The 106th Avenue Triplets
11002, 11004 & 11006 106th Avenue
Constructed: 1914
Three of Queen Mary Park’s last remaining pre-war homes stand tall along 106th Avenue. As with most properties of similar vintage, they started life as speculative ventures. Built to a uniform design, these three stucco-and-clapboard Foursquares sat on Edmonton’s urban edge, separated from civilization by farm fields, warehouses, cemeteries, and railyards. Each was rented out to transient workers on a year-by-year basis. Farmers, shippers, company superintendents, railwaymen, dispatchers, and stenographers called them home in those early days. But there were those who stuck around long enough to form an integral part of these houses’ stories.
For 11002, that family was the Griersons. Railway work is what drove them to the city. Samuel, the family’s head, “joined the road in 1917 and since 1923… worked out of Edmonton… holding a steady run between Edmonton and Watrous, Sask., on mainline passenger trains.” With his wife Onia, they raised two children, a boy, John, and a girl, Elizabeth Jean.
Edmontonians knew the family for its commitment to the tennis community. All four were active players, and Sam served as the Central Community Tennis Club’s general secretary, while Onia orchestrated dances on their behalf. The Griersons’ “unselfish efforts... contributed in no small way to the club’s success,” the Journal once wrote.
Elizabeth married on June 24th, 1943 at the family home. Sadly, an unexpected death had claimed John in 1936 — he was twenty. Samuel retired from Canadian National in 1950 and died five years later. Onia followed in 1963.
Railway work and premature death hounded the Wolfes, of 11004, much the same. Shortly after moving in, Albert H. Wolfe, a Canadian National Railways locomotive engineer, lost his wife Edith. The forty-four year-old succumbed suddenly, leaving him alone with their one child, Wilbert. The two passed time as soloists, providing music to local churches.
Albert remarried on June 25th, 1935 to Mrs. Charlotte Ann Craig — death nearly took her as well. On October 9th, 1939, she was rushed to the Royal Alexandra Hospital "after she fell out of her husband’s automobile when it collided with another car.” The engineer told police “that the brakes on his car failed to hold when he applied them because of mud and water in the lining received when he was traveling over mud roads north of the city. In the collision, the Wolfe car swung around in a complete circle, a door swung open, and Mrs. Wolfe fell to the roadway.” Fortunately, she only suffered “bruises and shock.”
Charlotte’s son, John Caldwell, was something of a prodigy. By age twenty-five he had “graduated with a bachelor of arts degree, majoring in English and journalism… Mr. Craig attended McKay ave and Victoria high schools here, and before enrolling at Taylor university, Upland Ind., attended Simpson Bible Institute in Seattle: McPhail school of Music, Minneapolis, and St. Paul Bible College. He received his graduate diploma in theology at the latter college.” Ordained at the age of twenty-one by the World Faith Missionary Association of Minneapolis, John served the active pastorate of Indiana’s Bryant Community Church.
John eventually returned to Edmonton to serve with the Royal Canadian Air Force. He later moved to England to study journalism at London University. Albert remained in his 106th Avenue home until his death in April 1961.
Wartime service marked the Kirkmans, of 11006, lineage. James William came to Canada in 1903, and served the country during the Great War. He “joined the 31st Battalion here in 1914… [and] returned from overseas in 1917 after having suffered gassing in the trenches. During 1917 and 1918 he was sub inspector for northern Alberta of the dominion police supervising conscription.” In the post-war years, James worked with the Soldiers’ Settlement Board and farmed in the district. With his wife — unnamed by contemporary reports — he raised four sons: Malcom, Fredrick, Robert, and Gordon.
It was Robert, the unassuming middle child, that brought the family fame. His early life wasn’t much different from most Edmonton men his age. Educated at Alex Taylor and the Roman Catholic Separate High School, he worked a middling job as an interior decorator with the T. Eaton Co. pre-war. After James’ death in March 1941, however, he joined the ranks of the Royal Canadian Air Force. He shipped out for England in September 1943 and from then on commanded headlines in Edmonton’s dailies.
Flight Sergeant Robert Kirkman, bombardier, served aboard a Halifax bomber known as “The Seven Dwarfs.” The crew, composed of three Canadians, two Englishmen, one Australian, and one American, adopted nicknames from the titular characters — smiling Rob Kirkman was known as “Happy.” Through the skies his Halifax flew, dropping bombs over Germany and the occupied territories of France and Belgium. Nazi facilities in the likes of Boulogne and Essen were his targets.
The raid over Dortmund was his most harrowing. Legion Magazine writes that “Dortmund boasted more than two dozen industrial works, including collieries and coking plants, chemical and explosives works, iron foundries and steel works, and 10 power stations.” On the cool night of October 6-7th, 1944, Bomber Command sent in The Dwarfs and 522 other R.C.A.F. and Royal Air Force bombers to wreak havoc on the region’s synthetic crude production facilities. From the Journal:
“Ten miles from target, the starboard outer engine of [Robert’s] Halifax was hit by flak and ceased to function, and the aircraft started to lose height. An aircraft directly in front of them blew up in the air, while a second one to the starboard went down in flames. ‘The Seven Dwarfs’ was left a target for all anti-aircraft guns.
Flak crashed all around the bomber. The port aileron was rendered useless and the pilot was unable to turn in that direction. He did mange to make a flat turn to starboard to get into the bombing run.
Kirkman gave the order that kept the pilot on a straight and level course until he dropped his bombs and the aircraft turned for home.
The pilot battled the controls and held his throttles wide open, but nothing he could do prevented the aircraft from losing height.
As the bomber crossed the enemy coast it was down to 8,000 feet and by the time it reached the English coast it was down to 1,000 feet.
To prevent the tying up of a runway in case the aircraft crashed, the pilot set it down on the grass of the airfield. It spun around immediately [as]the wheels touched and the port inner engine burst into flames.”
All seven crew members survived without serious injury, although their wireless operator was rendered unconscious over Germany — a piece of shrapnel severed his mask’s oxygen tube. A thorough examination of the aircraft afterwards revealed that Nazi fire ripped 188 holes into the plane’s body.
Kirkman and his motley men continued to fly sorties until early 1945. That February, Robert was “released from the R.C.A.F. and placed in its civilian reserve” — it’s likely that a wound necessitated the decision. He returned home and in March 1946, was joined by his war-bride, Violet Palfrey, a one-time Women’s Auxiliary Air Force member.
Image Gallery:
Sources:
“Many Attend Tennis Club Dance at Patricia at Weekend,” Edmonton Journal, September 30, 1929.
“Central Tennis Club Presents Season’s Prizes,” Edmonton Journal, October 13, 1930.
“Deaths: Mrs. Edith Wolfe,” Edmonton Journal, March 21, 1934.
“Deaths: John Eldridge Grierson,” Edmonton Journal, May 11, 1936.
“The Railwayman’s Section,” Edmonton Journal, May 16, 1936.
“Two City Residents Hurt at Week-End,” Edmonton Journal, October 10, 1939.
“J.W.P. Kirkman, War Veteran Dies,” Edmonton Journal, March 19, 1941.
“Betty Grierson Bride at Knox,” Edmonton Journal, June 24, 1943.
“Editor-Bookkeeper Gets Arts Degree,” Edmonton Journal, July 29, 1943.
“Girl Hopes Speed Brother’s Release,” Edmonton Bulletin, September 29, 1943.
“Edmonton Flier Raids Boulogne,” Edmonton Journal, September 18, 1944.
“Edmonton Airman Reaches Safety After Heretic Attack Upon Essen,” Edmonton Journal, October 19, 1944.
“War Wives, Children, Arrive in Edmonton Early Wednesday,” Edmonton Journal, March 6, 1946.
“Personals,” Edmonton Bulletin, December 5, 1946.
“The Roving Reporter: Railwayman Retires,” Edmonton Journal, December 6, 1950.
Sharon Adams, “The Bombing of Dortmund, Legion Magazine, October 7, 2020,
https://legionmagazine.com/en/2020/10/the-bombing-of-dortmund/
