Thursday, January 23, 2020
In Memory of Gary
My wife, Sylvia, and I were deeply saddened when we received a phone call from Sophia, and also from an old friend, John Dolstra, who had lived next to me in Courtice, telling us of Gary’s death. Sylvia and I therefore want to extend our deepest sympathies to Sophia, to all the members of his family and her family, and to everyone who knew and loved Gary.
I was five years older than Gary, so that we weren’t classmates in school, but I got to know Gary very well later on, and, especially during the summers, when I was home from university, we did many things together – sometimes going swimming, more often golfing together, sometimes with his brother Ed, but often just the two of us. We were also keen fans of the Oshawa Green Gaels junior lacrosse team, which Gary and I loved to watch – an incredibly strong team who were not only the junior champions of Canada in their first year – 1963 – thereby winning the Minto cup, but who also went on to win the national championship seven years in a row.
Gary was one of the most likable and admirable people I have known. He was a very kind and loving person. He was also a person who seemed to me to be able to look at the world, and see it as it really is. Finally, Gary was as open and straightforward as anyone I have met. With many people, even very close friends, one sometimes feels that there are some things about which they would prefer not to talk, some places where one should not go. Not so with Gary, and this openness and straightforwardness was one of the things that I most loved about him. Like so many others who knew him, I shall miss him very much.
Michael Tooley
