BFH: Horace Boultbee (1875-1965)

Horace Boultbee (1875 - 1965)

(written by the Editors)

     Horace Boultbee was born October 1, 1875 in the City of Bangalore, India, the son of William Boultbee and Marian Mulock Boultbee. His father was involved with the construction of the Madras Railway. Bangalore is located in the south-central section of India, at an elevation of 1,000 metres above sea level. The elevation gives it a pleasant climate even during the summer months. Many years later, " Marian wrote to her son Horace about why he was born in Bangalore: We had rented a fine residence in large grounds for 3 months - in order to get away from the heat of Arkonam in September. However, in Military Cantonments in India, this is the way the Magistracy do things.
     In 1876, the family returned to Canada on a two-year furlough. The children were left in the care of a friend, Mrs. Ambrose of Hamilton, and the parents returned to India until the work on the railway was completed. The parents returned to retire in Canada in 1882.
     Horace was educated at Upper Canada College in Toronto, and at the University of Toronto where he graduated in 1897 with a degree in Political Science. He related to his son Richard once that calculus was a requirement for most courses at the University, but the subject had not been taught at the College in those days. Consequently he was advised to take Political Science which did not require calculus as a subject. How a small event can affect our later choice of occupation!
     Early in 1898, he obtained work as a journalist for the Toronto Globe, reporting local events, and a few years later was reporting political stories for the Globe from Ottawa. In 1904, he transferred to the Toronto Mail & Empire as their Ottawa political reporter, and the earliest record we have of this period is an October 26, 1904 clipping of a political meeting, with the by-line of Horace Boultbee.
     Horace married Nan Greer, the daughter of James Greer and Margaret Haliburton Greer of Toronto. Both Horace and Nan were long-time members of the choir at St. Paul's Anglican Church on Bloor Street East in Toronto, and it was there that they first met. They were married on January 9, 1905 with the full choir in attendance. They lived in Ottawa while Parliament was in session, and then returned to live for two years with his mother at 52 St. Alban Street, Toronto. Two days before their marriage, Horace and Nan signed a marriage settlement stating that he would set up a trust account for her of some money he would receive upon the demise of his mother, Marian Boultbee. Horace and Nan had four children, Richard, Marian, Patrick, and James.
     While in Ottawa, he performed as a soloist with St. George's Church Choir, Ottawa St. George's Church Choir when they sang Stainer's Crucifixion at Eastertime in 1905. A review appeared in the Ottawa Citizen for April 21, 1905, and it read in part:

The solo work was well worthy of favorable note particularly that of Mr. Horace Boultbee, who has a powerful, well controlled bass voice. Throughout the piece in the long and trying work placed upon the bass soloist, he took up the themes with force and clearness and a thorough mastery of every phrase.

He was a member of the Press Gallery of Parliament, while working in Ottawa.

HORACE BOULTBEE at age 31
Photo by M. O. Hammond, Fall 1906
Photo courtesy of the Archives of Ontario
Collection No. ACC 6355 S9163 AO 1814

     He was an amateur photographer, and a Life Member of Toronto Camera Club. He won a bronze medal from the Club, about 1906. He took scenic photographs, mainly in southern Ontario, and a selection of 50 of his early photos are on file at the National Archives of Canada, under Accession No. 1980-240. Five of his prints are reproduced in a book prepared by members of the National Archives. The title is Private Realms of Light - Amateur photography in Canada/1839-1940 and it is published by Fitzhenry & Whiteside of Markham, Ontario.
     Horace took ill with typhoid fever in 1907, and had to resign from The Mail and Empire. He related to his son Patrick that one day while convalescing by walking downtown in Toronto, he met his brother Thumby who enquired after his health. Thumby made him an offer to prospect for minerals in the Muskoka area of Ontario along with a friend, and perhaps that way regain his health. Thumby paid all bills while the two prospectors travelled down the Moon River from Bala to Georgian Bay. No precious metal was found, but his health did improve. Horace was grateful for this act of brotherly love.
     During this period of low income, he, Nan and their young son Richard took rooms at 142 Mutual Street, and Richard remembers just barely that there was a sandbox in the small yard for him to play in. Horace managed to sell some free-lance articles which appeared in the Toronto Globe in its Saturday Magazine section. A scrapbook of clippings of some of his reportings from before and after the ill-health period has survived, mainly from the period 1904 to 1913. About 1909, Horace, Nan and Richard moved into his mother's home at 73 Walmer Road, Toronto, and it was there that his daughter Marian was born. A few years later, probably just after his brother Thumby's death, the family of four moved into Thumby's cottage by the Don River. They searched for a permanent home, and Richard tells an amusing story of finding it at 115 Melrose Avenue, Toronto:-
     Mother went for a walk one day and told him she had seen a new three storey house for sale at a reduced price of $600. Three storey brick houses with a basement sold for around five thousand in those days. Dad told her she must be mistaken, but she said $600 was right. He inquired, found out she was right, and bought the house. I think the house is still standing (it is).
     In 1908, he obtained work as editor of Canada Lumberman, a trade magazine published by Hugh C. MacLean Publications Limited of Toronto. He was editor of Canada Lumberman for ten years, and during this period attended occasional luncheons organized by owners of wholesale and retail lumber dealers. In May 1915, the retailers formed a credit bureau in the Toronto area. During the winter of 1917/18, two other organizations were formed, The Ontario Retail Lumber Dealers Association and The Wholesale Lumber Dealers Association. The three organizations held a joint meeting and decided to open an office under the management of Horace Boultbee. Early in 1918, he resigned his position as editor of Canada Lumberman, and commenced his new duties at the good salary for those days of $4,000 per year. In 1927, the retail group felt that they wanted a full-time secretary, and hired Horace to be their Secretary-Manager. These events are described in more detail in the August l, 1940 issue of Canada Lumberman.
     He remained with the Retail Lumber Dealers Association for 39 years, concluding his work as a Consultant to the Board of Directors. In December 1957, the Board tendered him an Appreciation Dinner.
     In his later years, Horace prepared a family tree of the descendants of Felix and Washington, the two brothers who moved from England to Ancaster, Canada. He named the descendants of Felix the Ontario Line, and the descendants of Washington the British Columbia Line. Horace visited the B.C. relatives during these years, and kept up a correspondence for a few years. He also corresponded with his sister Rosamond in Eastbourne, England telling her of the Canadian family tree. In June 1955, Rosamond received a visit from Walter R. P. Boultbee of Rochester, England, the family historian of that period, and eventually Walter and Horace passed family histories back and forth. Their children, Elizabeth and Patrick, were still performing that function in the 1990s.

Horace died August 23, 1965, and is buried in St. James' Cemetery, Toronto.