Harvey Partner was born on May 22, 1925 to Fred and Hazel (nee Darch) Partner on a rural property near Kirby. He was the fourth child of five siblings, having four sisters. The family farm of two hundred acres was located north of Tyrone in the Long Sault area, near the crest of the Oak Ridges Moraine. This is best described as hard scrabble farming as the area is composed largely of glacial limestone deposits left behind by the retreating of the most recent ice age, about ten thousand years ago.
During the Great Depression, he was educated at the rural Long Sault schoolhouse but was withdrawn after Grade 8 in order to assist at home on the farm. Three years later he found employment at the Goodyear Rubber Co. in Bowmanville, but shortly volunteered for WW2 service, at the CNE Grounds in Toronto, on January 25, 1944, at the age of 18. He was assigned for training in the Royal Canadian Army Service Corps.
The Royal Canadian Army Service Corps (RCASC) is the administrative and transport corps of the Canadian Army, providing all transportation and supply services to the Army. WW2 had brought about greater use of motorized transport to provide all supply services to the Army. The RCASC moved supplies from the rear areas to the front-lines. They delivered all rations, ammunition, petroleum products, and all other essentials. They did so with a variety of vehicles ranging from three to ten-ton trucks, and forty-ton tank transporters. Harvey knew how to operate farm equipment and heavy vehicles and was recognized for his mechanical ability and his aptitude for motors.
He was initially assigned for training in Orillia and then to bases near Brandon, Manitoba and Red Deer, Alberta. As the only male child in his family, the family needed his assistance on the farm during the growing and harvesting periods. He was returned home for this purpose between June and October of 1944. He reported back for service in November of 1944 to a base in Kingston, Ont. As the war in Europe was ending in May of 1945, he was sent for basic infantry training in Sussex, New Brunswick and St. Jerome, Quebec. Again, in July of 1945, he was returned home to assist on the farm until October of that year. He returned to the base in Kingston and was demobilized on the date of April 1, 1946.
After serving, Harvey became very industrious. He returned to Goodyear Rubber, opened a business for farm equipment and purchased the mill in Tyrone, working all three simultaneously. He married Bernice Quinney on August 9, 1947. They would raise a family of five, two boys and three girls. He attended trade school which led to opening a storefront in Orono named after him, Harvey Partner Plumbing, Heating, Electrical and Air Conditioning. He conducted this business for 40 years until the time of his death on March 16, 1993. Locally, Harvey was a member of the Royal Canadian Legion, President of Bowmanville Rotary Club, Loyal Orange Lodge and was also a member of the Masonic Lodge. Harvey was the Commissioner of Hydro for 22 years and was instrumental in the amalgamation of Newcastle Hydro to Veridian Hydro. Dad truly believed in service above self and continued to give back to his community.
Harvey’s service never took him overseas, the war being almost over when enlisting. He was too young to join up any earlier. Furthermore, in times of food rationing and sending foodstuffs overseas, local food production was just as important as sending men into combat. Personnel appraisals noted him as likeable, willing, co-operative, very mechanically inclined and enthusiastic about the Army. He did his duty.
Courtesy of the Orono Weekly Times with special credit to Wendy Partner
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