Burton Somerville was fully immersed in his community.
He loved people and he liked to have fun, said his wife Fran.
“He didn’t like to miss anything,” she said, adding he liked to be informed and got involved in whatever he could.
Burton had an interest in all things political. He kept an eye on council and sat on the committee of adjustment.
Fran said Burton was an innovative farmer and in some ways was ahead of his time. He once worked with the University of Guelph on an agricultural study, had an interest in alternative energy and exposed dozens of young people to farming through a summer employment program.
Fran said urban youth enrolled in the program lived with them at the farm and learned about life in the country. These youth had never had a home life that involved regular meals as a family at the kitchen table. She said in many cases it was more like an adoption program.
“We’ve been to all their weddings and Christenings for their babies. We have kept in touch with them all these years, they were all great kids,” said Fran.
One of them was a pallbearer at Burton’s funeral last week.
“Burton’s church was very important to him. He was baptized in the United Church in Stayner where he was a member for 81 years and he was on every committee and taught Sunday school to many of the young people who came to the visitation,” said Fran.
He was a proud father, involved in his son Wayne’s hockey and daughter Nancy’s figure skating. Wayne played for the Stayner Siskins and Nancy, who died of ALS in 2005, was a gold-medal skater.
Burton was also an athlete and a sports fan. He played junior hockey with the Stayner Royals and he was the pitcher for the junior farmer baseball team.
Burton and Fran raised their two children on the family farm, just east of Stayner.
Burton’s parents, with two sons and a daughter, moved from a farm on the 27/28 Sideroad to a new farm on Highway 26 in 1952.
Fran said there was so little traffic on the highway at the time that they drove the cattle down the sideroad and down County Road 7 to their new home.
“They just drove their herd right down the road,” said Fran. “They called the neighbours and said they would be doing it at such and such a time and they all went out and stood in their laneways.”
Fran and Burton met through Junior Farmers more than 60 years ago. Fran (nee MacNicol) lived on a farm south of Duntroon. They were both on the executive and got to know each other during monthly meetings.
They courted for almost three years before marrying in 1957. They lived in Stayner for a short time before building a home on the Somerville family farm.
“I always say, we were like the Newfies because we moved four times and never left the farm. We just kept trading up houses,” said Fran.
Once their children were teenagers, they moved to the main house.
“We started Waynan Dairy Farms in 1960,” said Fran. “We purchased the farm next door and across the street from Mr. Elvin Smith and he had the same number of cows and the same amount of dairy quota as he did.”
She said they bought the lot and moved them to their farm and that was the beginning of Waynan Dairy Farms.
She said when it came time to name the operation they made several submissions that were already taken. It was Fran’s mother who suggested Waynan, a hybrid of her children’s names, Wayne and Nancy.
In addition to the dairy operation, they sold beef cattle all over the world.
“That was big business before foot-and-mouth and all those weird diseases came up and all the borders were shut to Canada and that petered out,” said Fran.
She said Burton was fully immersed in the farm community, he always showed cattle at the Royal winter fair, the Ex and all the local fairs.
“He was big on fairs and big on community, anything that was community,” said Fran. “He helped build the hall at Duntroon, he was on the board of Sunnidale Corners hall for 10 years, he was chairman of the board. Anything rural and anything exciting, he was part of it.”