Charles Gladstone Manore: Husband. Father. Veteran. Hiker. Born May 18, 1924, in Kingsville, Ont.; died Aug. 6, 2018, in Sarnia, Ont., of cancer; aged 94.
Charles Manore. (Family Photo).The Globe and Mail
“His spirit chaungèd hous.” Charles would often interject lines of poetry that he learned as a child into conversations. Some serious, such as Chaucer’s dying knight in The Knight’s Tale, and some not: “Ketchup, ketchup in the bottle, none will come and then a lottle.” They all demonstrated his approach to life: Life was finite, life was challenging and rewarding, life was to be met with humour and humility.
Charles was born at home to Victorian-era parents. A smart lad, he thrived in a two-room schoolhouse, completing his primary schooling in six years. He had a magnificent memory and a penchant for playing with words. He enjoyed spoonerisms: He would often order “chish and fips” in a restaurant to see if the waitress was listening, and when his oldest son, Ralph, had a daughter, Charles started referring to his other children (Mark and Jean) as Uncle Jark and Aunt Mean.
Charles was also a good athlete in his youth, spending many hours playing shinny or baseball. As a fielder, he could find a ball in the air as soon as he heard it hit the bat. (This was a necessary skill, as he could not afford much-needed glasses until he started working in high school.)
When the Second World War broke out, he was anxious to enlist, but, out of respect for his mother, he waited a week after turning 18 before signing up. He served in the Royal Canadian Navy, as a coder, serving on a minesweeper, then a corvette and finally a destroyer. He served in the Battle of the Atlantic and was stationed in the Channel during the D-day landings.
After the war, Charles enrolled in the business program at the University of Western Ontario but quickly switched into history. He graduated with the highest average of his class. He went to Indiana University for a masters in geography and met Marilyn Mayo from Lincoln, Neb., in the dining hall. Once he got Marilyn’s attention, their first date involved attending The Mikado. The couple married in December, 1950, and remained together for 66 years.
Settling in Sarnia, and after a brief stint teaching high school (it was not his forte), Charles began working in human resources at Ethyl Corporation in 1956. He felt a sense of great accomplishment overseeing the development of pensions and other staff benefits. And to recover from the stresses of work, Charles would go for long nature walks on weekends. He enjoyed being outdoors (especially bird watching) and supported the naturalist Lambton Wildlife organization; he was also a founding member of the Lambton Outdoor Club.
Charles retired from Ethyl in 1987, noting ironically that he had started on April Fool’s Day and retired on All Saints Day. He was a lifelong adherent to the Anglican faith and supported the changes the church made, including allowing women into the priesthood. He thought that they might even do a better job of running things.
Dad will be dearly missed by his family and friends: “His spirit chaungèd hous.”
Jean L. Manore is Charles’s daughter.
To submit a Lives Lived: lives@globeandmail.com
Lives Lived celebrates the everyday, extraordinary, unheralded lives of Canadians who have recently passed. To learn how to share the story of a family member or friend, go online to tgam.ca/livesguide