|
On May 28, 1934, at a farmhouse at
Corbeil in northern Ontario, five identical baby girls were born to a
French-Canadian couple, Oliva and Elzire Dionne. The babies were named
Yvonne, Annette, Cécile, Émilie, and Marie. They were the world's first
quintuplets to survive, though they were tiny and very frail at first.
The Ontario government took the
quints from their parents and placed them under the care of Dr Allan
Dafoe, the doctor who had delivered them. A special nursery complex was
built for them, together with a public observation garden, for they
became Canada's major tourist attraction. More than 3 million people
came to have a look at the quints as they played in their nursery.
Meanwhile, their father fought a
nine-year legal battle to regain them. At last, in 1943, the girls were
returned home, but they had difficulty adjusting to their new life and
to their bothers and sisters. (There were 12 children in the family all
told.)
When the quints grew up, they moved
to Montreal. Émilie, who became a nun, died during an epileptic fit in
1954. Annette, Cécile, and Marie got married, but all eventually
separated from their husbands. They wrote a book, We Were Five
(1965). In 1970 Marie died, leaving three of the original five still
alive.
According to a recent audit,
Ontario netted $350 million in revenues related to the quintuplets. When
the five came of age, however, most of their share of the trust - once
estimated at $15 million - had been spent on the upkeep of Quintland. In
recent years, the three surviving quints have lived in poverty.
On March 6, 1998, the Ontario
government offered the sisters an apology and $2.8 million in
compensation. The move followed inquiries by family members over the
misspending of the quintuplets' money by the province.
Source:
The
Canadian Encyclopedia
|
