Stanley Emma Chant

  General Notes:

Obituary in The Toronto Star
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VENNER, Stanley Emma -- Peacefully on Sunday, September 9, 2001, at the Community Nursing Home, in Port Perry, at age 93. Stanley (nee Chant), beloved wife of the late Thomas Arnold Venner of Seagrave. Loving mother of Rae Yaki of Oshawa, Tom Venner and his wife Lyn of Toronto, John Venner and his wife Eryl of Oakville, Pat Fisher of Seagrave and Beth Deleff of Omemee and predeceased by baby Nora. Loved grandmother of 19 grandchildren and 23 great-grandchildren. Dear sister of George Chant of Brantford, Alan Chant of Toronto and Miriam Chant of Toronto. Lovingly remembered by Martin Fisher, Gus Yaki, Diane Venner, Barry Deleff and Dave Newman. Relatives and friends will be received at the WAGG Funeral Home, "McDermott-Panabaker Chapel", 216 Queen Street in Port Perry (905-985-2171) on Sunday, September 16th from 1-2 p.m. A service to celebrate the life of Stanley Venner will be held in the Chapel at 2 p.m. with Reverend John Griffen officiating. Interment Pleasant Point Cemetery. If desired, memorial donations may be made by cheque to the charity of your choice.
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A Biography of Stanley Emma Venner
Thanks to her daughter, Rae Yeti, for this

Stanley's parents were born and raised in the Kingston area. In the early 1890's they moved to Webbwood, a small village in Northern Ontario, west of Espanola, where her father was first a pharmacist, and then involved in other businesses including the lumber business. Stanley was born in 1907, the 6th of 10 children. When she was 2 or 3 years old the family moved into a large new frame house on the outskirts of town that her father had built. She has many happy memories of her early years there, the most important being allowed to ride her white horse “Bill”. On her 10th birthday - December 30th 1917, the big house burned to the ground. She remembers the brick chimneys from 3 fireplaces and a furnace that were left standing the next day. In the spring of 1918, the family moved back to southern Ontario and bought a farm on Taunton Road, east of Oshawa. She left school at 14 to become her father's “hired” man. This she loved - doing all the farming required of her - milking, ploughing and above all, working with the horses including old Bill, as she called him. She always preferred working outside on the farm to housework - but did find time to learn to play the piano very well, reaching grade X and teaching a few students in the rural community. She remembers driving herself to lessons by horse and buggy. While still a teenager she learned to drive her fathers' car and she drove all over Canada and to Florida several times before giving up her car at 86 years of age. In 1929 she married Arnold Venner who had come to teach at the little red school house at Mitchell's Corners near the farm. For the next 18 years the couple moved around Ontario - Arnold teaching in several schools - and finishing his BA degree in 1935. In 1947 Arnold bought a farm first in the Oshawa area, then in 1950 on the 2nd of Mariposa near Fingerboard school. Once again Stanley became a farmer while Arnold continued to teach in area schools. Stanley raised a family of 5 children and the older three brought grandchildren home to the farm for many summer visits. In 1967 they retired and in 1969 built their own home in Seagrave - Stanley often pounding nails with Arnold. Once settled, she took ajob clerking in Seagrave Country Store for a year or so - her one and only employment outside her home! Stanley and Arnold traveled across Canada to both coasts making several visits to sons and a daughter in Alberta and BC. They also traveled to Florida several years where they had a trailer at Lakeland. Arnold died in 1981 and Stanley continued to live in the Seagrave house - still traveling to visit family - even a trip to England to a son's wedding in 1982. Stanley lived alone in the Seagrave house until moving into the Villa in Port Perry in November of 1996. Throughout her busy life she always found time to help out with UCW and community activities, bazaars and fund raising. She remembers helping Seagrave UCW prepare meals for a movie crew that included Henry Fonda when a movie was filmed using the Ocean House in Seagrave and has pictures in her albums of the ladies with Henry! In her later years she did all kinds of crafts including dozens of needle point pictures. The last seven years before moving to Port Perry she hand quilted 26 crib quilts and crocheted as many afghans for her great grandchildren. I'm sure she would tell you that she has found the last few years difficult without Arnold - her family has always been the center of her life.

Stanley married Thomas Arnold Venner, son of Thomas Venner and Flora Matilda Sutherland, on 2 Jul 1929 in Hampton, Ontario.¹ (Thomas Arnold Venner was born on 18 Jun 1907 in Perth Ontario,² died on 22 May 1981 in Seagrave, Ontario and was buried in Pleasant Point Cemetery.)