Chapleau Public Library celebrates 35 years in civic centre after several location moves throughout its history since 1887

N. Ont library rep, Renee Cecile, Lt Gov McGibbon, husband 

When Pauline McGibbon, then the Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario, visited Chapleau to officially open the Chapleau Civic Centre, 35 years ago on June 28, 1978, she was impressed with the library included in the building.

"One can judge the stature of a town or village by the extent of its library," the lieutenant-governor said in her remarks as she toured the library accompanied by Mrs. Renee Cecile, chair of the library board; Estelle Morin, the librarian, and board members. 

It was also a special occasion for Mrs. Cecile who was presented an achievement scroll by George L. Evans, a board member and deputy reeve of Chapleau in 1978. In 2012, the library was named the George L. Evans Library in his honour.

The scroll to Mrs. Cecile said it was in recognition of her "untiring devotion" to library service in Chapleau. She had served as a board member since it was established in the late 1950s. Her granddaughter Lisa also presented her with a bouquet of red roses.

A library was on the minds of Chapleau's early citizens by 1887, two years after the arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway and the founding of the community.

Mechanics institute

In his book 'Pioneering in Northern Ontario', Vince Crichton wrote that a meeting was held in the CPR restaurant on December 13, 1887 with the purpose of forming a "Reading Club or Library". The first library appears to have been in a room at the Royal Hotel, but it burned down and by 1889 land had been obtained from the CPR for the construction of a Mechanics Institute built on a site across from the Bridgeview Motel on Birch Street.

According to Wikepedia, mechanics' institutes,  the first one established in Edinburgh, Scotland  contained inspirational and vocational reading matter, for a small rental fee. Later popular non-fiction and fiction books were added to these collections in the library section. Other services were also provided.

The Mechanics Institute was a described as an "elaborate structure", for the times and included the library, a reading room, a hall and space for oganizations to meet in a two-storey building. By the end of 1890, the library had 178 members and 894 volumes. It cost $621.02 to build.

By 1895, ladies had become active members,and in 1899 when J.B. Dexter was president of the institute 200 new books were purchased bringing the total number of volumes to 1408 of which 1201 were taken out over the previous year.

Disaster struck in 1910 when the Mechanics Institute burned down resulting in a total loss not only of all the library holdings but municipal records too as it had also become the Town Hall after Chapleau was incorporated as a municipality in 1901.

After G.B. Nicholson and his wife Charlotte built St. John's Memorial Hall in memory of their son Lorne and all the Chapleau men who had been killed in World War I, a library was located there but it appears that interest waned for a number of years. Mr. Nicholson was the first reeve of Chapleau. St. John's Memorial Hall is now the Legion Hall.

At some point, it was relocated to a small room in the Town Hall which later became the reeve's office.

However, in 1957 led by Marion Hueston, a movement was launched to establish "a real public library" for Chapleau, according to an article by Margaret Costello.

Vince Crichton wrote that a better site was needed and William Austin agreed to provide one in the building once called "tenement row" on Birch Street where the Bargain Shop is now located. A.L. Morse of Sheppard and Morse Lumber Company donated all the white pine for shelving while the Chapleau Rotary Club bought and laid all the new linoleum flooring while Nick Coreau and J.M. 'Jack' Shoup took charge of erecting the shelves. It opened in April 1958.

First board members were Mrs. Hueston, Mrs. Cecile, Margaret Costello, Mrs. William Burrows and Vince Crichton.

The new board was warned not to be discouraged because "maybe the library idea would not catch on like wildfire" and it may take five years to be accepted. Within two years the library had 1200 members and housed more than 4800 books. It did catch on!

By 1965, the location again had to be moved as Cecil Smith had bought the property and needed it to build a new Stedmans store. 

Town Hall

Back to the Town Hall it went but this time to the auditorium the site of many plays, concerts, meetings as well as a coutroom but hardly used for anything by the 1960s. For several years only the floor space was used but as its membership grew, more was required.

Mrs. Doris Marchioni, the librarian in 1973 explained the situation to Maggie Costello. Mrs. Marchioni said it was a matter of not enough room for all a real library needs -- not enough room for books, for sufficient tables for those who may be doing research or just to read, let alone proper facilities for the staff to work comfortably, and finally storage.

The library staff was moved on to the stage, while new bookshelves lined the walls, reading tables were added, and according to Maggie Costello, "...everything looks much more inviting, brighter and lighter and there's much more breathing space."

When the township council decided to proceed with the civic centre, the library board became enthusiastic partners in the project, and on June 28, 2013, will officially celebrate 35 years in the same location.

FOLLOWING UP

Frances (Jardine) Corston, now Lundquist added some information to my column on curling. She recalled her husband Henry mostly called by his nickname "Chicken" telling her that "the Corston men used their horse Billy to haul gravel from the gravel pit on their farm to level the ground for the new curling rink.  They ran out of money at some point and got the necessary funds from Chief Simon Cheez of the Ojibway people, with the understanding that native girls could curl..These girls were the Pirie girls, Mrs Barty. Mrs Fortunato. Mrs  Perfetto and Mrs Jack Green..I assume they must have agreed as they got the money,,,however..the women never did get to curl.....Mr. Corston in the picture was one of the rinks called the Half Ton Rink, because of their size...." Thanks Frances.

Thanks to Michael McMullen for research assistance.

My email is mj.morris@live.ca

Personal columns in Chapleau Press of 1962 part of community life, now we 'facebook' and 'tweet'

After receiving the Personals column from the Chapleau Press of October 11, 1962 recently, it struck me that the news about the comings and goings of citizens and their visitors was a very important part of community life, and yes, it sold newspapers too.

I learned first hand the importance of social news and personals columns shortly after i became a newspaper reporter in 1964 at the Daily Press in Timmins. Most contributions were handwritten in those days and quite often news reporters were called upon to type them out into a news story. And woe betide if you made a spelling error in someone's name. Actually it was a great experience in "getting the name right" one of the first principles young reporters learn, made more difficult as you had to transcribe all manner and forms of handwriting.

But the Personals column and other social news were a very popular section of the newspaper, maybe even moreso than sports or comics. I realized quickly that "hard news" was not always the main reason people bought a newspaper.

Doug Greig sent me the clipping on the very day that Bill McLeod sent out a news release announcing the launch of his new book 'Chapleau: A Retrospective on LIfe in an Isolated Northern Community.' Doug had coincidentally received the clipping that day and Bill and I are mentioned in the Personal column.

Bill advises that he will hold a book launch in Chapleau on Thursday, September 30 from 2-4 and 7-9 p.m. at the Chapleau Public Library.

It read: "Michal (sp) Morris and Billie (sp) McLeod students at Waterloo College were home for the Thanksgiving weekend." Of course it should have been Michael and Billy, but those were the only misspelled names in the column that I could detect. And yes, Bill and I attended Chapleau Public and Chapleau High School in the same grade and also attended the same university, now Wilfrid Laurier in the same years, different progams.

Here is a sampler of moments in the lives of some Chapleau citizens as reported in the Chapleau Press in the fall of 1962.

Mary and Grant Campbell were busy.

"Mrs. Mary Campbell, Worthy Matron of Melba Chapter 313 was the delegate from Chapleau to the 7th Annual Session of the Grand Chapter of the Order of the Eastern Star of Ontario held in the Royal York Hotel. Mrs. L.T. Green also attended."

"Mr. Grant Campbell left for Halifax where he will be the delegate from the Royal Canadian Air Force Association Wing 423 to the R.C.A.F. convention. Mrs. Campbell accompanied him."

Frank Coulter, who served many years on the public school board was off to a convention. "Mr. and Mrs. Frank Coulter spent the week in Sarnia where Mr. Coulter attended the public school convention as the representative from the Chapleau Public School Board."

On a business trip: "Mr. Ovide Cote and Mr. George Collins were business visitors to Montreal where they had the opportunity of attending the Shoe and Leather Fair held in the Mount Royal Hotel which proved very interesting. Mrs. Cote and Mrs. Collins accompanied their husbands and had an enjoyable time sightseeing and shopping."

Meanwhile, "Mr. and Mrs. Mel Richardson and son Paul have returned after a pleasant motor trip to Toronto and Montreal", and "Mrs. Agness Freeborn has just returned from vacation in eastern parts of Ontario and Quebec."

Visiting Chapleau, "Mr. Alvin O'Hearn of Burlington was a visitor with his parents Mr. and Mrs. George O'Hearn", and "Mr. and Mrs. Joe Shannon of Falconbridge were visitors to Chapleau." Mr. and Mrs. Shannon had been long-time employees of Smith and Chapple Ltd.

You don't see Personal columns as much now in the newspapers -- now we can "facebook," "tweet" and send email to each other!

DAVID McMILLAN AT THE BEACH

"Just finished reading your article on the beach area and, in doing so, learned for the first time of the major role Dr. Young played in its development. If I remember correctly, a lot of us learned to swim by initially dog paddling with those rectangular boards held out in front like surf boards as we kicked furiously in order to keep our faces from going under. As we grew older ( unfortunately not wiser ) I recall taking part in a bicycling exercise that was the brainchild of one of my peers that entailed riding your bike off the high diving board. Granted, there wasn't much time or room to get up a good head of steam before you rode your bike down into the water but it was an exuberating couple of seconds and well worth the effort required to haul the bike on your shoulder up the steps to the upper level. We did, however, use our grey matter by remembering to tie ropes to our bikes for retrieval purposes. These events always took place after lifeguards Babe Chambers and Jackie Poynter had left the beach area at the end of their day and if further elaboration is required I'm sure Howard Goheen or Timmy Goodwin could help out in that regard."

HENRY 'SONNY' THERRIEN DIES

I recently received word that one of Chapleau's great hockey players, Henry F. Therrien, "Sonny", 76, Kaukauna, died at Theda Clark Medical Center on Thursday, Aug. 19, 2010, with family by his side. Henry was born on July 17, 1934, in Chapleau, Ontario, Canada, son of the late Frederick and Adrian Anne (Levesque) Therrien. He played hockey growing up in Chapleau then attended St Michaels College in Toronto, where he played junior hockey prior to being drafted into the USHL, where he was a two-time league goal scorer for the Indianapolis Chiefs.Prior to representing the U.S. in the 1966 World Hockey Tournament in Yugoslavia, he joined the Green Bay Bobcats. He was also an honorary member of the Flying Fathers Hockey Club in Canada. My sympathy to his family.

Finally, the Chapleau Press was the immediate successor to Mid North News, and was followed by The Chapleau Sentinel. My email is mj.morris@live.ca