This week we return to our look at some of the “historic characters” from our community who you may never have known were from Newmarket. I am profiling two people who, while they made their contributions elsewhere, got their start here. I would like to think their time spent in Newmarket contributed to their successes after they moved on.
The first is a man whose name you may recognize, but were unaware of his Newmarket connection. Harvey Reginald MacMillan was at one time said to be the richest man in Canada.
MacMillan was a Newmarket farm boy, raised by his maternal grandmother in Pine Orchard. He would go on to be one of Canada’s all-time success stories as the founder of MacMillan Bloedel, the country’s largest forestry products company.
Born Sept. 9, 1885, he was an only child who grew up on his grandmother’s farm and attended Bogarttown Public School and Newmarket High School before proceeding to the Ontario Agricultural College in Guelph, where he excelled in his studies. He was quoted in an interview as commenting that he initially had no interest in agriculture and particularly in forestry, but that particular course was the cheapest area of study in which he could enroll.
His interest in forestry came about because he loved to work outdoors, get his hands dirty, and work in relative isolation. A lucky field of study, indeed, as it would lead to fame and fortune and he would be a driving force in the forestry field throughout his life.
After completing his Bachelor of Science, he took a job on a forestry survey crew in British Columbia before enrolling at Yale in 1908, where he would receive his master’s degree in forestry management. Returning to British Columbia after graduation, he became chief forester in 1912 after spending nearly three years in a sanatorium recuperating from tuberculosis.
He would go on to establish the BC Forest Service, holding the position until after the First World War.. He became the timber-trade commissioner for the federal government, assistant manager of the Chemainus plant of Victoria Lumber and Manufacturing Co. and, by the end of the war, an employee of the Imperial Munitions Board.
In 1919, MacMillan, backed by British timber merchant Montague Meyer, launched the H.R. MacMillan Export Co. His manager and later partner was W.J. Van Dusen, and the two men developed the company into a major exporter of lumber.
He proved to be a real entrepreneur, combating his competition with aggressive marketing, the purchase of sawmills and timber limits, and the building of a plywood plant in 1935. During the Second World War, MacMillan was chairman of Wartime Shipping Ltd, a Crown corporation.
After the war, he continued to expand his company, building the Harmac Pulp Mill in 1947. In 1951, the company merged with Bloedel, Stewart and Welch. In 1956, MacMillan resigned as chairman and, in 1970, he and Van Dusen resigned as directors, but MacMillan maintained his interest in MacMillan Bloedel until his death in Vancouver in 1976.
MacMillan funded multiple philanthropic endeavours, many of which were named in his honour. These include: the H.R. MacMillan Space Centre (formerly the H.R. MacMillan Planetarium) in Vanier Park in Vancouver, the MacMillan Provincial Park along Highway 4 east of Port Alberni, B.C. (the park contains the world-famous Cathedral Grove, a stand of large Douglas fir), the H.R. MacMillan Theological Library at the Vancouver School of Theology, and the H.R. MacMillan Building at the University of British Columbia.
The second of our featured “historical characters” is Mazo Roche, born on Prospect Street Jan. 15, 1879. Her father, William Richmond, and uncle, Daniel, were well known local merchants, with Daniel having shops in Aurora and Toronto. Her mother, Alberta Lundy, was the daughter of Daniel Ambrose Lundy, a foreman at the Cane Wood Products Company. Alberta Lundy was a second cousin to my Grandma.
In 1881, then aged 3, she moved to Aurora, where her father managed one of Daniel’s stores. She is said to have always had the ability to create drama around her. In many interviews, she spoke of her “happy and cherished childhood” and it would seem that once she became an author, she drew upon those childhood memories for her plot lines and characterizations.
Her cousin, Caroline Clement, was her constant companion in a series of plays and misadventures as a child. Remember that name, as it will pop up later in this narrative.
Roche always claimed there was a French aristocrat in her lineage, which prompted her to change her name to Mazo de la Roche — her nom de plume, so to speak. She was the only member of the family to do so. In her biography, Roche obscured her past, with no mention of her birth place, early years or heritage.
She is quoted in an article from the ‘50s with saying, “As I look back on my grandparents and great-grandparents, great aunts and great uncles, I am struck with just how ordinary they were, having never accomplished anything notable at all — I descend from a series of distinguished-looking nobodies.”
John Roche, a school teacher, and Sarah Roche, who were Roche’s paternal grandparents, are buried in Newmarket Cemetery. It seems that Sarah so impressed Mazo that the fictional Gran Whiteoaks was based on her grandmother.
Many of the so-called nobodies in her family crossed the rugged Pennsylvania mountains and floated their Conestoga wagons across the wilderness to reach their new home here in the Newmarket area.
Her great great grandparents, Enos Lundy Sr. and his wife, Rachel, with their eight children, made their month-long journey to our area in 1805. Of the Quaker faith, they would take up land on Concession 2, east of Aurora.
Her great grandfather, Enos Lundy Jr. was only nine years old when he walked the trail to their new home. In 1817, he was to marry Margaret Bostwick from Concession 3, Whitchurch, and among their 10 children was Daniel Ambrose Lundy, Roche’s grandfather.
Roche was an early feminist — my grandmother regaled me with stories of her exploits — and was a very successful writer of the time, Jalna and the story of the Whiteoaks being two of her more famous novels. She blazed the way for so many female writers of her day. She was a lesbian who never really hid the fact from her public. She and her cousin would enter a life-long relationship, finally adopting a young girl, who they raised together in staid old Toronto. There is a cairn at the entrance to Fairy Lake dedicated to the memory of Mazo Lundy aka Mazo de la Roche.
This grand old woman of letters died in 1961 in Toronto and rests in the Anglican church-yard in Sibbald Point near Lake Simcoe. Family lore states that she loved the area from first sight, but even more important to her was the fact it was the final resting place of her life-long nemesis, Stephen Leacock, who had over the years debated with her in public about the waste of literary prowess on a mere woman and had berated her for her sexual bent.
My grandpa told me that she bought the plot overlooking the final resting place of Leacock to gloat for eternity the fact that she had been successful despite her gender. Her initial request for her tombstone had made mention of him but the story goes that she was dissuaded from proceeding with this form of revenge.
I hope you have enjoyed this glimpse into the lives of two of Newmarket’s famed citizens who, while having to go out into the world to find success, always saw Newmarket as the place they began their lifelong adventure.
Sources: The Toronto Star – Jalna Author was born in Newmarket August 1984; The Newmarket Era – Once Canada’s Richest Man; Lundy Family History; A Collection of Oral History Interviews – Richard MacLeod
