Katie Melton "Honey - We's Come From All Over"

Notes - This account gives a brief history of the arrival of African American immigrants to the Athabasca area, namely Amber Valley- an area twenty miles east of Athabasca. Katie Melton was four years old when her family left North Carolina around 1906 and travelled for four years through Mexico, Oklahoma, and then finally Canada, all the while trying to escape the harsh realities of slavery. Hearing of 169 acres of land in the Athabasca area selling for $10.00, plus $6.00 a year for taxes, they decided to head further north. The Melton Family took the train as far north as it went, then used a horse and wagon to what would later be named Amber Valley. From 1910 to 1913, 75 African American families came up from the southern United States to homestead in the Amber Valley area. Katie Melton remembers how difficult the twenty mile trip to Athabasca in the winter was; how getting supplies and mail could be deadly. These new landowners worked hard to farm wheat and saved money from odd jobs to build their own log homes and be self-sustaining. Katie Melton fondly remembers attending Colinton School as long as she could. She married at twenty and had six children. At the time this account was written, she was still living on her original homestead (8 pages)