Tennis Court, Holyrood House, Oakville, ca1940
Description
- Media Type
- Image
- Text
- Item Type
- Photographs
- Description
- Main record photograph: Mother Alice Lessels and son Roy Lessels playing tennis on the courts at the Holyrood Estate, Oakville, Ontario.
Second photograph: (Click on "Pages" "Select") Roy and younger brother Alistair are playing.
In his photograph album notes, Roy Lessels says, "The court was red clay. After each game was played, you had to drag, brush the lines and roll. You dragged the length and width of the court with burlap, you brushed the lines with a line brush and the final step was rolling the surface smooth with a lawn roller. It was a hot job on a hot summer day."
Note the practise board behind Roy. The court was fully fenced.
Alice and Jack Lessels were both born in Scotland. After emigrating separately to Canada, (Jack with his brother, Harry) they met and were married in Toronto.
Jack had been working as a groundskeeper on the Dunnikier estate in Kirkcaldy, on the east coast of Scotland so he had good experience to work as head groundskeeper for Gordon and Kathleen Lefebvre on their Holyrood Estate.
Gordon Lefebvre was from the Oshawa area and worked as head of the General Motors Pontiac Division. Kathleen was from Oakville, her sister was the wife of Dr. E. Soanes, a prominent Oakville family doctor. - Notes
- Information and photographs of Holyrood house, the Lefebvre family and the history of the property in the Trafalgar Township Historical Society digital collection were shared by Mr. Roy Lessels in May 2016. Roy's father was the head grounds keeper for the estate from 1929 to 1945, in the employ of Gordon Lefebvre who was head of the Pontiac Division, General Motors Company, and again from 1955-1969 for David Knapp. The images with notes remain the property of Mr. Lessels.
The "Groups of Related Records" link will take you to the other records, maps of the property and photographs of the estate people in Mr. Lessels photo album. - Subject(s)
- Personal Name(s)
- Alice Lessels, d.age 99, 11 months, 14 days, married John (called Jack) Lessels, b.1902, d.March 5, 1986, age 84. Son John Roy (called Roy), b.February 13, 1930, married Joyce. (He worked for Rubbermaid for many years, Joyce worked for Oakville dentist, John McLennan.) Son Alistair Anderson, b.January 27, 1932 (in Edinburgh, Scotland), married Diane Hammer in March 1964, d.July 29, 2014. (He had a real estate brokerage in Collingwood.) Harry, brother of Jack Lessels, d.August 19, 1990.
- Local identifier
- TTJRL000512
- Collection
- Trafalgar Township Historical Society
- Language of Item
- English
- Geographic Coverage
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Ontario, Canada
Latitude: 43.4335330552645 Longitude: -79.6773195475769
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- Copyright Statement
- Copyright status unknown. Responsibility for determining the copyright status and any use rests exclusively with the user.
- Recommended Citation
- Tennis Court, Holyrood House, Oakville, ca1940
- Contact
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Trafalgar Township Historical Society Sponsor: Jeff Knoll, Local & Regional Councillor for Oakville Ward 5 – Town of Oakville/Regional Municipality of Halton
