Podcast

Peter Handley:
Hi there and good day! Welcome to North Bay's heritage diary. Listen up we shall weave for you tales of days and times gone by which can inform today and show the way to tomorrow. This municipal Heritage Committee Podcast looks at our town, our people, and our stories. This time we open our diary of voices from the past for a conversation with the late World War Two Veteran, City Politician, and businessman—Don King. This was originally recorded in 1999 as part of the Cogeco cable series, “Life Is,” and in part two King talks: politics, the waterfront, the people of the city. Please excuse any dated references

Peter Handley:
Politics in Widdifield in 1960, when you decided to throw your hat in the ring for the first time.

Don King:
Actually, Peter, it was 1959. And I was through my hat in the first time and was defeated.

Peter Handley:
Oh yeah? And it didn't discourage you, obviously.

Don King:
Well, being the new guy on the block. I figured I didn't have any experience, but that taught me. At that point, they appointed me to the Council did as weed inspector. I think that was to discourage me. But it made me a hell of a lot more anxious to proceed. The first thing I did was force the city into buying a weed spraying machine, and under legislation, I could take them to court even though they had appointed me. So we got a weed spraying machine and a 45-gallon drum of weed sprayer. And in fact, their township still owned it when amalgamation came into being.

Peter Handley:
You went ahead and did that. And you said, you either get it or you're going to have problems, even though you knew you were going to be running again.

Don King:
That's right. That's the way things are...

Peter Handley:
You got things done

Don King:
You get things done that way. I was a little bit more cocky in those days than I am today.

Peter Handley:
What was Widdifield like in the 60s?

Don King:
Well, in the 60s, Widdifield didn't have too much. There was no sewer. The majority of places were on pumps. For water, there were no water mains. And actually, what started me was gap construction in those, not the existing gap construction, but it was just in its primary days and the first contract that they had, and they had a contract up in front of my house on Janice Street. And they had such a mess. Boy, I couldn't keep up with this. So I ran for Council. And the second time around, I got in the number two spot. And I became chairman of Public Works, not knowing too much about it. And it went from there.

Peter Handley:
Over the years and the various positions you've held in Widdifield and in North Bay, you chaired and have been a member of a lot of different committees and different organizations. When you retired from politics, did you figure you had a pretty good handle on things like that?

Don King:
Yeah, I did. I took time like I used to in those days was $300 a year. This is what you got as an alderman in the township. I think the Reeve got something like $600,000. But I used to go out and drive around the road. Look at all the different problems out in the back bushes and where the roads had to be rebuilt at my own expense. There was no gratuity. You just did it because of your interest in it.

Peter Handley:
Did you continue to do that sort of thing when you were on the North Bay council?

Don King:
Yes, we did. I used to go out when Marley Dater was the engineer. I used to go out with them on different projects and look at them and see what was cooking. And it gives you an education.

Peter Handley:
What reaction did you get from the administration when you did things like that?

Don King:
Well, I found that. I don't know what it's like today, but I got along well with the administration both in Widdifield and then the city. And I still get along well with the people that are still there. I doubt if I ever had a fight with any one of them. I've asked some strange questions. Basically, I got reasonable answers. So it went well.

Peter Handley:
Okay, after amalgamation, it was a whole new ballgame. How long did it take before that really started to work, before the old divisions were gone?

Don King:
Well, the first year in 1968. I ran for Mayor's position. Eight people ran for Mayor last year, and Merle Dickerson beat me based on 50 votes. And there was a doctor ran, and hotel owner and I can't remember all the names but there were, I guess maybe a click between the city and the township of West Ferris. Widdifield was sort of on the outs at the start. I think basically because we started the ball rolling in bringing it together, and there were certain conditions that were affected, and the official plans that had been in place, one took precedent over the other, that type of thing. And, of course, this is where the conflicts started. But eventually, it took two or three years, and things started to mellow in. And some people resigned from the different positions, like Eric Bryant, which was the township clerk. He came in, he was too icy or something in the city, and he quit. And that eliminated and got rid of it—
He wasn't forced out. He just decided to retire from it—and there were some other people; I can't remember all the names, but they gradually boiled down, and the administrations more or less cut back to the proper place. But the rulings of the municipal board were that these people had to be integrated. And that's where it may have caused some problems. Maybe some people noticed that more than I did.

Peter Handley:
Were you fairly satisfied with the way it worked?

Don King:
Yeah, I think it was the only thing that could happen. Actually, the city had some idea about taking over an industrial area in itself as the annexation of a part of the township. And when they started that, it made me think, well, a little without that, we've got nothing. And I talked my Council into making the application for amalgamating the study to the township. And in that way, I knew the board—or I suspected the board wouldn't permit that. So they brought it in, in the manner in which it eventually did.

Peter Handley:
Were you fairly good over the years at persuading people to your points of view on Council?

Don King:
I'd like to think I was able to on a good number of them.

Peter Handley:
Did you actually, for example, would you sort of lobby your fellow councillors on a matter, or would you just do that in an open Council?

Don King:
No, well I do it in open Council, but sometimes, depending on what the issue was, there are some issues that you couldn't lobby on. My old Favorite was North Gate that was pretty cut and dry, and the results settled. But basically, I would spend maybe three, four times a week up at the City Hall. So I knew the workings that were going on. I understood what was taking place. That's on top of the meetings. I would go in the morning or in the afternoon and what have you. I found it worked that way. I had to have a hands-on type of knowledge to be able to...

Peter Handley:
You said the North Gate was cut and dry. Did you mean by that that everybody had their minds made up? Well, in advance?

Don King:
Yeah, pretty well. I think it was the 80 or 81, the election year. They called it the Slate. Leslie came in after we had been on the floor for a couple of years on Council. Unfortunately, and I still say, unfortunately, what happened was bad for the city. Hadn't Northgate gone ahead, we would have had a Sears and an Eaton's store here in North Bay that was all cut and dried, it was agreed upon. We had the vice presidents of both companies come to Council and told us that they'd signed the agreement that was all wrapped up.

Peter Handley:
Where? At North Gate?

Don King:
At Northgate. And if we had that, you wouldn't have the people going to Sudbury to show up today.

Peter Handley:
Why did that not happen?

Don King:
Mainly because of the downtown business people. And I think they were wrong. I still think they were wrong, and that's only my opinion. And they did themselves a disservice by fighting it because had Northgate gotten the Simpson Sears and an Eaton store. You would have had people coming from Pembroke, Huntsville, and the South, so instead of people going to Sudbury, Sudbury people would have been coming to North Bay. Sudbury just got the Eaton’s. Sunridge has got the Simpson Sears.

Peter Handley:
Now we've, we've hoped to get a Sears here.

Don King:
You're not going to get one.

Peter Handley:
You don't think so?

Don King:
When they told us right in the council meeting, which was in 1982 that if this thing didn't come, don't expect them to be here for another at least 15 to 20 years.

Peter Handley:
Okay, North Gate, you have mixed feelings about the North Gate thing, didn't you?

Don King:
Yeah, I felt I was right. I still think I was right now. Although it didn't happen. I think the city was the loser. It would have created jobs with the type of Eaton's and Sears are two good employers. North Bay would have grown. It is dated at 55,000 population or 56. For how many years now? 10? 15, since the Northgate issue. And we haven't had any progress. You look at the Official Plan prior to Northgate. And at this point, there was supposed to be approximately 115,000 population in North Bay.

Peter Handley:
The waterfront was something that you got yourself involved with very much. So you sat down with a government official over your kitchen table.

Don King:
That was the CPR marathon realty.

Peter Handley:
That was one of the major first steps, right?

Don King:
That was. The first step on the waterfront was draft plans, not our draft plans, but plans drawn up in 1921. That was the year I was born. And they drew the plan, I don't recall, who it was. But it was a couple who had that drawn up. But it was for the waterfront, northwest of the dock. And we did the development southeast of the dock. So I had Bill Davis down there, at one particular point. I told him what I would like to see happen because I was just speaking as one member of the Council. Council hadn't agreed to anything at this point. And he came up with $10 million for the city of North Bay. And it was all done. The bills were not paid by the city. They were paid by the province and Carolyn. No, not Carolyn. Let's see who was the last liberal?

Peter Handley:
Dick Smith?

Don King:
No federal.

Peter Handley:
JJ Bailey?

Don King:
JJ Bailey was a really good person for the city. He did, we're opposite politics, but he was very good for North Bay. He arranged to have all the stone that goes along the shore and makes the harbour there now declared a surplus of the seed site. He made the arrangements with the trucking firm down south around Barrie, I believe it was, and they hauled all the rock from the seed site, put it over on the dock was done through small craft harbour people out of Burlington, and they paid them directly. So the city didn't do any of the paying at all. The only thing that we had to do after we bought the property from the CPR was that the lakefront, the water lots were transferred back to the federal government. The water lots adjacent to the government dock so that they could do the work on their property.

Peter Handley:
That's a fair trade, don't you think

Don King:
I thought it was very reasonable.

Peter Handley:
Is that is that the most satisfactory thing that you've been involved in politics?

Don King:
For me, personally, I take a great pleasure in being able to have been in the position to have been involved in it. I keep in mind that one person doesn't do the things. It takes many people, and there are many good people that I had working with me that made this possible.

Peter Handley:
But you got to have a leader. You got to have somebody who can prod

Don King:
The waterfront, the marathon Realty, the CPR, the Vice President CPR had the property declared surplus. Marathon, I can't remember the names, which is terrible. When we negotiated with them, we bought up for $250,000 from Timmins Street down the street. And we sold back to gap construction for $250,000 for the harbour site today. So, in fact, the city of North Bay got the waterfront for nothing... It’s lots of fun.

Peter Handley:
Yeah. From projects to people, Merle Dickerson. How well did you know Merle?

Don King:
About as well as any person knew him. I had gone on gavelling junkets with them. I've gone to many places with him. He'd give you the shirt off his back. He was a good guy. And a lot of people thought he was crooked. But you know, something, he had to have 5 more people to be crooked—

Peter Handley:
--Because it takes six votes out of 11 to pack anything to pass.

Don King:
That's right.

Peter Handley:
But they used to say Merle would get in as Mayor despite whatever shenanigans he’d been up to. Better the... again, I'm just using the old expression, “better the crook you know than the one you don't.”

Don King:
That too. And he said there were many live people in the graves too.

Peter Handley:
He did have a knack for that. Well, when he was when he let down his hair with you if you go away and trips and you talk, and you'd been foes and friends for so long. He said he'd give you the shirt off his back.

Don King:
You had to be careful that he didn't steal it back, though.

Peter Handley:
Did you like him?

Don King:
Yeah, very much.

Peter Handley:
Was he sort of cut from the same cloth? In other words, was he a blunt, a very forthright individual? Would he tell you what he thought?

Don King:
In a roundabout way. You always had to watch for one thing. He had one eye that twitched. And if he was telling me a story that eye started working on.

Peter Handley:
He's a legend. I mean, as far as North Bay is concerned.

Don King:
Yeah.

Peter Handley:
Was he good for the city?

Don King:
In one sense, yes, in another sense, no. where I think maybe some of them—and this is from personal knowledge—that in some quarters in Toronto, in the ministry, in the government, they didn't like dealing with him. I don't know why, but he must have done something. That wasn't satisfactory. So in that sense, he was a handicap at times when you're dealing with Queens Park. But personally, as far as my own personal thoughts are concerned, I had no problems. He tried to put North Bay on the map. And he had conventions coming here and all that sort of thing years and years ago. He did, and this is where Mallery comes into the picture because Mallery worked very much with them. They were good friends. She ran the winter carnival. For one thing, he had dog fleas in the Royal York Hotel in the lobby in the Royal York hotel. I remember that very, very much. And he had singers coming from California, but Hollywood. This one that he had, I can't remember his name. But he brought him here, and it wasn't supposed to cost him anything, the righteous Lehman and Willard Richardson. The Council at that time, and they were going to make him pay for the cost of the guy coming to the city. I don't know how it ended up. That was before annexation, but those were some of the things.

Peter Handley:
Of all the Mayor's you had, Meral, Briscoe, Stan Lawler, do you get along with them all.

Don King:
Pretty well. I didn't seem to have too much. Cecil Hewitt was an easy guy to get along with. He's a nice easy gentleman. He didn't. He wouldn't do anybody any harm. Stan Lawler was a go-getter. Bruce. Oh, one you missed was jack smiley.

Peter Handley:
That's right. That's right.

Don King:
Bruce, he. He was my alright guy. Yeah. Jack Smiley. I was on Council with him too. So I got to know them from being Mayor. All politics takes is a little bit of give and take.

Peter Handley:
Were you a give and take type of person in those days?

Don King:
Yes. I think I was. I would ask questions. If we got an answer to a question. I'd say thank you very much. And that was as far as I'd push it. There are other times, like with the Northgate issue, that I just wouldn't take no for an answer. I think that was one that created a great deal of disharmony in the city, and in fact so much so they had charges laid against me of a conflict of interest. And it was costly. And that was mainly within the law profession that was brought about. So much. So I couldn't even get a lawyer in North Bay to represent me. So I got one from Toronto, so that makes it doubly expensive. So, I forgive, but I don't forget.

Peter Handley:
Let me put you in a bit of a spot here. Who's the best counsellor for the city that you ever worked with that you can think of? And if it's too difficult, we'll slide away from it. Is there anybody that stood out in your mind as a counsellor?

Don King:
Dick Donnelly did, and in a lot of respects, Dick would basically because of his legal profession, because nine times out of 10, he ran for Mayor, you get defeated. You run for Council. You come in first. And he was at the top, and he was chairman of Finance. The majority of the time, and he ran a good budget meeting. He did. He wouldn't take no for an answer 99% of the time, but I think he had the interests of the city at heart.

Peter Handley:
He had a lot of power

Don King:
Yes, he did. His presence had a lot of power. Just his knowledge.

Peter Handley:
The biggest changes in the city, as you see it in the past 30 or 40 years?

Don King:
Well, when I was just thinking about it today, and when I joined the army in 1940, the population of the city in North Bay was about 18,000. The township of Widdifield had maybe 2000 plus West Farris, which was maybe three. Now it's 55, or 50/60, depending on whether you're coming in from the South or the West. Its 55, at one and 56 at the other. So the city has grown, but not as much as it should have. And I just don't know how to answer that question.

Peter Handley:
Would you like to see a city of 100,000? Here?

Don King:
Yes, in some respects. The children wouldn't have to go away; they wouldn't be educating all our young people. And then they're off to other places for employment. The employment is his bad in North Bay. It's worse than it is in Toronto, particularly for young people. They get a part-time or short, short-lived type thing. They can't make a basis for it. You see it on the main street if you drive down there at night. Yeah, the 100,000. That would make it a little bit more industry, a little bit nicer to have things. But the Council can't make that happen. But it will happen in spite of or with the Council, or without it. It's going to happen. Eventually, it will happen. That's the way North Bay is, and it's done it as long as I can remember.

Peter Handley:
If you could do anything over again, as far as being a politician is concerned, is there anything you'd do differently?

Don King:
Not too much. I'm satisfied with my lot. The only way I can, I even answer that I have to revert back to Northgate again. The only way that they could get me was through my daughter. Because she had a job at Northgate, a part-time job 20 hours a week minimum wage. And they got me through her. They never, they couldn't nail me for anything crooked that I ever did because I just didn't do it. I'm happy with the way things went. Not with one particular thing. I'm not happy. But that's an experience. That's a learning experience. You learn a great deal from things like that.

Peter Handley:
As a politician, then you think that it was worth putting in the 30 some odd years that you did.

Don King:
Yeah, I enjoyed it. I'm quite happy with the things that I was able to have a part in and be able to help directly.

Peter Handley:
Well, you helped direct us right because you're involved with some of them in the city did over that time period. You mentioned from 1940. That's when the growth occurred to about I guess the mid-80s to late 80s.

Don King:
There was one, and let's go back to Widdifield time, so I'm jumping all over the map now. But we had the sage housing complex built. And this was back in the 60s, either 61 or 62. And the government didn't want to pay for the water. We were buying it from the city in those days, so I told them either pay, or we shut the water off, and this is with a couple of generals in my office in the city. And the township's answer is you can't do that. That's blackmail. I said you put a name you want to, but that was going to happen Monday morning. The bill isn't paid. The water is shut off. The next week I had an engagement with ABM Harvey up at the airbase as the Reeve. I was asked to talk to the NCO thing, so I stood up, and I got booed. So I said, Okay, fellas, I'm from the same level. I'm not a General or Colonel. I was just a regular guy in the army, and so I quieted them down, and they weren't booing at the end. They were happy I took the government and made them pay. They paid.

Peter Handley:
That tale perhaps encapsulates Don King.

Peter Handley:
This edition of our heritage diary voices from the past with the late Don King was originally recorded in 1999 for the Cogeco cable TV production, “Life Is,” and is rebroadcast in this format through the courtesy of Cogeco Your TV. Thank you for spending some time with us and listening to our stories. These productions are put together by the North Bay Municipal Heritage Committee, not only to retell old tales, but hopefully to kindle interest in area history. Local lore is important to any community. We shouldn't let it go unremarked and unremembered. Views expressed in this podcast are not necessarily those of the corporation of the city of North Bay, or its employees. Join us next time, when we flip another page of the diary of our shared past. You can reach us at Peter.Carello@cityofnorthbay.ca. Production – Casey Monkelbaan and Peter Carello. Pete Handley speaking.