Burial For My Father
May 13, 2007 my father passed away in Scarborough, Ontario, Canada and was cremated but never burried. To close this chapter of my life I need to place him in a 'forever space' where he can be found. Due to a number of personal issues in our family, he was handed to me. Allow me to share a short version of that story.
When my father passed he passed with no will, no money, an extensive history as a political reporter and media relations man, no extended family that we can find and a history of alcohol abuse and heart issues.
Part of why I am here is to raise the money necessary to put him to rest. Another part of why I am here is to encourage people to seek help if they are in horrible situations that can affect them forever and to plead with people to write up a will or create something to cover your passing. You see...
After he passed a friend took a letter from him, that he had written out for me, under my request, to research family and discover if his heart issues were due to the alcohol abuse only or if there was a medical connection I should be aware of. The friend entered the vague information into Ancestory.ca for me and it took a few years but I began to see connections pop up. I now had a connection to relatives in England and France as well as other parts of Europe and North America. Suddenly I went from no history to so much history.
When the tenth Anniversary of his death came and went I realised that, as much as I had found distant cousins, I still could not find his parents nor could I find any relatives back in Ontario that I could call on for support or a preexisting burial plot to place him in. I began to give up and was coming to terms with emotionally trying to handle his remains in my home. With the constant reminder of how I have him being with me every day combined with the looming possibility that they will pass a 'no remains' law if you don't have a person in a will to pass them onto for responsibilty, I began to worry. I can't stand the thought that his family and his hard work and his small (global wise) yet HUGE (local wise) contributions to Media would go unnoticed. I am swamped with the sensation that no one will be able to visit a grave site to lay a flower or say a prayer or say sorry or thank you. I couldn't do it. I couldn't justify the cost of a scatter permit or the thought of him disappearing in time... Then it happened. My husband found his brother. He found their story and where his brother is buried.
My goal now is to bury him with his brother.
If you have a moment. It's quite the story. I'll be kind and only share the litle pieces I think counts....
Robert (Bob) Carr (My father) and Michael J Carr
It's a long story of moving from place to place. From what I can tell his mother had a hard time being a mom. Relationship to relationship, job to job, drinking problems to lost moments. Eventually these two wound up in Brookside (correctional facility) when Michael was 11/12. This would have made my father around 13/14.
Michael passed away of pneumonia at the age of 12 at Brookside. Story says he snuck out a window, while sick, to play. We found his grave.
We have confirmed that it is him. We have talked to history societies that have been collecting information for those various areas and we have discovered that he is there, in a plot of the right size for the both of them but there is no grave stone or homage to him. We have confirmed that it is permissible to bury them together but to bury them without note, seems wrong to me. I need to end this part of the story and make the boys much more findable and let them know they did the best they could.
I have incredible memories of my father. They are sometimes scattered by moments of drinking, anger and rejection of his family, but they resurface when I saw him reporting on the latest story, taking us out for picnics and encouraging me to be what I need to. He didn't always agree with my choices but he never stopped me. I have no memory of him degrading me unless he was drunk, then that creature would come out. A brilliant man with so much more to give remained wrapped up in the history of a disjointed past. The hurt child continued to hurt right to the end and the more I find about him the more his existence as an adult makes sense.
Please help me put him to rest with his brother. Please help my husband and I to get back to Toronto (we moved to BC for work) to see those who are still close to us and head out to Cobourg with his remains, to burry him.
I will come back and adjust the amount as more information comes in or is made more accurate (marker, taxes, additional fees missed, discount of flights, date changes...)
My goal is to either make it back there for October and bury him on the same date as his brother (October 18) at the earliest but not leave it longer then his death date (May 13) at the latest.
Additional funds raised willl go towards money lost by being away from employment (not accounted for in this goal - Can equal approx $1200 to $3000 as we are freelancers/business owners in the entertainment industry) or (if we are able to set aside additional funds or work extra hours) towards a donation to the Heart and Stroke Foundation. When I had the small wake for him (back in Ontario, when he passed and just before I had to run back to BC for work) we were able to contribute $200 for Heart and Stroke. We'd like to give them a little more. $200 seemed so small but I never realised what it takes to deal with death when someone has no way to cover their passing.
Once the goal has been met and before we head on our way, we plan on paying for an ancestry.ca full membership and updating all the 'leaves' on the tree, to the best of our ability, in order to reconnect as much as we can.
If you have an account with Ancestry feel free to look me up. My profile is CarrHunger.
And you can easly contact me through my webpage:
If you have any additional information about my father's past or the family connected with me (or even Brookside, cemetaries in those areas or assitance/services in closing this chapter) please feel free to contact me.
I will be returning to this campaign once I can rescue some of the VHS footage I have of my father and show you some of his career. I have very little left of him but the desire to share is HUGE!
Thank you.
Estimated breakdown on costs:
Burial fees: $1000.00
Burial marker to include both: $2300.00 to $4000.00
Airfare for both: $1000.00
Car Rental: $400.00
Hotel: $700.00
These estimates are based on only making it to Ontario. Our costs for hotel, flight, and additional needs can be more if we make it to England to meet family we didn’t know we had before this. It is a two part goal but if we can achieve part one (getting dad back) I will be very grateful. Any raised over this amount will go towards the second goal at another date.
