Hello again and welcome! A fun post today detailing some of the social times Charlie had during his Young Adult years with his sisters, friends and dates!
Charlie made several trips to visit and vacation with his sisters.
January 1942, he and Mary spent a week with Enid in Toronto.
July 5, 1945, he took the train to Earnscliffe, Muskoka for a week with Mary and Enid.
August 2, 1948, he went on a holiday to Gravenhurst with Enid and Bill.
Charlie also remembered some social events:
“One time, I was invited to a dinner and dance, a Liberal Party Function, as Isabel Taylor’s escort in London, Ontario. Her Father, Senator William Taylor, was Chief Liberal Whip in the Dominion Parliament. I also enjoyed the dances at the Masonic Hall during the war. They were sponsored by the Masons. I remember Margaret being there in the 1940‘s.
I remember that on May 24th, 1946, Archie Carnahan took Amy McCutcheon and I took Margaret to the Summer Garden’s Dance Hall on the beach at Port Dover. Archie drove and on the way home his car stopped a mile or so south of Oakland. I blew into the gas tank and the car started. Yeah! Margaret remembers that she wore a purple dress and a lilac in her hair. The moon was full and she thought they would have to walk home when the car stopped and wondered what her Father would say…? When she got home the door was locked and she climbed in the study window!
In the fall of 1948 I went to Mr. Burbidge to ask his permission to marry Margaret Elizabeth Burbidge. Subsequently, I asked Margaret to marry me and gave her an engagement ring. In 1948, I also started building a new home on Talbot Street in Scotland, next to Grandfather Halliday’s home where Aunt Lena lived.”
From Kate’s diary: December 25, 1948, (Charlie) went to the Burbidge’s with a gift of a sewing machine for Margaret’s 21st birthday.
“I remember that on New Year’s Day 1949, Burbidges were here for dinner, and Margaret came a few days before.”
Also from Kate‘s diary: “On July 16, 1949 Charles and Margaret were married at Grace United Church in Hamilton, where her father was the minister. Rev. Wilfrid Burbidge conducted the ceremony assisted by Rev. Rodger Nunn, minister of Scotland United. Margaret Carmichael was maid of honor and Archie Carnahan was the best man. The ushers were Allison Burbidge and W.W. Montagu Smith. The reception was held on the lawn between the church and the manse, catered by the church women. Tomato juice, roast chicken, potato salad, cabbage salad, relishes, rolls, ice cream with small cakes, wedding cake, coffee, tea and mints for 90 guests seated.”
“We spent the first night in a motel on the way to Toronto. We discovered that the people that looked after our luggage so carefully before we left for our honeymoon had removed my pajamas and sewn Margaret’s night clothes up. We spent our honeymoon at Britannia Hotel in Muskoka from July 17-24. When we got to our room there were twin beds! The next day the maid had pushed them together. I remember that Margaret had her first lesson in golf there.”
And on Christmas Eve of that year, “we had Father, Mother, and Mary over to open our Christmas gifts.”
Thus we come to the end of Charlie’s Young Adult Years, and next time we’ll hear the story of the Scotland Fire Service.
Til then,
xo
andrea