Several Old Columns Pt 2: “Great-uncle Arthur” - his name lives on

In January, 1993 an article by my mother (Edith Jane Harrison) was published in the Norwich Gazette entitled ‘The Thirties: A little went a long way.’

I have a copy of it thanks to Carlisle Penney, a former resident of Norwich, at present a resident of London, who still subscribes to The Gazette and left a few 18 - 19-year old columns written by my parents in my mailbox on a when my wife and I were likely galavanting around our nation’s capital and spending my hard-earned money as if there was no tomorrow.

I’m so glad he did.

I’ve read several of the columns by now and have been rewarded for my efforts several times over.

About ‘The Thirties: A little went a long way.’

I notice my mother liked the colon ( : ) as much as I do now. Why, I can barely start the day without at least one or two. (Sure, look at earlier posts if you don’t believe me).

Part of a paragraph, mid-story, piqued my interest.

“Great-uncle Arthur always had a large garden; he would drop by with baskets of this and that, and he kept chickens and a cow - without him we would have been worse off after Dad died.”


[“Great-uncle Arthur and I have similar facial features.”]


["Uncle Arthur, Aunt Edith's grave stone, Norwich, Ont.": photos GH]

“They (Arthur and his wife) had no children, but he planted and harvested each year and no doubt helped other families besides ours. Aunt Edith was a great cookie baker, I especially remember her ginger cookies, my favourites.”


["Ida Belle Catton, my mother's mother"]

I wonder if my mother was named after her Aunt Edith? I wonder if my middle name, Arthur, is a connection to her great-uncle? If so, we both share a connection to very hard-working and generous people.

I also learned my mother had an Uncle George who “lived around the corner”, worked at the fertilizer factory (I know where that used to stand) and was my grand-mother’s half-brother.

Now, I know my Great-grandmother Gordon was married twice, so perhaps George was from her first marriage. If so, my family tree just got a bit more complicated - and that’s okay, because I hear there is strength in diversity.


["My great-grandmother - a Campbell by birth - married first a Gordon, then a Robbins"]

Finally, I noticed my mother said that without Arthur’s help “we would have been worse off after Dad died.”

She wrote the column when she was about 70-years old, and probably remembered Arthur fondly. He was a help to a family that was perhaps doing poorly or facing struggles because there was no man in the house. And as mother, at 70, wrote she remembered those hard times without her father - her Dad.


["Lawrence or Lorne Catton, my mother's Dad"]

I’m glad those feelings about her Dad lived on inside her.

And live on in her writings.

.