ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — With the familiarity of a typical downtown corner boy, Jim Case walks briskly from one side of Springdale Street to the other, pointing out the house he lived until he was one, then to his grandparents’ house across the road, where he lived after that.
He points across Charlton Street going east, to where a convenience store called Ray’s used to be. You could get chips, a bar and a soda for a quarter in those days, he said.
There was a retaining wall near the top of the hill, where his brother fell and was knocked unconscious. Ronnie Steele, the boy who alerted his mother, said, “I … I think he’s dead,” Case recalls.
“About 10 years ago, I got sidetracked. My father was dying, and he was sort of the keeper of the family genealogy,” Case said. “I got sucked down into that vast hole and I started going back more generations than my father had ever recorded.”
He’ll never forget her expression as she walked up the hill that day, he said.
Then there was the corner of Charlton and Springdale, where one of the kids would stand during the winter, keeping an eye out for cars, while the other kids waited at the top with their slides for the signal.
Even then, Case knew he wanted to be an architect.
“I announced to my mother when I was seven that I was going to be an architect, without really knowing what it was,” Case said. “I plotted out my life in terms of how I get from high school to become a practising architect in the shortest amount of time.”
Over a period of 40 years, Case worked all over the world. He also worked on the Fogo Island Inn and the Fortis building at the bottom of Springdale Street.
He has written for years, but since retiring, he’s finished his first book, titled “Ananias,” a fictional story based on one of his ancestors.
“About 10 years ago, I got sidetracked. My father was dying, and he was sort of the keeper of the family genealogy,” Case said. “I got sucked down into that vast hole and I started going back more generations than my father had ever recorded.”
Piecing together all the clues, he discovered who his great-great-great-grandfather was. Or so he thinks.
“My wife would say, ‘What utter nonsense, you don’t know that, there’s no way you can prove that,’” he said. “That’s when the lightbulb went off. I said, ‘Aha, I have all these things that I know as facts, it’s just all the things in between.’”
Case constructed his novel around Ananias Case, using historical records as a blueprint.
“Ananias” is out now and available from Nevermore Press at https://www.nevermorepress.ca/.
1. What is your full name?
James Bertram Case.
2. Where and when were you born?
1958 at the Grace Hospital in St. John’s.
3. Where do you live today?
In St. John’s and in Salmon Cove, which is the family home. All the Cases are from Salmon Cove.
4. What’s your favourite place in the world?
Being an architect, I have travelled to most of the major cities in Europe. I’ve been a lot of places and lived in a lot of places, enough to say that Salmon Cove is the most special place on the planet.
5. Who do you follow on social media?
I follow architects and urban planners who I respect. I also like to follow political commentators. I also follow other writers and publishers and particularly book reviewers in the faint hope that someone may actually review my book someday.
6. What would people be surprised to learn about you?
I play an incredibly mean blues harp. I mean, I can do James Cotton, OK?
7. What’s been your favourite year and why?
I’m not sure I have a favourite year. I’m like the songwriter whose latest song is invariably the best. I think that every year that I’ve gone through has gotten progressively better, which is the signal that I’ve been incredibly fortunate, and thankful for that, in my life.
8. What is the hardest thing you’ve ever done?
When I had to leave home by myself to go find work away from my wife and kids, I found that just to be brutal. The first time I did it, I had to spend nine months alone in Montreal and I hated it. I hated it because I had small kids. Every time my wife shovelled the driveway, I was sort of heartbroken. So that’s it, unequivocally. That’s what Newfoundlanders have done for bloody centuries, and I’m no different. But that does not make it easy, not in any way.
9. Can you describe one experience that changed your life?
Back in 1993 … on two weeks' notice, we packed up wife, kids, sold the car, rented the house — absolutely traumatic — to get to Ulsan, Korea, so I could start work. Ulsan, where no English is spoken generally, and you’re embedded in the culture of Korea, it’s a huge thing.
10. What’s your greatest indulgence?
For an architect, the greatest indulgence has to be travelling. In the classic tradition people became architects by travelling to Greece and to Rome and studying the antiquities. And basically, you came home to wherever you were from … and you said, well I’m going to build something now and I’m trained as the master builder because I’ve done all this travelling. So, architects have to travel, especially if you’re from St. John’s, you’ve got to travel, you’ve got to see buildings, otherwise you cannot be fully engrossed in your art.
11. What is your favourite movie or book?
My favourite book is “The Sun Also Rises” by Ernest Hemingway. You read that when you’re really young, there probably should be some sort of heading on it that says you’re not allowed to read this. It’s like reading “Revelations” as a teenager, it scares the (expletive) out of you. Now, movie: hands down, no questions asked, “Cinema Paradiso” (Italian film directed by Giuseppe Tornatore). Aside from being an absolutely glorious story that you just have to see, the soundtrack is phenomenal. It never gets old.
12. How do you like to relax?
I like working with my hands. I always did. I’ve got a fabulous wood shop now, a carpentry shop, out in Salmon Cove. I like to go in there and spend time making stuff. Generally, it ends up being stuff for my granddaughter.
13. What are you reading or watching right now?
Every year I try to read a novel or a book that has some influence, which helps me as a writer. Last year was “Moby Dick” (by Herman Melville) and this year it’s “Don Quixote” by (Miguel de) Cervantes. Every year I read a pile of CanLit, and Newfoundland literature as well. Right now, I’m reading “We Are Water,” by Wally Lamb.
14. What is your greatest fear?
I’m afraid of dementia and Alzheimer’s. It runs rampant in my family and it’s also hereditary. My father died of Alzheimer’s and it was an agonizing, cruel death. My grandmother before him, on his side, suffered terribly from dementia. I’m close to it, and it doesn’t make the fear of it any less.
15. How would you describe your personal fashion statement?
My wife says I have no taste and no fashion sense whatsoever. Here I think I am a purveyor of tasteful buildings. But obviously, I mean, look at me. I have a fisherman’s knit sweater and a pair of jeans and that’s probably as good as it gets.
16. What is your most treasured possession?
I have a gold American Waltham pocket watch that belonged to my grandfather. But it’s not the fact that it’s this incredible object, which it is. … It’s the connection to my grandfather. And I was very close to my grandfather.
17. What music are you listening to right now?
There’s all kinds of wonderful local talent. Whether it’s someone like Kat McLevey, The Once (or) Fortunate Ones. And all the usual stuff that I’ve been listening to for 40 years — Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, John Prine.
18. Which three people would join you for your dream dinner party?
I have just written a fictitious novel about everything that my great-great-great-grandfather did and got in trouble for. And as a result, I feel like he’s that close that I can, just like I can reach out and touch you now, he’s that close to me. But it’s ethereal, as someone from five generations ago would be. So, my three favourite people in the novel are him, his first wife, Grace Rose, and his best friend, Will Parsons. And having written 100,000 words about those three people, wouldn’t it be nice if (I could ask), “I’ve written all this stuff about you, is it even close?”
19. What is your best quality, and what is your worst quality?
I always say yes, which could be best or worst. But I always deliver on what I say. My worst quality, and you can confirm with my wife, I am way too critical and cynical. And the older I get, I think, the more cynical I get. And I’m doing my (hardest) to try and change that.
20. What’s your biggest regret?
When I was a kid, I just wanted to do three things. I wanted to be an architect, I wanted to be a writer and I wanted to be a singer, musician (and) songwriter. It’s not a regret, but it’s the what if of the other two journeys. So now I’m trying to really cram both of those into retirement.
Responses have been edited.
Andrew Waterman is the culture and entertainment reporter for The Telegram
