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Event Date: August 10, 1935
Event Type: Death

Description: Suddenly, at Bradford on Saturday, August 10, 1935, Harold Leeds Blackwell, manager of the local branch of the Canadian Bank of Commerce.

Article summarizing Cpl. Reg. A.C. Wilson of the Bradford OPP detachment duties in Bradford; also includes his farewell party and information on his wife's efforts in town.

BRADFORD - Life-long Bradford resident and lawyer C.T.S. "Charlie" Evans last week shed further light on the history of the old convent on Barrie St.

The convent it currently the object of a legal tussle over ownership between the town and the contractor Fred Picavet.

Mr. Evans said he recalls being told by Kate Stevenson, the daughter of 19th century Bradford lawyer John MacLean Stevenson, that her father constructed the house based on plans of a Scots castle.

A CASTLE
"I recall her telling me that at one time he had gone to Scotland and had come back with plans of a castle and that he had this house built according to that plan," Mr. Evans said.

According to his personal records, Mr. Evans noted that Mr. Stevenson had been a Master of the Masonic Lodge in Bradford in 1877, a post usually held by older men.

"So hazarding a guess I would have to say that that house would be 150 years old," he surmised.

FIRST WAR
He said that the Lukes family, who owned the Bradford flour mill in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, likely moved into the house around the beginning of the First World War.

"Dick Crake bought the Lukes' house (where the Anzil Plaza now stands) around that time and the Lukes moved into what everyone now knows as the old convent."

Mr. Evans said a check could be made in the registry office in Barrie to determine when the property was originally purchased by Mr. Stevenson.

"Two weeks ago these columns reported on procedures required to convert Bradford's Association Library into a Public Library, according to advice from Mr. Mowat, Director of Public LIbraries for Ontario, at a meeting held here. Upon request from a publicly called meeting a Council can change the status of a library without a vote, but, if Council does not see fit to do this, a petition requesting the transfer from association to public library status, signed by 30 municipal voters, demands that a vote be taken at an early date. ..."

"Lavish was the praise Monday night as approximately 200 Bradford residents gathered at the community centre to pay tribute to nine firefighters who have each given more than 30 years of service to the town..."