Suzie Stohn was born in Toronto, growing up in the “Village”, not too far from Russell Hill Road in the city’s north end. Her family was well off, fortunately insulated from the effects of the Depression. Suzie lived a good life, enjoying school at BSS and in a boarding school in Quebec’s Eastern Townships. From there, she went on to McGill, and that’s where she was as the war was underway. Back in Toronto, she recalls that she was bored and looking for direction, so she and a friend decided to join the navy, and they became WRENs. They were trained in signals and communications, and Suzie found herself stationed in Ste-Hyacinthe, where she spent much of the end of the war doing her part to ensure Canada’s victory in the Battle of the Atlantic. As that phase of the war came to an end, Suzie was sent out west to Prince Rupert, B.C., where she was to be readied for the war in the Pacific. That part of the war ended in short order at that point. In those last months Suzie reconnected with John, and their prewar friendship went in a new direction, and they married in 1946.
John and Suzie Stohn were interviewed in their home in January 2019 by Scott Masters and Eric Brunt.
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