the harbordite

THE
HARBORDITE
Last November, We Remembered...
Inside this issue:
Editorial
2
Rememberance Day,
Cover Story
3
Harbord’s 3
Lost Soldiers
6
WWII Remem- 11
berance Story
Commencement 14
Grads Gives
Thanks
19
Looking Forward To...
35
Editorial: Message from Co-Editor
- Ben Lee (‘78)
Happy New Year, fellow
Harbordites! Its 2015 already! 2014 flew by so fast!
I’d like to take this opportunity to say how it was an
honour to be part of the
Harbord Rememberance Day
ceremony this past November. To honour the fallen
Harbord Students who gave
their lives up for our country’s freedom at such a
young age, was ever so moving. This year’s service was
amazing as we discovered
three more of our own Harbordites who gave their ultimate sacrifice.
I was impressed when I saw
everyone gather outside to
pay their respects. I felt
the unity of all Harbordites
and guests that morning and
was very proud to be a part
of the Harbord family once
again.
I would like to announce
that this will be the last
Harbordite in its traditional
semi-annual format. After
this issue, the Harbordite
will become a shorter more
timely web-based magazine,
It will also be published as
an online monthly publication.
I look forward to hearing
your feedback.
-Ben
Remembrance Day Presentation at Harbord C.I.
Cover Story!
A gathering of Harbordites surrounding our World War I memorial on Rememberance
Day 2014.
Remembrance Day Presentation at Harbord C.I.
Cover Story! - Continued...
Left Photo: From Left to Right, Sapper
Joseph De Ponte, Major (ret) Michael
Boire, Piper Douglas Clark, Corporal (ret)
William Davis, Harbord Principal Vince
Mead and Sergeant (ret) William Carlisle,
President of the Toronto Black Watch
Association
Right Photo: On left, Great niece,
Mrs. Evelyn Martin and on right,
Great-great niece, Ms. Maria Harrison, of Lt. Myer Tutzer Cohen M.C.
laying down his wreath.
Harbord students laying down poppies in
memory of the fallen
soldiers who were
Harbordites.
Continued...
Left Photo: Syd Moscoe speask to the
crowd prior to hearing the wonderful
sounds of the Harbord choir.
Right Photo: The “New” addition of
the three names to our World War I
memorial.
Harbord’s 3 Lost Soldiers - The Back Story
by Syd Moscoe
HARBORD’S THREE LOST
SOLDIERS – THE BACK
STORY
It all started in the fall of
2013. The Harbord Club received an email from Mr.
Earl Chapman, Archivist of
the Royal Highland Regiment (RHR) of Canada, also
known as The Black Watch,
48th Highlanders. He sent a
copy of a news item from
the Toronto Daily Star,
dated November 17, 1917,
informing of the death of
Lt. Myer Tutzer Cohen, on
the battlefield, who was
awarded the Military Cross
posthumously. The article
referred to Lt. Cohen having attended Harbord Collegiate Institute before
enlisting in the Canadian
Army to fight in the First
World War. Mr. Chapman
inquired as to whether we
had any records to confirm
Lt. Cohen’s attendance at
Harbord. Lt. Cohen’s name
was not on Harbord’s list of
those who served in the
First World War.
Unfortunately, TDSB does
not retain school records
for more than 50 years. A
search of what records we
have in our Museum did not
elicit any other information. We do know from
articles written in old Harbord Reviews (the original
name for the annual yearbook) and “The Happy
Ghosts of Harbord” that
over 500 students and
staff of Harbord enlisted
and served in the First
World War but we only had
information for about 460.
The newspaper article did
refer to the fact that Lt.
Cohen and his family lived
at 588 Huron Street which
was then and still is in Harbord’s attendance area.
We have been informed
that if no other evidence is
available, it is accepted
that facts of residence,
schooling and dates of
death as reported in a
newspaper are accepted as
primary proof of those
facts.
The Directors of the Harbord Club took the matter
under consideration and decided it would be a good
idea to investigate the possibility of adding Lt. Cohen’s name to “Our Soldier”. There was a space on
the west side of the monument. It appeared that
when the monument was
first designed space was
left on both the east and
west side for an additional
plaque. At sometime in the
past, the space on the east
side had a plaque added.
With the help of Mr. David
Sowerbutts, the Chief Ar-
chivist of the TDSB , we were
put in touch with Mr. Brett Davis of the Age of Bronze , a
metal work artisan. He came
and looked over the existing
plaques. He informed us that he
could design and manufacture a
bronze plaque to match the colour and letter size of the existing plaques and it would be
similar in shape and size to the
plaque that had been added to
the east side of the monument.
As Bret informed us, the letters of the original plaques
were created in 1921 and as the
moulds for those letters were
no longer available he would
have to make , not only the
plaque from scratch but also all
the letters for Lt. Cohen’s
name.
We were quoted a price of
$2034.00 and the same was
paid by the Harbord Club in
May and Bret commenced his
work.
In order to assist in covering
some of the cost and have the
students feel a sense of participation , Belinda MedeirosFelix, a Harbord Director and
Harbord Staff member approached the Prom Committee.
They agreed that $1.00 from
each Prom ticket sold would go
to sharing in the cost of the
plaque. And so $215.00 was
raised by the Class of 2014 and
received by the Harbord Club
with thanks.
In June, I was in Montreal and
Continued...
had an opportunity to visit
Sts. Andrew & Paul Presbyterian Church, the home
church of the RHR , 48th
Highlanders, and as well ,
the 48th Highlanders Armoury. The main window of
the Church is dedicated to
the Regiment and contains
(in part) a figure of a soldier in kilts with the Jewish
Star of David over his right
shoulder. The soldier is Lt.
Myer Tutzer Cohen. In the
Armoury I visited the Officers’ Mess and there in
their highest place of honour was a photo of our lost
Soldier, Lt. Cohen. We now
have a copy of that photo .
It will be placed on our website and eventually in our
Hall of Memories.
When I returned to Toronto, an email was waiting for
me from Ms. Fiona Smith ,
the archivist at St.Andrews
Presbyterian Church , King &
Simcoe Streets, here in Toronto.
She informed me that her
church was in the process of
honouring First World War
soldiers who gave their
lives. She came across the
name of Lt. Walter Howard
Curry.
The records she was able to
obtain and which she forwarded to us established
that Lt. Curry had indeed
attended Harbord before
going on to University and
then enlisting in the Canadian
Army.
I then contacted Bret and told
him we had another name to be
added to the plaque he was
creating. As there were now
two names he would have to
adjust the spacing so he started over again.
As school started up again in
September, Belinda also an advisor to the SAC, approached
the SAC regarding participating in sharing the cost of the
new plaque.
After some discussion, the
SAC, led by President Andre
Roy, agreed that $1.00 from
each student’s SAC fees would
be donated to the Harbord
Club to help defray the cost of
the plaque. And so the students raised $1113.00 for
which many thanks.
Later in September we received an email from a media
firm working on a documentary
for TVO . They inquired about
Lt. Col.Thomas Craik Irving,
D.S.O., who from the records
they had and which they provided to us, had attended Harbord before going on to the
University of Toronto and then
enlisting in the Canadian Army
Engineers. And now we had a
third lost Harbord soldier
found.
I contacted Bret again. It was
now late September. He told
me that with three names he
would have to start all over
again. He would have to destroy what he had done. The
process requires that he
makes a sand mock-up, a
mould from that which he
sends to the foundry where
it is cast in bronze. It then
comes back to him for polishing and patinating –a form of
protective coating . He hoped
it would be ready on time.
Plan “B” was that if it was
not ready he would have the
mockup in place for the Remembrance Day ceremony.
In the interim we learned
from Mr. Chapman, that
there were direct family descendants of Lt. Cohen, Mrs.
Evelyn Martin of Kitchener ,
a great-niece as well as her
daughter Maria Harrison , a
great-great niece. Unfortunately were unable to find
any direct descendants of Lt
Curry or Lt. Col. Irving.
The next step was to create
a program for a Remembrance Day service. Though
Harbord conducts such a
service every year, it has not
been since 2007, when we
rededicated a refreshed and
restored “Our Soldier”, that
we had a service outside. We
contacted Mr. William Carlisle , President of The Toronto Black Watch Association , who readily agreed to
Harbord’s 3 Lost Soldiers - The Back Story
by Syd Moscoe - Continued…
assisting in the programming
and protocol. Through his efforts we were able to obtain
the services of Douglas Clark
as our piper and as well Sapper Joseph Da Ponte of the
32nd Combat Regiment to attend to represent Lt. Col.
Thomas Irving. Ms. Fiona
Smith would represent Lt.
Curry , while Mrs. Evelyn Martin and her daughter Maria
Harrison would represent Lt.
Cohen.
Two special representatives
whom Mr. Carlisle brought
along to the service were
retired Major Michael Boire,
C.D., who presently teaches at
the Royal Military College in
Kingston , Ontario , and retired Corporal William Davis ,
a veteran of the Second
World War. Major Boire
spoke at the service. Sapper
Da Ponte (age 21) and Corporal Davis (age 92) had
something in common, both
were grads of our neighbour
school, Central Tech.
Mr. Arnold Witt , viceprincipal, led a team of teachers including , Mr. Daniel Leblanc, Mr. Aaron Magney, Ms.
Karen Beutler, Ms. Barbara
Martin and Ms. Renata Todros
in working out the logistics of
how to get all the students
into place, when and what
music and songs would played
during the service. Mr. Carlisle advised as to the order
and timing of the service.
In the meantime, while all
the meetings were taking
place, and the students rehearsing, we worried and
wondered about the progress
of the plaque. On the Thursday before Remembrance
Day, we received a telephone
call from Bret Davis that he
had just received the plaque
, had finished the patination
and would be installing it the
next day. No need for a Plan
B.
Unfortunately , as Bret told
us later, the granite of the
monument was so hard he
broke his drill bit and was
unable to buy one any where
in the neighbourhood and so
he returned Monday November 10th, to complete the installation. At this point, Art
teacher Mr. Ross and his
crew of artists prepared a
cover of black cloth and attached it to the monument
to cover the plaque which
cloth would be removed during the service by the representatives of our three lost
soldiers.
November 11 dawned sunny
and bright with a welcome
temperature of 16C. The entire student body moved into
their assigned places with
military precision. The band
hung out in the foyer of the
auditorium while the choirs
took their place on the steps
leading to the auditorium.
Mr. Magney and his crew in-
stalled a public address system to bring sound to assembled.
Mr. Vince Meade, Principal,
welcomed all. I, Syd Moscoe
acted as Chair. Manuel Ferreira, a staff member, handled the flag honours. Gabriel
Dunk-Gifford, a Grade 12 student, handled the trumpet
honours.
After the opening remarks ,
the plaque with the names of
Harbord’s three lost soldiers
was unveiled. For Lt. Myer
Tutzer Cohen were, Corporal
(ret) William Davis, Major(ret)Michael, C.D., Sergeant (ret)William Carlisle,
representing The Black
Watch Association of Toronto
and Mrs. Evelyn Martin and
Ms. Maria Harrison. For Lt.
Walter Howard Curry was Ms.
Fiona Smith, and for Lt. Col.
Walter Craik Irving, D.S.O.,
was Sapper Joseph Da Ponte,
32nd Combat Regiment. The
covering was removed by Corporal (ret)William Carlisle and
Sapper Joseph Da Ponte in
the appropriate military fashion and later handed to Syd
Moscoe to be placed in the
Harbord Museum.
At 11:00 am Gabriel DunkGifford played Taps while Mr.
Manuel Ferreira lowered the
flag to half-mast and two
minutes of silence was observed. The end of the silence
was sounded with Revielle
played by Gabriel after which
...Continued
the Piper Mr. Douglas Clark
played.
Following a musical interlude
nine wreaths were presented
and laid at the foot of monument in the name of and by:
1. The Black Watch Association by Messrs. Davis, Boire
and Carlisle;
2. Lt Myer Tutzer Cohen, M.C.
by Mrs. Martin and
Ms.Harrison;
3. Lt. Walter Howard Curry
by Ms.Smith and a student;
4. Lt. Col. Thomas Craik Irving,
D.S.O. by Sapper Joseph Da
Ponte;
5. Harbord Staff-Past & Present- Mr. Daniel Leblanc & Ms.
Belinda Medeiros –Felix; Ms.
Janice Gladstone and Mr. Daniel LeBlanc
6. The Harbord Charitable
Foundation by Harvey Mandel(HCI-1964) and Abby
Gopsill(HCI-2016);
7. The Harbord Club by Ben
Lee (HCI-1978), Sidney
Ingham(HCI-1978) and Sierra
Medeiros – Felix (HCI2010);
8. The Students of Harbord
Collegiate by Andre RoyPresident SAC; Mara Jezernik
– Sr. Vice-Presdient SAC; and
William Xu-Jr, Vice-PresidentSAC;
9. The Harbord Club Museum
Volunteers by Kira Knight and
Cameron McGlade Bouchard.
The choirs presented two numbers accompanied by the electronic piano.
The program ended with the
singing of O Canada. To the
sound of the piper playing , the
Grade 10 students entered the
Hall of Memories and placed
their poppies on the picture
frame of the veterans of both
wars and the rest of the assembled guests were invited to
place their poppy at the monument.
A reception was held in the
Museum for the invited guests.
It was in this gathering that
Mr. Carlisle presented to the
school a plaque from The Black
Watch Association of Toronto
thanking the students for
their contribution in honouring
Lt. Cohen and staging a meaningful Remembrance Day service.
- Syd Moscoe
Harbord’s 3 Lost Soldiers - The Back Story
by Syd Moscoe - Continued
WWII Rememberance Story by former
Harbord Teacher
- Ms. Clair Soper
REMEMBERING the 19,000
AIR TRAINING PLAN MUSEUM MEMORIAL WALL
SEPTEMBER 10, 2014…BRANDON, Manitoba
This year is the 75th anniversary of the beginning of
WWII. Over a million Canadians joined various branches
of the military and home defense to do their part in the
war effort. It touched every Canadian family.
Around the country there
were training schools set up
for aircrew. This initiative
was called The Commonwealth Air Training Plan.
One school was in Brandon,
MB. Over 130,000 personnel
went through courses there:
pilots, navigators, mechanics,
bomb aimers and gunners.
There were young men from
Canada and other Commonwealth countries, Australia,
New Zealand and Britain especially. Some were killed in
training,most went overseas,
and some did not return.
Thanks to the tireless efforts of Les Allison, who was
eighteen when he went to
the war, now of Carmen, MB,
and with the assistance of
Harry Hayward, a comprehensive book of the names of
those in the RCAF who did
not return, along with a brief
paragraph on each, was pub-
lished under the title They
Shall Grow Not Old (known
to many as The Book).
When my father and his
brother, both veterans of
the air war in Europe, found
this book 20 years ago, they
poured over it for days, looking for the names of old
friends from the war. They
were happy NOT to find
names in the book as that
would mean that the man had
survived.
There are over 18,000 names
in this book. And now these
have been engraved on a
black granite wall beside the
Commonwealth Air Training
Plan Museum in Brandon, MB.
This memorial wall was unveiled on Sept. 10, 2014, in a
very moving ceremony with
veterans, representatives
from the military, politicians,
dedicated museum personnel
and hundreds of people who
were there to see the names
of loved ones, names that
they could touch. People
came with photos and stories. Some families
hadseveral names on the wall.
Flags were raised and lowered and Les Allison, now 90,
with his son Neil, played the
Last Post. There was a flypast comprised of a Tiger
Moth, a Stinson, a Harvard
and a Fairchild, all from the
museum's collection.
Then, black sheets were removed from the wall’s granite
panels by relatives. More
than 60 of these panels
stretch for over 91 meters,
in a gentle arc, reflecting the
shape of a wing. For the most
part, the names on this wall
are of RCAF men. Their
ranks aren't given, nor their
dates, nor place of death and
burial, nor the circumstances. All that information can
be found in The Book and it
makes for sobering and tragic reading. Beside every name
is a number, mostly19 or 20
or 21 or 22. I saw one 17, and
one 44. These are the ages
of the young men when they
were killed. Short lives.
They were brave, and probably terrified, kids for the
most part. Facing the wall,
there is a 2.6 meter high
bronze statue of a young aircrew officer heading to, or is
it from?, his 'trip' as it was
called. He's looking at the
WWII Rememberance Story by former Harbord
Teacher, ..Continued
names of all those who did
not come home.
I found my uncle's name on
the wall, Sinclair Sop-
er, after whom I was
named. And I went looking
for the names of the 25
young men who had attended
Harbord Collegiate in Toronto where I taught for 20
years. I had met these men
through photos in the
school, their beaming young
faces smiling out at me,
wearing their RCAF uniforms so proudly.
I found the name of the father of a friend, Squadron
Leader Ralph Davenport,
who went overseas near the
end of the war to fly with
the boys he had been training in Canada. He was killed
over Germany in March of
1945. It's all in The Book,
with the names of his crew,
all buried in Kiev.
I also found the names of
the uncles of 2 other
friends, one killed in a training accident in England, and
the other over Germany in
1944, flying with 6 RAF
crew, like my uncle, in a Lancaster.
Every name on that wall has
a story. They all had families
and friends who grieved for
them and continue to remember. The tragedy is
that their life stories were
too short. What might they
have accomplished? Who
might they have become?
What they did in their lives,
wemust never forget. They
gave us freedom to live our
comfortable and secure lives
here.
They were all heroes. Some
were decorated. The celebrated Andrew Charles Mynarski, who was awarded a
Victoria Cross, is on the wall.
Medal or no medal, citation
or no citation, they were all
heroes, willing to make the
ultimate sacrifice. The
names of the 6 Canadian
PoWs, part of the 50 recaptured Great Escape officers
from StalagLuft 3 who were
shot by the Gestapo, are
there. The Mosser twins,
Andrew James and Robert
William, aged 19, both died
when their ship taking them
to Europe was torpedoed off
Greenland. They were not
among the 16 of the 53
RCAF officers on board who
were pulled from the frigid
waters by a frigate. Incidentally, all but one of those
16 survived to see the end
of the war.
That polished, black granite
wall, stretching for what
seems like infinity, with
more than 19,000 names including panels to RAF,
RNZAF and RAAF, serves as
a sobering reminder of the
cost of not being able to
keep peace and harmony in
our world. It's still some-
thing towards which human
beings are striving.
They Shall Grow Not Old
is on display in the air base
museums in Brandon, Comox,
Hamilton and Trenton. It
can also be purchased
through The Commonwealth
Air Training Plan Museum in
Brandon.
Donations for the wall and
the statue may be made to
the Commonwealth Air Training Plan Museum in Brandon.
Clair Elizabeth Beck Soper
- Ms. Clair Soper
THEY
SHALL
GROW
NOT
OLD
Harbord C. I. 122nd Annual
Commencement
October 10, 2014
2014 Scholarship and Awards Winners!
2014 Scholarship and Awards Winners!
2014 Scholarship and Awards Winners!
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Lydia Wong
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Tristan Morris
2014 Grad & Harbord Club 120th Anniversary Award Winner Gives
Thanks!
- Maya Biderman
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Lindsey Benjamin
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Victoria Lee
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Jhenelle Grey
taken from ”The Flash” - an English class
stude nt news pape r, 1980 taken from ”The
Flash”- a n Eng lis h class student newspa per,
1980
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Melissa Lam
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Vivian Martin
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Pascale Walters
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Katerina Hatzinakos
taken from ”The Flash” - an English class st ude nt
news pape r, 1980 taken from ”The Flash” - an
Englis h cla ss student news pa per, 19 80
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Rebecca Lu
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Jia Yuan Chen
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Nefertiti Wright
Mohamed
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Stephen Seo
2014 Grad & Harbord Club Award Winner Gives Thanks!
- Andy Nguyen
Mohamed
2014 Grad & Harbord Club 120th Anniversary Award Winner
Gives Thanks!
- Patrick Gallagher
THE HARBORDITE
Harbord C. I. - Looking Forward To...
In this section, we highlight school events that are upcoming
~ Feb 16th - Family Day
~ Feb 25th - Winter Activity Day @ H.C.I.
~ Mar 14th - 22nd - March Break
~ Jun 5th - Last Day of Classes, Farewell Assembly, SAC BBQ
~ Jun 23rd - Class of 2015’s Prom
2014 Annual Meeting of the Harbord
Charitable Foundation
Peter Miller, Treasurer of the Harbord Charitable Foundation, is pleased to
announce that this year the Foundation paid out $7,900.00 scholastic awards
at the Commencement exercises and the Awards Assembly. These are funds
earned from money donated over the years by former students , teachers and
friends of Harbord Collegiate establishing scholarships and awards.
Why a Harbord Club?
#1. To establish and maintain a sense of common
identity among former students and teachers of
the school
#2. To share news from Harbordites everywhere
#3. To provide funds for prizes, awards and
scholarships in all grades of the school
#4. To promote school spirit and pride in the students through historical knowledge
#5. To collect, preserve and display the school's
historical photographs, papers and artefacts
#6. To assist in class reunions and annual homecoming events
Contact us:
on Facebook - Harbord C.I. grads/alumni
(We are over 500 in group!)
via Email - [email protected]
or - [email protected]
Harbord Club Executive
President Emeritus - Murray Rubin -HCI-1950
President Pro-Tem - Syd Moscoe -HCI-1952
Harbordite Co-editors - Ben-1978 & Belinda-1981 -Staff
Director - Ben Lee -HCI-1978
Director - Sidney Ingham -HCI-1978
Director - Belinda Medeiros-Felix -HCI-1981 –Staff
Director - Vasan Persad HCI-1994 - Staff
Director - Diana Da Silva -HCI-2009
Director - Sierra Medeiros-Felix -HCI-2010
Director - Harvey Mandel -HCI-1964
Student Representative - Cameron McGlade Bouchard - HCI-2016
Please donate to the Harbord Club.
Charitable receipts are only issued for donations of
$50.00 and over. All cheques of $50.00 and over for
which a charitable receipt is required should be made
payable to "Harbord Charitable Foundation" and on
the face of the cheque in the Memo line insert the
words "For the Harbord Club" .
For any amount less than $50.00 or if a receipt is not
required please make cheque payable to "Harbord
Club"
Thank You.