Large Fierce Mammal

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My grandfather survived “The Great War” and before leaving England married Violet Axtle of Surrey. The two returned to Canada, briefly residing in East Chester before moving to Montreal where they started their family of six, an even mix of girls and boys. The second youngest was my mother, Evelyn.

46 years old when the second phase of “The Great War” cranked up in 1939, my grandfather lied about his age and successfully rejoined the army. The picture at left shows both sides of a post card sent to him by my grandmother after his deployment to England. While my mother had already been born at this point, my grandfather’s survival was still of significance to the direction of this story.

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Like the proverbial blind squirrel that can nevertheless find an acorn once in a while, the Canadian Army caught on to the sham before my grandfather’s feet were dry in England and ordered his return to Canada for demobilization. With a few weeks to kill before he could be booked aboard ship, he had time to work on his already well established reputation as a womanizer. At right is one of a number of photos he sent home showing him posing with his latest “landlady”. His return to Canada was soon followed by the breakup of his marriage to my grandmother. She remained in Montreal while he returned to East Chester, Nova Scotia where he went on to start and operate a successful logging operation.

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Ever the willful girl, and against her own mother’s protests, my mother left Montreal when she was 15 and moved to East Chester to work in the woods with her father. It was because of that move to Nova Scotia that, three years later, she met my father, Lawrence Clement Whynacht, at a dance where he was fronting a band called “Slim Major and his Ranch Boys”. My father was Slim Major. He chased her until she caught him. The picture at left shows them on their wedding day.

After they married, my parents moved to Montreal where my father worked days as an elevator operator and attended night school to learn the new and mysterious arts of radio and television repair. I was conceived in Montreal but missed being born there by three months. I took care of that bit of business in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia on 23 April 1957. St. George’s Day. My ever-so-British grandmother was very pleased.

Robust, unruly, and fueled by all the natural goodness mother’s milk could provide, I was officially launched upon the world.