Sentimental Sunday: Goodbye, Aunt Norma

Aunt Norma, my Mom’s second youngest sister, died two weeks ago on 5 May 2013. I found out about her passing the morning after her death, as I was preparing to leave for the NGS 2013 Conference in Las Vegas. I immediately sent a condolence message to her son, my cousin Richard. Mom was deeply saddened by this unexpected news. She hadn’t seen her sister in over 20 years (Mom lives in British Columbia, while Normande lives in Ontario), although they spoke on the telephone.

This past Thursday, Richard called Mom to let her know about his mother’s last days. He explained that her Roman Catholic French-speaking parish priest administered the last rites, that she was conscious, and that she was surrounded by her children at the end. He also told us how he stayed by Normande’s side for 30 hours until she closed her eyes one last time, and that he made the arrangements for his mother's wake and funeral. Although Mom felt emotional listening to Richard’s words, she was grateful that he took the time to personally call her.

Normande, or Norma as she was also known, was born on 12 January 1937 in Rouyn, a mining community in northwestern Quebec, Canada.¹ She received the names “Aline Normande Laurette” at her baptism three days later at Cathédral Saint-Michel Archange in Rouyn. Her godparents, Paul Samuel and Laurette Coursol, along with her father Eugène, signed the parish register.²


Normande (right) with her sister Jeanne d'arc, about 1946

Eugène was the town’s chief of police.³ He and his wife Juliette, who celebrated their 11th wedding anniversary the previous summer, were the parents of seven living children (six daughters and one son).

I’ve written about Aunt Norma here, here and here.

In the spring of 1957, Norma married Howard Handy in Sarnia, Ontario. They had four children: Brian, Michael, Julie, and Richard. My cousin Brian, who was two months younger than me, passed away in 1979; Uncle Howard passed away in 1984.


Normande and Howard on their wedding day, 1957

I’ll never forget my aunt. She was tall (she and Aunt Jeanne d’arc were the tallest of the Desgroseilliers sisters), beautiful, always prettily dressed and coiffed, and a happy and smiling woman.

Goodbye, dear Aunt Norma.

Sources:

1. Paroisse Cathedral St-Michel Archange (Rouyn, Quebec), Sacramental Certificate, 1987 (privately held by Yvonne Demoskoff, Hope, British Columbia), Aline Normande Laurette Desgroseillier [sic] birth and baptism certificate (1937 baptism); issued 1987, citing the parish register. Although Normande was born on January 12th, she celebrated her birthday on February 12th.

2. St-Michel-Archange (Rouyn, Quebec), parish register, 1937, no page number (entries are entered in chronological order), entry no. B.17, Aline Normande Laurette Desgroseillier [sic] baptism, 15 January 1937; St-Michel-Archange Jean-Baptiste parish; digital image, “Quebec Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), 1621-1967”, Ancestry.ca (http://www.ancestry.ca : accessed 10 April 2011). Normande’s baptism record states her date of birth.

3. St-Michel-Archange, parish register, 1937, no page number, Aline Normande Laurette Desgroseillier [sic] baptism, 15 January 1937. Normande’s baptism record states her father’s occupation. Eugène was employed as chief of police in small communities located in northern Ontario and northern Quebec from about 1927 to about 1940.

Copyright © 2013, Yvonne Demoskoff.

Tombstone Tuesday: Maurice Belair

Two days ago on Sunday, I posted my father Maurice Belair’s obituary. Today, I follow up that post with a scanned image of his gravemarker. Dad is interred in Our Lady of Good Hope Roman Catholic Cemetery in Hope, British Columbia.


Maurice Belair gravemarker

 Dad's gravemarker reads:

BELAIR

Maurice Belair

1927 – 1996

Safe In The Arms of Jesus

Copyright © 2013, Yvonne Demoskoff.

Sunday’s Obituary: My Father, Maurice Belair

Tomorrow, May 6th, marks the 17th anniversary of my father’s passing.

My Dad had been unwell with chest pains when he was admitted to our local hospital the previous week. (Dad had a history of coronary artery disease since 1985.) Five days later, he suffered a heart attack¹ and died that Monday morning; he was 68 years old. His doctor was with him, but none of us (my mother, my brother or I) were there because of the early hour and the suddenness of the attack.

I asked Mom if she’d let me compose the obituary; she agreed. I prepared one for our town’s weekly newspaper (seen here)² and one for The Daily Press of Timmins, Ontario, where our family lived from 1958 to 1979.


Maurice Belair obituary, 1996.


Sources:

1. Maurice Belair, Medical Certification of Death, 1996; Fraser Canyon Hospital, Hope, British Columbia; photocopy supplied May 1996 to Yvonne Demoskoff, Hope, British Columbia. Dr. D. Duke, Maurice’s physician, completed and signed the medical certificate, and allowed a photocopy of the document to be made for Maurice’s daughter Yvonne.

2. “Maurice Belair”, obituary, The Standard (Hope, British Columbia), Thursday, May 9, 1996, p. 16.

Copyright © 2013, Yvonne Demoskoff.

Wednesday’s Child: Gaston Desgroseilliers, A Brief Life

Gaston Desgroseilliers (lower right) and his sisters, 1937

Top row: Mariette (left) and Madeleine.

Middle row: Simone (left), baby Normande, and Marianne.

Bottom row: Jacqueline (left) and Gaston.

(This lovely, but somewhat blurry, photo is the only one that my Mom has of her brother. Gaston looks about 2½ years old. I’m assuming that the baby in the picture is his little sister Normande, who was born in early 1937.)

On 21 February 1935, on a cold winter day, Gaston Desgroseilliers was born in the village of Hearst, Ontario, Canada. He was my uncle, my mother’s younger brother. Like his elder sister Marianne, who died young, I never got to know him. (I've written about Marianne's story here.)

One day in the spring of 1941, six year old Gaston, his father Eugène, his uncle Jean-Paul Beauvais (his mother's brother) and a few others went fishing on Georgian Bay, not far from where the Desgroseilliers family lived in Parry Sound, Ontario.

On the way home, Gaston sat in the back seat of the car. The door suddenly opened when the vehicle turned a corner. Gaston fell out. The car stopped and Gaston, who seemed alright, was helped back in. He worried that his mother wouldn't let him go fishing again, so he asked his father not to tell his mother about the accident.

But Gaston wasn’t alright. At home, he became feverish and ill. Two weeks later, on 6 May 1941, Gaston died at the hospital. He was only six years old. His parents Eugène and Juliette never fully recovered from the loss of their son.

In February 1987, I wrote to the Town of Parry Sound to see if I could find out where Gaston was buried. (My mother didn't know for sure where Gaston rested.) I soon received a reply from the Cemetery Records department, and later a follow-up reply. The letters contained information about the cause of death and the burial location. I was grateful to receive these details, but they came with an unexpected twist.

Mom had always believed that Gaston died of head injuries, but according to the death certificate (with its information transcribed into the Cemetery’s Interment Register), the cause of death was “acute lung trouble” (a type of pneumonia). As for Gaston’s place of burial, Mom only knew that it was somewhere in Parry Sound. Now she learned that her beloved brother was laid to rest in an unmarked, single grave in Hillcrest Cemetery.

Rest in peace, mon uncle Gaston.

Copyright © 2013, Yvonne Demoskoff.