Residential school survivor displays hundreds of toy trucks to heal lost childhood
As he walks forward along the river, Gib thinks back on his childhood dream.
“I wish I was a truck driver,” he says before moving his hand like he’s holding a pencil. “I used to sketch trucks. Free hand. By myself.”
Gib started drawing them when he was about six, when he began attending the Kuper Island residential school. His wife Loretta says they weren’t allowed toy trucks there.
“He was putting [his truck drawings] on his wall,” Loretta says. “Because he couldn’t play with them, him and the other students.”
The truck pictures were Gib’s gifts to the other kids in lieu of the real thing until he found, during his decade at the residential school, that he’d lost the ability to draw altogether.
“I tried so hard to bring it back,” Gib says. “But the abuse, they really pushed it away.”
Gib says he hasn’t drawn since.
Instead, he’s focused on creating a family with Loretta. They’ve been married 46 years and Gib ensured that their six children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren had countless toy trucks to play with.
“[The trucks] just start overflowing in the house,” Loretta laughs. “And I said [to Gib], ‘You’re going to have to do something!’”
“Hey! I got an idea!” Gib recalls thinking. “So I start building this fence.”
A small fence that, over the past 14 years, has expanded to hold a big collection. The three-level structure, where Allenby Road crosses the Cowichan River, features hundreds of toy vehicles of various sizes.
“It’s my hobby,” Gib says. “It’s my lost childhood.”
It’s also an opportunity to turn toys that he and Loretta buy at thrift stores and garage sales into gifts for those who ask. To give what Gib never got.
“It just makes him feel better to do this,” Loretta says, starting to cry. “I just love him so much and I know what he’s been through.”
She also knows that more than a place to store his toy trucks, Gib’s display has become a space to honour too many others’ unfulfilled dreams.
Gib says he thinks of the individual kids he went to school with a displays a specific vehicle for every one. There’s a tractor for the boy who wanted to be a farmer, a fire truck for the one who hoped to be a firefighter.
“Everything I put there was… to help them,” Gib says. “[Each truck], that’s a child.”
And the boy who once drew trucks to inspire hope is now the man who displays them to provide healing.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Police arrest 3 Indian nationals in killing of B.C. Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar
Three people have been arrested and charged in the killing of B.C. Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar – as authorities continue investigating potential connections to the Indian government.
Grandparents killed in wrong-way crash on Hwy. 401 identified
A 60-year-old man and a 55-year-old woman killed in a wrong-way crash on Highway 401 earlier this week have been identified by the Consulate General of India in Toronto.
Quebec man who threatened Trudeau, Legault online sentenced to 20 months in jail
A Quebec man who pleaded guilty to threatening Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier François Legault has been sentenced to 20 months in jail.
TD worst-case scenario more likely after drug money laundering allegations: analyst
TD Bank Group could be hit with more severe penalties than previously expected, says a banking analyst after a report that the investigation it faces in the U.S. is tied to laundering illicit fentanyl profits.
Canadian doctor concerned new weight-loss drug Wegovy may be used inappropriately
As Wegovy becomes available to Canadians starting Monday, a medical expert is cautioning patients wanting to use the drug to lose weight that no medication is a ''magic bullet,' and the new medication is meant particularly for people who meet certain criteria related to obesity and weight.
Biscuits with possible plastic pieces, metal found in ground pork: Here are the recalls for this week
Here are the latest recalls Canadians should watch out for, according to Health Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.
Britney Spears 'home and safe' after paramedics responded to an incident at the Chateau Marmont, source tells CNN
A source close to singer Britney Spears tells CNN that the pop star is 'home and safe' after she had a 'major fight' with her boyfriend on Wednesday night at the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood.
Local MP, MLA call on federal government to remove sunken vessel in Saint John River
An MP and an MLA are calling for the removal of a sunken vessel in the Saint John River.
Human remains found in rural Sask. possibly a decade old, RCMP say
RCMP say human remains found in a rural area in central Saskatchewan may have been there for a decade or more.