(14 Feb. 1880-7 Feb. 1942), physician. (Mahlon Locke, Mahlon W. Locke, Dr Locke). He was born and died at Williamsburg in Dundas County. It is hard to state, without venturing on what must appear to those who are new to his story or have not read any of the 1930s sources on him, how famous this village doctor was in his own country and the United States. It was reported in 1934 that “More than a ton” of an American magazine (unnamed in the news story) containing part two of an article on Dr Locke had been shipped to Williamsburg. (Standard Freeholder 5 Sept. 1934) Dr Locke treated arthritis, rheumatism and other problems by manipulation of the feet of his patients. Special shoes known as Dr Locke’s Shoes were well known at the time; see for example the advert. for these shoes, placed by Barbara’s Bargain Store, Alexandria, Ont., in the Glengarry News of 17 July 1936. Dr Locke was not a Glengarrian (though his wife was of GC ancestry), but the extensive writings on him and the photographs they include are valuable sources for the flavour of Eastern Ontario life in the 1930s, the period of his greatest fame.

     In a story redolent of the Depression years, an elderly man from Ashton, near Ottawa, who had travelled all the way to Dr Locke’s clinic by horse and buggy, stated that “The old horse and buggy are fast enough for me.” (Standard Freeholder 26 April 1933) In 1937, Wilson MacDonald the poet and his wife were staying at the Cornwallis Hotel in Cornwall while he was being treated at Dr Locke’s clinic. (SFH 12 May 1937) The obituary of Edward A. Sabourin, Cornwall taxi driver and former GC cheesemaker, recalled that he “moved to Williamsburg in the boom days of Dr. M. W. Locke and conducted the Pine View Inn for five years.” (SFH 5 Aug. 1943)

     Dr Locke’s fame was sinking fast in his final few years, when the beginning of WWII and the virtual end of the Depression had created a new mental atmosphere. And after his death, forgotten now by the public, he was left to the historians. But perhaps now, with greater consciousness of the tourist trade, things are changing. A mural depicting Dr Locke was unveiled at Williamsburg, 2001. (SFH 27 Sept. 2001) And his name reappears, as for example in the recent advertisement for the sale by auction of the contents of a Morrisburg “tourist home established in the years of the famous Dr. Locke.” (Glengarry News 23 Nov. 2005) He has a life in the MacMillan Dictionary of Canadian Biography, but, amazingly, he lacks an entry in the Canadian Encyclopedia! His medical degree (1904) was from Queen’s University. See the present dictionary for Mrs Elizabeth Bethune Kiely.

See Bibliography of Glengarry: index for sources for life of Dr Locke * Glengarry News 13 Feb. 1942 * death, funeral, with editorial “A Genius Passes,” and report on estate, Standard Freeholder 7-11 Feb. & 7 Oct. 1942 * Harkness 465-469 (portrait) * Fraser (1959) 38 * death of Mrs Hannah Smith, of Winchester area, said to be Dr Locke’s first patient, mother of J. T. Smith, of Alexandria, SFH 10 Dec. 1932 * Edward A. Sabourin: also Rutley 78, 84