A Waterloo County Album: Glimpses of the Way We Were

Geoff Hayes is an associate professor of History and the Director of
International Studies Option at the University of Waterloo.

One cannot find Waterloo County on a map of Ontario anymore. But it
still exists in memory and a wealth of photographs. Stephanie Kirkwood
Walker’s childhood in the southern “Scottish” half of the county
in the 1940s and 1950s makes this a very personal collection. Her
choices reflect an idyllic sense of that time when kids still played in
fountains and eager art students toured the concession roads trying to
emulate the work of county-born artist Homer Watson. Towns like Hespeler
and Preston (now both part of the city of Cambridge) then still enjoyed
thriving industries as well as their own cultural signatures. Walker’s
loosely organized chapters highlight the county’s markets, churches,
parks, bands, sports teams, fairs, and festivals. Floods, fires, and
world wars also helped shape the collective memory of county
communities. These photographs suggest that these calamities were often
devastating. But there is something reassuring in the way in which these
streetscapes become familiar once again.

Walker’s impressive choices of varied county landscapes are a
testament to her fine esthetic sense. Perhaps most interesting are her
photographs of people. The women behind the counter at Henning’s
grocery store in Preston seem impatient, more eager to serve their
absent customers than to pose for a photographer. In a chapter called
“Getting Around,” Walker’s family photographs beautifully relate
the ongoing impact of transportation through two generations. In 1905,
Walker’s great aunts were photographed as they cautiously prepared for
a buggy ride; 45 years later her father stares sheepishly at the camera
as he huddles in a snowstorm near Galt. The new Dodge sedan behind him
has just suffered a collision with a slow-moving train. These family
photographs and others from private collections add much to the texture
of the book. Some of her choices are familiar, but Walker has done very
well to bring previously little-known shots into the work. The result is
a varied, thoughtful, and beautiful set of images that reveal much about
Waterloo County as a “state of mind.”