A song in her heart

Norma Manson may have found fame in the ’50s as a member of the pop trio the Hames Sisters, but her love of music lasted a lifetime

On a balmy summer night in Toronto in 1959, three beautiful singers walked onto the stage of the CNE Grandstand — they were opening for Danny Kaye — and the crowd went wild.

The Hames Sisters — Norma Hames and her younger siblings, Marjorie and Jean — were only in their twenties, but they were already famous, having toured North America and Europe performing classic pop music. They were also regulars on “Country Hoedown” — the TV series on which Johnny Cash made his Canadian debut — filming live from the CBC. “We performed for the Canadian Army in Germany and France in 1964,” remembers Jean Newberry (the former Jean Hames), “and travelled through Canada doing shows at events such as the Calgary Stampede, Klondike Days in Edmonton and the Fisheries Exhibition in Nova Scotia.”

Born in Mimico, Norma Janet Hames was the oldest daughter of Alan Leslie (Les) Hames, a manager at General Electric, and Ella Jane Stephenson, a teacher. Les, who had led an orchestra in Saskatchewan before getting married, wrote three-part harmony for his daughters. A conscientious student, Norma earned a diploma in piano through the Royal Conservatory of Music.

In 1954, when Norma was 19, the three teenagers — with Norma on piano, Jean on vibraphone and Marjorie on bass — began auditioning, and were hired for “The Denny Vaughan Show.” That gig was followed by a nine-year run on “Country Hoedown,” a show that also featured Gordie Tapp, Tommy Hunter and the Singing Swinging Eight dancers, which counted Gordon Lightfoot and Billy Van among their ranks. “The three of us always thought what a great singing voice Gordie (Lightfoot) had and thought he would make it at some point,” Marjorie recalls.

The sisters also performed at Maple Leaf Gardens as a part of skating champion Barbara Ann Scott’s ice show and were featured on Arthur Godfrey’s radio shows in New York City and country music legend Red Foley’s show in Missouri. They also recorded several singles and released an album called “Meet the Hames Sisters.”

The trio’s fan base grew along with their exposure. “We got a couple hundred pieces of fan mail a week and wrote back to many of them,” says Marjorie.

For Norma, appearing on “Country Hoedown” ended up yielding more than fame and a paycheque, when camera operator Ron Manson got up the nerve to ask her out. The couple married in 1959, settling into a house at Yonge and Finch — where they lived for 60 years — and welcomed son Al in 1962 and daughter Janice in 1966. Music had a prominent place in the family home. “They had a Heintzman piano in the living room,” says Janice Manson-Blue, “a piano in the basement, a keyboard in the spare room and a 100-year-old pump organ in the basement.” The walls were adorned with Norma’s nature photographs and pictures from the sisters’ showbiz days.

The Hames Sisters disbanded after Norma and Jean started families, but that didn’t spell the end. “They’d do shows at places like Scarborough Town Centre,” Manson-Blue says, “and Mom dressed up as a voluptuous Dolly Parton as she sang, ‘Here You Come Again.’ ” Norma also recorded music until the year before her death.

For Norma, family was paramount. Al followed in his parents’ footsteps and joined the entertainment business, becoming an award-winning television editor. He also shared his mother’s musical talent, duetting with her on piano at home. Norma delighted in being a grandmother, travelling with her kids’ families, making them clothes and serenading them with “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”

The love Norma had to give extended beyond her own family. She worked as a Sunday school teacher and an educational assistant. She and her daughter dressed as clowns for Reach for the Rainbow Day at Ontario Place with the cast of TV’s “Fame,” in order to raise awareness for people with special needs. In her senior years, Norma volunteered to help the homeless, and at the Lyndhurst Hospital, her homemade baked goods earned her the nickname “the Pie Lady” as well as a volunteer award from the City of Toronto.

Norma, who died at 86, believed that everyone should be recognized for their unique gifts. “She said, ‘Always measure people from the neck up,’” Manson-Blue says, “‘and appreciate the different abilities that different people have.’”

Always measure people from the neck up ... and appreciate the different abilities that different people have.

NORMA MANSON