Don Hayward grew up at a hydro-electric generating site on the Spanish River, surrounded by the natural world of the Canadian Shield hard rock country. The experience of the north has influenced Don’s feeling for the natural world. During 1970 – 71 he backpacked in Australia. Returning to Canada to study photography, Don met his wife Diane in Toronto. The family ran a small part-time farming operation in Dufferin County as Don commuted to his job in the electrical industry. Don and Diane now live in Goderich Ontario on the shore of Lake Huron.  

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Steam dominated the railways of the world for a hundred years, but the powerful marriage of internal combustion and electricity gradually pushed steam aside. By the end of the 1950s, steam was fading fast and diesel locomotives were dominating. The old romance of living steel and tough men would not go quietly. On a small backwater sub-branch of the Canadian Southern Railway, the men of the old and the new collided. Love, hate, ambition and intrigue came together to end in tragedy. Ex-Mountie Mike Donovan, hoping for quiet semi-retirement as a railway cop soon discovered that sleepy backwater Ontario provided more excitement and mystery than he thought possible. As Donovan digs deeper, he finds killers are not always evil and victims not always deserving as the old motives of lust, jealousy, love and fear play out their deadly dance. In the end he finds, in spite of all, love wins. 

“We will destroy Toronto. We will destroy industrialism.” In a world where industrialism devastated the planetary ecosystem at a fast pace, the environmental movement split into two factions. The established environmentalists evolved into business operations where paid jobs, fundraising, government and corporate grants became the main focus. This faction believed that green corporations and growth could save the planet and allow the destructive ballooning of human numbers to continue. They thought that electing members to industrialist controlled parliaments would make a difference. The second faction understood that only total destruction of industrialism would be effective, allowing the remaining species to survive and perhaps some humans. At the extreme of this group sat the deep resistors, organised in cells so black that the security forces were not aware of them until they first attacked. Sherwood Green, in a spectacular series of fires and explosions, launched a surprise attack on Toronto, the strategic financial centre of Canada. The frantic, response of police focused on the above ground supporters of Sherwood Green.

Jos Amiel, a young reporter for the local, superficial TorontoNewsNow television network hoped covering Sherwood Green would build his career. Events drew him in deeper as the stress of the attacks exposed the seamy underside of the fragile city culture. Jos began to understand, if Sherwood Green succeeded, they would destroy Toronto along with his career.

Don Hayward's memories of his early life in High Falls, Ontario, on the Spanish river framed as a fictional return to the disappeared town sometime in the early 2000s. The span of memory is from about 1948 to 1961. In the engaging stage play Ipperwash, Falen Johnson and Jessica Carmichael lead us to consider place, loss of home and dislocation from our roots. They presented the story as an explanation of the native peoples’ connection to the land. I left the Blythe Theatre with a mixture of excitement and sadness in my heart. Our industrial culture over the past 200 years has led to dislocation for most of us, as economics has forced people to move or has obliterated our places of youth, and in my case, both happened to High Falls. It had disappeared by 1980. 

This annotated, pictorial history of High Falls, Spanish River, Ontario is compiled and assembled by Don Hayward. It covers the period from 1904, when the first generating station was being built, until 1986 when the last house was removed. There is some material post-1986. 

This is a collection of verse I have written over 70 years. Margin notes to a life. My first attempt at verse was in Grade 5 in our one room, 8 grade school, SS4B-Drury. The next effort, Creeping Death, is from a Grade 10 English assignment. I have generated many verses expressing thoughts and feelings since those early efforts. As I say, they are margin notes to my life.