In doing some research for a book that includes references to River Street in Moose Jaw, I came across an inappropriate reference in a volume of articles about the history of Moose Jaw. The article appeared in a book entitled Moose Jaw: People, Places and History, a publication edited and, apparently, primarily written by John Larson and Maurice Richard Libby, published in 2001. I was enjoying my read until I came upon a reference to a man who might have been mistakenly identified by a reader as belonging to my grandfather, the owner of Moose Jaw Hardware. Quite frankly, I was outraged by that reference.
NOTE: The awkward layout of the book, including the table of contents and the positioning of an inserted article left the impression that a man named Don Kossick was responsible for the words at issue. It was apparently not Kossick who wrote them but one or both of the editors. For this mistaken attribution I apologize, but in my own defence, I did reach out to Kossick via e-mail several times but received no response. If for some reason he did not receive them, then the victimization in this entire matter is compounded — and I am sincerely sorry for it.
The intent of my article remains the same, however. In an unnecessary and factually inaccurate, out of context insertion to a chapter on “The Dirty Thirties,” the writer (s) included a third hand recollection (a memory of a man’s father) that suggested the owner of the store had deliberately refused to pay the store’s share of some work his father had carried out.
The man was said to have hauled furnace ashes away from the store in a dray on the basis of an understanding that participating merchants in a work relief program would cost-share payments for the work with the City of Moose Jaw (presumably funded by the federal government). I would have just ignored this reference but given the fact that histories of the city are very rare, the article leaves a sullied impression of the owner of the hardware in question that will likely stand for several generations.
By the way, full disclosure: this letter is submitted by a lifetime “left social democrat” and frequent social activist, so please don’t dismiss it as a defensive volley from a recalcitrant right wing ideologue.
The entry at issue makes a hearsay reference to an “old man” named Walter, who was deemed to be the owner of the store and the “father of Ross Thatcher,” who was at one time a social democrat and later the Liberal Premier of Saskatchewan. At the time that the relief program was in effect, however, the owner of the store was not an old man, as stated in the recollection. Nor was his name “Walter,” as implied in the book. It was “Wilbert” and his nickname, which flowed from that proper name, was “Billy.”
Some sober second thought and editorial competence would never have allowed the reference at issue to be published. It was, after all, weak hearsay, lacked any triangulation for context, and created a sullied reputation that will survive for many years. After all, there are no other popular histories of Moose Jaw, at least that I am aware of.
While the article made reference to a man who is long since deceased, fact checking with surviving family members or others who may have once been employed in the store at the time should surely have been undertaken.
Moose Jaw Hardware (sometimes referred to as “Thatcher’s Hardware”” was in its time the second largest retail store in Moose Jaw, second only to Eaton’s for many years. Until it closed in 1959-60, it offered a variety of products for sale, including not only an abundance of hardware items for farmers in the area and home renovators, paint and paint brushes, kitchen appliances, chinaware, beds and furniture, as well as toys, sports equipment and the latest CCM bicycles. It provided much of southern Saskatchewan with their first and second “automatic” washing machines and dishwashers, and their first electric and gasoline fuelled lawn mowers.
The hardware store occupied three floors of a building on River Street and, as I recall, approximately 9,000 sq. ft, of floor space. It was the anchor outlet for one of the first hardware chains in western Canada. There were other outlets in small towns in southern Saskatchewan, two in Moose Jaw (i.e., a smaller one on Main Street called the “Electric Hardware,” which I think was the first of the two stores in Moose Jaw) and two quite substantial stores, one in Regina and one in Saskatoon).
By my rough estimate, over its lifetime, the chain created employment for well over a hundred full-time employees and perhaps as many part-time and casual workers. Given its significance to the commerce of the area and its local and domestic origins, I do find it somewhat surprising that it has never been featured in historical pieces on the city. The same disregard was suffered by several other local businesses in the city, including Joyners on Main Street.
My grandfather was a frugal, careful and clever businessman, not given to ostentation. He had a clear vision of what he wanted to accomplish and the way that business should be run. He was also community minded and participated in a variety of local service projects in Moose Jaw, including through partnerships in relief programs. Not a vociferous man politically, he did have strong ideas about the importance of individual hard work and industry in a developing economy and was wary of competition to individual businesses from co-ops and governments. However, he was also strident in his views about the excesses of right wing zealotry. For this reason, he named the building in which he located Moose Jaw Hardware the “Eden Block” as a namesake reference to Sir Anthony Eden, the cabinet minister and , for a short, incomplete term, the British Prime Minster who aggressively warned against any alliance with Hitler in the years prior to World War II.
Like many owners of small and medium sized businesses, Wilbert came to deeply regret some of those intrusions, such as several requests for support of sports teams which, as it turned out, did not exist, several left wing organizations and right wing organizations of brief duration seeking membership signatures. He carelessly signed up for some of them in order to rid the store of several persistent campaigners for extremist causes. Wilbert also actively supported his son Ross’s support for labour during his city council years, as well as during his years with the CCF in the Federal Parliament.
By the way, the Moose Jaw Hardware was relatively successful, even during the Depression, a feat that was rare for small businesses at the time. That success could not have been achieved by an entrepreneur who was careless in managing his reputation with customers, employees and part-time workers. Anything like cheating a man on a work relief program would have, metaphorically speaking, circulated about the city at the speed of light. Let’s face it, Moose Jaw was a very small city at the time. The reputation of business owners was key to their success.
The Thatcher family name has been subjected to a continuing blanket of suspicions and insults associated with things that almost all the descendants of Wilbert Thatcher had nothing to do: neither the politics of my uncle, Ross, especially his misguided challenge to Medicare, nor the tragedy implicating his son Colin , who was convicted of murdering his wife Joanne. Frankly, we are so very tired of being considered in negative ways. Given this ongoing vilification, we hardly need our family name to be called into further disrepute by sloppy and inaccurate writing and book editing. Presumptive accusations of guilt by association through family membership is clearly politically incorrect and in the popular inventory of righteous concern, it belongs on the same vindictive pathway as prejudicial epithets about gay, ethnic or racial epithets.
I do hope this submission goes some way to correct the record at issue, although I fear the damage is done. In recognition of this likelihood, I am currently in consultation with a legal firm to pursue a remedy in the courts, which may be a more effective redress.
My grandfather was not a cheat and most of his descendants now live very successful and meaningful lives, from work in medicine and optometry, business, sociology and community activism, community-based architecture and urban planning, to script writing in Hollywood. Some of them practice law and two are artists. We are all saddened by this unnecessary, irresponsible and inaccurate shot in the dark at my grandfather that came out of the blue.
Sincerely,
Dr. Richard Thatcher
(Richard is a retired sociologist and currently a writer and artist now living in Craven, Saskatchewan. He spent the first five years of his life and dozens of happy visits to family back to the city after growing up in Saskatoon).
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the position of this publication.
