Skori-ing Big in the Search for Canadian Roots

Reviewing Accounts of the Candy's in the Kinsella History Book with the Skori's

When at the Flagstaff County office Ken, eager to locate the homestead on the county property map displayed on the wall of the lobby, didn't take into account that there are many Section 32's in Flagstaff County. The Section numbers are only unique within a Township. Anyway, the wrong Section 32 (one in the township just east of the actual homestead) led to the mistaken conclusion that members of the Skori family, who have been in the Kinsella area for many years, were the current owners.  Brent suggested we contact Ross Skori since he actively worked land in the area.

Ken called Ross and left a message with Ross' wife, but the conversation left Ken wondering if he had not made a mistake. Comparison of the county section map with a road map revealed the mistake and led to making contact with Ian Morken (see previous posts).  The mistake turned out to be a blessing however.  The next evening Ross returned Ken's call.  Ross owns Sections 31 and 33, the Sections on either side of Section 32 (the correct one) containing the Candy homesteads and his house is on the NW quarter of Section 33.  Ross also volunteers as caretaker of the Kinsella cemetery and the Candy name was familiar to him.  Ross said he would give his Uncle, who is a long time resident of the area, a call and get back.

Shortly Ross called back and said; "I think I have some information you will be happy to hear."  His Uncle did indeed remember the Candy's.  Dick and Florence Candy's house was still standing and was across the road from the Skori's and there was also a house built by Henry Candy in the area.  He invited us to drop by after our planned visit with the Morken's.

Is everyone in Alberta this nice?  The Skori's were as wonderful as the Morken's.  They had spent the evening before our visit looking through the Kinsella local history book and putting Post-Its wherever they found a reference relating to the Candy family.  The information was almost overwhelming as we attempted to rapidly piece things together.  There seemed to be some minor inconsistencies to the various personal accounts regarding the specific properties involved (southeast vs northeast quarters etc.).  Ken was only partially successful at scanning some of the pages of the local history book using his cell phone.  The book contained some material written by either Aunt Dorie or Aunt Gladys and a shorter account clearly written by Eileen (with mention that both she and her sister Doris were born on the homestead) that was appended to the other account.

It became clear that there are connections to the Smith/Eckhert family (Aunt Florence) that could be explored some day. Both Ken and Janet agreed that the lives of Uncle Dick, Aunt Florence and Uncle Tom were pretty much unknown to both.  Cousin Lorene, who was along during the 1955 return to Kinsella trip, may know more.

We later attempted to locate a copy of the Kinsella local history book at libraries and elsewhere in the area as it is now a 'must have' in some form.  There are copies in Calgary and Edmonton libraries that someday will make a good reason to return to the area to get better and more complete scans. Many of the local homestead histories are available online from the University of Calgary, but unfortunately the Kinsella area history does not seem to be among them.  Perhaps a request for the Kinsella history to be digitized would result in it becoming available on the internet.

Read more to see some of the Candy account.

The third to last paragraph describes a house built by Henry Candy for the Tonkin's.  It still stands!

Where is page 92 you ask?  I don't know!  Working quickly it was easy to miss pages from the book. One of the library copies in Calgary or Edmonton needs to be accessed and a proper job done to get all of the available accounts.