Meaford's Beautiful Joe Park

Meaford’s Beautiful Joe Park:

Pop quiz: Can you name the first Canadian novel to sell one million copies during the author’s lifetime? No? I’ll give you a few A Place hints. It was published in 1894. The author was born in the Maritimes, and, at the time of her death, she was called “Canada’s most revered author.” If you guessed Anne of Green Gables, you would be wrong.

forWritten by Ken Haigh Photographed by Mike DavisJoe

▲ Margaret Marshall Saunders’ famous novel was inspired by true eed another clue? events that happened in Meaford. How about this: the story is based on true ◀ Beautiful Joe Park near events which took downtown Meaford celebrates Nplace in Meaford, Ontario. animal welfare and commemorates Give up? the heart-wrenching novel The novel is Beautiful Joe by about an abused dog Margaret Marshall Saunders. who becomes a hero. ▶ 20 Winter 2013-14 21 Winter 2013-14 A Place for Joe ▶

▲ Police dogs are honoured with a monument.

▲ Heart-breaking sensitivity has been crafted into the face of Beautiful Joe. ◀ A bronze statue depicting Beautiful Joe greets visitors to the park.

In the summer of 1892, Moore’s daughter, Louise. The Margaret Saunders, a school Moores owned a gristmill on ▲ Pavilion for personal memorials teacher from Halifax, Nova the Bighead River. Saunders to beloved animals. “Our Best Scotia, was vacationing in didn’t know it, but she was Friend,” “Forever in My Heart,” Meaford, a small port on about to have an encounter and “Herding Angels” are just Georgian Bay. She was staying that would shape her career. some of the declarations on with the Moore family, who the individual plaques. were soon to become her Continued on page 42 ▶ family, since her brother, ◀ The provincial plaque over Jack, was engaged to William Sign outside the park in Meaford. ▶ the grave of the real Joe.

22 Winter 2013-14 23 Winter 2013-14 A Place for Joe ▶ Continued from page 23

▲ People with disabilities can enter into a large memorial to special service dogs, and get close to monuments in raised beds.

Saunders had dreams of ears and tail. As with most kindness to animals. She and he rewards the Morris becoming a writer. She had abused animals, Joe was a decided to enter. Her novel family’s kindness by warning written one book already, timid creature, and he would won the contest and became them of a burglar in the an unsuccessful and rather hide on a nest of old flour an international bestseller. house. His action also saves conventional romance. Local sacks under Mr. Moores That novel, of course, was the their lives, since the burglar legend has it that, while she counter whenever a stranger story of Beautiful Joe. (who was his ex-master) was in Meaford, she went entered the mill. But he Saunders lets Joe tell his intended to set the house for long walks, hoping to find seemed to have taken a shine own story, beginning with his ablaze to cover his crime. inspiration for a new writing to Miss Saunders, and he cruel and unhappy early years Local interest in Beautiful project. Her companion on accompanied her everywhere. and his subsequent rescue by Joe was revived in 1963 these walks was the Moores' One might even say he Mr. Moore (called Mr. Morris when Joe’s grave marker little dog, Beautiful Joe. Joe became her muse. in the novel). The setting is was discovered near the was, in point of fact, not When Saunders returned shifted to Fairport, Maine, banks of the Bighead River beautiful at all. He was a to Nova Scotia, she heard because the contest rules just below the old Moore mutt, mostly terrier. Mr. of a writing contest, stipulated that the story must house. The wooded property Moore had rescued him sponsored by the American have an American setting. along the river, which had from an abusive owner, who Humane Education Society. Saunders later admitted that once belonged to the Moore had beaten the little dog Contestants were asked to the family she wrote about family, became Beautiful Joe repeatedly and who, in a fit of write a novel, modelled after was really her own. Over Park, and a provincial plaque drunken rage, had mutilated Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty, the course of the book, Joe the dog by chopping off his which would encourage is brought back to health, Continued on page 44 ▶ 42 Winter 2013-14 43 Winter 2013-14 A Place for Joe ▶ Continued from page 43

dogs that assist people with The memorial to search and rescue disabilities. The BJHS has dogs who worked at the 9/11 created a pavilion in the park attack sites. The cross is made of where grieving pet owners iron from the Twin Towers. ▶ can erect personal memorials to their own beloved things—an annual Beautiful animals. Joe Festival, perhaps.” Evelyn Dean, chair of Margaret Saunders wrote the BJHS, spoke about the 25 books in her career, most society’s current projects. of them about animals, A new monument to but she never repeated the Margaret Saunders, designed success of Beautiful Joe. by Meaford artist Gunter That book went on to sell Neumann, was unveiled in millions of copies around the park on October 3, and the world, was translated the society has also received into more than a dozen approval from Meaford town languages, earned her an council for an off-leash dog honorary degree from Acadia park. Future improvements University and a C.B.E. from ▲ The story behind the police dogs monument. ▲ The story behind the 9/11 memorial. to Beautiful Joe Park include King George V, and never a footbridge, marked trails, went out of print. Saunders’s was erected over the grave park into a symbol of the working dogs. There is a picnic tables and wheelchair- message about animal welfare to commemorate Margaret bond between humans and memorial to the search-and- accessible washrooms. The inspired millions of people. As For the love Saunders and Beautiful Joe. their canine companions. rescue dogs that died when project she is most excited Beautiful Joe says at the end Today, the park is cared There is a bronze statue of the Twin Towers collapsed in about though is Beautiful of his own story, “[B]e kind of animal for by a group of volunteers Beautiful Joe at the entrance New York City on September Joe: The Play. to dumb animals not only called the Beautiful Joe to the park, and scattered 11, 2001. There are also “We commissioned a because you will lose nothing companions Heritage Society, (BJHS) throughout the park are a monuments in the park to play,” says Dean, “from by it, but because you ought which has transformed the number of monuments to police dogs and to service playwright Michael O’Brien, to; for they were placed to be based on the novel. It on earth by the same Kind premiered at SpringWorks in Hand that made all living Stratford in May 2012 and creatures.” nev was voted ‘Best New Play’ by the audience. We are staging Ken Haigh, author of Under the a full production at the Holy Lake: A Memoir of Eastern Meaford Opera House in the Bhutan, is a frequent contributor spring of 2014, and we are to this magazine. His last hoping to take it province- feature was “On the Trail of Tom wide after that. We know Thomson,” Spring 2013. people will love it. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house at Stratford, and I mean that in a good way. It’s a Beautiful Joe heartwarming story. We hope Heritage Society: the play will lead to greater http://beautifuljoe.org/

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