Open Windows Series of Articles

WELCOME BACK TO OUR OPEN WINDOWS SERIES OF ARTICLES

INTRODUCTION TO PART TWO OF THE ARCHIVES COLLECTIONS

By Ted Currie

Research and Editorial Assistance by Suzanne Currie

     In our former antique shop, located on upper Manitoba Street, in Bracebridge, beneath what was known then as Martin's Framing, dating from 1989 to 1995, I had a lot of time to write in-between customers. It was horrible in terms of business revenue, from one day after the Thanksgiving holiday, until the cusp of the Christmas season when things got a little more lucrative, as far as antique and collectable sales. In those years, I was also a "by necessity Mr. Mom", and we had our sons Andrew and Robert enrolled at Bracebridge Public School; although we lived at that time, in our present house, we call Birch Hollow, here in Gravenhurst. Suzanne was teaching at this point, at Bracebridge and Muskoka Lakes Secondary School, and with our shop in town, it was the most sensible arrangement with the boys, to have them attend school there as well.

     I looked after Robert in the shop, for the morning, as he went to school for the afternoon session, while Andrew was already in Grade One by this point. The reason I bring this up, is that after all these years, we're still a family (like those television Waltons up there on Walton's Mountain) working in and around our antique business; but now everything is based here in Gravenhurst, It takes us five minutes to get from home to work and it's a fabulous arrangement. As I wrote copious amounts in our previous antique shop, I have written triple the amount in the studio of our Muskoka Road storefront, which was, of course, the former Muskoka Theatre. While we don't have as much time between customers now, because we have a much better year round clientele, I still get in a fair bit of writing time, in between antique hunting adventures, and doing some minor furniture restorations. In Bracebridge, business was so poor in the off-season, that, no kidding, I wrote the foundation copy for three books, and wrote weekly columns for the Muskoka Advance, and The Muskoka Sun. It was a great way to pass the time in an empty shop, and feel that I was being somewhat productive, although the accountant didn't have much optimism that it was a good way of running a business. I did make some freelance income, but mostly I traded editorial copy for antique shop advertising. The summers were great and often provided enough income to carry us five or six months into the autumn and winter seasons.

     I wrote about anything and everything that inspired me at the particular moment I raised a pen, and began scribbling notes into one of my many notebooks filled to capacity with stories I thought I'd never use; but wanted to have in my possession just in case, one day, the well, as they say, ran dry. Most of the editorial material I recovered recently, found while I was looking through my old files, (because Suzanne asked me to clean up my room), were wonderfully nostalgic, reminding me of those days when I used to have Robert, now nearing his 29th birthday, riding my lap while I made these notations for posterity. I also wrote a great deal of editorial copy for numerous local publications, from our home in Gravenhurst, on many days when Robert and Andrew played with their toy cars at my feet, and how precious those moments were; such that I can still hear their chattering when I read editorials I penned on those occasions. I have always benefitted from our home here at Birch Hollow, overlooking the beautiful wetland we call The Bog, which was the perfect choice of residences for our young family, when we arrived here from Bracebridge in the fall of 1989. It has been an inspiring place to be a writer in residence, enabling me to sit down at a keyboard, or curl into a comfortable old chair with a window view of the wetland, with pen and paper,  knowing from the moment of engagement, I would be able to write for hours without feeling tapped-out. It is no different today, and the Katherine Day series of articles was largely composed here, while enjoying this most invigorating vantage point.

     The autumn season has always been my favorite time to write and I have a vault of material from this period of the rolling year, dating back forty years. When I took my initial foray into professional writing, it was in my attic office in the former home and medical office of Dr. Peter McGibbon, of Bracebridge, a charming brick estate that looked out over the line of Norway Maples in Manitoba Street's Memorial Park. It was the autumn of 1977. It was one of the most exciting periods of my writing career, because everything was ahead of me, at this point, and there were so many exceptional possibilities. It short order I would become a columnist for the fledgling Bracebridge Examiner, and by the early winter of 1979, I was a cub reporter for the Muskoka Lakes-Georgian Bay Beacon, and eventually becoming the editor of its sister publication, The Herald-Gazette where I put in the next decade. For most of this time, I worked from the McGibbon House (gone now, by the way), and even though I wrote almost every day through this period, for Muskoka Publications, it was my free-time writing that entertained me the most. It was always in the fall of the year, and the period up to New Years, that seemed to unwind my creativity, just as it had, as a child, growing up in Bracebridge; the Christmas season being so compelling to me in actuality, that it remained thus, many decades later; still writing about those days for fear that if I didn't, I would surely forget them altogether. I wanted, at the very least, to have these records of that town, in that period of time, for the benefit of my sons, who might find it nostalgic one day, to trace their father's ramblings up on Hunt's Hill, and the well trodden trail from Alice Street to the arena on James Street where I spent most of my free time in the winter months.

     The stories included in this extended "Open Windows" series, are significant to me as both a retrospective, of what it was, back then, I found so important, and endearing about this amazing district of Muskoka; and in a late innings' desire, on my part I think , to understand what characteristics about small town life, influenced me so profoundly, such that it would have influenced so much of my writing, and so much of my attitude for most of my writing years. Feeling sad about how much we've lost as rural communities, of the social / cultural warmth of once upon a time. The stories included in this series, which will conclude on New Year's Eve, were written because of my good feelings about my hometown, (some about Burlington, where I lived for the first few years of my life), and the great loyalty I have for our region of Ontario to this day. I will never leave Muskoka voluntarily. The editorial pieces have a little bit of everything attached to them, from antiques to occasional snipes at local politicians for not doing more to conserve and protect our region from being destroyed by over-development.

     I hope you will enjoy the stories upcoming, which may at times reveal our family's many encounters with ghosts in dwellings we've lived. And there will be stories about old cronies we've known in the antique and history professions. And there will be others dealing with sad events, happy occasions, and remarkable events I was fortunately able to enjoy in person. I hope you will join us for this little autumn season journey through an old writer's accumulated nostalgia. As we approach the Hallowe'en period, by mid-month, I will once again re=publish an abridge version of the "Tale of Sleepy Hollow," by Washington Irving. I do this each year as a new tradition, in an attempt to tempt the leadership of Bracebridge to embrace the brilliant work of Irving, the author responsive for the name "Bracebridge," taken from his early 1800's book, "Bracebridge Hall." It's their right to use Irving's legacy yet they choose not to, for whatever reason. I have an interest in this story as well, seeing as my Dutch ancestors, the Vandervoorts settled in New York, in those founding years of the colonies, and may well have met the Headless Horseman, but keeping their heads upon their shoulders.

     I hope there will be a little bif of editorial entertainment for readers. If you love Muskoka as our family does, then you will be pleased with the setting our each story. All in one way or another, even if they are on a foreign subject, were inspired by life in this region of South Muskoka.

EVERY ANTIQUE DEALER HAS A FAVORITE BOOK THEY HAVE FOUND INSPIRATIONAL

     IT IS A BOOK I CONSULT REGULARLY. IT SHOWS THE INTENSITY OF MY STUDIES. RIPPED DUSTJACKET, AND THUMBPRINTS ON SOME OF THE PAGE-TOPS. I AM A READER WHO EATS WHILE ENJOYING A BOOK. BIG PROBLEM. IT'S A CANADIAN BOOK COLLECTING BIBLE. THERE HAVE BEEN A FEW TIMES WHEN I'VE BEEN TEMPTED TO SELL IT, BUT ONLY BECAUSE THE PRICE HAS BEEN RATHER SUBSTANTIAL. I HAVE RESISTED FOR QUITE SOME TIME NOW, AND BECAUSE IT'S IN SHORT SUPPLY, AND A GREAT STORY FOR THE BOOKSELLER-ME, I WANTED TO SHARE A CHAPTER OR TWO WITH YOU. IN MY PREVIOUS BLOG, I MENTIONED THE COMPROMISES OUR FAMILY HAS MADE SINCE THE MID 1980'S, WITH THE RE-DESIGNATION OF LIVING SPACE, IN THE THREE HOUSES WHERE WE'VE RESIDED. I SUGGESTED THAT THIS WAS A COMMON OCCURRENCE AMONGST ANTIQUE TYPES, AND I OFFERED TO HIGHLIGHT ANOTHER DEALER WHO HAD MADE SIMILAR COMPROMISES OF HER ABODE, TO ACCOMMODATE A NEW BUSINESS SHE HAD ACQUIRED. IT'S AN AMAZING STORY OF RESTRUCTURING AND SUPPORTING FAMILY, AFTER THE LOSS OF HER HUSBAND; AND DEMONSTRATION OF WHAT A STALWART WORK ETHIC CAN DO, EVEN UNDER THE MOST ADVERSE CONDITIONS. HAVING TO SURVIVE THE ECONOMIC CHAGRIN OF THE GREAT DEPRESSION. AND TAKING OVER A BUSINESS SHE HAD ONLY A CURSORY KNOWLEDGE, IN ONE OF THE MOST RUTHLESSLY COMPETITIVE PROFESSIONS ON EARTH…….TUCKED TIGHTLY IN THE DOMAIN OF RARE AND OUT OF PRINT BOOKS.

     "THE SIDE DOOR - TWENTY-SIX YEARS IN MY BOOK ROOM," BY DORA HOOD, WAS FIRST PUBLISHED, IN HARDCOVER, BY THE RYERSON PRESS, TORONTO, IN 1958. QUITE A FEW YEARS AGO, I WAS ABLE TO PURCHASE AN INSCRIBED AND AUTOGRAPHED COPY, DATED SEPTEMBER 1970. PRESUMABLY SHE HAD SOME BOOKS LEFT OVER FROM THE 1958 PRINTING, AND GAVE THIS PERSONAL COPY TO A FRIEND. IT IS INSCRIBED, 'TO MY FRIEND FLORENCE BOYT WITH AFFECTIONATE REMEMBRANCE……DORA HOOD." DORA HOOD OPENED ONE OF THE MOST RESPECTED OLD BOOKS SHOPS IN TORONTO, AND WAS KNOWN TO BOOK COLLECTORS AROUND THE WORLD. THAT'S RIGHT, AND SHE WORKED OUT OF HER MODEST HOME, IN A TIGHTLY KNIT, BUT QUICKLY DIVERSIFYING NEIGHBORHOOD. THIS PROVED TO HER GENERAL ADVANTAGE, AS A BOOK SELLER.

     "IT WAS BY CHANCE RATHER THAN BY DESIGN THAT I BECAME A BOOKSELLER," WRITES DORA HOOD, TO OPEN HER BIOGRAPHY. "IT CAME ABOUT IN THIS WAY. I DINED ONE EVENING WITH MY FRIEND, JEANETTE RATHBUN, AND THE CONVERSATION TURNED TO THE CONGENIAL SUBJECT OF BOOKS. I WAS SURPRISED TO HEAR HER SAY RATHER WEARILY, THAT SHE WAS TIRED OF BOOKS. SHE THEN CONFESSED THAT FOR MORE THAN TWO YEARS SHE HAD BEEN ATTEMPTING TO CARRY ON A MAIL-ORDER BOOK BUSINESS IN HER SPARE TIME, WHICH MEANT THE EVENINGS, FOR SHE HAD A FULL DAYTIME OCCUPATION. SHE HAD AT ONE TIME HOPED SHE MIGHT MAKE THE BOOKS HER BUSINESS, BUT NOW SHE KNEW SHE COULD NOT DROP HER SALARIED WORK IN FAVOR OF THE UNCERTAINTY OF SELLING BOOKS.

     "AFTER DINNER I ASKED TO SEE THE BOOKS AND FOUND THAT THEY WERE ALL OUT OF PRINT BOOKS ON CANADA. I THINK THIS WAS THE FIRST TIME I HAD ENCOUNTERED THE EUPHONIOUS WORD 'CANADIANA' AS APPLIED TO BOOKS, AND IT WAS MOST EMPHATICALLY THE FIRST TIME I HAD SEEN SUCH A MINUTE AND TIDY SECOND-HAND BOOKSHOP; FOR SUCH IT WAS. SHE HAD ISSUED A FEW CATALOGUES AND HAD COMPILED A SMALL MAILING LIST, AND HER FILES AND ACCOUNT BOOKS WERE MODELS OF NEATNESS. I BEGAN TO ASK QUESTIONS. WHERE DID SHE GET HER STOCK OF BOOKS? THAT WAS THE DIFFICULT, SHE CONFESSED. IN HER LIMITED TIME SHE COULD NOT LOOK FOR THEM AND KEEPING STRICTLY TO MAIL-ORDER IT WAS DIFFICULT TO EXPAND. IT HAD ALMOST CEASED TO BE A PAYING ENTERPRISE. I STAYED LATE BUT FINALLY TORE MYSELF AWAY AND STEPPED OUT INTO THE WINDY MARCH NIGHT. I LIKED WHAT I HAD SEEN OF THAT SMALL BOOK BUSINESS. IT HAD A POWERFUL APPEAL TO ME AND I THOUGHT OF NOTHING ELSE ALL THE WAY HOME. SUDDENLY, AS I NEARED MY HOUSE, I FOUND MYSELF SAYING OUT LOUD TO THE SWAYING ELM TREES, 'THAT IS WHAT I WANT TO DO! I'LL MAKE HER AN OFFER.' BY THE TIME I HAD TURNED THE KEY IN MY DOOR, I HAD TAKEN THE FIRST STEPS ON A JOURNEY WHICH WAS NOT TO END FOR TWENTY-SIX YEARS."

THE MAKING OF A BOOK SELLER - AND A CANADIAN LEGEND

     Now comes the compromises to family and home, in order to run an efficient, affordable business, to help raise her two children. Dora Hood writes in her biography, "In a short time satisfactory arrangements had been completed and I was in possession of a business about which I knew nothing. Looking back over this period, I do not remember having had the slightest misgivings about my ability to become a bookseller, although up to this time no experience in my life had included money making. But things were different now. I had six months before, become a widow and I knew I must add to my small income in order to keep myself and my two small children. If all went well, this was the answer. I had two assets. On the intangible side, I knew I had a certain awareness of books. On the tangible, a house that would lend itself to such an enterprise. It had four good sized rooms, one behind the other, on the ground floor, and it was on a street which was fast turning from a residential to a business one. I felt it might be possible, with the help of a housekeeper, to bring up my family, and at the same time conduct a business. I think on the whole, I found the latter job the less difficult. I remember vividly the first few weeks of my business career. Nothing could have been more unbusinesslike. I pushed the furniture to the back of my long old fashioned drawing room, and moved in a large utilitarian steel bookcase, a typewriter, and a massive steel letter file; and then the books arrived. As I unpacked them and spread them out on the Persian rug, I thought I had never seen a more uninteresting collection in my life. But I was wrong and, as time went on, I learned not to judge books by their outward appearance. This was the nucleus around which was to gather and disperse, as the years passed, and many thousands of Canadian books and pamphlets.

     She writes, "I had no intention of keeping my trade to mail order only and hopefully expected a steady stream of customers once it became known that such a shop existed. Little did I know that collectors of Canadiana were few and widely scattererd across our great country, and that most men's thoughts were otherwise engaged in 1928 - that year of wild speculation and easy money. Nevertheless, a few letters began to arrive via the old address, and it was necessary to decide on a distinctive name. As books are a commodity of individual taste, I reasoned that perhaps buyers would like to know that they were dealing with a person rather than a company, and since men use their own names in business, why should I not use mine? The prefix "Mrs." sounded old-fashioned, even Victorian, so I decided to leave it out and as, in its present form, the business could hardly be called a shop, it became and remained Dora Hood's Book Room. I do not think any other name was considered. The public, uncertain as to how to address such an establishment, in general, solved the problem by the usual 'Dear Sir.' But curiosity got the better of some of them. A customer in Quebec begged to be forgiven, but he felt he must know whether the lady he was addressing was a Mrs. or a Miss. Later we became great friends but I failed to find out whether I would have been more acceptable as a single woman. Was I handicapped by being a woman proprietor of a second-hand bookshop? I do not think this occurred to me in the busy early years of my enterprise. But later, when I was well established, I knew I had to prove myself in a field where men almost exclusively had held sway."

     As for how it affected her young family, she writes, "The Book Room was a new experience in the lives of my two children, aged seven and ten. It needed a rapid change in my behavior sometimes, to turn from three ingratiating bookseller to the stern parent when occasion arose. Once I arrived in the office to find my seven year old daughter already there and in the act of displaying an illustrated book to an amused customer, with the remark, 'Now here is a very nice book!' Fifteen years later, she became my chief cataloguer and we worked together until the time of her marriage. It was a family occasion for us to sit around the dining room table, and to roll and tie up the catalogues ready for posting, until increasing homework put an end to my children's part in it. It was six months before that I realized I had a full-time occupation on my hands. Gradually my hours at work lengthened, and often I worked far into the night, when the house was quiet, with my cat for company curled up on one of the wire baskets on my desk."

     In a relatively short period of time, as a bookseller, Dora Hood was prospering enough, that she needed more books. More books meant the requirement of much additional storage space. "The time came more quickly than I had anticipated when more space was essential in the Book Room. The family retreated to a smaller room and the erstwhile drawing-room became wholly an office. More bookcases were fitted in, the fireplace was taken away, and the table on which we wrapped our parcels was moved to the hall. Still the room could hardly be called businesslike. There remained chintz curtains, the Chippendale bookcase and the Persian rug. I had qualms about the wear on the latter, until assured by a rug man who cleaned it, that that kind of rug was intended for use in mosques and would wear a hundred years." She notes, "By 1938, in spite of the Depression, the Book Room had developed growing pains. The room and hall that seemed so spacious at first, had grown uncomfortably crowded and each new purchase added to our problems. My children, too, were demanding more space for themselves and their friends, as they grew into adolescence. There were still two large rooms on the ground floor, an old-fashioned ample kitchen, and next to it an unnecessarily large dining-room. I decided on drastic measures to deal with a desperate need. i would make these two back rooms into offices and leave the front two for our living quarters with amidships, so to speak, a small modern kitchen. My architect, the late Hebert Horner, proved a man of deep understanding. He said it could be done by the simple means of taking down one wall here and putting another up there, by turning a window into a door, and thereby giving my customers direct access to the books. This returned the front door to exclusive use by the family and avoided inevitable collisions with important clients.

     "But it wasn't quite as simple as that. To alter a house and still live in it, to say nothing of conducting a business at the same time, proved too much for me. I stood for it for a few weeks, then covering up the books as best I could, I fled to Muskoka and tried not to think of what was happening at home. When I returned, despite dust and general confusion, I knew I had made the right decision. It only remained to move the bookcases and then the books into the rear offices, no small task. The bookcases fitted into the new wall space as though they had been measured for it, which they were not. I had merely trusted to luck and the results were better than I deserved. All hands were needed to transfer the books. Dust flew, chaos reigned, books mysteriously lost turned up and in the midst of it all, the household cat was vainly looking for her favorite wire basket. With the posting of the 'Book Room' sign on the side door, a new era had begun."

      "Part of the charm of keeping a second-hand book shop, I soon learned, is the uncertainty of where your next supply of books is coming from. I do not remember having worried about this, even in the early days of my venture. Very few weeks passed when no books were offered to me. To be sure, they were not always the ones I most needed, but that too added to the spice of life. It was comparatively simple to buy a dozen books, but quite another proposition to be offered a large library, when one was as inexperienced as I was. I was fortunate, I know now, in being offered good libraries for at that time I had few competitors who were willing to put their capital into books."

Katherine Day Part 14 Conclusion

An invitation by Nicolas Eekman for a 1939 joint exhibition of work by him and Katherine Day held in New York. Notice he is looking with affection at a spider while Day is amused by a flower. Eekman was very influential in the 1930's on the budding Canadian artist.

The drawing above is one of Eekman's best known, being a portrait of the injured Don Quixote. This and the image above were included in the invitation to a 1969 show in Brussels.

Part 14
Conclusion

Canadian Artist Katherine Day's Biography Still a Work in Progress

By Ted and Suzanne Currie

     The sheer emotional weight of pleasant nostalgia that comes broadly today, with this alluring aroma of harvest, lingering in the air, takes us back to childhood and the sensory perceptions we experienced of the changing seasons. The chill atmosphere along this picturesque route through Oro-Medonte is invigorating to the spirit of discovery, and travelling these storied country roads is an adventure in time travel; because here, history animates, though the writer is hard-pressed to know exactly why. Suffice that it is an unexplained while glorious sensation, seeing the spectacular painted hardwoods and vivid evergreens, neatly bordering the farm fields, that only weeks ago were wavering with tall ripening corn stalks hauntingly silhouetted against the azure sky of early September. It was scenery that in all its picturesque grandeur, yet strange haunting reality, evoked memories of lives past, days elapsed, while, a moment later, similarly, and electrically provoking philosophical contemplation.
     These are the same roads, dusty lanes, and well packed down walking paths that were travelled many decades ago, by local resident, artist and writer, Katherine Day, who found great delight in the change of seasons, and the stark contrasts of a hot summer and a bitterly cold winter, with its array of blizzards and deep freezes. She watched as the summer haze of humidity, evolved into the cool morning mist of an autumn daybreak, over a landscape rich in agricultural enterprise, and pastures stretching to the nearly obscured Oro-Medonte hills and valleys, of great attraction to the artist in residence. I sense that she still haunts this enchanted place, walking the roadway near her cherished Hawthornes, and finding spirited recreation, acting, for me now, as its most faithful servant. She adored the region of Oro-Medonte, in Simcoe County, and found an endless source of inspiration here, as I do on these frequent motor trips to explore the place she called home.
     "Miss Evelyn Clares. Margaret Manor. Doddington, Kent. Re Studio 1st Weekly. First make a cleverola of 1 pint raw linseed oil warmed in a jackette pot. 1/4 powdered resin (fine) sifted into the oil whilst on the stove, stir continually till melted together. 1 pint hot glue added gradually to above and kept stirred, till the whole is the consistency of golden syrup. Whilst warm and liquid add above to the following matrix: equal parts by measure of white marble-dust, plaster of paris, zinc white, soaked in parchment size and well ground together. Add 2 parts of, by means of the charcolla to 3 parts of the matrix. In a porcelain mortar, mix well and beat with the pestle till it is in a creamy condition and fit for laying on the surface with a palette knife. As it may be brushed on and smoothed over with a knife. Lay in, with three or four coats, pumice each layer before the fresh one is applied. Do not use a flexible surface."
     These notes are written onto the inside cover of a sketch book belonging to "K Day" dated "1935, used while she was studying art while in Europe. It is at around this time that she was a student of Nicolas Eekman, a period that would greatly influence her opinion of art and her capabilities to create it for public consumption.
     I found the Katherine Day collection of archive papers, and sketch books, because I am a career antique hunter. I began scrounging for interesting finds by the age of five, and everyone in our Burlington, Ontario neighborhood, knew that the darkened figure moving-about near their garbage cans, set out for weekly pick-up, was more than likely "that Currie kid again!" I can remember my mother Merle being so embarrassed when some of our neighbors confronted her about "Teddy" rummaging through their garbage. She worried most of all that these people had come to believe I wasn't being properly cared for at home, cast out like one of Oliver Twist's mates, to forage in the urban wild. No, the Currie kid was a hunter-gatherer in the early years of turning pro as an antique dealer. It's this quality and quantity of the writer, and the fact I have been tutored by two of the most aggressive paper and book collectors, in Ontario, being Miles David Brown, and Hugh MacMillan, the author of "Adventures of a Paper Sleuth." This said, there was no way I was going to ignore the cardboard box loaded full of booklets and paper files, stuffed under a neat old table at a local antique mall we frequent, in the City of Orillia, known as Carousel Collectables. It was at this moment of discovery, that I met the biography of Canadian Artist Katherine Day, and embarked on a remarkable story, based in one of the most picturesque regions of the province, known for its deep well of history; especially of the indigenous peoples who dwelled in Huronia, prior to the arrival of the Jesuits in the 1600's. This box invited the antique collector / historian to more fully develop the importance of the find.
     Published with today's posting, is a limited edition print, being number 23 out of 100 printed, showing two jack-in-the-boxes, having the heads of well known Flemish Artist, Nicolas Eekman, and Katherine Day. As was identified in the first part of this 14 chapter biography, the engraving, in card format with printed invitation (this part is missing) was undoubtedly an original notice given to friends, family, and art patrons, for a 1939 exhibition of Eekman's work, in a shared gallery space with his student, Katherine Day. The exhibition we believe, was in New York, but we may be corrected, as our information at present is vague in this regard. Eekman had been Day's private art instructor in Paris in the mid 1930's, as were several other accomplished European artists such as Henri Jannot, who would join with the art movement in Europe known as the "New Forces," in 1935, the same time Day was working with Eekman. The invitation, as you can view it today on this page, suggests that these two jack-in-the-boxes were quite independent in values, likes and dislikes, and style; Day preferring the prettier things of nature, Eekman, finding beauty in what to most would be of mortal danger, should the spider bite. While the art piece promotes the fact the artists have joined together to present their work, there are those who have looked at the graphic, on the urging of this writer, and observed a significance to the stars illustrated on the left side. Could there have been a more serious relationship between the two artists? Miss Day possessed two art gallery notices for Eekman exhibitions as late as 1969, found in her archives collection, showing she maintained an interest in his career accomplishments many years after she returned to homestead in Oro-Medonte. While his art career flourished in Europe, despite the dangers of the Second World War. The Nazis wanted to catch-up with the Dutch artist, who kept on painting through the conflict, but signing a different name to his work.
     It is highly speculative to suggest there was a romance involved in their teacher-student relationship. It can't be confirmed by the impression of a single piece of art, or by the fact they held a show together in the same year that Eekman released his famous drawing of the injured Don Quixote; a work of which he is still revered in art history. In 1939 Katherine Day was establishing herself back in her home region, on a fifty acre property on what is now known as the Horseshoe Valley Road, in the Oro-Medonte area of Simcoe County. It can only be resolved by those who knew her best, many of course deceased by now, whether her return to her childhood home was the result of a perceived failure in the realm of international art, or she had parted ways with a romantic interest. It is only speculation that this enters the story, but it must, based on the graphic that companions today's chapter. Yet without question, Nicholas Eekman did influence the art work and attitude toward the profession, of Katherine Day, and it will be obvious with some of her sketches, published over the past fourteen days, she possessed both enhanced insight and a little bit of applied mischief, with a creative flare for fantasy, even offering a number of unsettling panels, that might to some, all considered, everso slightly, a shade of Eekman's style. Which of course, this biographer would expect, considering the time she spent as his student.
     But make no mistake. Katherine Day was stalwart in her mission to succeed at whatever she set about to accomplish, including designing and overseeing the construction of her first abode, "Hawthornes," and her second, the magnificent fairyland residence she called "Pax Cottage." "Pax" by definition meaning "Kiss of Peace," and is a familiar title used in England, (among many other countries) to adorn similarly appointed cottages. She was a successful contemporary homesteader, and created an environment that inspired her work, and facilitated her explorations of art and nature, and the rich embrace of the rural clime beyond anything that the great cities of the world could provide to the contrary. She had spend considerable time in London, Paris and New York, meeting with some of the finest artists and writers in the world, at that time, many now legendary in accomplishment, yet she chose the quiet hinterland of Oro-Medonte to do, what critics would suggest, was her finest works of art.
     The images in the sketch books, dating back to the mid 1930's, were of course, never meant to be published, as they were indeed, only rough sketches from which to reference later, for larger works if they met her requirements. Yet in the modesty and simplicity of these rough sketches, dwells the magic of her creative essence, which serves rightfully to enlighten us about the foundation she was building, image by image; the experimental sketch of characters, on to broader landscapes, in order to become a better artist / illustrator / print maker. I am eager to see other works of art from the hand of Katherine Day. In an accounting book leading up to her final days at Pax Cottage, before being taken ill, there is evidence of her selling art work, and registering the modest earnings from "panels" that should, by her own successes, have been selling for many hundreds of dollars more. She became well known for her expertise in quilt design, and especially the art and craft of creating magnificent hooked rugs. In fact, one of her better writing projects, included the preparation of a book, which was never published, on the methods of creating these beautiful rugs, many still in existence to this day. I will be publishing this text separately some time in the future, for those interested in rug hooking, and Katherine Day generally, because she was giving instructions based on her art training, and revealing the inspiration she had received from artists, such as well known Canadian Artist, J. W. Beatty. As related, of course, to the effective use of colour to enhance a piece of art. She also explains in the text how nature can be employed to find these interesting and effective colourations, and how the four seasons in Canada should be taken advantage-of, for subject inspiration.
     On the attractive and substantial grave marker, in the Day family plot, at Orillia's St. Andrew's-St. James Cemetery, there is no companion inscription that documents that Katherine Day was an accomplished Canadian artist. An early role model for Canadian women artists thereafter. But it's what she wanted, as she had lived a modest life, and was never one to boast of her accomplishments. Who am I to  intrude upon her integrity further, by then suggesting it is a reference that should be added, so that those who stroll through the picturesque cemetery will find this reference. Her work must thusly stand alone as testament to her creative successes. Her biography is full of merit, make no mistake of that fact, as the illustrations and story should reflect her contribution to the cultural integrity of our region, province and country.
     I am hopeful that in the weeks, months and years, following this template biography, which is a mere shadow of what it could become with new information, that new opportunities for research will be revealed, which can be added to the content of the Katherine Day story. As with other artist biographies I have worked on, the editorial material is never really concluded, as long as there are other sources to tap into, and archive materials that suddenly, or eventually become available. I have no intention of abandoning Katherine Day's story, for as long as I am able to undertake research, and thusly write-up the findings. I want to share images of her work from private collections, if they become available, and I, of course, remain eager to receive submissions of archives material, further regarding her life and times; not just confined to her art work. I am particularly interested in her years of residence at Hawthornes and later at "Pax" Cottage. I would be grateful to find the missing chapters of her manuscript highlighted in Part 13, and I know there are other years of her journals that would infill a great deal of biographical information currently missing.
     The written and art resources, published on this facebook page, will be offered, at our expense, to community archives, regional museums, the archives collection of the Art Gallery of Ontario, and the National Gallery, to assist future biographers researching Ontario and Canadian artists.
     We hope the images published with this series of columns, have over the past several weeks, blended successfully with the biographical material, and we will share any other images received, as they become known and shared with us long into the future. Thank you so much for joining this feature series. It has been a pleasure indeed, to serve the memory of this fine Canadian artist.
     Please click-on the video that companions today's final chapter. It was produced by my son Robert, who also provided the musical accompaniment on the guitar. Robert and I have worked similarly on three other videos and I was delighted when he asked if he could create a short tribute piece for Katherine Day as well. Let us know what you think of the video, which by the way is also being offered to archive collections locally and nationally.

Katherine Day Part 13

Part 13 -

The Budding Writer on the Homestead - Canadian Artist, Katherine Day "The Novelist"

By Ted and Suzanne Currie

     I don't believe, although I stand to be corrected, that Katherine Day thought of herself as a serious writer. She may have, at times, as any artist can attest as a distinct fact of profession, become frustrated by a sensed lack of progress in her chosen field. She wasn't the first artist / painter / illustrator, to think of a writing career as an alternative preoccupation. There are just as many writers, who turned to art when their creative juices ran out in the print enterprise, and they thought they could become painters or sculptors as a sideline. Quite a few have succeeded at this cross-over. Miss Day never truly abandoned art when, for a change, she took the plunge, and experimented with the written word. I do believe that if she had worked closely with a tutor, or editor, her ideas could have been transformed into attractive, highly readable manuscripts. I have offered her an apology, as best I can, for imposing myself as such a ghost writer in retrospect, and assisting her with one chapter of an unfinished novel, found in her collected papers. I wanted her work, in the spirit of her original intent, to make it to print, after all these years, if only in the second-to-last chapter of this template biography. It was her intellectual property then, and now, because the theme and progression of the chapter has not been changed from its original intent and story progression. I've shortened the content and made changes to meet that end. It is still the creative energy of Katherine Day at its heart, and of this, I am, as a latter day ghost writer, only too pleased to participate.
     "At the end of a pleasant summer, a neighbor friend, Stephen Brown, at last, came one evening to have a chat with Mrs Burns. He chose a time when he would have the place to himself, for he saw to it that the two girls were away that night, playing tennis on the Metcalfe's court," wrote Katherine Day, in an untitled manuscript she was working out of her home at Hawthornes, nestled so peacefully in the treed landscape of the Oro-Medonte area in Simcoe County. The manuscript which is missing the first six chapters, and its concluding chapter, is an attempt by the well known Canadian artist, illustrator, to try her hand at creative writing. It is in essence, the constitution of a romanitic novel, and was probably commenced in the early 1940's, shortly after returning to her home region, after a lengthy period of time in Europe studying art with tutors such as Nicolas Eekman, among many others in both London, and Paris, before the hostilities of the Second World War.
     The manuscript was never published and when Katherine Day's possessions were dispersed sometime following her death in 1976, it is likely the missing chapters were in other boxes of her personal archives. As well, the story was never edited, so I am taking some liberty as a former editor, to polish the text ever so gently, without changing the intent of Miss Day. There are those who knew the artist who might feel the story is more intimate to her personal biography, while others would dismiss it as just being the result of an urge to create, just like her art work which earned her acclaim.
     I can easily visualize Katherine Day in her charming abode, sitting at her typewriter, a cat curled-up in her lap, a dog on her feet, with the aroma of fresh cut flowers from her garden, mixing with the wafting scent of freshly harvested honeycomb, and the lingering invisible vapours of the past hour's cookery activities. If ever there was a perfect writer's sanctuary, it was at Hawthornes, so preciously tucked into the flower gardens and hardwoods on the hillside. The visitor at this time, of which she had many, would have heard the tell-tale tapping of typewriter keys, while approaching up the cottage walkway. One might have expected, from such an enchanted place as this, that the fairy-kind themselves might be toiling within. The writer continues to sculpt her story of "love lost" and then, by happenstance, and time, found once again. If you put yourself into Katherine Day's setting, sitting for example, in a nearby chair that affords a good place to watch, the story will take on the aura of its creator, and, yes, Hawthornes, as it existed according to her cherished design.
     "Mr. Burns was always shut up in his study, a pleasant enough place with its walls lined with books, and a big armchair in which he could doze away with a book on his knee, close to the window of which afforded a lovely view. He pretended to spend all his time studying, and consuming the content of his many scholarly texts, but with this window opened to enhance the atmosphere, he looked up with great enthusiasm at the array of butterflies, hovering over the late season roses, his wayward attention proving that he was never to busy to admire something of great beauty. There he was, the evening young Mr. Brown called to consult his wife, the good Mrs. Burns, of which he had the utmost respect to handle such family business as this. Trust Stephen to have everything arranged his own way, recited over and over before visiting the Burns residence, where he knew Mrs Burns would stare him down with her flare of old country intensity. "We've had a pleasant summer, haven't we, Mrs. Burns," he asked initially, knowing the answer would affirm his own opinion. "Ay, Stephen, it has been an accommodating season," she answered with the gaze of expectation, that the young man was not visiting to discuss the weather. "I greatly appreciate you taking these few moments to talk with me, Mrs. Burns, and of course, I always enjoy the cheerful atmosphere of your good home." With growing anticipation of what will come next in conversation, she nods and replies, "We'll it is nice of you to say such a thing." There was an uncomfortable calm prevailing in the room. The gentleman seemed preoccupied about his shoe laces, finding it difficult to look up, and judge the expression on the matronly woman's face, in case she was in the midst of scowling.
     "Stephen was unsure of himself, rare for the up and coming lawyer, having a fine reputation in the court rooms of the province. He was not being helped by this judge, at this cruel moment of anticipation, and he knew that Mrs. Burns was acutely wise and protective of her family, which made the issue at hand much more sensitive. This was going to require a building of courage, as if arguing a case to a positive outcome. The old woman was not about to make it easy for him, and for good reason. If he was interested in pursuing her daughter, in a future marriage, he was going to have to do better than what he was mustering at this moment. She was about to offer the poor shaking chap a glass of water, when he began to clear his throat as if to make some profound argument in his own defense; of taking up her time on this beautiful day.
     "It was momentous for him, more so than any of the cases he had experienced in the court house, of which he was for more comfortable than now. The scene he had carefully constructed before-hand, to avoid this kind of stumbling with words and actions, was doing little to remove the feeling of discomfort, and the sensation he was about to make a complete fool of himself that could never be erased in her mind. He was literally placing his future, and all his confidence from this point, in this elderly Scottish woman, who had a stare that would melt glass. He possessed admiration for her matronly sense o f duty, and he knew that to get past her guardianship, he would have to appeal to her sense of proportion, and sensibility toward the circumstance. She was known to be quite high spirited at times. He had seen her this way several times, on previous visits. Stephen had placed all the eggs in the single basket he held precariously, as he lifted his head to face his presumed advisory; at least for the time being. While it may be said with some confidence, that a man is made or ruined by the marriage he enters into, the constitution of the family attitude, was either the wings of mercy or the anchor of destruction. If her parents were unhappy with the marriage, they would be a burden thereafter to constantly fear for their critiques; but if he was accepted and encouraged, it would be a marriage with family support that would pay many benefits in the future.
     "Mrs. Burns was quite content to let the young fellow stew a while longer. She was well aware of the fellow's drift of conversation, and she was, without showing it, pleased that young Margaret, her daughter, was to get such affection from this budding professional with a good future ahead. Getting her daughter's affairs settled had been on her mind for several years. It did make her ponder why her second daughter had not yet found a partner, as she was of the two, the most outgoing and ambitious. Margaret was by even the most loving opinion of a mother, a plain little mouse of a creature, kindly so, and fond of house-making. Stephen represented a solid opportunity for a prosperous life and family. She made an effort to ease the young man's nervousness, by offering a slight but distinguishable smile beyond the original scowl. Stephen, with a dry mouth and throat, on the verge of commanding a cough, spoke quietly, "As you know, I have always admired your daughter, Mrs. Burns. I suppose it is because she is so different from myself."
    Mrs. Burns, with the look of challenge on her face, asked in return, "Whatever do you mean, as being different?" This was a surprising statement, because it wasn't a truthful observation. They were quite similar, almost as if a brother and sister. Mrs. Burns turned her head slowly to look at him, her expression strained, her suspicions raised. Had she heard correctly. Margaret and Stephen were the proverbial case of 'two peas in a pod' and had been for all the years that had known each other. All those who knew them would say the same. Their little fidgety ways had been the subject of most of the jokes that passed their way, and even their expressed opinion on many of life's matters were alike. She waited for him to explain, her eyes now burning into his soul. The man was even more uncomfortable than before.
     "She is so jolly and so wonderfully full of life, and I am, by my own sorry admission, a 'sorry-sides' character. And she is of course, so enchanting and beautiful.' 'Tut, tut,' said Mrs. Burns pushing back in her chair as if about to receive a great blow of news. "Young man, I have never considered my two daughters anything but very ordinary young women, who are beautiful of spirit but common as mortals, undeserving of such affections, as you have mentioned." Stephen looked up in a momentary surprise, that he had unintentionally offended Mrs. Burns by suggesting her daughter was beautiful. "I have deep affections for Abbie, beauty aside," he said, creating a heavy, pressing silence in the big room. The old lady moistened her dry lips and cleared her throat before she found the audible voice to ask, 'What was that you said Stephen. I think I must not have heard you right. Why mention Abbie when we have been talking about Margaret?"
     "The whole environment of the Burns' residence seemed suddenly darker than it was a few minutes earlier, as Stephen estimated in his mind, that if there was confusion on her part, an explanation was going to test his creative talent. Everything seemed to be more imposing on his conscience, from the sounds and sights of outside, the clock on the mantle, the visible asters blooming in the garden just outside the parlor window, even the footsteps he could hear on the decking of the verandah at the front door. As some of the willowy flowers dipped their heads in the back and forth of the chill breeze, Stephen settled down in a chair without apology, to attempt some explanation why he had come to seek approval to court the most unlikely of her daughters. They were not kindred spirits and even he knew it was going to be awkward telling this woman, the daughter he had spent most time with in the past, was not the object of his matrimonial desires.
     Mrs. Burns didn't need to know more. She had just been stunned by his statement of intention, opposite to what would likely have been an acceptable position on his part. Abbie was distinctly different than Margaret, and had never considered Stephen as anything more than a friend of the family, and one who socialized with her sister when at the cottage property. When she began feeling tenderness in her knuckles, rubbing them in contemplation, it suddenly arrived in her mind, about a time in the old country, while at school herself, when she had been reprimanded for doodling on her slate with the small bit of chalk in her hand. The teacher, going from desk to desk to examine students' work, was not pleased with her imaginative sketch of the instructor, and it warranted in his opinion, a sharp crack to her knuckles. She remembers trying not to cry at that moment, so as not to appear weak to classmates. It was a strange recollection at this moment, when discussing the future of her daughters, but it stressed in her mind, the need to concentrate on the action to follow, and deal with the consequence of this new information on Margaret especially, who will be heartsick at the revelation. Her reaction had to be even and sensible to the young man's mission, to ask for her daughter's hand in marriage. Plans were being swept away by this change of affection, but she couldn't appear weak to either Stephen or later, both daughters who would undoubtedly be shocked by the twist of fate.
     "Stephen was indulging in a snipit of a daydream, putting him anywhere else but in this room, facing the glare of a potential future mother-in-law. He recognized that her sudden shock at the situation, was the result of his lack of preparedness, because it was an unexpected turn, even in his mind, because his affections had always been directed at Margaret and not Abbie. He even feasted temporarily on the belief he had played it sly, catching the matron off guard, and possibly, as a result, garnering some affection for his astute selection for a bride. He had, in secret, affections for Abigail, such that no one else understood this emotional involvement. She would make a fine wife to grace the home of a successful lawyer full of ambition. She would always give him due measure of admiration and encouragemnet. This was certain, just as Mrs. Burns, being her Minister-husband's closest admirer, Abigail would mirror her mother's sense of responsibility. These Burns' women were "no new women," as to the ages spoke, he thought to himself. She was not mannish in any way and would take her place with family economy. Just in case he was wrong about this, he wasn't going to blurt it out here at fireside, in the presence of a woman who could dash his expectations. He wasn't wrong for his old values that a woman should grace the home. There, they would be content. Abbie pleased him because she was that rare combination; a clever woman who did not object to confining her efforts to a limited sphere. His wife would be an admirable hostess, a leader in the town, a worker in the church of which he was a piller. She would bring about a new credibility to his own efforts at building a profession. He was beaming inside with his convictions about to come to fruition, when Mrs. Burns would confess her joy at the thought of the pending nuptuals. He was pleased with himself for selecting Abbie as a 'help-meet', as he called it, under his own sculpted plan for future living.
     Stephen looked up at Mrs. Burns, expecting an expression somewhat more calming than previous. 'Does this proposal take you by surprise? I know of course many others admire Abbie. All the men I know admit to have affections for her, calling her wonderful, having so many admirable qualities.' Mrs. Burns responded in short, 'Oh, whilst, so it is Abbie you have come to talk about." There was a detectable seriousness to the woman's face. All was not well, and would not be well in the Burns house, thanks to Stephen's sudden change of affections that would destroy the heartfelt ambitions of daughter Margaret. Before her mind's eye, Margaret's face came as a vision; her actions and joy when expressing her affections for Stephen; this strange man sitting beside her now, telling her that he wanted to marry her sister, who she well knew had no interest in his advances no matter how sincere. Margaret had only been a friend to Stephen, contrary to what she had believed for long and long in their social encounters. A baffling anger filled her heart as she hadn't experienced it in years. This was a confrontation against the whole spirit of goodwill as she practiced it as a matter of inherent humanity. She had a difficult decision to make and an alarming muddle to sort out. They would would be deep and take years to heal.
     "She waited for Stephen to speak again, for she found herself confused about the best course of action. It was as if she hoped he would offer such an engaged explanation, in its sensibilities, the matter would suddenly and profoundly make sense, as to why he was about to hurt one daughter to engage the other. With obvious hesitation and a slight newfound stutter in his voice, Stephen stated with growing hubris, as a lawyer might be expected to offer in clarification, "Mrs. Burns, I promise you Abbie would see a  great deal of you and your family as a married woman, as we would be living in Mara (of Simcoe County). I will soon be entering the firm of Douglas and Harris, and prospects are good that I might eventually become a partner in the firm. It isn't as if we would be moving halfway around the world after we marry," the young man stated, occasionally changing his focus to look out the window, just in case Abigail should be seen coming along the front path. "What under these circumstances, at present, do you wish me to act upon Stephen, if anything at all." Stephen was momentarily inspired, sensing an opportunity to move forward with the proposal. "I would very much appreciate it Mrs. Burns, if you could find it in your heart, to tell her of my intentions, to ask for her hand in marriage, with your approval of course, as with Reverend Burns, I assure you. Especially that you would secure an invitation for me to address Abigail for a formal proposal of marriage." His eyes looked at the woman with great emotional appeal, such that he would be broken hearted if she had declined his request.
     She was not inclined to perform this duty, but because she knew the answer in advance, it was a better choice to shield the young man from the bitter truth. What she wanted to say to the nervous ninny, couldn't be spoken without hurting him. She couldn't understand why he would not have chosen Margaret, as everyone in the household had expected he would do one day. There would be no choice in the matter. Margaret would have to be told, her love for this fellow would not be returned. Would she take this distress against her sister in a fit of jealousy. What was this clumsy man doing to the serenity of her residence at this moment?
     "I will, with some reluctance, speak with her about this matter, and find out whether or not, she would be willing to meet with you on a more formal occasion, for you to ask your question. I will address it when she comes home later this evening, and I will let you know the outcome when you arrive next."
     "When might that be, Mrs. Burns," asked Stephen, wringing his hands for lack of anything better to do with them. "May I return tomorrow for my answer?" "Ay then, you may come tomorrow, but I won't guarantee that you will receive the answer you wish, let that be clear." Surprised by the directness, and the tone of pessimism, Stephen extended his thanks and his farewell in a few seconds of conversation, and skipped out of the parlour and out the front door, much as if he had just won, however narrowly, the first battle of numerous, to secure his future direction. He sped home on wings, his thoughts bright and facial expression rosey. Abbie was a prize to covet. Together they would rise to eminence in the professional community, he had designs on conquering. He took a deep breath of the atmosphere of this important domain on earth, smiled broadly, folded his arms to his chest, and with great daring, rode his bicycle along the dirt roadway, feeling it quite impossible that he might fall the result of miscalculation. His ambitions were soaring. He was intoxicated by his own perceived success today. He carried on his merry way, singing some ditty or other to celebrate the occasion. It was only a muffled clatter of little notice, when the bike wheel left the roadway, and the framework of the vehicle collapsed down into the gutter, taking rider and rubber on a dramatic tumble into the rock-filled water-course. His saving grace that he was out of sight of the main house, and no one had seen his fall from his apparent glory.
     Later that evening, Mrs. Burns, on sensing the right moment to approach her daughter, walked up the flight of the creaking wooden stairway, slowly according to her tight joints, and difficulty catching her breath. She went to her own bedroom and asked for the assistance of Abigail, to balance her down into a favorite window-side chair. You could hear the rustle of her long black dress that connected with the floor boards, and swung back and forth on her hips, seemingly twice as large as her small frame warranted of such attire. "Help me to get down into my chair Abigail, my dear, I have such a headache, and feel a little unsteady on my feet." Her daughter arrived in the doorway of her mother's bedroom, etched with concern there was some sort of pending collapse. She grabbed her elbow from behind, and helped turn her around to slide more gently down into the armchair. After the slow settling into position, and the chorus of groans and fabric rustling, Mrs. Burns found sudden comfort in the collapse into security, of a chair brought all the way from her parents home in Scotland. The same chair her father had sat in, with his old pipe clenched in this jaw, talking about the failings of politicians and their ilk. It gave her an unspecified measure of confidence, although she wouldn't have been able to express why she felt this way. This didn't matter. She needed to confront her daughter about a delicate matter. Stephen Brown's affections for one thing. The impact on Margaret, the other. A cup of tea was of assistance as well, clearing her throat for a question that was burning from the inside out.
     "She sounded grim, making Abbie feel initial trepidation about what was on her mother's mind, necessitating an early evening chat. She sat on the edge of the large bed, with its Victorian elegance and high headboard, awaiting whatever conversation was about to arrive from her mother, calmed by the current environment of soft cushions on old bones. It was obvious though that, by facial expression alone, her mother's mood was inspired by depression, not an irritation about some report of her daughter's social affairs. "Has something happened mother, to give you such a headache," asked Abigail. "Ay lass, something has happened, that I must address this very moment, though I know the answer in advance." She adjusted her glaze from the gardens out the adjacent window, to her daughter sitting on the edge of the bedstead. "Young Master Brown was here earlier this afternoon, to ask me a difficult question." "Did he come to ask your approval of his plan to ask Margaret to marry him," Abigail asked with a tell-tale grin on her face, as if a good thing was happening for her sister's future. "It wasn't what I could have imagined, after all the years of knowing the boy; you see my dear girl, he did the exact opposite to what we all in this family hoped would happen one day." Well, what did he want mother," Abigail demanded, with a worried look now gracing her pretty face.
     "I'm afraid to say the gentleman has asked for you instead, and my permission to allow him the opportunity to state his intentions to you personally." The hair brush dropped to the floor from Abigail's hand, and pushing the curls of hair away from her eyes, as she fumbled for a suitable response to the statement that was still smashing at emotions, causing her to ask repeatedly for the woman to revisit the same unsettling words just spoken. She steadied herself against the tall dresser, and looked out the window, as if she suspected Stephen Brown was outside waiting for her answer; spying on her now, and intruding upon her freedom with this unwarranted call upon her mother, asking such a ridiculous question. Forcing this uncomfortable moment in family history, that deserved its integrity of good humour, and sensibility despite its essence of debacle.
     "Well, what might your answer be to such and enquiry," her mother asked, knowing full well, it would be a clear rejection. "This is not of my doing mother, I assure you. I have never had any interest in that man, and would never consider such a proposal, now or ever. It has always been Margaret, who has been the target of his affections, and certainly not me," she stated in failing voice, tears welling up in her eyes, at the almost insulting situation, that would cause her sister considerable grief, as Margaret had very much entertained the idea of becoming Mrs. Brown before the year was out. "Mother, he is a fool, and a man of lesser character, to have led my sister on, and then abandoned her for something he perceives as being better for his future. I would not have a man like him if he was the last man on earth." Her mother nodded acceptance of her daughter's position, and agreed the young man was more interested in his own welfare, and position in his professional pursuits, thinking that Abigail would be more adventagous to the cause of upward accomplishment, than the loving company of a woman who dearly respected him for all his virtues, as questionable as they seemed at this moment of discussion. "I will pass on your regrets, Abigail, and dispatch the man from this residence when he next visits, which I expect will be tomorrow." Abigail retreated to her room, after taking away the tea cup and saucer from her mother, who was content to recline and watch out over her garden from that second floor portal. What should she tell Margaret to make it as gentle as possible. She felt older than her age, and it seemed life's duties were becoming harder and harder to tend to, in her failing health. This matter did not help at all, as the damage inflicted by truth, would last the rest of both their lives. Hers was a shorter time to expend.
          She turned the thoughts round and round in her mind until she feel asleep in the chair. Her husband would eventually coerce her to come into the bed, and after a short adjustment to sleeping attire, Mrs. Burns collapsed into bedlam to dream of happier circumstances. Instead, she couldn't get past the realities of the final hours of the day. It was the burden of a near nightmare that didn't end when she awoke to sun beaming in the chamber. The issue was still the same. She would have to, on this day, break the heart of her daughter. Ruin her life with the truth of the man she wished to reside with, to the end of days. Now with one great crash, the house that others had built for Stephen and Margaret had toppled over, like the young man crashing his bike into the moat at roadside.
     Margaret was told by her mother, that morning, of Stephen Brown's intention of asking Abigail to marry him if unopposed. She took the survey of the ruins with expected dismay. Margaret's hopes obviously, by tears streaming down her face, were crushed. There they were likely to remain, for people of her slow and cautious demeanor to weather. It had turned into a hopeless muddle for both daughters, and mother, who could do nothing to calm the outrage that had overtaken an otherwise happy residence.
     Abbie would, in no uncertain terms, sweep away the proposal by the young Mr. Brown, who was devastated such a man of property and standing would be dismissed so casually. What was she thinking to disregard such a prosperous union for both their lives? She became smitten by anger at the boldness of the red-headed man-child. She could not, under the circumstance, have ever tolerated him even as a brother-in-law, should he have decided to ask Margaret, after this initial rejection. He must have been mad to have thought she would marry him, as if he was picking a horse or an article of furniture for his house; that I would surely want to be a part of for its resident securities. As symbolic of the cleansing from Mr. Brown forever, she vigorously tossed out a basin of water, from her bedroom window, at almost the same time, as Margaret tossed out water from the kitchen window, possibly with the same intent of restoration. Abigail had not be flattered by the offer of marriage, but rather, deeply offended by the man's inconsideration, turning away from the woman he had been long associated, who just happened to be her sister. In fact, she was furious. Margaret, at a matter of emotional conflict, felt she would never marry, as she had lost her one true love, who by no coincidence, had let himself fall for her own sister. A tragedy untold, but etched in the hearts of the Burns family, who ended their summer by the lake in a mire of conflicting loyalties, and family values, that by stalwart conviction, would survive intact to serve the future. Stephen Brown was mired himself in his mistaken approach to win the hand of a fair maiden.
     He pedaled home slowly that afternoon, following the offering of bad news that Abigail had rejected his marriage proposal. His bike had a bit more wobble to it than the day before, the result of his accident, yet today's unsteady operation, was mostly the result of having just been the victim of his own misguided presumption, he could have all that he wanted in life. He himself fell into bedlam when he arrived at his residence, pondering how it was, that he had ruined his relationship with Margaret as well, in a poorly conceived move at advancing his career.
     "Oh damn it all," was what he uttered, over and over, as he buried his face in the scrunched-up pillow that would, before sleep overcame him, become wet with selfishly generated tears of his newfound burden of loss and shame. What had he done?
     If the times of our lives had paralleled, I would have felt it a great honour to have worked with the artist / writer, as an understudy, because she possessed a creative flare for the written word.
     This was just an ever-so brief glimpse of one selected chapter of a never-published, unfinished work of fiction, from the bosom of Hawthornes, and the hand of Katherine Day. A happy ending? It was heading that way, but we will never really know for sure. But the essence of this biography, is to be a background to the most important aspect of her work, being the field of art. It is, in summation, how we will honor her accomplishments......that of being an important contributor to the cultural identity of this region of Ontario, and Canada itself. Please join me tomorrow for our own final chapter, of this template biography, which will hopefully be added-to in the future, when new information is revealed, to be included in the more complete story of Katherine Day.

Katherine Day Part 12

Part 12

The Writer / Homesteader, Katherine Day of Oro-Medonte

By Ted and Suzanne Currie

     "It was a May-day - a perfect Ontario May-day - all a luxury of blossoms and perfume. In the morning rain had fallen, and though now the clouds lay piled in dazzling white mountain-heaps far away on the horizon, leaving the dome above an empty quivering blue, still the fields and the gardens remembered the showers with gratitude and sparkled joyously under their garniture of diamond drops. The wild cherry trees bordering the lane and the highway, and the orchard behind the house were smothered in odorous blossoms of white and pink. A big flower-laden hawthorn grew in the lane, near the little gate building leading from the garden. From its topmost spray a robin was pouring forth an ecstatic song - a song so out of proportion to his tiny body that he was fairly shaken by his own tumult - trills and whistles, calls and chuckles, all incoherently mingled and shouted forth in glorious hysteria."
     The passage above was not written by the subject of this biography, being Canadian Artist, Katherine Day, of the Oro-Medonte area of Simcoe County. Although she didn't write the piece, some readers of this series will be able to detect similarities in style, and certainly the area highlighted by the book, was in the neighborhood of both writers. The well written passage was taken from the 1909 first edition, of the book, "'Elizabeth Of The Dale," written by Marian Keith, no stranger to the Orillia area of the province. In fact, the author would have known Katherine Day's father, Isaac Day, as he was a long serving regional School Inspector in Simcoe County and all the way up to South Muskoka, and she was a teacher in Orillia. In fact, she was a teacher when Katherine Day was attending school in the same district, and may have crossed paths during this time. But the writer, Marian Keith, was really a woman by the name of Esther Miller, later to become the wife of Dr. G.C. MacGregor, "the tall handsome minister of the Presbyterian Church in Orillia. Esther Miller was the daughter of John Miller, "who taught school on the 2nd Concesssion of the old Barrie Road," and her mother was Mary Johnston. This is according to the well documented history, written by John Craig, entitled "Simcoe County: The Recent Past," published in 1977 by The Corporation of the County of Simcoe.
     According to the historian, John Craig, Esther Miller moved with her family to the village of Edgar, and then to Orillia, where she "taught school and Sunday school. She was educated at Rugby and Erin Public Schools, and then graduated from Toronto Normal School. Her teaching career spanned the period from 1899 to 1906. It was at this time that she began her long and prolific literary career. Her first novel, 'Duncan Polite,'was published in 1905, while still teaching; her seventeenth and last book, 'The Grand Lady,' in 1960."
     "In 1910 she married Dr. G.D. MacGregor, the tall, handsome minister of the Presbyterian Church, in Orillia. His work eventually took them to Toronto, London, Calgary and Brantford." They eventually came to reside in the Owen Sound area, after his retirement. John Craig notes that "In many of her books, for example, 'Duncan Polite,' (1905), 'Silver Maple,' (1906), 'Treasure Valley,' (1908) and 'Elizabeth of the Dale,' (1910), she provided an accurate and sensitive picture of life in rural Simcoe County in the early days. Although most of her plots were derived from Victorian melodrama, she was an able chronicler of the times she wrote about - the general stores, church socials, one room school houses, Scotch-Irish rivalries, building and harvesting bees, sleigh rides and so on."
     Is it possible Katherine Day knew Esther Miller from her own school days, in the early 1900's, and for that matter, might she have read some of her books having a hometown character. We do know she was abundantly familiar with Canadian Writer, Stephen Leacock, and his summer home on Brewery Bay. She makes a reference to the Leacock Museum in a separate story on "rug hooking," also included in the archives we purchased. Is it possible that Kenneth Wells, author of the famous "Owl Pen," series of books, also knew Esther Miller, from his own youth spent in Orillia, and later on in his editorial career, as he would have mingled socially, as a well known Canadian writer himself. I can certainly find similarities between Katherine Day and the writing of Kenneth Wells, and for that matter, with the regional descriptions so poignantly written by Esther Miller in her early work.
     It is of course, only speculation on my part, that the writers knew of each others work, but excuse me for this liberality of thought, as I am abundantly aware of my own writer colleagues, especially those with Muskoka in common. While Katherine Day was best known for her art work, particularly her illustrations and prints, she was an aspiring writer of considerable merit. In the archives collection is a minor example of her attempt at fiction, with a love story she wrote with a local backdrop, that while unpublished, does contain material an editor could work with, to put into book form. Published below, is a rather curious text, in her handwriting, entitled "Petty Sessions," about a court case regarding a horse that didn't quite measure up to its description as far as work went. It was time consuming to transcribe from her handwriting which was particularly small, and my eyes weak and old. So please bear with me as we work through the material.
     (No date given but it is probably pre-1940) "The judge's head was closely combed with a white thatch pointed in front, concealing his own hair which might easily be whitening too. He appeared to be about sixty years of age, but age had not dimmed the keen eye that peered over his glasses at the court. He sat motionless and aloof, at his tall desk overlooking the courtroom, a long pen in his hand, a book before him, in which he was continually writing his version of the evidence declared before him. 'It always rains on petty sessions day, say the Irish, because of the lies told there at that time.' 'You know this is a case of the purchase of a horse. My client, Mr. Manning, bought this horse from the defendant, Mr. McCann, and it was found unsatisfactory. In fact, it wouldn't work. When Mr. McCann was approached on the matter, he refused to do anything about it.' The lawyer swung his long black robe from side to side as he dipped down to look at his notes on the table, and looked up to address the attentive judge.
     "'Call the plaintiff,' said the judge. The plaintiff, a tall, clean-cut finely featured old man, stepped into the box where the oath was administered phrase by phrase, which he repeated. He gave his name, the judge cupping his ear with his hand to hear it. 'Address his honour,' said the attorney. This horse was one of several owned by Mr. McCann and was shown at the Enniskille Fair last May. Yes, it was the 10th of May. He had been introduced to Mr. McCann by Mr. Gray. Mr. McCann had said the horse could do any work; yes, he had particularly told Mr. McCann twice that he wanted the horse for mowing and that if he could not move he was of no use. Mr. McCann said that the horse was a good one, and if he was not all he said about, then he would agree to a week's trial. Well, he couldn't remember about the week's trial, but he remembered quite well that he had said that the horse was good for mowing and Mr. McCann said that it would have no problem tasked with this operation. And that you could give it back if he couldn't. 'And could he,' asked the Judge. When it came to mowing the hay, in the middle of July, the horse was timid in a single harness; and it was just as timid in the double harness, and then the horse was sent to a neighbor who was very good training horses. No change could be achieved. And now it is standing in the stable eating its head off."
     Katherine Day adds the dialogue as follows: "'But you have not told me how the horse behaved with the mowing machine?' The horse went backwards and sideways and leaped about fit to kill anyone, but it wouldn't drag the mower. And not with a single nor double harness. In fact the only thing the horse would do was draw a cart on a hard road. It wouldn't work on tilled ground. He had paid thirty-two pounds, ten shillings for him and twenty shillings and eight pence for the carriage, and the creature worth no more than fourteen or fifteen pounds as it stood. 'When did you find this out?' It must have been the middle of July, before the hay was ready to cut, and it was then that he found out that the horse was no good. Then he had written to Mr. McCann and had told him about it. He had received no reply. He called at the house and was told Mr. McCann was not at home. He was told that the dealers would be at Hinton farm the next Thursday, and he would be there, and said that's where he could complain about the circumstances of the horse. But when approached, Mr. McCann wanted nothing to do with the matter and said, 'I've been stuck myself.' Just that! He turned away and said once again, 'I've been stuck myself.' So then he and his lawyer wrote Mr. McCann a letter. The two letters were produced in court. The first read, from Mr. Manning, to Mr. McCann, as follows:
     "'Dear Sir; In regards to the horse which I bought from you at the Enniskille Fair. The horse will not mow although you guaranteed that it could do any sort of work. I should be glad if you would do something about it, as you promised to if there was any problem. You indicated that you would be willing then, to take it back, if it, for example, refused to work. Would you let me know by return post what you will do to resolve the issue. In the second letter, from Mr. Manning's lawyer to Mr. McCann, the following content was read to the court: 'Dear Sir; I am instructed by my client, Mr. Manning, that on or about the 30th day of May, 1938, you sold a horse to him at the Enniskille Fair. This said horse was guaranteed by you to be capable of any sort of work, and it was specifically mentioned by my client that the horse was purchased for mowing. It is stated by my client that you agreed to the return of the animal if it did not prove all you said it would perform, as far as mowing was concerned. On or about the fifteenth of July, 1938, this horse was attached to the mowing machine and proved itself incapable of drawing that farm machinery. It is therefore now the right of my client to demand that you should receive back the horse which has proven unsatisfactory, and refund the purchase price. Otherwise a refund of ten pounds of the purchase price is asked on the value of the horse.' This letter produced nothing but silence. Hence the law took its course.
     "Mr. Manly rose to leave his seat. The defendant's lawyer stuck out his jaw, screwed up his mouth and eyes, and rose to his feet. Mr. Manly seated himself grimly to listen to the insults forthcoming. Was he not aware that a week's time for the work trial of a horse could not be construed as being the same as three or four months. The horse, as an example, was bought in May. No dealer could possibly do business on that basis. The horse was bought for mowing and there was no mowing until July. That was the case. Mowing. Was there no possibility of trying out the horse in the week following purchase, to see if it would pull the machinery? Afterall, a week is a week. 'For mowing,' asked Mr. Manly, setting a stubborn jaw. Could the horse not have been attached to the machinery and driven around as a trial in the yard, before the week was up? The horse could have been tried-out with the mowing machine prior to their being hay to cut. The new owner didn't do this until it was time to mow, which was well beyond a week later. Yes, the defendant heard plenty. Not compliments about his conduct in the case. He was unwilling to say much on the matter in his defence. Upon silent pressure, exerted by counsel and the judge, he looked up, peering out one eye, and then the other, and said suddenly, that he had heard enough. Mr. Manly had a reputation, you see, that preceded him, of changing his mind about horses he acquired. He had registered the same complaint previously, that a horse he had purchased wouldn't work as promised, and asking for his money to be returned. The defendant wagged his head and bumped his shoulders against the back of the chair.
     "'And have you ever heard anything against Mr. McCann, who is a highly respectable man, who has dealt in horses for many years? I've never heard anything about him one way or the other, said Mr. Manly, and was then allowed to descend from his seat. The man who had introduced the two principals came up to be questioned; having a long nose, neatly combed hair, anxious eyes and a pursed-up mouth. He sat on the edge of the chair and was tangled up in two minutes, dumbfounded when he had to admit that he had distinctly heard Mr. McCann specify a week for the expiration of his guarantee. They had gone to one side, and he had heard nothing else. Then he remembered that he had once bought a horse from Mr. McCann and had taken it back to him a month later. Yes, it was true as well, that Mr. McCann had given him a week's trial of the horse but he had actually taken it back after a full month had passed. The neighbour came up and testified that he had tried out the horse and he couldn't do anything with it. The horse as well, wouldn't mow.
     "Mr. McCann came up to defend his reputation as an honourable horse-dealer. 'Impossible!' Mr. Manly turned his head away from the disgusting sight, the defendant's counsel had afforded him at that moment. Score one for the defendant, and the round faced, red haired little man sitting by his counsel, on the bench, looked modestly cheered. And why, pursued counsel, should you have demanded ten pounds damages two months ago, and now say that the horse is worth only fifteen pounds? 'The horse is losing value every day,' said Mr. Manly briskly. Now why did you not return it by rail when you discovered it was of no use to you? 'How could I do that, your honour, when I had no means of knowing that Mr. McCann would receive the beast. I might have been refused and I would have had to pay double the fare on it, coming and going. The entire court glanced from the plaintiff to the defendant, and Mr. McCann closed his eyes and his mouth for a moment. The courtroom was silent.
     "He (Mr. McCann) had bought that horse only four or five days previous to the Enniskille Fair. He had not tried it for mowing, and general farm work, yet he had no absolute proof it was a good worker. He had sold it for thirty-two pounds, ten shillings, to Mr. Manly, less ten shillings goodwill money. No, he had not known that Mr. Manly had called at this house, although he had received the letter. Yes, he had met Mr. Manly at Hinton's Fair but nothing had been said about the return of the horse. Nothing at all about the previous transaction. They had simply talked about other things. They looked at the horses he had, at that time, but not one word was spoken, or mentioned in any way, that the horse previously sold to him was a problem. Nothing about it being returned. Certainly it was his custom to give a week's warranty on any horse he sold. A week was long enough to try a horse and he couldn't do business in any other way. He didn't remember anything being said about mowing. It was a good horse none the less. He had acted in good faith.
     "'Your honour,' said the plaintiff's counsel, 'I am reminded very much of the warranty that is given at an auction sale. Being that this article is guaranteed in perfect condition, and fit for use, such warranty to expire on the date of purchase. With the exception of Mr. McCann and counsel, the court was mildly amused. 'I find however,' said his honour, 'that it is clearly established that this horse was purchased for a particular purpose known to the plaintiff, and I also find that no warranty given in such a case can expire, until that particular purpose has been investigated and fully proven. I award the damages mentioned in the letter written by the plaintiff's counsel to defendant. Next case please."
     Worth noting just in case you plan on selling a horse for mowing, and, well, it doesn't.
     Please join me tomorrow, for another chapter on the biography of Canadian Artist, and writer, Katherine Day.
   

Katherine Day Part 11

The Water Diviner from Sincoe County

Part 11

Life in the Country - With Canadian Artist, Katherine Day, of Oro-Medonte

By Ted and Suzanne Currie

     The typewritten inclusion, in Katherine Day's otherwise handwritten journal, is entitled simply, "Goats and the Weather," and a secondary story, composed later in the 1940's, post Second World War, is headed "Notes on a Well." First, we'll check out her view on goats and how they are influenced by inclement weather, at Day's farmstead in Oro-Medonte, probably written in the early 1940's; when still residing at her first house, known with considerable affection as "Hawthornes." Her second dwelling, built to her specifications, a short distance away, was called "Pax Cottage."
     Now in the words of Katherine Day: "It was the occasion of the first fall of snow this season. It came with a nasty blizzard ripping down from the north, and it came all one afternoon and on into the night. Preceding it came a rain quite suddenly. It caught Polly (the goat), Susie and their escort Ferdinand out in the open, and they came romping home. Nannies run rather awkwardly, but they certainly make time, as you would see if you raced to close a gate ahead of them. Ferdinand prances like a wooden doll, rocking along with his fore-feet together and his hind feed together. And he brings up the rear.
     "They leap into their goat-shed and shake themselves. Then they complain, if of course they see anyone around to hear their complaint. They tell us about all the bad things they ever thought of the rain, and they repeat it over and over. Unnecessary wet stuff that gets into their fur, they utter to those who might pay attention to their plight. Oh, woe is me! They peer out of the door and scan the heavens for a break. If no sunshine is coming, they lie down in their stalls. They carefully scratch a clear spot with their hooves and lie down, turning around like a dog to survey the spot from all angles. Then ill-temper being over, for the time being, they chew their cuds. When the sky is clear again, they will go out.
     "They got fooled the first day of the snow. The sky cleared and the sun shone, and out they trotted to nibble on the dry hay, that was left along the edge of the field. They were so occupied that they did not notice the snow-clouds zooming overhead, and they were caught in the blizzard. That was around the noon hour, and I had taken their leaf of baled hay out to them, when I noticed I had no goats where they should have been. Ferdinand's bottle was in my pocket, and sooner than let him miss it on such a dramatic day, I went down to the end of the land and called. No response. Usually they answer quickly.
     "Well, it was pouring down with heavy wet snow, and I had only a scarf covering over my head, so I decided to leave the goats to fend for themselves. Fifteen minutes later, it was pouring, and the goats were still away somewhere on the property. They have sense, and those goats were probably sheltering in the spruce grove, snug and warm together, and they were wearing their good thick fur coats, more than I was. So I came in and had my lunch, and then went out again with Ferdinand's bottle. They were back. They were gulping down their alfalfa in great chunks and butting each other out of the way. Ferdinand was skipping from side to side of the cream separator, snatching at a sprig of alfalfa, whimpering as they butted him. He gave a crow of delight when he saw me and butted his hard head at the nipple of the bottle before he started drinking. Then he got down on his front knees, waved his tail in circles, tipped his rear end up and started to swallow that gruel of his. He loves it by the way. He gets a bottle three times a day, with eight ounces each time, and he swallows it in nothing flat. It froths out over his nose, and when he shakes his head he throws froth over his ears. 'Good stuff,' he would probably say if he could."
     Katherine Day writes that, "It is a gruel of calf-meal. It is made with about a cup of water and a table-spoon of dry calf meal, put on to boil. When it boils it is cooled down with milk, and that's Ferdinand's treat. I got five pounds of meal for him, and when he has finished that, he can go on dairy ration and hay, like the two grown-ups in his company. They all stayed in for the rest of the day. I closed the lower part of the half-door, and the snow still blew inside. As I had already brushed out the snow from that floor, I thought they had enjoyed enough of the stuff, and I closed the top half to keep the weather out. Polly looked at me out of the window with a smug look on her face. I think she had an idea that I was shut out in the storm, and it served me right."
     Now for locating a well on her property, Katherine Day composes a little story about her water needs at the home she had just erected near the Hawthornes cottage which was constructed first. Note, Miss Day also sketched the fellow she contracted to locate her well, and it appears with today's chapter. She writes: "When I built Hawthornes, I simply asked a well-digger in the nearest town, to come out with his equipment and drill me a well. With the help of a 'witcher' - or 'dowser' if you like, that part was done speedily, and we tapped an underground stream. That was all. The next house was built after the war, when everyone was either hanging on to what they had, in the way of a house, or dazedly scrounging all the materials he or she could collect, and calling themselves lucky for the effort. Everyone was beseeching the building brotherhood for a quarter of a quarter of a minute of their time. All the builders had two or three jobs going at one time. There seemed to be no ordinary labour to be had. Everything had become specialized. Dig a well, indeed. Too hard was the work, said some. And by this time, the men who had drilled the well at Hawthornes, was suffering heart strain from overwork.
     "Optimistically, I at least located the well. I had it 'witched'. The witcher was a small and undistinguished man who lived on a few acres over near Lake Simcoe. He made his living by farming, and this gift of locating wells was just something a little extra. He would not state a charge, and seemed rather shy of commercializing this strange virtue. He arrived in a rattling old car on a misty morning in October. By this point, we had suffered a prolonged dry spell in the region, and the omen for non-discovery seemed propitious. He had several forked sticks with him, which he had cut that morning, for freshness was necessary in his tool chosen to use in that hour of discovery. He did not say much. He looked at us with his large intense, innocent blue eyes, and heard what we had to say. Then he stepped apart, twig in hand with the point up, and paced the ground. He held the two forks, one in each hand, thumbs down, elbows tight to his body, and strode along intent and wrapped. He and the earth were communing. He would walk into the mist and then come back to us,and we dared not speak for fear of breaking the spell.
     "Presently the enchanted look left his face and a beaming smile broke out. A smile of triumph. The magic branch in his hand slowly and deliberately dipped its head toward him, his elbows moved out and up, and the branch pointed directly to the earth below him. He breathed a long sigh, and said, 'There she is. I felt a pull back there, and I thought we had water. There's a stream down below. A running stream'. You would have thought he had invented it, he was so pleased with his efforts. He now paced back and forth to establish the direction of the underground stream, and came towards us with the air of a conqueror. 'Where would you like the well to be located,' he asked. We told him, and there it was. In a small amount of time. However, the difficulties of the war intervened. No one wanted to be bothered with the hard work of digging a well. The driller no longer took contracts. It was not until spring that I found some men who would dig it for me.
     "They dug and found a flood of water at seven feet, and they stoned up the sides of the well. It was a handsome bit of stoning, and I was quite proud of it. The water flowed in up to the top while we were occupied in putting a handsome coping around it, with two forked trees as standards and a roller with a real Quebec sort of handle on it. We nailed a rope in the middle of it, attached a bucket on the other end, and worked the windlass with great pleasure. Alas, the water ran out with much the same speed as it had run in on that proud day. In six weeks the bottom of the well was bare, with great rocks which defied an ordinary extraction. A workman got a few of the smaller ones out, and to our surprise, there appeared a circle of stones which could only have been set there by hand. That was as deep as ten feet down the hole. On this we pondered for some time, and came up with three theories, one of which was probably correct. A. The Indians had constructed it three hundred years earlier, when they roamed this land called Huronia. The authorities at the Ontario Museum in Toronto soon knocked that idea higher than a cocked hat. Indians, we were informed, did not need to dig wells in this country three hundred years ago. The land abounded with fresh streams, and when they tired of an inhabitation, they moved to another, also being close to a water source. Why did they need to dig a well?
     B. It was a natural rock formation. Even a child could have proven that this theory was silly, for the stones were at least several layers deep, and the opening was consistently fifteen inches across.
     C. It had been a well at one time earlier, in history, probably for the first settlers to homestead in Oro-Medonte, and abandoned later and most likely filled-in upon departure. Now this was a theory that seemed to hold water. True, the oldest inhabitants could never recollect a house at this point of land, let alone ever knowing about a well having been located there. But evidence is evidence, and we had it down that well. Besides, this spot which had been dug out was full of large boulders such as might have been found on the surface of the land, when it was being cleared for homesteading, some hundred years earlier. What would be easier than to fill in an unwanted, unsatisfactory well with the great stones which had to be placed somewhere on the acreage, out of the way so as to be able to cultivate and plant the farm fields.
     "We had plenty of time to digest this theory, for no one wanted to dig the well anyway. I carried water for a year from a charming little stoned-up well at the side of the road, a hundred yards farther on. One day, the following year, two workmen, who had laid some crazy pavement for me the year before, came and asked me if I wanted them to dig my well. You can imagine my astonishment, to be asked for work after all this time! I pulled myself together, not wanting to get hysterical with my joy, made a bargain with the gentlemen, and they soon began work. We had to dynamite some stones out, and the work was heavy; but these two men persisted until we got a layer of water. They went through hard-pan, and gravel, and shale, and we had everyone calling on us and telling tales about what we could expect after clearing certain formations. But when we eventually encountered gravel again at twenty feet down, we were sure that the water could not be far off. Besides it was July, a hot dry spell.
     "At twenty-two feet down we stopped. This time I made arrangements for large tiles, thirty-six inches across inside. We got nine of them, each thirty inches high, and made a gravelly bed for the lowest one to rest on. Then we got the biggest wrecker (tow truck) in town, to come and lower them into the well. One of my diggers took a ride down on the lowering ropes, so as to guide the great cylinders into place. When all nine were down, the entire group of men, truckers, wreckers, and diggers leaned over the top tile and gazed down into the well. It was a touching sight, but I did not have my camera on hand to record it.
     "All we had to do after that was to pack the earth back around the tiles, wait for it to settle, and then reconstruct the coping and the windlass. The water tasted of cement until the next spring. But the winter's frost cured it, and we have a real and prosperous well for the effort and expense. We put a top on it of double tounge and groove wood, with a square opening hinged to throw back, in order to lower the pail. The odd other thing has got into the well by misadventure. Most notably, a pair of pillow cases accidentally rolled into the opening off the top of the pile, I was making in a basket; and they floated on top of the water, about ten feet down. My frantic efforts to hook them up only made them more water logged, and they soon sank out of sight, with that deliberation, and it made a mere human like me, wring her hands and wail. They were nice pillow cases.
     "There is a pail on the bottom of the well. It was quite a nice pail as well, but it decided, quite on its own, that I had tied an ineffective knot of rope on the handle, and it could escape custody if it so desired, by overwork, and give itself the freedom it obviously desired. It is still on the bottom of the well, mocking me, and likely to remain there forever. There is never less than twelve feet of water during the summer months, which is remarkable, and in the other seasons, you can almost dip a pail out of the top. Alas, there is no resurrection of the things that you accidentally drop into a well."

     Please join me tomorrow, for Part 12 of the biography of Oro-Medonte's artist/ homesteader, Katherine Day.