Mary Cecile Wilson (Lockrey) of Southampton quietly passed away in the early hours of Thursday, June 18th at the Southampton Hospital.
Cecile was born in London, Ontario to Cecil and Jean Hardy. She is survived by Lorne Lockrey in Southampton (her partner of 52 years), her sister Helen Browning (Robert) of Port Elgin, sons Richard Wilson (passed away in 2025) (Sharon), Michael Wilson in Belleville and Terry Wilson (Gillian Wood) in Port Elgin. Grandchildren include Rick: Joanna (Edmonton) and Brian (Bradford); Mike: Elizabeth (Trenton) and Kimberly (Kitchener) and 7 great grandchildren.
Where do we start to tell the story of this lady? Active, busy, caring, passionate about genealogy and her deep roots in Bruce County, baker, chef, volunteer, grandmother, gardener and more.
Cecile spent her childhood summers either at her parent’s cottage in Gobles Grove or with her aunts and uncles on their farms around the Port Elgin area. This shaped her passion for family roots leading eventually to a decades long retracing of the MacLean family heritage in Ireland and Scotland. To anyone who would listen (and some who were forced to) she would gladly take you through long winding stories of what she found, going back over a few hundred years, including how early settlers traveled down the Saugeen River by raft, to establish settlements in the area. This wasn’t a hobby – it was a passion. No, it was an obsession. If you happened to casually ask her about your family history it was very likely the next time you saw her she’d have a handful of documents and say “Oh, I just thought I’d see what I could find for you”.
Her love of Bruce County and its history led her to a 20-plus year volunteer position in the Southampton Genealogical Society at the Bruce County Museum, coordinating volunteers in the capture and archiving of newspaper “clippings” of events, births and deaths in the county.
In 1976 after moving from London to Port Elgin, then Burgoyne, Sauble Beach and finally to Southampton, Cecile and Lorne stepped into the world of Square Dancing. They helped found the Wiarton Squares Club with Lorne calling “Squares” and Cecile calling “Rounds”. They also called for at least three other clubs. For over 20 years they called weekly dances in the area, elsewhere across the province and hosted big Square Dance Jamborees held in the Southampton Coliseum. Cecile enjoyed making their custom dance outfits as much as she enjoyed dancing and calling.
Somehow in-between the family tree research, Square Dancing, volunteering, grandchildren and baking she found time for gardening. Slowly at first, but once she settled into Southampton her yard became an ever changing, ever growing garden including a 20 foot cascading rock waterfall that attracted birds, butterflies and small creatures into their yard.
It was a busy life, well lived, full of many friends and relatives in her beloved Bruce County. She will be greatly missed but we know she is still tracking the family tree, adding flowers to her heavenly garden and watching butterflies dance amongst the blooms.
A Celebration of Life will be announced in the near future.
