Gwennyth Leslie Arbuckle

Where does one possibly start to pay tribute to an amazing Mother, Grandmother, Great Grandmother, and friend to many, whom had a wonderful life lasting an incredible 103 years!!!

Gwennyth Leslie Arbuckle (nee Moore) was born in Brampton Ont. on February 18th 1922 to Oliver and Annie Mary Moore.

Gwen passed peacefully in her sleep, in her own bed (just as she had hoped for) at the Greenway Retirement Village on July 30th 2025. She was a resident of Greenway for over 20 years.

Gwen was predeceased by her loving husband George Frederick Arbuckle, sister Olive (aka Bunny) and her brother Maxwell. Gwen is survived by her daughter Suzanne Christie and family (Taylor and his partner Alexandra, Jill and her husband Ryan (Johnny and James), and her daughter Brett, her son Ted Arbuckle and his wife Brenda (Caleigh and Audra and her husband Lucas. (GG, Freddie and Porter), her daughter Laurel Panther and her husband Mark, (Sarah and Kett) and her son John Arbuckle (Lexus, Greigor and Devon) and his partner Seonaid Munro.

Gwen was a skinny kid growing up, perhaps because she contracted tuberculosis at around age six and required surgery. She was close to her family and extended family. Her Uncle Norm and his sister Aunt Jean (whom lived until she was 101) lived nearby and Gwen would visit them often. These visits kept up until Jean and Norm passed away.

Gwen demonstrated kindness from a young age. As a child she made visits to the local Brampton jail, which was just down the street, to visit with the inmates. Young Gwen would sing and dance for them. Imagine that, a kid being able to walk into a jail to speak to the secured residents!

Over the years in the different places she lived Gwen made many lifelong friends. At 103 she has outlived the vast majority of them, but there are still a few of Mom’s younger friends around whom have stayed in touch as best they could.

Gwen’s first job was working for a lawyer in downtown Toronto and she enjoyed sharing memories of those early days. She especially loved the dances at the Palais Royale.

Gwen married George on June 24, 1950 and their first home was in Niagara-On-The-Lake, where George was the production manager of the York Farms cannery. It was there that Gwen gave birth to Suzanne (Feb 1952) and Ted (July 1953).

The family moved to Port Credit in March of 1954, and then on to Brantford in March of 1956, where George was the General Manager of the two York Farms factories. It was in Brantford where Gwen gave birth to Laurel (Aug 1956) and John (Aug 1959). Brantford remained the family home until 1976 when Gwen and George moved to Unionville as George was transferred to Canada Packers head office in North York

Gwen made many close friendships in Brantford. She was easy to get to know, friendly, and she loved to entertain. Gwen and George hosted an annual New Year’s Day Open House that featured a wonderful buffet of assorted foods. The Arbuckle house was always open for the kids' friends, and became the defacto morning meeting place for John and Laurel’s friends before they headed off to James Hillier Public School.

George would have to travel for work from time to time, and Gwen always loved to join him, however there was one issue that made this a tad difficult. Gwen was a superstitious sort, and one day a fortune teller read her tea leaves, and told Gwen that she was going to die in a plane crash. That was all Gwen had to hear, and the bus became her transportation mode of choice. Gwen had no fear of travelling alone as a woman, and would meet George where the business meetings would be held. Not only would she take a bus to get to the meeting location, she would take a round-about tour to get there, often leaving a week or two ahead of George to be sure she got to the location well ahead of him. She would write and send Post Cards along the way to let us know where she had been. This bus travel kept up for a number of years, but eventually Gwen got over her fear of flying. Gwen enjoyed the travel with George, and they visited many places in the US and eventually Europe.

As kids growing up in Brantford we had a number of pets. Some were brought home by George, like a baby ground hog he somehow picked up at the York Farm’s airport plant, but the vast majority were introduced to our home by Gwen. We had cat’s (two of which had litters), mice, a couple of dogs, Brocliff, (named by Sue), and Mom’s beloved Arnold. When returning home from a trip to Florida, Gwen thought we needed a pet alligator. She brought home our first one on a flight from Florida. She liked Alligators, we had two, over the years. She said she just stuffed the gator she named Albert under her seat in some sort of bag or cage.

While in Brantford Gwen raised her family and was also engaged in the community and with friends. She was a long time member of the I.O.D.E., played some bridge, and was an active member of the Brant Curling Club, and of Saint Stephen’s Anglican Church. During the harvest season, when there were labour shortages at York farms, Gwen (along with a few other York Farm manager’s spouses) would work on various production lines at the Airport Plant. She generally worked on the “Corn Husker” line. They would work evenings and she would leave for work around 3pm and get home at midnight. This job gave her the opportunity to pick up fresh corn on a daily basis. One would be very hard pressed to find anyone who enjoyed a cob of corn more than Gwen!

In 1958 Gwen and George built a cottage on a piece of the Arbuckle family farm property outside Coboconk. The cottage was always referred to as “Gwen’s cottage”, as she had used funds left to her by her Uncle Charlie in Chicago to finance the build. The cottage became so central to all of our lives. Mom would be there all summer taking care of us, and dad would come up every weekend and always take Mondays off, as he never could take holidays in the busy summer season at York Farms.

We would have many guests each summer, all of us packed into a 4 bedroom cottage, with one small bathroom. As kids we all slept in the bunk room, and each night Mom would put on a record to help us get to sleep. She must have almost worn out the grooves on the albums Oklahoma, My Son the Nut (Allan Sherman), South Pacific, the Sound of Music, and The Best of Phil Harris. We always got to listen to one side and sometimes two. Many of those old songs come back to all of us from time to time.

Each year we would head up to the cottage when school was out, and we stayed there all summer. How lucky were we!!!

Mom loved the CNE and we went for years. We all loved the Air Show, the Midway and the “FOOD BUILDING”. Mom always loved her food! She loved to try different things, but was never fussy. She could chew a bone clean, better than any turkey vulture, and would often finish up any bits off a chicken leg, spare rib, or beef bone left on her kid’s plates. She always mentioned the food at Greenway being good, especially the soup. She loved her soup.

As mentioned, Gwen enjoyed travel. Dad liked it, but after retiring to Coboconk in 1982, he was just as happy to stay home and take care of things. Gwen loved Coboconk but her wanderlust was strong and she would head out alone, or with one of her many road trip buddies like Anne MacDonald, Sheila Smith, Lorraine Christie or anyone else she could grab for an adventure. Dad used to make up big signs for her return. There was one that went something like:

Welcome Home Gallivanter

No more Restaurants

No More Motels

and he would have mops, brooms and a vacuum leaning on the sign.

After Dad passed away in 1993, Mom continued to travel. She would take train trips, bus trips, and fly south to visit friends in Florida and Aruba. Gwen also liked to take repositioning cruises. In 2007 she went from Seattle to Sydney.

Gwen had always wanted to climb “The Sydney Bridge” So, what did she do? At 85, she managed to book, and climb, the Sydney Bridge! Gwen’s love of travel kept up until she was in her late 90’s.

During Gwen’s 100th year, March 2022, she fell and broke her right hip. She was confined to the hospital for several weeks, and at that time there were days when we thought she might not make it. Fortunately, as always, Gwen rallied and returned to Greenway.

She did her best to rehab and exercise. Things were coming along well until Sept 2022, when she had another fall, and broke her left hip. The second hip healed much faster than the first, and she was in and out of hospital in about two weeks. With two broken hips her mobility was limited. We were fortunate enough to connect with the agency “Nurses Next Door” who helped Mom 4 hours each day since then. They would help get her dressed and take her down for meals, along with staff from Greenway. Special Thanks to Shivani Arora, Komalpreet Kaur, Sylverne Billy, and Gurjit Kaur of Elcare and Nurses Next Door for all the kindness and attention they showed Mom over the past three years.

Gwen liked to have her “hair done”. She felt so lucky to have been able to have Mary Soltani do her hair every week.

Gwen was truly the matriarch of the Arbuckle family. Matriarch sounds a bit too harsh for some reason, as Mom was so very kind caring, and nice. She always knew where her kids were, and we all travelled extensively during our careers. On top of that, mom also knew where each of her 10 Grand kids were, who also travelled a lot with work and for pleasure. Gwen was “with it” right up to the end. How good is that? 103 and still had her marbles! Gwen was fortunate to have had great health, other than the broken hips. She was only taking one medication a day, her “happy pill” and still enjoyed a rye and water from time to time. In her final months, John and Seonaid got her up to the cottage in Coboconk a few times. She was actually up to the cottage two weeks before she passed. On this final visit she had dinner with friends and family, and got to play with all five of her Great Grand Kids, whom she absolutely loved to pieces.

Mom was a positive person who rarely complained and who often mentioned how happy and content she was, in spite of spending most of her time in bed over the last couple of years.

Greenway was the ideal place for Mom as they all treated her with respect and love, and she was able to get down to the dining room for lunch and dinner every day. This kept her active and engaged with others. It definitely kept her going. Special THANKS to all the staff at Greenway.

Words will never capture the complete essence of a life so well lived, and a person so well loved as Gwennyth Leslie Arbuckle. She was a trooper, she was one of the good ones, and she will be missed by many.

There will be a service for Gwen at noon on 12SEP25 at Christ Church, Coboconk followed by a celebration at 2 at Moncks Landing Golf Course, Norland. Donations in Gwen’s memory can be e-transferred to the Coboconk Legion legion12@bellnet.ca to help fund a generator to support the community during power outages.