When she welcomed me inside I noticed she was a bit shorter than me (the top of my head is up here, the top of her head is down this far).
I’m going to say she stood 4 ft., 11 inches tall and by the end of the visit I knew, without a doubt, who kept that household running smartly.
As our combined conversations about family history and the war years came to a satisfactory conclusion (for that day) Mary made a comment that made my ears sit up.
“I came to Canada by ship,” she said, “and while at sea met a girl from Scotland who was moving to St. Thomas (Ontario), the same town I was travelling toward.”
“Can you remember her first name?” I asked. “Was it Elizabeth or Betty?
“I can’t recall,” she said.
“And her last name?”
“McKillop, McKenzie, perhaps. It was so long ago,” she said.
“But it started with Mc or Mac?” I asked.
“I think so.”
And why was I so interested?
Well, my dad, to the chagrin of some of his own family, married a young girl by the name of Elizabeth Ann McLauchlin from St. Thomas in 1944, just a few short years before he married the woman who later became my mother.
Had Elizabeth come to Canada by ship? Was she Mary’s ship mate?
I’ll take an old newspaper clipping of my dad’s first wedding with me when I pay a return visit to Allan and Mary in two weeks.
Good grief. One or two very significant ‘what ifs’ come to mind, don’t they?
***
I’ll return to this story in about two weeks.
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