Eleanor first came to the Cremona district in 1904, at the age of nine years. Third of four Tyson girls, she came with her mother, Mary, and three sisters from Byrn Mawr, Pennsylvania to Alberta, where her father, James, had taken up homestead land. It took five days and nights for the family to reach Carstairs on the Homesteaders Train. The cars consisted of wooden benches with a stove in one corner for everyone to cook their own meals. Owing to heavy rains, James was unable to get into Carstairs for four days after his family arrived, and only then, with the help of a good neighbour and a wagon and four horse team. During the four day wait, Mary and her daughters stayed in the Carstairs hotel. Upon the arrival of James, all the essentials were loaded into the wagon, and with his family, they started home. Flour, yeast, beans, rolled oats, baking powder, syrup, jam, dried fruit and pork and salt would be their main diet for most of the year. Daughter Eleanor loved her first glimpses of this new country, and she still did seventy years later. There were no roads, fences, or people, only the unmarred beauty of the countryside. After living and going to school for ten years, Eleanor moved to Calgary, where after four years in 1917 she graduated as a register nurse at the Holy Cross Hospital. After several years nursing, Eleanor met Mr. G.Z.H. Van Haaften, "Van", who had come to Canada from Holland in 1913, representing a Dutch Mortgage company. Five years later they were married. They travelled extensively in Europe until Van was transferred to Winnipeg, and here two little girls joined the family, Hazel and Lorna. In 1934 Van bought the homestead farm and farmed till his deanth in 1960. Eleanor lived alone on the farm until her eightieth birthday, when she moved to her new home in Cremona, where once again she used her gardening skills to change an empty lot into a place of beauty. Always a busy woman her skill in growing flowers was surpassed only by her skill in fine handwork. Eleanor died November 22, 1977 at the age of 82 years, a truly great pioneer lady.
(From Under the Chinook Arch. Van Haaften/Tyson family story written by Mrs. A (Lorna) Gano)