This Christmas the family was healthy and happy and had invited two of their favourite ‘singles’ from the Lab- Lila, and Santiago, a Fellow from Spain- to come for dinner. Both of them were good with the children who were happy to show their loot off! I had the ironing board I had apparently been wanting, and a doll’s bed and linens made by Cec and Cyn, I think. The doll was hard plastic and she walked, and Charlie had a selection of mechanical vehicles including a train.
Cyn made lists, of course, so thank yous could be written, and Carol properly informed.
The neighbours were not on Cyn’s Present List but I wouldn’t be surprised if they’d received jars of Cyn’s festive mincemeat!
This month is such a busy one for Cyn that her mother doesn’t get to hear all the juicy details about the celebrations until the New Year. In her two previous letters Cyn writes about her preparations for Christmas – in fact, her packing of parcels to send outside of Canada happened in November to make sure they got to their destinations in time- but there is no doubt she enjoyed ordering the children’s toys from catalogues, and making her Christmas cakes and pudding, more than writing the 80 Christmas cards they sent!
Cyn’s List of Parcels Packed!
Before Christmas, of course, there was a family celebration to be held: Charlie turned three!
Grannie sent a card and present, they had a cake for tea with the gifts, and now the children are old enough, they went out to dinner, a thing the cook always appreciated!
Charlie’ birthday was always the start of the holiday season for the children, with a big share-able present- in this case a wagon – wheels they could drive/ride around the unfinished basement with the tricycle when it was too cold to go out!
It is likely that Cyn got photos of her friends’ children with their Christmas cards, but she put them in her scrapbook in amongst her fall events, although they have a summer vibe. No doubt she sent pictures of Linda and Charlie looking one year older as well!
First, however, her friend Anne sent pictures of the previous spring and summer, before her husband’s tragic death in Cambridge.
The summer of 1955, they seem to have gone to the beach! Cyn, enjoying her new sewing machine, was busy making mother-and-daughter skirts for Anne and Janita for Christmas.
Meanwhile, in Newcastle, the Sheedy boys were getting older too.
And Nan and Dick Heslop were obviously proud of their daughter!
Back in Canada, after their working summer, Merle and Dix sent a picture of their boys, John, Lorne and Bruce.
These would be the cousins we were closest to, but it would be a few years before we met them.
While the Spectroscopy Section was busy at the NRC, their friends in Chalk River were gaining international recognition. Canadian atomic research was to result in the development of medical isotopes in the 50s, CANDU nuclear power reactors in the 60s, and Ray Appleyard’s continuing visits to New York, to the UN.
Meanwhile at home, Cyn got some modern technology that she’d been wishing for for years!
Out in Saskatchewan, another Costain scientist, Cec’s youngest brother, Carman, completed his Master’s and, following in his brother’s footsteps, was headed for Cambridge to work on his PhD in the field of radio astronomy. During the summer of 1953 when Carman had stayed with them in Ottawa, they had gotten to know him and Cyn’s knowledge of rooms, landladies, and houses in Cambridge was now put to use on his behalf. And he was not going alone!
Carman and Leona were visiting Ottawa before sailing to England, the family would get to meet the bride, and Carol would get to meet yet another of Cec’s family.
The National Research Council where Cec worked had permanent staff members: Dr Herzberg, the head of the Physics Division, with Alec Douglas, Boris Stoicheff, Don Ramsay, Cec and others; and also Fellows who came from all over the world for 2 years and then usually returned to jobs at home. This meant that an unspoken part of the staffers job was being helpful to the newcomers and making sure their families were getting on well.
Dr. Herzberg and ladies.
For Cyn and Cec, that meant entertaining, and once the summer holidays were over, they held an evening for their friends (possibly wanting Carol to enjoy the people she’d been reading about in Cyn’s letters for the past 4 years, as well as the outfit- Cyn’s skirt was her gift!)
Cec’s camera came out, showing drinks and hors d’oeuvres,
friends and Carol dressed up,
Phyl Douglas and Carol (Grannie to us, Mummy to Cyn.)
Alec Douglas, Joan Stoicheff, and a wife…
ladies smoking elegantly,
physicists chatting happily,
Mrs. Herzberg and Alec, plus a Fellow?
Charlie saying Good Night to his godfather, Boris Stoicheff.
and the children in pyjamas insisting on saying goodnight as part of the entertainment.
After the holiday at the cottage, the next exciting event was Linda’s birthday. Grannie had been in Ann Arbour for the actual birth, but never for a birthday celebration, so that made it special, and so did the prospect of a party. The November before, Janek’s 3rd birthday party had overwhelmed the children at their first party with 16 guests, but Cyn had told her mother that she thought they would try something smaller and get the two children used to such celebrations.
They sent invitations to the Ramsay girls, Barry, Janek, and Joanne Tomlinson who lived in the area, none of whom really knew each other at that point although Linda, Joanne and Janek would be in the same class from Kindergarten through to Grade 13!
So besides the birthday girl, there were 3 girls and 3 boys and they posed in party clothes on a nice August day.
Front Row: in shadow Wendy Ramsay, Janek Blachut, Shirley Ramsay. Standing: Joanne, Cyn holding Charlie, the birthday girl Linda, and Barry Gander.
I am sorry that there is no letter telling what happened at the party, but there were cards, probably little presents, and a very girly cake!
Since Cyn recorded all this in her scrapbook, I assume it was successful as all her well-planned events were. However, the family celebration was probably more fun for Linda and Charlie. Since Linda had a summer birthday and Charlie a winter one, they usually got a big present that both could enjoy- such as a sandbox or a sleigh.
The big present. Since they already had a tiny tricycle, and a wagon, they had lots of wheels!
In August, Cec and Cyn rented a cottage so that Grannie could enjoy the Canadian cottage experience- primitive facilities, ancient stoves and fridges, bedrooms with walls that stopped before the roof so that noise and mosquitoes could circulate, but outside peace and quiet with lovely views, sand, shallow to deep water, August heat, and a dock jutting into a big lake.
Linda liked the water.
Water Play!
Grannie must have found the Canadian lake a bit chillier than the Carribbean!
Budding scientist.
These toys were made of tin, which worked well in a sheltered sandbox, but rusted at the cottage. Can’t think why.
My nicest swimsuit.
Everyone enjoyed the cottage, but it was never much of a holiday for Cyn who had to cook under difficult circumstances, so we only did it every 3 years or so.
In July, Carol Ewing arrived in Ottawa, three years after her last trip, to visit her daughter Cyn, Cec, Linda, and meet her grandson for the first time. But hers was not the only visit. Cec got his camera out to record the meeting of the in-laws: his Aunt Lily came up from Toronto- she hadn’t seen them since Linda was 6 weeks old- and Cec’s sister Merle and her husband Dix came from Port Arthur, and they met Carol and the children for the first time. As they were all lovely people, they got on well!
Charlie and Uncle Dix
Carol Ewing is standing, with Lily Costain seated, at the back of the house on Montreal Road.
Lea, Cec’s second sister, had been staying with Merle and Dix with her son because of her health, but has returned to her husband Wendell who was working in Ottawa. So in these family photographs the only one missing is Cec, who is behind the camera.
Adults: Wendell & Lea Atchison, Dixon & Merle Moor, Cyn, Aunt Lily, and Grannie! Children: Daryl, Charlie and Linda.
Both Merle and Dix had university degrees, but at some point decided to get teacher’s qualifications by going to Teacher’s College in the summer in Toronto for a couple of summers. I assume their three sons went to their grandparents in Saskatoon while their parents took courses. We would meet those cousins a few years later. Meanwhile, Cyn took the camera.
As Cyn and Cec prepared for their visitors in the summer by buying a dining table and chairs and writing letters about the arrangements to Carol in St. Vincent, they heard from family in the west, where Cec’s sister Merle and her husband Dix planned to come to Toronto, visiting Uncle Milton and Aunt Lily, returning Lea and Daryl who had been staying with them to Ottawa, and meeting Linda and Charlie for the first time. It was going to be a summer full of visitors!
However, ordinary family life went on, celebrations over Mother’s Day in May, and Cec’s attendance at the Spectroscopy Conference in Columbus, Ohio in June, which was, as it had been the previous year, the week of his birthday on June 16th.
The Spectroscopy Section had their photograph taken on the steps of the N.R.C. on Sussex Drive, with Dr. Herzberg in the front row wearing glasses, and Cec the tallest in the back row left.
The big event in my grandmother Carol’s life in February 1955 was the Royal Visit. Princess Margaret, sister of the young queen, was to make an official visit to St. Vincent, and the public would be allowed to ‘meet’ her at a Garden Party. Carol and her sister received invitations to this, and instructions on how to dress and behave (!), attended, I hope enjoyed themselves, and sent the ephemera to Cyn (probably because there was a 3 year old Linda interested in princesses.)
Possibly a new hat would not be considered an unnecessary expense by the Hazell sisters!I wish I could have read Carol’s letter to Cyn that accompanied these instructions. The final paragraph suggests a backstory!
Princess Margaret must have liked St Vincent, because later she made a home on the island of Mustique, the Hazell’s holiday island that Carol’s brother Fred would sell in 1958!
A Family History in Letters 