Bigwin Inn Pen-Pals

Contact friends from days gone by!

Before you start on this page, I'd like to mention that unfortunately, some information "may" have been recently lost concerning one or two of the people to submit to this page. If you're name is already here, please check your listing as there "could" be mistakes in your info. If that's the case, email me and I'll correct it asap. Sorry for the mix-up!

Requests have been received about contacting other people who worked at Bigwin Inn at various times. So, I thought that perhaps we should have a page for doing just that, and this is it.

This page then is a means of contacting friends who you may have lost track of, since your days at Bigwin Inn. If you would like to possibly be contacted by an old friend or if you have someone you'd like to contact, please send me an email and I'll post your email address (or your "snail mail" address if you prefer) here along with just a few words which you'd like to include. Please keep your information to less than 5 to 10 lines.

You may wish to say when you were at Bigwin Inn and what you did there. You may also give the name of the person you wish to contact if you like, and should that person or one of their friends see your contact info, they may contact you if they wish.

No guarantees of contacting anyone for sure, can be given.

Here's the current list.

Bonnie (Thomas) Foster (1958 or '59 approximately)

Email address: brf4622003@yahoo.com

"At dinner this evening we were talking about summer jobs and of course I remembered Bigwin. I decided to "Google" Bigwin and came up with your wonderful site. I am in Florida at the moment and don't have my photo album here, so can't give exact date, maybe 1958 or 59.

My name was Bonnie Thomas and I worked as a switch-board operator and lived over the porch in the main rotunda with about 6 or 7 other young "ladies". Names I can remember...Janet Comerford, Leslie, Judy, Beth and Chef Menkoff and his wife. Duke Ellington was there that summer and I have a poster signed by him and Kruppa. Many memories of Chico Vallee. Oh yes, and handsome Norton the ferry boat driver, Ron, (equally handsome) from the boat livery and Dave Eaman, who I did keep in contact with for a few years. Would love to hear from anyone from this time.

Bonnie (Thomas) Foster

Email address: brf4622003@yahoo.com

Mardi Bolton (1955 - 1956 approximately)

Email Address: mardibolton@rogers.com

Wonderful memories of Chicho Valle, l think that's how you spell it and his orchestra. I learned how to Tango and Samba. Frank Leslie, a Toronto stockbroker was there at that time. My friends were Marilyn Higgins, Mickey Ramsay (Marjorie Judith Ramsay) Libby Loman and many more. It was a long time ago but I still cherish the memories.

I would love to hear from anyone at that time.

Gail Moore

Email Address: gmoore@nygh.on.ca

My name then was Gail Ray and I worked at Bigwin summer of '69 as a housekeeper but also did some waitressing and some work in the little tuck shop.I was there with a girlfriend called Dayle. If anyone is reading this who worked there that summer I'd be happy to hear from them.

Carole & Robb Main
1049 Terrace Drive,
Bullhead City,
AZ  86442

Email Address: elan@citlink.net

Carole Main (Moss) and Robb Main met at Bigwin Inn during their time working there in the mid '50s. Carole was a waitress in 1955 and 1956 and Robb worked in the kitchen and later as the butcher during his years there, 1953, 1955, & 1956.

Subsequently, they were married and went to Bigwin on their honeymoon in 1957. Carole writes, "We would love to hear from our old friends."

Mike McCall
3957 Hwy. #359,
RR#3 Centreville,
NS, Canada
B0P 1J0.

Mike writes:

"I was employed at Bigwin for the summer of 1948 as a night auditor, which meant that I left the Pavillion every night at 10:45 and sat down for the rest of the night in the office of the main lodge with the day's accumulation of charges in front of my calculator and several ledgers. My quarters were on the top floor of the easternmost of two guest lodge.

It was the custom for staff to periodically put on an evening of musical entertainment for the guests. This took place on a temporary stage at one end of the main lodge. Some of the people involved along with myself were, Margaret Barr, Isabelle Hay-Roe, Marshall Bruce Evoy, and Marguerite Gignac.

Others I recall from that era are:

- A local, known only as "Hughie" drove one of the motorboats
- Deirdre McGonigle worked in the kitchen
- Cathy Orchard, a waitress, and I took walks and canoed together for part of the summer
- Gino Longarini was a bartender
- Bigwin's Manager then was named Murdoch
- Sandra McLennan and her brother (boat shed) obtained their employment (as I did) through Sandra's father who was an executive with a company in Toronto called Cardy which then owned Bigwin Inn.
- I remember a Heintzman, first name Shirley?

If there are any old duffers like me around who recall any events or people from the era when I was there, I'd love to swap tales. Such as they are."

Myrtle (Murrie) Warnke
1025 South B Street
Lake Worth, FL 33460

Myrtle writes:

"I worked at Bigwin around 1942 or 1943 from June to to August with

- my friend Geri Wood. We worked in the tea house kitchen. We were there the summer that [then princess, later queen] Juliana of Holland came to visit with her children and Ladies-in Waiting.

Also working there at that time with us were:

- Helen Neilsen from Huntsville
- Dave Humphries from Etobicoke
- a gal named [something] Winterbottom
- and two guys who claimed their last names were Winter & Summer.

It would be great to hear from any of these people. My email is wfence@bellsouth.net .

As mentioned before, if you used to work at Bigwin Inn and you would like to be
contacted by others you may have known then, send your information to me and I'll add your name, short message and email address to this list.

Please note:

Because of growing spam problems, I'm showing our email address as a part of an image below, in an effort to combat the email address gathering programs of the spammers. If you wish to communicate with me, please record my email address
from the following image and address your email to me there. Thank you!

And if you see a name here to whom you'd like to write,
please click on their email address and a new window will open up
in your email program enabling you to contact them directly.

If at anytime you wish your address removed from this list,
please write to me again, and it will be removed as soon as possible.

To get back to the main page,
please click on the small Bigwin ashtray just above.