Introduction to

A Mid-Century Childhood - 

Growing Up in Toronto's Lawrence Park 

It has been my ambition to write this book less as memoir and more as social history. My personal story is far from exceptional and not in itself especially interesting. Nevertheless, many snippets of memoir have intervened.

Years ago when I was doing research for Frank Welsman, Canadian Composer, I came across Clarence Duff's memoir of his childhood in Toronto in the 1880s.¹ It was an invaluable book for my purposes as I sought to imagine my grandfather's early years. I know that non-academic books of this nature can be helpful for anyone wanting to gain a particular sense of what the times were like.

My mid-century childhood was decidedly different from that of my daughters and vastly different from that of my grandchildren. It is for them, therefore, that I have made this record of the way things were when Grandma was growing up.

I grew up in Lawrence Park which, in the middle of the last century, was very much a suburb in North Toronto. Time and place play significant roles in one's childhood, and Lawrence Park is a foundational part of this story. For that reason I chocse to start the book with a brief outline of its history.

With times being what they are right now, I was perhaps drawn to exploring this subject with the hopes that future generations might take a page from this book and remember to enjoy the simpler things in life.

1Duff, J. Clarence. Toronto Then and Now. Toronto: Fitzhenry & Whiteside 1984