Davis, Frank “Tex”

Frank “Tex” Davis was born August 24, 1926 in Sackville, Nova Scotia.  He grew up there against the backdrop of the Great Depression, second youngest of eight children, and Tex’s mother died when he was only ten years old.  Tex remembers his father doing what he could to keep”the wolf from the door”.  Tex’s family lived right next to one of Nova Scotia’s “coloured” settlements, and he and several brothers went to that community’s school – quite an unusual situation for that time.  Tex stopped going to school after Grade 3; he recalls that he was not a good student, so when his mother died he gave it up and went to work on nearby farms.  He and four of his brothers would go on to enlist when the war came:  Tex for his part went into the militia first, and his early experiences included helping to load the troop ships in Halifax.  He also continued training during this time, mostly at Bedford and Aldershot.  Then Tex was called west, and sent to officers’ training:  the army had said they saw something in him, but Tex’s lack of education came back to haunt him during this time, and he was instead made part of the 6th Division.  The 6th Div. was readied for the war in the Pacific, including the eventual attack on the Japanese homeland, attacks that never came.  Tex looks back and sees this as a waste of the regiment’s youth and fitness:  they were trained for years and never deployed, and then the atomic bombs ended the Pacific War.   Tex returned to Nova Scotia in 1945, where he met and married Irene, and then he took work in the Ministry of Transportation.  A few years later, he chose to return to the military and he became a dispatch rider.  And in fact that’s where he earned the name “Tex” after he chased cattle off a road that the regiment was traveling on.   Tex stayed in the military through to 1960, and he enjoyed his time on Harleys travelling the Ontario countryside.  Tex Davis was interviewed by Scott Masters at the Parkwood Veteran Centre in London, Ontario in August 2023.Davis, Frank “tex”