Vanilio Raffin immigrated to Cayley, Alberta, Canada from San Lorenzo, Italy in 1950. He worked as a hired hand on a farm for several months until he could afford to send for his family. Finally, Vanilio send word and Lilia and Aldo began their trip across the Atlantic Ocean by way of a large ocean liner. Aldo was only 6 months when he arrived in Canada.
Raffin Transit Mix started as a proprietorship in 1950 by Vanilio and Lilia Raffin. They started out by only having a small hand mixer. They made 8 inch concrete blocks by hand, one at a time. They would then lay the blocks to make basements and/or foundations. This was extremely hard labour and very time consuming.
In 1952 Vanilio purchased his first gravel truck. This made it easy for him to move large loads of gravel. In 1955, Vanilio purchased land in Nanton and soon built a house there. Aldo started helping out with small jobs around age 6. Their youngest child Liliana was born later in 1957. In 1962, Nino Zampa (Lilia's brother-in-law), started working for the company.
In 1965 the shop was built. In 1966 Aldo started working for the company part time when he wasn't at school. The company also got their first concrete truck that year; it was a 1957 International.
In 1967 the batch plant was built. A few years later the truck storage building was made. The steel materials that went into the building actually came from an old coalminer's building in Crowsnest Pass.
Aldo married Connie Holliday in 1974. She slowly began to take over the secretarial duties and bookkeeping for the company. In 1978 Raffin Transit Mix became incorporated. Lilia passed away in 1979, but Vanilio continued to run the business.
Connie and Aldo had two children, Rhonda in 1981 and Randy in 1984. In 1985 Vanilio retired and Aldo took over the family business. Vanilio passed away in 1990, a few months shy of his 70th birthday.
As Rhonda and Randy got older they also worked for the company. Rhonda married Peter Anderson, July 1st, 2005. She is currently the Assistant Manager at Petland in Red Deer, Alberta. Randy is currently working for Ford, installing stereos, alarm systems and such, in Edmonton.