In today’s column we continue our look at city and regional firsts.
In June of 1955, Arthur Youngs’ home became the first house to be moved from the power project area to the Youngsdale subdivision near Riverdale. Youngsdale Avenue runs parallel to Powerdam Drive between Princess Street and Dover Road. Youngs was a dedicated teacher with a 45-year career.
At the start of July 1958, various local and national firsts took place during the St. Lawrence Seaway & Power Project Inundation Days (I-Days) festivities. Canada had the honour of having the first ship through the new Snell and Eisenhower Locks, the only two Seaway locks on the American side of the border. The Humberdoc cargo freighter owned by Paterson Steamship Lines was captained by Robert Cutt, a 29-year-old Ingleside resident.
Another Canadian first likewise took place during I-Days when Prime Minister John Diefenbaker became the first Canadian head of state to start up an Ontario generating unit at a provincial public utility. The first of a series of 60,000 KVA generators at the Saunders Generating Station had already undergone rigorous testing. The PM effectively initiated the next phase of testing as the 16 generating units were systematically launched one by one over a period of time.
Evan Roys was a fifth generation United Empire Loyalist (UEL), whose family homestead was in the now lost village (hamlet) of Maple Grove. The family home was relocated not once, but twice. The original family house was moved to facilitate the Cornwall Canal, and his brick veneer house was relocated in 1958 to make way for the power project. Roys told a news reporter that the homestead was site of the first prayer meeting of the UELs who migrated from the Mohawk Valley to the area in 1783-84.
The Seaway era ushered in many changes, including Cornwall’s overnight growth from slightly more than one square mile to an area covering 31 square miles, which accentuated the need for more suitable urban infrastructure, including addressing recreational staffing needs. The City’s first recreation director, Bob Turner, began his work here in July of 1958 and received his permanent certificate in June of 1961. In Bob’s former employment, news accounts reported that he had become the province’s first black recreation director.
A national political first occurred during a 1958 by-election; it was the first (and so far, only) time that a father and daughter served as Members of Parliament simultaneously. After her husband, Arza Clair Casselman, died, Grenville-Dundas elected Conservative Jean Casselman, to the House of Commons; joining her father Earl Rowe, long-standing MP for Dufferin-Simcoe. She held the seat for ten years, being defeated in the redistributed riding of Grenville—Carleton. Casselman was the first woman to serve as a parliamentary secretary in the Canadian government. And she served as Canadian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland from 1979 to 1983.
Don Smith is Curator / Manager at the Cornwall Community Museum.
