Coutts and Flim Surveying Inc is the latest corporate body of a group of surveyors who have serve the citizens of southern Ontario since April of 1956 when Donald Herbert Trollope (#710) opened his survey office in Oshawa.

Don's first survey was to mark the limits of a small parcel that was Part of Lot 7, Concession III in the Township of East Whitby. He billed his client $35.00. Like most surveyors he probably had a tough time justifying his "exorbitant" fees to his client.

Don had it tough that first month, as that $35 job was all he had. The next bit of work came on May 5th, 1956 and it seems he was off to the races as his day book shows that he was busy preparing all types of surveys for a variety of clients from then on. Even in the dead of winter he was busy.

The biggest job Don did was to prepare a Judge's Plan on Lots 15 & 16, Concession VIII, Township of Scott. The survey was commenced on October 16th, 1958 and was finished on April 6th, 1959. Part of the lands was submerged under the waters of Wagner Lake so he had to work on the ice during the winter. The Plan wasn't deposited in the Registry Office until May 12th, 1960. For all his trouble he billed $1048.00. It was his highest paying project ever.

Most of Don's work centred on preparing Location Surveys (we now call them Surveyor's Real Property Reports). At $20 each he had to keep the crew hopping to make a living.

It is interesting to look back through the day book and see names of clients who are still at it 50 years later. Names like Jeffery, Zygocki, Parkhill and Yanch, among others. The loyalty of these clients has enabled the firm to keep going and providing professional survey services to the public. But it has been the general public that has requested the vast majority of the survey services and the firms have endeavored to be the professional that the public was able to turn to when they needed professional survey services.

Mr. Trollope stayed in business until the end of October 1960, when he sold the business to Henke (Henry) Flim (#1006). The same care that Don gave to his business was made by Henry and the business flourished, though it never became as big as the other survey firm in Oshawa. Still, people preferred the personal touch that Henry gave them and his employees stayed on through the years as did the solid core of clients.

Henry cornered the local market for preparing route surveys for most of the road expansions that went on after 1960. One doesn't look very far in the Registry Office before he comes across a road widening Plan that was prepared by H. Flim Ltd. It was Henry that surveyed the Town Line Road between Whitby and Pickering Townships (now known as Lake Ridge Road) from Victoria Street to the northern reaches of the County of Ontario (now the Regional Municipality of Durham). Most of the east-west corridors were surveyed by Henry as well.

Most surveyors are not fortunate enough to have children that want to follow in their fathers' footsteps but Henry was. His son Allard (Al) (#1790) decided that surveying was the life for him and after attending the University of Toronto from 1988 to 1992, Al articled to Henry and became commissioned in 1996.

Al couldn't wait to take over the reins and, after putting together a business plan that was accepted by the Association, he was granted a Certificate of Authorization. He was granted the C of A because he planned on having Henry around to act as a sounding board when making legal decisions. It was tough on Henry as he had to let Al make the day-to-day decisions and only when things needed his expertise did he intervene. For the most part Henry's input was mainly done at the Registry Office as he searched the records for best evidence so his son could make informed decisions.

Al headed the firm, taking more and more responsibility for the decisions he made, until May 2005, when he sold the business to Hugh Coutts.

Hugh was commissioned in January 2000, after serving his articles with William Coe, of Lindsay and J.D. Barnes, Oshawa. Whereas his forebears had been Ontario Land Surveyors right from the get-go, Hugh had started his career as a Civil Engineering Technician. He had worked for the Department of Highways of Ontario, the County of Ontario, various engineering firms and a large marine construction company. A lay-off in 1986 caused him to reconsider his career options and after talking it over with his wife, they decided that he would pursue a university degree in Survey Science. No small undertaking considering he had been out of school since April 1972 and had a wife and four small children. He attended Grade 13 first (September 1986 to June 1987), then he attended Erindale College of the University of Toronto from September 1987 to May 1992. Dedication and persistence to a worthy cause was needed.

The perseverance paid off. A wide range of empirical knowledge has enabled the new company, Coutts and Flim Surveying Inc, to take on projects that those who had gone before would never even have dreamed of. Hugh's drive and expertise has also meant a change in the way the company does business as well. Equipment has been modernized, employees with advanced capabilities have been hired, and partnerships with other experts has meant a radical change in what can be done but it has also meant that the traditional types of surveys could be undertaken with a greater degree of accuracy and a decrease in time that it took to complete the jobs. The Judge's Plan that Donald Trollope took six months to completed, in 1958 and 1959, can now be done in a couple of weeks.

The future still looks promising and exciting as the Company builds a great future upon a wonderful past.