The Past Life of Maureen Screen by Parkland Resident Don Kerr
Maureen Screen awoke on a morning in 1954 to find that Hurricane Hazel flooding had washed away fourteen homes on her street and killed thirty-two residents, including the five-year-old neighbour she walked to school every day.
The first thing she heard that day was a voice on a loudspeaker from a helicopter whirring overhead. It was warning residents who had sought refuge on the roofs of their houses to remain there to be rescued and not try to swim to safety in the raging waters of the Humber River.
It was only later that Maureen, who was ten at the time, learned that eighty-one people had been killed in Toronto and that police and firemen were helpless to save some people. A fireman described houses being swept downstream with people in them: “People were screaming ‘Save us! Save us!’ We could see them, but they were too far out. There was nothing we could do; the water was up to our necks.”
Maureen attended Western Collegiate, went on to secretarial school, and married her high school sweetheart when they were both twenty-one. Brian played hockey for the Toronto Marlies, was traded to a Boston Bruins farm team, and returned to Toronto to play with the Western Dodgers.
When South Africa was setting up a hockey league, Brian signed a two-year contract to play in the league that included German, Swiss and Dutch teams. He and Maureen emigrated to Johannesburg. They became very good friends with a local couple and stayed for nearly five years. Maureen describes South Africa as beautiful. “It’s God’s country”, she says. Brian played hockey and worked for Wilson Sporting Goods. Selling golf clubs. The company paid for his membership in a golf club, at which he played with golf greats Gary Player, Ernie Els, and Nick Price.
Maureen and Brian returned to Canada where they both got jobs with airlines, Maureen with Cathay Pacific and Brian with Canadian Pacific. Their connections allowed them to travel extensively and cheaply. They both loved to shop and, being married with no children, they indulged themselves shopping in Japan and Hong Kong. Brian got a kick out of going to a tailor in Hong Kong one day and walking out the next in a handsome, tailor-made suit for an amazingly low price.
They maintained their warm friendship with their South African friends and alternated visits every other year. Maureen and Brian took the couple to Cape Cod, San Francisco and a summer cottage. Their friends took them on various excursions, including to a famous wild animal preserve.
Maureen and her friend continued to travel together after they both became widows. Maureen visited Israel during a peaceful period and was impressed to see Jews, Arabs and Christians living in apparent harmony. She was especially conscious of a sense of history in the country. “It was like walking in the Bible,” she says.
For Maureen, the height of her travels was a safari to Kruger National Park, an African preserve, to shoot big game – with a camera, not a gun. “Elephants are my favourite animals,” she says. “They travel together, look after one another, follow the same trails every year, and they never forget: if they come across the skeleton of one of their herd, they pause to run their trunks over it affectionately.” She has ridden elephants and walked them, leading them by their trunks. In Morocco, she rode a camel which she described as “a mean animal – they bite.”
Maureen is afraid of snakes and doesn’t like “creepy crawly things like lizards.” In South Africa, she checked under the covers every night to make sure she wouldn’t wake up with a couple of geckos for company.
In the mid 90’s, Maureen returned to her church and her faith and has been involved ever since. (She now lives) at Parkland, (where) she enjoys social activities, including playing Samba, bingo and trivia and attending Bible Study.