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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
"It was a different time."

That's a recurring theme when you get City Taxi driver Andy Hrstic talking about Yellowknife as it was 43 years ago, when he first moved here.

Andy Hrstic, who first moved to Yellowknife 43 years ago, shows the home on Morrison Dr. where he used to play poker with former mayor Fred Henne in the 1970s on Monday. - Kevin Allerston/NNSL photo

"Basically, I was looking for a better life," said Hrstic, who left Croatia, the former Yugoslavia, for Canada in March 1966.

He said he had been working as a miner in Sudbury, Ont., and when a friend of his at the mine left for Yellowknife, he soon followed suit to work at Giant Mine at age 20 in 1968.

"Yellowknife was a small place at the time, a little over 3,000 people, and I kind of liked the friendliness of the place, and there was a lot of work and an easy pace of life," said Hrstic.

Among his first experiences in Yellowknife was a tour around town with a friend of his, one he describes as "a little scary."

"A friend took me for a drive basically towards Dettah, and so, when he told me I was in the middle of the lake, I couldn't believe it," said Hrstic through laughter.

He worked at Giant Mine, first as a mill helper, and then as a roaster, separating the gold from ore.

"Once a year we used to clean those roasters and man alive, that was really something else," he said.

"We used to basically go in there with coveralls and plastic gloves and a piece of tissue over the mouth and go inside there, and the pure arsenic goes up to your waist to push the arsenic to a hatch in the middle and get it ready for storage underneath the ground," said Hrstic.

"But those were different days, and the rest of the dust basically used to be hosed down, and there was a ditch that went around the complex, and it used to go straight to the lake."

He recalls that at the time, the tallest building in town was the Arthur Laing Building, and that for years the intersection at Franklin and 50 St. was the only traffic light in town. One of his favorite memories is buying a sports car at the Frame and Perkins Ford Dealership, where Yellowknifer is today.

"That was the showroom, where the newsroom is, I still remember picking up my pride and joy, Cobra Torino, 1970," said Hrstic.

He said a popular pastime was gambling, often five-card low-ball poker. He played with many Yellowknifers, including the city's mayor at the time, Fred Henne. In one instance, when they were playing at 34 Morrison Drive in Old Town, a slip of the hand showed him one of Henne's cards. On that hand, Henne had bet $1,000 – a lot of money for 1976 – and Hrstic called the bet.

"And all hell broke loose after that, because Fred said, 'How the hell could you call?' and I said 'How the hell could you bet?'"

"It was a different time," he said of playing poker with the mayor.

Hrstic said he's impressed with how the city has grown, and said he still considers Yellowknife one of the friendliest communities he's seen.

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