VINCE DEE

The tribute to the late Vince Dee generated largest number of messages. One may suffice:

I choked up reading the Vince Dee tribute. My God, looking back he was larger than life in so many ways. Just a fantastic piece of writing. I doubt many people can say they ever met his equal. A true "One in a lifetime" character.

Mike [Joyce]

GRENELL ISLAND CHAPEL

Architect Rick Tague and contractor Steve Taylor share recollections about the distinctive building:

Hi Paul,
I just took a quick look through the magazine, and of course went right to the article about John B. Williams, Architect. When I put together a slide show on Island Churches of Jefferson County, Steve Taylor took me out to the Grenell Chapel. Either he told me, or it was written somewhere that E.S. Paxson was the architect for the Chapel. However, when I google him, he is a painter, not an architect. I did find reference to a brother William Paxson, who was an architect in Philadelphia. I am copying Steve with this, maybe he could shed some light on it.
Hope all is well with you,
Keep up the great work,
Rick

Hi Rick and Paul,
I don’t recall knowing who the architect was, but I believe there is a note inside the chapel that states who the benefactors were (the Kerr families and others.) It may also mention the architect. I have a key to the chapel and will check it out when conditions permit.
Best,
Steve

Dear Paul,
It’s nice to learn more about the Grenell Island Chapel. Construction of the building was originally financed by three or four prominent Grenell Island families, among them the Kerr family, that also built and owned the three cottages on Grenell - the large white house on the hill behind the Chapel and the other two on the small islands to the south connected by bridges to Grenell. The Sweetapple family (descendants of the Kerrs) still summers at South Point.

Arch Kerr (James A. Kerr), who inspired and mentored me, designed and installed the cross and six “songbird” glass windows behind the altar in memory of his aunt, Lois Kerr, who left South Point to him. The windows came from the boathouse that remains on South Point. The present cottage on South Point, formerly a skiff house, was barged into the canal and jacked up over the large stone wall and placed on the ruins of a large former house that had burned. Converting the skiff house to a cottage was Arch’s thesis project at Princeton in the early thirties.

Nellie’s father, Tommy Mitchell did the work on the island and in the chapel. Somewhere I have a print of Arch’s beautiful drawings for the window installation. If I come across them, I’ll show them to you.
Best,
Steve

KATHY KEMPSON PHOTOGRAPHS

Since you brought this to my attention again this morning, I've left it up on my screen. This ["Cliff Dweller"] has to be one of the best Thousand Islands shots ever taken. I need to sleep out in the boat in the Admiralties on a foggy night to wake up and get exactly this shot, because I can't think of any way to top it. I love it.

Ian Coristine

Hello Paul and Ian,
...The phrase "you can't step in the same river twice" really comes to life in relation to photography. One of these trips, everything will line up and it will be as magical as the day I took that shot. Different magic, but magical all the same. ...

Kathy Kempson

Paul, could you provide an email address or forward this message on to Kathy Kempson re her outstanding photo "Cliff Dweller"? I am a watercolor artist and each year I compete in the Clayton Museums Art show "Along the Rivers Edge". I would like to ask her for permission to use her photo as a reference for my entry this year.

Thank you for your help in this matter....I eagerly await each issue of TI Life. You do a great job!
Sincerely
Carole Norton Dingman
Stuart, Florida

"Cliff Dweller." Kathy Kempson

VANSTON'S STURGEON FISHING

Hi Paul,

Just read through many of the new articles in the magazine. Here's some "it's a small world" history for you...

Clark Vanston was married to my Great Aunt Nellie Vanston (my dad's, mother's, sister). Aunt Nellie was Clark's second wife, and actually was distantly related to him as well.

I spent my childhood summers at their waterfront home. I, feeling very mature and grown up and given reins of self responsibility, used to take one of Clark's small wooden (rental) boats out for a row and to fish out in the channel. Even now, memories are flooding back. Aunt Nellie used to send me to the barn in the morning to get fresh eggs from the chickens. They used to scare me, as they were naturally alarmed at their egg removal. Aunt Nellie developed a solution to calm both the chickens and
me! She would send me with a half dozen white porcelin door knobs to place under each chicken I had taken an egg from. The hen quickly settled back onto the door knob and I escaped with fresh eggs unscathed.

I still can see Uncle Clark at the dinner table having tea Aunt Nellie had just poured for him. It was the largest flow blue cup and saucer ever made I'm sure. Uncle Clark would pour the tea from the cup into the deep saucer. He would then proceed to drink from the saucer with a long inward noisy suck of the hot tea, cooling it as he drew it in. He never drank from the cup.

I certainly remember George and his sturgeon fishing. I recall a story
that he once felt he must have had on the largest sturgeon he had ever caught, but did not get to see the fish. While pulling in his hand line one time, the fish, caught at one of the outer hooks, began to swim in opposition. It was all George could do to hold the line. He lost ground on several feet of line and the whole time had to be careful to not set any hooks going back overboard into his hands. One of the hooks going out due to the tremendous pull, caught the wooden transom of the boat. George was being pulled backwards, like the 'old man and the sea', and finally was forced to cut the line when the freeboard of the transom was dangerously close to swamping.

I know Bob (Clark's grandson; George's son) quite well and we exchange stories a couple of times a year. Bob recently gave me a folder of photographs of the old waterfront homestead and images of Clark in a skiff, etc. etc.

I know somewhere here at the national Park we have a 1970's circa slide of George with a sturgeon overflowing out of his compact Datsun truck.

Small world, eh?

Bud Andress

George Vanston slides a live sturgeon out of his small pickup truck, circa mid 1970's. Park Warden Chris Kall, of St. Lawrence Islands National Park, looks on and an unidentified woman watches on the left. (Photographer unknown: SLINP files)

 

Paul, do have some old black and white photographs of the Vanston waterfront homestead (farmstead) including some shots of Clark Vanston (with fish; in a skiff, etc., if I recall), but nothing is electronic. I don't remember any shots of George - I'll have to check through them again. To repeat, there is that one shot of George with his truck and a large sturgeon here somewhere at the Park (not sure if only available on a slide, or if it got digitized, but I've seen the slide in the past).

Bud

Believed to be George Vanston with sturgeon in Jones Creek area, circa 1950's (Photographer unknown: SLINP files)

 

Hi, Bud.

I discovered one sturgeon photo in Kathleen Burtch's article on Jones Creek in Life on the Edge, showing David May and Elton Eligh with a big catch. It's a small halftone, so not very useful for reproduction. Kathleen adds a few interesting items: although Vanstons, Mallorys, and Mays all respected separate fishing territories, they shared a fishing camp on a small island at the mouth of Jones Creek. I suspect that this is just below Ian's island, Spong (or Raleigh, as it's named on the charts).

Paul

Sturgeon Holding Corral (date and photographer unknown: SLINP files). This temporary holding area was part of .a Mallory fish weir operation in the Jones Creek area

The island is now called Paul's Island, owned by Bill Paul. His son David is Brockville's commercial development guru and his other son Bruce is a neighbor (second house from the western point at Jones Creek) who wrote the story about Vanston.

Ian Coristine

Unknown man with sturgeon (date and photographer unknown: SLINP files), probably taken on Grenadier Island, Ontario.

Unknown man with sturgeon, circa 1972 (R. Marchant photograph: SLINP files)