Ken met lifelong friend Ted Jamieson harvesting crops during war

I met Ken during the summer of 1943 while I was working as a Burlington farm hand under the auspices of the Ontario Farm Service Force, an organization devoted to placing high school students on vegetable farms to replace workers who had enlisted. The reward to joyful students was an early departure from high school and a waiving of final exams. This enthusiasm was dampened a bit the first day we worked in the fields during a teeming all-day rain. 


(Above, Ted Jamieson, third from right, is best man at Ken and Babs' wedding Aug. 18, 1951) 

Ken and I became fast friends as our small Ottawa group became integrated with the Burlington high school students, initiating a friendship that lasted some 75 years. It included visits to Ottawa and Port Hope which continued until age made the highway much longer and the body much weaker. One such visit saw Ken and I participate in the creation of the NDP at the Ottawa auditorium. Ken, as you know, went on to become an active and effective member of the party. 

After the war, Ken stayed with us in Ottawa while he worked a night shift at E.B. Eddy paper mill in Hull. We saw no problem in the fact that we did not have an extra bed, as Ken slept during the day after his night shift while I slept nightly in the same bed. That's what friends are for. 

Ken participated in my 1950 wedding, when I took my beloved Doris as my bride. While Ken and I waited for the ceremony to begin an elderly lady brushed me aside and told Ken that she was there to see him married. Seems Ken was indeed the best man, after all. 

Speaking of weddings, on the night before she married Ken, Babs stayed at our place in Ottawa. To this day, neither Doris nor I can remember what circumstance led to that, but it was a fun occasion, with Babs having difficulty taking her eyes away from her wedding ring. 

Doris and I say Fare Well to Ken, a life well lived, and offer our sympathy to his family. 

Doris and Ted Jamieson

 


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