KAWARTHA LAKES-In the 1980s, the Fenelon Falls Public Library was one of those places that most village residents visited regularly and Marg (Holliday) Allen was the familiar face that greeted them. After becoming librarian in 1977, Marg loved her job and devoted herself to making the library the best it could be for the community. “It was her dream job,” her daughter Kathy Arscott explains. Many families would remember her from Storytime.
Marg Holliday was born on September 4, 1926 in Orillia. As a child, her family moved several times, as her parents pursued different business ventures. Her family moved to Loring, where her father operated a store and post office. Then they moved to Burnt River—where her parents Anna Mae and Fred Holliday operated Holliday’s Hideaway, a tourist lodge on Four Mile Lake. “It was very rustic,” Kathy says. “They had cabins there for guests to stay in. Grandmother was a great cook and prepared the meals for the families that came in the summer by train.” Next, Hollidays moved to Fenelon Falls, where they owned the Hearthstone—another accommodation located near the south shore of Cameron Lake.
“They moved quite a bit,” Kathy recounts. “Every time, she would pack up all the books that would have been left behind. Though they were heavy, she always wanted to take them with her. As something that she loved, books were second only to her kids. She enjoyed reading mysteries.”
As a young adult, Marg became a teacher, working at schools at Fell’s Station, Haliburton (Grades 4-6), Nogies Creek and Union Creek. While she was teaching at Union Creek, she met Clarence Allen and they married in 1950. The young couple moved to Oshawa, so Clarence could take a job at GM—as many young men from the Kawarthas did in that era. Marg taught at St. Gregory Separate School and Holy Cross Roman Catholic School. To teach at these schools, she had to be Catholic and had converted when she was married.
As a primary teacher, “the children just loved Marg,” Kathy remembers. “She was 100% patient. She was always patient with me when I was growing up and she was just as accommodating for her students. She was very good at being there for people and she was always trying to be helpful. She brought kids up to Fenelon Falls to go swimming before she retired from teaching in Oshawa, so I met many of her students outside of the classroom. No one ever had a bad thing to say about my mom. She was admired.”
While Marg and Clarence were raising their family in Oshawa, they had a cottage on Fell’s Bay, just north of Fenelon Falls. When Kathy graduated from high school, she was more interested in living in Fenelon Falls than Oshawa, so “I thought I would like to move up to the cottage. My parents said they had been wanting to do that, but we were waiting for me.” So, the family moved back to the Kawarthas. One of Kathy’s sisters lived in Fenelon Falls, the other in Lindsay. In 1975, they converted their cottage to a year-round home, by adding a second storey to it.
Marg retired from teaching when her family moved to the cottage, and started volunteering at the Fenelon Falls Public Library. At the time the library was located in a shop on Colborne Street, in the Cunningham-Fraser block, beside the IGA. John Sobko owned the building, renting it to the library for $77 per month. There were wooden bookshelves on either side, with the lower books displayed on an angle to make them easier to see. In 1983, Sobko demolished the building to make way for an IGA expansion.
After Marg had volunteered for two years, librarian Evelyn Snedden retired. Marg was hired as Fenelon Falls’ new librarian in 1977. At the time, the library was fundraising to open a more modern facility on Market Street in former municipal offices—the village office was then housed in Heritage House (RWH Construction). Marg worked tirelessly to make this dream a reality, as many people volunteered and donated. Early in 1980, the new library opened—it was much larger, which allowed the it to offer readers a better selection and have space for programming.
“Marg always had the kids at heart,” Wayne notes. “She was always thinking of something that they could do. She would hide books in the library for the kids to go find them. She had drawing activities set up on the table. She really encouraged kids to use their imagination. She had a reading program on Saturday morning. My kids often went, and then they would want to go bowling in the afternoon.” Storytime at the Fenelon Falls Public Library was well attended. Marg set up chairs facing the front counter, where she would present the weekly program.
“I started working at the Fenelon Falls Library in 1990,” Debbie observes. “At the time I had only been in Canada for 6 months and was feeling very homesick. Marg Allen was the supervisor of the Fenelon Branch, which at that time was part of the Victoria County Library System. She took me under her wing from the start. She was an amazing lady and her knowledge of local history was outstanding.”
“When you came into the library, Marg was always very friendly,” Wayne recalls. “She was often putting books away, waiting on someone, or helping them find a specific book. She was a wonderful lady, who would do anything to help you. She always had her hands going doing something.” Debbie adds: “Most of the time Marg had two things in her hands: A book and a can of Coca-Cola. When she arrived in the morning, one of the first things she would do was open a can of Coke.”
“She had an amazing knowledge of the books in the library,” Kathy observes. “If someone came in that she didn’t know she would ask them what kind of book they wanted, and then recommend authors to them. She would remember what people signed out, and then let them know if the library got another book by the same author. She made the library into the success that it was because she personalized the service—she realized what people liked and didn’t like. She had a very sharp memory right up to the end.”
Marg organized many book sales at the library, which acted as a fundraiser for the facility. She accumulated many boxes full of books, which were laid out on tables in the yard to the south for sale. It was a popular event, as many people enjoyed flipping through all the titles and supporting a community organization.
In the early 1990s, the library was part of another municipal reorganization, as the village offices were preparing to return to their former home. In 1993, the library would move into an addition on the south side of the building, which occupied the yard where the book sales had once taken place. “Marg worked tirelessly to raise money for tables, chairs, shelving and everything that we would need, that was not included in the building project,” Debbie explains. “Marg formed a Friends of the Library group, which put together a cookbook of local recipes as a fundraiser. She also solicited donations from community organizations like the Rotary Club.”
Just as the new library project was coming to fruition, the time had come for Marg to retire as librarian at age 67. “At the time, there was mandatory retirement, and she decided to retire before they came to ask her. She missed working at the library, and it was very hard on her. She was a very passionate woman, and everyone knew how much she loved that library. If people didn’t bring their books back, she would go, knock on their door and get them back. She gave everything to the library, her whole self. A year or two after she retired, the mandatory retirement clause was removed.”
Debbie became the village’s new librarian, and Marg once again found new ways to serve her community. “Even after Marg retired, whenever I called, she would help with advice and local history information for our patrons,” Debbie says. Over the years, Marg had talked to countless visitors at the library and she did not forget the stories that they told. She developed a unique understanding of local history.
Marg was a very avid collector—“She loved her stamp collection,” Kathy observes. “She stated collecting stamps when she was a girl, then when we were kids, she went to the Oshawa Stamp Club. Then after she retired from teaching, she faithfully attended the meetings of Fenelon Falls’ Stamp Club. She loved attending stamp shows, and would travel to Cobourg, Trenton, Ottawa or Peterborough to see if they had something on the list of stamps that she was looking to acquire.”
“After we moved to Fenelon Falls, she applied for a job at the Royal Philatelic Society of Canada and became sales manager. People from all over Canada and the United States would fill little yellow books with stamps and send them to my mom. She would make up a box of these books and send them to stamp clubs, for sale at their meetings. After the meeting they would be returned, and she would send the package on to another club. She received a 10% commission on sales—and it was a job that she did on her days off from the Library, because the library was only open Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.”
As Marg was collecting stamps, they often came attached to postcards—which were a source of interesting historical images. Over the years, she amassed an impressive collection of local images, to compliment her remarkable historical knowledge. She was part of a committee that wrote a history of Fenelon Township that detailed local farms, businesses and organizations. Then as Millennium projects, she was instrumental in compiling village histories of Fenelon Falls and Burnt River. In and Around Burnt River and Fenelon Falls Then & Now remain the most comprehensive histories of these villages.
The first local history book that she worked on was a history of Fenelon Township, published in 1987. Then, after she retired, “there were a lot of supper conversations about her wanting to do a book on Fenelon Falls,” Kathy remembers. “She started having the idea about five years before it was printed. We had worked together on collecting postcards, so as she put a story together, I would see if there was a postcard to illustrate it. She and Caroline Fenelius-Carpenter went to a lot of people’s houses to get the information. We saw the generosity of the village as they willingly shared their pictures so we could scan them. She had wanted to write a second edition, but passed away in 2019 before she had the chance. So, Caroline and I thought it would be a great idea to publish a second edition for the 20th anniversary of the book. There were a lot of changes in the businesses over those 20 years.”
After she retired, Marg did not slow down. She took a job as census co-ordinator for Victoria County. She worked just as hard as a volunteer as she had done to build the library. She became a driver for Community Care, Meals on Wheels and Vicky’s Values. She helped out at the Salvation Army Thrift Store. She worked the floor at Bingo Bingo. She collected money for the Canadian Cancer Society and the Salvation Army Red Shield. She would faithfully drop discs into Cameron Lake to measure water clarity. “She just loved helping others,” Kathy explains. “She was somebody who needed to do something. She was never idle. Even when she was not able to get out, she would still make phone calls.” The Provincial Government recognized her efforts with an Outstanding Achievement Award for Volunteerism.
No surprise, when Marg was not working, she was often reading. She was a member of the Thursday (Book) Club. “In one picture she was dressed up,” Kathy recounts. “And she did not dress up!” She was very happy when she was working on her stamp collection. “She loved going to the show. When Gone With the Wind came to Fenelon, she went to see it three times. It was her favourite movie. She also liked watching shows about historical battles. She just loved going to the casino and would play the penny or nickel slots—the bare minimum. It seemed she always made money, whereas the rest of us would play crazy and come away with no money. She was very methodical in everything she did. And if she took $100 into the casino, she would come away with a little more money.”
In her retirement, she had the time to devote to family history, and spent a lot of time on ancestry.ca. She not only worked on her own family history, but also for a friend. “A lot of women her age did not use a computer, but Mom was very apt with it. That’s where she played her solitaire games.”
Having been a teacher and a librarian, Marg loved to help younger generations. “Her children meant a lot to her. Her grandchildren were very special to her, she liked to watch movies with them. She liked to take them out in the woods to show them things. She and her family planted the pine trees on the 25-acre lot behind the cottage. She always had interesting stories to tell everyone, to pass on to her children and grandchildren.” Debbie adds: “It was a privilege and an honour to have the chance to work with Marg. She taught me a lot about working with the public and providing children’s programs.”
“A woman of many talents, who willingly shared with the community young and old.”
This story is a memory and nobody’s memory is perfect. Sometimes details get a little mixed up, things get forgotten or overlooked, and the perspective is inevitably subjective. If you notice something that not right, have something you would like to tell us, or a memory to share the museum would be happy to hear from you: [email protected]
This story is part of our partnership with Maryboro Lodge, The Fenelon Falls Museum and was written by Glenn Walker..
If you want to make a donation to the museum, you can e-transfer to: [email protected] or mail a cheque to :
Maryboro Lodge Museum
Box 179
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Fenelon Falls, ON
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