Living Heritage Podcast Ep189 - Down on Bellvue Farm

Did you know that Admiralty House Communications Museum was once a farmhouse? In this episode, folklorists Shannon Bateman and Alyson Small trace the domestic history of the property, its furry inhabitants, and the legacy of the Parsons family who cultivated the land for nearly fifty years. Settle in as we share stories of blossoming young love, Saturday afternoons spent baking, and a clever cow named Swiss – which all took place at the Bellview Farm.

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Living Heritage is about people who are engaged in the heritage and culture sector, from museum professionals and archivists, to tradition bearers and craftspeople - all those who keep history alive at the
community level. The show is a partnership between HeritageNL and CHMR Radio.
Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

Living Heritage Podcast Ep188 Venereal Disease in the First World War

Today on the Living Heritage podcast, we are in conversation with Allison Bennett, a Ph.D. Candidate at Memorial University. Her research investigates the soldiers of the British Army who contracted venereal diseases while serving in the Middle East during the First World War.  Her research interests include War and Society; Gender History; and the History of Medicine. We talk prophylactics, prostitution, and recent pandemics!

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Living Heritage is about people who are engaged in the heritage and culture sector, from museum professionals and archivists, to tradition bearers and craftspeople - all those who keep history alive at the
community level. The show is a partnership between HeritageNL and CHMR Radio.
Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

Living Heritage Economy Case Study - Hiking and Heritage with Barb Parsons-Sooley

 

Our newest in our Living Heritage Economy case studies is released today: A Walk Back in Time: Hiking and Heritage with Barb Parsons-Sooley.

Barb Parsons-Sooley is an avid hiking enthusiast and owner of Wind at Your Back Guided Adventures. She has been a hiking guide for several years for Routes Adventures, touring people around the Bonavista region and sharing Newfoundland and Labrador’s history and stories. She is also the president of the Hike Baccalieu trail maintenance association.

These case studies examine the links between living heritage, traditionality, entrepreneurism, and community economic development in Newfoundland and Labrador. Barb's case study is number 7 in the series, and you can find all of them at https://www.mun.ca/ich/resources/,

For more information, email ich@heritagenl.ca 

Living Heritage Podcast Ep187 The Great War Spy Panic

 

This week, we are handing over the podcast to Admiralty House Museum, in cooperation with Memorial University Folk6740 Public Folklore students Katie Crane, Micaela Muldoon, and Mariana Esquivel.

This episode of the Pigeon Post podcast centres on (purported) German spies in Newfoundland during World War I. The hosts discuss various stories about people of German ancestry, or people who were perceived to have German ties, who fell under suspicion and the consequences of this. The hosts also discuss rumour theory, the social and political climates that breed rumours, and the dangers of believing and spreading them blindly — in World War I and at all times. 

Download the mp3 here

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Living Heritage is about people who are engaged in the heritage and culture sector, from museum
professionals and archivists, to tradition bearers and craftspeople - all those who keep history alive at the
community level. The show is a partnership between HeritageNL and CHMR Radio.
Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

Living Heritage Podcast Ep186 Carding and Weaving in Millville, Codroy Valley

Today, we are taking a trip to the community of Millville, in the Codroy Valley on Newfoundland’s west coast.  We’re going to have a chat with Edwin “Hockey” Gale, whose family started the carding mill that gave the town its name.  Joining him is Megan Samms, who is a weaver and textile artist living and working in Millville near the house she grew up in, and where she learned to spin yarns and knit them together. 

You can visit Megan's website and see some of her gorgeous work here:
https://livetextiles.online/

You can also follow her on Instagram here:
https://www.instagram.com/livetextiles/

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Living Heritage is about people who are engaged in the heritage and culture sector, from museum
professionals and archivists, to tradition bearers and craftspeople - all those who keep history alive at the
community level. The show is a partnership between HeritageNL and CHMR Radio.
Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

Living Heritage Economy Case Study - Living History Meets Social Enterprise: The Green Family Forge

The Green Family Forge is the focus of August's Living Heritage Economy Case Study.

The Green Family Forge. Photo by Dale Jarvis.

The Green Family Forge is a Registered Heritage Structure in Trinity. It is both a Living History museum and a fully functional forge, supporting two blacksmiths who create stunning metal crafts. The Trinity Historical Society hopes to grow this social enterprise and generate new opportunities in old traditions.

Blacksmith working at Green Family Forge. Photo by Dale Jarvis.

You can download a pdf version of the case study here.

This is part of a series of case studies examining the links between living heritage, traditionality, entrepreneurism, and community economic development in Newfoundland and Labrador. For more information, contact Dale Jarvis at dale@heritagenl.ca. Photo courtesy of Wooden Boat Museum of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Living Heritage Podcast Ep185 Using the BillionGraves app to document local cemeteries

Cemetery sleuths Dale Jarvis and Katie Crane introduce you to the BillionGraves app for your mobile phone.  BillionGraves is the world's largest GPS-linked cemetery data resource. As you take photos with the BillionGraves app, each gravestone is automatically marked with a GPS location. The data is then made readily available at BillionGraves.com for free for millions of families around the globe for generations to come. Dale and Katie talk about the intro workshops they've been running with communities, and give you some tips on how you can get started using your phone to document and map local cemeteries and grave markers.

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Living Heritage is about people who are engaged in the heritage and culture sector, from museum
professionals and archivists, to tradition bearers and craftspeople - all those who keep history alive at the
community level. The show is a partnership between HeritageNL and CHMR Radio.
Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

Heritage Weaving - Condon's 100% Pure Wool Blankets, Prince Edward Island to Newfoundland

 

A while back, I got an email from Joanne Morrissey, who we've been working with on her North River project. She had just cleared out an old trunk that had been stored in her basement since 1992. Her mother used to buy sheep's wool when they were shorn in the spring, wash it, pick it and mail via Canada Post to Wm. Condon and Sons, PEI, to have blankets made. 

She writes, "They would make and return in the mail, or return a blanket in the mail, maybe not from the exact wool, but at the time I thought it was from the exact wool!"

If you have a memory of wool processing in Newfoundland, or the Condon mill in particular, email me at dale@heritagenl.ca.

Cemetery Conservation in Placentia: St. Luke's Anglican Churchyard

Last week we visited the most adorable churchyard in Placentia to teach a cemetery conservation workshop with the O'Reilly House Museum and other heritage volunteers.

St. Luke's Anglican Churchyard. Photo by Katie Crane.

St. Luke's Anglican Church has an ancient history. The current church was built between 1906 and 1908, but the original church that was on the site was built in 1689. Many of the stones in the churchyard are fieldstones, and there were a number of 17th century Basque stones which were removed for preservation, suggesting the use of the site as a burial ground predates the 1689 church. You can read more about the history of St. Luke's here.

Memento Mori stones for the Hobson family. Photo by Katie Crane.

Student workers, museum staff, and other heritage volunteers met inside St. Luke's Anglican Church to listen to Dale Jarvis and Andrea O'Brien discuss cemetery conservation. 

Dale talked about the Do's and Don'ts of cemetery conservation. Everyone was curious about how to properly clean and maintain gravestones in historic cemeteries, and how to make sure that information about the gravestones are properly documented using either written marker record forms, or apps like BillionGraves.

Andrea talked about how municipalities can designate historic cemeteries which can help protect them. She talked about the work that the cemetery committee and the Conservation Corps Green Team are doing in the Immaculate Conception cemetery in Cape Broyle. 

Afterwards, we had a short break in the rain, so we went outside and I walked people through how to use the BillionGraves app to document the inscriptions on the headstones. The recording is a work in progress, and you can check out the St. Luke's Anglican Cemetery page here.

Gravestones at St. Luke's Churchyard. Photo by Katie Crane.

If you want to learn more about the work that's going on in the Immaculate Conception cemetery in Cape Broyle, or why cemetery documentation and public engagement is important, you can check out the most recent HeritageNL newsletter here,

We'd love to visit more communities and help cemetery committees, museum workers, and heritage societies safeguard historic cemeteries. Have questions? Want us to visit your local cemetery and lead a documentation workshop? Get in touch! dale@heritagenl.ca or andrea@heritagenl.ca