SILCOX
SILESKY
SILINS
SILLS
SILVERMAN
SILVERSIDES
SILVERSTEIN
SILVERSTONE
SILCOX o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-07-19 published
He gave his city artistic merit
Windsor gallery's longtime director built a fine collection in
his pursuit of 'communal pride'
By Bill GLADSTONE
Special to The Globe and Mail Saturday, July
19, 2003 - Page F9
Canada's art world is lamenting the end of an era with the demise
of Kenneth
SALTMARCHE, founding director of the Art Gallery of
Windsor, who died in Toronto on July 3 at the age of 82.
An accomplished artist, Mr.
SALTMARCHE ultimately made his greatest
mark as an arts administrator and is being remembered as one
of the last of a dying generation of artists-turned-gallery directors
who revitalized the art scene across the country.
Hired in 1946 to oversee operations of what was then the Willistead
Art Gallery in Windsor, Ontario, he transformed the facility
from a room on the second floor of the municipal library into
a leading regional institution that possessed an astute collection
of nearly 3,000 works by the time he retired in 1985.
"The gallery really had a very simple and rather primitive beginning,
and he built it from absolute scratch, from zero," said Bill
WITHROW, former longtime director of the Art Gallery of Ontario.
"I was always impressed with that fact."
As a collector, Mr.
SALTMARCHE is remembered for having "a good
eye" and for acquiring many works by artists initially considered
out of the mainstream, such as Harold Town and Prudence Heward.
Over time his judgment was proved sound as a favoured artist's
reputation would soar, along with the market value of his or
her works.
He concentrated on attaining both historical and contemporary
Canadian works, including numerous canvases of the Group of Seven,
thus laying the foundation of the gallery's present collection
of more than 5,000 pieces.
"He often collected against the current, which means you can
make a dollar go a lot further," said David
SILCOX, managing
director of Sotheby's Canada. "He bought people when they weren't
popular -- he was very intelligent that way."
Alf BOGUSKY, director of the Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery,
calls the collection Mr.
SALTMARCHE assembled a "magnificent
accomplishment" that reflects "the beautiful story of the development
of Canadian painting, as represented by the earliest formal portraiture
by British and French artists right through to the contemporary
period of the Seventies."
Known for his energetic vision, Mr.
SALTMARCHE had a knack for
drumming up community involvement through innovative programs
such as Art in the Park, now a long-established annual event
in Windsor. Aided by his wife Judy, he made the gallery a vibrant
centre of cultural life and charmed volunteers and patrons alike
to new heights of involvement and philanthropy.
Aware of the advantages of being situated at Canada's southernmost
border point, he cultivated friendly relations with the Detroit
Institute of Arts, situated across the river and a few city blocks
away, even sending over exhibitions of Canadian art. In the mid-1950s,
he scored a major coup by persuading his U.S. counterparts that
a key work languishing in their collection would have a much
more appreciative home in Canada.
As a result, the Detroit Institute of Arts donated A Side Street
Group of Seven stalwart Lawren Harris's celebrated 1919 painting
of a snow-covered Toronto street -- to the Willistead gallery
as a gift in commemoration of Windsor's 100th birthday. (Tom
Thomson's 1914 painting Algonquin Park came into the gallery's
possession in the same period.)
When nine previously unknown early 19th-century watercolours
by early bureaucrat-painter George Heriot appeared on the market
in 1967, Mr.
SALTMARCHE was determined to acquire them despite
their "distinctly Old Master price tag" exceeding $45,000. He
quickly raised three-quarters of the sum from Windsor residents,
then convinced the Canada Council into making an exceptional
grant of $10,000 to complete the purchase.
Mr. SALTMARCHE saw collecting as "an art museum's primary function,"
and once wrote: "Communal pride -- whether civic or national
in scale -- is engendered by the owning of works of art of outstanding
value and is a completely natural reason for assembling a permanent
collection."
He struggled with the library board for years to make the gallery
an autonomous institution, and his eventual success was seen
as a milestone by directors of other regional galleries. In the
early 1970s, he moved the gallery into a historic renovated brewery
building. It later ceded those premises to the province (for
use as a casino) and moved into a prominent new downtown building
in 2001.
Born
September 29, 1920, in Cardiff, Wales, Kenneth Charles
SALTMARCHE
arrived in Windsor with his family at the age of four, and moved
with them to the village of Vienna, south of London, Ontario,
during the Depression. It was in Vienna's one-room schoolhouse
that he encountered the travelling exhibition of Group of Seven
reproductions that inspired him to dedicate his future to art.
"He always told me that seeing that show was the pivotal point
in his passion for art," said his son Noel.
A graduate of the Ontario College of Art, he began programming
at the Willistead Art Gallery about 1946; he also began to write
art and music criticism for the Windsor Daily Star and painting
landscapes, still lifes and family portraits. In 1947, he married
Judith DAVIES, and they had Noël and his twin brother David two
years later. His family often joined him on painting expeditions
around the world, some of which resulted in solo exhibitions
of art.
He was a member of the Order of Canada and held an honorary law
degree from the University of Windsor. As well, he was the founding
president of the Ontario Association of Art Galleries and a founding
member and past president of the Canadian Art Museum Directors
Organization.
Soon after Judith died in 1992, he painted a series of watercolours
"and that was the last work he did," Noël said. Afflicted with
senile dementia, he spent his last years in several retirement
homes and then a nursing home, Castleview Wychwood, in Toronto.
Predeceased by brothers Ronald and Leslie as well as his wife,
Mr. SALTMARCHE leaves Noël and David, daughters-in-law Deb and
Anita, and four grandchildren, all of Toronto.
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SILESKY o@ca.on.manitoulin.howland.little_current.manitoulin_expositor 2003-10-22 published
Alberta Ann
(MAGUIRE)
SLOSS
In loving memory of Alberta Ann (Maguire) Sloss, November 1, 1947 to October 9, 2003.
Alberta SLOSS, a resident of Espanola died at the Espanola General
Hospital on Thursday, October 9, 2003, at the age of 55 years.
She was born in Mindemoya, daughter of the late Oswald and the late Elsie
(QUACKENBUSH)
MAGUIRE.
Alberta was a teacher at the Webbwood Public
School, S. Geiger School in Massey and
A. B. Ellis School in Espanola.
She was a member of the Spring Bay Pentecostal Church and the
Queensway Pentecostal Church in Espanola. She enjoyed gardening but
her greatest joys were serving the Lord Jesus and the time she
dedicated to her loving husband, children and grandchildren. Alberta
will be greatly missed by all who knew her or worked with her over the years.
Dearly loved and loving wife of Ken
SLOSS of Espanola. Loving mother
of Bryan and wife
Susin
SLOSS of Thornhill, Brent and wife Chani
SLOSS of Alma, and Brad and wife
Amber
SLOSS of Cambridge. Dear
grandmother of Shekinah, Blake, Shayna and Hannah Joy. Dear sister
of Rosalie
JAGGARD (husband David) of Mindemoya and Elsie
SILESKY of
Englehart (husband Clifford predeceased). Also survived by five nieces and nephews.
Friends called the Culgin Funeral Home, Gore Bay on Sunday, October 12.
The funeral service was held from the Wm. G. Turner Chapel at
the Culgin Funeral Home on Monday, October 13, 2003 with Pastor Frank
HANER officiating. Interment followed in Long Bay Cemetery.
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SILINS o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-04-05 published
SILINS,
Guntis, M.D.
Died suddenly and unexpectedly on March 31, 2003. Husband of
Ruta and father of Matiss, Austris and Krisjanis. Funeral service
will be held on Wednesday, April 9, 2003 at 1: 00 p.m. at St.
John's Latvian Lutheran Church, 200 Balmoral Avenue, Toronto.
Mourners may pay their respects to the family beginning at 12: 00
p.m. Turner and Porter Yorke Chapel, (416) 767-3153, can be contacted
for additional information. In lieu of flowers, donations may
be made to the charity of your choice in Guntis' memory.
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SILLS o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-02-24 published
BUCHANAN,
Audrey
Cameron
At the Cambridge Memorial Hospital, on Sunday, February 23, 2003,
in her 90th year. Audrey
BUCHANAN (née
SMAIL,) formerly of Toronto,
was the beloved wife, for over 60 years, of the late Stanley
BUCHANAN (2000.) Dear mother of Betty
BUCHANAN of Toronto, and
Nancy RZESZUTKO and her husband, Walt, of Cambridge; loved grandmother
of Sian SILLS and Mark
FRANKLIN of Toronto, Erin and Michael
HARTMAN of Burlington and Kathryn and Corryn
RZESZUTKO of Cambridge
dear sister of Alex
SMAIL of Oakville; dear sister-in-law of
Alfred BUCHANAN of Toronto; and special aunt of Kathleen
SMAIL
of Tualatin, Oregon, Pat
BRANDON of Coldwater, Ontario, Blake
and Allison
SMAIL,
Bruce and Judy
SMAIL, all of St. Joseph's
Island, Ontario, and Janet
SMAIL of Sault Saint Marie. Audrey
graduated in nursing from Women's College Hospital in 1937, following
which she became Night Supervisor of The Ontario Hospital in
Saint Thomas. Since her retirement from nursing, Audrey had been
actively involved with the Alumnae Association of Women's College
Hospital. She treasured the long, happy summers spent with children
and grandchildren at the family cottage at Floral Park on Lake
Couchiching. Since 2001, she resided at Queen's Square Terrace
in Cambridge, Ontario, where she found a happy and fulfilling
life surrounded by new best Friends and kind caregivers. Friends
will be received at Coutts Funeral Home and Cremation Centre, 96
St. Andrews Street, Cambridge (wwwfuneralscanada.com), on Tuesday
from 7-9 p.m. The funeral service will be conducted in the funeral
home chapel on Wednesday, February 26, 2003 at 3 p.m. A reception
will follow in the Coutts Family Reception Cottage. Spring interment
will take place at Carlyle Cemetery in Iron Bridge, Ontario.
As expressions of sympathy, donations may be made to Women's
College Hospital Alumnae Memorial Fund, 58 Lascelles Boulevard,
Toronto, Ontario M5P 2E1.
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SILVERMAN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-05-26 published
Eileen KRIEGER
By Lesley KRIEGER, Karen
McDONALD and Bob
SILVERMAN Monday, May
26, 2003 - Page A14
Daughter, granddaughter, niece, sister, dancer, student leader.
Born January 5, 1981, in Ridgeway, Ontario Died January 20, near
Belleville, Ontario, in a car accident, aged 21.
Eileen grew up in a small town where she spent most of her time
either dancing at her mother's dance studio or running wild on
her grandmother's farm. "Eileen the Bunny Queen" was an early
nickname that reflected her love of rabbits. But she spent time
with more that just rabbits -- there were also all of those raccoons,
squirrels, chickens, turkeys and, of course, horses. Later, she
even managed to integrate cats, dogs and rabbits into her university
life.
She grew into a beautiful young woman with a dazzling smile and
what seemed to be boundless energy. She once told her housemate
that she found sleep boring. As she matured she became immersed
in myriad activities but family remained at the centre of her
life. She was a loving daughter to her father Charlie, and a
mentor to her younger brother Karl and sister Meaghan.
Eileen's interests and those of her mother meshed to a greater
extent than they do for many mothers and daughters. One of those
passions was dance. Her final performances were in Casa Del Sol,
Spain. An extraordinary bonding took place among the dance Friends
as they travelled and worked together.
Eileen's high school years left their mark on her teachers. One
teacher, Ken
GIBBONS, found working closely with her at the student
leadership camp to be "a joy and learning experience for me.
She was a natural teacher who knew the material and showed a
genuine concern for those she was leading. The greatest thrill
for a teacher is to know even one person like Eileen." Hugh
O'BRIAN,
founder of Hugh O'Brian Youth Leadership, recalls Eileen's qualities
at the World Leadership Congress, calling her "a true achiever
and a great representative of Canada."
This straight-A student somehow managed to spend a year as president
of her high-school student council, stay involved in sports,
and receive the 1999 Award for Excellence and the Principal's
Leadership Award before entering Queen's University in 2000 where
she majored in Development Studies and Sociology.
While at Queen's she took a job as a waitress at Summerhill (the
principal's official residence, which is used for entertaining).
There, her poise, self-confidence and engaging personality resulted
in her meeting and getting to know many people, including members
of Queen's Board of Trustees, honorary-degree recipients, and
Members of Parliament.
From her first year on campus Eileen became involved in the Canadian
Student Leadership Conference (now known as Withinsight) which
is a Queen's student-run initiative. This annual conference takes
place in Ottawa and attracts students from across the country
who come to hear government, business and other community leaders
speak or lead workshops. It was at that conference one year,
that Eileen met Richard, who became her true love.
Eileen became the national director of the 2003 conference, but
she did not get to see the results of her hard work; the accident
that took her life occurred three days before the conference
was to begin. Her executive team members were devastated by her
loss but came together to run a very successful conference in
her honour. In future conferences, there will be an annual award
offered in her name.
Upon hearing of her death, Al
FISHER, a professor of music at
Queen's, wrote: "I found her (to be) a vital, intelligent and
accomplished young person. The cruelty of a sudden, violent death
for such a treasure is profoundly numbing."
Lesley KRIEGER is Eileen's mother, Karen
McDONALD her aunt; Bob
SILVERMAN,
Dean of Arts and Science at Queen's, a friend.
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SILVERSIDES o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-04-02 published
Robert TROW
By Ann SILVERSIDES
Wednesday,
April 2, 2003 - Page A20
Gay liberation and A.I.D.S. activist, health-care worker, musician.
Born November 23, 1948, in Toronto. Died October 21, 2002, in
Toronto, of a brain aneurysm, aged 53.
The last time I saw Robert, he was bicycling north on Church
Street near Queen Street in Toronto, heading to a meeting. Though
he was running late, he graciously stopped to answer some questions
I'd been meaning to ask him about the history of Hassle Free
Clinic, the downtown Toronto sexual health clinic where he spent
26 years, first as a volunteer and later as a long-time staff
member. A few weeks later, Robert was dead, and Canada lost a
knowledgeable, tireless Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome activist
who had kept up his activism until the day he died.
About 400 people attended his memorial service at Hart House
Theatre at the University of Toronto. As an undergraduate, Robert
had performed in that theatre, and he remained a member of Hart
House long after completing two University of Toronto graduate
degrees.
He grew up in Thornhill, Ontario, the eldest of three boys. His
father was an engineer, and his mother a homemaker. Playing piano,
which he took up as a child, was a lifelong passion.
Many gay men are rejected by, or alienated from, their original
family; their gay Friends become their family. Robert was lucky:
he maintained close ties with parents, brothers and extended
family, and kept up with both (heterosexual) best Friends from
high school and a large family of gay Friends.
In the mid-1970s, Robert began working and living communally.
He volunteered on the collective that ran The Body Politic, a
left-wing gay liberation newsmagazine published in Canada but
with a worldwide readership. He wrote articles, mostly about
health-care issues, edited, proofread and did paste-up -- but
also took on the thankless task of distribution manager. He lived
in a series of communal houses with his former long-time partner,
writer Gerald
HANNON, and other Body Politic collective members.
To his Friends, Robert was known as Bunny, and his foibles --
dithering, an aversion to drafts, a highly developed sense of
personal frugality, a propensity to lose his wallet, a talent
for being, as Gerald noted, sprawlingly messy -- were more than
offset by his generosity to all and his wicked sense of fun.
When Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome emerged in the early
1980s, Robert helped organize the first public Acquired Immune
Deficiency Syndrome forum in Toronto on April 5, 1983, which
was sponsored by Hassle Free and Gays in Health Care. He went
on to be a founding member of the Acquired Immune Deficiency
Syndrome Committee of Toronto. After a test for Human Immunodeficiency
Virus was developed, Hassle Free became the first clinic in Canada
to offer anonymous testing. When anonymous testing was eventually
legalized in Ontario, the government adopted Robert's manual
on anonymous testing guidelines.
Robert served on the Ontario Advisory Committee on Human Immunodeficiency
Virus/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome and other bodies. "But
first of all, he was passionate about Hassle Free Clinic. He
wouldn't take on anything that wasn't also good for the clinic,"
said Jane GREER/GRIER, his co-worker at the clinic. All the while,
Robert was Human Immunodeficiency Virus positive and coping with
the effects of his condition and medications.
The Ontario Ministry of Health awarded him a posthumous citation,
and Toronto City Council observed a moment's silence in his honour.
Silence was an odd tribute, Gerald noted -- because Robert almost
never stopped talking, whether it was his "up-to-date" gossip
about the Hapsburgs or the Holy Roman Empire, or his appreciative
"Oh, boy!" when one of his Friends served him dinner.
Robert is survived by his partner, Denis
FONTAINE, his parents
Bill and Lucie, his brothers Philip and Christopher, and his
wide family of Friends.
Ann SILVERSIDES is a friend of Robert
TROW.
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SILVERSTEIN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-03-22 published
Champ didn't tell his mother
Toronto fighter was talked into boxing by his brothers during
the Thirties as a way to make more money
By Barbara
SILVERSTEIN
Special▼ to The Globe and Mail Saturday,
March 22, 2003 - Page F11
When Leon SLAN became Canada's champion heavyweight boxer, he
didn't tell his mother. She disapproved of the sport, so he kept
the news to himself -- though not for long. Mr.
SLAN, who died
last month at the age of 86, had for years fought under another
name and managed to escape his mother's wrath until 1936, when
he won the national amateur title and the irresistibility of
fame upset his comfortable obscurity.
The modest Mr.
SLAN went on to become a successful Toronto businessman
who had so allowed boxing to settle into his past that in 1986
most of his Friends were surprised when he was inducted into
the Canadian Boxing Hall of Fame. It astonished everyone that
the man they knew as the co-owner of a luggage-making company
was known in boxing circles as Lennie
STEIN, holder of the Canadian
amateur heavyweight title from 1935 to 1937.
A quiet and unassuming giant of a man, his wife described him
as invariably soft-spoken. "I never heard him raise his voice
once in all the years we were married, Isabel
SLAN said.
By all accounts, Mr.
SLAN's mild demeanour belied his prowess
in the ring, said his son, Jon
SLAN. "
For a man who was a champion
at a blood sport, he was the gentlest person you ever met."
Born in Winnipeg to Russian immigrants on June 28, 1916, Mr.
SLAN was the second of three sons. In 1922, the family moved
to the Annex area of Toronto where he attended Harbord Collegiate
Institute.
His father, Joseph
SLAN, was a struggling tailor with
interesting ideas about the garment industry. In 1931, he headed
a co-operative called Work-Togs Limited. It consisted of a small
band of tailors who were to share in the profits. The project
suffered from poor timing: It came on the scene at the height
of the Depression and failed dismally.
In 1934, Joseph
SLAN died in poverty and Leon and his two brothers
Bob, who was born in 1914, and Jack, born in 1918 -- had to
provide for their mother. Bringing home meagre paycheques from
what little work they could find, the three decided to find a
supplement.
At the time, boxing was a popular spectator sport and one of
the few that was open to Jewish athletes. Bob and Jack knew that
a good fighter could earn a decent living in the ring. Their
eyes fell on Leon. At 17, their 6-foot-2, 200-pound, athletic
brother towered over most grown men.
"Leon was big and strong and Bob and Jack thought he should be
boxing, Mrs.
SLAN said. "The family needed the money."
They persuaded him to give it a try and promised their support,
she said. "They took him to over the gym. There they were, the
three boys walking down the street arm-in-arm with Leon in the
middle. They all walked over together to sign Leon up."
They didn't consult their mother. In fact, the brothers decided
to enter the fight name Lennie
STEIN, so she wouldn't read about
Leon in the papers and worry.
As it turned out, the new Lennie
STEIN was a natural. Mr.
SLAN
won his first major fight in a Round 1 knockout over the Toronto
Golden
Gloves title holder. "
STEIN is durable and exceptionally
fast for a heavyweight, " The Toronto Star reported in 1935.
"He has the ability to rain punishment on his opponents with
both hands."
In this way, he won almost all of his major fights. It helped,
too, that his coach happened to be Maxie
KADIN, a legend in Ontario
boxing. Out of 40 bouts, Mr.
SLAN netted 34 wins, 22 by knockout,
and six losses.
A fighter who possessed a dogged and implacable manner, he was
popular with the fans.
"He was known for not staying down on the canvas, Jon
SLAN
said. "On those rare times when he was decked, he always refused
the referee's outstretched hand and picked himself up."
Yet, for all his success, Mr.
SLAN rejected the opportunity to
go fully professional. A manager and promoter from New York had
seen him in a bout with a certain German boxer and saw possibilities.
"He wanted to promote him as the Great White Jewish Hope, " Jon
said.
The
German boxer happened to be the brother of Max
SCHMELING,
the Aryan protégé of Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich, who in
1936 had defeated the otherwise invincible Joe
LOUIS in the upset
of the century. To make it even more interesting, the manager
proved to be the famous John
BUCKLEY, who called the shots for
Jack SHARKEY, a heavyweight who had beaten
SCHMELING four years
earlier.
"The promoter got so interested in this meeting of German and
Jew that he offered my father a contract, but he didn't offer
enough money, " Jon said.
The problem, it turned out, was that Mr.
SLAN couldn't afford
to turn professional, he once told a Globe and Mail reporter.
"I was making good money then, $25 a week, and I was supporting
my mother, " he said in 1988. "I asked him [Buckley] to put up
$5,000 [and] he just laughed at me. He said he had hundreds of
heavyweights."
Negotiations ended right there. "He was [only] interested in
me because I was Jewish and that would go over big in New York."
It wasn't the only time that race emerged as an issue. Mr.
SLAN
had boxed under the auspices of the Young Men's Hebrew Association
until 1936 when it was blackballed by the Amateur Athletic Union
of Canada for withholding a portion of its proceeds. The money
was earmarked for the Canadian Olympic effort, but the Young
Men's Hebrew Association had refused to support the upcoming
1936 Berlin Games because of Germany's poor treatment of Jews.
In the end, the Amateur Athletic Union permitted Mr.
SLAN to
enter as an independent and he went on to fight unattached to
win the Toronto and national titles.
"It seemed so easy at the time, " he said in 1988. "I was a very
quiet kid, but when I won, I became such a hero."
That glory turned out to be the undoing of Lennie
STEIN, the
fighter -- though it was all something of an anticlimax. The
one thing Leon
SLAN had feared on his way up through the ranks
came to nothing: his mother finally found out that he boxed and
then failed to react -- at least, not that anyone in the family
can remember.
"She just took it in her stride, said Isabel
SLAN. "
She was
a Jewish mother from the old country. I don't think she really
understood what boxing was all about."
Perhaps, too, it helped to smooth matters that her son's secret
endeavours had ended in triumph. She can only have felt a mother's
pride.
In 1937, Mr.
SLAN retired from boxing and found a job at a produce
stall in Toronto's old fruit terminal on Colborne Street and
was later hired by his brother Bob, a proprietor of Dominion
Citrus
Ltd. It was tough work with long hours, Mrs.
SLAN said.
"Leon would have to get up at 2 o'clock in the morning to go
unload the fruits and vegetables off the trucks."
Even so, he still had some time for boxing. After working long
days at the market, he taught athletics at the Young Men's Hebrew
Association and it was there that he met Isabel
MARGOLIAN. A
concert pianist newly arrived from Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, she
happened to take one of his boxing classes for women.
"We were all lined up in a row, punching bags, " she remembered.
"Leon came up to me and told me I wasn't punching hard enough.
Then he took my hand and hit it into the bag to show me how to
do it. I felt my bones crunch, but I didn't say anything."
As it turned out, he had broken her hand. When he learned what
had happened, he phoned her and thus began a different relationship.
They married in 1942 and later that year Mr.
SLAN enlisted in
the army where he ended up in the Queen's Own Rifles. While in
the army, he returned to boxing and won the 1942 Canadian Army
heavyweight title.
After the war, the
SLAN brothers founded Dominion Luggage in
Toronto's garment district, a company that started small with
eight workers and grew into a successful enterprise employing
200. Each brother had a different responsibility -- Jack was
the designer, Bob took care of the administration and Leon was
the salesman.
"It was a job that really suited him, Mrs.
SLAN said. "He was
very personable [and] sold to Eaton's, Simpsons, Air Canada --
all the big companies. He became good Friends with many of the
buyers."
The three brothers enjoyed a comfortable relationship built on
affection and loyalty, Jon said.
"Bob liked to fish, so he took Thursdays and Fridays off to go
to his cottage. My father took Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
afternoons off to golf."
Jack, the creative force among them, rarely left the business
but never begrudged his brothers their leisure time.
"They had the perfect partnership, " said Jon, a relationship
anchored by their mother. "They were her surrogate husbands.
I don't think there was a
SLAN wife who felt that she wasn't
playing second fiddle to my grandmother."
The brothers went to her house every day for lunch until she
was 90. "She made old-time Jewish food. Her definition of borscht
was sour cream with a touch of beets, " Jon said. "She cooked
with chicken fat and the boys loved it."
Sophie SLAN died in 1984 at the age of 93.
In 1972, the
SLANs sold Dominion Luggage to Warrington Products,
a large conglomerate. "Warrington made them an offer they couldn't
turn down, " Isabel said.
Even so, the brothers' relationship continued into retirement.
"They called each other every day, even when their health was
failing, " Jon said. "Bob died in 2000 and Jack in 2002. My father
took their deaths very hard."
Although he never boxed again, Mr.
SLAN played sports well into
his 70s and could still show his mettle. He had taken up tennis
at about the age of 40 and, when he couldn't get a membership
at the exclusive Toronto Lawn Tennis Club in Rosedale, he co-founded
the York Racquets Tennis Club. It opened in 1964, directly across
the street from the Toronto Lawn Tennis Club.
Mr. SLAN died of heart failure in Toronto on February 11. He
leaves his wife
Isabel, son Jon and daughters Elynne
GOLDKIND
and Anna RISEN.
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SILVERSTEIN o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-10-29 published
A champion of Canadian textile workers
By Barbara
SILVERSTEIN,
Special▲ to The Globe and Mail Wednesday,
October 29, 2003 - Page R5
A pioneer in the labour movement within Toronto's once-vibrant
garment industry and an early advocate of basic social-welfare
programs has died at the age of 105.
As a union activist, William (Velvl)
KATZ survived blacklisting
in the 1920s to establish the embroidery local of the International
Ladies Garment Workers Union and later went on to co-found the
Labour League, a Jewish radical left-wing mutual-benefit society
that later evolved into the United Jewish People's Order.
"He was a man of integrity, intelligence and idealism," said
his daughter Ida
ABRAMS. "He held... an exacting moral standard.
If he gave his word, he meant it."
Mr. KATZ, who died in April of heart failure, was born in 1897
in a small Polish town just north of Krakow. He and his three
younger siblings were raised in the sheltered communal life of
Hasidism, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect. Mr.
KATZ studied at
a religious school and later apprenticed as a cobbler and had
almost no exposure to the secular world until 1918, when he fled
to Germany to avoid military conscription. In 1997, he told the
Canadian Jewish News that his life changed dramatically. In Poland,
the only books were religious, he said. "Suddenly there were
books on every subject imaginable."
By all accounts, Mr.
KATZ became caught up in the intellectual
fervour ignited by the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. "He thought
communism would bring an end to anti-Semitism and all other forms
of discrimination and injustice," said Ida
ABRAMS. "He believed
the revolution was just around the corner."
In 1920, a cousin who was suddenly unable to travel offered Mr.
KATZ a free boat ticket and he arrived in Toronto with the address
of the relatives of a German friend. Mr.
KATZ became their paying
boarder. In the course of his stay, he courted their daughter
Bluma and married her in 1922. Two years later, he brought his
brother Ben and then his sisters Lil and Eva to Canada. Similar
efforts to bring his half-sister Esther failed and she did not
survive the Holocaust.
Around that time, Mr.
KATZ quit shoemaking and turned to the
garment industry where he took up union organizing. Eventually,
his reputation as a "lefty" alienated bosses and by 1924 he was
unemployed. Ida
ABRAMS recalls vivid memories of May Day parades
she attended with her father. "People marched with banners and
flags and sang union songs. There was always the threatening
presence of policemen on horseback."
His job problems ended in 1930 when Mr.
KATZ became a partner
in a modest embroidery shop on Adelaide Street. Although he was
an employer himself, he continued to support the efforts of the
labour unions. In those years, Mr.
KATZ campaigned for basic
social-welfare programs -- such as old-age pensions and unemployment
insurance -- through the Labour League Mutual Benefit Society,
a Jewish radical socialist organization he co-founded in 1926.
Mr. KATZ had initially belonged to the Workmen's Circle, an established
left-wing Jewish proletariat benefit society but in the mid-20s
it ruptured over ideological differences. Mr.
KATZ was among
a radical group that broke away to establish the Labour League
which, in later years, even ran political candidates. In 1945,
the league was renamed the United Jewish People's Order.
In its formative years, the Labour League established several
cultural institutions that still exist today: the Morris Winchevsky
School, the Toronto Jewish Folk Choir (formerly the Freedom Singing
Society), and Camp Naivelt, a collective of 90 cottages near
Brampton, Ontario The camp was a popular venue for folksingers
Pete SEEGER and Phil
OCHS performed there -- and it was where
the Canadian folk group The Travellers got its start.
United Jewish People's Order flourished until 1956, when Mr.
KATZ learned of the atrocities of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin
and disenchantment set in. Instead, he supported institutions
in Israel, and the preservation of Yiddish culture. Through this
he became Friends with Canadian Yiddish poet Simcha
SIMCHOVITCH,
whose latest book Toward Eternity: Collected Poems, is dedicated
to Mr. KATZ.
Mr. KATZ, whose wife died in 1972, leaves his daughter Ida
ABRAMS
and his sister Eva
GANTMAN.
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SILVERSTONE o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-08-15 published
Howard HOAG
By Steven DENURE, Julia
WOODS, Michael
HOMER, Marty
SILVERSTONE
Friday, August 15, 2003 - Page A28
Friend, husband, father, rugby player. Born September 17, 1952,
in Ottawa. Died June 15, in Toronto, of cancer, aged 50.
Friends experienced a quintessential Howard
HOAG moment a few
years ago on the dock at a friend's cottage at a remote spot
in Georgian Bay. They had an old recurve bow and a quiver full
of new arrows, and were taking turns shooting at -- and missing
a floating target anchored far out in the bay. As was his
lifelong habit, Howard arrived much later than anticipated. He
stepped out of the boat with a nautical flourish, and, after
being roundly berated for being late and bringing what looked
to be only six (warm) beer, he picked up the bow and tested its
pull. Then he turned and fired an arrow and hit the previously
unthreatened target the first time, with a satisfying thunk,
like an exclamation mark at the end of a sentence. In the moment
of stunned silence that followed, he gave a withering Hoagian
look. "That's how it's done," he said, and picked up his six-pack
and his knapsack, which turned out to be full of wine, and headed
up the hill, leaving the merry band on the dock properly put
in its place.
His Friends spent so much time waiting for him that they dubbed
it "Howard time." The wait was always worth it. At every party
there was "before Howie" and "after Howie." With his arrival,
the conversation always sparkled a little more, the wine tasted
better, the room seemed to grow bigger -- plus there was his
unique ability to infuriate and/or entertain everybody in the
room.
Howard grew up in Trois-Rivières, Quebec, the youngest of four
children born to a production manager at the mighty
CIP paper
mill. As a child he was a Boy Scout, soloist in the church choir
and an avid canoeist. He would later tell stories about paddling
around the islands in the St. Lawrence River and watching the
foam from the mill make the paddles disappear.
His voice eventually changed and, when he got to Montreal's McGill
University, so did the songs. Howard studied environmental biology,
but his true passion was the game of rugby. In recent years,
Howard was best known as the heart and soul of the Toronto Scottish
Rugby Club, as well as a key organizer of its annual Robbie Burns
night. In Montreal, however, he's a legend: it was his monumental
gaffe (he loudly lambasted a group of football coaches while
the men in question sat in the next room listening to every word)
that led to the creation of the Howie Hoag Award. Since its inception
in 1971, "the Hoag" has been given out weekly during the MacDonald
College football season to the player who performs the most remarkable
misdeed of the week.
We are comforted to know that the last several years of Howard's
too-short life were the absolute best. At 48, the classic lad
and confirmed bachelor met the love of his life, the incomparable
Louise RICH, and her daughter, Odette
HUTCHINGS.
This perfect
trio -- whose adopted nickname was H.R.H. -- did not have anything
like the number of years they deserved together, but what they
did have was packed with enough love and laughter to fill many
longer lifetimes.
Tragically, last Christmas Eve, Howard, who'd battled cancer
as a child, learned that the radiation treatment that had saved
his life 42 years earlier had probably led to the growth of an
inoperable tumour in one of his bile ducts. In early June, Howard
was given only a few days to live, but survived long enough to
marry Louise and spend another week with his family and the Friends
he loved. He also lived long enough to die on the day and at
the hour of what used to be his absolutely favourite kind of
night: just after midnight on a midsummer's eve with a full moon,
which Howard used to say was "God's flashlight."
Steve,
Julia,
Mike and Marty are Friends of Howard
HOAG.
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