Friday, February 4, 2011

A beloved UEL pioneer

The Pioneer Spirit
As a child in “The County” I never knew my grandparents. My mother’s parents were living in Alberta, and my father’s parents were deceased. However, I had the great privilege to know and love my mother’s grandmother, my great grandmother Waity!
Born in 1868 she lived until 1952. My great grandfather Philip died when I was still a baby, so I have no memory of him.
Grandma Waity was a tiny woman, barely five feet tall, and lived alone in a log house near Point Traverse, or Long Point as I knew it, in the County of Prince Edward. The house was perhaps a mile from a dirt road, and about a half mile from Lake Ontario. Of course there was no electricity or running water. The log house still stands and is pictured in the book “The Settlers Dream”. I believe it is now in use as a private cottage.
I have clear memories of visiting her at her home, and even now I recall the smell of fried cakes as she pulled them from a huge cast iron cauldron.
A pair of ancient binoculars stood on a window sill that faced the lake. As with all the old homes of The County, there were hollyhocks and Lilacs in abundance.
In the 1980’s, Arthur and Bill Bongard who were rather distant neighbours often talked about her, and her fried cakes.
Sometime in the late 40’s or early 50’s she suffered a stroke and finally had to leave her lifelong home to come and live with us where she stayed until her death in 1952.
One of the pictures shows her with me at Warings Corners, likely about 1946, and we stand beside my parent’s 1927 Essex. Another picture shows my mother as a baby with her parents (my grandparents) and her grandparents (my great grandparents).
The third picture is the log house as shown in The Settler’s Dream, after it was abandoned.
I grew up with no electricity, telephone or running water, and all heating and cooking were done with wood or coal. Even so, I cannot imagine what it was like for her living alone in that remote log house, especially during the long and very cruel winters.
It remains a treasure to me that I have strong memories of a real pioneer, a grand daughter of original UEL settlers.
mailto:deerthistle@sympatico.ca




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