days later on September 6 he wrote again to the family.
“Saturday Dear People: — I have moved and am writing this in my new room. The address is
S.E. Weir Knox College Residence Toronto,
but as the parcel will come by express possibly you had better send it to the office (120 Bay). It is unlikely the delivery man could find anybody to sign his book. It is chilly down here and I caught a cold last night or this morning. I think I had better have my overcoat. I don’t know whether to go up thanksgiving or not. I could go up Saturday noon & return Tuesday morning. I could bring the overcoat back with me then. I don’t like to spend the money (something like $5.00) as I have so little left and must buy some text books. I lost $2 out of my pocket Friday. I will have to have the coat pressed anyway and am not particularly anxious to go up. What do you think about it? For myself I think I had better have the coat sent down with the bathrobe. I suppose they could both go in a suit box. …”
Sam went on to describe his room, its position facing east onto the quadrangle and its bay window.
Although it was not encouraged, but it may have been condoned, Osgoode students were not expected to work in a law firm. For many a student however, it was a necessary adjunct to a livelihood. Sam seems to have been taken on by G. Wilkie of Corley, Wilkie, Duff and Hamilton whose address was listed at 120 Bay Street.
An October 1917 letter had Ruth musing that “Ted seems to have a near thing of it making ends meet.” For his second and third years he found a cheaper lodging on Washington Avenue nearby. Later he claimed he had been at Osgoode on scholarships. All his professional life Ted, or Sam, longed for an undergraduate degree in law, a LL.B.
In writing to Ruth in 1917, Martha may have sounded gloomy and depressed in her letter as her friends, including a special one, went off to war. She apparently indicated to Ruth that she did not enjoy teaching particularly. After the war her special friend returned from overseas, shell shocked and with amnesia. Remaining unmarried, Martha stuck it out teaching English and History at a high school in Sarnia, until her retirement in 1959.
The year after the war ended the family was eagerly waiting to hear that Ruth would be coming home. Ruth wrote on January 22, 1919, “I am on my way to Rumania. The Red Cross gently but firmly suggested that I go. It’s only until July. There will be 60 of us in the party — six nurses. I will keep a little diary. I will be giving out aid and food. No nursing.” Unfortunately, although Ruth’s letters number in the hundreds, the ‘little diary’ has not survived.
Ruth’s career in Romania centred around parcelling out food in remote mountainous areas and ensuring that peasants planted the seeds rather than eating them at once. In this she was so successful that her activities came to the notice of Queen Marie of Romania. Ruth was invited to stay in the palace upon more than one occasion and the Queen accompanied her on several of her missions. Ruth was decorated with the Regina Maria medal, the highest honour that could be bestowed on a foreigner by the Romanian government. Altogether she had provided 700,000 meals in one year. In June of 1920, Ruth contracted malaria and was invalided to Paris. Part of her prescribed treatment was taking pills laden with arsenic. By October, Ruth was invalided back to New York City and although still ill, she returned to London, celebrated as a war heroine.
When Ruth first arrived in Romania, she was headquartered in Bucharest, but when visiting Constanta on the sea coast, she celebrated her thirty-third birthday with a party. Her presents were jokes from her friends, except, “but I did get a beautiful Turkish rug from my buddy.” This was more than likely a reference to Wilbur Howell of New York, also serving in the American Red Cross and whom she later married. In Constanta also Ruth found what she had been searching for, a chess set for Ted. The one she found was of amber, intricately and delicately carved, and made in Moscow. Wilbur approved saying, “it was very fine.”
Ruth and Wilbur Howell announced their marriage in the City of New York as having taken place on January 22, 1921. No mention was made of a specific location, neither a church nor a city hall civil ceremony. Apparently there were no Weirs present, with the exception, of course, of the bride. Wilbur was to become a great influence on Sam in his growing interest in and appreciation of art. The two men became devoted friends and Wilbur’s acceptance of and hospitality to his wife’s family made him a quite exemplary son-in-law.
At some time between 1915 and 1920, Sarah underwent an operation for exophthalmic goitre. Dr. Hadley Williams, Martha’s former employer, performed the operation. Sarah must have been feeling tired and irritable, usual symptoms of the condition quite often brought on by strain and worry. Although letters written to those serving overseas were not to be retained, a letter from Sarah to Ruth from 1919 has survived, telling that, “Paul has sprayed the fruit trees. Ted is a very important person in some ways, in others the veriest infant, but he will improve with age in both directions, I hope.”
There was more encouragement for Ted from Ruth than from Sarah. She wrote to Ted, “Don’t worry about your shingle. There is always room for a good lawyer.” To Sarah she wrote that she was happy that Martha now had a good school. “We have all got that wretched lack of self confidence “and with Martha in Sarnia and Ted in Toronto, “you must be very quiet with only Paul at home.”
Ted was still a most impecunious student, studying and working with great earnestness and with no social life, no money to spend on dating girls or any sort of student high jinks and frivolity. In his final year in the spring of 1920 it was Ted’s turn to succumb to the influenza epidemic that took more lives than the hostilities then known as The Great War. He was at home for three weeks, cared for by his mother, and was allowed to write his final examinations late.
On October 1, 1920, Ted was called to the bar. Although he had graduated from Osgoode Hall earlier in the year despite the influenza, he had to wait for the first graduation ceremonies succeeding his twenty first birthday. His were the highest marks, one of four out of a class of 244 who graduated with honours, a most distinguished record but at a cost of loneliness and with none of the light-hearted camaraderie typical of an undergraduate.
4 HIS EARLY YEARS OF PRACTICE
EVEN BEFORE HE WAS CALLED TO THE BAR, SAM HAD BEEN EMPLOYED in the firm of Ivey and Ivey in London. One of the first cases he worked on, an appeal case concerning H.J. Garson and Co., the plaintiff, versus Empire Manufacturing Co. Ltd., defendant, involved alleged short weights and dirty metals. In the Supreme Court of Ontario Ivey and Ivey acted for the defendant. The appeal was dismissed with costs by the plaintiff to the defendant. The case was heard before the Chief Justice of the Exchequer, Sir William Mulock, and Messrs. Justice Riddell, Sutherland, and Masten. Sam was well pleased to have helped with the presentation of the case and kept everything related to it in a special file.
In 1921, he wrote to the External Registrar, University of London, South Kensington:
“Dear Sir: I am in receipt of the pamphlet containing the Regulations relating to degrees in Laws for external students and after reading the notes upon State 116, I am in doubt about my manner of admission.
I am not a graduate in arts of any university, but I am a graduate of Osgoode Hall (Ontario Law School Toronto) where I received the degree of Barrister-at-Law before being called to the Bar. Does this entitle me to admission of your law examinations? I am exceedingly anxious to write for the LL B (honours) but cannot go to London for your matriculation examinations. I, of course, have an honour certificate of matriculation into the Ontario universities and have standing in several subjects equivalent to the first year of our universities (Toronto and McGill). I can give references as to my fitness and would point out that I have received scholarships
