Bob Carswell adds a story that goes with the 1950s Cartierville School photo

Jim Carswell, Lesley Carswell, and Bob Carswell, about 1953, at Cartierville School annual carnival. Source: Bob Carswell

The photo in question was included in a post (and a comment at the bottom) entitled:

MCHS 2015: Smaller room, more intimate space

As a follow-up, Bob Carswell has added an additional comment of interest:

Sometimes a story tells itself…..

There is an interesting story behind the photo as well….some time ago I went into Black’s Camera in Bloor West Village to get some photos done. Among them was a slide my father had taken back in the 1950s….. you guessed it, the one I added to my last writing about Cartierville School and the annual winter carnival.

When I went back to pick up the photo, they had actually produced it backwards from the slide negative. For that reason, I left it with them and asked that the photo be reversed. Well, I thought I had picked up everything from the store but the day before they finally closed I got a call about the photo that they had forgotten to call me earlier about.

I asked them to see if the Bakery next door would hold it for me for a week as I was having some problems myself and could not get there on the Saturday. The girl they spoke to had just started working there and she would not commit so I was stuck until they suggested they would mail it to me.

So the following week I waited for it anticipating it would take a few days to get to me…..sure enough a few days stretched into two weeks and I figured it was a goner.

Photo from Victoria by the Sea, Prince Edward Island, July 2015. Jaan Pill photo

Then one day I found an envelope in my mailbox with a Toronto return address on it……however, closer inspection told me a different story. My young friend Jessica in the store had taken it upon herself to mail it to me even though it was a guy there who said he would.

I knew that Jessica had decided to go back home after Blacks closed for good and as I was delighted to find it in my mailbox, I wondered how long it had taken since she mailed it. I then discovered that she did not mail it in Toronto but it travelled with her to Pugwash,

Nova Scotia where the local post office duly stamped their mark on it signifying where it had been shipped from……Pugwash is a tiny community of some 500 residences and some 750 people remaining (2011) on the north shore of Nova Scotia at the head of Pugwash River opposite PEI. This photo travelled thousands of miles to get to me thanks to the kindest of one young lady who did not forget me. Thanks Jessica!

Bob Carswell

Prince Edward Island

[End of text]

Closed Black’s store at Cloverdale Mall. The Target store also closed some time back. Jaan Pill photo

Given that Bob’s story mentions Prince Edward Island, I’ve posted a photo from this past summer from PEI. The lack of visible air pollution, in PEI as compared to Toronto where I live, is among the many things that is noticeable about the Island.

I’ve also posted an iPhone photo of a closed Black’s photo store at Cloverdale Mall. As I’ve noted in previous posts, two shopping malls to the west of Old Mill Toronto offer unique and different shopping experiences.

Cloverdale Mall and Sherway Gardens: A study in contrasts

Cloverdale Mall is a remnant of a bygone tine; Sherway Gardens is a high-end store where a person within a specified demographic range goes for serious shopping for the latest styles. I shopped recently at Cloverdale Mall, where I was able to get a sale price on an Otterbox case, with a clip-on belt case, for my vintage iPhone 4s. Given that my smartphone needs are pretty basic, the 4s version does the job quite well for me.

I think back as well to the days when digital cameras were not quite yet up to speed compared to 35mm negative film. But the digital versions did keep on improving, of course. One of the reason Black’s closed, from what I’ve read, is that people were no longer buying much in the way of point and shoot digital cameras, because smartphones produce images that tend to be at the same level as a basic digital camera.

Stay Inn

If you are staying at the Stay Inn, for the MCHS 2015 Reunion, Sherway Gardens is a 10-minute walk directly to the west of the hotel. To get to Cloverdale Mall, it’s a short ride by car of taxi going north along the 427 or the East Mall (your choice). Or if you walk, along the East Mall, it’s probably a 40-minute walk.

As well, to get to Old Mill from Stay Inn, among the options is a taxi to Kipling subway, and then you can take the subway right to the Old Mill subway station. From the subway, it’s a three-minute walk to Old Mill.

Registration details

You can access the details here. For your convenience, a key piece of information is the following:

The cost is $150 for single tickets and $250 per couple of tickets, where one person is an MCHS graduate or a former student or teacher.

Cheque payments should be in Canadian currency, payable to MCHS 2015.

Please mail your Registration cheque to:

MCHS 2015 Registration
c/o Diana Redden
4487 – 222A Street
Langley, B.C.
V2Z 1B2

If you have questions please contact me at jpill@preservedstories.com or send me a text message (or phone me) at 416-722.6630. The latter is the number for my vintage iPhone.

At the June 17, 2015 meeting in Kitchener of the organizing committee, were all set to take a photo of (left to right) Gina Davis Cayer, Lynn Hennebury Legge, and Scott Munro in the back seat of Lynn’s Mustang, but then we discovered a baby car seat was already occupying the seat! Jaan Pill photo

Humber Room

I am currently working on a series of posts highlighting the content of the reunion, starting at 6:00 pm on Oct. 17, 2015 at the Humber Room at Old Mill Toronto. Our opening activity is the Business Card Game, an ice-breaker that Lynn Hennebury Legge has imported from the Chamber of Commerce in London (London, Ontario, that is).

Lynn is also the budget person for the reunion. She has ensured that the costs for the reunion are matched by the registration fees. That is, with her close attention to detail, we are headed toward a balanced budget on the reunion. Without her help, and her past  three decades of experience in working with corporate budgets, in her day job of long ago (her current jobs include looking after grandkids), we would be up the creek without a paddle, heading toward Niagara Falls without a barrel.

We look forward to meeting you at the reunion – starting with the amazing Business Card Game! Lynn Legge will introduce the game; she has many years of experience in the staging of it!

What do I get for $150?

We are very pleased that quite a few people have taken the time to view a video at Vimeo (see link below), recorded at the Boston Pizza at 190 Gateway Park Drive in Kitchener, where we have our Event Committee meetings. We meet in Kitchener because it’s half-way between London, Ontario and the Greater Toronto Area.

Lynn Hennebury Legge lives in London, making it easy for her to attend the meetings. Kitchener is also a convenient location to enable another key member of the committee, Gina Davis Cayer, to attend. She lives to the south of Kitchener, in St. Williams. The rest of the Event Committee lives in the Greater Toronto Area. Our next meeting is at 11:30 am on Wednesday, Sept. 9 in Kitchener. All MCHS alumni are welcome to attend the meetings.

DEADLINES

The above-noted video at Vimeo features Gina Cayer, Scott Munro, and Lynn Legge. In the conclusion of the brief video, Lynn notes that the Oct. 17 reunion may be a final opportunity for 1960s grads to meet together at an event of this size. We look forward to your attendance at the reunion! If you plan to attend, please note there are some deadlines that you have to meet.

The deadline to pay by cheque is Oct. 1.

If you plan to pay cash at the door, you MUST contact Jaan Pill at jpill@preservedstories.com or at 416-722-6630 (from anywhere in Canada) by text or by a phone call … BY OCT. 12.

Please note the deadline.

We will make sure Old Mill knows our final attendance figures by the deadline for notice of cash payments. We need to receive notice that a person is attending by Oct. 12, if they plan to pay at the door. Otherwise, we cannot accept cash payment at the door!

As well, if you plan to attend the Oct. 18 Brunch at 11:00 am, we need to know by Oct. 11. The Brunch is $35 per person; each person pays their own way.