This month’s “3 Things” was already written well before my self-imposed deadline, but fate intervened and I am compelled to insert this late breaking news:
The 2025 Gävle Goat, which I wrote about last year, has literally fallen. Not due to nefarious forces, just high winds from Storm Johannes. Click on the image below to read about this tragedy.
In the regularly scheduled department, this month I bring you: 1) more family history, 2) a nice pic coincidentally by a Glasgow boy, and 3) things escalate, literally and figuratively, on the stairs.
The continuing Bonhill saga
Last month, we followed the story of John Broadley1 who, in 1861, brought Elizabeth Aimer to Bonhill as a baby and raised her as his own. Since then, I discovered that John’s wife, Isabella, died in 1880 from “erysipelas and inflammation of the membrane of the brain“. Her death was hard to find because it was registered under her maiden name, McCallum, and her marital status was “single”, which suggests a marital breakdown.
My research into the lives of John Bradley and Elizabeth Aimer Bradley became a minor obsession, and what I unearthed is a bit too long to include in this monthly “3 Things” post.
I put the whole thing, including the part from last month, on its own page which you can read at the following link.
If you are hesitating, you should know that it includes a detour into Scottish pre-marital sex practices, so I’m sure some of you will click the button.
If you remember everything from the first part2, you can skip straight to the new stuff here.
A warning: Everyone3 who has read this finds it confusing. Half the people involved seem to be named James or Elizabeth. I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do about that.
The Captive Butterfly
Edward Atkinson Hornel’s The Captive Butterfly was the very first artwork to be acquired by the Art Gallery of Ontario. The gallery bought it for C$610 in 1905, the same year as it was completed. HVW and I went to see it recently, and it is quite delightful.
You can read more about it at the AGO website.
A Vignette
Most mornings, I go outside to get some exercise. There is a set of stairs at the reservoir just behind our place, and I run up and down them several times to get my heart pumping.
One day this past month, I was part way through my routine and headed down the steps, breathing a bit heavily, as a woman was coming up. We looked at each other and mumbled a “good morning”, except she didn’t hear me and groused loudly as she continued up the stairs,
Or don’t say “good morning”, I know it’s a Toronto thing, you don’t think you have to be polite.
She was still going up when I got to the bottom and turned around for my next ascent. When I caught up to her, I felt that I needed to correct the misunderstanding. So as I passed I said, a little louder than before,
I did say good morning, by the way.
But she hadn’t heard me coming up behind her and was startled.
So now you are trying to scare me.
Then, sarcastically,
That’s really friendly!
At this point, I realized she was wearing ear buds and that that was why she hadn’t heard my original greeting, or my heavy footfall as I ran up the stairs behind her. Now I was a bit miffed at her taking offence with me, when she was the one with something playing in her ears.
I reached the top of the stairs again and turned around. She was near the top as well and as we passed this time I leaned over and said,
If you hadn’t been wearing headphones you would have heard me.
I don’t know if she heard me this time or not, but when she walked away across the reservoir I could hear her loudly proclaiming,
Oh now you want to be friendly. You could have just said hello in the first place.
She kept walking away, but by now, I was upset. So there I was at the top of the stairs shouting at her across the reservoir,
BUT I DID SAY “HELLO”.
Then I realized that there were dog walkers, and joggers, and kids going to school who were unaware of the preceding events and just saw a crazy old guy shouting at a woman. Felt a bit foolish for letting things escalate so quickly.
PS: the header image this time is from the first big snow storm in Toronto last month. It was an unusually cold and snowy December.
Very entertaining piece of genealogical family research. Truly impressive. Sent from my iPad
Laughed a bit at the woman with the headphones. I would have been yelling too! Skimmed you genealogy report. Interesting, especially given my Scotch-Presbyterian heritage. And isn’t genealogical research fun and, I might add, addictive. Happy New Year.
Thanks Curt – yes, genealogy is addictive. I always thought the objective was to find someone important in your past, but I have realized that is rewarding to just disentangle the lives and loves of ordinary people.
Very much so. And, I might add, go on searches in ancient graveyards.
The stairs story is great — a perfect morning snack (since it’s too early to forage into the weeds of the throngs of people named James and Elizabeth). More please. (i.e. I’d love a series on your brushes with Torontonians). TIA.
There are a number of Torontonians who subscribe to this blog. They are uniformly charming, polite and steadfast. The others though….
I spent a few minutes with my grandkids in front of The Captive Butterfly a few weeks ago. We decided that the captivity referred to in the title is not the butterfly, but the three rapt girls who don’t want to risk breaking the spell of wonder. Such a rich composition, thanks for flagging it Stu.