Lenore Bartlett

MRS. LENORE KATHLEEN BARTLETT 1923 ~ 2013 Lenore Bartlett died peacefully on February 1, 2013 in Mattawa, Ontario where she had lived for the last three years of her life. Born May 15, 1923, in Truro, Nova Scotia to parents Isobel and Karl Fraser, she grew up in Truro, Montreal, Sudbury, and Port Credit with her sisters Grace and Karol. Brother Donald came along a bit later. In her youth Lenore developed a love of the outdoors and particularly of canoes. She spent summers with her family in Algonquin Park at Kiosk. As a teen and young woman she was a councilor and canoe instructor at Wapomeo, the Taylor Statten girls' camp on Canoe Lake. As was her way anywhere she traveled and lived, Lenore made friends at Taylor Statten who remained friends all her life. Lenore married high school boyfriend Brock Bartlett in 1945 while he was a sailor in the Royal Canadian Navy. She and Brock attended the University of New Brunswick from 1946 until 1949 when they graduated. They purchased their beloved property in Sundridge, Ontario and had their first son David in February, 1951 but had to move to Manitoba for work that same year. Lenore and Brock lived in Pine Falls, Manitoba from 1951 until 1986. During that span they had two more boys, Thomas and Gordon. Lenore was an active community force over the years. She served as a member of the Legion's Women Auxiliary and the hospital board, president of the United Church Women, a curler, and a willing and enthusiastic participant in many varied activities. She was in her own way also a pioneer and role model in her attitudes toward racial equality, women's rights, education and fostering independence of thought and spirit for everyone. She and Brock returned to Sundridge in 1986 when he retired and lived there at the top of the hill until Brock's death in 2006. Their house served as a hub for their children and grandchildren: David, wife Cathy, daughter Emma; Tom, wife Lynn, daughters Erin, Elaine, Robin, and son Fraser; and Gordon, wife Monika, and sons Karl, Konrad, and Kurt. Lenore was a great grandmother five times over. Lenore lived at the Empire Living Centre in North Bay from 2006 until 2011, again making a number of very good friends and serving on resident committees. She moved in with Tom and Lynn in Mattawa in 2011, then a year later, into the Algonquin Nursing Home. She took ill two weeks before she passed away, having lived a very full life. Arrangements are being handled privately with the family and a celebration of her life will be held sometime after the snow is gone. Memorial donations to Esprit Place Family Resource Centre in Parry Sound would be appreciated.