By Nancy Miller Chenier
Oral histories from Lowertown residents
Now residing in Plantagenet, Jack Daoust still remembers vividly his early years in Lowertown. In is seared in his memory as the most dynamic and lively neighbourhood of Ottawa. Jack recalls living with his parents, his two brothers and his sister at 97 Dalhousie Street as the most wonderful time of his life. From 1947 until the family moved to Chelsea in 1956, little Jack’s world was all about his family, friends and neighbours.
One of the best spots to have fun in the neighbourhood was the park at the corner of Dalhousie and Cathcart – officially Bingham Park, but called Cathcart Park by the children. With school friends or other neighbourhood kids of all ages, the park was where Jack always went to play all kinds of sports – soccer or softball in the summer, hockey in the winter. With so many kids in the community getting together there, it seemed that the whole neighbourhood was looking after the kids.
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On summer weekday evenings, the recreation staff would show open-air movies using the park’s shack walls as screens. Jack would sometimes watch them from his cousin’s porch across the street. In winter, aside from playing hockey on the ice rink, the most anticipated were the winter festival festivities. On one occasion, Jack decided to experiment with how many hot chocolates he could drink. Being young, he drank and drank, and, as expected, was sick in the evening – proving that there is such thing as too much hot chocolate!
Since his house was close to the train yard, Jack would hear the trains pass by. The freedom he had as a child allowed him to explore the tracks. One day, he went there with his cousin Butch and saw an unsupervised handcar. Because they had seen the workers pulling the cranking bar up and down easily, they assumed that it wouldn’t be much harder for them to do it, too! With both hands on the bar, Jack pushed down as hard as he could, hoping desperately for the handcar to move. Fortunately, it was a lot harder than it looked, and it did not turn into a silent movie rogue handcar scene; but the train yard workers saw them, and the boys had to quickly flee the scene.
Another train yard memory involved Jack voluntarily testing the fruit that was delivered by train to see if they were any good. Back then, trains would arrive with all kind of fruit for the Ottawa stores in cars that had doors opening on both sides. Once the workers were away from the train car and the merchandise, Jack would open the other side door and select some samples. Fresh fruit was never wasted!
When his family left Lowertown and moved to Chelsea in 1956, Jack felt as if his life would never be the same. He was not only losing his friends and his neighbours, but also the place he called home. However, all of his great memories of family, friends and neighbours will remain with him forever in his childhood’s wonderland of Lowertown
Jack’s apartment building at the corner of Dalhousie and Boteler
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