DAVID BROWN SHOWED ME A LEARNING PATH THROUGH THE WOODLANDS

I never really knew how wonderful it was, to live across from The Bog, until someone told me. Not just anyone. An educator. A wilderness canoeist. A man who made his living from the environment of Ontario. A teacher known by thousands of youngsters and adults, who had benefitted from his special classroom, near Hamilton’s Botanical Gardens. I was his special student....a project I suppose. He liked to move the unmovable!

When I authored the biography of teacher/historian, Miles David Brown, back in 2000, I felt unfairly abandoned holding onto an old promise! Fate unfortunately got in the way of self imposed protocols. I never break a promise. My kids disagree but I’m talking professionally here. I wasn’t sure whether to shelve the project or carry-on to the best of my ability. Few had as many intimate conversations with the educator, in his final years, than Suzanne and I. If we wouldn’t write the book, who could practically fill-in and do justice to a project that would take a year to research and write,...... and most likely be a labor of love and respect, with nary a cent of profit. We certainly didn’t do this to make a profit. We did it as friends. Friends who initially were scared to tackle the life story of a man who was both complicated and contradictory. He was a brilliant man but eccentric. How would we represent all his characteristics properly, and not offend his colleagues and students, who really didn’t know just how strange Dave had been for years and years. (At the time of his death Dave had stuffed over 100,000 rare books and documents into a small Hamilton bungalow)

When Dave first asked me to write his life story, as an outdoor educator, I assumed he’d be around for the whole project. He had it all figured out including the cover-art. What I didn’t realize is that Dave was close to death when he hired me on. I went from being quite confident I could deliver a worthy biography, ghost writing for Dave, to the nervous lead author on a book left up to me to compile and design. While I never doubted Dave was looking over my shoulder the whole time, I confess it was one of the toughest writing jags I’ve experienced. Dave was a fussy, fussy man, and I had to make it right. Well, bottom line is, I sold out the biography and Dave haunts me quite pleasantly in memory.

Dave was a key component and motivating force in the Outdoor Education programs in Ontario, and his classroom in Hamilton, was filled with an absolutely amazing array of critters....some alive and in glassed containers, terrariums, aquariums and hundreds of preserved animals of forest and boglands. I met Dave as a fellow book collector, in the antique shop we used to operate in Bracebridge, and after only a few meetings and impromptu debates about Canadian history (which our shop was famous for), Dave became a regular house guest, on his many camping and canoeing forays in northern Algonquin Park. The boys couldn’t wait for Dave to pull into the driveway with his red truck and yellow canoe, heralding the arrival of natural goodies. Dave never came here without some natural oddities to show the boys. One day it might be rattles from a deceased rattlesnake ( Dave would harvest these from snakes killed on the road), to portions of moose antler broken in battle, lightning-fried wood, from damaged trees, so that our boys could see and smell what a bolt of electricity against wood could manifest. There was always a plethora of interesting items, from old woodstoves, logging chains, cant hooks, and pike poles in the back of that truck, harvested from the many waterways of Ontario, where Dave liked to canoe. Dave was a teacher 24-7, and he always had his students in mind when he came upon something peculiar, while traversing a lake, or portaging from river to lake. Thousands upon thousands of youngsters in this province learned about nature from David Brown. He was a nature guide, a television personality in Hamilton, an historian, and an amazing tutor to our family.

One day he showed up here covered in muck. “Fall out of the canoe Dave,” Suzanne asked our burly guest. “Come here,” he waved, as he ambled to the back of the truck. “See that log,” he questioned. “Check out that stamp on the end.” Sure enough it was an end cut with a lumber company stamp, of which he had a collection of Muskoka’s antiquated logging industry marks, of which this one was a J.D. Shier stamp. It was the bloody size of the log-cut that impressed us, and the fact he was able to wrestle it off the bottom of a bay, and haul it into the canoe by himself. And he paddled for an hour after that engagement. “I’m going to put this in the display cabinet at the education centre with some of the logging stamps I’ve got at home,” said Dave. He did it for the kids....and guests of the education centre who might be interested in Canada’s early logging industry. That’s the way Dave was. He was like a good billiard player thinking three shots ahead. (Dave’s wife was used to coming home to find turtles etc., in the bathtub, and boxes upon boxes of artifacts and books he’d found or purchased on his travels. He said she left him when he only had 30,000 books, and just a few cant hooks and logging chains in the livingroom.)

Dave, Suzanne and I, used to sit out on our front deck, overlooking The Bog, and he talked for hours on end about his many wilderness excursions. He’d take our boys Andrew and Robert on nature hikes through the lowland, and so patiently deal with their many questions about flora and fauna.....question dear old dad fumbled with, and mother had to consult her wildflower guidebook to answer otherwise. Dave knew it all. He could find snake skins and bear poop, and tell you when these natural events occurred. He’d show them the handiwork of the local woodpeckers, and draw their attention to tracks in the spring snow. I followed behind, in awe of all this wonderful man knew, of the bountiful and precious nature around us.

I’ve sat on this same deck with Canadian historians, experts in many fields, and there have been wine enhanced discussions about everything from World War and politics, to Muskoka’s old boats, boat builders and artists. I’ve debated the death of Canadian landscape artist Tom Thomson, with those close to the case, and found out Dave had particularly important information the Mowat grave was still occupied by the artist (contrary to accepted belief)......a story told to him by someone intimate with the Canoe Lake community of 1917. I went on to write three published feature articles, with a huge following, inspired in part from that front porch chat with the good Mr. Brown. He was a story bonanza for an eager columnist.

I sat out there for a wee bit this afternoon, and while a little chilly in the shade, it was a warming reconciliation, to feel Dave’s presence beside me again, lounging together, mortal and spirit-kind, looking out over what I find so amazing about this Gravenhurst neighborhood. He wasn’t a showboat of information, and he never force-fed conservation as a personal life mission. In fact Dave made money on weekends, chopping dangerous trees down for Hamilton customers. Dave realized that it was impossible to save every tree, every pasture, all the woodlands we knew as children, and even some of the wetlands we believe fragile. He was blunt and honest and I knew he was right. Yet he realized with a good science background, when destruction of nature had gone too far. Many times, before retiring to bedlam, Dave and I gave a final toast, to all the wee beasties that played upon the Moor, and the fairies that may have frolicked in the moonlight in the beck beyond the hillside.....the fairy rings, in evidence Queen Mab had been there the eve before. Science for Dave was a classroom protocol but his eyes told of enchantments far and wide, and Robert and Andrew listened intently, so as not to miss any of the drama on his woodland hikes.

Dave told me he liked our place.....very much enjoyed the view over this wild paradise in an urban package. I agreed. I’m so glad I wrote his biography. I’m so glad we spared this Bog for all the youngsters and their parents who enjoy trodding down its pathways today, in those marvelous adventures in contentment.....that have never ended for me!