Right, Left and Centre: The Poltics of Some Canadians by Dave Jaffe. Part Four.

   The Soldier Who Came Home Alive by Dave Jaffe. Part Four.


          In 1952 Lenny Soames went to Korea and came as a soldier to this war torn peninsula. He was shot at and fired back. He  killed communist troops with his rifle and grenades. The killing disgusted him. "I can never forget the stuff I saw," this tough street fighter said. Once his army tour was over, Soames left the army and never went near it again.
    "I have no time for military parades, medals or any of that stuff," he said. "After what I went through in Korea I won't go near war and armies." Yet though his time in the Canadian army embittered Soames, it had taught him some skills. He had learned how to kill and disable anyone with his bare hands. Once back in Toronto, he was soon on the move. He headed west to Vancouver and tried to get a job there as a longshoreman. When that failed , he shuffled for a while from job to job. Sometimes he worked as a bouncer in night clubs. This job had its dangers.
      Drunken youth in night clubs sometimes attacked Soames in fights, seeing him as an easy target, since he was usually the shortest bouncer on the floor. They soon found out they'd made a mistake. Soames often made mincemeat of these foolhardy youngsters. He usually threw them onto the floor, and sometimes broke some of their bones.
      Then Soames tired of this work. After his daughter was born, he took a job as a security guard at a local private golf club. "The people there are well-heeled and a little snooty," he said. "But it pays the rent." Lenny and his wife split up in the 1970's. Yet he got together with his daughter every weekend and always kept up with his support payments.  Soames was one tough man but he was also a dutiful father who was kind to his daughter. In the 1980's he often met her at the Kingsgate Mall on East Broadway on Saturdays and listened to her as she told him about her schooling and other experiences.
     "Soames was a tough guy," said someone who knew him from the old weight room at the Y.M.C.A.  on Burrard Street. He surely was. He died in the early 21st century in Vancouver, a fighter to the end.