Newcomers at Fletcher's Field

Newcomers at Fletcher's Field
Oil on Canvas 24x36
Painted: 2021
Original Image Taken: 1949
 
My father always told me that he never had a childhood.  The hardships of the Holocaust forced him to grow up fast and become an adult literally overnight.  In 1949, he was only 16 that first summer in Canada but his ‘social life’ mostly included people much older than him.  As Holocaust survivors these people found community with each other.  They were hollowed out by atrocities of the war and together they could just be themselves at gatherings like the one pictured here.  Fletcher’s Field was a park right across the street from the Jewish Immigrant Aid Services office in Montreal.  The park offered green spaces for newcomers to gather, search for ‘landsmen’ and share stories about adapting to the strange new culture they were trying to understand and find their place in. These people did not want to be at the receiving end of community assistance.  They just wanted to get on with life, rebuild their families and contribute to the country that had taken them in.