It was 1956. Television was in its infancy. Canadian programs such as Cross-Canada Hit Parade, Front Page Challenge, The Big Revue and, yes, the Barris Beat, were new on the tube. This country’s actors, singers, dancers, writers and directors were just getting their show-business legs in a new medium. One of its rising stars, a multi-faceted comedic actor named Don Harron, happened to meet another up-and-comer, producer Norman Campbell.
“What am I going to do?” Campbell asked Harron. “I’ve got 90 minutes of time to fill on CBC TV and no program.”
“I’ve got an idea,” Harron said. “Let’s put ‘Anne of Green Gables’ on TV.”
Within 10 years, Harron and Campbell had taken a one-shot TV musical idea and transformed it into one of the most talked about, most successful tourist attractions in the country. With the show book by Harron and Campbell and song lyrics by Elaine Campbell (Norman’s wife) and Mavor Moore, the musical stage production Anne of Green Gables premiered at the Charlottetown Festival in 1964. It has run at the Confederation Centre of the Arts every summer since and has played to more than 2 million viewers in Canada, the U.S., the U.K. and Japan.
Don Harron, now 86, related this eureka moment the other night at the Tin Mill restaurant in Uxbridge, Ont., as members of the Lucy Maud Montgomery Society of Ontario prepared to launch their “Burn the Mortgage” campaign. The LMMSO had assembled some of its “champions” – people who in turn will invite family, friends, social and business associates to help the society overcome its next important hurdle.
The LMMSO hopes to pay out the last of the $200,000 mortgage on the Historic Leaskdale Church, where Lucy Maud Montgomery’s husband, the Rev. Ewan Macdonald, ministered to the local Presbyterian congregation between 1911 and 1926.
Much of the discussion at the Tin Mill the other night focused on innovative ways to convince admirers of the Lucy Maud Montgomery legacy to offer a gift of $1,000 (or perhaps 10 post-dated cheques for $100) to eliminate the rest of the mortgage by next fall. The hope is by October 2011, when the LMMSO will stage a three-day centenary celebration of Maud’s arrival in Leaskdale, that the whole community can watch the society pay off and burn the church mortgage once and for all.
In addition to Don Harron’s reflections on Maud, several of the champions present (and I declare my own interest here as one of those “champions”) offered their own takes on the importance of the Manse, the church and Maud’s literature. Among them, local financial advisor Brian Evans described what he felt was a community-wide obligation to preserve the church the same way it raised funds and built the second arena ice pad. LMMSO board member Melanie Whitfield related the emotional attachment to Maud’s writings she’s felt since she was a child; and to know she now lives in the neighbourhood is a dream come true.
I too believe strongly in telling the big story – the way Don Harron has over the years – and getting the big dollar investments in Anne Shirley and all the other manifestations of Maud. However, my inclination for fund-raising is to explore the grassroots perspective too. I think the future of the Manse, the church and Maud’s legacy rests in the hands of today’s aspiring writers. And I don’t just mean the accomplished and professional ones. Remember, Maud started as an amateur. So did Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro and even Johanna Skibsrud (this year’s winner of the Giller Prize).
And every family has an aspiring writer – a boy or girl who loves and wants to learn to write. I think raising awareness of Maud and the need to preserve her home and her literature must come from those writers (and their families) who love their own creativity as much as hers.
The other night at the “Burn the Mortgage” pre-launch, Don Harron and actress partner Claudette Gareau offered one final anecdote from the past. They remembered 1967, the Confederation year, when Queen Elizabeth attended a variety show commemorating the country’s Centennial. Harron remembered inserting one of the songs from Anne of Green Gables into the show for the Queen. Following the performance, Harron said, all the Queen wanted to know was when and where she could hear more of the Anne of Green Gables show.
“I think Maud would be amazed that Anne of Green Gables is the longest running musical in North American,” Harron said. “And she would be amused that the mortgage on her church has not yet been paid.”
Inspiration enough, I guess, for all – from royalty to commoner – to help the Lucy Maud Montgomery Society of Ontario “burn the mortgage” sooner than later.