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14 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Tues. August 28, 1984 Campbell Darce Campbell is finally doing okay. by Cathy Robb Actually, he's doing more than okay, he concedes, his trim 53 year old figure sprawled out on a couch in the Campbell's Port Hope century home. He's his own man in the frenetic real estate game and figures he's moved about 25 per cent of the people in Port Hope in the last 10 years. He lives in a house that could make the front page of Better Homes and Gardens and he's stashed enough money in the bank to pay the least. And just to make things interesting, Darce Campbell is wearing the Liberal colours for Durham- Northumberland in this eléction campaign. On the surface, Camp- bell looks like a man who has been milk-fed all his life, used to tennis matches at the club and Lacoste T-shirts. But he's not. As his campaign workers are quick to point out, Campbell's been poor. He knows what it's like to be jobless and have a hungry young family to feed. He's been through it all. And then some. "I grew up in Cobourg on the poorest street in town," he recalls in the quick, rapid-fire dia- logue he has been using to canvass all day long. "Except I didn't know I 'was poor then because AUTOMOTIVE MACHINE SHOP Head Rebuilding - Engines Rebuilt - Rotor & Drum Turning - Flywheel Resurfacing (flat & recessed) - Engine Boring and Head Resurfacing - MERV PUGH 179 Casimir St. - P 985-9345 SHORT TERM CERTIFICATES 30-119 Days 11% (Minimum $50,000) 90 - 364 Days 10%% (Minimum $5,000) GUARANTEED INVESTMENT CERTIFICATES 2 Year Annual Interest 122% (Minimum $500) Rates subject to Change without Notice STANDARD fA TRUST 165 Queen Street, P.O. Box 1318 Port Perry, Ontario 1.08 INO Telephone: 985-8435 4 Foon ( Morro d ( ompens Moodie ( onade Doposs Mo nren ¢ ( grocery bills for a little while longer, at everyone on the street was in the same boat. My mother and father were both factory workers, lived and died and never owned a house in their life- times'. The key to being young and poor was to be tough or to be good at something. Campbell was both, with a keen interest in athletics that saved his butt on more than one occasion. Darce was 17 when he came home from school one day to find his house empty with a note of eviction on the door from the sherriff's office. His parents were gone and young Camp- bell was forced to fend for himself. That day he went home with a friend but he was eventually taken in by the Port Hope dairy owner, a hockey buff who admired the unfortunate youth's talent and put him to work on a local team. He also handed Camp- bell his first job in the banking business, as a junior clerk. By the time he left the bank a few years later, a - wi Fo 6) - At first Carole Campbell wasn't terribly thrilled that her husband Darce had been chosen to be the riding's Liberal candidate, but now she loves it, gefting involved wherever she can. Hearing c Aid (Centre ¢f Port Perry Dennis J. Hogan ann Hearing Aid Consultant Dr. E. Mannen's Office - 24 Water St. S., Lakeview Plaza, Port Perry, Ontario LOB 1NO. 985-9192 985-3003 HOME INSURANCE INSURANCE BROKERS LTD. 170 Water Street North, Port Perry - 985-8416 Also see us about your Life, Auto, Farm, Commercial & Mortgage Insurance Needs! Darce has worked his way up to credit officer, no small feat for a young man without a high school diploma. His first years in the banking business were prosperous ones. Sent to Bracebridge to another branch, Campbell was paid well, not only for his job but also for playing on the Brace- bridge hockey team. It was there that he met Carole, an employ- ee at a rival banking institution and one of the nicest girls he'd ever set eyes on. "I was the luckiest girl in town", Carole recalls with a grin. "My mother took in hockey boarders". Darce promptly married her on the spot. NHL BOUND At one point in his hockey career, Darce signed with the Detroit Red Wings, on the NHL negotiation list. He con- templated going pro- fessional. A life in hockey was tempting, but he hung on to his banking career instead. "It looked to me like it was something worth- while to do", he remembers thinking. At 27 he hung up his skates for good, sick of the "gladiator's ring" that hockey had be- come. Besides, he had other things on his mind--like supporting his growing family. It was 1963 and Camp- bell was feeling a little stymied by the Bank of Nova Scotia. So he landed himself a job in smoggy Los Angeles, packed his kids in a '56 Meteor and took Route 66 all the way to L.A. They'd only been there a short while when Darce caught Carole crying one day, with a large-sized case of homesickness, tearfully asking to go home. What else could he do? The car got packed up with belongings and kids and the Campbell clan headed for the Great White North. The car lasted until Regina where it died a peaceful death, forcing the family to board a train to complete their journey. But somehow, the exhausted troupes wound up in Washago, a deserted whistle stop in the middle of nowhere. NO JOB And there Darce and his family sat. An embittered father with a wife and kids to support, no job, no place to live, no car and $300 to his name. His eyes listlessly followed the antics of his sons who, immune to the depression of their parents, were horsing around with the equip- ment in the station. He watched as they ran and shouted and wrestled around, and quite suddenly, he began to laugh. A glee- ful, throaty laugh that verged on hysteria. Carole looked at him like he'd gone crazy. "I said, y'know? There is no place we can go but up', Darce remembers saying to her. And he was right. The next few years were spent travelling from one promotion to the next, mostly with a major lending institu- tion in the States. He spent a lot of time in business development, dealing with some of the world's largest corpor- ations. He taught him- self everything he need- ed to know about marketing and com- puters and wound up with one of the most powerful positions in the company. His mug was featured in Time, Newsweek and Sports Illustrated and for the first time in his life, Darce Campbell had no worries about money: HEAD BACK He was worried about his health, however. The American air was wrecking havoc with his allergies and even though he loved his job, he decided to head bac to Port Hope. : And as Carole points out, they'd never intend- ed to make the USA their home. They want- ed their sons (five, by this time) to marry Canadian girls and make their own homes in Canada. When he resigned the company's board of directors came to see Darce personally, to find out why he was leaving, and to try to convince him to stay. But there was no convin- cing him. Once again, the Campbells headed home. REAL ESTATE He went into the real estate business because he knew a job in the Canadian banking system just wouldn't be enough to put all five sons through university. Besides, 'I've never had the chance to sell anything tangible. Always intangible things before. I guess I just wanted to burn my bridges again' "Everything we've done, we've done impul- sively", he says. Which is why he ran for mayor of Port Hope, just three weeks before the election. He lost, but just barely, and figures he would have won handily if he had had more time. That was two years ago. Now he's running in the big leagues, for higher stakes, against the odds-on favourite, Tory incumbent Allan Lawrence. * For Campbell, a man who can't resist a chall- enge, the opportunity was just too good to turn down. "It's so challenging in that I have no chance at all, supposedly", he says with a wicked grin. "Lawrence doesn't know it yet but he's in for a real barn-burner of a campaign". BARN BURNER Since Durham- Northumberland Lib- erals acclaimed Camp- bell as their candidate in mid-July, he's been - hitting the streets in a tornado of energy, bang- ing on doors from one end of this vast riding to the other, spreading his own indomitable charm all the way along. His energy is infect- ious. He has vowed to himself to visit 10,000 homes and he's more than halfway there. When he reached his 5000th home, owned by a Mrs. Rose Bellehumeur of Cobourg, he present- ed her with a bouquet of roses. When he knocks on the 10,000th door, he'll hand the owner a commem- orative gold medallion. The approach is a fresh, imaginative one. Campbell shuns all- candidate meetings and other '"'impersonal" electioneering tech- niques. He considers them a waste of time. CONFIDENT He insists his cam- paign strength lies in the ability to talk to people on a one-to-one basis, and he swears that he has swayed hundreds of would-be Conservatives and NDP's. Campbell feels confid- ent his 33 years of professional service in the private sector would help him serve consit- uents. This confidence has snowballed from the feedback of door-knock- ing and he says people have reacted favour- ably to the idea of being represented by "a small businessman with a human touch rather than a professional politician". He's sure he's going to whup Allan Lawrence on election day, regard- less of John Turner's fortunes. "I'm running a per- sonal campaign,' he insists. But if he doesn't win, he's not going to let it get him down. "For mc it's easy because I'm a street person anyways,' he says shrugging. "The only thing that would crush me would be if the town of Cobourg didn't support me because I'm a native son. If I lost the election I'd be crushed for maybe 24 hours. Then I'd look for a new challenge'. a em a No io A. So ra i ! 1 EE EE EE ET OCC"