COHEN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-04-19 published
BABITS,
George
Joseph B.A.Sc., C.A.
It is with profound sadness that the family announces the passing
of a beloved husband, father and grandfather. In his 68th year,
George died peacefully on April 15, 2003, surrounded by his loving
family, following a courageous and inspiring 3-year battle with
kidney cancer. Having overcome an initial 4-month prognosis,
he never gave up the fight.
George will live forever in the hearts of his beloved wife and
soul mate of 42 years, Katherine, his devoted sons George (Wendy),
Thomas (Trisha) and Christopher (Jennifer). His grandchildren
Monica, George Matthew, Paul and John will all miss their dear
''Papa.'' The family regrets that he will miss the births of
his twin grandchildren due in less than two weeks. Also mourned
by his brother Pal, sister Anna and many nephews and nieces in
Hungary, as well as his many Friends in Canada and around the
world. George was predeceased by his parents and his brother
Laszlo.
Born in Debrecen, Hungary, George was a champion weightlifter
in his youth, winning numerous regional and national titles.
While attending the University of Sopron, he left for Canada
as a refugee during the 1956 Revolution. He completed his degree
in geological engineering at the University of Toronto, and went
on to become a Chartered Accountant. George began his career
at the accounting firm Ernst and Ernst, followed by more than 27
years at Imperial Oil Ltd., where he had the opportunity to combine
his scientific knowledge with his financial acumen. After retiring
from Imperial in 1991, he continued to work in his own accounting
practice until his death. Throughout his life, he generously
volunteered for numerous organizations, including many in the
Canadian-Hungarian community. His sense of charity seemed to
know no bounds. He always gave of his time, energy, knowledge
and expertise, freely to those in need.
George's greatest passion was his family and his legacy will
live on, because it was as a husband and father that he had his
greatest success. His love and devotion to his family was boundless,
and he has left his children with a great appreciation for the
importance of family, education and respect for others. He was
the greatest role model that his sons could have possibly asked
for, and he will forever be in their hearts. Father we love you.
Many thanks to the fine medical professionals who helped George
in his battle and treated him with exceptional care and respect:
Doctors BUKOWSKI and
COHEN of the Cleveland Clinic, Doctors
TSIHLIAS
and Waddel of the University Health Network, Doctors
KUGLER and
STRAUSS of Gottingen, Germany and their pioneering vaccine therapy
program, and Doctors
BJARNASON and
SMITH and the team at the Toronto
Sunnybrook Regional Cancer Centre.
The family will receive Friends at the R.S. Kane Funeral Home
(6150 Yonge Street, at Goulding, south of Steeles), on Tuesday,
April 22, 2003 from 7: 30-9:00 p.m. The funeral mass will be held
on Wednesday, April 23, 2003, at 11: 00 a.m. at St. Elizabeth
of Hungary Roman Catholic Church (432 Sheppard Ave. E.). Donations
to the Sunnybrook Foundation Fund #9182 To Support Kidney Cancer
Research (In Memory of George J. Babits) c/o Dr. Georg Bjarnason,
2075 Bayview Avenue, Toronto, Ontario M4N 3M5, would be appreciated.
Messages of Condolence may be placed at www.rskane.ca.
''Szivunkben Orokke elni fogsz!''
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COHEN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-06-12 published
Three cheers for a funny fellow
Like his hapless Canadian hero, he often found himself in hilarious
situations
By Carol COOPER
Special to The Globe and Mail Thursday, June
12, 2003 - Page R9
Once in the middle of an interview at the Toronto airport, writer
Donald JACK left to fetch a document from his car. Notorious
for a sense of direction so poor he found it difficult to navigate
through a city park, let alone the airport's massive parking
lot, Mr. JACK took so long to find his vehicle that by the time
he returned the interviewers had gone.
Like Bartholomew Bandy, the hapless hero of The Bandy Papers,
Mr. JACK's eight-volume comic-novel series describing an Ottawa
Valley boy's adventures during both world wars and between, the
author often found himself in hilarious situations, made the
more so by his telling.
A three-time winner of the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for
Humour, Mr.
JACK died last week at his home in England. He was
Listeners were reduced to tears of laughter by his tales of construction
disasters while having a villa built in Spain; a house sale falling
through on closing day; and an aging bright yellow car named
Buttercup, whose sun roof shattered soon after it was searched
for drugs at the Spanish-French border, showering Mr.
JACK with
glass, insects and rust.
Once, while being toured with his daughter around the offices
of his publisher, McClelland and Stewart, Mr.
JACK entered the
boardroom and shouted with surprise. There on the carpet lay
a large amount of dog excrement left by an employee's pet. In
his Bandy-like way, the writer very nearly stepped into it.
"If you could choose one author out of the entire world who during
a visit to his publisher would stumble across this, it would
be Donald JACK," said Douglas
GIBSON, president and publisher
of McClelland and Stewart, who knew the writer for more than 30
years.
"Things would go wrong for Don, very seldom caused by himself,"
said Munroe
SCOTT, a close friend of more than 45 years. "He
would narrate all this stuff either in person or in a letter
and make it all hilarious, because he always saw, in retrospect
at any rate, the funny side of things. You'd be doubled up with
laughter."
Despite Mr.
JACK's incident-prone nature, it would be a mistake
to see Mr.
JACK as a buffoon, said Mr.
SCOTT, also a writer.
"He was enormously well read, erudite and could handle the language
with aplomb at many levels. He could make me feel like a Philistine."
Said author Austin
CLARKE, who was Mr.
JACK's neighbour for five
years during the 1960s. "He was a quiet, reserved, retiring kind
of man. You would never have known he was a writer."
Mr. JACK's
Leacock medals came for three volumes of The Bandy
Papers: Three Cheers for Me, in 1963, That's Me in the Middle,
in 1974 and
Me Bandy, You Cissie, in 1980. Published between
1963 and 1996, they still enjoy a loyal following, including
a Web site which draws mail from around the world. Six of the
eight volumes were recently reissued by McClelland and Stewart.
Drawn from Mr.
JACK's fascination with the First World War, the
rural people he met in the Ottawa Valley and his time in the
Royal Air Force, The Bandy Papers feature the blundering Bartholomew
Wolfe Bandy, who in the first volume, Three Cheers for Me, inadvertently
becomes a hero, despite capturing his own colonel by mistake.
Ensuing volumes follow Mr. Bandy's adventures through to the
Second World War. Although devastatingly funny, they also describe
war's horrors and the realities of the home front, and lampoon
war's leaders.
Mr. Bandy encounters and influences historical figures, such
as then British minister of defence Winston Churchill, and generously
offers him use of the altered Bandy phrase "blood, sweat, toil
and tears."
While best known for The Bandy Papers, Mr.
JACK wrote countless
documentary film scripts, stage, television and radio plays,
as well as two non-fiction books: the history of a Toronto radio
station, Sinc, Betty and the Morning Man, and another about medicine
in Canada, Rogues, Rebels and Geniuses.
His third play, The Canvas Barricade, won first prize in the
Stratford Shakespearean Playwriting Competition in 1960. Produced
in 1961, it was the first, and remains the only, original Canadian
play performed on the main stage of the Stratford Festival.
Mr. JACK, however, did not see much of its opening. He left the
auditorium for the lobby. "During the performance, we'd be aware
of a crack of light from a door opening slightly and a white
face would stare through, then vanish for a while, before another
door would open a crack, and the same apparition would fleetingly
appear," Mr. Scott said.
Born on December 6, 1924 in Radcliffe, Lancashire, England, Donald
Lamont JACK was one of four children of a British doctor and
a nurse from Prince Edward Island. After attending Bury Grammar
School in Lancashire and Marr College in Scotland, he gained
enough qualifications to attend London University.
While stationed in Germany with the Royal Air Force in the last
year of the Second World War, Mr.
JACK attempted short-story
writing, but thought he lacked talent. After his mother asked
him, "Isn't it about time you left home?" Mr.
JACK immigrated
to Canada in 1951.
Interspersed with jobs as a member of a surveying crew in Alberta
and a bank teller in Toronto, Mr.
JACK studied at the Canadian
Theatre
School in Toronto run by Sterndale
BENNETT.
There he
wrote two plays, one of which drew praise from theatre critic
Nathan COHEN and a job offer from a film Company. Mr.
COHEN later
wrote Mr. Scott, decrying Canadian theatre's "shameful treatment"
of Mr. JACK, which largely ignored him.
A theatrical background enhanced Mr.
JACK's writing, according
to Mr. Gibson. "His dialogue was terrific and his scene-setting
was excellent."
After leaving the school, with the encouragement of his wife,
Nancy, whom he married in 1952, Mr.
JACK worked in the script
department of Crawley Films in Ottawa. Two years later in 1955,
the company's head, Budge
CRAWLEY, let him go because he thought
Mr. JACK would never make a good writer.
A dry first year of freelancing followed, until in 1957 Mr.
JACK
sold the play version of his novelette Breakthrough, published
in Maclean's, to Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Television.
It became the first Canadian television play to be simultaneously
telecast to the United States.
He never looked back. By 1972, A Collection of Canadian Plays,
Vol. 1, which included Exit Muttering by Mr.
JACK, noted he had
written 40 television plays, 35 documentary film scripts, several
radio plays and four stage plays. The works included Royal Canadian
Navy and Canadian Armed Forces training films for the National
Film Board and often demanded a great deal of research.
Mr. JACK wrote with military discipline, beginning at 9 a.m.,
taking tea at 11 a.m., lunch at 1 p.m., tea again at 3 p.m. and
finishing at 5 p.m. "All my life, I swear, that routine never
altered," said one of his daughters, Lulu
HILTON.
Persisting in writing drafts in pen and ink long before adopting
the typewriter and, much later, a word processor, Mr.
JACK often
developed storylines while walking. A 1959 Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation press release explains Mr.
JACK's dedication: "My
self-discipline is to keep reminding myself of how lucky I am
to be able to be the only thing I ever really wanted to be --
a writer."
During the early 1980s, Mr.
JACK and his wife returned to England
to be near their daughters who had emigrated there, and their
grandchildren. Mr.
JACK missed Canada's open spaces and its classless
society, and visited often.
At the time of his death, he was working on the ninth volume
of The Bandy Papers. He died on or about June 2 of a massive
stroke at his home in Telford, Shropshire, England. He leaves
his two daughters, Maren and Lulu, six grandchildren and one
great-grandchild, a brother and a sister. His wife Nancy died
in 1991.
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COHEN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-08-11 published
GUTMAN,
Adam
(George
Adams)
In Montreal on Sunday, August 10, 2003. Beloved husband of the
late Ida Baron
GUTMAN.
Father of Betty, and Dr. Jimmy
GUTMAN.
Father-in-law of Susan
SCHAFER and Greg
KUDRAY.
Brother-in-law
of Albert BARON and Sylvia
GUTMAN.
Grandfather of Evan and Bianca.
Uncle of Debby, Judy and Stephen
MERLMELSTEIN,
Fran
PARKER and
Shelly COHEN.
Admired by thousands. Died gently in the presence
of his family. Leaves behind a legacy of art, music and poetry.
An accomplished and charitable mentor for the entire community
regardless of colour, race or creed. Our greatest thanks to the
loving and caring staff of Manoir Pierrefonds. Funeral Service
from Paperman and sons, 3888 Jean Talon W., Montreal on Tuesday,
August 12, 2003 at 10: 45 a.m. Burial at the Rodomer Society Section,
Mount Pleasant Cemetery Duvernay. Shiva at his son's home. Donations
may be made to the Montreal Symphony Orchestra in memory of Adam
GUTMAN. (514-842-3402.)
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COHEN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-10-29 published
COHEN,
Sheila
In loving memory of Sheila, who died nine years ago, on 3 Cheshvan
5755, but whose compassion and generosity and kindness and sense
of fun light our lives to this day. At the rising of the sun
and at its going down, we remember her -- Bob, Ellen, Norton,
Vicki and Molly.
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COHEN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-11-15 published
GENSER,
Bonnie
It is with great sadness that we announce the death of our mother,
grandmother, and great-grandmother, Bonnie
GENSER, who died on
Sunday, November 29th, 2003. She died peacefully, without pain,
with her family by her side. She was predeceased by her husband
Harold GENSER who died in 1980, and her siblings Rebecca
JAUVOISH,
Lottie BECKMAN, Bessie
MELEMADE, David
LEVIN, Rosie
LEVIN, Esther
POLLOCK and Harry
LEVIN.
She leaves to grieve her death and celebrate
her life, three daughters, Naomi
COHEN
(Jared
SABLE,) Toronto,
Barbara BUTLER, Winnipeg, Susan
STARR (Don
STARR), Toronto, London,
six grandchildren, 6 great-grandchildren. In addition to her
immediate family, she is remembered by her sisters-in-law Esther
Genser KAPLAN,
Myrna
LEVIN, Beverley
LEVIN and Marion Vaisley
GENSER, and many nieces and nephews.
Bonnie served in a leadership capacity in various areas of the
community; president of the Bride's group, National Council of
Jewish Women, president of Lillian Frieman Chapter of Hadassah,
founder of the Shaarey Zedek Girl Guides, and later as a commissioner
of the Manitoba Girl Guides. During her many visits to Israel
she served as a volunteer in areas of agriculture, education,
archaelogy, and social services.
She lived life to the fullest, and will be remembered for her
dynamic personality, wit, charm, generosity, and infectious smile
which made everyone feel special.
We wish to thank Vangie, Claire, Amy, and Ruth for their loving
care.
Pallbearers were her grand_sons Scott
COHEN,
Paul
RAYBURN, Josh
BUTLER,
Sheldon
POTTER, granddaughters Hally and Misha
STARR,
and nephews Michael and Daniel
LEVIN.
Honorary pallbearers were
Don STARR,
Jared
SABLE, Perry
RAYBURN, and Mayer
LAWEE.
Rabbi Allan
GREEN officiated and her granddaughter Leanne
POTTER
spoke on behalf of the family. Donations in Bonnie's memory may
be made to The Bonnie Genser Fund in the Women's Endowment Fund
of the Jewish Foundation of Manitoba, C-400-123 Doncaster Street,
Winnipeg, Manitoba, R3N 2B2, (204) 477-7525 or www.jewishfoundation.org
or the charity of your choice.
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COHEN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-12-24 published
'The lovable rogue' who made and lost fortunes
One of Canada's most successful real-estate salesmen threw famous
parties, especially during the 1980s boom, when he brokered property
deals worth more than $10-billion
By James McCREADY,
Special to The Globe and Mail Wednesday, December
24, 2003 - Page R9
Toronto -- His Friends called him a lovable rogue. His enemies
left out the lovable. Eddy
COGAN was a love-him or hate-him kind
of guy, a brash real-estate salesman, maybe the most successful
real-estate salesmen of his era in Canada. He sold more than
$10-billion of real estate in the 1980s, by far his most successful
decade.
When Eddy COGAN died in late October, people remembered two things
about him straightaway: He was the one who brokered the huge
Greymac apartment deal. And he was also the greatest party-giver
of the 1980s in Toronto, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars
on a three-day bash, when he would take over the entire Windsor
Arms Hotel -- rooms, restaurants and bars -- and open them to
his Friends.
Mr. COGAN brokered a deal in 1982 to sell 10,931 apartment units
belonging to Cadillac Fairview to a group led by Leonard
ROSENBERG
of Greymac Trust. The sale was worth $320-million but Mr.
COGAN
found out a couple of hours later that Mr.
ROSENBERG and his
partners had flipped the buildings, selling them for $500-million
to what turned out to be a fictitious Saudi Arabian consortium.
Mr. ROSENBERG eventually went to jail, but Mr.
COGAN was clean
since he didn't have any part in the illegal flip.
Edwin Aubrey
COGAN was born on October 5, 1934. His father had
fled Ukraine after the Russian Revolution. It was a sound decision,
since Stalin starved the Ukrainian peasants in the 1930s and
Hitler's death squads killed almost all the Jews in Kiev during
the Nazi occupation.
Eddy's father was a professional boxer and waiter who changed
his name from
COHEN to
COGAN to get work at Toronto's Park Plaza
Hotel, which didn't hire Jews in the 1930s. Eddy went to Palmerston
Public School but wasn't much of a student and dropped out of
school in Grade 9. At 15, he went west and worked in the woods
in British Columbia.
A few years of manual labour had him thinking about a change,
and he returned to school and qualified as a land surveyor. After
many years working surveying properties, he decided to move into
real estate. In the 1950s, when Mr.
COGAN started doing property
deals, most of the action was in what is called "assembling"
land, which means buying up huge tracts of land, not just in
the country but also in the city.
Mr. COGAN would do things such as go door-to-door asking people
if they wanted to sell their houses or buildings. He was working
for developers such as Cadillac Fairview, which in turn would
put up a strip of high-rise apartment buildings once the land
had been assembled. Probably more than any town planner, Mr.
COGAN changed the face of Toronto from the 1950s to the 1980s.
"After rent control came in, in 1975, there was less demand for
buildings," says Larry
COGAN, who worked with his father for
more than 20 years. "It was the main reason Cadillac Fairview
decided to sell off those properties."
It was that deal that made Eddy
COGAN rich and allowed him to
launch the famous parties of the 1980s. The parties ended with
the real-estate crash of 1989-90. Mr.
COGAN had invested in a
6,000-acre property called the "jail lands" just north of the
city. It was an old prison farm that was to be turned into a
residential development. When the property boom went bust, so
did Mr. COGAN. It was the end of one big fortune and the start
of a decade spent rebuilding his wealth. In the 1990s, perhaps
his most successful transaction involved Terminal 3 at Toronto's
Pearson Airport.
Mr. COGAN was a slender man with a wiry build and movie-star
good looks. Women found him attractive, and his Friends said
that women were his weakness. He enjoyed spending time in Los
Angeles and New York in the company of models and actresses --
some famous, some not.
"When he saw an opportunity to be with a high-profile, beautiful
woman, he would approach it like a real-estate project," his
son Larry said. "He would network and use all his skills to close
the deal."
Like many people who work on deals for a living, Eddy
COGAN had
an unconventional business day, in particular in the latter part
of his career. He loathed gadgets. He didn't like cellphones
or computers and never had an e-mail address of his own. Rather
than offices, he preferred to meet in restaurants, though he
was a light eater and didn't drink much. After the Windsor Arms
and its restaurants closed, he switched to Prego, a restaurant
in Yorkville.
Mr. COGAN lived his work. He was always working on a deal, micromanaging
it to make sure the project came off.
"He was a big thinker. He was very fit and he liked to walk and
think," said Diane
FRANCIS, the journalist who became a close
friend after doing a few stories on him in the mid-1980s. "The
last big deal he was working on was in Niagara Falls, New York."
When he first looked at Niagara Falls, the town on the Ontario
side was a success, with a casino and a diversified tourist trade.
Niagara Falls, New York was a dump, with an empty centre, shuttered
factories and a neighbourhood that was a household name for environmental
catastrophe, Love Canal. Mr.
COGAN spent the better part of a
decade trying to develop the New York side into a place as successful
as the Ontario side. At the time of his death, a casino had opened
on the New York side and he was closer to putting his dream together.
He lived in downtown Toronto in a huge penthouse in the Colonnade
on Bloor Street, a rental apartment with a small swimming pool
inside the unit. Mr.
COGAN was a generous man, always willing
to help his Friends. Once, when promoters were trying to put
together a race between American and Canadian superstar sprinters,
Mr. COGAN helped bankroll it. It lost money.
Mr. COGAN married once and divorced. He leaves his six children.
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