Sydney Leonard “Gramps” Wordsworth

I thought I’d better give my grandfather on the Wordsworth side, Sydney Leonard, equal billing to my Gramma, whom I recently profiled.

I feel fortunate to have such great memories of both of my grandparents.

Gramps and Gramma were married for 70 years, which is pretty amazing. Not just for their personal longevity in terms of the expected life span for when they were born, but also for how long they stayed married. With divorce rates today it seems times were just different for people like my grandparents.

While I ended up sharing Gramps middle name of “Leonard” it was my father who shared Gramp’s looks. If I put my father Jack and Gramps side-by-side you’d have trouble telling the difference.

I remember what a great sense of humour Gramps had, which I suppose born late in the 19^th century and living through a depression, a couple of World Wars and other challenges, must have come in pretty handy. This might explain his longevity.

I had countless wonderful hours working with my grandfather. Whether in the garden or painting the greenhouse, his famous expression was “Okay Mate, Enough for Today!”

If you look closely at this photo with Gramps and Gramma, he has the kind of smile that borders on a smirk, like he’s up to something.

Gramps loved wrestling. I remember 6 pm on Saturday being reserved for watching several hours of wrestling on the small black and white television. It made Saturday nights at my grandparents’ house pretty special.

Gramma was an excellent cook and Gramps loved to eat. I have fond memories of great dinners, which seemed like a feast fit for kings and queens with my grandparents.

I have been challenged to find many photos of Gramps. Gramma was in a number which usually seemed to contain grandkids. I’m sure it was a case of cameras being quite a luxury in those days, and the fact that people worked long hours and 6 day weeks, so he was probably not around much to be in photos.

He had a real sweet tooth and could always be found enjoying jelly beans. He also had a fondness for scotch and he smoked Navy cut cigarettes.

If you took today’s dietary warnings about sugar and health warnings about alcohol and cigarettes you would assume he lived a short life. But Gramps lived to be 96. So much for doing what you’re told.

He apparently got lucky in the “gene” lottery for old age. I hope he passed some of those genes along to me!