The Quintland Sisters(10)
“Mr. Dionne,” he said tartly. “A word.” And the two men stepped out into the evening.
I waited until all our city guests were gone before pressing Ivy about Mr. Davis. “But had you met him before?” I was watching her face. “Mr. Davis seemed like he already knew you, and you him.”
Ivy was busy sorting through the parcels and boxes, a seemingly endless number of cotton diapers, tiny bonnets, blankets, petticoats, shirts, safety pins, nursing bottles, tubes, and more. The idea of our minuscule charges ever being hale enough to need shirts and petticoats seemed laughable, but it gave us hope just fingering the tiny things, so clean and white in the gloom of the farmhouse.
“Ah, no, but I think I’d like to know him already, if you know what I mean,” she said, her impish smile tucking neatly into her left cheek. “It’s high time this job came with a few perks, wouldn’t you say, Em?”
June 1, 1934 (North Bay Nugget)
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OLIVA DIONNE SIGNS HANDSOME CONTRACT TO EXHIBIT FAMILY AT CHICAGO
“They are improving steadily. That doesn’t guarantee anything. Two of the babies nearly passed last night, but this morning I felt more optimistic than at any time since their birth.”
In this way Dr. A. R. Dafoe expressed the condition of the quintuplets born last Monday morning to Mr. and Mrs. Oliva Dionne, Corbeil.
The babies are now being fed on nothing but human milk and this morning 18 ounces arrived from the Sick Children’s Hospital, Toronto.
Rev. D. Routhier, Corbeil parish priest, announced this morning that a contract with the Tour Bureau, Chicago, at a meeting in Orillia yesterday, to exhibit the family at the World’s Fair, had been signed by Oliva Dionne, the father of the quintuplets. Father Routhier accompanied Dionne to Orillia.
The contract stipulates that the attending physician must first declare the mother and children ready to travel. It specifies that if nothing happens to the children and it is not too late for the fair, the Tour Bureau will provide special transportations for the entire family, including the grandfather, doctor, nurse, and assume all cost of the trip to Chicago, including salaries of the attendants. The contract will provide $250 weekly during the time of the exhibit, including expenses, and 20% of all receipts. Father Routhier of Corbeil Parish will be entitled to 7% of the earnings.
Until such time as the family can be moved, Dionne is to receive $100 weekly.
GOVERNMENT TAKE HAND
A true Canadian atmosphere was thrown on the situation today when the Ontario government stepped in and offered to make arrangements for all services, working with the Children’s Aid Society.
Told of the contract Dionne had signed, Dr. Dafoe was glad to hear that the family would get some much-needed money, but said it would be unwise to move the babies within three months, adding “their condition and progress govern the entire matter.”
“I was delighted,” stated Dr. Dafoe, “when I read the interest the Ontario Government were taking and they are helping in every way possible.”
Used with permission.
June 1, 1934
I was dressed for school and seated at the table when Father read the news in the Nugget about M. Dionne signing the deal to display the babies at the Chicago World’s Fair. We’d already bickered over Father’s insistence that I go to school today, the last day before exams. I’ve spent every day this week at the Dionne farmhouse and wanted to go straight back out there today, but he put his foot down. I truly don’t see the point of it. I have no real friends or teachers I want to say goodbye to and I’ve never been a good student. All I’ve ever wanted to do is read and draw. Perhaps if we’d stayed in Ottawa and I still had art class on my report card, I’d have at least one decent grade to please my parents. I have no head for maths, history, or geography, and I will do miserably on those exams—another disappointment for Father. But he long ago gave up on me doing anything further with my schooling, so it’s ridiculous he insisted on me going back for these last few days.
However, the news about the Dionnes in the paper startled us all into talking again. Father read it out loud and I gasped. Everyone who comes into the post office still grouses to Father about paying two cents instead of one for a postage stamp, so an income of $250 a week is unimaginable. And M. Dionne is already doing better than many farmers in our area. He grows food for his table and owns his own truck, something almost no one else in Corbeil could boast, or Callander for that matter. But I knew he’d also been frantic about all of the supplies and medical people filling his home. This offer must have seemed like a windfall.
“The Catholic priest appears to be in on the deal.” Father snorted, snapping the paper. Father has little time for religion of any stripe. “‘Father Routhier of Corbeil Parish will be entitled to seven percent of the earnings,’” he read from the paper.
Mother was shocked. “But, Emma, surely those tiny babies won’t survive a trip to Chicago, will they?”
The story in the Nugget also said two of the babies had nearly died in the night and had stabilized only after oxygen tanks arrived from Toronto. It was almost unbearable going to school, knowing two of the babies were in danger, but I knew I’d catch it from Father if I didn’t.
As soon as the final bell rang, I pedaled straight out to the farmhouse. The crowds have tripled in size, with at least forty cars and trucks lining the road that runs between Callander and Corbeil. Several men and women along a makeshift fence were waving newspapers and shouting at M. Dionne senior, who was still pacing the front of the property, now in the company of a local constable. I wriggled my way to the gate with difficulty and managed to attract the attention of Grandpapa Dionne, who let me through.