HIPEL o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-11-04 published
KRAFCHIK,
Terrie
(Theresa)
Died at Saint Mary's Hospital on Monday, November 3, 2003, at 90
years of age. Beloved wife of the late Paul Peter
KRAFCHIK
(February
1989.) Mother of Gail and her husband Bob
HASLER of Ottawa, and
Jim and his wife
Lillian
KRAFCHIK of Toronto. Grandmother of
Michael KRAFCHIK,
David
KRAFCHIK, both of Toronto, and Laurel
Anne HASLER of Saint John's, Newfoundland. Sister of Dorothy
WEILER
of Kitchener, Marie
KARN of Puslinch, Loretta
McCASKILL of Barrie,
and Helen HIPEL of Waterloo. Sister-in-law of Gladys
HERGOTT
of Kitchener. Predeceased by her brothers, Irvin, Elmer and Jerome
HERGOTT.
Terrie was an active member of Saint Mark's R.C. Parish
where she was also a member of the Catholic Women's League. She
taught bridge to the blind from 1973-1975, and was very involved
in parish bridge marathons from 1954-2003. The
KRAFCHIK family
will receive Friends at the Henry Walser Funeral Home, 507 Frederick
Street, Kitchener (519-749-8467) Tuesday and Wednesday from 2-4
p.m. and 7-9 p.m., with parish prayers on Wednesday at 8: 30 p.m.
Prayers will be offered at the Funeral Home on Thursday, November
6, 2003 at 10: 15 a.m., then followed by Terrie's Funeral Mass
at Saint Mark's R.C. Parish, 55 Driftwood Drive, Kitchener, at
11 a.m. Fr. Bill
TRUSZ officiating. Interment Woodland Cemetery.
As expressions of sympathy, donations to Saint Mark's R.C. Parish
Mortgage Fund or to Saint Mary's Hospital Foundation would be appreciated
by the family. Visit www.obit411.com/1135 for Theresa's memorial.
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HIPKIN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-06-23 published
Elsie Maud
MILES
By John HIPKIN
Monday,
June 23, 2003 - Page A16
Mother, grandmother, wife, friend and survivor. Born November
11, 1909, in Hackney, London. Died April 27, 2003, in Moncton,
New Brunswick, of natural causes, aged 93.
My mother Elsie's birth in a gaunt Victorian hospital almost
a century ago was shrouded in secrecy, so we shall probably never
know how she came to be the child of maidservant Alice Maud
HOLLOWAY
and an anonymous father. Consistent with her unknown origins,
she was shifted throughout her infancy and girlhood by a remote
and faceless authority from one foster home to another, in one
at least of which she was routinely subject to unspeakable abuse.
Such were her difficult beginnings, but as the hundred-plus family
members and Friends who attended her funeral can testify, hers
was a life of triumph over adversity and an inspiring example
of how a person can actively fashion their own fate.
At the age of 14, Elsie became a trainee maid in a London gentleman's
household, where she learned the domestic arts that she scrupulously
and proudly practised throughout the rest of her life as a wife
and mother.
My father Jack was a regular customer at a tobacconist's opposite
Hammersmith police station, where my mother later worked as a
sales assistant. He was a mounted police officer with a tall
and manly figure, jet-black hair and a winning way with women.
My mother fell for him and they had three children: myself, Naomi
and Anthony. But Jack left my mother, and during the Second World
War, she was unsupported, unemployed and homeless. These were
the days before the welfare state as we currently know it, so
we were often forced to sleep in the waiting rooms of London
train stations, which invited the stern attentions of the magistracy,
who insisted that we children be taken into care. And so we were:
I went to Dr.
BARNARDO's children's home and my brother and sister
went into adoption.
In 1941, mother joined the Auxiliary Territorial Services women's
army. During her service years she met, fell in love with and
married Paul
MILES, an army captain and
son of a Sussex clergyman.
She had three children with him: David, Pamela and Hugh.
I didn't keep in touch much with my mother after I went to university
in the immediate postwar years, but by the early Seventies I
had re-established contact. I learned that she and her husband
had emigrated to Canada in 1956, where Paul had taken up a position
with a refrigerator company. In the 30 or so years that followed,
we restored our relationship, and I was also reunited with my
sister, living with her own family in Nottingham.
A year and a half ago, I was also reunited with my brother, who
is now a deacon at the Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. And
so it was that at mother's funeral, all six of her children and
many of her grandchildren were present to bid her farewell.
Mother gladdened the hearts of all who knew her. She was filled
with joy, despite a life that began with difficulty, and which
had known disappointment and destitution. But she was finally
fulfilled in motherhood, marriage and Friendship.
Death's claim is only a partial one. What remains in us and in
our hearts is the living spirit of a woman who overcame adversity
and took delight in her good fortune and her large and reconciled
family.
So even in that most awesome encounter of all -- with death itself
she has finally triumphed.
John HIPKIN is Elsie Miles's eldest child.
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