STANTON Norman Wilkie connection

Thanking Norman Wilkie for getting in touch with us. Norm had been searching the internet this year after the sad deaths of both his parents for clues to his Scottish heritage. He stumbled across our family website. Fantastic news for us as this means we have found another branch of the tree and another Canadian branch.

Norman has lived the majority of his life in Canada after immigrating with his parents in the 1960s. At this time there was a great exodus of Scots being offered a more relaxed immigration Policy at that time.

Norman's family line. We share the same ancestors from Andrew Stanton and Maria Whelahan line.

Norman’s parents emigrated from Edinburgh in Scotland to Mississauga, Ontario, when he was just turning four. Norman’s dad knew somebody on the ‘council’ and this friend put his name forward for to move to a new council scheme which was being built in Edinburgh at the time. The scheme was called Dumiedykes and the street called Viewcraig Gardens. The scheme remains intact today and overlooks Arthur Seat, an extinct Volcano. It is a beautiful setting, not far from the Palace of Holyrood in central Edinburgh. And it must be said in her favour that there are not so many housing schemes could match the splendour of her majestic views.
View from the Volcano 'Arthur Seat' peeping down on Dumiekykes and overlooking the beautiful City of Edinburgh.

Dumiedykes today

But unfortunately the occupants of the scheme at the time were not so nice. The story that Norman’s dad tells him was that one evening when he came in from work there were a few boys on the stairs of the tenement. When his dad said ” Hello Boys” they told him to …F…off. Norman’s dad went home and let his wife know of the incident. They then decide that they weren’t going to raise their son in this environment.
Fortune had it that there were other Stanton cousins who had already left for Canada some years earlier. Mary Stanton Willis and Norman tells us that it was she who helped look after Norman on his arrival in the country.
Norman’s grandmother Rosina Dawson Stanton emigrated a few years later, and I presume that this was after the death of her husband which was in 1965. They had lived in Peffermill, Edinburgh. It would have made perfect sense for Rosina to emigrate to be with her children.
Walter Michael Stanton was the great grandad of Norman Wilkie. Walter married Jessica Anderson and they had two daughters Rosina Dawson Stanton and Maria Whelahan Stanton. This wonderful portrait shows the whole family. Walter has a 'Stanton' look about him with his sharp features.