Peter John Sparkes

Retired Air Canada cargo facility, Toronto International Airport

Born: 01/07/1927
Died: 04/21/2025 in Guelph, Ontario
Interred: Marymount, Guelph

Peter was born in Lowestoft, Suffolk, in 1927, to his mom’s second husband, Bill. When WW11 began, Peter was evacuated to his inland relatives’ farm to keep him safe from the bombs that attacked his birth place. As a child, he found the planes and artillery sounds exciting to the point that he would endanger himself by watching the air strikes from outside his home. So enthralled was he that, when he reached his mid-teens, he lied about his age and registered at the local war office. Upon acceptance into the army, he was trained as a tank driver. Unfortunately, his tank hit a hidden mine and rolled over, severely damaging his upper left arm. He received a discharge from the army and sent home. He got hired as a bus driver in Cambridge, and that’s where he met his first wife, a conductor on one of his buses. They married in Cambridge and lived there for a while until the he heard that Canada was hiring British people to fill vital positions in transportation.

Peter and his small family emigrated to Canada in 1956, and they had no problem finding employment and housing. He did a lot of driving both buses and streetcars in Toronto. He eventually got employed by Air Canada in its cargo facility where he stayed until early retirement. At this point in his life he was on his second marriage and had two sons and a daughter. Unfortunately, his wife succumbed to cancer and he was single after many years of wedded bliss. Not having had the benefit of a complete education, he got involved with a computer…and that’s where he met and married his third spouse. The rest of his life history was a hectic whirlpool of dining, dancing, and travelling all over the world (mostly North and South America, the Caribbean islands, the British isles, and western parts of Europe). They retired to the Elliott Retirement Community and have led a quiet life until his death.