Chapters

Prologue: Children Born to John Skilling and Agnes Ruxton
Chapter 1 Introduction
Chapter 2 My Paternal Grandparents: John Skilling and Marion Cochrane
Chapter 3 My Father John Skilling
Chapter 4 My Mother: Agnes Ruxton
Chapter 5 Our House on Railway Street
Chapter 6 Floss Skilling
Chapter 7 Maude Skilling
Chapter 8 Orville Skilling
Chapter 9 Mae Skilling
Chapter 10 Gert Skilling
Chapter 11 Bill Skilling
Chapter 12 Harold Skilling
Chapter 13 Agnes Norma Skilling
Chapter 14 Vernon David Skilling

Chapter Fourteen Vernon David Skilling

Verne Skilling, the ninth and last surviving child of Agnes Ruxton and John Skilling, was born on August 8, 1900 in Teeswater, Ontario about four years after Norma.  Unable to complete her memoir before she died, Norma wrote very little about Verne. Some details survive in records and letters especially from John to his son living in Toronto in c. 1920s. Photographs of Verne also survive. I will piece together what I can.

Like his siblings before him, Verne was probably born at home with assistance of a midwife. By this time the older children had left home or were in and out. Floss, 22 years older than Verne, had been away working as a milliner in Aurora, ON when Norma was born 4 years earlier.  She was married in March 1902. Maude, 19 years older, taught music and often away from home though she didn’t marry until 1915. Orville 17 years older, left for Toronto the following year and was married in 1907. Gert was 13 and still at home for a few more years as was Bill who was 11. Harold, born after the loss of a son in 1891, was 7 and Norma was 4. Norma talks about herself, Harold and Verne being considered the younger group of Skilling kids.



Verne Skilling Age 9



By the time Verne was born, Agnes had had 10 pregnancies (that we know of) and was 40 years old. John was 47 years old. Their house was small and John earned a tiny sum as a choir leader, salesman of musical instruments and sewing machines, and painter. They were poor by any economic measure. But they were bright, musically gifted and enterprising. A daunting challenge for the younger Skillings.



Verne would have attended primary school and Continuation School in Teeswater as his older siblings had done. Following in their footsteps with probably many of the same teachers, he would have been expected to perform well. No record of his scholastic achievement survives.

We do have some record of his musical achievement. He was considered to be a gifted violinist and by the age of nine, was performing in the Teeswater Methodist Sunday School Orchestra directed by his father John Skilling.



Verne would have taken music lessons at an early age and learned at least two instruments like his older siblings. He seems to have settled on the violin and was said by family stories to have been very talented. By the time he moved to Toronto to work, he was still taking lessons as per his father’s letters chastising him to practice or it wouldn’t be worth paying the $1.00 per lesson.

Verne left home at about age 16 in May 1916 and moved to Toronto where he boarded first with sister Mae at 83 Ellsworth Avenue. 

He got a job about a month later with the Royal Bank as an administrative clerk; he says in a letter to his mother dated January 8, 1917:

“I have a lot of work to do since the stationary order came in. I have to stamp up all the statements  and there certainly are a bunch. All the statements need to be stamped ‘Gerrard & Jones’ (the bank branch?) and a lot of work like that. We get our stationary twice a year and get enough at a time to last, so it has to be quite a lot.”

In another letter dated March 18, 1917 Verne says he has been in Toronto almost 7 months and will have been at the bank for 6 months on the 25^th of March. He mentions going to Timothy Eaton’s Memorial Church and enjoying Reverend Henderson. He attends a violin concert with brother  Will and sister Mae who seems to have procured the tickets through her contacts. He mentions expecting to be called up for military duty, like his older brothers, as soon as he is of age, in about a year and a half (by then the war was over). He apologizes several times for his bad writing and says he is practicing his penmanship every night along with practicing his violin.

By 1921 Vern was living with his sister Maude at 151 Glenholme Ave. His older brothers Bill and Harold were also boarding with Maude and her husband Lambert Stinson.

He met and married Annabelle McMullin in Toronto on April 10, 1922. They were both 21, she, a stenographer, and he, a merchant. (Was he working for Orville?) It may have been a quiet civil ceremony as both witnesses appear to have not been family members and the marriage license shows his religion as Methodist and hers as Roman Catholic.



Verne and Annabelle Skilling
1923

On February 6, 1930 a daughter, Mary Virginia was born to Verne and Annabelle.

To be continued......

Norma Skilling

Agnes Norma Skilling was born in Teeswater, Ontario on July 25, 1896 and officially registered on July 26^th. She called herself Norma Agnes although her names were registered in the reverse order. She was the 5^th daughter and 9^th living child of Agnes Ruxton and John Skilling. Her oldest sister Floss had left home by then and was working as a milliner in Aurora, Ontario. Maude was 16, already teaching music, and away from home a lot.

Norma was always keenly aware of her birth order in the family as one of the youngest. She was treated as a bit of a nuisance by the older ones perhaps simply because she was one of the younger ones. She was surrounded by bright musical older siblings and often felt the comparison and the high standards set. She loved the musical harmony when they all sang together, she along with Maude in soprano. She loved her mother and admired her older siblings, especially Bill and Gert who were very good to her while growing up. By the time Norma was about 10, most of the older sisters and brothers had left home except Bill and Harold. She, as the only girl would have had to help her mother with household chores. Her father was often away conducting choirs or on the road selling musical instruments.

Norma completed her primary and secondary education in Teeswater, Ontario. She must have been a good student because her brother Bill tried to persuade their father to send her to university, though it wasn’t common in those days for women to go. Her father objected as he lacked the means to support her and thought it unnecessary for a woman.

 In 1917 she entered Normal School and lived with her father’s sister Aggie and her husband Richard Offord in Stratford, Ontario. She enjoyed being with Aunt Aggie and studying to be a teacher.

But before she finished her year, at Easter on March 31^st, 1918, Norma had an attack of appendicitis and was rushed to hospital for immediate surgery. She developed serious complications from a bowel perforation and gangrene. This required a second operation. Norma was delirious and extremely ill in hospital for a month and did not return to Stratford until late June. She had to write some of her exams in bed but managed to pass.

Her sister Mae paid her board to Aunt Aggie and her fees to Normal School. She also supported and encouraged her to take her exams in bed in a private room of the hospital. Norma passed her exams and began her teaching career September 1918 in a rural one room school on RR#3 in Mildmay, Ontario.

The following summer of 1919 she attended the Summer session at the University of Toronto and received her Interim Certificate in Elementary Vocal Music.

She visited her oldest sister Floss and Will in Neepawa the summer of 1920.

In November 1920 while still teaching in Mildmay, she received her Permanent Public School Second-Class Certificate.

In 1921 Norma’s sister Gert encouraged her to come out to Winnipeg to teach. With her certificates and letters of recommendation from a former Normal School Music teacher, J. Bottomley, and a W. A. Wilkinson, Methodist Pastor from Mildmay who described her as “excellent in character, versatile in gifts, and worthy of the confidence of all”, Norma was able to get a one year Manitoba Teaching Certificate and a contract to teach at River Heights Public School (later renamed Robert H. Smith School) in Winnipeg for which she was paid $1200 for the year. 

River Heights School 1919
Winnipeg School Division photo

She gives her address on the Teacher’s Agreement as 72 Niagara Street, which may have been the Kavaner’s address at the time. During this time she had some success with her vocal music program and discovered her talent for conducting choirs.

After her one year contract with the Winnipeg School District was over, Norma returned to Toronto and taught on an occasional basis until she got a full-time job at Rosedale Public School. Once again her class was singled out in April 1923 for its musical achievement in the local newspaper, Rosedale Topics.

While living in Teeswater, going to the Methodist Church and going to primary and secondary school, she met the Jackson family who were living on a farm just outside of town. One summer around 1910 when she was about 14, Mrs. Jackson asked her to come to their Sauble Beach cottage with them to work as a mother’s helper. Her job was to help with the housework and look after the younger Jackson kids, Irene and Jud.

She got to know the older Jackson boys while at Sauble Beach, if she hadn’t already, and was kind of sweet on Bert at first. Later, Ray won her heart and, when he enlisted in 1916 at the age of 17 (he lied and said he was 18) and went overseas, Norma wrote to him, sent parcels and waited patiently for him to return.  He was wounded in the shoulder on August 30, 1918 and spent a long time convalescing in England in the days before the wonders of penicillin.

When he returned to Canada they were married at Timothy Eaton Memorial Church on April 24, 1926 in Toronto. Witnesses were her brother William M. Skilling and Anna J. Thompson. She was 29 and he was 28. Her sister Maude catered the wedding supper for 30 guests. As there was no refrigeration, the plates were all taken down to the cool basement and carried up again for the meal.

Although Norma loved teaching at Rosedale Public School, she was required to resign once she married. In 1926 married women weren’t allowed to teach as the Board believed they were taking a job away from a man who really needed it to support his family.

Norma and Ray were thrilled to be expecting their first child the following year. Barbara Ann Jackson was born on October 30, 1928, a perfectly beautiful and healthy baby girl. Before Norma could take her home from the Toronto General Hospital, Barbara Ann developed an infection. Lacking modern drugs like penicillin, the baby was unable to resist and died 19 days later. They buried her in Park Lawn Cemetery and tried to resume their lives.

Norma was shattered and couldn’t believe what had happened through no fault of her own. She had waited so long for this child. Her anger at the Toronto General Hospital was suppressed. Condolences of disbelief from family and friends poured in and she kept every card and every note. This loss altered her very core and she worried about having more children. She was now 33.

Finally she became pregnant again and, just after her 34^th birthday, gave birth to a son, John David on September 25^th, 1930. She and Ray were over the moon with joy. She adored him and wanted to do the best for him. She studied the latest theories of infant and child rearing and followed them to a ‘T’, even when it went against her instincts, so committed was she to doing the right thing. 

Four years later a daughter, Rosemary Elizabeth was born on August 24^th, 1934 and Ray and Norma were delighted their family was now complete. 

to be continued...

Chapter Twelve Harold Skilling

Harold Roy Skilling was born on July 31, 1893 the eighth child of Agnes Ruxton and John Skilling. The seventh child, John Alexander had died a few days after birth in 1891. Harold was four years younger than his older brother Bill.

As he was growing up, Harold was always known as the “quick one”. He was a very alert child and as a young boy was always willing to run errands for his mother. He seemed to anticipate her needs and, for example, would be away down into the cellar to fetch the milk or cream before he was even asked to go. His snapping brown eyes were watching everywhere to see what he could do to help and when. This alertness carried on well into his later years.  Harold always supported and was kind and thoughtful to his younger siblings, Norma and Verne.

Harold had a beautiful tenor voice and when the family got together he would harmonize with them making a beautiful chorus.

Harold finished his primary and secondary schooling in Teeswater and then attended the University of Toronto ( Victoria College) as an undergraduate.

Harold’s high school sweetheart was Etta Redburn who lived with her parents and sister Myrtle on Main Street about 3 blocks from the Skilling family in Teeswater.

When war broke out, Harold enlisted in the 5^th Field Ambulance Medical Corps as a stretcher bearer. He was wounded seriously in the abdomen at The Battle of the Somme, September 1916 and was sent back to England to recuperate. After his discharge from hospital, he transferred to the Royal Flying Corps (RAF). He received his wings and completed flight training on Sopwith Camels, but the war ended just as he was ready to go on duty as a pilot. He returned to Canada in July 1919.

All the time Harold was overseas, Etta Redburn wrote to him faithfully and sent parcels. Strangely, when he returned, for some unknown reason, he didn’t want to have anything to do with her. This act was quite out of character for Harold and he never explained his actions. Harold worked for his older brother Orville delivering milk and eggs during the summer of 1919 and then in September entered the School of Dentistry with the Class of 2T3. While at school, he was Class President and Secretary, and wrote the Class Newsletter.



Harold Skilling Delivering for Orville
Toronto, 1919

 Money was very hard to come by and Harold had a difficult time paying his way through Dental College. May and Gert helped him a lot and so did Orville.

In Toronto, Harold met Eleanor MacDonald from Orillia who ran an upstairs tea room near Adelaide and Yonge Streets. Harold spent a lot of time at The Blue Gingham Tea Room while a student. After he graduated in 1923 he began his practice and he and Eleanor were married on July 15, 1925.

Harold and Eleanor had no children and by 1928 Eleanor was doing volunteer work in the community. One job was driving a woman with four children who was expecting a fifth, to the doctor’s or the hospital, wherever she needed to go. The woman’s husband was a milkman and earned a poor wage. The mother died when the baby boy was born and the father didn’t know how he was going to manage. Though filled with grief by this tragedy, eventually Harold and Eleanor were able to adopt this beautiful baby boy whom they named Donald Roy Skilling.

Don grew up to be a handsome young man and made his parents very happy and proud. He married Jean McKeown in 1950 and with her help, had a successful paint and decorating business in Hamilton. One rainy night in January 1963 when his daughter Lynn was 9, Don was driving home alone from Hamilton and crashed into an abutment, killing himself instantly. Harold and Eleanor never got over this loss. Neither did his daughter.

Harold’s career as a dentist continued to build successfully in his Bloor St. W. office. He was an honourary life member and past-president of the Academy of Dentistry, was on committees of the Canadian Dental Association and contributed to its journal. He conducted a program of preventative dentistry in East York schools.

Harold was a charter member of the Toronto Optimist club which his brother Bill had started in 1924 in Canada. He chaired every major committee, becoming President in 1936. He was actively involved with helping boys through the Optimists and got the club to sponsor a Junior Drum and Bugle Band which appeared at the CNE.

He was active in Timothy Eaton Memorial church where he sang in the choir in his undergraduate years.

Harold also did a lot of pro bono dental work for family members. David and Rosemary were sent to Uncle Harold as were all of Grace’s children. Grace has provided some details:

Around 1938 “when Ross and I were first married, Ross was having a serious dental problem and the dentist in New Toronto wanted to extract all his teeth and put in an upper and a lower plate. Ross was horrified and talked it over with Uncle Harold … (who) said that if he followed his directions to the letter, he could help him. Of course Ross did. He had him use thin elastic bands to clean his gums, like flossing teeth. Then Uncle Harold did some deep cleaning of the gums too. Years later, Uncle Harold said he would like to take Ross to the Dental College to demonstrate what could be done with a bad case of gums“.  Ross still had all his teeth in 1984 at the age of 79.

Grace continues:

“Our children all had orthodontic work done by Uncle Harold. Barry was the worst. We had a terrible time keeping those appliances in, as Barry would pry them out and throw them away. Uncle Harold persisted as no one else would have, and Barry would be a much less handsome boy if he hadn’t.

When Allen was teaching, he got into a car accident and had his front teeth knocked out. Uncle Harold nearly cried when we brought Allen in to him, as Allen was the only one of our children that had perfect teeth and hadn’t needed braces. Needless to say, Uncle Harold did a super job and Allen is very thankful.”

In 1978 Harold collapsed suddenly of a massive heart attack while shoveling snow and died in hospital three days later on January 25th.  Norma was deeply affected by his death and it inspired her to write her family story.

Chapter Eleven Bill Skilling

August 20, 1889 was the birthday of a dear little baby boy, born just two years after sister Gertrude, and five years before me. My parents named him William Milton but, until he was well into his teens, they called him Willie. He was a blond little boy with almost white hair and big brown eyes. He was a gentle child and always very good to me. He had a wonderful sense of humour, always telling jokes and, worse than that, he was a great punster. He also had a serious side and was an excellent student. When he was quite small he had rheumatic fever which I believe affected his heart. Sometimes when he fell asleep on the “lounge” in the dining room, he would waken with bad dreams and make a lot of strange noises that frightened me.

Bill was the one of all my siblings who often tried to boost my self-esteem. I remember him trying to persuade our father to enroll me in university, something not many girls aspired to around 1914. Father got quite angry because Bill was trying to tell him to do something he couldn’t afford and thought unnecessary. Bill got frustrated and started to cry. I never forgot that moment and my admiration and affection for Bill knew no bounds after that.

Bill had a lovely baritone voice and used to practice classics. He took piano lessons, as we all did. One time he had a great urge to learn to play “The Star Spangled Banner”, and was doing quite well with it but ignoring his other assigned pieces. One of our sisters told Miss Staples, our piano teacher that all he played was “The Star Spangled Banner”, so she took Bill to task for this and forbid him to play it.

Bill got his High School Matriculation with honours and enrolled at Victoria College in Toronto in the class of 1T5, meaning if all went well he would graduate in 1915. While at Vic, Bill joined a great many extra-curricular activities such as the Men’s Glee club, a select quartet, and the Drama Club. The Glee Club even toured Great Britain, which was a big deal at that time.

The friends Bill brought home were delightful fellows. Their laughter and excitement thrilled me through and through. By the time Bill graduated in 1915, the First Great War was in full swing and he was itching to enlist and “do his bit” to help. He had a suspicion that he might not pass the physical exam because of his rheumatic heart, so he employed a few tricks to confuse the medical examiners. He passed and enlisted in the Imperial Army who was looking for college graduates to train as officers. Bill took his training at Oxford where he reveled in its tradition. He came out as a Second Lieutenant and assigned to Artillery (Canadian Expeditionary Force, Royal Field Artillery) where he had to ride a horse. He was lucky he’s learned to ride on dear old Prince in Teeswater.

Bill was sent to France as a Forward Observation Officer who went ahead, made a dugout, then with a phone gave directions as to how many degrees left or right, high or low, the big guns should be swung to the gunners. He went through the bloodiest, most awful battles of the war and during the 3rd Battle of Ypres, around August 18, 1917, collapsed and was taken to hospital in England. I have a letter he wrote from there in which he describes the hospital as a “mini-paradise”. He was sent home in April 1920 with a badly damaged heart. I don’t have the space to describe the events leading to his collapse or to quote from his letter, but the letter is available to anyone who wants to read it.

Bill came home broken physically and very depressed. As a result of his condition, he was refused admission to Theological College, thus dashing his dream of becoming a Methodist Minister. He was advised neither to run, hurry upstairs, walk against the wind, up hills nor to crank a car. He was on a 100% Disability Pension from the British Government, though it wasn’t much.

Around this time a woman named Anna Maud Hallam came to Toronto to lecture on Practical Psychology. She had a lot of new ideas and after Bill took her course, his attitude really changed and he found a great deal of courage. He decided if he was at death’s door, he might as well make the most of every day he was alive. Mother worried a lot about his breaking doctor’s rules, but Bill’s motto became: “A short life, but a merry one!” He bought a big old high second-hand car and called it “Diana of the Ephesians”. I don’t remember the make and no one’s left to ask.

One day Bill saw an ad in the paper asking for someone to organize an Optimist Club of Canada. He got the job and after a great deal of effort and contacting some very important people, the Inaugural Ball for the first Optimist Club in Canada was held in Toronto on August 18, 1924. Two of the original charter members are still alive in 1980. Bill and Harold Skilling were both charter members. Later he organized several more Optimist Clubs.

In 1933 Bill went to the World’s Fair in Chicago and made a point of looking up some radio characters he’d been listening to and corresponding with. He returned to Toronto and got a chance to sing and act in several radio dramas.

Bill’s life was very full and he always wanted the rest of the family to enjoy the things he enjoyed. He worked very hard until one day he had a stroke. He was taken to Christie Street Hospital, unable to speak and quite paralyzed on his right side. He refused to allow us to treat him like a basket case. He pushed a jug saw puzzle I brought him to the floor. The first word he taught himself to say, without moving his lips, was “water” because although people would offer him food, the bedpan, or back rubs, no one ever offered him a drink. He regained his power of speech but sometimes the word he intended to say would come out wrong. Then he would laugh heartily. Eventually, he could do a lot of things; but one day, he overdid himself, and on November 7, 1933 passed away.

Bill's passing left a great blank space in our family and we all felt, as my mother did, that a part of us was gone. Bill was a truly great individual. It staggers one’s imagination to think of the good this man might have done in this world, had it not been for the war which cut down the best young men in the flower of their manhood.

Chapter Ten Gert Skilling

Mae was only 22 months when my mother gave birth to Gertrude Edna on April 14, 1887. We all called her Gert though my mother called her Gertie. She was born with the cord wrapped around her neck and nearly died at birth. She had a great many birthmarks on her legs. My mother said Gertie was the cleverest of all her nine children. She walked at seven months. She was quite small in stature and was the prettiest of the Skilling girls. She had green eyes with dark lashes and her skin was ‘peaches and cream’. She was considered a real beauty with her light brown hair that shone almost luminously.

Gert’s feet were tiny and she had a pair of highly desirable ‘Queen Quality’ shoes that I wanted so much for her to hand down to me. But even though Gertie was 9 years my senior, I soon passed her in size and alas, never could get even my big toe into her ‘Queen Quality’ shoes. She really was a little Cinderella and I often used to feel like the ugly sister with my freckles and taller stature by about age 14. I don’t think I ever bore her any ill will.

After going to Normal School, Gert came back to Teeswater to teach for a few years in a rural School called the Eighth School. She commuted the 2 ½ miles back and forth daily on a bicycle. I loved to go out there to her school for special occasions like Christmas concerts and spring picnics where I got to know a lot of her pupils. She also taught in Teeswater School in the Primary room which was a separate building, when I was in about Grade Eight (called Senior Fourth at that time).One day when we were lined up to march into our classroom, Gert came out of the big school to go to the old stone school where the primary classes were held, and one of my classmates remarked with admiration: “Isn’t she a dainty little piece, though?” I was surprised, thrilled and proud. I had always just considered her my sister and did not appreciate her beauty.

by S.Askin
Teeswater, Ont.

After teaching around Teeswater for a few years, Gert did a very courageous thing and accepted a position in Calgary, Alberta, which to me seemed like the end of the world. We looked forward to her letters wanting to read about the exciting things happening in her life. Each year at Christmas a box arrived from Gert that was the highlight of our Christmas season. Besides sending unique and very acceptable gifts for us all, she enclosed holly and pine cones and all sorts of decorative pieces. At that time presents were not wrapped in gift wrappings. Today I remember the imaginative and artistic little decorations more than I remember any of the gifts. She had a real talent for the beautiful and unusual, much more than was often appreciated at that time.

by Arthur Studio
Detroit, Mich.

She met Harvey Kavaner in Calgary and in due time they were married. To save money they were quietly married there on June 1, 1915 and came home on their honeymoon. I remember they were very lovey-dovey. Harvey was a member of the Calgary Grain Exchange and later became very successful. In honour of the occasion, my father painted the house.

Gert and Harvey had three children, Merren, born in 1916, Jean, born in 1919 and Harvey Jr., born in 1920.  They moved to Winnipeg around this time and Harvey became President of the Red River Grain Company.

In 1921 I went out to teach at River Heights School in Winnipeg at Gert’s invitation and lived with them. Merren was five, Jean was two and Harvey was one year old.  There was a year and a day between Jean and Harvey. 

Gert was very talented at interior decorating. Even when she lived at home she would make curtains and hangings with lovely stenciling. Her home was always beautiful. She taught me a lot later after I was married about how to change a room around with a few adept changes and enhance the appearance.

Gert was at least 50 years ahead of her time regarding nutrition. She could have been a doctor, so well informed was she about so many things which she put into practice. In 1924 she got grain from the milling company, did research and experimented using her little hand meat grinder, with different combinations of wheat, rye and flax until she formulated the recipe for a tasty and healthy hot porridge which she named Red River Cereal. I was happy to have a part in introducing this product in 1926 at the Toronto Exhibition. Grace and Vern and I made porridge and served it with real cream in tiny portions while explaining the healthy ingredients: wheat, rye and flax. This cereal has been on the market ever since.

Kavaner Family

Sadly, little Jean died in 1926 just before her 7^th birthday, when her dressing gown caught on fire after touching the red hot element of an electric heater. This caused a great deal of grief in the family and strained relations between Gert and Harvey.

They built a very grand home at 901 Wellington Crescent and moved in 1929. In the summer of 1930, Mae, Wadd and Doris Mason and Grace Skilling drove to Winnipeg to spend 6 weeks of the summer with the Kavaners and were feted at a huge garden party there. I never saw the house but heard about it from those who had. That year the exterior and interior of the house on Wellington Crescent, was featured in Canadian Homes and Gardens.

Gert Skilling Kavaner

Alas, the crash of October 1929 had tragic effects on the fortunes of the Kavaners and they were later forced to sell their beautiful mansion.

In December 1936 Gert came home to visit our parents and arrived just a few hours after our mother’s death from pneumonia. Our father was senile and quite a problem. In fact I think this hastened our mother’s death. Gert took hold of the situation and cared for our father until his death the following July in 1937. She got some tutoring jobs and some part-time teaching at Moulton College and she ran the house where mother had roomers after we all had left.

The shock of mother’s sudden death and the pressure of caring for our father compounded the earlier trauma of her little Jean’s death from the fire. When her son Harvey left to join the war as a pilot in 1939, Gert had a stroke and a nervous breakdown. She was hospitalized and after a lingering illness died in Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Toronto in 1946 just a month before her grandson Craig was born to daughter Merren and George Murray. Her kindness and consideration for others knew no bounds, but her body could not stand all the pressures.  She gave so much, to so many. A clever, sensitive person to whom life dealt too many blows.

Chapter Nine Mae Skilling

Mae ( Marion Emma) was born on June 2, 1885 when Orville was 23 months, Maude barely 4 years, and Floss was 6 ½. She was 12 years my senior. My mother said Mae was the most ‘aggressive’ of our family, but she did not use that exact word. Mae distinctly had qualities of leadership from an early age.

My earliest recollection of her is when she and Gert left home to attend a Teacher Training School called ‘Model School’ in Mount Forest, Ontario. This was a four month course which gave them what was called a Third Class Teaching Certificate. A group of six of them went: Mae and Gert, Merle Mann, Louise Howson, Wilma Johnson and Gladys McPherson (who later married Dr. Midford Gillies, and was mother of James Gillies, former MPP). Gladys, the last survivor of this group died in January 1980 at the age of 94. These girls were an extremely clever and peppy bunch. I was about 10 at the time and worshipped them. All were accomplished singers and formed a double trio which performed in the Teeswater area. I reveled in the times they came to our house to practice. 

About this time I used to take a great interest in watching them dress for parties and singing engagements. I was put in bed by this time but wasn’t asleep. First, they put on a corset which was laced up the back, with the laces pulled very tight, so that their waists were quite tiny and their hips looked quite large. This was a desirable contrast, and I remember hearing a lady once compliment Mae on her nice plump hips. That wasn’t enough. They would then pad the hips out with what was called ‘a bustle’, a four or five inch thick padding fastened around the tiny waist with tapes. Next came the tight ‘under waist’, designed to flatten their bosom, and upon this was pinned a sort of bib with many starched frills, each edged with valentine’s lace. This gave a nice round smooth front for their shirt waists and hid any semblance of breasts. If no one was around to pull the laces of the corset, the lace was looped around the bed post and the lone person getting dressed would walk a few steps to tighten the corset.

In those days all the women had long hair. The front of the hair was combed down over the face, furiously backcombed, and on top was pinned ‘a rat’, about three inches in diameter. This was made of their combings or could be purchased. They securely pinned it from ear to ear then with one grand sweep, threw the teased hair up over the ‘rat’ and produced what was called ‘a pompadour’. The back hair got the same treatment: the ends were formed into a knot or a figure 8 and pinned securely with many hair pins.

Then the hats were placed on top of this masterpiece of hairdressing and fastened securely with great long sharp hat pins which often had a gorgeous knob on the end. (The hat pins, I heard, could also be used as a means of self-defense.)

Mae was musically gifted and played the piano and violin in the Teeswater Orchestra.

About this time (around 1905?) Mae got a job teaching in a remote place called Scotland, on Manitoulin Island. She talked for years about the hardships of the winter and earned the princely sum of $250 a year. After Mae saved enough money, she and Gert registered at Normal School in Toronto to upgrade their qualifications. They lived with Orville and Rose Skilling.

Mae was accepted on the staff of the Toronto Board and in a few years climbed to assistant principal at Perth Avenue Public School, an unusual position for a woman at the time. She held this position for many years.

While at Perth Avenue School she trained and directed the school choir. For nine years in a row, they were awarded the Gold Shield at the All Toronto Elementary Schools Music Festival, held annually on Empire Day at Massey Hall. It became a foregone conclusion that Perth Avenue School would sweep the awards even with different adjudicators. Others began to complain that some schools would not enter the competition as there was no chance of winning. One day the judges gave First Place to another school and Mae was devastated by the loss.  She called it “jealousy”.

That was a hard summer for us. Even though I was thrilled to have her home, it wasn’t long before she was slapping and yelling at me. I could never do anything right in her eyes.  We kids learned to tread lightly when Mae was around as one never knew when that left hand would whack us out of the blue.

Mae had a boyfriend named George McQuibban whom she met at ‘Model School’ in Mount Forest. That seemed to me to be the ultimate in love stories. She talked about him a great deal but I never met him because, when he came to Teeswater, Vern and I were shipped off to friends in the country. George was going to medical college. This ‘affair’ went on for years and years. (I use the word ‘affair’ in the connotation of 1912 not 1980.) Alas, around 1917 or 1918, George ended the relationship. He was going blind and died a few years later.

I admired Mae tremendously with all the glamour surrounding her. She could be most generous. When any financial help was needed for education, she was the first to offer. She paid my board and fees when I went to Normal School in Stratford. When Harold and Bill returned from the war in 1920 she was right there to help. When I had to have a serious operation at Easter of my Normal School year and had given up all hopes of passing, she encouraged me to take some of my exams in bed and others in a private room. Fortunately I passed. I wonder if I ever paid her back or thanked her sufficiently. She also rallied us all around to help pay Harold’s expenses at Dental College when he returned from France. There was no Department of Veterans’ Affairs in those days.

Mae was a natural comedienne and could keep a roomful of people in stitches for a whole evening with her mimicking. She had a way of making funny faces that would have me rolling on the floor, helpless with laughter.

Mae had begun teaching music appreciation in the classroom where her talent was recognized by the Columbia Gramophone Company. There was a developing interest in the use of phonograph records as an educational device.  Mae was offered a job with Columbia teaching music appreciation, writing to music, folk dancing etc. in Normal Schools and Colleges. She travelled across Canada, all expenses paid and for the unheard of salary at the time, of $3000 a year. She once gave me a present with a tag saying “to Norma, from the three thousand dollar lady”.

In 1924 she gave up all this affluence and married Wadd Mason, a widower with a 10 year old daughter named Doris. They lived on Hillsdale Avenue in north Toronto.

When the music teacher at Toronto Normal School died suddenly in 1930, Mae was called in to replace him. Later she was approached to direct a Toronto Women Teachers’ Choir. She trained them beautifully and for a few years she filled Massey Hall and Eaton auditorium for two nights with lovely choral music.

Mae and Wadd had one of the first camping trailers and went on trips coast to coast every summer. When Wadd retired, they bought five acres near Unionville, Ontario and lived in the trailer while Wadd set about building a lovely substantial home for them with his own hands.

“The Farm” as we called it, with its large garden and beautiful apple orchard, became a Mecca for their large circle of friends and the family. We always felt welcome to come whether it was to skate on the ice on the little lazy river that wound through the property, to gather spring flowers, to devour strawberries, to load the car up with vegetables, to have corn roasts, to pick apples or to have Christmas dinners or New Year’s Eve parties. So many memories there.

During the last few years of her life, Mae seemed to have much less energy though she still had a great interest in life and all her surroundings. She died on August 2, 1967 and has been sorely missed both by her wide circle of friends and all the family.

Chapter Eight Orville Skilling

Orville was born June 16, 1883. He was only 13 when I was born but I have no early recollection of my eldest big brother. He was always playful with me and taught me how to waltz, although dancing was frowned upon by our parents. With a lovely tenor voice, he would often sing “Goodbye My Bluebell” and other songs popular at the time of the Boer War. He used to slip me the odd penny and would dance me on his knees. He had a quick temper that would sometimes flare up but was soon over. When we used to stand around the piano and he would sing with that clear beautiful tenor voice putting harmony, I was really in heaven.

Orville left school when he was quite young and went to Toronto. He married Rose Darling there in 1909 and she was a wonderful wife. Their home was a happy one and whenever I visited, there was a lot of fun and laughter. When they were first married they lived on Wascana Avenue in Cabbagetown, when it really was Cabbagetown. Orville was a very hard worker and had a great talent for business. He started off working for himself going door to door selling butter and eggs. Soon he had a horse and wagon and continued to expand. (If you have seen the Kraft Cheese ad on television, you know what kind of wagon I mean.)As his business grew, he bought 311 Jones Avenue, a block above Riverdale Collegiate with a large yard and stables in the back, and a lane at the side of the house. Before long he had about 12 employees and was doing a thriving business.

Orville and Rose had four children: Grace, the twins Jack and Marion, then a son Harold William, the latter named after my brothers Harold and Bill, both off fighting in France at the time of his birth.

When the twins were 9 months and Grace was about 3, I spent 2 months of the summer holiday helping Rose with housework and the children. I was only 16 and had a lot to learn. Rose taught me so much and gave me good advice. I am forever grateful to her. She also made me some very nice dresses.

At Easter 1918 I was in Normal School and had to have a very serious operation for appendicitis with complications of a bowel perforation and gangrene. There was no Ontario Health Insurance then and I had no money. My wonderful big brother Orville paid the doctor and all my hospital expenses.

When the Spanish Influenza epidemic struck in September 1918, I had just started teaching. My school was closed so I went back to Teeswater along with sister Gert and 2 year old Merren who were visiting from Calgary. Gert was pregnant with Jean and it was said that this flu could be fatal for pregnant women. In Toronto Orville was sick in bed but got up to go and help the widow of one of his employees who had succumbed to the flu. He returned, went to bed, and never got up. His little daughter Marion died on October 18^th and Orville on October 21^st. They were buried in the same grave in Mount Pleasant Cemetery.

Orville was a going concern when he died at 35 years of age. He was a good father as well as a wonderful husband, son and brother. He left behind a grieving widow, a daughter Grace of 6 ½, Jack nearly 5 and Harold only 16 months. Young Harold was just walking then and carried his father’s hat wherever he went for days after Orville’s death.

The world lost a wonderful man in his prime and on his way to his first million dollars. He left behind a great many descendants who will carry on his tradition of doing good in the world.

Chapter Seven Maude Skilling

The second child born to our parents was Eugenia Maude on June 29, 1881. Like Floss, she had bright brown eyes and dark hair, but a much quieter and gentler manner than her older sister. She had a lovely singing voice and was an accomplished pianist.

She too, was away from home when I was little, but spent more time in Teeswater in my childhood than Floss. She was very loving and treated us younger children with affection and grace. She played the violin in the Teeswater Orchestra and had music pupils in Gorrie, Fordwich, and Wroxeter in Huron County, as well as being organist on the large pipe organ in the big church in Gorrie. These villages were not far from Teeswater so she got home fairly often. She travelled to these places by train and the fare was only a few cents in those days.

I was always delighted when Maude came home. She would curl my hair and never pulled when she was combing it. I loved to hear her play the piano. Whenever singers came to give concerts in Teeswater, she was called on as an accompanist and complimented for her skill. The ‘Sons of Scotland’ used to bring talent and put on what we called the ‘Scotch Concert’ every year in Teeswater. Maude used to tell me how the performers made up behind the scenes: added little false curls to their hairdo and even painted their cheeks. 

Maude married Lambert Stinson from Gorrie in 1915. He was quite a humorist and always looked nice as he was a very classy dresser. He was quite a clever man and the story was that he had passed his exams for University Entrance at age 15 and his parents enrolled him in Victoria College. They later were informed that Lambert had never turned up for classes; so his father went down to investigate and found his son working at pasting up signs on billboards. He just didn’t want to go in for higher learning. When Maude met him he was the proprietor of a little butcher shop in Gorrie, Ontario.

Maude and Lambert left Gorrie after their marriage and went to live in Toronto. Maude always had a large piano class and kept a number of boarders, usually teachers. Lambert worked for my brother Orville in the office as a bookkeeper. After Orville died in 1918 Lambert became a car salesman. Maude sang as a paid singer in the Eaton Memorial Choir and was one of Sir Ernest MacMillan’s favourite choristers. Lambert also sang there.

Maude and Lambert never had any children and this was a great disappointment to them. (She had a large tumour removed from her uterus at one time.) Maude however showered a lot of love on her little nieces and nephews. Orville’s children, Jack, Grace and Harold, all went up to Aunt Maude’s every Saturday morning for their gratis music lessons. Our two children were too young to avail themselves of her wonderful talents as a teacher, but she loved them dearly and they loved her too.

When Ray and I were married in 1926, Maude took over complete responsibility for the catering and had plates for 30 guests. As there was no refrigeration then, these plates were all taken down to the cool basement and carried up again for the wedding supper. I wonder if I ever thanked her enough.

Maude had a thyroid condition which was wrongly diagnosed by her doctor. When she went to have the operation, it was too late, and she succumbed to complete dehydration*. My dear, gentle, patient, kind, loving and generous sister passed away too soon at 59 years of age.

* An autopsy showed that she died of rheumatic heart disease 3 May 1941 at Toronto General Hospital

Chaper Six Floss Skilling

My eldest sister was christened Florence Elizabeth but always called Floss or Flossie. She was born December 6, 1878 and by the time I was born in 1896, Floss had moved to Aurora, Ontario to work as a milliner.  I was told she taught piano before that. She was an accomplished pianist, but had many other talents as well. Floss had dark hair and snapping brown eyes that were almost always crinkled up in laughter. She had a wonderful sense of humour and in 1902, she married Will Guinn who had an even greater wit and a very congenial personality.

Their wedding is my earliest recollection of either of them. I was six when they were married in our tiny house in Teeswater, with Mae and Maude as bridesmaids. I do not remember the bride as much as I remember the bridesmaids’ white organdy gowns with many tucks and ruffles. I thought they looked like angels. The crowning event of that day for me was when the bridegroom gave me the stupendous gift of a whole dime with instructions to buy myself some ‘Newports’. Newport Chocolates were the elite chocolate of the day and I felt like a very lucky girl.

Floss and Will took up residence at Gore Bay on Manitoulin Island where Will started a monument business. In 1903 their first child Marion Winnifred was born, named ‘Marion’ for our paternal grandmother and ‘Winnifred’ after Winnifred Nixon, Floss’ best friend. I remember my mother went to Gore Bay to be present at the birth, taking my younger brother Vernon, aged 2, with her. I was left at home at the mercy of my older sisters. When Marion was 11 months old, the next child, Ruxton made his appearance.



Floss with Ruxton and Marion Winnifred Guinn
c. 1905

 I’m not sure when they moved to Neepawa, Manitoba but they lived there for their remaining years and produced seven fine children. Will moved his monument business there and was very successful.

Floss and I used to say to each other we were distantly related as she was the first and I was the ninth of our parents’ children.  Over the years she spent considerable time with us and this was when I really got to know her.  She had very high ideals and worked very hard to bring up her children to be fine citizens. She was an ardent member of the Eastern Star and the Methodist (later United) Church.

I visited them in the summer of 1920 when I was teaching in Winnipeg, and saw why they had such a happy home. She told me once she always hated to see Will Guinn go out the door. They were a truly devoted couple.  She lived to be 83 years old and still retained a youthful outlook on life. She never ceased to grieve for Will Guinn, who died several years before her.

Chapter Five Our House on Railway Street in Teeswater, Ontario

The house all nine of us were raised in was quite small and certainly had none of the conveniences of homes today. How my mother coped with what she had to work with and sent out her 9 children well-dressed, well-fed, with good manners, and the ability to absorb as much education as was available in Teeswater, I do not know.

Skilling House
Teeswater, ON c. 1910

The house contained fairly large living room or parlour which was called “The Room”. It had a carpet woven of rags with a dark border around the edges. It was tacked down and was lifted every spring and fall, taken out to the backyard, and whacked with a carpet beater. This was a wire a heavy wire in a long loop with the two ends driven into a wooden handle. We all took turns whacking the dust out of the carpet, no doubt working out a lot of hostilities unknowingly. (No one had ever heard of hostilities or working out anger then!) We always had a piano, a couch, several cane bottomed chairs and two rocking chairs. I don’t know what became of them. We did not know enough to appreciate or preserve them.

Off “the Room” were two bedrooms. The one at the front of the house was occupied by our parents and the other was the “spare room”. Some of the family slept there and vacated it when we had company. In those days people would visit each other for several days or weeks at a time. This was the room occupied by our father when he nearly died of typhoid fever in 1902. I remember at 6 peeking in at him in fear when he was delirious. His face was red and he was raving. Many people died of typhoid at that time as it was easily transmitted by unsafe water.

Our paternal grandmother Marion Cochrane Skilling McIntosh also died in that room. I remember peeking in again then and hearing my father saying:  “Mother, mother can you hear me? Squeeze my hand if you can hear me.” I remember a little of the funeral in 1902 and seeing my aunts with white shirt waists tucked into long black skirts. The skirts had little trains on them and their tiny waists above bustles gave them an interesting figure. I remember seeing them with their hands over their faces standing in different windows weeping.

We had another fairly large room on the main floor which contained the wood stove. The stove was brought into that room in the fall and taken out to what was the summer kitchen in the spring. It was always a very traumatic affair, heaving that heavy iron stove down 2 steps and setting it up out there. Moving it also necessitated removal of the stovepipes which extended half way across the room to the chimney and were usually filled with soot. These pipes were about 9 inches in diameter and were composed of many short lengths about 30 inches long fitted together. It was essential to be very careful when removing them as the pieces could come apart spraying everything nearby with soot. Sometimes some of my brothers would get impatient and try to hurry. The deluge of soot was nothing compared to the roar of epithets from our father. Mother was usually patient but this activity used to raise her ire too. We all breathed a sigh of relief when the pipes were set outside well beyond the house. They we had to bang the pipes with sticks until all the winter’s soot was dislodged before putting them in their summer quarters.

This same room also contained a work table with a leaf which could be raised to hold extra things or dropped to a flat perpendicular position on hinges when not in use. These are called “fall leaf or drop leaf tables” and can bring a pretty penny now at auctions. Mother did her baking here and I washed the dishes here too. Just beside this table was the pantry door and this was the only place our mother had for storing food. She usually had 100 lb. bags of flour and sugar which stood on the floor. This pantry was under the stairs and its space diminished as the stairs came down.  On the floor of the pantry was a trap door with hinges which could be opened by lifting a metal ring then fastening the ring on a large hook attached to a lower shelf.  This was the inside entrance to the cellar. Often people with short memories would go off and leave that trap door open. It appalls me to think we all made it to adulthood without anyone falling down those stairs. Only one minor disaster I know of occurred and it is still a family anecdote. One summer our brother Orville and his four lively children were visiting us and my mother, using the outside entrance, had set a couple of pans of milk on the cellar steps for the cream to rise. She would then skim off the lovely thick rich cream and leave the skim milk. Someone left the trap door open in the pantry and little Jack (one of the twins), 20 months old, opened the pantry door and hurtled down the steps right into the two pans of milk. We all worried about his safety but found nothing but a skinned upper lip. He kept showing his sore lip to everyone saying: “Fa down a milk”. To this day, that is a family saying.

At the other end of the room was the dining room, with an oak extension dining room table, a cupboard for the dishes, and several chicken coop chairs painted yellow. My job every Saturday was to wash all these chairs. I was proud of my handiwork. Our father’s desk stood at the end of the room and was called “the secretary”. It had a bookcase above enclosed with 2 glass doors. One of the books inside I remember was a doctor book and the front and back pages were an ugly colour I called “bitter”. My father kept great ledgers where he accounted for every twenty-five cents. Why I don’t know, since he never balanced them that I know of and there weren’t even any income taxes then!

Mother’s sewing machine stood under the window at the end of the room. Along one side was what we called “the lounge”, a plain upholstered couch raised at one end. This couch was so comfortable that nearly every evening one or another of us children had to be carried up to bed, having succumbed to the sandman in eyes of a tired child after a busy day. My brother Bill occasionally used to have night terrors after falling asleep on the lounge.

Two steps down took us to the summer kitchen which contained a table, the wood stove in summer, and a cupboard of sorts and the wash tub. Under the table was another trap door, similar to the one in the pantry, but when it was opened, it disclosed the cistern which collected all the rain and melted snow collected and piped from the eaves around the outside of the house. We never had a pump for it. To obtain water we had a pail with a chain attached to the handle. The pail was dangled down to the surface of the water and, with an adroit twist of the wrist, was turned over and sank in the cool depths then drawn up hand over hand. This is the way we obtained all our water used for washing clothes, bathing, and washing hands and faces in an enamel basin set on a backless chair. Again I am shaken at the thought of how easily any of us might have drowned, so easy would it have been to slip into that deep cistern.