Herbert Bruce Memorial Park to replace Perryview Park
Jun 16, 2009 - 03:42 PM
By Chris Hall
PORT PERRY -- One of Scugog's most remarkable citizens from the past will be memorialized in the near future.
At Monday morning's municipal committees session, councillors agreed to endorse a request from Scugog historian and author Paul Arculus to rename Perryview Park in honour of Dr. Herbert Alexander Bruce.
The park could be dubbed the Herbert Bruce Memorial Park, offered Mr. Arculus in a letter to council last week.
Among his accomplishments, Dr. Bruce, who was born in Cartwright but raised in the southern Port Perry area, helped establish Wellesley Hospital in Toronto, was appointed as Ontario's Lieutenant Governor in 1932 and later became the Member of Parliament for Parkdale in Toronto. He died in Toronto in 1963.
The park, a large swath of greenspace with walking trails and a retention pond, is located on the west side of Simcoe Street, just south of the McDonald's restaurant.
Renaming the park in Dr. Bruce's honour, said Scugog Mayor Marilyn Pearce on Monday, "is a no-brainer. I think we should just do it and contact the Lieutenant Governor and Archives of Ontario and get on with it for 2010."
She added that Perryview Park is just a "made-up" name and urged her colleagues to endorse the idea.
"Let's not analyze it to death," said the mayor.
When contacted on Tuesday, Mr. Arculus applauded the Township's quick decision on the matter.
"I think it's an exciting move and obviously council is interested in heritage matters and I think a large portion of our future economy will be built on our heritage," he said. "It's absolutely, marvelously appropriate to do this."
Mr. Arculus added that he has other ideas to pitch to the Township in the future regarding renaming other municipal parks in honour of Scugog's past prominent citizens.
Also on Monday, councillors were told that a request to rename Crestview Park in Blackstock to Roy E. Carter Memorial Park, in honour of a Blackstock resident and Canadian soldier killed in the Second World War, is still being considered.
John Sellars, Scugog's director of parks, recreation and culture, told councillors that staff were "grappling" with the "complicated" matter and that a recommendation should come forward in late August.
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