A Legacy of Caring

by John McCullagh

  The prosperity of the post-war years nevertheless created a mood of generosity toward social services, in steep contrast to the attitudes prevalent during the Depression era of the 1930s.

  British “war guests”

  In 1940, people in Britain were preparing to be bombed or even invaded by German forces. There was widespread fear that London and other large industrial cities might be devastated. For their own safety, children of all ages were evacuated to small towns and rural villages — and, in a pilot project, more than 1,400 were sent across the Atlantic to be boarded with families in Canada. This government scheme was supplemented by private arrangements that sent children to live with relatives or family friends, as well as by an evacuation of students from British schools to collaborating Canadian schools.

  Children’s aid societies throughout the province were asked to help find homes for and to supervise these “war guests,” as the children participating in the government scheme were called. There was no shortage of families interested in “doing their bit.” In Toronto, people wrote letters, telephoned and came to the CAS offices offering to help. In addition to those volunteering their homes, 400 volunteered their time to work for the agency. These included eighteen people who acted as telephone operators, one of whom wrote:

  To appreciate [our experience as telephone operators], one must keep in mind that the coming of the children was quite uncertain and the anxiety on the part of friends was very great. Telephones rang all day, asking such questions as: “Has the boat arrived?” — “This is my nephew John here” — “Can we see the children?” — “Have you got my name down for Mary Jones?” — “What must I do to get a war guest?” etc., etc. More delays brought more telephone calls until we were dizzy trying to satisfy inquirers. It was a nerve-wracking job, entirely done by volunteers, [but I believe we were able to] calm and comfort many an anxious inquirer.

  Children’s aid societies throughout the province were asked to help find homes for and supervise the “war guests,” as the children evacuated to Canada were called. In addition to those volunteering their homes, 400 volunteered their time to work for the agency. These included eighteen people who acted as telephone operators.

  To conduct home studies of those volunteering to take in a child, the society enlisted the help of the Infants’ Home, the Protestant Children’s Home, the Jewish Children’s Bureau, the Neighbourhood Workers’ Association and the Big Brothers’ Association. As Jean Roberts, a worker at the Infants’ Home, wrote in a contemporary article:

  There are many stories I could tell you of our visits . . . but what impressed us most was that no matter what class of home we entered, from that of the family on the verge of relief to those with cultured, comfortable surroundings, there were few exceptions to the same offer: “We want a child in our home and we want to share all we have.”

  More than 2,200 homes were approved, although it transpired that the CAS of Toronto needed to place only 145 children, while its Catholic counterpart, the St. Vincent de Paul CAS, needed to place only sixteen. The “Blitz” (as the bombing raids during the Battle of Britain of 1940–41 were called), although it was destructive and caused loss of life, proved to be not as dangerous as had been predicted, and parents soon stopped sending their sons and daughters away and brought their evacuated children back home.

  More than 2,200 homes were approved, although it transpired that the CAS of Toronto needed to place only 145 children, while its Catholic counterpart, the St. Vincent de Paul CAS, needed to place only sixteen.

  However, the dangers of the Atlantic crossing — more than one ship carrying evacuated children was torpedoed — prevented most of those sent to Canada from returning to Britain. Both the CAS of Toronto and the St. Vincent de Paul CAS therefore found themselves supervising these young people’s placements until the end of the war. To do so, the CAS of Toronto created a war guest service department with a supervisor, a social worker and sixty-two volunteer home visitors. Many of these volunteers were former staff members or schoolteachers who gave up their evenings and weekends to help out.

  Officially, the children themselves were made wards of the Department of Public Welfare under the British Child Guests Act. One of those wards supervised by the CAS of Toronto was thirteen-year-old Robert Brown, who broadcast a message across Canada and to his homeland on a radio program at Christmas 1940:

  I have been asked: “Is it very different living in Canada?” — fashions in clothes, for example. I’m afraid I don’t know much about that, but the things we eat, yes. Ice cream is Canada’s staple diet. It suits us down to the ground. Sports? Well, there’s baseball, skating, skiing and other jolly sports. Is school different? Well, Oakwood Collegiate in Toronto, where I go, is a great school. But there are things here that are not different. There is love — of country and Empire and freedom — so strong that it has made us strangers feel at home.

  Many parents sent letters of appreciation to the agency. One wrote:

  We are not a bit worried about our little girl — she is in safe hands, in addition to which, she is in the midst of what appears to us a whole nation of would-be fathers and mothers. It is rather startling in a way but, nevertheless, a magnificent display of human kindness and good will, standing out more clearly in comparison with the conditions over here [in Europe] where the lust of power and the ruthless will to dominate has for the time being crushed all peace and good will.

  Young boys in the agency’s care at play.

  Photo reprinted with permission of City of Toronto Archives, SC1, Item 134.

  By 1946, most of the war guests in the care of the agency had sailed home on the ships that had brought returning servicemen and women back across the sea to Canada. The few that remained were mostly those completing university degree courses.

  “Our boys in the King’s Forces”

  When war broke out, many older wards of the society were eager to serve with the King’s Forces, as the Canadian army, Royal Canadian Navy and Royal Canadian Air Force were collectively known. By the end of 1942, two hundred young men in the agency’s care had enlisted. Four subsequently died during active service, and several became prisoners of war.

  By the end of 1942, two hundred young men in the agency’s care had enlisted. Four subsequently died during active service, and several became prisoners of war.

  The agency went to great lengths to support these wards and former wards by sending them letters, care packages, newspapers and magazines and — most valued it would seem — cigarettes. Many of the young men wrote back letters trying to be cheerful, but they looked forward to the day when the war would be over and they could return home. One of them, named Jack, wrote to his worker just before he was seriously wounded in the Dieppe raid of August 2, 1942, when more than half the Canadian soldiers deployed were killed or taken prisoner:

  I’m keeping in good health and not too awful bad spirits, though a person is bound to get lonesome for home and the ones they love, especially after two years. But maybe Christmas will be spent in different surroundings, who knows? I shall not forget what the folks have done for me when the war is over. It makes it so much easier to do your duties when you know the people back home are pulling for you. So thanking you once again and hoping to see you again to thank you in person.

  “I’m keeping in good health and not too awful bad spirits, though a person is bound to get lonesome for home and the ones they love, especially after two years. But maybe Christmas will be spent in different surroundings, who knows? I shall not forget what the folks have done for me when the war is over. It makes it so much easier to do your duties when you know the people back home are pulling for you. So thanking you once again and hoping to see you again to thank you in person.”

  — Jack, a former ward and

  Canadian soldier writing in 1942

  Services to soldiers’ families

  During the First World War, a Soldiers’ Aid Commission had been established to support families where fathers wer
e absent on military duty. Such was not the case during the Second World War, when this task fell to the children’s aid societies.

  For the duration of the Second World War, children’s aid societies administered living allowances and helped families to set budgets.

  In some cases, the societies were already supervising homes before the father enlisted because of child neglect or potential neglect, and they continued to do so after he joined up because the protection concerns persisted. In other instances, the father’s absence was itself considered to be the cause of the neglect. Despite their husbands’ duties overseas for years at a time, and the fear these wives felt that they would never see them again should they be killed while on active service, CAS of Toronto records speak of workers’ concerns about mothers who neglected their family responsibilities because “[a] freedom from the restraining influence of the partner in the home [can lead] the mothers, whose marriage tie has never been very strong, to open infidelity and consequent moral neglect of the children.”

  The CAS workers who wrote such reports, all women themselves, seemed unaware of, or perhaps, given the values of the time, felt unable to act on an understanding that it would be only natural for wives to seek the companionship and support of another partner at such a difficult time.

  A second large category of services provided by children’s aid societies to the families of servicemen and women was the administration of living allowances. As Williams writes:

  [Children’s aid societies] determined the eligibility for living allowances of wives, children, parents and other relatives of the thousands of men and women in uniform. [They] also assumed responsibility for counselling and adjusting family problems [and] investigated and recommended upon supplementary grants to the regular allowances and advised the military whether “compassionate leave” should be granted to service personnel where family problems were acute. As the war went on and members of the armed forces were discharged, many for reasons of ill health or injury, there were applications for pensions and veterans’ allowances to be investigated and evaluated.

  At the CAS of Toronto, this work took a great toll on an already overburdened staff. It required the establishment of careful bookkeeping and reporting, the analysis of liabilities and needs, and the setting of an individual budget for each family. These cases were particularly difficult for workers because, in most situations, the family resented the society’s interference in their right to plan their own spending.

  Along with dealing with these challenges, CAS workers continued throughout the war years to fulfil their primary tasks of protecting children and, where necessary, providing them with substitute care. The agency’s resources were tightly stretched, with foster homes in unusually short supply in a community preoccupied by war and survival. Workers, some of whom were seconded to other civilian and military duties, were busy with a continuously increasing caseload in protection, child-placing and adoption services.

  All this put tremendous pressure on society staff, foster parents, volunteers and board members, which prompted managing director Bob Mills to write: “In the face of continually increasing workloads, the spirit of our staff has been magnificent and their response unfailing. My personal pride in them is unbounded and I [wish] to express my own appreciation and that of the society.”

  In addition, the press and the public at large both recognized the commitment and leadership in the welfare of children undertaken by the CAS of Toronto during the years of wartime crisis.

  Post-war staffing challenges

  Immediately after the war’s end in August 1945, both the CAS of Toronto and the Infants’ Home struggled to maintain a full complement of qualified and experienced staff, despite the return of workers from war-related jobs. Many married women resigned their jobs at the agencies to resume homemaking responsibilities. There were also concerns that the heavy workload and low salaries paid to social workers compared with those in other professions would hinder the agencies’ ability to recruit new staff.

  At the end of the war, the annual salary for social workers at the society was only $1,400, just a hundred dollars more than the rate established in 1923. This issue prompted the formation of a staff association in 1942 (there was also one at the Infants’ Home) and led its members to vote four years later on a resolution that it reconstitute itself as a trade union. When the results of this poll were counted, however, only a few had voted in favour of a unionized workplace. This came as a relief to the board of management, which, predictably, had argued strongly against such a development.

  Annual salaries for workers were raised to a maximum of $2,260 if they were professionally qualified and $1,950 for those who were untrained. A contributory pension scheme was introduced, the number of annual vacation days was increased, and staff were given every other Saturday off.

  The society’s board, in response to its own and its workers’ concerns, undertook a number of initiatives to make CAS work more rewarding and competitive. Annual salaries for workers were raised to a maximum of $2,260 if they were professionally qualified and $1,950 for those who were untrained. These salary levels were regularly improved over the succeeding years so that, by the end of the decade, the top of the front-line worker scale reached $2,900, while supervisors were paid $3,300. Administrative and clerical staff received comparable increases. A contributory pension scheme was introduced, the number of annual vacation days was increased, and staff were given every other Saturday off. The agency was frequently reorganized to make the best use of all available resources.

  “Child in Swaddling Clothes” was created by Florence Wyle, R.C.A, O.S.A. This artwork marked for many years the entrance to the Infants’ Homes on Huntley Street.

  Similar changes were made at the Infants’ Home, which had, in 1942, belatedly obtained a new charter to reflect that it was now solely a child placement agency. At that time, the agency also changed its name from the Infants’ Home and Infirmary to the Infants’ Homes of Toronto.

  At both agencies, in-service training programs were expanded to strengthen supervisory supports and increase worker skills. At the Infants’ Homes, where most front-line workers were nurses, staff were taught casework theory and were trained to apply knowledge of human behaviour to their everyday practice. Caseloads were gradually reduced through the hiring of additional staff. At the CAS, this again raised the need for additional office space as the accommodation at 32 Isabella Street became very crowded, so the society began to either purchase or rent the neighbouring properties at 22, 24, 26, 28 and 34 Isabella Street.

  Foster home shortage and a new Receiving Centre

  The foster home shortage, first experienced during the war years, remained, partly due to the increase in the cost of living and partly because foster parents were becoming more choosy about which children they would accept — they were particularly shy to provide homes for adolescent boys, as well as the increasing number of emotionally disturbed children being admitted to agency care.

  Kid-size facilities.

  Both the CAS and the Infants’ Homes tried to find ways to address these issues and give foster parents greater satisfaction so that they would serve the agencies over longer periods. Their initiatives included a raise in board rates — with a special supplement going to those homes taking children considered hard to serve — improved training and support programs and better publicity about the need for foster families.

  The foster parent shortage meant there were more children living in outside institutions and at the CAS shelter at 33 Charles Street East — and they were staying there longer. To alleviate the pressure for beds, the society rented a building across the street at number 38 to use as an annex to the shelter.

  More kid-size facilities.

  In the meantime, the Infants’ Homes had purchased, in 1941, a semi-detached house at 40 Huntley Street. It would serve as a reception home to give temporary care to infants from emergency situations, to aid children in the transfer from foster families to adopt
ive ones and to assess children whose behaviour had become too difficult for their foster parents. This building quickly proved not to be big enough to meet the demand, so the agency acquired the other half of the house, at number 38, with the intention of converting both houses into one unit. However, seeing that the reception home concept had quickly proved its value, the agency decided instead to erect a modern, purpose-built centre.

  A fundraising campaign secured $20,000, which, combined with a grant from the city and the proceeds from the sale of 38–40 Huntley Street, enabled the agency to purchase land at 15 Huntley. On this site, the agency built the Infants’ Homes Receiving Centre, which opened its doors on February 28, 1947. It accommodated twenty-five children and seven live-in staff on two floors. An additional ten staff lived off the premises. The building would be used as a receiving home until 1974.

  Photo reprinted with permission of City of Toronto Archives, SCI, Series G, File 1, Item 1.

  Retirements of Vera Moberly and Bob Mills

  In October 1945, Vera Moberly handed in her resignation as executive secretary of the Infants’ Homes, but agreed to stay on until the end of the year while the agency searched for a successor. Two years later, in December 1947, Bob Mills resigned as managing director of the CAS of Toronto.