By Thomas Smith

A remarkable woman is preparing to celebrate her 100th birthday on Saturday, Jan. 31st and everyone is invited.

Ruth MacBrien, the only living founder of Minden Bible Church, is a woman with a thousand stories. Likely more.

“My first memories are playing in a playground in the Hudson’s Bay store in Winnipeg,” she said. The early memory was of her mother, letting her play with other children while she did some shopping. Another fond memory, after moving to Niagara Falls, is crawling into an igloo that her older sister Marion had made.

“We came east when I was three and a half. My dad had been working on the railway. They went on strike, so my uncle said there was a job that he could do in Niagara Falls working on the generator at the Power Station there. Back in those days we moved a lot because dad followed the work. So he moved and mom, my older sister and I followed.”

After staying in Niagara for a little more than two years, Ruth remembers that she loved foraging for mushrooms with her father.

“In Grade 1, you had to be in your sixth year to attend school in those days so I attended Hunewood School from January to June, in Toronto as my dad moved for work again. We lived in an apartment in the St. Clair area.”  For Grades 2 through 8, Ruth attended John R. Wilcox School. “I did well, I was valedictorian in Grade 8,” she said. St. Clair was well built up, with stores, etc, the streets wide enough for two lanes and street car tracks in the center.

In her first year of high school, World War II began. Her favourite subjects were geography and writing. An active member of the school’s choir, she remembers singing “When the Lights Go On Again (All over the World),” which reached number one on the charts in 1943.

“I had a good group of friends from my church who visited places together.” On one occasion on a trip to Buffalo with a group of friends she recalls with a laugh, “We didn’t have a place to sleep, so we slept on the floor of the library.”

In 1939, Ruth met her future husband, Bob, through his older sister Betty, a member of their church group. ” We had a lot of things in common. He was a painter and I dabbled in that a bit,” said Ruth. Bob attended school in Toronto, living in a house that his dad had built for him because in Carnarvon, school only went to Grade 9 and he wanted to go to high school. He was born in Detroit and his family moved to Haliburton County when he was quite young. She noted that this was during the War. Bob joined the Navy where he operated the radar and transmitted messages using Morse Code, serving on the Cruiser Ontario for two years in World War II. While on leave after an appendicitis, he played tennis with Ruth and her friends in Aurora. She admits he wasn’t very good, but he was recovering from surgery, after all. 

Ruth worked for Continental Life while she and her family moved to Aurora. Later, after taking the bus  to commute to work, she was offered a job, closer, at Collis Leather, working in dictation. Ruth transcribed business conversations in shorthand while listening through a dictaphone. She was often required to do payroll, inventory, and write letters for the boss.

“In 1949, one of the girls in our church group wanted me to join her coming north to visit Bob’s sister Betty at Brien’s Pines Cottage Resort on Boshkung Lake. I didn’t realize that Bob was doing some of the cooking there so we became reacquainted. I came again  at Thanksgiving with Betty.” 

“Our first date was canoeing and it was awfully cold on the lake that time of year! Bob’s mom got me warm by the cookstove in their warm kitchen. Our second date  was climbing Ferguson’s Mountain, now called Cooper’s Mountain. He wanted to hike to the top to see the sunset. Of course it was dark when we came down, so of course he had to hold my hand.”

She remembers her wedding day being a rainy day, having a sit-down supper, the wedding taking place at Oakwood Baptist Church. “My husband peeled the potatoes for the salad,” Ruth said with a laugh.

In the spring of 1952, her husband Bob had a lung hemorrhage from a missed spot on the x-ray of his lung at discharge from the Navy which resulted in a year’s stay at the sanitorium in Gravenhurst. They had moved north after having their first son in 1951, and stayed in a cottage at the Brien’s Pines. “I loved it better up here,” Ruth quipped. “I married someone from here. I loved it up here and never looked back.”

Ruth and Bob have five children from their 66 years of marriage including Paul, Catherine, James, John, and Lois. At last count, on December 24, 2025 there are 13 grandchildren, 30 great grandchildren, and one great great grandchild.

Since Ruth was 12 years old she has been tatting. Her favourite method of self expression in art, tatting involves knotting fine lace in patterns over a core thread. An unforgiving art form, MacBrien says it requires precision. If a mistake is made, you need to start over. However it is an accessible craft, very portable that is done with a shuttle and your fingers. Ruth is one of the founding members of the Kinmount Artisan’s Market, a dedicated volunteer at the Kinmount Fair in the Heritage Building for nearly 30 years, and a presenter at Stanhope Heritage Day. Ruth says that she first learned to tat from her grandmother. Her father learned alongside her to help her out. Tatting was a popular art in Europe, especially Spain.

“The story goes that my dad’s family came from Spain as part of the Spanish Armada and got shipwrecked off the coast of Ireland,” she said.

Ruth’s talent in tatting is exemplified by her intricate snowflakes, doilies, flowers, bookmarks, and other geometric lace creations.

After moving to the Carnarvon area, Ruth worked for Carnarvon Lumber where she ‘whipped their books in shape’, and later worked alongside her husband as they operated Bob’s TV and Hardware, later Hillside Pro Hardware.

Looking back on her longevity, Ruth says, “I am most proud of what my children have done.”

Raising her children north of Carnarvon, she says that a lot has changed since she moved here.

“People have changed. It was very simple back then, everybody knew everyone else.”

Many people have built their cottages around the local lakes near her and she no longer knows everyone’s name.

She remembers a time when her husband’s father, Victor MacBrien, donated land to build the Maple Lake Phone Exchange, a place where ‘operator’ Frona Sisson connected you to the person you were calling by manually plugging your wire into another socket on the board. You can see this system at the Haliburton Museum. Phone lines were not private, but ‘party lines’ with two or more people on the same line. Often when one picked up the phone, others would pick up the phone and you would hear ‘click, click, click, click’ as uninterested parties would hang up their phones. Each phone on a party line had a certain sequence in the ring. Ruth always answered only her calls and certainly didn’t listen in on others’ private conversations. Teddy, Frona’s dog, delivered messages directly to people in friends’ houses.

“When my sister-in law’s baby was born, the dog sent the message down,” she said with a chuckle

As the only living, founding member of Minden Bible Church, Ruth still regularly attends Sunday services with faith an important part of her life.

Marg Hinds, part of Minden Bible Church’s Ministry Team says that Ruth MacBrien is like the ‘First Lady’ of Minden Bible Church.

“She is an incredible woman. We are very honoured to call her one of our own. She has been a mentor and role model to so many of us,” said Hinds. ” We are delighted to celebrate this birthday with her. We would love to wish her many, many more.”

Ruth attests her longevity to her faith.

“I would say we grew up with Biblical principles. When you follow those, you can have peace of mind and live a life that is good,” said Ruth, “trusting God to provide for all of your needs.”

Ruth MacBrien’s 100th Birthday Celebration will be taking place on Saturday, Jan. 31 from 1 to 4 p.m. at Minden Bible Church, located at 177 Bobcaygeon Rd. The cake cutting will be taking place at 2 p.m. In preparation of her 100th birthday, her daughter Lois has requested congratulatory letters from King Charles III, the Governor General of Canada, the Premier of Ontario, MP Jamie Schmale, and MPP Laurie Scott.

All are invited to come with their best wishes and celebrate Ruth’s 100th.

Edits and revisions completed by Lois Coltman and Ruth MacBrien