The Postcard
A postcard that was published by the Kitchener News Co. Ltd. of Kitchener, Ontario. On the back of the card they have printed:
'Kitchener, Ontario.
Mennonite family, a common
Main Street scene at St. Jacobs,
Ontario, near the City of Kitchener,
Ontario.'
The card was posted in Woodstock, Ontario on Monday the 20th. May 1968 to:
Master Stephen Carter,
The Cathedral School,
1, The Close,
Salisbury,
Wiltshire,
England.
The message on the divided back was as follows:
"Sunday 19th.
We saw several of these
horse and buggy drivers
this morning. They belong
to a certain Mennonite
religion and they drive
horses all the time.
We went to a cattle sale
yesterday - quite a different
set-up from England!
I am writing this with pop
records playing in the
background - we are at
Mr. Sugden's home and his
children like records too!
Love from Dad & Mum."
Walter de Havilland
So what else happened on the day that the card was posted?
Well, the 20th. May 1968 was not a good day for Walter de Havilland, because he died on that day.
Walter Augustus de Havilland, who was born on the 31st. August 1872, was an English patent attorney who became professor of Law at Waseda University.
He was one of the first Westerners to play the game of Go at a high level. He was the father of film stars Dame Olivia de Havilland and Joan Fontaine.
Walter de Havilland's Early Life and Career
De Havilland was born in Lewisham, south London, the youngest of eight children. He was the fourth son of the Reverend Charles Richard de Havilland (1823-1901), of a landed gentry family of Guernsey origin, and second wife Margaret Letitia (1831-1910), daughter of Captain John Molesworth, R.N. and sister of the 8th. Viscount Molesworth.
He was a pupil at Harrow and Elizabeth College, Guernsey, and subsequently studied Theology and Classics at Cambridge University from 1890 to 1893.
After graduation, he worked as a patent attorney, becoming a member of the Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys, and moved to Japan to study patent law there.
Whilst in Japan he became a university lecturer, first teaching English and football at the former Fourth High School (the predecessor of Kanazawa University), Tokyo Higher Normal School (which was the predecessor of Tsukuba University), and later becoming a professor of Law at Waseda University.
He also ran a law firm in Tokyo, specialising in patent law.
Go
Whilst in Japan, de Havilland discovered the game of Go, and became quite obsessed with it. Although not the first Westerner to take up the game, he was, according to writer John Fairbairn, the first with a reasonably high level of skill in the game.
His teacher was Yoshida Toshio; a game between the two of them from 1908 was considered good enough for publication in the magazine Gokai Shinpo.
In 1910, de Havilland published a short work entitled The ABC of Go; the National War-Game of Japan, which made him a minor celebrity in the Go-playing world.
Walter de Havilland's Family
Walter de Havilland was the father of actresses Olivia de Havilland and Joan Fontaine, both of whom were born in Tokyo while he resided there, to his first wife, Lilian Augusta.
In 1919 she took them both to live in California. His daughters reportedly took second place to his love of Go, and his obsession with the game affected his ability to engage fully with his family.
After Lilian divorced him in 1925, he remarried twice; first to Yuki Matsukura (previously his housemaid), and later to Rosemary Beaton Connor.
In 1931, his daughter Joan, then thirteen years old, went to Japan to live with him, but returned several years later to the United States.
The brothers Geoffrey and Hereward de Havilland, of aviation fame, were his nephews.
Later Life and Death
In later life de Havilland retired to North Vancouver, British Columbia. He died on the 20th. May 1968 at the age of 95.
'Young Girl'
Also on that day, the Number One chart hit record in the UK was Young Girl by The Union Gap.
