Chatting it up with the Boss, A Visit with my Sister, History Part 2

Paisley, On

On Friday, Nov. 13^th after Bill left for work, I had my tea upstairs. It was around 8 when I went down again and made my thermos of coffee and packed a banana and some cheese slices Bill cut for me. I remembered the second trip down the stairs to go back and get 3 loonies and to take the RO water jug for a fill up. 😊 I retrace my steps so many times in a day because I’m so forgetful. LOL

As near as I can figure, this is the Hogg Pearce Home
William Walker Hogg spared no expense building this as a bridal home for his first born
daughter, Mary Crockie Hogg and her husband Thomas French Pearce
around 1900
What can I say but "Wow!"

It was a cool morning at 3C/39F but the frost was either dissipated off my windshield or I was sheltered enough not to have any. I saw some on Wes’s window from about 5’ behind where I park. No scraping for me. It was a good drive, I obviously missed the buses stopping, and made it to Durham laundromat by 9. There were 3 customers who were in the process of drying their clothes so it wasn’t long and I was on my own.

I may have posted this already but here is the history of this GoCo Gas Bar & Variety
Formerly the Balmoral Hotel on Paisley's main street (Queen St. S.)
Little remains of the 3-storey building that once anchored the south end of the business district.
As McClure's Garage the main floor was opened up to allow cars to drive inside
Obviously, upper storeys were later removed

As the last masked lady was finishing up with her folding, in walked my boss. It has been over a month since I’ve seen Jamie and I miss our occasional chit chats. He hung around for about 20 minutes to half hour and when the lady left, I gave Jamie a ‘real’ hug for his birthday that was on the 11^th. I wasn’t sure what she’d think. It was only ‘virtual’ in our card write up. 😊

Two views of the Braeside
This was built in 1880 by Samuel Rowe (one of the founders and first settlers of Paisley)
as a wedding present to his daughter

I love the trim around roof peaks and brickwork over the windows

We caught up on a few things and I was sad to hear that his driving job is ending in another week or so, I think he said. He is actively looking for something else already and I’m sure he’ll find something suitable. After working a full career in a Honda factory, an assembly line would be out of the question for me! I only had the floors to do when he left and that didn’t take long and I was on my way home.

Dr. McLaren's home
A French Renaissance house built shortly after the arrival of the railway in Paisley
The mansard roof, designed to give an extra storey, is a feature that was reaching its peak in Europe about the same time this was constructed. This mammoth structure has been home
of several doctors and was probably the birthplace of many residents of Paisley.

In Hanover, I stopped at Independent to get some yogourt and Bill’s Nutter Butter cookies and then drove to Donna’s for a visit. She has a few articles of clothing that she is getting rid of so gave me a chance to see if I’d like anything. I came home with a few light weights and one heavy sweater, a jacket, a pair of dress pants and even an ear wrap headband thingy! She listened to me whine about my toque scenario and then offered this to me. 😊

At the north corner of the building that our room is in,
this was the first brick store originally built for the merchant and Postmaster Thomas Orchard.
Originally Orchard/Ballachey General Store (1860)

More recently known as Thompson Bros. Furniture, it is now empty and up for rent
I love the rear warehouse constructed of stone in 1864

It was a grand hour and a half, since she was alone, and after reminiscing over my drive yesterday, I headed for home. It had warmed up a teensy bit to 6C/43F and with no sunshine all day, not bound to get any better. The spitting from my earlier drive kept me company part of the way home but it wasn’t deterring the ride any. While I was in Durham, I also remembered to fill up the 5-gallon water jug so at home made two trips from Ptooties to garage to bring everything in.

At the corner of Albert and Inkerman Streets, this used to
be the Paisley Continuation School and is now apartments
Built in 1914 on the site of the first school which was destroyed by fire a year earlier, this served as Paisley's public school until 1969 when a new school was opened at the south end of the village

Wes and Susan were both at home when I arrived and within half hour, Bill texted that he was on his way. Friday afternoon to ourselves is always a nice prelude to the weekend. The day brightened up around 2:30, not only because we were together (aaah) but the sky actually seemed clearer, the clouds not so heavy and gray. Instead of going for a walk, I lazed the rest of the day away.

And now, back to Wes and Susan's property
The Porteous Bank
This was my personal tour inside

The vault door remains closed but not locked and opens up to a set of inner doors
to the bricked vault

While upstairs, I had the brain wave that while these 3 house mates watch a Hallmark movie in the theatre room, perhaps I could put a dvd in my laptop and watch one of our movies on there! Yay! Brilliant! Unfortunately, the dvd drive on my Lenovo ThinkPad has never worked well and today was no exception.

No different than our children of today, the youngsters had no perception
of historical value and jotted their names on the inside vault doors

Imagine having bags of cash and coin stashed in here?

This is where customers files were kept
All of this, knotted wood floors, was behind counters with iron bars

A dvd that I chose would not play. It would seem to start and then nothing. That was so frustrating. As if that wasn’t enough, the drive tray got stuck with the dvd inside and trying to get it open we snapped the end off. Grrr. Yes, now I’m very upset. Bill purchased an external dvd drive for his laptop, which didn’t come with one, so just maybe I’ll be able to use that. Otherwise I’ll just read. Here I was thinking I may have resolved some of the winter woes.

The manufacturers name over the door

The bank president's office in the back room

Wes closed the door and you can see the markings that the jeweller/watch maker
had imprinted while his business was in operation

Looking from the north side towards the open vault door
Notice the different flooring sections
The narrow 2-tone was were customers could walk
There were counters and offices on the other sections of knotted flooring
where staff were housed during business hours
Most recently, Susan rented the space out for an ice cream shop
That is why you see such colourful walls on the south side

At 5:30, Bill and I went downstairs to start supper. Fried burgers tonight with peach crumble and whipped cream for dessert.  The burgers were ooey, drippy and delicious! After dishes, Bill slipped upstairs for a snooze before the movie starts and I finished watching the last half hour of NCIS. It seems I’m not seeing much tv these days so thought I’d take advantage while being in control of the controls. 😊 I didn’t take pictures today – of anything – so I will post a few more from the Paisley history book.

One last look at the beautiful (but not uniform) flooring
Looking out the front door to the main street (Queen St. S.)
Porteous Bank was a bank from 1879-97
Shoemaker's Jewellers held fort for almost a century with their name still imbedded
in the sidewalk
Now you know about as much about the bank as I do.
Good night!

Enjoy and have a great evening! Thanks for taking the time to stop by.