Thorncrest Village ~ The Early Days

Smoking

Smoking for adults back, when I was a kid, wasn’t considered a bad thing. In effect, most of the adults I knew, smoked. I think that it was result of soldiers returning from the wars. I believe that most soldiers smoked to calm their nerves. That being said, smoking was just “normal”. Smoking in cars, home, restaurants, bars and events was not frowned upon. It wasn’t until later that people became aware of the perils of smoking (well, so much for my lecture, sorry). Unfortunately, the smoking habit rubbed off on the lot of kids, myself and Richard included. Tobacco companies made it easy for kids to buy “smokes”. Thorncrest Village was one of the first places in Ontario to have a shopping centre. Not an enclosed mall, but an outdoor shopping centre with about 15 stores. It was a new concept that allowed village residents to shop locally. The centre had a grocery store, a restaurant and, I think, a pharmacy. It also had a service station. On the service station property was “new fangled” vending machine. It sold cigarette packages (5 to a pack) for 5 cents (that’s right, a penny a cigarette). There were no restrictions on who could buy. Bring on Gary and Richard! We became “smokers” at an early age, we were “cool”! At this point my parents (especially my mother) didn’t know about my “cool” habit. That came after!