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It’s Friday night in Ross River, population 352, and Alice and Arthur’s place is hopping. A handful of the couple’s 38 grandkids spill out of the kitchen into the living room, where Curly, a little black mutt, is barking wildly. The Johns’ house has always been full of relatives: five generations grew up around Alice and Arthur. “What’s the secret to staying married so long, Mom?” asks daughter Dorothy, 62, yelling loud enough for Alice’s old ears. Alice looks at her quizzically. Dorothy repeats the question. Alice observes Arthur, sitting quietly across the room enjoying his cup of tea. “I don’t know,” she says, laughing.

Alice and Arthur were officially married at an Anglican mission in 1935 after spending almost three years together in the bush. Later that same year, out on their trapline, a visiting Catholic priest blessed them. Last May, Pope Francis consecrated their union, sending a letter in honour of their 78th anniversary celebrations. The illuminated document, written in thick black calligraphy, has

been framed and now hangs in the house.

The Johns shared a big brass bed until just a few years ago, when their aching bodies finally forced them to sleep separately. But Alice still gets up every morning and fixes her husband coffee and toast, and when his snuff runs low, she makes more, mixing powdered birch fungus with tobacco and strong black tea.

It used to be the other way around.

For as long as their children remember, Arthur would bring his wife a cup of coffee before she got up. “Mom had to be treated very good,” says daughter Mary, 59. “We could never swear or raise our voices in front of her.” Coffee in bed was one of the few luxuries life in the mountains outside Ross River permitted. There weren’t disposable diapers, processed foods or doctors. Alice spent most of her days gathering berries, drying meat for winter, sewing, setting snares and tanning hides, often with one of 11 children strapped on her back. Arthur trapped, cut wood for the steamships plying the rivers, helped miners search for gold and ran mail for the U.S. army.

This rugged existence didn’t allow much time for romance, though there were moments-nighttime toboggan rides when the kids were asleep, quiet swims under star-filled skies. Alice and Arthur worked hard to survive, and cared for each other through the loss of seven children to disease and accidents. When their remaining kids were taken to residential school in Lower Post, B.C., more than 300 kilometres away, Alice and Arthur packed what they could carry and travelled by dog team to rebuild nearby.

Years later, when the Johns finally moved back to Ross River, animals and intruders had ransacked their old cabin. Photos were scattered across the floor, and with them a love letter, containing pencilled promises in a script that wasn’t Arthur’s. “When Mom first started going with Dad, she had no choice,” says Dorothy. “I think she might have had someone else in mind.”

Arthur and Alice were very different. He was social, always meeting people and inviting them to the house. “Dad helped everyone and believed you get back what you give,” says Mary. One time, he offered to teach a German couple to tan hides. They stayed for two weeks. Sometimes her husband’s storytelling would make Alice-the quieter one-crazy. When Arthur paused to talk to people, Alice would jokingly tell one of her children to drive away, in a bid to speed him up.

Alice never got her licence, so when they were in their 60s, Arthur put her behind the wheel. The lessons were going well but stopped abruptly when Alice rolled the truck. Arthur decided to stick with cards. After learning how to play poker from the American soldiers for whom he worked, he had taught his wife. She was a natural: whenever they played, they cleaned up.

The pair took pride in each other, and not just when it came to poker. Alice cooked Arthur the best moose meat; he gave her the fastest dog team. Whenever Arthur went trapping, he ensured his wife had the choicest furs to work with. In return, Alice sewed Arthur the most beautifully decorated dog harnesses and the thickest footwear.