneau
Northern News Services

NNSL (Feb 22/99) - Betty Ann Gillespie was raised in the small farming community of Oyen, Alta., and came to Yellowknife 16 years ago.

When she leaves Yellowknife in a few weeks, a big chapter in the history of city will leave with her. Sixteen years is a long time, especially when most of those years were spent working in the city's world-renown landmark, The Gold Range Hotel.

Gillespie remembers "Margaret Thrasher," "Dan the Man with the air guitar," among many, many others who have passed through the Strange Range, as it is sometimes known.

But there's more to Betty Ann than her memories of the years spent catering to the needs of the bar's patrons. The woman who sat across from me at a table in The Diner is a gutsy, no-nonsense woman with a dream on her mind.

Yklife: What's taking you away?

Gillespie: Time to move on. I need a new adventure.

Yklife: Where are you headed?

Gillespie: I'm headed down to Alberta for a while. I want to go to school, possibly get some retraining. And then... I plan on heading down to Central or South America.

Yklife: Are you serious? That's an adventure!

Gillespie: I've always had that dream -- of living in the Caribbean, or in the Mediterranean. Someday. My own little bar. On a beach or something. It's just time to go and try and do it. If it doesn't work...

Yklife: You'll have tried it.

Gillespie: I'll have tried it. I can always come home.

Yklife: You've worked at the Range the whole time you've been here?

Gillespie: I've worked for Sam -- other than a little over a year -- I've worked for him the whole time. Cause I was gone, I went to Europe for six months and then one other time I took a leave of absence for about six months.

Yklife: Where in Europe?

Gillespie: I was in England, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Italy, Greece.

Yklife: Wow! You've got the travel bug.

Gillespie: Oh yeah. Always have had.

Yklife: Working at the Range that whole time, you must have seen some pretty... interesting... things go on.

Gillespie: Oh yeah!

Yklife: What would be the most... extreme example?

(Betty Ann groans loudly in a here-we-go-again sort of way.)

Gillespie: People always ask that question and there's just so many. It's hard to pick on any one.

Yklife: OK, we'll skip that... how about the most memorable for you?

Gillespie: I have so many of them. The majority of them really good memories.

Yklife: I have a feeling this place is known across Canada, that lots of people have memories...

Gillespie: Across Canada, across the States, and in Europe.

Yklife: (I scoff.) Really.

(Betty Ann recounts a story of being recognized in Jamaica as a waitress from the Gold Range.)

Gillespie: It's just got a character and charisma all its own. And you can be your own self in there. We don't like phony people. Years and years ago someone summed it up: we may not have a lot of class but we've got tons of character. It's reputation is a lot worse than it really is. We've people phoning us. They don't phone information. They phone us, they phone Mary for the bingos, the phone us for phone numbers, they phone us if they're looking for people to go to work. That is just one of the things we put up with.

Yklife: How about Yellowknife, I mean 16 years...

Gillespie: It's a great place. I love it. Some of the best people in the world are up here. And I'm really gonna miss it.

Yklife: Has it changed much?

Gillespie: When I first came up here it was a really, really small town country feeling, which I really enjoyed -- growing up on the farm. Those were the days when you never locked your doors. Everybody knew everybody -- take you an hour to get to the post office. And it's still friendly that way. You know, we're like any other town. Growing pains, the high rises, the crime. It just goes hand in hand. And it just seems more prevalent (the crime) 'cause we know everybody here. It has changed a lot. I notice, in the years, there's a lot of apathy. There isn't the community spirit that there used to be.

Yklife: Is that because it's a "city" now?

Gillespie: That could be the answer. I don't know what it is. It's just an apathy. And nobody really cares. They all just sit back and complain but they don't want to do anything about it.

Yklife: How about family? Have you ever married? That sort of thing?

Gillespie: Nope. My family's up here. I have 400 or 500 hundred kids in the bar, who I have to babysit all the time.

Yklife: Mother to everybody!

Gillespie: Basically. (She laughs) No. This is the place closest to home after I left home. I consider it home. I have a younger brother down south, who actually just phoned the other day. They're having their first child so he's really, really excited. And he wants me to hang around. And I'm on medical leave so...

Yklife: You're sick?

Gillespie: Chronic carpal tunnel.

Yklife: And that's from carrying, at work?

Gillespie: Carrying, lifting, constantly. And the smoke and everything. It's just getting to me. Not good for my health.

Yklife: So you want to go down and open a little bar?

Gillespie: Yeah. A 10- or 20-seat bar on the beach. Eventually a house with three or four rooms I can rent out. Nothing too big. I'm tired of babysitting.

Yklife: Quiet life?

Gillespie: The nice quiet life I want. And if it doesn't get done, I have nobody to blame but myself. And maybe one other person. I'm just... tired of babysitting.

Yklife: Any place in particular? You've been down there right?

Gillespie: I've been down to the Caribbean, and to parts of Central America, and parts of South America. I'm buying a Jeep or a 4 X 4 and I'm just going to start driving and if I like a place I'll stay for a while. And if I don't like it, I'll move on.

Yklife: Are you afraid at all -- of jumping into the unknown like that?

Gillespie: No.

Yklife: Excited?

Gillespie: Oh yeah. Very excited. I did that when I was in Europe. I just travelled. I didn't have any set plans. (She laughs, stops, and considers for a moment.) It's a little bit scary... It's a little bit scary leaving a job at this time in my life. After being here for so long, after being basically pretty secure, and just taking off but...

Yklife: But you gotta do it.

Gillespie: You gotta do it.

Yklife: How old are you?

Gillespie: I'll be 43. It's a birthday present to myself.

(Betty Ann tells me her birthday, but makes me promise not to print it. She's afraid of revenge at the bar. We have a laugh at what they might do to her. Well deserved? She doesn't go into it.)

Gillespie: On the whole, it's a great place anyway. And the people are good in there. They just stick together.

Yklife: Look out for each other?

Gillespie: Look out for each other. I'm not afraid. I bounce in there. And if I have a problem... well, there's still quite a bit of that old chivalry around that you don't see in a lot of other places.

Yklife: So what happened a little while ago -- the stabbing -- is that an anomaly?

Gillespie: It's not usual and it did not happen in the bar. It did not happen in the bar. At all. It was a couple of winos fighting over a bottle outside and Albert didn't even realize that he got stabbed and he wandered in. I mean, this is a home away from home. It's everybody's home. We had people come in and celebrate their 75th wedding anniversary in the bar. Just last year. We had balloons and champagne for them and banners on the wall. That's where they wanted to celebrate it. It's a neat bar. We've had a lot of people ask us why we would put up with it. And I don't know, it's just kind of pride I guess. If you can work there you can work anywhere. And the people you get to see... We get more celebrities through that joint...

Yklife: Who for example?

Gillespie: Let's see... Lou Diamond Phillips was in, just off the top of my head. Not that I think he's any big celebrity. All the hockey stars have been in there. We've had other premiers come in. Anybody that's anybody basically, when they're in town, they do come in. What's her face there, from England, they didn't come in. But I'm pretty sure some of their entourage were in there.

Yklife: You don't mean?

Gillespie: Yeah, the Queen was over here. In fact, we thought Philip might pop in for a little jam. But no, there were a few from their entourage that were in there. It's a meeting point. You can have one little wino over there in the corner with his dirty old street clothes and a lawyer sitting over there with a $1,000 suit on.

(Here Betty Ann tells me of some notables she's had to throw out. The list is impressive.)

Gillespie: They all get treated the same.