May 28, 1934: The Dionne Quintuplets Are Born

Dr. Roy Dafoe with the Dionne Quintuplets

May 28, 1934, 90 years ago: Five live baby girls are born to Elzire and Oliva-Édouard Dionne in Callender, Ontario, about 215 miles north of Toronto. To a world, and in particular a native country, Canada, suffering through the Great Depression, this successful birth of quintuplets, a rarity at the time, was considered a treasure.

The Dionnes were Franco-Ontarians, with French as their only language, at a time when French-Canadians, especially outside largely French-speaking Quebec, were discriminated against; and, within their own community, dominated by the Catholic Church, where any kind of birth control, in this era before the birth control pill, was forbidden.

And so, the Dionnes had already had 6 children, 5 of whom had survived infancy: Ernest, then 9 years old, meaning he was born when Elzire was just 16 (they married when she was 15 and he was 21); Rose Marie, 7; Thérèse, 6; Léo, who died of pneumonia just after birth; Daniel, 3, and Pauline, just 11 months.

In other of birth, they were: Yvonne Édouilda Marie, Annette Lillianne Marie, Cécile Marie Émilda, Émilie Marie Jeanne, and Marie Reine Alma. (Yes, each one had "Marie," the French version of "Mary," in her name. Did I mention that the family was Catholic?)

After the "quints," who made 11, they had 3 more sons, for a total of 14 children: Oliva Jr., Victor, and, giving Elzire something of a break, Claude was not born until 1946, when she was 37.

The Dionne girls were premature. After 4 months with their family, custody was signed over to the Red Cross, who paid for their care and oversaw the building of a hospital for the sisters. Less than a year after this agreement was signed, the Ontario government stepped in and passed the Dionne Quintuplets' Guardianship Act, 1935 which made them wards of the Crown until the age of 18.

The Ontario Provincial government and those around them began to profit by making them a significant tourist attraction. The fuss made over the quints was intense, without consideration to the feelings of the other children.

They starred in 3 feature films, fictionalized versions of their story, as "the Wyatt Quintuplets," with Jean Hersholt (despite his French-sounding name, he was from Denmark) starring as their doctor, John Luke, in all 3: The Country Doctor in 1936, Reunion in 1936, and Five of a Kind in 1938. The last of these starred Claire Trevor and Cesar Romero as radio journalists, competing for the quints' story. Essentially, Hersholt was playing Elzire's obstetrician, Dr. Allan Roy Dafoe, who became the quints' pediatrician until his death in 1943, from complications from cancer, at age 60.

In 1944, Betty Hutton starred in The Miracle of Morgan's Creek, as an American housewife who has 6 baby boys at once: Sextuplets. A newspaper headline made for the film reads, "CANADA DEMANDS A RECOUNT!" (In real life, Hutton had 3 children, all separate births.)

The quintuplets left the family home upon turning 18 years old in 1952, and had little contact with their parents afterwards. There may have been reason for it: In 1995, the 3 surviving quints alleged that their father had abused them. I won't post the details.

The Dionne Quintuplets in 1952

Perhaps the Church would have been disappointed if none of the sisters had become a nun, and one did, Émilie. But she developed seizures, and asked not to be left unattended. On August 6, 1954, at age 19, the nun who was supposed to be watching her thought she was asleep, and went to Mass. Émilie had another seizure, rolled onto her belly and, unable to raise her face from her pillow, accidentally suffocated and died. She was buried at Sacred Heart Cemetery in Corbeil, Ontario, near their hometown of Callender. And then there were four.

Marie, the youngest, married first, and had 2 daughters. Annette married, and had 3 sons. Cécile married, and had 5 children, 1 dying in infancy, and produced the only multiple birth among the quints, twin sons. Annette and Cécile eventually divorced, and Marie separated from her husband. Yvonne never married, or had children.

In 1965, author James Brough wrote a book, in cooperation with the then 4 surviving sisters, titled We Were Five. In 1970, when they were 36, Marie Houle was living alone in an apartment in Montreal, and her sisters were worried after not hearing from her in several days. Her doctor went to her home and found her in bed, Marie having been dead for days. A blood clot was found on her brain, and it was determined that she had died on February 27. She was buried at Cimètiere de Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville, outside Montreal. And then there were three.

Their father, Oliva-Édouard, lived until 1979, age 75; their mother Elzire, until 1986, 77. In 1995, they lost their brother Ernest, 69; their sister Rose Marie, 67; and their brother Daniel, 63.

Left to right: Yvonne, Cécile and Annette in 1995

On November 19, 1997, the McCaughey Septuplets, the world's first known seven-baby birth to survive infancy, were born in Des Moines, Iowa. Memories of the Dionne Quintuplets, the surviving 3 then being 62, were brought up. The survivors wrote an open letter to parents Bobbi and Kenny McCaughey, warning against allowing too much publicity for the children. By that point, the surviving 3 Dionne sisters had reached a $4 million settlement with the Ontario government as compensation for their childhood exploitation.

Yvonne Dionne died on June 23, 2001, at 66, and was buried next to Marie at Sacred Heart in Corbeil. And then there were two.

Brother Victor lived until 2007, at age 79; brother Claude, until 2009, 63; brother Oliva Jr., until 2017, 81; sister Pauline, until 2018, 85; and sister Thérèse, until 2021, 91.

Cécile (left) and Annette, 2017

As of May 28, 2024, their 90th birthday, Annette Allard and Cécile Langlois live together in a house in in North Bay, Ontario. North Bay is the body of water on which Callander sat. The town's name was changed to North Bay, because of the confusion. A museum honoring the Quintuplets' legacy -- allegedly -- is nearby.

*