George & Colleen Dunkley

AUDIO INTERVIEW

SUMMARY

November 24, 2014 

00:37  George was born in 1938 and lived at 169 Oakwood Ave. until he was 22 years old. Colleen and he both went to Oakwood Collegiate. Colleen moved to Robina in 1953.

01:06  SCHOOLS: George’s father (Albert Wesley Dunkley) worked at Oakwood and was involved with the Oracle, the school’s yearbook.

01:28  STREETS: Oakwood: His house was north of St. Clair, where the streetcars still turn around. They were three houses north of the turnaround.   

01:34  THEATRE: The Oakwood Theatre: Just south of them was a theatre where an apartment building is now. They would go there sometimes.

01:53  DATING / SCHOOLS / YOUTH GROUPS AND TEENS: They started dating at Oakwood. She was 15 and he was 16.  She was in grade 10. This was related to music because she was in the choir and George was in the orchestra. They had parties .

02:55  SCHOOLS / NEIGHBOURHOOD STREET LIFE: When Colleen moved to 64 Robina, he used to walk up to her house, just north of Glenhurst. Before that she lived at Ascot and Harvie Ave. near Lansdowne. She would walk to and from high school at Oakwood.

03:23  PERSONAL HISTORY: Colleen’s family history: Her family ran a corner store after her father came out of a sanitorium for TB. He had been a professional soccer player in England and played for Exeter. Later he came to Canada to play for Hollinger gold mines in Timmins, and he also worked for them, drafting and drawing plans. Her mom left Cornwall, England at age 14 with her father to work a farm near Timmins. Her mother said it was so cold in winter that she would wash the floors and they would freeze. She opened a cigarette corner store up there and all the soccer players would come by; that is how they met. Colleen’s father developed TB, so they came down south from Timmins when Colleen was 6. It seems he went to London for treatment. But now Colleen doubts it was TB because he worked in a mine. Her mother went to work in a factory. Her granddad was a builder and built a house at Kane near Eglinton, so they moved there while Colleen was still in elementary school. Her parents opened a little store with a house at the back for the family.  Her father worked in the store and her mother continued in her factory position. Eventually mom became the administrator of the menswear factory. After 50 years she was running the company. It was a Jewish firm. They went to Israel and left her mother in charge of 80 workers and she worked full-time until she was 80. She worked on King St. On Saturdays she worked in the store. Colleen went to Earlscourt Public School.

06:55  Colleen was born on December 12, 1939; it was minus 40o. They lived in a little bungalow at the edge of the forest in Timmins. She used to pick blueberries and was sometimes chased by bears. She remembers walking a mile to school through huge snow. Toronto didn’t have as much snow!

08:10  SCHOOLS: Building Oakwood: George’s dad bought the lot they lived on at Oakwood and St. Clair; it had been an apple orchard. He came to Oakwood at the school’s beginning, around 1909. St. Clair was a dirt road back then. The trustees who were elected every year in those days decided to build the collegiate out in the “middle of the country.” People thought they were all crazy and voted them out the next year.

09:04  POLITICS / SCHOOLS: City Boundaries and School Fees: George lived in York Township - north of St. Clair was not City of Toronto.  Because he was in York, he should have gone to Vaughan Rd. Collegiate, so for a few years his father had to pay fees for him to attend Oakwood, even though he was only half a block away. The last couple of years they changed school boundaries and he could go for free.  

09:56 Fire Stations: Also because of being in York, the firehall on Hendrick wasn’t their firehall. Theirs was on Vaughan Rd. (It is now on Oakwood). It was on Vaughan Rd. between Oakwood and Eglinton.

10:27  TRANSIT: Streetcars and Boundaries: You needed a different ticket for the streetcar up Oakwood Ave.; you couldn’t get a transfer. You were in York Township. As soon as you got on the streetcar to go north, you were in York Twp. 

11:35  POLITICS / COMMUNITY GROUPS and SERVICES: Police: Times were different; York Township Police rode on their bikes. They were very kind. If you were going away for a month you would tell the police and they would check your house to make sure all was well. Funny story: the police caught his father climbing up a ladder to the bathroom window - he had forgotten his keys.

12:17  Postal Services: He could write a letter to Colleen in the morning and she would receive it in the afternoon. If she answered it he would get the reply the next morning. Saturdays there was mail - only once a day, but otherwise twice a day for 3 cents. Writing a letter was the “formal thing to do”.

13:06 Electricity: If you had an electric clock it wouldn’t work here and at the cottage because the hydro was 25 cycles per second down here and 60 cycles/second up north. You couldn’t interchange electrical appliances.

13:56  TRANSIT: Trolley Buses ran up and down Oakwood  Ave., Rogers Rd. and Ossington. Buses came later. 

14:25 Streetcars: Stopped running about 1 a.m. and started again around 5 a.m. Squealing wheels at turnaround would wake them up.

14:48 MEMORABLE EVENTS: Winter Storm of 1944: The TTC had a great big snow plow that ran on the streetcar tracks. It got stuck in front of their house for 3 or 4 days. It was one of the worst storms, and they had a week off school. 

15:43  WYCHWOOD PARK: Residents: Alec Woodside was George’s best man. Alec’s father, Moffat Woodside, was president of the U of T University College for a time. Alec was a prof at UBC. 

16:30  RECREATION / SCHOOLS: The Oakwood Stadium: Also called Crang Stadium, where No Frills is now. There was a pool out front. Crang was a football player for George’s dad at Oakwood Collegiate and later made a lot of money, so he bought the property and let Oakwood use it. The pool was on St. Clair, the stadium in behind. Later, in the mid 50s, the stadium was used for stock-car racing which he found annoying. George lived on Oakwood from 1938 - 1961.  

17:58  SHOPS: Loblaws: Colleen worked at the store between Oakwood and Robina on the north side of St. Clair. You had to be 16 to get a job, so that’s when she started working there. 

18:34  SHOPS: Customer Service: George’s Aunt Mary would come and visit from Picton and shop with them. She would talk with cashiers if she didn’t like their attitude: “Now just a minute young lady, we have our relationship all wrong. I’m profit and you’re debit. Now, we’ll continue when you get that straight.”

19:40  MEMORABLE PEOPLE: If anyone asked George’s father what he did for a living, he said he “coached football, hockey, and basketball, and I teach Latin and Greek on the side.”

19:56  SCHOOLS: Oakwood Collegiate: His father taught high school classes in the original building at the top of King Edward Elementary School. It was originally called the Northwest High School. 

20:28  SHOPS / LIBRARIES Lehman’s Library: Was across the road from Oakwood on the north side. It was a lending library and bookstore, and George worked there. High school didn’t provide textbooks. On the first day of school everyone would try to get all their books.

21:28  SHOPS: Drug Stores: St. Clair Drug Store, Goldblatt was on the NW corner of Crang and St. Clair. George would get chocolate milkshakes there several times a week.

22:00  Kresges: Was at Bathurst and St. Clair, but that wasn’t where they would go.

22:12  PLACES OF WORSHIP: Dufferin St. was more familiar to Colleen because her church, St. Chad’s Anglican Church, is on Dufferin north of St. Clair.

22:38  RECREATION: High School Formals: Often were at Casa Loma.

22:53  Tea dances: Held in the school auditorium, after school or at lunch. They would move out all the benches. 

23:38  SHOPS: Oakwood Florist: Was very famous. It was on the south side of St. Clair just east of Oakwood. There used to be two banks, one on the south side, and one on the NE corner.

24:11  MEMORABLE PEOPLE / HEALTHCARE: Dr. Canning was a dentist at the corner of Christie and St. Clair, upstairs. He was a WWI veteran, like George’s father. His drill was worked with his right foot. It was very noisy. Shared memories of early dentistry.

25:18 YOUTH GROUPS AND TEENS: There was a YMCA on Robina, east side just north of St. Clair. His dad, when he retired, went there on Thursdays for the St. Clair 60 Club - lunch and a talk. George recalls that it was in a purpose-built building.

26:06  MEMORABLE PEOPLE: Jack and Carl Cole from Coles Books were at Oakwood when his dad was teaching there. The brothers were very poor, and used to deliver the newspaper in the morning. There were a lot of papers in those days; the Globe was in the morning and the Telegram and Star were evening papers. So lots of work for kids. Eventually Coles opened one store, he thinks, on Yonge. In those days you had to buy textbooks. George’s dad would slip them books under the table (at least this is what George heard).

27:08  DEMOGRAPHICS:  St. Clair area was mainly WASP and Jewish in those days. Oakwood Collegiate was not multicultural.  

28:00   RECREATION / TRANSIT: Sunday Closures: No sports on Sundays.  Streetcars didn’t run on Sundays.  

28:10  SCHOOLS: George attended Rawlinson till Grade 8. It was located in York Twp. The principal, Mr Wheeler, lived next door to Colleen on Robina. He was a big man who always wore a bowler hat. The kids were getting the strap out in the hall all the time. More boys got the strap, but girls got it too. That was standard for those days. Even in high school the strap was being utilized.

29:15  Courses: He took “manual training”- woodworking and electricity - at Rawlinson in grades 7 and 8.

30:00  SCHOOLS: Community Centres: Schools and churches were the centre of the community. Earlscourt, McMurrich, Regal Rd., Rawlinson were the local public schools. The 1933 Oracle has a wonderful history of Oakwood Collegiate. In 1908 the school board decided to create Northwest High School on the top floor of King Edward School.

30:50  Oakwood: George’s dad said there was no electricity at the school or in that whole area down to Davenport. He took eggnog made with raw eggs for lunch. (George and Colleen discuss photos of school staff in the yearbook they are looking at.) 

31:44  Northwest HIgh School / Oakwood: In 1908 there were 108 first year students at Northwest on top of KIng Edward. They looked for a site to house the school and found  a 5 acre lot at the corner of Oakwood and St. Clair. His father bought a lot nearby to be close to work. It was an area of “woods and fields in which cattle grazed”. The cost of the school site was $15,000 and the building was $135,000.

32:25 Oakwood music: Colleen’s recollection of the music program: Mr. Davidson and then Mr. Snell were teachers. She tried to play the French horn. They used to perform at Massey Hall with other high schools, but there were more performances at school. She remembers “Jerusalem” as a school song. Also the “Oakwood song”.

33:35  Swimming Class: There was a huge swimming pool. Swimming was a required part of the phys ed program. You had to obtain the bronze medallion before you could graduate. For the pretest you had to get a brick from the bottom of the pool, and you had to save somebody. Colleen says she nearly drowned but did get her bronze. She had to overcome her fear of the water. You had to take phys ed every year.

34:58  YOUTH GROUPS AND TEENS / DATING: George led the Trio choirs. Choirs were all girls; the triple trio would be 9 singers, the double trio would be 6. George would teach, conduct and play the piano for the songs that they learned. George dated several of them, but Colleen was the last in line. They sang at St. Michael and all Angels and at St. Clair United Church (now St. Matthew’s). 

36:18  SCHOOLS: Oakwood’s early history: In 1911, the only house in the area was at the corner of Oakwood and Burlington. It is still standing. There were no sidewalks, so the principal had to make sure a 2 plank walk was laid down. There were sidewalks by the time George was there. 

36:51  Oakwood Music: Colleen and her brother were part of the acapella choir in 1956 or 1957. They had trouble getting boys to join.

37:40  PARKS: They would go to Christie Pits for track races and school events. They would also compete with other schools there.

37:55  RAVINES: There was a little ravine where Springmount Ave. is now. It was part of Garrison Creek.

38:26  YOUTH GROUPS AND TEENS: Boys at Oakwood were required to be in the Cadet Corps.The girls could also join. They might put on a show at half time. They would go down to the armories at Fort York. George was a trumpeter in the band.

39:06  WARS: WWI: George’s Dad was one of the first to go “lead the boys”. 

39:16  PERSONAL HISTORY: George’s father: Albert Wesley Dunkley was born near Exeter. He lived in Wireton, and Picton Ont. He attended high school in Napanee and graduated in 1899 from Queen’s with an MA. Started teaching in Orangeville. He played Senior A hockey for the Orangeville team. He was good enough that the Toronto St. Pat’s offered him a job playing hockey. He was insulted and said “You don’t pay a person for playing hockey.” He loved it. He lost most of his teeth and broke his nose several times playing. George didn’t play hockey as his mom was worried about him damaging his fingers, which would affect his piano playing.

41:40  SCHOOLS: Oakwood Collegiate: They thought about appointing a secretary to help the principal - more economical than using teachers part time to do office work. However, they didn’t see how they would use a secretary if they had one full time.

42:16 SCHOOLS / HEALTHCARE: George’s father’s first wife was a music teacher at Oakwood and lead the choir there. They won many championships. She got a tooth infection and died.

43:00  PERSONAL HISTORY: George’s mother: She was originally from Almonte, near Ottawa. His parents went to the same church.

43:16  PLACES OF WORSHIP: As a child he went to St. Clair United, now St. Matthew’s. Colleen went to St. Chad’s Anglican on Dufferin just north of St. Clair.

43:32  SCHOOLS: Oakwood: In 1908, the total enrollment was 300; half were boys. 

Sports: From 1908 - 1933 Oakwood won many championships in hockey, rugby, football and track. In 1932 the rugby team were Ontario champs. George’s dad was very involved in coaching. 

44:46  MEMORABLE PEOPLE: Norman Endicott was a Rhodes scholar. Reg Gilmore and Buck Billings also went to Oakwood. 

45:08  PERSONAL HISTORY: Music: George took piano from an early age. When he was around 8 years old it was decided he would go to St. Thomas Church Huron St. because they had a boys’ and men’s choir. It’s still famous for music in Toronto.

45:30 George’s Music Mentors: Music mentorship that lead to a career. He had a piano teacher, Mrs. Proctor who lived on Robina for a while. When he went to St. Thomas’s the organist took him under his wing for piano and organ, and he also sang in the choir. More history of George at St. Martin’s in the Fields where Colleen joined him. She sang in the choir. They were there for 25 years.

46:40  COMMUNITY GROUPS and SERVICES / NEIGHBOURHOOD STREET LIFE: Police: Police were your friends. If you are doing something you shouldn’t be doing they would bring you home and that was the end of it.  Your parents would look after the situation. You wouldn’t be put through the court system. His parents said that if you get into trouble at school, you’ll get into twice as much trouble when you get home.  

47:15  PERSONAL HISTORY: Colleen’s brother: He attended Earlscourt and Oakwood and was in the choir at St. Chad’s. He went to teacher’s college after Gr.12 and later got a B.A. in music, same as George. He enjoyed sports, like her father.

48:30  Multigenerational living: When they first moved to Toronto, Colleen’s family lived in the basement of her grandparents’ home, and her aunt and uncle lived on the third floor, her grandparents on the middle floors. 

49:12  George’s family: George had a sister who was 10 years older. 

49:28 TRANSIT: Streetcars: George thinks the old ones were made of wood. They were colourful. They had a stove for heating, doors at the back and front. They were noisy and very rickety. The conductor would be turning the handles. The ticket would be a nickel.

50:31  SCHOOLS: Oakwood: Music Program: Music was always important. The program produced a number of good musicians. George accompanied Nelson Dempster, who played the cello. All the girls would swoon when they heard the cello. George played the organ and piano, and in the school orchestra he played violin and viola. Earl Davison and George’s dad were synonymous with Oakwood.    

51:50  Target Practice: Cadets had shooting practice with live ammunition at targets in the basement. 

52:56 ENTERTAINMENT / MEMORABLE PEOPLE: George lived next to a movie theatre. His father, A. W. Dunkley, was a major in the army and a sports fan. He didn’t think much of emotional movie pictures. When they went to the movies and people would be weeping, he would be difficult and would get thrown out for being disruptive. He had been in the trenches in WWI and had a low tolerance for emotions.

53:36  SCHOOLS: Oakwood: Is a UNESCO school. Dr. Hardy Hill, who was head of history for many years, was the one who set that up, probably in the 50s. Oakwood was very proud of the designation. 

54:14  WARS: WWII: George’s sister was in grade 13 in the early 40s and studying for departmental exams. When there were air raid practices, you weren’t allowed to have any lights. His dad would put sheets over the windows so she could study. This happened regularly. Inspectors would be out checking and you would be in trouble if they could see your lights. 

55:23  Rations: Colleen’s recollections of WWII were the rations. She remembers the tokens that would get you butter or meat. She wasn’t in Toronto at the time. George’s family would go to Rawlinson school with coupons to get butter, sugar, meat. 

55:44  Gasoline Shortages: Gasoline was in short supply, so George’s family couldn’t go to the cottage in Kincardine once they ran out of coupons. The car sat unused for a whole year till you got more coupons. No matter how much you were willing to pay, without coupons there was no gas.  

55:37  Remembrance Day used to be a school holiday. Central Tech, one of the biggest schools in Canada, always had a big Remembrance Day service. All the veterans from the Board of Ed. would march down there. George would go down with his father who would have put on his medals. This continued for many years.

57:32  SHOPS: St. Clair Ice Cream store: Between Dufferin and Lansdowne, possibly nearer Dufferin on St. Clair, there was a big ice cream parlour. It was a special treat to go there after church for Colleen’s family. George went to one on the west side of Oakwood Ave., just north of St. Clair. George would be sent out to buy a brick of ice cream for dessert. No one had freezers.

58:39  SCHOOLS / TEENS: Oakwood: Kids hung out on the stairs in those days, just like now. George wore baggy pants, plaid shirts with chains hanging down - a “swinger”.

59:27  PLACES OF WORSHIP: Sunday Activities: Church was very important.  Everyone went to church at least twice on Sundays.  George would go 3 times because he sang in the choir at St. Thomas’s. His mother insisted that he go to the Sunday school at St. Clair United at 3 p.m. Nothing else was open. He got into trouble for washing the car on Sunday because you didn’t do that on Sunday. People would sit in the parlour and read the Bible - the worst books in the Bible (laughter).

1:00:30  Missionaries: Memories of George’s Methodist minister grandfather. When he retired he became the missionary at Rice Lake near Picton for the First Nations.  

1:02:04  Importance of Religion: You couldn’t get a bank loan unless your Minister signed off on it. He had to vouch for you that you were a reputable person. They would sign your passport application too. 

1:02:27  If you wanted to get business, you might go to Church to be seen. For example, a funeral director with a business on St. Clair would arrive late to church and follow the choir up in the processional and sit in the front seat so everyone could see him. Graduating dentistry students were told to join a church to get business. 

1:03:18  Church Socials: Churches had many teas and bake sales. George’s mum was always busy with church functions for the ACW [Anglican Church Women].

1:03:36  TRANSPORTATION: People generally walked to church; many didn’t have cars. Colleen’s family didn’t have a car until her father was in his 70s. Her mom was upset because she didn’t want him driving. As a young woman in England her mom had driven a motorcycle, but she was too nervous to drive a car in Toronto. 

1:04:38  PLACES OF WORSHIP: St. Columbia United Church at Vaughan Rd. and St. Clair United at Rushton Rd. combined and became St. Matthew’s. 

1:04:57  SCHOOLS / PLACES OF WORSHIP: Musical Performances: Oakwood music groups went to St. Michael and all Angels at Wychwood and St. Matthew’s to perform.  

1:05:13  PLACES OF WORSHIP: Neighbourhood Churches: St. Clair Church of the Nazarene was on the south side of St. Clair west of Dufferin. A  friend of his went there. Also, there were St. Clare Roman Catholic church, and Holy Rosary.     

1:05:31  Social Status: You were an outcast if you didn’t attend church. It was part of your social “status”. 

1:06:20  Community: School and church were the community centres. They led the way with hospitals and education.

1:06:48  NEIGHBOURHOOD STREET LIFE / SCHOOLS: St. Clair was a comfortable community. “Teachers were our friends. There was a community of spirit with the teachers.”