Sister Donnelly expressed much of her spirituality in the great love she had for nature. She saw the hand of the Creator in the beauty and songs of the birds, the trees, the animals and all of nature …
She loved going for walks in the bush behind our place with our faithful dogs and appreciated their company both inside and outside the house. She said that they were good therapy and made her think how faithful and wonderful the Creator is.17
One of Catherine Donnelly’s traits, already evident in her youth, which would endear her to many in the future was her generous and forthright nature. Although she did intimidate some with her dominant personality, she could be a good companion and an excellent raconteur, and was never hesitant about seeking and developing long and lasting friendships with a great variety of people. She made new friends during her summer term at the Model School. Several of her letters many years later recalled young men and women with whom she was still in contact. But her term at Model School was particularly enjoyable because one person taking the course with her was her dearest friend, Nettie Wright, also from Alliston. Seventy-seven years later she described their relationship:
… lovely good and constantly my faithful friend for the rest of her life. She lived to be a little over 90 and her Anglican father and home-training made her strong in morals and ethics. I hear regularly from her niece, Marion Harper — Mrs. J.F. MacKinnon of Toronto, a widow now. Her Mother was Frances Wright, wife of Dr. Harper. Only Marion is left of that bright good family.18
By January 1902 Catherine had obtained her first position as the teacher, responsible for grades 1 to 8, in the one-room Bandon School No. 10 at Adjala, near Colgan, at the south end of the township. She boarded with the Gunning family and with them attended the splendid Colgan church on Sundays, getting there by horse and buggy. She remained there until January 1903, when she transferred to her old No. 5 School, which she had attended just a few years before. It was a mile from her parents’ home, and she was able to save more of her scanty salary to pay for her forthcoming study year at the Normal School in Toronto to upgrade her teaching certificate.
Reflecting on her first teaching experience among her own people, Catherine remembered that “the people of that Adjala area were very kind to me — to any teacher. The pupils were very obedient and respected and loved the teacher. The families were good. They were good to me and God was good to me and to them.”19
CHAPTER 2
LIFE AS A TEACHER IN ONTARIO, 1904–1918
When Catherine Donnelly Left Alliston to attend the Toronto Normal School in September 1904, she left behind the quiet routine of her parent’s farm home, her younger sisters, Teresa (Tess) age fourteen, and Mary Loretto (Mamie) age ten. Her grandmother, Mary Ann Donnelly, had lived with them until her death the previous year, shortly after passing her hundredth birthday. Her mother had cared for her mother-in-law all her married life. Now she herself was not well and needed help to care for their home.
The decision to stop teaching and take the year of study in Toronto to fulfil the required Normal School year had not been an easy one for Catherine. Tess was boarding in Alliston while attending high school, and had a very good teacher. If Catherine left, she would have to stay home, as she would be the only person available to look after their mother. Was it right to interrupt her sister’s schooling and leave her with such a heavy responsibility at that time? In one way, the circumstances were right for her to go to Toronto because she had been asked to share lodging with her friend Nettie, who would also be fulfilling the mandatory year’s attendance at the Toronto Normal School for the Ontario permanent teaching certificate.
When Catherine sought her mother’s advice, the sick woman had replied, “No, you go, you know what you can do.” They agreed that it was important that she obtain professional qualifications because she could command a higher salary and be eligible for advancement.1 Moreover, Catherine’s mother had always approved of her friendship with the Wrights, and felt that she would benefit from living with such a congenial room-mate. Sharing a room also meant that Catherine’s meagre funds would go further.
Many years later Catherine recalled the importance of this decision to seize the opportunity to deepen her relationship with the daughters of the Anglican rector:
Nettie Wright was just 2 days younger than me and was a great Christian — one of great physical beauty too — as well as spiritual strength. Nettie Wright and her sister Amy too, were at Alliston School with me and were my best friends — continuing through my life. Nettie Wright and Amy were faithful admirers of the S.O.S. work and often said so. Nettie died May 28, 1974, 90 years old. They were truly Christians of a very noble type.2
Catherine worked hard in Toronto, and was enjoying her year when, shortly before she was to write her final examinations in May, she was unexpectedly called home. Her mother’s illness had been diagnosed as tuberculosis. The doctor said he could do nothing to save her and she required more care. Catherine was devastated; now she would not be able to complete her school year. Nevertheless, she prepared to leave Toronto immediately. Her problem was solved by the compassion of the Normal School principal, William Scott, who was sympathetic when she told him her plight. Her marks to date were excellent, and so he granted her full credit for the year’s practical work, waived her final examinations, and certified that she would receive the Ontario permanent teaching certificate in June. To the end of her days, Catherine Donnelly always recalled his kindness with gratitude.
Catherine returned to Alliston to a deeply disturbed household. Apparently she had not comprehended the hopelessness of the situation when the doctor had discovered the then fatal disease a few months earlier. As her father reeled from the shock, friends and relatives persuaded him that he would not be able to carry on the farm without his wife, or make the arrangements for his two younger daughters to attend high school in Alliston. Their mother had always attended to such things. He had decided to sell the farm and move into Alliston.3
The major factor in making this decision was probably his concern that his fifty-acre farm was heavily mortgaged,4 and it was unlikely that, at the age of fifty-nine, he would ever be able to pay his debts. In her memoirs, Catherine never mentioned the crushing mortgage, but she did refer many times to the shortage of money when she was growing up, and attributed it to her father’s “bad business ventures,” and the periodic economic depressions which afflicted the Ontario farm economy in the late nineteenth century. According to the old provincial directories, Hugh Donnelly was a woollen factor as well as a farmer — that is, a person who dealt in wool futures by buying up the fleeces from the farmers before the mills had established the yearly buying price. If the woollen factor received less money when he sold the wool to the mill than he had already paid the farmers, he could be in serious financial trouble.5 Land records in the Ontario Archives show a continuing series of smaller loans against the Donnelly property for many years, and even though they were paid off, they indicate a chronic cash shortage.
Even in her old age Catherine still recalled the sale of the farm with sadness. She felt that if she and her sisters had been given the chance, they could have managed to run the farm and thus keep the land and the old homestead she had loved. As she ruefully remarked to her nephew, “I thought I could teach near home and come home on weekends. The neighbours didn’t think it