Tom Byrne: From Dublin to Dawson City
A Life Lived Following His Own Heart
There are strange things done
in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold:
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge
of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
- Robert Service [1874-1958]
By CATHOLINE BUTLER
VANCOUVER - The great Robert Service was a people's poet. "The only society I like," he once said, "is that which is rough and tough - and the tougher the better. That's where you get down to bedrock and meet human people." Service found that kind of society in the Yukon gold rush, and he immortalized it.
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TOM BYRNE at the Robert Service cabin in Dawson City where he has been presenting his show based on the poetry of Robert Service for the past 27 years.
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Robert Service will never be forgotten as long as Dublin-born actor Tom Byrne is alive. Tom Byrne is known as the "Official Bard of the Yukon." Every summer from June to September, you can see and hear Tom at the Westmark Hotel in Dawson City, where he does a one and a half hour show on the life and times of Robert Service. Tom has been doing this show for the past 27 years and has been a great boon to the tourist industry in Dawson City.
Tom Byrne is an interesting character himself. He blazed his own trail and the list of his achievements is enormous. One fact which may have been forgotten over the years, is that Tom was the driving force and main organizer of the original St. Patrick's Day parade held in Vancouver between 1973 and 1976.
The parade route started at Thurlow and Robson Streets and continued straight down West Georgia Street into Gastown to finish at the world-famous Gassy Jack landmark. Thousands of local people came out and it is estimated that as many as 30,000 people lined the parade route.
Along with his partner Terry Turner, Tom financed, promoted, and produced four outstanding world-class events. They organized everything from media coverage to arranging floats, to all the permits and legal obligations with City Hall.
Bill Forbes was the Grand Marshal along with his faithful Irish wolfhound Cuchulain. Section Marshals at the parade were, Tom Butler, Bill Connon, Frank Horan, Tom Gibbons, Frank Lochary, Jim Haughty. They looked after the floats, marchers and bands.
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THE LATE Bill Forbes was the parade Grand Marshal. He is shown here with his faithful wolfhound Cuchulain
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The St. Patrick's Day parade was the second largest in Vancouver at the time behind the annual PNE parade, and there was a long list of dignitaries who participated. Although Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau was unable to attend, he appointed Art Lee Vancouver's member of Parliament to represent him. Also from the Federal Government was Margaret Mitchell representing the NDP.
From the Provincial Government were Premier Dave Barrett and the Attorney General Alex MacDonald. Vancouver Mayor Art Phillips and Burnaby Mayor Tom Constable were also present.
An enormous stage was set up right in the middle of Gastown and all the Irish bands in town took turns performing. The event was covered by all the television stations and radio station CKNW who set up a live booth right on the site.
Jimmy Clark from The Blarney Stone, Ray and Helen Carton from the Harp and Heather, and Bruce Judd from Paddy's, along with Violet Moore and her Irish dancers, all donated entertainment to perform on the street stages.
It was a great financial success to all the stores along the streets of Gastown and there were line-ups down the block at every club and restaurant in the area. At the time, there was also The Spinning Wheel, the Pig and Whistle, and the Medieval Inn - all were jammed packed.
Everybody, including the dignitaries, police pipe bands, fire department band, police motorcycle drill squad, and so on, ended up in The Blarney Stone and a great time was had by all.
Tom recently sat down to talk to The Celtic Connection about the parade and the Irish community in Vancouver, his life in the theatre in Dublin, and how he found his way to the Yukon to recite the poetry of Robert Service.
"I got a taste for the grease paint, when I attended the Christian Brothers school in Dublin," Tom said, "every year they held an opera that I would take part in. It would be held at either The Gaiety, The Royal, or The Gate theatres. It was a big production and after that I started doing a bit of amateur theatre in Dublin."
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TOM BYRNE on stage at The Blarney Stone with a First Nations chief in full regalia, following the St. Patrick's Day parade.
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After the Second World War, Tom moved to England where he studied acting at The Lambert Academy of Dramatic Art. Following his schooling, he worked around England at various theatres, and he said, "that's where you learn at lot."
"You have to be able to build the sets, paint the sets and make the props...you have to do everything." It was while Tom was directing a play that he met his wife Betty, who was a tap dancing teacher. Eventually, Tom persuaded Betty to also get into acting and they worked together.
In 1956, Tom and his family moved to Vancouver where he got a job working with the Dominion Bridge Company, the contractors who were building the Ironworkers Memorial Second Narrows Bridge in Vancouver.
Call it Irish luck but on June 17, 1958, the day several spans of the new bridge collapsed, Byrne was working at the plant on Boundary Road and his life was spared. Seventy-nine workers plunged 30 metres into the water.
Eighteen were killed either instantly or shortly thereafter, possibly drowned by their heavy tool belts and many more injured. Tom remembers the devastation saying, "it was a very sad day."
Tom's first love was always the stage and he missed that atmosphere when he moved from England. He recalls, "I really missed the theatre," he recalls. "When we moved here, the Freddy Wood Theatre at the University of British Columbia was the only professional theatre company and there was no full-time work in the theatre.
"I eventually met, Pat Warren and Babs McConville and we used to get together after mass and all go for breakfast. Babs was a real trooper, she was not only a wonderful person but like a mother to us all. Burnaby had a little theatre and Leo and Paddy Burns and Pat Warren asked me to come along and work with their plays.
"We eventually decided to start our own theatre company, which we called The Emerald Players and we put on some fantastic plays. Everything had to be perfection. We built the street scenes and you'd think you were walking down the street. We won all sorts of awards.
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VANCOUVER'S Gastown was a sea of people at the first St. Patrick's Day parade back in 1973. Tom Byrne was the man behind it all, organizing and financing it almost single handedly.
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"The Arts Club Theatre was another theatre that Bill Forbes and I got started, it was a club then on Pender Street. Raymond Hall, who was an English writer at the Arts Club Theatre wrote a play called Cinderella, I played the ugly sister and Margaret Forbes (Bill's wife) was also in the play. We had a great time doing it.
"Eventually an old church on Seymour Street became available and we moved in there and Doctor Rice and I worked day and night fixing it up. Doctor Rice was a heart specialist and the first doctor to make a mechanical heart at St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver.
"When you work in theatre, you have to have a sideline or you'd starve. I managed to get into painting and decorating, so that I would always have something to fall back on and I did interior painting contracting on my own.
"When a job came up in the Arctic, in the Northwest Territories, to take over the painting of 14 different settlements, I applied for the job. It involved flying in a small plane from one job to the other and it sounded great, since I'd always wanted to see the Arctic."
It was while working on the job in the Northwest Territories that Byrne almost perished from the cold after his car ran out of gas on the Dempster Highway. "In desperation, I said a little prayer," Tom said, "I said, 'God are you going to sit up there and let me die or are you going to help me?'
"Two or three hours passed and the next thing, I heard a motor and lights and low and behold, it was a taxi. And as we were almost into Inuvik, didn't the taxi run out of gas. I thought Holy God what's going to happen now. Luckily two mounties came along and picked us up and dropped us off in the town and I went into the legion and had a large whiskey.
"I stayed in the Arctic for nearly three years but I couldn't keep away from the theatre. So, I started a theatre company in Inuvik. This is the most northerly theatre that's ever been built in Canada. We put on plays and people loved the theatre. They heard about our plays in Dawson City, Yukon, and asked if we would put a show on there since they were presenting an International Drama Festival with participants from all over the world.
"We put on the play Riders to the Sea, which is a classic Irish play. I thought it would be appropriate as it happens on the Aran Islands, and, of course, in the Arctic they have the same kind of treacherous sea.
" It turned out to be a great success. We got the best director, play and set...one after the other. I was invited back to Dawson City the next year, and since Robert Service wrote all of his famous poems there, I decided to give them Robert Service.
"The show was such a success that the Director of the Klondike Business Association contacted me and asked if I would come back to Dawson and do my Robert Service show on a permanent basis as they saw this show as a great boon to tourism.
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JIMMY and Pat Clark of The Blarney Stone is shown above with his treasured vintage car and some of the servers from the pub
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"I thought that was a great idea, so I packed up my job and went back to the theatre, where I belonged. It was then that I decided to write a show on Robert Service, which I've been doing ever since."'
The Arctic still holds magic and mystery for many and while it may seem isolated and distant, Tom has left his mark on the region and his work in Dawson City has attracted attention from far and wide.
Publications such as The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and National Geographic have written articles remarking his performance as Robert Service. Tom has also been profiled on CBC's Fifth Estate, on Much Music and in the book Famous Canadians.
Many famous people have also travelled to the North to see Tom Byrne perform his Robert Service show in Dawson City over the years, including such luminaries as Shirley Temple, Jimmy Stewart and Marlin Brando. Indeed, Mary Lou Whitney Vanderbilt, of the famous Vanderbilt family, flew in from New York City especially to see the show.
Tom Byrne is not only writing a book about his fascinating life experiences...he is writing three books. One about his life in Ireland, the other about his life in Vancouver, and another about his ongoing life in the Yukon.
Tom Byrne's Robert Service Show is available on DVD, double and single CD and videos. He is also available for Robert Service readings from October to May...before he heads back to the Yukon for another season.
To purchase the DVD, CD or video, or for information on bookings for Robert Service readings, call Christine Ralfs at (604) 723-0479, or e-mail: cralfs@shaw.ca.
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