By Bertha Johnson – Red Deer, Alta.
One of our District Court judges (known now as Court of Queen’s Bench), told me I had a distinction within the court system in Alberta. I was the first female court clerk in the province.
Over the course of my career, I did everything from counter service to jury trials and completed my employment into retirement as Clerk of the Court/Administrator of Small Claims Provincial Division.
During my time in the 1970s at Red Deer, we had applications to procure a marriage license. One day while working the counter, a bride and groom arrived in full wedding attire. They wondered about the paper they handed to me and said they thought it was the marriage license.
I explained it was only the application by which to procure the license. They said they gave it to the minister at the church but he explained that they must get a license before he could marry them. I could hardly keep from smiling at this point.
Ran from the building
I told them the cost after they had completed the required information. The bride didn’t have her purse with her and the groom was short a dollar. The bride was almost in tears.
I went into my own purse and gave them the required amount so they could be on their way back to the church. They practically ran from the building for the return to their ceremony. I never heard from them again, but often wondered how the rest of their day and lives went after that experience.
After I transferred to Calgary, we were often working with jury trials. One day when polling a jury—which is calling names out of a hat (so to speak) from the many that were named to serve. One lady was selected twice and was agreed to by both lawyers.
The rule was to be polled three times if there was no rejection twice before. By this time, she had listened to all kinds of reasons (and excuses) from folks as to why they couldn’t serve on the jury.
After I had called her name a third time with no response, the judge repeated her name very loudly. A person next to her nudged her. She looked up to the bench, the judge called her name again, she cupped her hand to her ear and said “Aye?”
His Honor said “dismissed”.
