Pat O'Grady and his wife Annie (Coyne) built the house in 1902 and lived here with their 4 children. According to the Chesterville history book, Pat operated a machinery firm along with Larry Jordan. Because of the house's size and prime location, he must have been a successful businessman. In 1919 the O'Grady's sold the house to the Catholic Church, specifically, the Kingston Diocese. On September 4, 1919, the Sisters of Providence moved in and the house began its 50 plus year history as "the convent". The house sits immediately beside St Mary's school and the nuns were the primary source of teachers for the school. During this period, the nuns raised personal money by giving piano lessons and many older residents of Chesterville still point out that they visited the house weekly for their piano lessons from Sister X.
Sometime during this period, the house also became a chapel. Directly across the street from the house sits St Mary's Catholic Church and someone made the decision to leave the church closed for weekday masses and instead build a chapel in the convent. Thus, the downtairs room on the front left of the house in the picture above became a chapel where the priest celebrated weekday mass and, until removed in the 1990's, the glass in the room's windows was yellow glass. To this day, there is still a raised platform in the room where the altar stood.
In 1972, the Church decided to withdraw the nuns from Chesterville and sold the house to Brian O'Connor. The O'Connor family lived here for less than a year before moving to the wide open spaces of Winchester Springs.
In 1972, Sally and Kevin Gillis bought the house and began the slow process of remodelling and modernizing. The Gillis family insulated the attic, remodelled the kitchen and began stripping the woodwork in the living room to show the beauty that lay hidden under too many coats of paint. Kevin became a television star, first appearing as the guitar player in the background on Bruno Gerussi's "Celebrity Cooks" show then later had his own show called "Bang Bang You're Alive". This latter show began with an opening scene of Kevin riding through Chesterville on a farm wagon while singing for some kids and prominently showed a good shot of the house. During this time, Kevin created the Raccoon series of shows for the CBC ("Raccoons on Ice" etc) so the Raccoons were conceived and born in this house.
In 1981, the Gillis family decided to move into Ottawa to be closer to Kevin's work and Kathleen and Bob Pitruniak bought the house. The Pitruniak family have continued the remodelling with more work on the kitchen and back kitchen, replacement of most of the windows (33 done, 2 to go), a new heating system, a back deck and a new roof
Perhaps the most touching moment for us occurred in the 1980's when St Mary's school was celebrating an anniversary and some of the nuns were invited back. As the present owners, we hosted tours by 3 of the nuns, the oldest of whom was in her 80's and had lived in the house in the 1930's. She slowly ascended the stairs and showed us which bedroom was hers and where her bed had been located and still remembered the snoring of the nun who had been her roommate.
Back to The Nunnery home page