Farmerettes at the Thedford camp are photographed in 1949 just fooling around with an old wheel from the former flax mill that was renovated to become their summer home.
By Bonnie Sitter
On a winter’s day in 2018, as I was sorting through photos that had belonged to my late husband Conrad Sitter, a black and white photo caught my eye. Three girls had posed for the photo by sitting on the running board of a very old car. Their faces were not familiar. I felt sure they were not relatives. I turned the photo over, hoping to see that someone had recorded their names. No luck. Ah, but there was a clue. Clearly written was, “Farmerettes about 1946.” I had no idea who the Farmerettes were and why the Sitter family had a photo of them. I was curious and decided to make an effort to learn about the Farmerettes. To date, I have not discovered the names of the Farmerettes in the photo, but my life has been forever changed and enriched by researching the Farmerette story. A chain of events that is quite amazing led me to Farmerettes who are now in their late 80s and 90s. As I set about researching the Farmerette story I discovered that most people were like me, they had never heard the term Farmerette until I mentioned it. When no help was forthcoming I discovered a novel had been written by Gisela Sherman. It was titled “The Farmerettes.” A novel for teens was not what I was looking for. I wanted answers to the questions of who, what, why, where and when. I caught a major break when my girlfriend Sarah asked me what I was doing. I replied that I was researching the story of Farmerettes. Right away she asked me if I would like to meet a Farmerette and of course I replied yes. She then told me that her mom had been a Farmerette in 1946 at an Ontario Farm Service Force Camp near St.Catharines. Since her mother now lived nearby in Huron County where I live, she said she would arrange for me to interview her. Her mother, Norene Pye Turvolgyi invited me into her suite and told me her story about the summer of 1946.
These Farmerettes from Thedford Farm Service Camp No.6 pose with farmer Alan Donald. It appears it was their lunch break as the black lunch box that was common at the time is in view.
The next excitement was the fact that the 17 letters she wrote to her family that summer had been saved and returned to her. At nearly 90 years of age and numerous moves that included living in Montreal and Toronto she still had the letters! The letters included descriptions of the long work days cutting asparagus, the new sprayer for the orchard, and a dress she had her eye on in a St. Catharines shop for her grandparents 50th wedding anniversary. It was forbidden to swim in the Welland Canal but that did not stop the young girls from climbing the fence and jumping into the 50 feet of water. Soon after arrival, Norene’s letter had a sketch of the inside of the Nissen Hut she shared with 3 other girls that summer. The post cards mailed home showed views of Niagara Falls, Queenston Heights, Brock’s Monument and the Rainbow Bridge. For Farmerettes who worked in the Niagara Peninsula hitchhiking to these places was considered a must.
I felt I had won the lottery. The interview with Norene and the information I had gleaned from the internet and through newspaper articles and photos convinced me it was time to write an article for a magazine called The Rural Voice. The story was published in June 2018 and a few months later the August edition of The Rural Voice had a letter to the editor that brought another surprise. The letter was written by a Farmerette named Shirleyan English. She did not subscribe to the magazine but it had passed through 2 sets of hands and ended up in hers because a friend said she remembered Shirleyan talking about being a Farmerette. Her letter to the editor described the summer of 1952, which was the last year of the Ontario Farm Service Force program, when she was at Camp No. 6 Thedford Ontario. She had worked for the Sitter family in the peppermint and onion fields. She said reading the article brought tears to her eyes as she still remembered it as the best summer of her life. She also said she had dated the farmer’s son George that summer. She felt I must be connected and I was. I married his brother Conrad. I located her in London and the conversation led to the amazing fact that she had planned to write a story in 1995 for a women’s magazine about that summer of 1952 when she left her home in North Bay and became a Farmerette. She placed an ad in newspapers all over Ontario asking for former Farmerettes to get in touch with her. Nearly 300 ladies wrote letters to her. Many said, “send me the questionnaire” and others said “what do you want to know?” Some even said “call me, I would like to help.”
A few ladies wrote detailed letters of the summers spent as Farmerettes. Shirleyan never did write the article but I discovered she still had the letters. Without hesitation I said, “we are going to write a book!” Then I added “we are going to have it ready to read in a year so the Farmerettes who are still alive will be able to read their stories.”We will finally acknowledge their service in food production from 1941-1952. So important was their contribution that it continued for 7 years after the war ended!
It was my turn to read the letters , which I did, and then I began to try and locate the ladies. Naturally I got a lot of “This number is no longer in service,” recordings. When I would find a Farmerette and explain what I was doing the joy in their voice as they recalled their time spent as a Farmerette was amazing. Many had never spoken about their Farmeretting experiences simply because no one had asked them. They did their bit and then went on with their lives.
Farmerettes, known locally as “camp girls” are shown in a field in what was known as “the bog” near the Thedford Farmerette Camp. These girls are pulling the mature Dutch onion sets which are then left in the field for the tops to die before being gathered to be screened. Whether you were weeding them or harvesting them, it meant kneeling or bending hour after hour in the hot sun.
Their memories in most cases were still fresh and they were eager to tell me their stories. The stories included the hard back breaking dirty labour, the long days in the sun, the salt pills, climbing the ladders and the seeping rashes caused by the peach fuzz. Their accommodation that ranged from tents, Nissen huts, converted barns, school gyms, and farm houses was always a topic of conver- sation. But the hard work was put aside and the stories continued as they described the hitchhiking, the dances, buying records and listening to the hit tunes, organizing and putting on variety shows to raise funds for patriotic causes and of course talking about boyfriends and making up fun songs about their camps and singing while they worked. Oh, and the curfews were talked about! Of course sneaking back to camp after curfew did happen.
Two unnamed Farmerettes pose beside the Ontario Farm Service Camp sign at Cottam Ontario. The Essex county location is described in a detailed 1945 letter written by Ardyss Daniells as having 75 girls.
