1

Christmas, of course, was an occasion for children to be at the Homestead. Other holidays were, as well. It's already been mentioned how summer holidays saw many of the Banting clan bring their children "home" to the farm.

2

Sunday School Class.
1908
Alliston, Ontario
TEXT ATTACHMENT


3

Excerpt from an interview between Marie (Banting) Shields and Robert Douglas Banting:

Marie: Every holidays: Christmas, Easter, summer holidays, they all came. We had all kinds of cousins come. One, two, half dozen at a time.

Bob: My father would be over there.

M: Yes. They'd go up to his place.

B: Nelson's and then come over?

M: Oh yes. They visited back and forth.

B: I think Aunt Jean [Webster, Nelson's daughter] was saying that there was traditionally Christmas at one location and New Year's at the other.

M: New Year's up at Uncle Nelson's. I think we always had New Year's there. And they all came, all the family.

4

Sample cup and saucer.
1960
Museum on the Boyne, Alliston, Ontario
TEXT ATTACHMENT


5

Jean Webster (Nelson Banting's daughter) shares this fun tale about her Uncle Fred:

"Now a Christmas story about Sir Frederick Banting, Father's youngest brother. Uncle Fred was very anxious to buy a gift for his Mother, so Grandpa gave him 5 cents, took him to town so he could buy his own gift. He put his gift in the top of the trunk where his clothes were kept. He bought a little cup and saucer and it was such a nice gift he just couldn't wait for Christmas to show it to her. Well, he took his mother up to his room and told her where she was to look for her gift. He opened his trunk and dropped the lid very quickly. He was satisfied and was able to wait until the proper time to give it to her."

6

50th Wedding Anniversary of Lena Knight and Thompson Banting.
1960
Alliston, Ontario
TEXT ATTACHMENT


7

The Homestead was always a site for family gatherings of all kinds. This photograph shows Thompson and Lena Banting, on their occasion of their 50th Wedding Anniversary.

The photograph was labeled by Robert Thompson Banting, grandson of Thompson and Lena, and indicates his familial relationships:

Top row, left to right: Uncle Ralph Banting, Aunt Marie Banting, Father Arthur Banting.
Front row, left to right: Aunt Helen Banting, Grandpa Thompson Banting, Grandma Lena Banting, Uncle Edward Banting.

Thompson sold the farm to his son Edward in 1952. Edward had already been working the farm for years.

Sadly, Lena died three years after this photograph was taken, with Thompson following her the following year.

8

The Banting Homestead.
20 April 2006
5116 Sir Frederick Banting Road, New Tecumseth, Ontario
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9

Pete McGarvey recalls spending "many a happy holiday [at Nelson Banting's] and at the William Banting farm, then operated by Thompson Banting. Mrs. William Banting, the family matriarch, lived in a large home at the corner of Queen Street and the Scotch Line, a block away from my materal grandmother Drennan's home on Victoria Street. There too, Banting, Drennan and McGarvey cousins would gather and frequently Dr. Fred would drive north from Toronto to visit."

Marie (Shields) Banting remembers that her "two grandparents lived next door to each other. I thought everybody's grandparents lived side by side."

10

The Homestead site is significant historically as well as sentimentally...