KAHNAWAKE REMEMBERS BRIDGE DISASTER $5 Quebec

HeritageVOL 4, NO. 5 SEPT-OCT 2007 News

Homeward Bound One woman’s ancestral travels in the land of the Cree Encounters in Eeyou Istchee London schoolboys meet the spirit of the North QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

Quebec CONTENTS HeritageNews EDITOR President’s message 3 JOSEPH GRAHAM Moveable Past Rod MacLeod COPY EDITOR 4 SHEILA ESKENAZI Letters PRODUCTION ASSISTANT A fate uncertain Isabel MacCallum DAN PINESE Much appreciated Patricia Rossi

PUBLISHER Timelines 5 THE QUEBEC ANGLOPHONE HERITAGE NETWORK 400-257 QUEEN STREET Powered by people Dwane Wilkin SHERBROOKE (LENNOXVILLE) So long, urban cowboy David Johnston QUEBEC Peek in the dark Beverly Prud’Homme J1M 1K7 PHONE Memory Acres 10 1-877-964-0409 The case for saving Canada’s dairy shrine Kevin O’Donnell (819) 564-9595 Homeward Bound 12 FAX Ancestral travels in the land of the Cree Vicki Boldo (819) 564-6872 Fluid Terms 15 CORRESPONDENCE New words for the language of modern life Steve Bonspeil [email protected] Encounters in Eeyou Istchee 16 WEBSITE WWW.QAHN.ORG London schoolboys meet the spirit of the North Frederic Fovet A Bridge with Two Tragedies 18 PRESIDENT Shoddy design and sheer bad luck doomed builders James M. Whalen RODERICK MACLEOD EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR What’s in a Name? 23 DWANE WILKIN Gaspé: On the Edge of Two worlds Joseph Graham HERITAGE PORTAL COORDINATOR MATTHEW FARFAN Reviews 24 OFFICE MANAGER New revelations of the Americas Sheila Eskenazi KATHY TEASDALE Making the Voyageur world Tyler Wood A royal collection of First Nations artifacts Sam Solomon Quebec Heritage News is Contemporary aboriginal art Judith Nolte produced on a bi-monthly basis by the Quebec Anglophone Heritage Network (QAHN) with the support of The HindSight 29 Department of Canadian Heritage and Quebec’s Ministere de la Culture et des Refrence Points Dan Pinese Communications. QAHN is a non-profit and non-partisan umbrella organization whose mission is to help Event Listings 31 advance knowledge of the history and culture of English-speaking society in Quebec. Canada Post Publication Mail Agreement Number 405610004. Cover: Wîhtikow pîsim/wîhtikow sun by Neal McLeod, 2002. Acrylic, oil, latex, pho- tographs and dried flowers on wood. Collection of Robert Byers. From In My Life: Contemporary Aboriginal Art exhibiting at the Canadian Museum of Civilisation in Gatineau until 16 March 2008. Photo © Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, Patrick Altman

2 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE Moveable Past by Rod MacLeod

ative peoples have always had an important those Angles and Saxons before they invaded Britain. place in Canadian history – namely at the be- The irony is that the stories of such peoples are not only ginning. I remember my grade school histo- valid and fascinating in their own right, but a crucial Nry textbook devoted virtually all of Chapter part of the planet’s vast and complicated saga. One (out of probably 25 or 30 chapters) to ‘The Indi- Writing Native history is even more problematic ans,’ and then moved on to the ‘important’ stuff: Cartier, than teaching it. Another moral question arises: should Roberval, Martin Frobisher, and my personal favourite a non-Native writer be telling the story when someone Bjarni Herjulfson. Europeans chipping away at an elu- from within the tradition could be doing so, possibly sive north-west passage was clearly far more significant with less bias? Artistic freedom notwithstanding, it is to Canada than the culture, economy and political strug- too easy to answer a defiant yes to this question. At the gle of a population whose diversity on all levels is noth- same time, there is more to the Native historical experi- ing less than astonishing. After ‘contact,’ Natives melt- ence than what can be told from an insider’s perspec- ed from the scene, and not just those cu- rious Hochelagans Native history is particularly fraught with challenges as so whose absence by the time Champlain ar- much of it cannot be approached in the way we are used rived proved so detri- to understanding events in the European tradition mental to the settle- ment of New France. Now, that was a long time ago—when I took grade- tive, crucial though that is. To argue that the history of school history, I mean—and now we work hard to Canada’s Native peoples should be the exclusive do- weave Native peoples into the Canadian narrative. His- main of Natives is to deny the importance of interaction, tory survey courses (Post-Confederation as well as Pre-) integration, endogamy, and the struggle for cultural sur- at the university or CEGEP level must incorporate the vival; it is akin to putting this vast experience back into experience of Natives at least as much as that of other Chapter One of the textbook, where it most certainly groups not hailing from France or the British Isles—to does not belong. say nothing of women and working people, a great many of whom were, of course, Native. (For an exam- his edition of the QHN includes several pieces ple of the latter, see the following articles on the Quebec by and about Canada’s Native peoples for your Bridge.) When I say “must,” I mean morally; not that consideration. Two of these are explorations there is any politically-correct compulsion. There are Tby writers of their Native heritage, from two respected historians who claim that too much about different perspectives. Vicki Boldo’s return to her Cree women and workers and Natives is taught and we roots is particularly striking given that she grew up with should concentrate on legislation and war, but the rest of little awareness of them, having been raised in British us know that the past, like the present, is much more Columbia by adoptive parents; only through consider- complex and much more interesting than endless stories able research as an adult, and then a fascinating personal of men in suits or battle fatigues. visit to Eeyou Istchee which she recounts here, is she A belief in historical diversity is one thing; another able to rediscover such a crucial part of herself. Denis is to teach it well. It means coming to terms with count- Gaspé rediscovers his own heritage in a different way: less societies and languages most of us were not ex- although he hailed from Kanesatake and retired there posed to in school and learning how to present their ex- and was always conscious of his Mohawk identity, he perience with respect and an appropriate degree of sig- finds unexpected personal significance in the connection nificance. Native history is particularly fraught with between the tragic death of 33 Mohawk workers in 1907 challenges as so much of it cannot be approached in the and the pride in one’s profession felt by Canadian Engi- way we are used to understanding events in the Euro- neers since that tragic lesson was learned. Frederic pean tradition: namely through official documents, pri- Fovet’s journey into Cree country with a group of vate correspondence, and chronicles. As a result, it is British teens is a reassuring look at how cultural interac- easy to dismiss pre-contact events as pre-history and tion is possible, even enjoyed, by young people of wide- therefore worth only a background chapter. Historians ly different backgrounds; if the youth of urban London have been doing this for centuries when it comes to all can revel in Cree heritage, perhaps their counterparts in sorts of non-Western peoples, including, for example, Southern Quebec will not be far behind.

3 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS Letters A fate uncertain Locating early records pertaining to other Protestant I was pleased to learn through a friend that there denominations is considerably more complicated. Visit was an organization interested in reclaiming aban- your local historical society or museum and ask to be doned cemeteries. For some years now, a group of en- put in touch with an archivist or local history re- ergetic people have been involved in restoring a searcher. You could start with a phone call to the Ar- Protestant cemetery located at Pointe au Chêne, Que- gentueuil Museum in Carillon at (450) 537-3861. bec, off highway 148, situated beside the Ottawa River. In the first year, we cut down large trees and installed a Much appreciated fence and gate. A few friends donated some money and I would like to express the support of our commu- the following year the stumps were shredded, the area nity organization for the Multicultural Heritage Out- was tilled and grass seed was planted. As is often the reach project as proposed by the Quebec Anglophone case, however, the work fell into the hands of a few Heritage Network (QAHN). I had the privilege of at- faithful, and money became scarce due to the fact that tending the first symposium last April and found the donors from years ago are no longer with us. quality of the event to be high and very much appreci- At present we are keeping the area mowed and a ated. This kind of initiative contributes valuably to on- weed eater is used to trim the more difficult parts. We going dialogue and exchange among Quebecers from need steps, because the tombstones, which also need many different cultural and historical backgrounds. attention, are on a raised area. Municipal records show You can, I’m certain, count on members of our organi- that a certain Mr. Campbell who came to Canada from zation to participate in a second edition of the Montre- Scotland in 1816 donated the land. We have tried to al Mosaic heritage summit. In the meantime, I look make inquiries about the names of the people buried forward to stimulating explorations of Quebec’s multi- there but with little success. If there is any help or ad- cultural history on the pages of Quebec Heritage News vice that you could give us, it would be much appreci- magazine. ated. Please accept our best wishes for the continued success of all of your efforts. Isabel MacCallum Grenville, QC Patricia Rossi Tyndale St-Georges Community Centre Publisher’s note: The Quebec Anglophone Heritage Montreal, QC Network (QAHN) has recently received federal funding [See p. 8, this issue] to prepare an inventory of sites Now we’re blushing such as these, and will hold a number of information I want to express my appreciation to the Quebec Heritage seminars in the coming months devoted to heritage- News team for the excellent service which you are providing. cemetery care and long-term planning. You and other The subjects and articles are of interest to all Quebecers and volunteer cemetery trustees are invited to watch this are properly researched, well-written and filled with informa- magazine for details, or sign up for our email bulletin tion. service, HeritageLine, which will carry meeting dates I particularly look forward to Joe Graham’s latest exposés and locations once they are confirmed. Knowing which of different parts of the Laurentians. Protestant denomination was originally associated Keep up the good work! with the Pointe-au-Chêne site will help determine how you best ought to go about finding the burial records. Peter R. Holland If it was an Anglican cemetery, you could check with Westmount, QC the Diocese of Montreal archives at (514) 843-6577.

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4 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007

TIMELINES Powered by people Walbridge descendants drive campaign to save Townships treasure by Dwane Wilkin pair of knees wrapped in leather pads is from the 1860s till his accidental death in 1897, Alexan- moving in the gap where a door once hung. der Solomon Walbridge made and patented machines From a pouch on his hips, Bill Cory draws for Canada’s railroad, farming and millwright industries. Aone shim after another and wedges them That his grandchildren and their friends in the com- with his hammer into a seam between the frame and the munity have managed to rally significant public and pri- inside wall. Crooked angles are a carpenter’s worst foe, vate financial support to save the barn is a fitting tribute so most of the work fixing the Walbridge Barn this sum- to a historical figure whose enterprising genius seemed mer has taken place at ground level, except for a roof- to embody the spirit hole that let the weather in and rotted some of the floor- of his age. It’s also planks. Repairing the old stone foundation required dig- a testament to the ging out a layer of old cow dung two-and-a-half feet visionary will of in- thick on the stable floor. dividual Walbridge The enigmatic, tee-totalling machinist, builder and family members inventor who erected this twelve-sided structure in Mys- who are determined tic left no floor plans for posterity. So Cory and architect to share that legacy Jacques Nadeau are relying mainly on Walbridge family with future genera- memories and local archives, including old photographs, tions of Quebecers. to reconstruct a bold and unique 19th century experi- Spearheading ment with mechanized farming. A grainy picture of the the restoration is a barn in its glory days, when it stood next to the opulent non-profit group and long-vanished family manor, Lakelet Hall—the called the Walbridge ‘Castle’ as villagers still call it— helped show exactly Conservation Area where to place a set of reproduction pane-glass windows Foundation, whose on the east wall. The windows are detailed replicas of a roots go back to 1974 when five of A.S. Walbridge’s de- sole remaining original survivor. “It’s not a production scendants set up a private corporation to turn the 80-acre job,” Cory observes. family estate into a nature preserve. Initial plans to Mystic is a tiny hamlet lying just a few kilometres recreate the lake that their grandfather had made by di- north of the Quebec-Vermont border near the town of verting local stream water were eventually dropped Bedford. The first families to settle in the area were when environment officials refused to grant the family squatters from the south who’d come in the aftermath of permission to rebuild a dam. But it did confirm a valu- the American Revolutionary War, the imprint of their able lesson in community heritage conservation, accord- New England roots still a prominent feature of local ing to Hardy Craft, the Bedford businessman who built heritage. Classified as an historic site by the Que- serves as the foundation’s director. “If you want to con- bec government in 2004, the Walbridge barn stands as a trol the future of something,” he says, “you have to set final vestige of the Mystic Iron Works foundry where, up an organization to do it.” A recent history of the Walbridge estate published by the provincial Culture and Communications Ministry notes that between 1888 and 1928 sixty circular, multi- sided barns were built across Quebec, though only a handful have survived into modern times. And the Mys- tic barn is clearly in a class all its own. Not only is it the only twelve-sided barn still standing, it is the only one ever equipped with a rotating floor to streamline the un- loading and storage of hay. A horse-drawn hay-cart could be led into the barn through a main entry, the floor swivelled to position the cart’s rear in front of a mow, then driven out of the barn the same way it came in. Through a system of cables and pulleys, a waterwheel stationed in the adjacent stream powered a drive shaft fitted with gears that supplied enough energy to operate

Contractor Bill Cory is carrying out restoration of the Walbridge barn and its curious system of gear mechanisms. Photos by D. Wilkin. 5 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS a hayfork, threshing machine, grain conveyor and a corn year’s budgeted repair costs. Walbridge family members cutter. The turntable, a technology that Walbridge evi- put up $18,000, with $15,000 coming from a provincial dently borrowed from the railway industry, was re- rural development fund called Pacte Rurale, $3,000 moved in the 1950s. But a ring of iron track on which it from the Municipality of Ste. Ignace and $1,000, a gift moved is still in place, as are some of the gears and the from Pierre Paradis, Quebec’s National Assembly mem- claw-like hayfork, hanging from the rafters. ber from the Brome-Missisiquoi riding. In 2007, Craft “I’m going to make it turn,” vows Cory, who grew asked for 50 per cent—and got it, a grant totalling up in Mystic and gained first-hand experience fixing $150,000. He’s now busy soliciting the balance through round barns when he restored one near West Brome vil- appeals to private heritage foundations, local municipal- lage a few years back. ities, businesses and individual supporters. Figuring out how to pay for the makeover has The generous support of Walbridge’s descendants, proved the most in- most of whom structive lesson of all. now live out of A study commissioned province, contin- by the Missisquoi His- ues to play a criti- torical and Museum cal role helping the Society recently esti- Foundation reach mated that it would its goals. And be- eventually cost more ing aware of other than $300,000 to re- people’s needs in build the barn, possi- the community has bly as much as helped the Founda- $800,000. Where tion develop key would the money support from other come from? People institutions. “I’m weren’t about to give money to a private family corpo- always looking for connections,” says Craft, who ap- ration. So in 2000, eight non-family members accepted proached directors of the Missisquoi Historical and Mu- to join the Walbridge descendants to form a charitable seum Society after learning that they needed a new foundation, thereby enabling the group to issue official home for their antique tool and machinery collection. tax receipts. “Once it became a foundation,” Craft The plan now is for future operational costs to be as- points out, “we could make requests for funding from sumed by the historical society, which will open the other sources besides government.” barn as an agricultural museum. Cooperation, says Quebec’s culture ministry kicked in $24,000 to- Craft, is a vital ingredient in community projects. “We wards barn repairs in 2006, or about 40 per cent of last all have to help each other.”

6 Walbridge Barn photo by Dwane Wilkin. SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007 So long, urban cowboy Quinns of Île Perrot ran family farm as rural theme park By David Johnston he cell phone rang. he bought in 1983 after leaving Macdonald Col- “Quinn here.” lege, where he was in charge of the greenhouses. TThis was Elwood Quinn answering, owner of One of the first things Quinn did was to be- the Quinn family farm on Île Perrot, the best- gin organizing school visits, beginning with known farm in the metropolitan Montreal area. Dorset elementary school in Baie d’Urfé. He was standing in a company parking lot At the same time, he got into catering and near the Orange Julep on Decarie Boulevard, entertainment, like the murder-mystery farm din- talking business with one customer as he ran a ners he offered from 1995 through 1998, before late-summer corporate corn roast for another, actors raised their rates and made the dinners Fujitsu Computer Systems. unprofitable. Over the years, the Quinn farm “I’ve been going like a 27-year-old,” said payroll had as many as 25 people on it. Quinn, who is actually in his 60s. But he won’t “We saw an opportunity to do something that keep up that pace for much nobody else was doing in longer. Quebec, agriculture as educa- After 25 years of bringing tion, agriculture as entertain- the farm to the city through ment,” said Quinn. catering functions such as the The Quinn farm became a Fujitsu job, and bringing the city household name after the late to the farm through school visits George Balcan of CJAD, who and murder-mystery farm dinners was born in St. Boniface, and so forth, Quinn has put the Manitoba, heard about Quinn family farm up for sale, its future and invited him and one of his uncertain. 90-kilogram pumpkins into his He’s not alone. As the 2006 studio one day before Hal- federal census showed, 5,300 loween. A solid friendship was farms disappeared in Quebec born that day. since 1996, or roughly one in “I just went in one morn- every seven in those 10 years ing and the light was on red in alone. his studio and this girl opened Traditional farming has been a squeaky door and told us to in trouble for some time now, but be quiet,” recalled Quinn. all the known problems—tougher international “George turned and said: ‘What the hell is competition, the high start-up costs of modern that?’ He looked at the pumpkin, then at the farming, a labour shortage and succession uncer- table in front of him, then at me, and then at the tainty—have gotten worse. chair on the other side of the table, in that order. That’s what prompted the provincial govern- I could tell right away he was a country boy.” ment last February to open public hearings into Like Elwood Quinn himself. the future of agriculture, and the agri-food busi- He’s a native of Metcalfe, Ontario who has ness, in Quebec. Since the hearings began, the rehearsed a very nifty quip on how to get there commission of inquiry headed by veteran Que- from the nearest big town, Ottawa. bec bureaucrat Jean Pronovost has heard numer- “Take Bank Street south, and just stay on it ous stories of sons and daughters of retiring until you get to John Quinn Road.” That’s where farmers who are unwilling or unable to take over his ancestor of the same name settled, after emi- the family farm, given the long hours and com- grating from Ireland in 1843. plexities of running a modern farm. It was at Macdonald College that Quinn met In the case of the Quinn family farm, one of his francophone wife, Marie, who grew up in the Elwood and Marie Quinn’s two sons isn’t inter- Ahuntsic district of Montreal. Marie said it isn’t ested in farming, while another son, after a lot of just farming that has changed over the years; the soul-searching within the family, has gone out people who visit the Quinn family farm have and bought another farm on his own. changed too. They’re more demanding. Elwood Quinn is asking $2.9 million for his “People don’t want you to use pesticides 50 hectares in Notre Dame de l’Île Perrot, which anymore, but they want the kind of perfectly

Elwood Quinn 7 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

shaped fruit and vegetables that only pesticides can give you,” she said. Looking back on his career as a celebrity farmer in the English-speaking community, El- wood Quinn said: “I spent too much time grow- ing stuff. I should have spent more time market- ing.” Still, it’s been quite a career; there aren’t very many west-enders or West Islanders under the age of 35 who haven’t been to the Quinn farm at least once. “Whoever buys will probably have to go or- ganic, and emphasize entertainment,” said Quinn. “The future, I think, is in entertainment.”

David Johnston writes for The Gazette in Mon- treal. Reprinted from the Sept. 3, 2007 edition. Wall of remembrance Tomb remnants salvaged for Irish settler monument

ieter Sijkes, a professor of architecture at eral design of the St. Columban monument . McGill University, and one of his students, Once arrangements have been made with local PYan Claprood, have begun to design a monu- church wardens, Keyes says the architects will com- ment to commemorate the Irish settlement history of plete a cost study of the materials and labour need- St Columban in the Laurentians. ed. Organizers or the restoration project hope to Following an initial visit to the historic Catholic start construction in the spring of 2008. In the cemetery, which has in recent months been the sub- meantime, volunteers have removed broken grave ject of an ambitious restoration project, Sijkes and markers that were discarded in the bush behind the Claprood are proposing to erect a commemorative church and have them stored safely in Montreal. wall composed in part of the many broken tomb- Over the coming winter, the stones will be cleaned stones discovered in early 2006 after a group of de- for inclusion in the monument. scendants of St. Colomban’s original inhabitants The Société d’histoire de Pointe-Saint-Charles made a pilgrimage to the site. intends to organize a bus trip toward at the end of “A lot of progress has been made since,” ac- October for historical society members and anyone cording to Fergus Keyes, a key organizer of the St. else who might be interested in visiting the St. Columban Graveyard Restoration Project. It’s hoped Columban Church & Cemetery. The historical socie- that the restored burial ground and monument will ty believes that that there is a strong connection be- help encourage other descendants of the communi- tween the Irish of St. Columban and the Irish that ty’s pioneer settlers to retrace their Quebec roots. eventually settled in The Point and Griffintown. Height of the wall, choice of materials, and its Details on the bus trip to the Laurentians will soon location in the cemetery, as well as future mainte- be available at the St. Columban web site, nance requirements, are being factored into the gen- www.stcolumban-irish.com. CHIRI graveyards sought he federal Department of Canadian Heritage will sites deemed to be at great risk of deterioration through contribute up to $40,381 towards the Quebec abandon or neglect in these regions: Montérégie, Estrie, TAnglophone Heritage Network’s Cemetery Her- Laurentians and Saguenay Lac-St-Jean. This will entail itage Inventory and Restoration Initiative (CHIRI), un- the compiling of comprehensive information for target- der the terms of a recently signed funding agreement. ted sites in collaboration with cemetery associations Money for the initiative has been made available and community groups, including QAHN member his- under the Development of Official-Language Commu- torical societies who maintain heritage cemeteries. nities Program (DOLCP) and is intended to help volun- For more information on how to participate in this teer trustees who care for historic cemeteries. project, please contact the QAHN office at (819) 564- The first goal of CHIRI will be to identify burial 9595 or toll-free at 877-964-0409.

8 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007 Peek in the dark Rawdon historical exhibit evokes pre-electric era by Beverly Prud’Homme

he Rawdon Family Fair is a combined effort body and spirit in an oasis of cool and quiet. of Christ Church, Rawdon, and the Mid-Lau- On site there is also a steady flow of entertain- rentian United Church. Originally each con- ment, from a demonstration of dog handling, our local Tgregation held its own annual fair but about pipes and drums band in full regalia, to local choirs & 12 years ago they merged. It is the largest single-day bands. There is never a dull moment on the stage. event in Rawdon, drawing not only local citizens but This is the second year the Rawdon Historical So- also many who come back to their hometown for the ciety has been invited to participate, and again this event. This year more than 1300 people passed year we were gratified and encouraged by the interest through the gates. shown in our history. The theme of our primary dis- Held annually on the second Saturday in July, this play was Electricity Comes to Rawdon. Various items family day offers a variety of experiences. There are of pre-electric homemaking were on display as well as all sorts of goods for sale, used and new. Many local pictures of household appliances. It is amazing to see artists offer their wares which range from plants to the reaction when someone realizes that, not only did jams, jellies and condiments, on through hand-sewn or we survive without television, computers and cell- knit clothes, embroidery, jewellery and woodcraft. Just phones, some of us grew up without electricity. about anything can be found in the various stands scat- Although Rawdon had train service for less than tered throughout the site. 50 years, great interest is always shown in Glenn The auction is always very popular with not only Cartwright’s display of photos. His knowledge on the ‘priceless treasures’ being purchased for a song, but al- subject is greatly appreciated. so for the entertaining banter of the auctioneer. There The RHS kiosk is also a place to inquire about lo- are games for all ages, drawings for various prizes, a cal family history and original homesteads. We have horse ride and, of course, the Rawdon Historical Soci- even introduced family members to each other. They ety’s tent to visit, where memories and experiences are had no idea they were related until they learned of shared and new information about the past is gleaned. their common ancestry. At the same time, these ex- The food tent offers the best burgers, hot-dogs and changes allow us to pick up some new and interesting French fries—guaranteed to skyrocket the cholesterol details of the history of Rawdon. of even the healthiest specimen. Candyfloss and drinks, both hot and cold, are also to be had. For the less adventurous gourmands, the parish hall offers tea, Beverly Prud’Homme is president of the Rawdon His- sandwiches and sweets where one can replenish the torical Society.

9 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

MEMORY ACRES The case for saving Canada’s dairy shrine by Kevin O’Donnell

Mount Victoria Farms’ legendary impact on Holstein breed researching his book, Mount Victoria Farms and the improvement was first examined by Kevin O’Donnell in this Montvic Rag Apple Bloodlines, Backus, regarded as the magazine’s March-April 2007 issue [“Hudson’s Holstein ‘Dean of Pedigree Reading’ returned to Hudson and the Dairy Pride,” p. 14]. A profile of the achievements of farm on the hill. “So, up we went,” recalled Backus. “At Mount Victoria’s owner T.B. Macaulay, in the insurance, the summit, as the road levelled out, it curved to the left and agriculture and humanitarian fields appeared in the May- suddenly there was a break in the trees and right in front of June 2007 issue [“The Man Behind the Milk,” p. 10]. The us, just as they looked forty-six years ago, stood the red following article reflects on the fate and heritage value of barns of Mount Victoria. They hadn’t changed at all.” these buildings that were once the pride of Hudson Heights. In 2003, George Miller and Dick Chichester, two American pioneers of Holstein artificial insemination, set acaulay Lane is a small sideroad splitting off off from Virginia to visit sites significant to the breed in from Mount Victoria Street. In 1985 when Canada. First they stopped at the Ingleside, Ontario monu- my wife and I moved to Hudson from the ment to Holstein pioneer Michael Cook, who imported two Mcity and bought one of the five houses on the bulls and ten cows in 1881. “But it was their planned stop at lane, we quickly became acquainted with the farm sur- Mount Victoria, Quebec, that clearly had Miller’s focus, and rounding us. Our property, it turned out, was once part of greatest anticipation,” the Eastern Ontario Agrinews noted, Mount Victoria Farms. “It’s the spot where former Sun Life president T.B. Known today as Macaulay established Norfolk Farms, the inno- a famous breeding vative agricultural institu- operation in the early tion created by Sun Life 1900s…. You could executive T.B. Macaulay tell from the excite- has been owned since the ment in his voice that mid-1940s by the Norris he was thrilled to see family, also prominent in for himself the stall business as well as in that once housed the prize cattle raising. When mighty Pabst….” we moved into the area The most fa- the Norrises kept a herd mous visits to the of about 50 shorthorns in ‘shrine’ took place on the fields nearby. Our June 29, 1942 at the bovine neighbours’ occa- Dispersal Sale when sional mooing in the mid- two thousand people dle of the night startled converged on the the newly arrived farm to make record refugees from the city. We loved to visit their home base, a bids on many of the 68 cattle, and on September 9, 1995, neighbourhood attraction: the large oxblood-red barn. when four hundred people from across Canada and the Older Hudson residents told us about the legendary United States gathered at the barn at the invitation of Hol- Mount Victoria Farms, its illustrious owner, and the bull stein Canada and the Hudson mayor of the day, Michael El- with the female first name, Johanna Rag Apple Pabst, affec- liott. This latter event was without commercial significance, tionately known as Old Joe. But was all this talk small town but simply to pay homage to the Master Breeder and Dairy puffery? While taping a video program at a dairy farm in Shrine Club Pioneer. Seated at the same spot as the buyers the Shawville area I decided to put the Macaulay legend to at the Dispersal Sale, the visitors listened to officials from the test: I asked the son of the farm family if he had ever Holstein Canada recount the significance of Macaulay’s heard of Johanna Rag Apple Pabst and Mount Victoria achievements. When they intoned the triple-named Hol- Farms. Indeed he had, the twenty-year-old replied, rhyming steins from this farm that had supplied foundation animals off the pedigrees of his family’s Holsteins attached to milk- for herds around the world, the roll call of succeeding gen- ing machines. “We regard that big barn in Hudson as a erations sounded biblical. Then a piper escorted the crowd shrine,” he said. to the bottom of Mount Victoria Street, where Pearl Hodg- He isn’t alone. Horace Backus, a former director of son Butchers, widow of the legendary herdsman Mort Holstein Association USA, recalled visiting Mount Victoria Butchers, unveiled a plaque honouring Macaulay and in 1946 as a teenage New York State farm boy. He was Mount Victoria Farms’ cattle-breeding accomplishments. drawn “just to see the buildings and the setting.” In 1988, When the crowd dispersed, it left the barn to its last two oc-

Caption??? Photo of the Macauly barn which appeared in a 10 1931 Beatty Bros book. SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007 cupants, Fleur, a horse, and Josephine, a donkey. Now the barn and the outbuildings stand empty, and Norfolk Farms has followed Mount Victoria Farms into his- From stable to table tory. No longer needed, the barn is succumbing to the rav- arns were not always recognized as a ages of time. A thriving agricultural area a few generations key link in the food supply chain. Histo- ago and with much of its land even today zoned green, rian Terry Copp in The Anatomy of Hudson is being overwhelmed by urban sprawl. So what B Poverty: The Conditions of the Working Class value does this still striking if dilapidated barn hold today? in Montreal 1892 – 1929 notes that during this A century ago art historian Alois Riegl noted the power period Montreal suffered appallingly high in- of “unintentional monuments,” things made for one purpose fant mortality rates compared with other North which have subsequently taken on what he called “histori- American cities. One cause was the unsanitary cal-value.” More recently French historian Pierre Nora ad- preparation and storing of food such as milk. vanced the notion of lieux de mémoire or memory sites. Between 1906 and 1915 about 20,000 children Lieux de mémoire are places (or things, events, or even per- died of infantile diarrhea, and as late as 1926 sons) charged with significance in the history of a commu- the death rate, though declining, was still al- nity. Sometimes this community can be a whole nation—or most double the rate of New York or Toronto. can even exceed national boundaries. These lieux de mé- Montreal drafted a comprehensive milk by-law moire in some way radiate a kind of charismatic signifi- calling for strict enforcement of sanitary rules cance. If it’s not too big a stretch, I’d like to compare our in 1914, but it was not adopted until 1925. A ty- local barn with an incident in the history of Leonardo da phoid fever epidemic in 1927 that killed 533 Vinci’s Mona Lisa. In 1911 an Italian nationalist named people was traced to a dairy. at Even at the start Vincenzo Peruggia stole the famous Renaissance painting of the 20th century, not all milk was pasteur- from the Louvre. For weeks after, grieving Parisians and art ized, especially the supply to homes in poorer lovers flocked to visit the empty space where la Giaconda neighbourhoods. A Beatty Bros. publication, had hung. This cultural lieux de mémoire was so powerful How to build a Dairy Barn (1912), signalling a that even the empty space the painting had once occupied more progressive era ahead, emphasized that “a attracted visitors, many of whom had not bothered to visit cow barn is really a food factory, and just as the museum before, when the portrait was on display. (It much care should be taken in its design and was recovered two years later.) equipment as in any other plant where food I think that the sentiments that Riegl and Nora articu- products are produced.” lated—that it is part of our nature to invest significance in charismatic objects, or places of significant accomplish- ments—are what stir us when we are in the presence of placing broken windows and repairing the hole in the roof, more prosaic masterpieces such as old barns. Outmoded, can be undertaken now and far into the foreseeable future. relics of an older agricultural tradition, these barns have that Many of us have a dream of a new vocation for the very quality of being relics of a way of life that lasted for barn, perhaps as a museum and centre for the arts, if it can- generations that makes them lieux de mémoire. If great not be returned to its original use. Alternatively, it could be events have taken place in or at these memory sites, they are converted to something like a horse barn. We would also all the more powerful. Hence the visits by Holstein experts like to save the setting that impressed Horace Backus and so and casual tourists alike to the Macaulay-Norris barn—a many others as they round the curve on Mount Victoria powerful icon, even if it is vacant. Only some twenty-five Street. John Norris estimates that the extra land beyond the acres of the old Mount Victoria/Norfolk farms still remain town allotment is worth nearly one million dollars. Repair- undeveloped, but they are in private hands and the owner, ing and retrofitting the old barn and outbuildings could easi- the estate of the late H.B. Norris, wishes to sell. John Norris ly cost another million. We are encouraged by the achieve- is keenly aware of the heritage value of the buildings and ments of other historical organizations in Quebec, such as has been in contact with Holstein Canada. The Hudson His- the Compton County Historical Museum Society and wel- torical Society has lobbied Hudson’s current municipal ad- come any suggestions or support. ministration to recognize the significance of this architectur- Meanwhile, if you are in the Hudson area, why not al as well as historical monument. The barn is, after all, the drive up Mount Victoria Street and view the home of “the largest and arguably the most aesthetically striking agricul- herd that was shot around the world.” tural building ever erected in Hudson, and a reminder of agricultural excellence that put the town on the map. But tax Kevin O’Donnell is president of the Hudson Historical revenues are limited; the municipality has a small if relative- Society. He can be reached at kevinodonnell46@sym- ly affluent population of 5,000, and no industrial base. patico.ca. Take a virtual tour of Mount Victoria Farms Sewage and water infrastructure needs take priority. The on the Virtual Museum of Canada’s Community Mem- town has agreed to accept the barn, the stable that housed ories website by visiting www.hudsonhistoricalsoci- Old Joe and about two acres as the municipal share of the ety.ca. Blame for the pun that ended this article lies development acreage. The mayor has indicated that only with Concordia University professor and Society mem- minimal repairs to prevent further degradation, such as re- ber Lambert ‘Scot’ Gardiner.

11 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

HOMEWARD BOUND An ancestral journey in the land of the Cree by Vicky Boldo

“And while I stood there, I saw more ‘the Land’ in Cree. each is unique, with its own special than I can tell, and I understood In 2002 I enrolled at Concordia cachet. These villages are steeped in more than I saw; for I was seeing in in journalism and public relations ancient values and redolent with life a sacred manner the shapes of things with the intention of brushing up on lessons to be learned and young peo- in the spirit, and the shape of all my writing skills. I believe that ple with talents to be realized. shapes as they must live together like everyone has a story and that those A paralysing anxiety overtook me one being.” stories need to be shared so that oth- on the night before our departure for ers may gain strength and determina- my first visit to Nemaska (Cree for – Black Elk tion to grow as individuals. Shortly ‘where the fish is abundant’)—the after completing my certificate pro- town that would become our predom- ven though I grew up on gram I was offered the opportunity of inant liaison within Eeyou Istchee. Vancouver Island, one of the an internship as Communications During the Air Creebec flight north I world’s most picturesque Agent on a film project for Agoodah realised that my nervousness was E places, I instinctively knew Pictures, an independent production largely due to my fear of acceptance that my true heritage lay elsewhere. company based in the Laurentians. as a ‘white Indian.’ Although I knew Once the freedom of information Agoodah is a Cree word meaning very little of my true heritage I want- laws permitted it, I began to explore ‘everything is alright, good, OK or ed these ancestors to be proud of me. my own history. As an adoptee, I fine.’ This expression would prove to Furthermore I wanted to be able to delved into the private project of be reassuring and instructive for me. connect on more than a superficial finding my biological family and be- The ultimate mission of this produc- level. gan an odyssey that would take me tion was not only to bring a movie to Upon arrival, exuberance over- east through Saskatchewan, into Que- the big screen but also to give expo- took us. Our greeting committee was bec and north to the Cree Nation, sure to the youth of the James Bay happy to see us, although there were tracing my ancestors to a place they territory. There are nine communities no balloons or banners, simply warm called Eeyou Istchee, meaning simply around the Bay within Quebec, and smiles, kind words, watchiya (hello)

The author meets a kindergarten class at Luke Mettaweskum School. 12 Photo courtesy of Vicky Boldo. SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007 and sincere eyes. The people of the of our arrival. The first was the quali- from Mother Earth’s energy. north have a very different outlook ty of both the natural light and the Following in this new sense of on life. The message I personally re- pristine air that crystallize the awe- time, I accepted an invitation to at- ceived was “Welcome home.” Once inspiring landscape. The second that tend Edna Jolly’s kindergarten class, my feet were on solid ground I got to permeates all human contact is the an unscheduled event that proved an my knees and placed my cheek to the caring sense of community. The third, absolute delight. The young ones got ground, thanking life for this amazing which has to be learned, is the mean- a major case of the giggles as I sin- opportunity. My anxiety was gone. ing of IST, or Indian Standard Time. cerely tried to muddle through the al- Imagine the comfort I found in seeing It is a concept introduced to me by phabet in their mother tongue. One myself in the faces, eyes and tenden- the Nemaskans. One comes to learn thing quickly became very clear: cies of those with whom I would that appointments and events do not within the northern communities, the spend time during each visit to the follow the strict agenda that city youth are the pride and joy of the eld- Eeyou Istchee. The visits to the north slickers have come to expect. ers. The eager students shared their would prove healing to both my inner Living off the land continues to aspirations with me of becoming doc- child and present self. The passing on be an important part of life and while tors, nurses and firefighters, but I was of knowledge is a philosophy that a four-hour trek (one-way) to Chi- particularly intrigued by the one little lives strongly within the Cree com- bougamau for the basic staples may guy who simply stated he wanted to munities and is become a hunter practised daily, “just like grand- even through what dad.” some would con- A prime loca- sider routine activ- tion for getting ities. When elders acquainted with speak, everyone the Cree culture listens attentively and tradition is to and always with visit a local shapt- the understanding wan (the name for that there is much the original to learn. Our film dwelling of the production team James Bay Cree, humbly encour- resembling a wig- aged the philoso- wam). I spent phy of motivate, many hours there inspire, unite. Ul- getting to know timately both be- the people and lief systems their customary proved themselves ways. During the to be compatible summer months, and all involved most wild-game gained perspective cooking is done and a new respect outdoors. The for the culture and tradition that em- seem a big deal for us, it is simply a shaptwan is assembled during the anated from both sides of a now dis- monthly routine for the locals. Na- winter months in the centre of town, appearing fence. ture, right out the back door, is the providing a common area for the true grocery store for sustenance. community to socialize and prepare lthough each village does When ‘moose break,’ ‘goose break’ food. The shaptwan in Nemaska easi- have at least one inn or or fishing seasons are in – office time ly surpasses forty feet in length. The motel, the locals are gra- is out. One could arrive in town with floor is lined with boughs from the A cious hosts and continual- a busy agenda, prepared to attend black spruce tree, on top of which, ly open their homes to out-of-town- prescheduled meetings only to find thanks to modern conveniences, is a ers. After a gruelling road trip from that the local band office and busi- synthetic grass carpet. Four large Eastmain to Nemaska, which includ- nesses are closed. Frustrating per- woodstoves encased in individual ed a near head-on collision with a haps, but also inspiring to see fami- sandpits run down the centre of the moose (no big deal to the locals), we lies bustle about in preparation for building with their pipes protruding arrived at the Jolly residence where departure to their bush camps. to the sky through a gap for ventila- hot tea, comfort food and turned- Thomas Jolly, Nemaska’s Economic tion that runs the length of the entire down beds awaited us. Development Officer, explained that ceiling. In here, inside this huge pro- Three elements of the Cree world these are his times throughout the tective cocoon, one discovers a sense came into focus within a short period year to go and recharge his batteries of community that has been instilled

The community shaptwan in Nemaska. Photo by V. Boldo. 13 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS over generations. fected. The interesting thing that I bours and family members surround- The Christmas season is especial- noticed with the majority is that they ing the controversial issue of the Ru- ly festive—Santa personally deliver- look back at those challenging events pert River diversion. Discussions ing gifts to each child’s home. Not in their lives as character building were heated, yet I could see that only is there the Grand Feast open for opportunities. Thomas Jolly ex- opinions were respected and each had all to attend, but I also witnessed plained that he too had suffered under a fair chance to be heard; a degree of families celebrating birthdays and an- the residential school system, and respect that I sometimes find lacking niversaries. Preparations for these that those particular times in his life in our southern world. Thomas had events go on for hours, sometimes were extremely difficult. Like others, brought me to visit the mighty river days. Beaver, goose, moose and cari- he had missed his family terribly, yet and explained his sadness concerning bou are caringly cut, strung and hung he has few regrets and feels little the topic. He is one of those forced to by the fire to cook, much like what hostility, because in his words and relocate as a result of the Old Post we know as a mechoui. Bones are thoughts he would not be the same Nemaska evacuation that took place boiled, made into tea and fed to the man today had he not faced those is- during the early Hydro Quebec devel- domestic animals or else filed down sues. opments and he knows full well the as multi-purpose tools for skinning The inner strength that allows cause and effect of changing nature’s on the next hunt. these people to absorb these experi- watershed. He has become an ardent Respect between genders borders ences and simply come out stronger supporter of the wind energy projects on the reverent. I was the sole female must come from an old culture with that are presently being evaluated as on our production team, and one its own deep well of social and spiri- future developments for the region. morning my colleagues and I were tual resources. Wishing to learn scheduled to go location scouting on more, I accepted to participate in the am eternally grateful for the ex- snowmobiles. My instructions from traditional sweat lodge ceremony, a periences I gained through my the shop owner were given last, and I memory I will always cherish. While time with the Cree. They taught could easily see they were exactly the acknowledging that the Christian I me the importance of respect, compassion, sharing, strength, kind- ness, humility and the value of hu- mour, which are the seven truths of the Grandfather. I received the valu- able lesson of being able to laugh at the events in my life and more impor- tantly to laugh at myself and to meet life’s challenges head-on, without complaint. Spending time with the Cree in Eeyou Istchee is a gift that I shall always treasure. Instilled in me now is pride—pride of my heritage and ancestry. I now know the free- dom of just being me. All the things about myself, when growing up, that I considered as faults or defects are now qualities because they have ori- gin. When someone asks what used to be my question of denial “so…are you Native?” I now hold my head high, stare them in the eye and re- spond, “Yes! Indeed I am.” And if I so choose I tell my stories of such delicacies as moose nostrils and beaver tail…of course with the sub- tlety of my forbearers. same as those given to the men. church discouraged the practice in And to all who have been an in- There was no patronizing, no “Now earlier times and some of the elders fluential part of this journey to self- you take it easy out there sweet are troubled with this return to tradi- discovery I send a heartfelt meeg- thing” or anything to that effect. I tional ways, we found the experience wetch (thank you). was simply equal. I was invigorated. to be both enlightening and highly I had numerous opportunities to spiritual. Vicky Boldo is a teacher in the Lan- discuss the residential school issue During our visits I observed the guages Department at College North- with those who were personally af- divide between town officials, neigh- side in the Laurentians.

Gathering inside the Nemaska community shaptwan. 14 Photo by Vicky Boldo. SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007

FLUID TERMS Finding new words for the language of modern life by Steve Bonspiel

Adapted from an article which first ap- chuckled. “We had a hard time on the by the people who speak,” Junker peared in the March 18, 2005 edition of pancreas, we had to give them a draw- stressed. “So the next phase is to do a The Nation newspaper, published by ing or show them where it is exactly. mix of education and community out- Beesum Communications and serving When I first started they gave me two reach. We’ll see what kind of feedback James Bay Cree communities. words for it. I kept showing them pic- we’re going to have.” tures and finally we figured it out. We Junker explained that there are had a lot of fun at the workshop, it’s three ways to create new words. The ave you ever wondered how very important to preserve our lan- first is borrowing from another lan- to say liver or pancreas in guage.” guage and incorporating it into Cree. Cree? How about insulin? Diamond hopes that in the future, Much the same way that many English HThose new terms are in cir- words associated with other entities in speakers in Quebec, for instance, have culation thanks to a program sponsored the community are translated as well. incorporated the French term ‘depan- by the Cree Health Board. The problem, he says, is lack of fund- neur’ into their vocabulary when they The resolution to invent new words ing. could just as easily say ‘convenience was passed by the CHB with the recom- “If Cree entities want to enhance store.” mendation and help of Dr. Faisca Rich- the language in the work place I think The second way is to give a new er of Public Health. They worked close- there should be a place where they can meaning to an existing word. Junker cit- ly with the Cree School Board’s Cree get funding,” he said. “I don’t know ed as an example the word iskuteu, language staff, linguists and medical from which organization they would which means fire and also takes on the professionals, to come up with 50 new [get funding], but I think the Cree cul- meaning of battery and sparkplug. The Cree words, created in Val d’Or Febru- ture and language is very, very impor- third way is to create a new word using ary 24-25, 2005. tant to many people in the Cree Na- the rules of the language. “I think it’s going to give confi- tion.” Junker has been working on dence to people who go to the hospital,” This was the first time people sat www.eastcree.org, a website dedicated said George Diamond, Program Officer down and came up with new words, he to the Cree language. Because of this, for Healthy and Safe communities with noted. “We’re trying to enrich and en- new words such as ‘browse’ and the Cree Health Board. “The translators hance our Cree language and culture.” ‘mouse’ have already been incorporated will be able to translate better what their Diamond said that the creation of into the Cree language. ailment would be. The elders will be new words was made possible through “I think it’s very important if you able to understand what it is because of the flexibility and dedication of the want a language to survive that the lan- the translation. Cree programs personnel. guage be able to move into describing “We concentrated on diabetes be- “This was a special case, working new realities,” she said. “Every lan- cause that’s the most prevailing disease with the Cree language people. They guage has in itself the power to create that we have in the Cree Nation,” Dia- had a meeting and we sort of piggy- new words.” mond added. “We wanted to translate backed on them and added two days so The words that were created are go- words or come up with new words asso- we could do this terminology work- ing to be discussed on the radio and are ciated with diabetes.” shop,” he said. also available in the terminology forum Diamond’s job, and that of Public The team worked closely with on the Internet at www.eastcree.org. Health nurse Louise Pedneault, was to Marie Odile Junker, a linguist at Car- “The new words are not being tell people the meaning of the word or leton University. “We tried mixing up forced on anyone, they are up for dis- find out the medical terms and in what the dialects, as well as to try with small cussion and don’t appear in the official context the word was used. groups and big groups,” she said. “The Cree dictionary,” said Junker. “Right Pedneault added, “My role was to community health representatives were now they are on the web so people can explain the medical words like pan- essential in explaining the words and make suggestions and comments. Only creas, insulin and the glands so they can helping to come up with new ones.” time will tell if people end up using describe it in Cree.” She also credited the elders, who them.” Community Health Representative were essential in the process. Their in- Emily Sam said the process was inform- valuable input ensured that everything Steve Bonspiel is a journalist with The ative and a barrel of laughs. ran smoothly. Nation. An online edition of the newspa- “The elders had some of these “It’s one thing to develop words but per is published at www.beesum-com- words already and we didn’t know,” she it’s quite another for them to be adopted munications.com.

15 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

ENCOUNTERS IN EEYOU ISTCHEE London schoolboys brave cell-phone withdrawl on jaunt through Cree homeland by Frederic Fovet

t’s almost 1:00 a.m. and trapline owners survey their the light is still strong to hunting grounds. Freddy the west. Not quite all- Jolly, one of the most fa- Inight daylight but that mous and most respected glow is keeping everyone trappers in Nemaska, is sit- stirring and talking around ting across from me at the the campfire and no one is campfire now, explaining quite ready to call it quits this to the students. He is yet. Around the campfire my also explaining how the di- little gang of Northside Col- version of yet another river, lege students who, with typi- the Rupert, for the needs of cal London trendiness, have hydro-powered electricity, turned looking dysfunctional will destroy and submerge into an art form, actually more territories the Cree seem to fit in this sub-Arctic have used for hunting and setting. Here they are, at the fishing. We stopped above edge of a Cree encampment the Rupert this afternoon on on the shores of Lake Cham- the way to Nemaska and the pion, well past the 49th par- students pondered for a allel, and they are finding the long while the gigantic, fu- whole experience congenial rious, almost mythical flow in the utmost. A few elders of this river. have driven up, are sitting When we arrived in around our fire and are recit- Oujé-Bougoumou that first ing tales of their nation’s his- night, it felt a little surreal, tory, sharing anecdotes from almost too genteel after the their quickly vanishing cul- long drive north and in tures. My Northside boys, view of the complete isola- with jeans drooping below tion. Here was a village, an the waist and holes elaborate- award-winning architectural ly displayed on sleeves, flop- masterpiece, native in feel py hair immaculately casual but almost futuristic in di- and windblown, are chatting mension and size. Was this happily, across century-long what native encampments are off the road, or off the tarmac roads, historical, social and racial barriers they had become in the 21st century? We in any event. We know we are going the are not even aware of. Perhaps people had been booked into Cespicit Lodge, a right way because we keep coming are right—perhaps this is the global vil- decidedly western-looking inn, and across native hunting camps and the odd lage. spent the first night watching cable TV off-road vehicle, making its way hur- It has taken two days to drive here, while the streets outside remained al- riedly in the other direction towards 600 kilometres of which have been on most empty. Was this what ‘The North’ Chibougamau, the ‘last stop’ in Western dirt road, along the famous ‘route du would be, I wondered from my generic civilisation, while we make our way Nord,’ little less than a road and little motel-style room – globalization at its deeper into the sub-Arctic forest, Joseph more than a track. The first day’s worst? That was when Samuel, my col- Conrad-style. The location of the Cree stretch, the previous day, had taken us league in this adventure, a young man encampments—and it is Oujé- along 800 kilometres of tarmac via Lac well versed in the art of Cree living, Bougoumou we are heading for first— St. Jean to the edge of the Cree Nations. came bouncing through the door with makes no sense when one considers a After a night of camping we crossed in- moose jerky and bear grease dip – and road map of Northern Quebec. The logic to Native land, north of the 49th paral- the spell was broken. We were definitely is found in the lake and river networks lel. All perceptions and routines seem far outside our safe cultural boundaries that link Cree settlements sometimes altered past this point. The ‘Nations’ and had left our world behind. 800 miles apart. This is still how

Photo of Rupert River from 16 http://commons.wikimedia.org SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007

t took a day—a day of thousands of kilometres of slow settling in. My up- forests and lakes we had driven rooted teenage Brits were through. We walked along the Iscrupulously but quietly beach; the students started fish- observed by our Cree hosts dur- ing. There was a question in the ing a day of idle slowing down, air and a sense of heaviness. A down to ‘Native time’; this was Native woman came forward a day spent expecting less and and asked us all to tea. She less until it was all offered served us tea from an enormous gracefully to us. By nightfall aluminium kettle, as well as bis- we had moved into the tradi- cuits and moose meat. As we tional village, were settled into left she asked the kids to say tepees on beds of freshly cut “Hi” to the Queen for her. As pine branches, and were sur- we got into the canoes, I know rounded by half the village, in we all felt it: the reason we had total and refreshing casualness. come all the way to this, the Some elders insisted on taking first trading post in North the canoes out to fish and on America. Natives say it’s the cooking their catch for us on Native cemetery on top of the the fire. The hospitality had a hill that gives this place its candid vitality I had not experi- uniqueness. I had felt it before, enced in many, many years, a long time ago, backpacking in that of a community that has Tanzania, waiting on a beach by nothing to sell or gain, but Lake Tanganika, alone, 17 years opens up to mutual curiosity. old, for a ferry into Zambia, a My London teenagers fell un- boat that never came, that same der the spell and as they all slid beach where Stanley had uttered into sleep in the giant tepee on the famous “Dr. Livingstone, I their pine branch mattress presume.” Anyone who has around the stove, everything been to Kigoma understands the felt absolutely natural to them—to us. we all know the frightful grumbling of true irony of the greeting. It was just How could one be so far away from the disconnected teenager out of cell- the same here, in Old Nemaska, the home, so cut off from one’s culture, phone range—but not so much as a sigh. gravity and solemnity of a world that comforts and bearings, yet be so irre- It is a compelling feeling, that ‘Heart of has disappeared and left us hanging on trievably at ease? As the guitar is Darkness’ drive towards the edge of the edge of existence and meaning as passed around and jokes are exchanged civilisation, an experience that even we know them and perceive them. As across the campfire, I look at those kids technology cannot rival or displace. It we huddled away from the spray on – some from London’s King’s Road, took us all the way, that need to see the those giant canoes, starting the journey some having grown up here hundreds of ‘edge,’ all the way to Old Post Nemas- back to our regular lives, I was glad I miles from what we consider civilisa- ka: by then we were at the same lati- had given those students this experi- tion; they exchange, they smile, they tude as James Bay and the Arctic wa- ence, this journey to the edge of what flirt; instantaneous rapport and complic- ters. First we had to get off the dirt track we know, of ourselves. I am not quite ity. I had observed the same phenome- for another 30 perilous kilometres of sure it is spirituality…perhaps rather non that afternoon when we had visited rock path. At the small jetty, two lonely just the opportunity of seeing ourselves the Oujé high school, in the simplicity, canoes were idly waiting. The old man as the speck of dust. They were calmer the humour and the reciprocity of my driving the water taxis was the brother and more together, our eight teenagers, students’ questions: “What do you do of an Elder that Samuel had stayed with than I had ever seen them. Eeyou when they are naughty?” said one with a in a hunting camp for a few months in Istchee, the spirit of the north, had done giggle. iPods in ears, nonchalant stroll Oujé in the past; everything has the sim- its magic. down the school corridors…all schools ple dimension of fate in Cree country. resemble each other, the world over. Over the next few days, all sense of e got into the canoes, al- Frederic Fovet is a co-founder and the time and planning vanished. Further most compellingly, not director of Northside College and the and further we went into the great North quite understanding why author of several articles on the Cree and the sub-Arctic forest, trying desper- Weveryone insisted, “You school board and the impact of residen- ately to stay out of the way of the 16- must go to Old Nemaska.” We sat there tial schools on Native perceptions of ed- wheeler logging trucks that maintained in blank determination as the giant ca- ucation. This article first appeared in a 120 km/h cruising speed regardless. I noes battled the choppy waters. And the January 2007 issue of Main Street, a expected my teenage charges to moan— then it was there, in front of our eyes: monthly newspaper in the Laurentians. the Old Post; beautiful, yes, like the

Map image source: www.idrc.ca/en/ev-64529-201-1- DO_TOPIC.html 17 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

A BRIDGE WITH TWO TRAGEDIES Shoddy design and sheer bad luck doomed builders by James M. Whalen

This article first appeared in the November/December Company and obtained a charter of incorporation to 2000 issue of Legion Magazine and is reprinted with erect a bridge over the river, a few miles upstream permission of the author. from the historic city near the mouth of the Chaudière River. Due to lack of funds, no work took place until 1900 when the company received financial assistance from the federal, provincial and municipal govern- ments. The Quebec Bridge Company then let a con- tract to the Phoenix Bridge Company of Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, to build the structure. In 1903, the Government of Canada vigorously promoted the bridge project because it wanted to see the establishment of the National Transcontinental Railway from Moncton to Winnipeg. As part of its commitment to the bridge project, the government guaranteed a bond issue to help pay for the work. The Phoenix Bridge Company’s design called for a cantilever bridge 150 feet in height above the high water mark. It was also decided that the structure would have a cantilever attached to piers on each side of the river by anchor arms of 500 feet each and linked together by a centre span initially projected at 1,600 feet. Besides being a transportation link for trains, the bridge would serve as a crossing point for vehicles and pedestrians. The Quebec Bridge Company selected Theodore Cooper, a well-known American bridge designer, as the project’s consulting engineer. The choice seemed ideal because when it came to professional construc- tion designers, Cooper had few equals on the conti- nent. He endorsed the Phoenix design as the “best and the cheapest” of those submitted, although he decided to lengthen the centre span from 1,600 to 1,800 feet. Before the parts for the bridge’s superstructure were manufactured, company designing engineer Pe- ter L. Szlapka estimated the weight of the completed panning the St. Lawrence River near Quebec work. The Canadian government had hoped to hire its City, the massive Quebec Bridge has a history own engineer to review the weight calculations, but of triumph and tragedy. Completed in 1917 at Cooper objected and the government reluctantly ap- a cost of more than $22 million, it is the proved the plans without alteration. S In February 1906, Cooper became concerned longest cantilever bridge in the world, stretching more than 1,800 feet between its main piers. For years, the when he examined the detailed drawings of the bridge has been viewed as an engineering marvel, but Phoenix Bridge Company and found that the actual few people know the full story behind its construction weight of the manufactured steel parts far exceeded and the two disasters that claimed the lives of 89 the weight estimated by Szlapka prior to manufactur- workers. ing. By then, the south anchor arm, the tower and two The story of the bridge begins in 1887 when a panels of the south cantilever arm were ready, and six number of entrepreneurs from Quebec City decided sections of anchor arm were in place. Cooper decided there was a need to increase business traffic in the to forge ahead and not introduce any changes. Con- area. The businessmen formed the Quebec Bridge struction continued because it was thought that the in- crease in stresses would be safe.

View of the bridge collapse. Photograph courtesy of 18 the Library and Archives Canada (C-000451). SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007

Remarkably, Cooper, who claimed he was not in about 55 in all – were working on the cantilever arm at good health, worked out of his New York City office the time of the collapse. Ingwall Hall, one of the few and did not make visits to the site during the erection survivors, lost two fingers in the accident. He had of the superstructure. He relied on Edward Hoare, the been standing on a platform known as a ‘traveller.’ chief engineer, and Norman McLure, the inspecting Travellers were used to carry heavy loads to specific engineer for the Quebec Bridge Company, to keep him jobs on the bridge. Hall’s traveller was located at the informed and to consult with him whenever a problem end of the south cantilever arm. arose. During the federal inquiry into the disaster, Hall In June 1907, McLure told Cooper that errors of was asked whether he knew something was wrong alignment in some of the lower chord splices on the with the bridge just by the feel and not by the sight of bridge’s south anchor arm were corrected by jacking it. “Well,” he said, “I could feel it start to go down and them into line. “Make as good work of it as you can,” it was going down fast you got tears in your eyes, and came Cooper’s reply. “It is not serious. It would be you could hardly realize anything beside you. My well to draw attention to as much care as possible in partner was just about seven or eight feet from me, future work to get the best results in matching all the members before the full strains are brought upon them.”

n August, McLure telegraphed New York be- cause splices between some of the lower chords in the south anchor arm were bent. Disturbed by Ithis report, Cooper asked for further details on how they became bent. By August 27, the misalign- ment of one of the lower chords became very notice- able. In just one week, chord 9-L went out of line from three-quarters of an inch to two-and-one-quarter inches. But despite these and other irregularities, the Phoenix Bridge Company did not halt construction. Acting on Hoare’s advice, McLure went to New York City to brief Cooper first-hand about the difficul- ties. After their meeting on the morning of the August 29, 1907, Cooper telegraphed the contracting compa- ny in Phoenixville as follows: “Add no more load to the bridge ‘till after due consideration of the facts. McLure will be over at five o’clock.” Cooper believed that the same message would be forwarded from Phoenixville to Quebec City, but this never happened. Further, after talking to McLure, Cooper assumed that work on the bridge had stopped, but this was not the case. Later that same day, McLure met with Phoenixville Bridge Company officials in Phoenixville and after some discussion it was decided that they would reconvene the following day. Howev- er, at 5:37 p.m., August 29, 1907, around the same time that the Phoenixville meeting was ending, the Quebec Bridge suddenly collapsed. In the space of just 15 seconds, the south anchor arm, the cantilever and I never noticed him and never saw him – never arm and the partially completed suspended span fell knew anything.” some 150 feet into the St. Lawrence River. At least 75 Hall fell into deep, icy-cold water where he spent of the 86 workmen on the site were carried to their a few anxious minutes before being picked up by a deaths and property damage was later estimated at makeshift rescue boat. over $1.5 million. Only 16 bodies were recovered Elsewhere, about a dozen men who survived the from the twisted wreckage at the bottom of the river. It fall were trapped alive in the mangled debris on the was Canada’s worst bridge disaster. foreshore, which at that time of day was relatively dry. Nearly all the victims were killed by falling de- For these men and for their rescuers, the situation be- bris, or drowned. The dead included 33 Mohawk steel- came more frantic as the tide came in. The rescuers workers from the Kahnawake reserve near Montreal. had less than an hour to save the men, and while they Most of these men, along with several other workers – tried very hard to get the men out, they lacked the

View of the bridge collapse. Photograph courtesy of the Library and Archives Canada (PA-020614). 19 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS equipment. As the water level rose, the trapped men work could start on a new bridge. drowned. In April 1911, the board of engineers awarded a The inquiry, which concluded with a report pub- contract to the St. Lawrence Bridge Company of Mon- lished in 1908, also heard from the Lajeunesse broth- treal. As before, the design called for a cantilever-type ers who were among the few who had landed near the bridge, but it differed from the previous one with the foreshore. Delphis Lajeunesse was working on the an- lower chords of the cantilever arms several times chor arm with his brother, Eugène, when the bridge stronger. One important innovation that added strength went down. He recalled the events: “I was on top just to the bridge was the K-truss design. This feature was putting a turn on the rope to send up a box of bolts conceived by Phelps Johnson, president and general when I saw something jerk the bridge. I fell down in manager of St. Lawrence Bridge Company. my box, stood up, fell down again, and I looked again. Construction started in 1913, and eventually the I thought the traveller had fallen two approach spans, the anchor down on the bridge. The trav- arms and cantilevers went up on eller was in the same place. I either side of the river. By 1916, came to this side of the bridge the bridge was nearly completed. and I looked, and when I saw Indeed, all that remained was the the bridge go down in that way I job of hoisting the mammoth was on that chord, and I thought centre span that would be con- that chord made the bridge fall.” nected to the cantilever arms. Lajeunesse was thrown The 5,100-ton span had been down on a girder, but managed built and was sitting in Sillery to get to his feet. At that point he Cove, approximately 3½ miles thought he was going to die. “I from the bridge site. On the thought, well, I am finished, but morning of September 11, the I stood there. Nothing came workmen faced a difficult task in over on me.” Amazingly, when moving the span upstream, but Lajeunesse landed he was not all went well with that part of the even dislodged from the girder job. The span was carried on he was standing on. He also de- scows that were guided by tugs. scribed how he saw his brother It was a slow process, but even- emerge from the wreckage, tually the span was manoeuvred bleeding but not seriously in- into position between the can- jured. tilever arms where huge lifting hangers, attached to the ends of he Royal Commission, which investigated the arms, raised it by hydraulic means off the scows. the cause of the disaster, concluded “the col- The span was to be lifted two feet at a time in a repeat lapse of the Quebec Bridge resulted from the operation until it was in place between the two arms. Tfailure of the lower chords in the anchor arm After four successful lifts on the north end and five near the main pier. The failure of these chords was due lifts on the south end, the workmen—about 80 in all— to their defective design.” The commission attributed took a break. this to “errors of judgement” on the part of Peter L. At 10:50 a.m., soon after they returned to work, Szlapka, the designing engineer, and Theodore Coop- something went terribly wrong. The southwest corner er, the consulting engineer. The commission found that of the span tore away and sagged. A few seconds later, “a grave error was made in assuming the dead load for the other ends pulled off their supports and the whole the calculations at too low a value and not afterwards span came loose and disappeared into the river. Thir- revising this assumption. This error was of sufficient teen men were carried to their deaths and several oth- magnitude to have required the condemnation of the ers were injured. bridge...” A large number of people witnessed the accident In spite of the enormity of the accident, the feder- from shore and their reaction was one of disbelief. “A al government decided the project must be completed cry of anguish went up from the onlookers as the span to establish the rail link for the railway system. So in rushed to its watery bed,” noted an article in one 1908, the Minister of Railways and Canals appointed a Toronto newspaper. “Women shrieked, men stood board of engineers that arranged for and supervised dumbfounded, while those directly interested in the the design and erection of a new bridge. Except for the building of the bridge could scarcely hold back the piers, nothing from the previous structure was recover- tears which welled in their eyes. It was as if they had able. In fact, the wrecked structure was in such poor lost a great friend. They had lived with this span. They condition that it was unrecognizable to the men who had pride in their work and on the day when their de- had been very familiar with it for nearly two years. sire was to be achieved, fate intervened... They have Much of this debris had to be cleared away before lost when victory seemed certain.”

View of the bridge collapse. Photograph courtesy of the Library and Archives Canada (PA-020612). 20 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007

Bridge worker Enoch McCann, who could not mediate steps to replace the span. No other part of the swim, was picked out of the chilly water by a rescue bridge was damaged. “One might think in the wake of boat. “I thought I would never come to the surface this second tragedy that the engineers and contractors again. When I did, I found two pieces of wood wedged might have wavered in their determination to proceed in tightly at the elbow joint of both my arms. How with the project, but they did not. On September 20, they got there I don’t know, but they saved my life.” 1917, the suspended span was lifted into position and Eyewitness Arsène Larocque, who helped trans- fastened to the cantilever arms. At last, the world’s port the span to the bridge site, described the moment longest cantilever bridge was completed and the first of the accident with some detail. “There was a noise train crossed it in October. Two months later it was like the snapping of steel. The centre span seemed to opened to regular trains, vehicle and pedestrian traffic. buckle in the middle and roll over, twisting the great In 1919, the Prince of Wales officially opened the steel girders. Then it disappeared. There was a roaring, Quebec Bridge and unveiled plaques in honour of the grinding sound when it collapsed. The giant arms and engineers who had designed and built the magnificent the steel bands which held the span shook consider- structure. There was no mention, however, of the men ably.” who died when the bridge collapsed. The investigation by the board of engineers deter- Seventy-eight years later, the Historic Sites and mined that the span did not buckle as Larocque and Monuments Board of Canada unveiled a new plaque others claimed. Rather, the loss resulted from the fail- that commemorates this “remarkable engineering ure of a casting in the erection equipment that tem- achievement,” but the wording on the plaque pays on- porarily supported the southwest corner of the span. ly scant attention to the workmen who died during its The October 19, 1916, report by the board of en- construction. gineers stated that the St. Lawrence Bridge Company “advised your board that they assume entire responsi- James M. Whalen is an archivist who recently retired bility for the failure” of the casting in the erection from Library and Archives Canada. He lives in Fred- equipment and the “resulting loss of the span.” The re- ericton, N.B. Legion Magazine is online at www.le- port went on to note that the company had taken im- gionmagazine.com.

Iron ring recalls engineer’s public responsibility by Denis Gaspé pon graduation, all Canadian-educated en- hand. Each ring bore the cold-iron hammer marks of gineers accept a solemn obligation to con- the smith who hand-forged it. The wearer of the ring duct their work without error or faulty ma- formally accepts his or her responsibility at a ceremo- Uterials in order to prevent injury or loss of ny conducted to confer the ring. Modern rings are life. This obligation dates back to the investigation made of stainless steel, as the original rings would de- into the collapse on August 29, 1907 of a bridge under teriorate from day-to-day wear. construction at Quebec City. The south leg of the Each province has an Association of Professional bridge suddenly fell into the St. Lawrence River, tak- Engineers that maintains the legislated standards set ing 76 men to their deaths. Many others were injured. for today’s engineers, and each member wears that Among the dead were 33 Mohawk ironworkers ring. from Kahnawake—almost half of the total number. The ring I wear has always guided me in my ca- The village was devastated as these men constituted reer as an engineer, and has had a special significance the majority of income earners at that time. Many of to me as a Mohawk. It gained added significance the men were married and had young families. when I learned that my nephew and niece are descen- The investigation showed that the collapse was dants of one of those Mohawk ironworkers who died caused by an error in the calculations of the design en- on that fateful day 100 years ago. Their great-grand- gineer related to the load-bearing capacity of a section mother was only three years old when her father died. of the bridge. It collapsed under its own weight be- Anywhere I go in Canada, seeing that ring on a fellow fore it could be completed. engineer’s finger reminds me of our shared responsi- To emphasize the importance of error-free de- bility for the safety of those who use our structures. signs, from that time onward, Canadian engineers ac- cepted the special obligation to prevent future inci- dents, and to remember the importance of that obliga- Denis Gaspé is a graduate of McGill University and tion, steel from the collapsed section of the bridge was worked for 30 years as a mining engineer in Alberta recovered and small strips were forged into rings to be and British Columbia. Upon retirement, he and his worn by engineers on the little finger of their working wife returned home to Kanesatake.

21 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

BITTER ANNIVERSARY Kahnawake Mohawks commemorate centenary of Quebec Bridge disaster by Watio Shakorontakéhtes Montour

solemn procession flowed through the heart and honour was wonderfully carried forth by the car- of Kahnawake and to the memorial site ing and efforts of hundreds of people, and commemo- near Turtle Bay to conduct commemoration ration activities were not limited to Kahnawake. Aceremonies for the 100th anniversary of the Officials, dignitaries and many descendents, com- Quebec Bridge Disaster. A resolute and profound mo- munity members living in the Quebec City area, held a ment of silence at 5:37 p.m. included the soft reso- well-organized series of events that eloquently recap- nance of a small, makeshift bell. This induced deep re- tured the sense of pain and loss that the 75 men and flection amongst the several hundred present, who their immediate families endured. A gathering of 400 were reminded of the sorrowful occasion, exactly 100 people at the St. Romuald church attended a play that years prior, on August 29, 1907, when tragedy and de- included an exceptional performance by Waiakeron spair was wrought on all Kahnawakero:non, following Gilbert, who spoke in Kanienkeha for an extended pe- the collapse and complete destruction of the southern riod. Despite the fact that 95% of the audience did not portion of the Quebec Bridge. understand a word, all listened The lives of 76 men were attentively, seemingly trans- claimed in an instant and 33 of fixed by his heart-rending per- them were the Mohawk hus- formance. Later, after filing bands, sons, brothers, fathers, out of the church and boarding uncles and friends of someone 5 coaches and numerous cars, in Kahnawake on that long ago the large contingent was es- day and they remain in the corted via a heavy police pres- hearts and minds of everyone. ence to the south bank of the A small steel replica of the Quebec Bridge. The north bridge was displayed to serve bound lane of the bridge was as a guide for the larger pro- completely shut down to all posal. Its majestic appearance, traffic and this enabled the with its silver-grey colour and hundreds of people present at the quick-pitched rise of the the future memorial site, upper chord, suggested a con- which is very close to the nection to the skies and heav- bridge, to sit and listen in rela- ens above. Another admirable tive comfort and quiet to the aspect of the steel structure words and actions of many was its east to west position- speakers and performers. War- ing, pointing directly at the ren Lahache, a descendant visible waters of the St. himself, represented the Mo- Lawrence River and towards hawk Council of Kahnawake the setting sun. A strikingly and expressed deep sentiment beautiful monument that embodies the dignity and and pride, addressing the receptive crowd in French. grace of the deceased was placed at the east end of the Tiorahkwathe Gilbert sang a self-composed ballad in steel structure and seems to serve as a symbolic an- two languages and his lyrics related the essence of chor to the entire memorial site. The locations of 33 what the life of an ironworker can sometimes be like. trees, one representing and dedicated to each victim, Donna Jacobs introduced the large crowd to an excel- were identified with white markers at pre-determined lent rendition of chanting, using a small rattle and a points, 18 of which were on the south side and 15 on larger than life, rapturous voice. the north. All of the trees will be planted in the spring Nia:wen, merci, thank you, to all those who put and the 18 trees destined for the south side will be countless hours into organizing these commemora- there to signify the fact that only 18 bodies were re- tions. covered and buried here in Kahnawake. The 15 other trees that will be planted on the north side, closer to Watio Shakorontakéhtes Montour is a retired iron- the waters, signifies the sad reality that the remains of worker from Kahnawake who is a blood relative of these men were never recovered. The day of homage bridge victim, John Tewaserake Norton.

22 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007 WHAT’SINANAME?

GASPÉ PENINSULA The Edge of The World

by Joseph Graham

umans spread across the world over a peri- better adapted to the fertile valleys and the other to the od of 150,000 years—6,000 generations— hills, and that these peoples would have slowly ex- following the weather and their needs. panded in unison, trading and warring with each other HThey moved to the edge of land masses, in an interdependent economy. The maize crops had imagining each time, no doubt, that they had arrived at been cultivated over hundreds of generations and the edge of the world, then slowly finding their way adapted to the different climates, slowly moving with across to new frontiers. They arrived in south Asia and people and through trade northward from Central southern Europe 50,000 and 45,000 years ago. Twen- America. Maize is a plant that is dependent upon hu- ty-four thousand years ago, people first arrived on the man intervention to reproduce, and the domestic crop west coast of North America and began to spread east will die without us. Botanists, in fact, cannot even de- along the southern fringe of the glaciers. The ice finitively find the original wild ancestors that would sheets reached almost show the stages of as far south as Pennsyl- domestication. In vania, and as the ice re- appears today as ceded, people pushed though it was simply northwards, bringing created by humans. their culture with them. At that time, the Americas were peopled lthough with different nations depend- and linguistic groups ent on who traded along the Atrade, rivers, and in contrast to American Natives the European wheat were fairly au- culture and the Asian tonomous and boast- rice culture, these peo- ed a large number of ples developed one cul- languages and cul- ture based on corn, or tural roots. This au- maize, and another tonomy may be, in based on the potato, part, attributable to both staples that were the lack of horses indigenous to our conti- and most of the oth- nents. Our contempo- er domestic animals rary understanding of that were used in the history of Quebec’s Eurasia. War, for aboriginal societies, them, was a slow, te- though woefully incom- dious affair com- plete, is based in part at pared to the light- least on enduring ves- ning-fast invasions tiges of a vital world on horseback or that predates the arrival chariot that continu- The Lord’s Prayer in Mi’kmaq ideograms as prepared by Christian Kauder, originally printed of European explorers in Vienna in 1866. Reproduced with Creative Commons 2.5 license ally rocked and but survives in many challenged the cul- place names. The origin of the name Gaspé traces tural growth of the Eurasian continent. In the Americ- back to those ancient times. as, the wars would have involved a lot more negotiat- ed settlements since the slow-moving advance of in- hile we have no written record of their vaders could not easily surprise the defenders. In fact, movements north, it appears that early there is evidence that invaders sometimes came bear- Native farming cultures were flanked ing gifts and tricked or cajoled their foe into submis- Wby hunter-gatherer cultures, one being sion.

23 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

Just as stories from the Bible help historians iden- Americas reducing its population to about 10 percent tify places and give background to other information and destroying most vestiges of the culture. The in- learned through archaeology, the Creation story of the vaders destroyed the rest, installing their own in its Mi’kmaq of the Gaspé peninsula is a variant of Algo- place. nquian mythology. It describes the actions of the first man, and, while it differs from other Algonquian cre- hen Jacques Cartier first sailed up the ation stories in many ways, it outlines the geography St. Lawrence River in the 1530s, he of North America fairly well. Glooscap, a mythical chose names for everything that he saw. figure whose creation predates ‘the first seven cou- WOften, though, he chose the names the ples,’ is described as having explored the continent: places already had. Some of the people who he found “Glooscap then travelled to the direction of the were Iroquoian, and they farmed and hunted in the setting sun until he came to the ocean. He then went lowlands along the river. He also met the Mi’kmaq, south until the land narrowed—and he could see two whom he encountered at the location of the present- oceans on either side. He again travelled back to day town of Gaspé. Mi’kmaq means ‘friends’ and was where he started from and continued towards the north not the name they called themselves so much as the to the land of ice and snow. Later he came back to the name that others called them. They called the site east where he decided to stay. It is where he came into Honguedo, a word which meant ‘the place people existence.” (Native American Lore, Stone-E Produc- came to meet.’ The name reflected their usage of it as tions, 1996). a port and centre of trade. Cartier, who was exploring This quick summary implies that the Mi’kmaq a virgin territory for France, saw Mi’kmaqs waving people were aware of the basic layout of the continent, beaver pelts and hailing him using Basque words. To which indicates an awareness of the land they all in- them, his ship represented more trade with Europe, a habited. This is not surprising given that they would trade they had been carrying on with the Basque peo- have traded with neighbouring agricultural peoples for ple for some time. Cartier wrote down the Mi’kmaq maize and other non-indigenous items, some of which name for the region – Gespeg – as Gaspé. The Eng- must have been carried or traded through a network of lish would call it Gaspay. The Mi’kmaq word means peddlers or some other system of exchange. ‘the end of the land,’ reflecting a worldview that The Mi’kmaq were members of the Wabanaki looked from a centre somewhere in the west or south- Confederacy, and the term Wabanaki means ‘people of west and saw itself at the edge of the land, a compara- the dawn.’ These nations lived in the east of the conti- tive view, differentiating themselves from their neigh- nent, as their name reflects. This identity seems to lo- bours to their west and south who were further from cate them with regard to others who were not as far to the edge. the east, and they seem to have named themselves in a geographic context. Joseph Graham is the editor of Quebec Heritage News In school, we were taught that North America was fairly empty when the first Europeans began to set- For detailed sources see: www.qahn.org/document.as- tle—that the land was thinly populated by ‘savages’ px who bordered on being irrelevant. In Canada, this view is reinforced by the assumption that Native peo- ples had no written language. The truth is much differ- ent. The early Jesuits documented that Mi’kmaq chil- dren took notes in their own script using charcoal and Does your group have a birch bark. The script survives, but clear records of heritage or cultural event culture or trade have not been found, and the impor- tance of the writing has been largely dismissed. Histo- you’d like to rians know that there were written languages in Cen- tral America, and, given the individuality of the differ- advertise on this page? ent nations, it is easy to disregard the scribbling of Mi’kmaq children, but it is suggestive of a much more complex culture that spanned the continent. Email us at Nonetheless, ways of life based on botany and wild game farming rather than on animal husbandry [email protected] with all suffered from a major vulnerability: Native people had the details. developed no resistance to the diseases that come with animal husbandry. Over generations, Eurasians lived in close quarters with domestic animals such as pigs, Free for QAHN members. horses, cattle and sheep and slowly, those who could not adapt sickened and died. When domestic animals were introduced here, these diseases tore through the

24 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007 REVIEWS

1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus

By Charles C. Mann Alfred A. Knopf 465 pages, $40.00

or a long time, conventional wis- Alliance. He shows how they built cities, and died.” Roosevelt’s research indicted to dom had it that when the first Eu- some of them bigger and better-organized her that the “Marajó was ‘one of the out- ropeans arrived in the Americas, than European cities of the time, and he pro- standing indigenous cultural achievements Fthey found scattered bands of prim- vides us with an understanding of the very of the New World,’ a powerhouse that last- itive peoples in most of the New World and advanced agriculture being practiced. He ed for more than a thousand years, had the remnants of perhaps slightly more ad- explains the development of the corn that ‘possibly well over 100,000’ inhabitants, vanced civilizations in Meso-America. This we know today from the wild grasses that and covered thousands of square was a nice comfortable assumption for were tamed and bred thousands of years miles…(and) ‘showed the most luxuriant those of us descended from the early Euro- ago. There are competing theories of the and diverse growth’.” Because the Marajó pean settlers, because we didn’t have to ask how and the when, and Mann provides us didn’t build grand public monuments, the ourselves about who we had displaced with not only these arguments but also idea that they could build an orderly society while settling the ‘wilderness.’ But those as- demonstrates the impact of the domestica- wasn’t considered until Roosevelt’s work, sumptions don’t stand up to scrutiny and in tion of various plants on the Americas and which she began in the 1980s. the past generation or so academics from the whole world, as plant stock was trans- Similar stories are told about the many disciplines have been examining the ported to Europe, Asia and Africa. Northeast. Although Mann’s work doesn’t records left by the earlier inhabitants of the Mann also presents many cases of the extend into Canada, similar conclusions Western Hemisphere. effects of smallpox and other debilitating about our assumptions can be drawn from Archaeologists, anthropologists and European diseases that wiped out whole the descriptions of societies in what is now other researchers have been looking at the populations. There is ample evidence that in Massachusetts. The degree of agriculture, history of the Americas in new ways and 1491 there were actually more people living trade and cultural development, including coming to radically different conclusions in the Americas than in Europe, but that discussions of diplomacy and war, do touch about what was here before Columbus’s ar- within a relatively short time the numbers on the foundations of some of the peoples rival. Charles C. Mann has done a formida- were reduced to a small fraction of those who populated the St. Lawrence River val- ble job of explaining these new discoveries alive at the moment of contact. ley. The final chapter of the book is entitled and interpretations in this well-researched, But the real beauty of this book is the The Great Law of Peace, and describes the rigorous but very accessible book. He takes detailed descriptions Mann gives of his vis- Five Nations confederacy of the Hau- the reader on explorations through remote its to the sites he describes, accompanied by denosaunee or Iroquois and their constitu- parts of Bolivia and Amazonia, among the researchers and also by the people who live tion, as well as its cultural underpinnings ruins of Meso-America and to the more fa- in them and trace their roots back thousands and the Europeans’ reactions to the society miliar landscapes of the Southwestern Unit- of years in those places. He gives us the that they fought with for control of what be- ed States and New England, all the while sights, sounds and smells of the Amazon came the eastern United States during the describing the old assumptions, the work jungle where the theories of archaeologists 1700s. being done to unearth artefacts and oral his- Betty J. Meggers of the Smithsonion Insti- The book benefits from the inclusion tories, and the new interpretations and tution and Anna C. Roosevelt of the Field of maps, photographs and drawings, a series knowledge available as a result. Museum clash over the date and type of the of appendices giving greater details of some This is not a romanticized vision of settlement found in and near Painted Rock of the topics covered more broadly in the primitive peoples living in harmony with Cave. Meggers believed that “the law of en- text, 40 pages of notes, a detailed index and the earth in small hunter-gatherer societies. vironmental limitation” indicated that it was a remarkable 45-page bibliography showing Mann describes the rise and fall of great from a “failed cutting from a more sophisti- the range and breadth of Mann’s research. civilizations. Describing the one we know cated culture in the Andes…Stranded in the as the Aztec for example, he delves into wet desert of the Amazon, the culture strug- Reviewed by Sheila Eskenazi, co-editor of their history and recasts them as the Triple gled to gain its footing, tottered a few steps, the Quebec Heritage News

25 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

Making the Voyager World: Travellers and Traders in the North American Fur Trade. By Carolyn Podruchny University of Toronto Press 442 pages, $41.50

or more than a century, French- bourgeois is also examined; even though varied the voyageur experience could be— Canadian voyageurs paddled deep the voyageurs were servants, she describes one gets the sense that little can be distilled into the interior of this continent to the ways voyageurs negotiated their condi- from such wide-ranging findings, interest- Ftransport furs and trade goods as tions of service. ing though they might be. part of an economy that helped define Podruchny describes life at posts in the However, the goal of Making the Canada. Yet very little is known of these interior, where voyageurs could become Voyageur World is to venture past a mere men who provided the manpower for this craftsmen or could trade at Native settle- description of voyageur life and to reach ac- critical fur trade. Theirs was a mostly illiter- ments, sometimes spending the winter in ademic conclusions about their labour rela- ate world, and what details do exist come Native lodges. At summer Rendezvous, tions, identity and ‘communitas.’ Podruch- from a British-born bourgeoisie that was voyageurs could assemble, drink, tell stories ny tends to over-reach in her arguments, happy to portray the hardy voyageur as a and fight, strengthening their group identity, making fascinating interpretations but with- mere caricature. Carolyn Podruchny’s re- much of which centred on masculinity. The out much backing; there are far too many cent effort, Making the Voyageur World, at- only females around were Native women, paragraphs that end in speculation. For ex- tempts not only to describe the daily life of who ventured into quite fluid relationships ample, the author claims that when the voyageur, but also to delve into his that occasionally resulted in long-lasting voyageurs gave nicknames to the bourgeois, headspace. marriages. Finally, at the end of their con- this was a way to “undermine master au- The book follows the voyageurs, start- tracts, voyageurs could head home, though thority.” While perhaps perpetuating a ing in the St. Lawrence Valley, where many, enamoured with the liberty of ‘Indian French-Canadian tradition of sobriquets, the French Canadian men signed contracts to country,’ chose to sign up again or even set- statement lacks proof. With regard to the serve the Hudson’s Bay or Northwest Com- tle down in the interior and become use of maypoles as route markers, Podruch- panies (the author focuses on the fur trade freemen. ny shows this to be a modification of the during the period following the French While the concept of following the French-Canadian tradition of honouring Regime). Some, known as pork-eaters, voyageur along his odyssey has allegorical seignieurs and militia captains, but then in- would paddle goods from headquarters in appeal, in practice the book’s flow is not sists on hinting that some Native influence Montreal to a midway post on Lake Superi- smooth. It doesn’t help that a number of must exist as well. or. More experienced voyageurs, called these chapters were once separate articles, In addition, the book’s writing style northmen, handled the routes from there to and have been cobbled together without proves to be considerably vexing. Sen- the interior, routinely performing heroic much effort to cut the redundancy down. tences tend to be choppy, period source feats of strength and endurance in the The reader is thus presented, for example, quotations are often followed by an almost process. with the difference between northmen and word-for-word description, and the academ- The author spends considerable time pork-eaters at least five times. And too often ic tone will discourage many casual readers. examining the traditions and beliefs that Podruchny breaks from the narrative struc- Podruchny conveys a strong apprecia- voyageurs developed on their perilous jour- ture to provide background details that tion for the voyageur life, and had she sim- neys. These had roots in Catholicism (for should have been elsewhere in the book. ply explored the daily life of the voyageur, example, passing from one section of the Despite the book’s faults, patient read- without straining to find deeper meanings, it route to another involved mock baptisms), ers will take pleasure in the ways these men may have been more appealing to the gen- and were also influenced by the voyageurs’ created a unique culture for themselves. It is eral reader. Even so, we are left to ponder unique situation. Podruchny examines the obvious Podruchny has researched a great how we Canadians, so quick to lament the daily grind of paddling and portaging birch- deal and wants to share it all with us, even tedium of our history, have so often over- bark canoes through the wilderness. This if, at times, it comes across muddled. Her looked such a fascinating group of adven- routine inspired the ubiquitous voyageur three-hundred pages could have been turers. songs, used to pass the time and coordinate trimmed by a third, and it could probably paddling, influencing the voyageurs’ values. have strengthened her arguments: by giving Reviewed by Tyler Wood. The relationship between voyageur and so many examples—by showing just how

26 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007

Premières Nations, Collections Royales de France

Pointe-à-Callière Museum, 350 Place Royale, Old Montreal Exhibit runs until October 14, 2007. Open Tuesday to Friday, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and weekends, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Info: (514) 872-9150 or email [email protected].

rush aside those pesky postcolonial unknown provenance or imaginative visitor to conjure. For instance, anxieties. This small but surprising is covered in images of 18th-century naval commander and Quebec exhibition features an exceptional birds and flowers that governor Roland-Michel Barrin de la Galis- Bcollection of native North Ameri- look distinctly Euro- sonière’s ‘Canadian savage’ mannequin, a gift can artefacts on loan from the Musée du quai pean; and, most curi- to the King’s children, is left essentially with- Branly in Paris. It is now on at Pointe-à-Cal- ously, a Huron-Wendat out examination of the meaning of such an lière Museum in Montreal until October 14, wampum belt made on appropriation. In addition, the majority of ref- 2007 and is so successful that it makes wad- Île d’Orléans praises erences to political dealings between coloniz- ing through the hordes of camera-toting the Virgin Mary in er and colonized emphasize amicable trade tourists and ice cream vendors in the Old Port Latin. But, unlike the and peace treaties arrived at through negotia- worthwhile. flow of power and tion. In contrast, the reality is that French sol- The collection itself is stunning. Along- money, such cultural diers and settlers forced their religion on Na- side French maps sit superbly maintained exchange moved in tive peoples, subjugated them by force or the First Nations hides, clothing and tools; moc- both directions. A threat of force, and used them as pawns in casins looking as though they are new, with French-made toma- skirmishes with British troops in the disputed ornate decorative flourishes; Labradorian hawk-pipe, from 1762, territories between French and British settle- coats, leggings and snowshoes; Mi’kmaq is adorned with fleurs- ments in what are now Ohio, Michigan and baskets and pottery. Also on display are cere- de-lis, and a note ex- elsewhere. monial feathered peace pipes, headdresses, plains that the British Pointe-à-Callière itself is worth at least weapons and several impressive full became as adept as as much time exploring as the exhibition. wampum belts, including the one thought to First Nations tribes at Spread across two buildings, the museum’s have been given to Samuel de Champlain by making wampum belts most striking feature is the jarringly modernist the Ottawa during negotiations in 1611. In the by 1725 or so. tower that stands beside the St. Lawrence centre of the room, a wonderful, giant, bright- Women’s lives are not omitted, as is so River. But the tower’s design belies what sits ly painted robe from the mid-18th century de- often the case in accounts that measure histo- below the two edifices: a sprawling and ex- picts the Arkansas tribe’s proximity to a ry by wars, technology and men signing haustive set of colonial-era Montreal artefacts, French outpost on the Mississippi River. treaties in the halls of empire. Considerable dug up in the very spot where they sit today. Conspicuous among the artefacts is a effort has obviously been spent providing ex- In 1989 it was discovered that Pointe-à-Cal- rather delightfully unexpected trope: the phe- planations of the role of women in First Na- lière is on top of the city’s first Catholic ceme- nomenon of cultural crossover. A number of tions life, both in terms of domestic behaviour tery, a fact which helped lead to the fort’s lo- items are the result of the European-Ameri- and the production of textiles (an industry de- cation. The smaller of Pointe-à-Callière’s two can interface, and demonstrate effectively the stroyed by the influx of European-produced buildings, Place Royale, was the city’s first speed with which such distinctions became goods by 1800). public square and customs house. In fact, a blurred. Iroquois leggings feature Scottish- Among the problems with many such museum archaeologist and researchers from style flaming-heart images; a painted hide of shows is the question to which the majority of the Université de Montreal revealed in mid- a generation of Western critical theorists de- August that Fort Ville-Marie, the original voted their lives: what remains of these arte- French settlement on the island, sat in a ware- facts sitting motionless under glass, illuminat- house not far from where the museum is. It’s ed by artificial lights, separated entirely from refreshing somehow to see the confluence of function, reduced to mere form – mere medi- the tower’s 20th-century design and the un- um, in McLuhan’s rendering? This decontex- derbelly of a 17th-century outpost – a juxta- tualization serves a purpose, subtly and per- position that fits neatly alongside the current haps unintentionally: the obscuring of the bru- exhibition’s exegesis of the beginnings of Eu- tality of military rule in New France. The sto- ropean-American cultural exchange. ries of how these various pieces were ac- quired, and at what cost to the original own- ers, are left out, dependant upon the informed Reviewed by Sam Solomon

Painted robe with dancers holding calumet, birds & dragonflies, mid-1700s; Wampum belt, western Great Lakes, 18th century; engraved powder horn, 27 Great Lakes, mid-1700s. Collection of Musée du quai Branly, France. QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS In My Life: Contemporary Aboriginal Art Canadian Museum of Civilization 100 Laurier Street, Gatineau Runs until March 16, 2008. Open Tues to Sun: 9 a.m to 5 p.m. & Thurs: 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Info: 819-776-7014

ike so many of us, I visit muse- Faye Heavyshield’s multidisciplinary Québec in 2005 to redress the historical in- ums much more frequently when installation, Aapaskaiyaawa (‘they are accuracies within our collective national traveling than I do when I am at dancing’) features forms symbolizing hu- memory. In this piece, a contemporary Lhome. But with a request to pro- man bodies floating in groups. The figures wampum belt suggests a new alliance for vide a casual visitor’s view of this exhibi- and the shadows they cast float like spirits the future with a shared national history. tion, I had both a reason and a deadline to in the transitional space between earth and Frank Shebageget has created a reper- see In my lifetime: Contemporary Aborigi- sky, past and present, affirming the contin- toire of iconic symbols—seaplanes, houses nal Art. uum between the land and Aboriginal tra- and tar paper—that serve as powerful refer- The exhibition features the work of ditions. ences to the intersection of Aboriginal and eight Aboriginal artists—some of whom Works from Neil Macleod’s Wihtikow Euro-Canadian cultures. Repetition in the have been prominent in the arts communi- series portray his dreams and the demons three pieces draws attention to the implica- ty for two decades, while others are only that inhabit them. They also serve as a tions of mass production and consumption now receiving national attention. The un- metaphor for the greed and self-absorption on Aboriginal cultures. Beavers is an instal- derlying theme of the exhibition is artists’ of the colonizers who destroyed Aboriginal lation of 1,692 tiny basswood models of a reflections on personal experience and an- spirit and lands—a metaphor still relevant bush plane of the same name. This plane cestral history thereby highlighting the in today’s consumerist society. A more op- was often the primary, if not only, link to wide range of perspectives held by con- timistic view of these works suggests that the outside world. The tiny replicas also temporary Canadian Aboriginal artists. destruction also holds a promise of renew- represent the exact number of Beaver air- More detail on how works are situated his- al, thereby reflecting the artist’s hope that planes produced by De Havilland between torically and within the context of their the wihtikow signals his culture’s continu- 1947 and 1967. In Small Village, thirty- body of work is provided through inter- ity and survival. nine small identical grey houses are lined views with artists on videos near each Nadia Myre’s sculptures, paintings up on cedar shelves—a comment on the piece. and videos explore themes of language and substandard federal housing projects on In the words of David Garneau, “I lost identity caused by disinheritance First Nations reserves and the uniformity of want people to remember in order to go which, in her case, occurred when a family many suburban developments. Communi- forward”. A Métis born in Edmonton and off the reserve adopted her mother. Com- ties II features the names of nearly 700 now on faculty of the University of Regi- plex relationships among family, ancestors First Nations, Inuit and Métis communities na’s Visual Arts Department, his great- and friends inspired the three conceptually across the country that are in the process of great-grandfather was jailed as a collabo- linked works in the show. Grandmother’s reclaiming their languages and cultures. rator of Louis Riel. Garneau’s paintings Circle is a sculptural installation centred on The names appear on tar paper, a material present pop art and comic book-inspired a structure reminiscent of fish-drying racks still used as a covering for many reserve caricatures of his family’s Métis heritage. that refers to food preparation and other houses today. A haunting installation blood on the family activities as well as her distance Curator Lee-Ann Martin was an inde- snow by Rebecca Belmore, a Vancouver from them. In the video Wish, the move- pendent curator when she prepared this ex- based Anishnabe artist originally from ments of Myre’s abstracted body connect hibition for the Musée national des beaux- Northwestern Ontario, draws parallels be- her with ancestors in the circle thereby ex- arts du Québec in 2002. The exhibition tween historical and contemporary atroci- periencing the pain and loss they suffered was designed to explore contemporary as- ties including Wounded Knee (South with the assault of colonialism. Her third pects of Native artistic practices in Canada Dakota, 1890) and the missing women work, Coda Construction, uses words, with a particular emphasis on Quebec. As from downtown Vancouver’s Eastside ground-to-air signals and Morse code in works of Quebec Aboriginal artists were neighbourhood—many of whom are Abo- Braille to express the urgency of desire. set in relation to works by Aboriginal riginal. Sonia Robertson is a member of the artists across the country, an eloquent Unsettlements by Hannah Claus is a Innu nation living in Northern Quebec. snapshot of preent-day Canadian Aborigi- collection of houses combining screen- Her internationally exhibited works have nal perspectives emerged. Martin is now printed wallpaper and beadwork patterns evolved from photography to installation the Curator of Contemporary Canadian that highlight intercultural relationships and performance work. In the past decade Aboriginal Art at the Canadian Museum of and transformation, reflecting the artist’s her site-specific installations have ad- Civilization where the exhibition continues preoccupations with being a Mohawk dressed both place and presence of spirit. until March 16, 2008. from the Bay of Quinte in Eastern Ontario Refaire l’alliance was originally created who also has European ancestry. for the Musée national des beaux-arts du Reviewed by Judith Nolte unsettlements (DETAIL) by Hannah Claus, 2004. Screen print on kozo paper, bass wood, seed beads, quilt, electronics components. Artist’s collection. Photo©P. Altman 28 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007

HINDSIGHT Reference Points by Dan Pinese

he road from Sherbrooke to Spider path littered with archaeological plots on either Lake, near Wilborn in the Megantic side. Each plot is divided into a grid with white Mountains near the Maine border lies rope with each segment dug out in a levelled, T across an undulating expanse of farm careful fashion. There are students of a summer fields and forest threaded by a string of small field school working around us, some scratching towns and villages rooted in the early settlement at the earth between the rope lines with trowels history of Quebec’s Eastern Townships. I buy a and placing it into containers while others rock coffee and a map because it’s early and within waist-high screened boxes back and forth, sifting ten minutes of leaving the driveway, my girl- the dirt. Chapdelaine goes up to the now sand- friend and I silently acknowledge that we don’t free screen box and points to a fragment of rock, know where we are going. “These are what we are finding the most, flakes “After Cookshire, we just have take the 212 of red chert…it comes from the Munsungun area east. It’s a straight line from there,” I tell her as I of southern Maine, about a 165 kilometres from look at the map and the directions I have on a here straight, roughly 250 kilometres by canoe.” few pieces of paper, scrawled during my conver- Chapdelaine reminds me that it is best to think sation with Claude Chapdelaine a few days earli- about these lengths in terms of distances by wa- er. Chapdelaine is a professor of archaeology at ter. The total picture is clearer and you under- the Université de Montréal and for the last sever- stand more. “The aboriginal people of Canada al years he’s been leading an archaeological dig never travelled from one point to another in on the shores of the lake now better known by its straight lines, they didn’t use straight lines,” French name, Lac aux Araignées. We drive Chapdelaine says. “Today, we travel by roads and straight through the heart of old Compton County think in straight lines. They went in every direc- and beyond, through Lennoxville, Cookshire, Is- tion. “ As he talks, I can’t help but notice the land Brook, La Patrie and Notre Dame-des-Bois, roped-off grids beside us and hear a car whiz by matching road signs with a voice on the highway at our backs. recording of Chapelaine’s direc- “How can you tell this site is tions. The voice tells us where to over 12,000 years old?” I ask. turn, what to look out for. A couple “The key feature of that en- of hours after setting out, we reach tire culture is the projectile Wilborn and cross a small bridge, point…just as it is the harpoon turning right down a dirt road till for the Inuit,” Chapdelaine says. we come to a red-painted cabin and “It’s the only time in the history a gate. The car odometer has of North America where people clocked approximately 125 kilome- were making a thin base, thin- tres. Just like the recording said. ning the projectile point on both “Where do we park?” I wonder. sides. These points appeared What Chapdelaine’s team has once and disappeared 2,000 years found near Lac aux Araignées dates after. By logic we can say this back over 12,000 years. They’ve site is at least 12,000 years old.” found fragments mostly, chippings The fluted point is a cultural of red chert—a silicate rock—evi- and migratory marker. Apparent- dence of the making of prehistoric knives, hand ly, in the 2, 000-year period in which they were scrapers, and drills. But it is not these chips used, they have been found as far east as the we’ve driven all the way out here to talk about. Maritimes and as far west as Alaska. These We are interested in the seven fluted points—a points “establish a general chronology,” says type of spearhead—that have been unearthed on Chapdelaine, “but it’s also a style. The way they the site. These are much more than fragments. dressed, kept their hair. Their culture is not just After we park the car, Chapdelaine emerges the projectile point but all the rest which is not in from the trail to our right and is holding a the soil. We lost most of the ways they used to walkie-talkie and wearing an off-white pocketed identity themselves. But they shared some type of vest. He greets us while leading us down a short artefacts and the fluted point is one…The culture

Left, a segmented plot on the Megantic site. Right, Claude Chapdelaine. Photographs taken by Dan Pinese. 29 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS of this group is the fluted point.” “But 12,500 years ago,” Chapdelaine jokes, “was a very rough time.” “Seems like they would go south where it’s warmer. Why would they come north?” I ask. The archaeologist has adopted the habit of speak- ing about his prehistoric subjects in the present tense. “They are going north to intercept the cari- bou, for their fur,” he replies. Southern Quebec 12,500 years ago was a gla- cial environment, quite a contrast with the forest- ed landscape it is today. It was frozen, glacial tundra, one that was starting to recede north, ac- cording to Chapdelaine. “As the glacier recedes the caribou are reced- ing north with the glacier. The people are follow- ing not the glacier but the caribou. But to have caribou you have to have tundra and the geogra- phers are telling us that the tun- dra is disap- pearing rapidly between 12,500 and 12,000 years ago. [The geologists] are working with the same im- pressions as us, they are using the same dating process.” As the in- terview con- cludes and Chapdelaine in- troduces us to a few of his stu- dents he says, “I like to say to my students ‘show me what you’re mapping and I will tell you who you are.’” I am not sure I understand Chapdelaine’s translation, whether he means mapping in terms of following or tracing something, but I can’t help but think about his earlier statement that our society thinks in lines. We follow lines. We are truly in a different world here: one composed of pieces between a lake spotted with fishing boats on one side and a highway on the other. I leave the site feeling excited and simultaneously puz- zled. I don’t understand what the pieces of pro- jectile mean, but I think that’s the point. “Do you want to stop to eat on the way back?” I say. “I think I saw a place on the side of the highway.”

A broken fluted point found near Lac Megantic showing its prob- 30 able original shape. Image courtesy of Claude Chapdelaine. SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2007 EVENT LISTINGS

Laurentians Montreal Region Beaurepaire-Beaconsfield Laurentian Ski Museum Westmount Historical Association Historical Society Mont Saint-Sauveur Fall Lecture Series 2007 Lecture Series, Centennial Hall, Westmount Public Library 383 Beaconsfield Boul. October 20, 4:30 p.m. Info: 514-925-1404 or 514-932-6688 Laurentian Ski Hall of Fame Dinner November 15, 7:30 p.m. Cost: 75$ per person October 18, 7-9 p.m. The American Revolution on Lake Info: Guy Thibaudeau, 450-226-3373 Down in the Titanic: Hartland Mol- Saint Louis and its Shores Tickets: Maureen Boorne: 514-710- son and the Allisons Speaker: Adrian Willison 9951 Speaker: Alan Hustak Info: 514-695-2502

Eastern Townships November 15, 7-9 p.m. Jewish Genealogical Society John Young and the Estate of “Rose- of Montreal Société d’histoire de Sherbrooke, mount” Monthly Lecture Series: 275 rue Dufferin, Sherbrooke Speaker: Caroline Breslaw Info: 514-484-0969 Sherbrooke 1802-2002: Email: [email protected] Two centuries of history December 13, 7-9 p.m. Info : 819-821-5406 Alice Lighthall (1891-1991): A October 14, 2 p.m. www.shs.ville.sherbrooke.qc.ca Beloved Westmounter Internet, PowerPoint and Novel Ways Speaker: Ruth Allan-Rigby of Presenting Your Family History Potton Heritage Association Inc. Speaker: Mel Solman of Toronto Fundraising Activity November 10, 1:30 p.m. Shipbuilding in the Gaspe October 21, 10 a.m. – noon October 13, 5 p.m. Speaker: Thelma McCourt of Hudson West Island Outreach Workshop at Oktoberfest: Federation CJA West Island Building Bavarian supper, music and dancing Quebec Family History Society Owl’s Head Ski Centre 173 Cartier Ave., Pointe Claire November 20, 7:30 p.m. Tickets: Jacques Thouin, 450-292- Info: 514-695-1502 Biala Podlaska: Revisiting Grandfa- 3020 ther’s Polish shtetl Info: Édith Smeesters, 450-292-0547 October 20, 1 p.m.–4 p.m. Speaker: David Lewis Sternfeld, pho- or Carol Bishop, 450-292-4844 Legacy Family Tree Computer Soft- to-journalist and filmmaker ware Stanstead Historical Society Speaker: Lorraine Gosselin November 4 and December 2 Colby-Curtis Museum Member Cost: 25$ Sunday Family Tree Workshops Info: 819-876-7322 Non-members: 30$ 5151 Côte Ste Catherine Rd. [email protected] November 3, 1 p.m.-4 p.m. McCord Museum of Canadian History October 20, 10:30 a.m. Quebec Land Records Online Re- Info:514-398-7100 The ‘healthy pictures’ of Wilbur Reas- search er: Victorian Art, Morality and the Speaker: Sharon Callaghan Permanent Exhibit Domestic Sphere at Carrollcroft Member Cost: 25$ Simply Montreal: Glimpses of a Speaker: Robert G. Colby Non-members: 30$ Unique City Member cost: 14$ Non-member: 20$ November 17, 1 p.m.-4 p.m. Until January 7 The British Are Us: British Genealo- Growing Up in Montreal November 3, 10:30 a.m. gy and the new databases available Caring for Grandmother’s Quilt for English and Welsh ancestors Until April 20 Speaker: Diane Skink Souvenirs of Here: The Photo Album as Private Archive.

31 QUEBEC HERITAGE NEWS

CULTURAL CALENDAR

Souvenirs of Here - The Photograph Album as Private Archive September 1, 2007 to April 20, 2008

A selection of images from the personal archives of Montrealers of Chinese origin who have preserved their life memories in collections of photographs. A true revelation, this exhibition probes how photo- graphy is used as a means of remembering.

Growing Up in Montreal October 29, 2004 to January 7, 2008

Explore the daily lives of young urban-dwellers in the last century by looking back on the behaviour and rituals, habits and games of Montreal children, from birth to adolescence, through the changes and discoveries of the 20th century. A space for historical discovery and dialogue between generations, this exhibi- tion features McCord’s remarkable collection of clothing, toys and photos.

COMING IN 2008: Reveal of Conceal? February 22, 2008 to January 18, 2009

A selection of garments, accessories, and photographs from the McCord collection shows how changes in fashion trends and cultural standards over the last two centuries have influenced women’s clothing choices.

The McCord is open from Tuesday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m on weekends, holiday weekends and Mondays during the summer months. Entrance fees (including taxes) are $12 for adults, $9 for seniors, $6 for students, $4 for children between the ages of 6 and 12, and $22 for families. Museum admission is free of charge to Friends of the McCord and children aged five and under. Free entry to all visitors the first Saturday of each month from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m.

690 SHERBROOKE STREET WEST, MONTREAL, QUEBEC, CANADA H3A 1E9 Tel: (514) 398-7100 Fax: (514) 398-5045 E-mail: [email protected] www.mccord-museum.qc.ca