Nanny and Grampy on their wedding day. |
My Nanny and Grampy lived in Wolfville on Highland Ave, for most of my childhood. They built that house and my mother and her siblings grew up in it. After they sold it when I was a teenager they turned the house into student housing for Acadia University. Well all the time they lived in that house they had a rhubarb patch in the backyard. It was a pretty big patch with lots of wonderful rhubarb that Nan used for pies, jams etc. Well every year, without fail, someone would come in the night once the rhubarb was ripe and rifle through the patch and take all they could carry. They never took it all, and always left some for Nanny and Grampy, but this happened year after year after year without fail. So much so that Nan had figured out when exactly they rhubarb thief would strike and set up a sting operation in the living room. The bay window faced the patch, so she figured she would stay up all night and watch the patch and finally be able to catch the rhubarb thief. So she lay in wait in the dark. Well she fell asleep and when she awoke in the morning, the rhubarb was gone! The thief had come and gone while she slept! She tried to stay up and catch them several years, but could never stay up long enough to catch them. The missing rhubarb continued until the year they sold the house and moved to Port Williams, and remained a mystery.
Shortly after moving into the new house my grandmother development dementia and went downhill at a fairly fast rate. She died six years ago never knowing who took the Rhubarb. So after laughing about this story with my mother on the weekend I said, "You know, now with the Internet and social networking, I wonder if we would ever be able to find out who that was." So here is my challenge to you: help me find who took the rhubarb. Obviously none of my family was ever upset over this, even my grandmother thought is was more funny then anything, and I remember laughing about it when it was happening. I would love love love to find out who was doing it, and kept my Nan on her toes all those years. So in order to do this I need you to tell your friends, post it online spread the word and lets see if this experiment works. I am doing this more to see the power of the Internet, and to satisfy our own curiosity so lets hope it works. I have heard of crazier things before! Here is the information you need to know;
- Nanny lived at 108 Highland Ave. in Wolfville, Nova Scotia
- Directly behind her house was the Basinview Apartment buildings.
- The house was White siding with a Burgundy trim.
- The rhubarb went missing between the mid 80's until the year 2000.
- The rhubarb ALWAYS went missing by the cover of darkness, probably in the wee hours of the morning.
- For many years there would have been a big yellow Irving oil truck parked in the driveway.
- The patch was in the backyard between two houses.
- There were 4 pine trees separating the yard from the apartment building parking lot, and there would have been a fireplace and a dog house in the backyard for many years.
I just tweeted this out to my followers on Twitter. Hope you find your answers! http://twitter.com/#!/Jen_Banks/statuses/158726132689149952
ReplyDeleteThanks so much Jen! It would be amazing if this mystery was solved thanks to social media!
ReplyDeleteRead this and realized you're writing about my friend's grandmother - your cousin. Is a great story and I've posted it to my business' website: Family Lines, in Calgary:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.facebook.com/pages/Family-Lines/322914747737054
That is so interesting, who is your friend? Any idea who stole the Rhubarb?
ReplyDeleteNevermind, got it :) James or Katherine is the friend. I checked out your site, thanks so much for posting it on your site and helping to maybe solve this old family mystery!
ReplyDeleteThe thief was the neighbour across the road. In the pantry with a knife.Or was it with a gun in the livingroom.....hmmmm
ReplyDeleteHa! Actually it was in the backyard with garbage bags Haha True story! If only it were as easy as Clue. She did have a neighbour across the road tho......
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