"GOU" 2003 Obituary

GOUDSMIT  GOUGEON  GOUGH  GOUINLOCK  GOULD  GOULET 

GOUDSMIT o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-09-06 published
GOUDSMIT, Anneke Cornelia
Died peacefully at age 88, 6 p.m., on September 2, 2003, at Norwood Nursing Home. Beloved mother of Millie, Flora and Paul. Grandmother to Corrie, Kristynia, Shireen, Bradley, Kyla. and Bryan. She will be greatly missed. Visitation will be held at Marshall Funeral Home, 10366 Yonge Street, Richmond Hill, Monday, September 8, at 2 p.m. with the Funeral Service following at 3 p.m. Reception afterwards.

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GOUGEON o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-02-17 published
Claude J. GOUGEON
By Claire LALONDE Monday, February 17, 2003, Page A16
Father, husband, businessman, art collector. Born January 14, 1923, in Ottawa, Ontario Died December 14, 2002, of fibrosis of the lungs, aged 79.
Act enthusiastic and you'll be enthusiastic was dad's motto.
In just such a positive manner, our dad raised five children, urging us all to reach for the stars.
Dad received his training as a pilot with the Royal Canadian Air Force during the Second World War. After the war, while working as sales representative for Imperial Tobacco Company in northern Ontario, dad met Rita BANNON. Perhaps it was his rich tenor notes and the sweetness that emanated from his violin, mingling with Rita's piano melodies, which led to their 1946 marriage in Sudbury, Ontario
In Sudbury, Claude began working for Rita's father at Bannon Brothers' Furniture Store and raised his four daughters and one son.
His entrepreneurial spirit surged and he moved to Arnprior, Ontario, where he invested his energy in his own furniture business and became president of the local businessmen's association.
Later, his love of wood and fine form resulted in his establishing Estate Antiques, a furniture-based antique shop in Orleans, Ontario (Our tongue-in-cheek quip used to be that: "Everything was for sale except Rita and the kids.")
On one occasion, my soon-to-be husband was sleeping in a downstairs bedroom. Dad had just finalized the sale of the oriental rug upon which the bed sat; he and my brother Tom tried to unobtrusively hoist the bed (upon which my startled fiancé was feigning sleep), to roll up and remove the rug.
Dad later developed a lasting passion for art, specifically 19th-century, Canadian art. Our home became his gallery. With each family visit we were caught up in dad's joy and expertise as he explained each new piece. He would point out the effect of light and shadow, the artist's self-rendering in a painting, the notch in the stonework that identified a historical date. His appreciation of art was as infectious as his personality.
Family was dad's first passion, however. He cherished our mother and often deferred to her natural good taste in the purchase of fine paintings. As children, our lives were filled with stories of boating expeditions on the Rideau and Trent canals, and a perspective of the world that no kaleidoscope could ever duplicate.
Dad's energy for life was boundless. He never had problems, only challenges; his love for his family was unconditional. This attitude was evident three weeks before my wedding, the day when I arrived home distraught over the bankruptcy of the clothing store where my wedding dress and three bridesmaids' dresses were stored. Dad knocked at the door of the establishment and spoke to the owner. Later that day, he arrived home, arms overflowing with dresses.
A natural teacher, one of dad's greatest lessons to us was his last: the manner with which he graciously surrendered his worldly goods and independence. In spite of a profound hearing loss, great difficulty breathing and myriad other discomforts, dad's attitude remained uncomplaining and positive.
His "act" of enthusiasm had become his natural personality and we were all benefactors.
Claire LALONDE is Claude GOUGEON's daughter.

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GOUGH o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-03-12 published
COATSWORTH, Helen Campbell (GILLIES) (1907-2003)
We regret to announce the death of our mother and friend. She died under protest on Friday, March 7, 2003, at the Sun Parlour Home, Leamington. She stoically survived the loss of her husband, Grover (1983), grand_son, Murray (1990), and son, Alfred (2001). She will be sadly missed by her daughters, Bev GILLESPIE (John) of Wheatley, and Ginny ALLEN (John) of Newmarket; her daughter-in-law, Bonney COATSWORTH of Guelph; and fondly remembered by her grandchildren, Jeff COATSWORTH (Sue,) Margot and Robert GILLESPIE, Duncan, Graham, and Michael ALLEN; and great granddaughters, Elizabeth and Katherine COATSWORTH. Helen was predeceased by her brother, J.D. GILLIES, and is survived by her sisters, Katharine McEACHERN and Janet GOUGH. She valued a special relationship with her many nieces and nephews. Helen contributed to her community as a farmer, historian, journalist, teacher and was awarded for her community service with county, provincial, and federal awards. With the wonderful help of her neighbours, she was able to remain on the COATSWORTH farm for 69 years. Her spirit lives on. A memorial service will be held at Talbot Street United Church on Saturday, March 22, 2003, at 2: 00 pm.

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GOUINLOCK o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-06-10 published
DIMM, Joan B.
Of Jupiter, Florida and Short Hills, New Jersey, age 75, died Monday, June 2, 2003 in Jupiter.
Mrs. DIMM, the daughter of Jean BAIRD and G. Roper GOUINLOCK, was born in Toronto, Canada. She graduated from Bishop Strachan School in Toronto, and attended the University of Toronto. Following her marriage to Ross L. DIMM, Jr., she settled in New Jersey.
Surviving are sons, Robert of Atlanta, Georgia, T. Edward of Blue Bell, Pennsylvania, a daughter, Patricia DIMM of Chicago, Illinois and five grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held at Christ Church in Short Hills, New Jersey at 11 a.m. on July 12, 2003. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be sent to the American Heart Association.

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GOULD o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-03-21 published
ROBINSON, May Elizabeth (Tracy) née TRACY- GOULD
Born November 18, 1914 Newcastle (Miramachi City), New Brunswick, died March 17, 2003 at Crofton Manor, Vancouver, British Columbia. Predeceased by her husband James Emerson (Robbie), the love of her life. She is survived by her three daughters, Susan (Mike NICHOLS), Zora (Alf SIMON), and Alice (Allan HALLDORSON), her grandchildren Jesse and Tracy, her brother Perley TRACY- GOULD (Hester) and sister Zora KEDDIE (Ray) and their families. Tracy graduated as a nurse from the Montreal General Hospital and joined the Canadian Army as an operating room nurse in 1939. She served from 1939-1945 following the troops through Europe. She met Robbie in Italy and they were married in the town hall of Brussels, Belgium on April 10, 1945. While raising her three daughters she was active in her community. In Winnipeg this included the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Deer Lodge Veterans Hospital, the Children's Hospital Book Market and working in the canteen in her local community centre. In Toronto she worked in the gift shop of the North York General Hospital and has been a generous donor to the foundation. In White Rock she worked at the Peace Arch Hospital's Superfluidy Shop. She belonged to and worked with a hospital guild in every city she lived in and remained a member of the Royal Canadian Military Institute until her death. She was an active member of the Nursing Sisters Association of Canada, contributing in many ways over the years. Her hobbies included baking for her family, Friends and charities, travelling, gardening and corresponding with old Friends. Tracy had a real love of life, with a wry sense of humour and a smile that could win anyone's heart. It was such a pleasure to share time with her; she will be sadly missed by family and Friends. Cremation has taken place. A Memorial Service will be held and details will be announced at a later date. In lieu of flowers donations may be made to: Ghurka Benevolent Fund or the Heart and Stroke Foundation or a charity of your choice.

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GOULD o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-10-29 published
FOGELL, David 1923-2003
Born December 22, 1923 in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Died October 27, 2003 at home with his family in Vancouver, British Columbia. He was predeceased by his parents Melach and Surka, brother, Ben and sisters Dora and Netty. Dave is mourned by his wife, Estelle, children, Melanie and her husband Ken GOLDSTEIN, Wayne and Mark. He will be greatly missed by his grandchildren Carie and her husband Stuart, Daniel, Sarah, Kylie; Sammy, Benji and their mother Dorothy ULLMAN as well as great-grand_son, Kade. He will never be forgotten by his many relatives and Friends. Dave was an incredibly charismatic and an intensely joyful human being. He felt deeply and loved unquestioningly. Those who were fortunate enough to be part of his life will be forever enriched by having known him. Dave approached everything in his life with meticulous attention. He had very humble beginnings yet he always remembered those who helped him throughout his life. He had a rare passion for living extending to everything and everyone. His seemingly endless energy led to numerous accomplishments and successes. He will be remembered most for his ability to make those around him feel loved. The funeral is Wednesday, October 29, 2003 at the Beth Israel Cemetary, 1721 Willingdon, Burnaby, at 12 noon. The pallbearers are Sammy and Benji FOGELL, Daniel GOLDSTEIN, Lanny GOULD, Howard DINER and Joel ALTMAN. Honourary pallbearers are Zivey FELDMAN and Harry GELFANT. The family would like to thank caregivers Denyse TREPANIER and Bryan WALKER as well as Dr. Larry COLLINS and Dr. Victoria BERNSTEIN. If desired, donations may be made to the Heart and Stroke Fund or the Jewish Family Service Agency.

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GOULD o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-12-17 published
Life was good for MAGNUSON
By Eric DUHATSCHEK, With a report from Allan MAKI Wednesday, December 17, 2003 - Page S1
It was one of those "catching up with" features newspapers run every so often. Last January, the Chicago Sun-Times profiled Keith MAGNUSON, one of the most popular players ever to pull on a Chicago Blackhawks sweater.
To the thousands who used to pack the old Chicago Stadium, MAGNUSON's ever-lasting appeal came from a rough-and-tumble playing style that produced a cracked cheekbone, three knee injuries requiring surgery, a torn Achilles' tendon, two broken ankles, a dislocated elbow, three broken jaws, a broken vertebra, a broken wrist, a dislocated shoulder, three missing teeth and more than 400 stitches.
MAGNUSON, after reflecting on his career, his hobbies and all the aches and pains that resulted from a 10-year National Hockey League career, observed: "Otherwise, I feel great. Cindy [his wife] and I are real proud of our kids."
"Life is good," MAGNUSON concluded.
Life for MAGNUSON ended at the age of 56 in a fatal automobile accident on Monday afternoon as he was returning home from a funeral for National Hockey League alumni association chairman Keith McCREARY, who died last week of cancer. MAGNUSON was the passenger in a car driven by former National Hockey League player Rob RAMAGE, the vice-chairman of the alumni association.
MAGNUSON played 589 National Hockey League games for the Blackhawks, and on his retirement in October of 1979, he joined the team's coaching staff, as an assistant to Eddie JOHNSTON. JOHNSTON, now the Pittsburgh Penguins' assistant general manager, remembered MAGNUSON yesterday as "the ultimate competitor. I mean, when Keith MAGNUSON put on the skates on, you didn't just get 100 per cent, you got 110 per cent every night. He just played with so much passion, it was unreal."
The Blackhawks made it to the Stanley Cup final twice in MAGNUSON's career, in 1971 and 1973, losing both times to the Montreal Canadiens. It was the heyday of hockey in Chicago. The Blackhawks had Dennis and Bobby HULL, the legendary Stan MIKITA and Tony ESPOSITO, a future Hall Of Fame member, in goal. MAGNUSON's job was to protect ESPOSITO, and he did it with a passion that JOHNSTON said was contagious in the Blackhawks' dressing room.
"What he always did very, very well was set the tone early in the game. He let the opposition know that when you dropped the puck in the game, "This was what you were going to see, guys, for 60 minutes.' "
MAGNUSON, who most recently was the director of sales for Coca-Cola Enterprises, grew up in Saskatoon as an all-round athlete. He was a boyhood chum of former National Hockey League coach Dave KING. The two attended Churchill elementary school and used to play 1-on-1 hockey: KING as a forward and MAGNUSON as a defenceman.
Eventually, MAGNUSON and four other teenagers from Saskatoon earned scholarships at the University of Denver and helped the Pioneers win two National Collegiate Athletic Association championships. MAGNUSON and Tim GOULD played every sport together and were also teamed as defence partners.
"We never missed a shift," said GOULD, whose wife, a nurse in Calgary, woke him early yesterday to inform him of MAGNUSON's death. "He was the greatest guy and a good friend."
GOULD said he and MAGNUSON used to dream up ways to get MAGNUSON to hockey, football and baseball games on Sunday.
MAGNUSON's parents were Baptists and considered the Sabbath a day of rest. It became GOULD's job to sneak into the MAGNUSON home while they were at church and take Keith's equipment to the rink or the diamond.
"Of course, if we scored a goal or a run, our names would be mentioned in the newspaper the next day," GOULD said. "But we thought we were keeping it secret."
GOULD said MAGNUSON was best known among his Friends for having a poor memory. Once in Saskatoon, MAGNUSON drove his dad's car to the rink for a Blades game, only to drive home with a teammate, the two of them completely immersed in the game they had just played.
The next morning, MAGNUSON's father asked where the car was. "Keith had to run back to the rink to get it," said Dale ZEMAN, another of MAGNUSON's former junior and college teammates. "There was also the night Keith and I went bowling when we were freshmen at Denver. We came out and couldn't find the car. It had rolled backwards three blocks because Keith forgot to put it in park."
GOULD said: "He was awful forgetful. We're having a reunion in June [for Denver University hockey] and we had a card printed up, and Keith's quote on it was: 'I'm going to be there -- and Cliff [KOROLL] is going to remind me.' The memories, that's what get you through this."
MAGNUSON is survived by his wife, his daughter, Molly, and his son, Kevin, a former University of Michigan defenceman who had a tryout with the Blackhawks. Recently, after a short playing career in the East Coast Hockey League, Kevin had gone back to school for his law degree, JOHNSTON said.
"To have something like this happen, this close to the holidays, the timing couldn't be worse. It's never good, but geez, here he is, going up there for a funeral for Keith McCREARY and then to have something like this happen.
"God, it's awful," he said. "We'll miss him. He was such a big part of the community in Chicago, an icon. Everybody knew Keith MAGNUSON. It's an awful tragedy."
San Jose Sharks general manager Doug WILSON, another of MAGNUSON's close Friends, was badly shaken by his former teammate's death. WILSON said he thought of MAGNUSON as something of a father figure. "Keith has had a profound influence on my life." Really, all I can say is, all my thoughts and prayers are with Cindy and the kids right now."
Jim DEMARIA, the Blackhawks executive director of communications, worked closely with MAGNUSON in his role as the founder and president of the Chicago alumni association.
"Any time you needed something, you could call Maggy," DEMARIA said. "He was the first guy in line to help any kind of charity you had. I mean, he was just that kind of person. And when the team wasn't doing real well, he was down in the room, talking to the coaches, telling the players, 'keep your chin up, keep working, things will turn around.' He was a real positive guy."

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GOULD o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-12-23 published
Mary Elizabeth STARR
By Elizabeth STARR, Michael STARR and Laurie STARR Tuesday, December 23, 2003 - Page A22
Musician, teacher, mother, mother-in-law, sister, granny. Born March 4, 1920, in Toronto. Died August 3 in Toronto, of a brain hemorrhage, aged 83.
Mary STARR lived a full life teaching the cello to generations of students and enjoying a close relationship with her family.
Growing up in Toronto, Mary received her licentiate in cello in 1947 from the then-Toronto Conservatory of Music (now the Royal Conservatory) -- the highest possible diploma, and a rather uncommon achievement at the time for cellists. As a member of the Conservatory orchestra, she remembered seeing "a young kid" who played a piano concerto with the orchestra. The "young kid" was Glenn GOULD. Through the 1940s and 1950s she travelled extensively throughout Ontario playing chamber music with various Canadian musicians who were to become well known: Victor FELDBRILL, Eugene KASH, Stuart HAMILTON, Steven STARYK, and John COVEART among them.
After her future husband Frank (a singer) went to England, he managed to entice Mary over in 1951 by sending her programs of the concerts that were happening in London. There Mary worked, practised, played, went to concerts, and got married in 1952.
After returning to Canada (and two children later), Mary's teaching career was well under way. Through her career she taught with the Metropolitan Toronto School Board as an itinerant cello teacher, privately with the Royal Conservatory of Music, and in the Seneca College Suzuki program. She taught three-year-olds, school-aged children, high-school students, university students and even a few of the parents of her students. After years of doing four to six schools per day walking up three flights of stairs (it always seemed to be three flights of stairs) with a cello and music, she left to concentrate on private teaching. Although a number of her students went on to become professional cellists, Mary remained a tireless advocate of the fundamental value of musical education to developing and informing the enjoyment of the art of music throughout one's life; this was more important to her than becoming a professional musician.
Whether at music camp where she was a faculty member for many years, or her regular Monday night quartet sessions where we will always appreciate the warm vibrations and wonderful harmonies that crept through our house, the opportunity to play chamber music, just for fun, was one of the great pleasures for Mary throughout her life.
With the death of Frank in 1969, Mary had to work hard to support the family to cover all the "needs" and most of the "wants." She did this admirably.
The last six years of Mary's life, after moving into an apartment in her son and daughter-in-law's house, were surely among her best. There she had security with independence, community with privacy, and a granddaughter who lived just downstairs. She would sit ensconced in her big green chair, content to let life swirl around her as she read, needle-pointed, embroidered, or knitted.
Nothing thrilled Mary more than when 11-year-old Laurie and a few of her Friends took up cello last year. So began private teaching all over again -- not something she expected at the age of 82, but this was much more fun!.
Mary was Mary right to the end. After making an impressive recovery from a broken hip and arm suffered through an encounter with a revolving door, she was soon to be discharged from the rehabilitation hospital. She was in good spirits, had her sense of humour, and craved her "big green chair." She worked hard for that goal that unfortunately was not to be.
Elizabeth and Michael are Mary's children; Laurie is Mary's granddaughter.

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GOULET o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-05-24 published
He ran O'Keefe Centre in its prime
Former accountant was an innovator: He booked a show using surtitles and a play about an interracial romance
By Carol COOPER Special to The Globe and Mail Saturday, May 24, 2003 - Page F10
Late one spring night in 1963, a phone call awoke Hugh WALKER, the first managing director and president of Toronto's O'Keefe Centre for the Performing Arts. A police officer wanted to know if "we had a mad Russian called Nuri-something dancing at the O'Keefe Centre," Mr. WALKER wrote in his book, The O'Keefe Centre: Thirty Years of Theatre History.
After the opening performance of Marguerite and Armand, in which he starred with Dame Margot FONTEYN, Rudolph NUREYEV had danced up the centre of Yonge Street, attempting headstands on cars as he went. Police intervened in the interest of Mr. NUREYEV's safety, but after a scuffle, the dancer landed in jail for causing a disturbance.
Endlessly kind, courtly and patient, Mr. WALKER notified the Royal Ballet with whom Mr. NUREYEV was performing, and the dancer was released.
Mr. WALKER, the man who smoothed the way for the stars appearing at the O'Keefe as overseer of its operations and who had previously supervised its construction, has died at the age of 93.
O'Keefe Centre, now named the Hummingbird Centre, opened on October 1, 1960, with the first performance of Camelot in the country's first Broadway musical. The show starred Richard BURTON, Julie ANDREWS and Robert GOULET and played to a glittering crowd.
In The Toronto Star, Gordon SINCLAIR wrote: "A salaam to Hugh WALKER for bringing the O'Keefe Centre home on time after 30 months of strain on his patience, nerves and humour."
Mr. WALKER had, in fact, developed an ulcer during the centre's construction, and the strain didn't end with its opening. Shortly after the curtain, his wife, Shirley, smelled smoke. It turned out to be a burning escalator motor, and after the fire was extinguished, Mary JOLLIFFE, the centre's publicist, ran to a hotel across the street for air freshener. The audience came out at intermission none the wiser.
It took royalty to solve another problem. At the time, temperance sentiment remained strong in Toronto, and teetotallers criticized the fact the O'Keefe was funded by, and named for, a brewery.
Mr. WALKER set about to gain acceptance for the centre. Learning that the Queen was visiting Canada in June of 1959, he convinced her aides that she should stop briefly at the construction site and view a model of the building.
Before an audience of arts patrons and the press, the Queen inspected the model and showed such an interest that she overstayed her schedule, delaying the start of the Queen's Plate, her next stop, by half an hour.
Mr. WALKER didn't know that the Queen or the O'Keefe would be in his future when he became executive assistant to Canadian Breweries and Argus Corp. owner E. P. TAILOR/TAYLOR in 1955.
It was only after his hiring that he learned that Mr. TAILOR/TAYLOR had responded to a challenge made by Nathan PHILLIPS, then mayor of Toronto, for industry to build a desperately needed performing arts theatre in the city. For the project, Mr. TAILOR/TAYLOR gave $12-million and the services of his new assistant.
With the slogan "To bring the best of live entertainment to the greatest number of people at the lowest possible prices," the 3, 211-seat multipurpose theatre, designed by modernist architect Peter DICKINSON, quickly became a predominant Canadian venue, predating the Place des Arts in Montreal and the National Arts Centre in Ottawa.
Pre-Broadway shows, musicals, ballets and plays from around the world came to the O'Keefe and it replaced Maple Leaf Gardens as the Toronto venue for the Metropolitan Opera. International stars such as Louis ARMSTRONG, Paul ANKA, Tom JONES, Diana ROSS and Harry BELAFONTE performed there.
During one of Mr. BELAFONTE's many performances at the centre, he experimented with a wireless mike. Accidentally, he tuned into the police frequency. "The O'Keefe audience had the unusual experience of listening in on a lot of police messages, while the police were able to enjoy hearing BELAFONTE sing Ma-til-da!," Mr. WALKER wrote.
Another O'Keefe story concerned Carol CHANNING. When the performer appeared at the centre in Hello, Dolly, she needed to make a number of quick costume changes. Since there wasn't enough time for Ms. CHANNING to run backstage to her dressing room, the crew put up a roofless tent in the wings.
From the fly bridge, the stagehands looked down on Ms. CHANNING, remaining quiet while they watched her change. After her last performance, she looked up at them and said, "Well, boys, hope you've enjoyed the show. 'Bye now."
Other more critical events are associated with the O'Keefe. In 1964, while awaiting her divorce from Eddie FISHER, Elizabeth TAILOR/TAYLOR stayed with Richard BURTON while he starred in Sir John GIELGUD's production of Hamlet at the centre. One weekend between performances, the couple stole off to Montreal and married.
And in 1974, ballet dancer Mikhail BARYSHNIKOV arranged his defection from the Soviet Union at the centre.
During the early 1960s, the O'Keefe became home to the National Ballet of Canada and the Canadian Opera Company. In his book, Mr. WALKER credits the centre with allowing the companies' artistic growth.
Still, not everyone spoke so kindly about the O'Keefe. Many critics denounced its acoustics and less-than-intimate size.
For that, Mr. WALKER had a ready answer. In 1985, Herbert WHITTAKER, then The Globe and Mail's drama critic, wrote: "Against the fading chorus of these ancient complaints, I hear an echo, the rather quiet British tones of Hugh WALKER: 'We know it [O'Keefe Centre] is too large for legitimate theatre, Herbert, but think of all the things Toronto would have missed if E. P. TAILOR/TAYLOR hadn't built it when he did?' "
Born on March 2, 1910, in Scotland to Brigadier-General James Workman WALKER, who fought in the Middle East during the First World War, and Jane STEVENSON, Hugh Percy WALKER was the middle of three children. After earning a B.A. at Cambridge University, he became a chartered accountant.
Mr. WALKER worked with firms in London, Palestine, Quebec, Scotland and Michigan before being employed by Mr. TAILOR/TAYLOR.
Although a great lover of theatre, upon his appointment as the O'Keefe's managing director, Mr. WALKER had little experience with its business side. This led to some innocent faux pas, such as when he booked a photo shoot with the Camelot stars at 10 in the morning, impossibly early for actors. In response, Mr. BURTON exclaimed: "What, in the middle of the night?" Ms. JOLLIFFE said.
Still, director and theatre critic Mavor MOORE said Mr. WALKER dealt with difficulties well. "He was very smooth," Dr. MOORE said. "He was very expert at handling people and situations. He was a calm man."
Mr. WALKER trusted his staff, Ms. JOLLIFFE said. "He was willing to take direction from staff people who had already been in the business, and that was unusual."
And he was gracious and courteous. "He gave great dignity to the performing arts profession and he treated people wonderfully," Ms. JOLLIFFE said. "He was a perfect model of a former era of English gentlemen."
Known for his hospitality, Mr. WALKER always visited the stars in their dressing rooms before opening night and entertained them afterward at First Nighters' parties with Mrs. WALKER.
When the WALKERs took Leonard BERNSTEIN to the Rosedale Country Club, Mr. WALKER tolerated Mr. BERNSTEIN's sending back the wine three times, Ms. JOLLIFFE said.
Along with bringing in commercial performances from the United States and Britain, Mr. WALKER showed some daring in booking shows. In 1961, Kwamina, the story of a romantic relationship between a white woman and a black man, played the O'Keefe.
Acknowledging Toronto's Italian population, Mr. WALKER arranged for Rugantino, the biggest musical hit in Italian history, to play at the O'Keefe in 1963. It was the first foreign-language attraction in North America to use "surtitles," and although plagued with technical difficulties, it played to 60-per-cent capacity.
Things changed for Mr. WALKER and O'Keefe Centre in the late 1960s. Initially, the centre had been a subsidiary of the O'Keefe Brewing Co., owned by Canadian Breweries, and was never intended to make a profit. The company wrote off its operating losses and property taxes.
When Mr. TAILOR/TAYLOR retired in 1966, directors of Canadian Breweries decided that they could not continue to pay the O'Keefe's high taxes. To resolve the situation, Metropolitan Toronto was given the centre in 1968.
A new and inexperienced board of directors brought a new way of doing things, and the centre's losses began to mount.
Mr. WALKER wrote that after the disastrous 1971-72 season, "what followed was not the happiest part of my 15 years at the O'Keefe Centre, and I would like to forget some of the things that happened."
In his final working years, Mr. WALKER dealt with both the centre's internal changes and rising competition from the Royal Alexandra Theatre, the St. Lawrence Centre and emerging alternative theatres.
After his retirement in 1975, he spent 10 years at the Guild of All Arts in Scarborough, Ontario, as the director of Guildwood Hall, curating former Guild Inn owner Spencer CLARK's historical architectural collection of artifacts, writing and illustrating a booklet on them, curating Mr. CLARK's art collection, making a film and lecturing.
He and his wife lived on the Guild's grounds for four years in the now-demolished Corycliff, where they hosted parties whose guests included many stars from the O'Keefe days.
Along with writing the O'Keefe Centre history while in his 80s, Mr. WALKER golfed.
Sue NIBLETT, who worked with him at the Guild, recalls seeing Mr. WALKER nattily attired in golf clothing and Wellingtons standing in two feet of snow driving balls into Lake Ontario.
"He had a love of life that I've never experienced or met in anybody before," Ms. NIBLETT said. "He didn't waste a day of his life as far as I could see."
Mr. WALKER died on May 2 and leaves daughters Katrina PARKER and Zoë ALEXANDER and two grandchildren. Another daughter, Sarah CHENIER/CHENÉ, and his wife, Shirley, predeceased him.

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GOULET o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-06-15 published
Radio pioneer built network
He founded Ontario's first French-language radio station in 1951 when his local station denied francophones airtime.
By Randy RAY Special to The Globe and Mail Monday, June 16, 2003 - Page R7
He started in business as a butcher, and later was a soldier and a hotelier, but Conrad LAVIGNE's first love was show business. Whether he was operating the television stations in Northern Ontario that became the largest privately owned television broadcast system in the world, appearing at the staid proceedings of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, or at conventions, Mr. LAVIGNE often delighted those within earshot with jokes, stories, witty comments -- even singing.
Like the time he sang grace during the annual meeting of the Association for French Language Broadcasters in the 1970s.
"Members of the head table, including myself and Premier Bill DAVIS, walked into the room and stood behind our chairs," recalls Pierre JUNEAU, chairman of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission from 1968 to 1975.
"Mr. LAVIGNE, who was chairman of the French-language broadcasters group, began singing grace in French, and with his very strong voice. People felt sort of strange with this."
When he was done, Mr. LAVIGNE looked at Premier DAVIS and quipped: "Well, Mr. Premier, this is to show you that when you are chairman, you can do whatever you like."
J. Lyman POTTS, former vice-president of Standard Broadcasting, remembers the time in the early 1960s when Mr. LAVIGNE appeared before the Board of Broadcast Governors -- predecessor of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission -- in support of a radio or television station licensing application.
At the beginning of his presentation, Mr. LAVIGNE expressed his regrets that Board of Broadcast Governors member Bernard GOULET had died at few days earlier. Then, without skipping a beat, he looked toward the ceiling and said: "If Bernie were here today, I think he would vote for my application."
"It broke up the room," says Mr. POTTS. "If ever a meeting got dull he'd liven things up. It was a joy to find him at meetings. He was a unique personality."
Mr. LAVIGNE, who was born in the small town of Chénéville, Quebec, on November 2, 1916, and raised in Cochrane, Ontario, died in Timmins, Ontario on April 16 following a lengthy battle with emphysema. He was 86.
Friends, family and business associates say Mr. LAVIGNE had show business in his blood in his late teens. On many evenings, the young man who moved to Timmins from Cochrane at age 18 to open a small grocery store and butcher shop with his uncle would act in plays in the hall of a local church. But he didn't get into the entertainment business in a big way until after he helped Canada's war effort, got married and started his life as an entrepreneur in the hotel business.
In 1942, he sold his butcher shop and enlisted in the Canadian infantry. He became a commando training officer while stationed at Vernon, British Columbia, and in 1944 headed overseas. While on a furlough from Vernon he returned to Timmins and married Jeanne CANIE. The couple raised seven children.
Mr. LAVIGNE returned to Canada in 1946 and bought the Prince George Hotel in Kirkland Lake, Ontario, which at the time was a booming gold-mining town. He sold the business in 1950.
He entered the world of media and entertainment by founding CFCL, the first French-language radio station in Ontario in 1951, in what, essentially, was his way of ensuring the area's large French-speaking population had a voice in the North.
Michelle DE COURVILLE NICOL of Ottawa said her father launched the station after a group of francophones that he was part of in Kirkland Lake was told by the manager of an English-language radio station that they would no longer be given regular air time to discuss issues of interest to French people.
"He was very proud of being a francophone," says Ms. DE COURVILLE NICOL. " When he was told that his compatriots would no longer be welcome on the local station he said, 'Oh, ya!' and got the idea of starting a French-language radio station. He moved to Timmins, applied for a licence and got it."
CFCL soon attracted a faithful audience, especially in Northwestern Quebec, where it could be heard more clearly than French stations in Montreal.
In a 1988 interview with Northern Ontario Business, Mr. LAVIGNE remembered the time he hired a relative unknown named Stompin' Tom CONNORS to perform live on CFCL. The radio station was located above a jewellery store and the pounding from Mr. CONNORS's size-11 boots caused china to fall off the shelves in the store below.
Radio was his first love until the mid-1950s when, on a business trip to southern Ontario, he saw his first television broadcast, on WHAM from Rochester, New York He fell for the concept of television and he and an engineer friend drove to Rochester and learned everything they could about the magic medium of television.
Back in Timmins, Mr. LAVIGNE bought a hill in the north end of the town, named it Mont Sacré-Coeur, built a road to the foot of his hill, and began blasting rock and working in earnest to put a television station on the air. By 1956, CFCL-television was a reality.
"There was always the fear of failure because of the sparse population," Mr. LAVIGNE said at the time. "But we had an engineer with us named Roch DEMERS, who later became president of Telemedia, and together we started putting up rebroadcasting stations between 1957 and 1962."
Kapuskasing's rebroadcasting station was the first such facility in Canada, and it added another portion of the sparsely populated northeastern Ontario market to the growing station's network. Eventually, Mr. LAVIGNE built rebroadcasting stations in Chapleau and Moosonee, Ontario and Malartic, Quebec, and by the time expansion was completed, CFCL-television served 1.5 million people. Eventually, he built the station into the world's largest privately owned system.
For many years he appeared on a very popular CFCL program known as the President's Corner, during which he would sit on camera in a comfortable chair and read and respond to letters from viewers.
Between 1962 and 1970, Mr. LAVIGNE's television network entered the world of high technology with its own microwave network. Mr. LAVIGNE had the northeastern Ontario television market virtually all to himself for about 20 years until the Canadian Television Network (CTV) arrived on the scene. He reacted by building new stations in North Bay and Sudbury with a rebroadcasting station in Elliot Lake to serve Manitoulin Island. Expansion continued in 1976 with the purchase of a bankrupt television station in Pembroke, in the Ottawa Valley. Eventually, Mr. LAVIGNE's private network stretched from Moosonee to Ottawa, and from Hearst to Mattagami, Quebec
"When we first started we had the market all to ourselves," he told Northern Ontario Business. "We had 20 hours a week of local programming, and it was beautiful. We gave the North a unified voice. One time, during a forest fire near Chapleau, our messages arranged for accommodations for 1,000 people in Timmins."
Mr. LAVIGNE divested himself of his broadcasting holdings in 1980, primarily because he was refused permission to operate a cable television service in the North. He remained a director of Mid-Canada Television, the network that grew from his little Timmins station in 1956, and was chairman of the board of Northern Telephone Ltd. For a number of years, he served on the board of the National Bank of Canada, and for 10 years served on the board of ICG Utilities (formerly Inter City Gas.)
His life after broadcasting also included 20 years as a property developer in the Timmins area.
"He was always a physically active person," says Ms. DE COURVILLE NICOL. "In the years he was setting up his television stations he would often go out with the engineers. He was not as happy sitting behind his desk."
Mr. LAVIGNE was elected to the Canadian Broadcasting Hall of Fame in 1990. His wife died in 1995. He leaves Ms. DE COURVILLE NICOL and six other children, Marc, Andrée, Nicole, Jean-Luc, Pierre and Marie-France.

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GOULET o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-09-13 published
Singer was hit on Hit Parade
Canadian-born performer played violin with Jack Benny and posed as wife of Sid Caesar
By James McCREADY Special to The Globe and Mail Saturday, September 13, 2003 - Page F11
She was called "Canada's First Lady of Song." In the late 1940s, singer Gisele MacKENZIE was so popular on Canadian Broadcasting Corporation radio that she was known just by her first name.
When she was 23, she headed off to Hollywood, where she became one of the main singers on Your Hit Parade, a popular American network television show in the 1950s. By the time television started in Canada in 1952, she was already a star in the United States, appearing on programs with Jack Benny and later with Sid Caesar, the hottest comedian of his day.
Gisele MacKENZIE, who has died at the age of 76, was not always known by that name. On the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, she was known simply as Gisele, though a 1950 Canadian Broadcasting Corporation press release did call her by her proper name -- Gisele LAFLECHE. As soon as she moved to CBS in 1951, she adopted the stage name Gisele MacKENZIE. The reason, she told a New York reporter in 1955, was that the name Gisele LAFLECHE "sounded too much like a striptease artist's." The real explanation was an American audience would have trouble with so French a name. It was the television network that ordered the name change.
Marie Marguerite Louise Gisele LAFLECHE was born on January 10, 1927, in Winnipeg. The name MacKENZIE was from her paternal grandmother. Her father, Georges, was a doctor, who played the violin, and her mother, Marietta MANSEAU, was a concert pianist and singer as a young woman. Ms. MacKENZIE started playing the violin seriously when she was 7. She made her first public performance at the Royal Alexandra Hotel in Winnipeg at the age of 12.
When she was 14, her family sent her to the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto. She studied the violin and the piano, and planned on being a concert violinist. Later in life, a story circulated that she never took voice lessons, but Jim GUTHRO, who was at the conservatory at the same time, remembered a voice teacher who took an interest in her. He also remembered that she attended at the same time as Robert GOULET and they would sing together.
When she first came to Toronto, she stayed at Rosary Hall, a residence for Catholic girls on Bloor Street at the top of Jarvis Street. Tess MALLOY, who was there at the same time, remembered her. "She lived right across the hall from me. She and her girlfriend used to drive us nuts practising the violin."
Ms. MALLOY didn't remember her singing at the residence, but somewhere along the way someone discovered Ms. MacKENZIE could sing. It was close to the end of the war and she started to perform for groups of servicemen. It was then that she was discovered by musician Bob SHUTTLEWORTH, a lieutenant who led a band for the Royal Canadian Navy.
Right after the war, she started singing with Mr. SHUTTLEWORTH's band at the Glenmount Hotel on the Lake of Bays, north of Toronto. Mr. SHUTTLEWORTH, who later became her manager and her husband, took her to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, which then broadcast live popular music over the radio.
"Bob SHUTTLEWORTH called me at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and said, 'Get a studio, a piano and a vocal mike. I have someone I want you to hear,' recalled Jackie RAE, then a music producer at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, later leader of his own band (and, incidentally, the uncle of former Ontario premier Bob RAE.) "I remember her wonderful voice and how fresh she was. We hired her straight away to do three programs a week."
The program was Meet Gisele, and it ran for 15 minutes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The program started on October 8, 1946, and lasted for four years. She was so popular the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation used her in other programs with names such as The Girl Next Door or The Song Pluggers.
In 1951, Ms. MacKENZIE was spotted by Bing CROSBY's son, and went to work in the United States for Bob CROSBY's Club 15, bumping the Andrews Sisters from their regular slot. The pay was $20,000 (U.S.) a year, worth $150,000 in today's money. She was 23.
The money was something Canada could never match. Mr. GUTHRO, later head of Variety at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, guesses she was making $200 a week for her radio programs.
"Gisele Leaves for Hollywood. Canada's Loss," read a headline in one Toronto paper. The article guessed at the pay package, and it was right.
Ms. MacKENZIE was about to have her best decade ever in show business. After a short stint on Club 15, she worked on the Mario Lanza Show, before landing her full-time job at Your Hit Parade. The idea behind the NBC program was to take the top seven songs on the hit parade that week and have them done by the regular singers in the Your Hit Parade troupe. The half-hour program was a huge success in the United States and in late 1953 the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation picked it up for a while.
Ms. MacKENZIE was the only regular singer on the program to have her own hit record, Hard to Get, in 1955.
Though none of her family shared her success, all were musical. There were her parents, both of whom were serious amateur musicians two of her sisters sang and played, and a brother played the cello. Along with Gisele, two of them had what is called perfect pitch.
"It's rare and she had it," Mr. RAE said. "You would play four notes on the piano and she could match them. Perfect pitch isn't always a great thing, but in her case it was."
Ms. MacKENZIE's training as a classical violinist came in handy on the Jack Benny program, on which she first appeared in 1955. The droll comedian always made a thing of how he couldn't play the violin. One vaudeville-type act they would do on his show involved her patiently showing him what to do with a violin after he made some awful screeching noise with his bow.
She was Jack Benny's protégé, and he helped land her own television program in 1958. Called the Gisele MacKENZIE Show, it lasted only six months.
But she remained famous. At one stage, she was the subject of This is Your Life, which involved linking up with old Friends and relatives. She was a regular on game shows that featured minor celebrities, such as Hollywood Squares.
In 1963, she was cast as Sid Caesar's television wife and made regular trips to New York City, where the program was done. Like other television programs of that era, it was live, since videotape was only just being introduced.
Ms. MacKENZIE also acted and sang in live musicals in the United States, things such as Annie Get Your Gun and South Pacific. Over the years, she also worked in Las Vegas, performing in night clubs there. She returned to Canada for the occasional concert and television special, including one on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in late 1960. It was about "her story book career" and included the yarn, always told by her publicists, of how she decided to take up singing after she lost her $3,000 violin.
By the end of the 1960s, the big work started to dry up and Canadian newspapers were running the occasional "Where Are They Now" articles. She was in a sprawling ranch house in suburban Encino, Calif. She also owned property in Palmdale and Marin County, Calif., as well as a house on Lake Manitoba back home.
All that detail came up in a nasty divorce from Mr. SHUTTLEWORTH in 1968. Because he was also her manager, he kept 10 per cent of her gross income for the next three years. She later married a banker, Robert KLEIN, but that also ended in divorce.
During the rest of her career, Ms. MacKENZIE kept working in regional theatre and made guest appearances on television series, including MacGyver and Murder, She Wrote, as well as singing stints on programs such as the Dean Martin Show. She also did television commercials in the United States and Canada.
Ms. MacKENZIE had some odd hobbies. She collected and mixed exotic perfumes and in the 1950s she took up target shooting, becoming an expert shot. She and her first husband had a large collection of pistols, rifles and shotguns. In her later years, like many Hollywood stars, she was involved with Scientology.
Ms. MacKENZIE, who died in Burbank, Calif., on September 5, had two children with Mr. SHUTTLEWORTH, a son Mac and a daughter Gigi (short for Gisele) DOWNS.

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