{"id":23741,"date":"2019-05-09T16:56:11","date_gmt":"2019-05-09T20:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=23741"},"modified":"2019-05-09T16:56:20","modified_gmt":"2019-05-09T20:56:20","slug":"front-porch-perspective-clifford-gambell-an-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/front-porch-perspective-clifford-gambell-an-update\/","title":{"rendered":"FRONT PORCH PERSPECTIVE: Clifford Gambell \u2013 An Update"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Stephen Somerville<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was on a business trip last week when I received an e-mail on\nmy private account. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was from Andrea McKechnie, the daughter of Cliff and Pat\nGambell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had interviewed them back in 2007 following a column about a\nRemembrance Day display at Devins Drive. I wrote about meeting them in their\nhome in Barrie and reading about their dad\u2019s experiences in the war which he\nhad written down by hand.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Andrea had moved out of Aurora in 2017 but she comes back to Town\non a regular basis to visit friends and she noticed that I was still writing\nthis column.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She reached out to let me know that her dad passed away on\nFebruary 27at the young age of 99 and that her Mom had passed away\nin August 2014, after having been married for 71; yes 71 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meeting Andrea\u2019s parents has been one of the great pleasures of\nthis volunteer columnist position.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cliff was a great story teller and you could tell how much he\nadored Pat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They both lived long and fulfilling lives surrounded by the ones\nthey loved, which I think is all that one can hope for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Below are excerpts of the two columns that I had written about\nClifford back in February 2009.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On voting day during the 2007 provincial election, I was\nsituated at Devins Drive Public School as an election scrutineer. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I subsequently wrote an election notebook column about the\nsix hours that I spent at the school.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The last item in that column had absolutely nothing to do\nwith politics.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I reproduced the cute poem done by a young student named\nKyra about her dog Bailey.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A friend of mine who has a daughter at the school called me\nand said that my column was pasted on the door to the office, just above the\noriginal poem. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was obviously flattered by this and thought to myself\nthat at least my column is meeting a better fate than that sought by some of my\nliterary critics (and certain family members) who continually suggest a more\nappropriate employment for this column would be at the bottom of a bird cage or\nin the wrapping of old fish.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to telling me about the poem, my friend wanted\nto tell me about the amazing Remembrance Day display at the school.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

She had attended the Remembrance Day ceremony at the school\nthe day before and one of the Veterans present stated to her that the display\nwas the best that he had seen in his ten years of doing these things. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

She went on that each piece of memorabilia in the displays\nhad a direct connection to a particular student.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

She said that I should go and see the exhibits as they\nwon\u2019t be up much longer.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So I did. And I was not disappointed. I was amazed in fact.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I therefore wrote a follow up column about the Remembrance\nDay displays.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I wrote at the time that there were lots of things to view;\nbut one small exhibit caught my <\/em>attention. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Student\u2019s Name:\nTyler McKechnie<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Teacher: Mrs.\nTaylor<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Name of Veteran\n(Soldier): James Smith (Tyler\u2019s great uncle)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Date of Birth: May\n6, 1915<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Date of Death:\n1975<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

War Served: World\nWar II<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Position: Private\nwith British 8th<\/sup> Army in North Africa and then Italy.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also noted that\nhe was a \u201cDesert Rat\u201d. There is also a picture of Mr. Smith.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tyler\u2019s mother,\nAndrea McKechnie, saw the column, cut if out of the newspaper and passed it on\nto her mother, Pat Gambell, who, after reading it, gave me a call. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ms. Gambell said\nthat she enjoyed my column and told me that she had also provided their\ngrandson Tyler with some of her husband Clifford\u2019s war-time memorabilia, which\nhad also adorned the walls at Devins P.S. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pat asked if I\nwould, as a favour to her, read her husband\u2019s brief manuscript of his World War\nII experiences, and see what I thought of it.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I automatically\nsaid, \u201csure\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, late last\nfall, I went to see Pat and her husband, Clifford G. Gambell in Barrie. They\nwere so nice and you could just feel the love between the two of them (they\nhave been married for sixty-five years). I had a most enjoyable couple of hours\nwith the two of them.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cliff regaled me\nwith his many war stories and Pat told me about the first time they met, while\nCliff was stationed in England.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cliff said that\nhis family had asked him to write down these experiences; which he did in a\nthirty-one page manuscript.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I did not have the\nopportunity to read Cliff\u2019s work until an extremely cold and snowy Sunday this\npast January; once I picked up the manuscript, I did not put it down until I\nwas finished.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was absolutely\nfascinating reading.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In my next column\nI plan to share some of these experiences with you, offer a few thoughts on why\nand how we need to preserve the lessons and experiences of our noble freedom\nfighters and lastly provide some of the uplifting words of tribute that Andrea\nmade at her father\u2019s funeral.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stephen can\nbe contacted at stephengsomerville@yahoo.com<\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Stephen Somerville I was on a business trip last week when I received an e-mail on my private account. It was from Andrea McKechnie, the daughter of Cliff and Pat Gambell. I had interviewed them back in 2007 following a column about a Remembrance Day display at Devins Drive. I wrote about meeting them […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[29,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-columns","category-opinion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-6aV","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-01 14:16:03","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23741\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}