Hi friend,

There's a park on the waterfront of Lake Ontario that's just a 10 minute walk from the Toronto Public Library's Mimico Centennial Branch, where we will start the ExperienceTO: Mimico Historical Tour on Saturday, September 19.

It's called Amos Waites Park, named after a former councillor and mayor of Mimico, back when it was still an independent municipality. Mimico remained a separate town until 1967, when it became part of Etobicoke, and eventually Toronto.

When Joel Winters from the Etobicoke Historical Society investigated the story of Amos Waites, he uncovered a fascinating glimpse into both the man and the community he led.

Amos was born in 1895. His father operated a five acre market garden near what is now the Queensway and Kipling. As a boy, Amos remembered winters so severe that his mother would cut potato sacks into strips and tie them around his legs so he could walk through the deep snow to school.

At 11, he took his first job as caretaker of the one room schoolhouse he attended, earning $2 a month to light the stove before classes began. He never attended high school because there simply wasn't one in the area.

Yet this boy who had so little formal education eventually became a councillor and, later, mayor of Mimico for three separate terms.

His political career included some of the most difficult years in the town's history.

During the Great Depression, many Mimico residents lost their homes because they could no longer afford their mortgages. The town itself went bankrupt because it could not collect enough tax revenue to meet the interest on its debt. A provincial supervisor was appointed, and even the town treasurer could not issue a cheque without the supervisor's approval.

As Amos remembered, "They watched every dollar."

The pressure extended beyond the town's finances. In 1936, unemployment and relief protests were increasing across Etobicoke.

Leadership becomes most visible when circumstances are difficult.

When resources are abundant, disagreement is manageable and the consequences of mistakes are limited, almost anyone can appear competent. The real test comes when the money is tight, people are frustrated, competing interests are demanding attention and every decision carries a cost.

In those moments, leadership requires more than being liked.

It requires judgment, courage and a willingness to accept responsibility for difficult decisions. That doesn't mean being harsh or dismissive. It means understanding that stewardship sometimes requires saying no, holding a difficult position, and accepting that doing what you believe is right may cost you personally.

Faithfulness is ultimately a better measure of leadership than approval.

Amos Waites could not control the Depression, the town's finances, or the anger of its residents. But he could choose how he would respond to the circumstances in which he had been entrusted to lead.

And that may be the most interesting lesson hidden in the story of a small park on Toronto's western waterfront: you don't get to choose the circumstances in which you lead. You do get to choose whether you will lead faithfully within them.

Thank you for taking the time to read and reflect.

Until next time,​
​Alex Rășcanu​

P.S. If you'd like to read the past e-newsletters focused on life lessons, you can find them here.

P.P.S. See you at one of the upcoming monthly ExperienceTO historical tours, such as the Mimico one on Saturday, September 19th.