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Showing posts sorted by date for query wells. Sort by relevance Show all posts

Wednesday, February 1, 2023

A “magnificently appointed Tudor mansion" - Grand Falls House designated as a Registered Heritage Structure


An iconic historic property in Grand Falls-Windsor has been awarded provincial heritage designation by Heritage NL.  

Perched on a birch-clad hill overlooking the Exploits River, Grand Falls House was built in 1909 by Alfred and Harold Harmsworth as one of the properties built in conjunction with the new paper mill. Following the establishment of the paper mill, Grand Falls became a boomtown, with workers drawn from every bay on the island. 

Grand Falls House, with its outbuildings and mature parkland, was designated as a Registered Heritage Structure by Heritage NL on January 17th, 2023. Designed by British architect Robert Douglas Wells, and built under the supervision of Tom Brown of New Harbour, Trinity Bay, the building has been described as a “magnificently appointed Tudor mansion.” 

One of the oldest original buildings in the town, the house hosted many visiting dignitaries over the years, including the Duke of Connaught (son of Queen Victoria) and Lord and Lady Baden-Powell, founders of the Scouting movement. For a number of years, it was the residence of the mill manager.

Grand Falls House during the residency of Sir Vincent Jones. HM Dawe Photograph Collection.

In 2022, the province formally handed over possession of Grand Falls House and its surrounding property to the Town of Grand Falls-Windsor for heritage-sensitive development.

“Grand Falls House is an important part of our history,” says Dr. Lisa Daly, Chair of Heritage NL. “It is an impressive, unique building, which helps commemorate the century-long impact of the Grand Falls paper mill on Newfoundland and Labrador.”

Heritage NL was established by the provincial government in 1984 to preserve the architectural history and living heritage of Newfoundland and Labrador.  Heritage NL designates buildings and other structures as Registered Heritage Structures and administers a fund on behalf of the province for the conservation of such structures.


Saturday, February 12, 2022

Ice Cutting and Salmon Fishing in Newfoundland and Labrador



In the twentieth century, the salmon fishing industry was intertwined with many other industries. It was common practice for fishermen to cut blocks of ice from frozen ponds in the winter using various types of saws (Figure 1) and store them in sawdust to later use in transporting their freshly caught salmon to merchants when the fishing season opened. Sawdust was an abundant byproduct from sawmills and acted as an insulating layer for ice which prolonged the use of ice well beyond the cold winter months. This made ice cut from ponds in the winter accessible in May and June when the salmon fishery opened.




Figure 1: Image reads: a "double bit" axe is referred to an axe with two blades, the handle was usually short. My father had one in his household when he was a boy. Often people would have one side sharp for cutting wood, and a dull side for cutting ice in the winter when they would take a load of wood from the woods and carry it home over. Image courtesy of Memorial University Digital Archives Initiative.

Once the ponds froze over, ice would be cut into large 18-20 inch square blocks using a pit saw and hauled by horse and sleigh to ice houses and sawmills to be unloaded into piles of sawdust (Figure 2, Figure 3). In Harbour Breton, ice from Beaver Pond was being cut out at nearly 20 dory loads per ice house. These ice houses were filled with sawdust and protected from sun exposure to ensure the preservation of ice for several months.


Figure 2: Ice cutting in Cape Broyle on Beaver Pond circa 1950s. Image courtesy of Andrea O’Brien taken from Mr. Ronald O’Brien’s collection.




Figure 3: Ice cutting in Gaultois, Newfoundland circa 1887 (Wells 2014).

In Whiteway, a community in Trinity Bay, several families such as the Burgess’, George’s, Legge’s, and Jackson’s, were operating sawmills while also salmon fishing in the summer and ice cutting in the winter.

Albert Legge has many memories of his family’s sawmill and their salmon fishing. Albert recalls an ice house located in New Harbour operated by a fish merchant named Ernest Woodman. Woodman, likely with the help of his sons, would also cut ice in the winter time and store it at his ice house until local fishermen had fish to sell which was then packed in ice and sent to markets. Likewise, Clifford George remembers an ice house in New Harbour that was built of boards into a large square area filled with sawdust where ice blocks were buried.

Legge remembers that in the 1950s there was an ice house owned by his family located on a pile of sawdust from their mill. The Legge’s did not cut ice themselves, instead they filled their ice house with ice from Woodman’s ice house in New Harbour. The ice from Woodman was delivered to their ice house by truck rather than horse. The ice was stored in the house in piles of sawdust (Figure 4) until May when the salmon fishery opened. Albert remembers that salmon were caught on a berth along the shore at a point called Salmon Point, which was the perfect spot to place a salmon trap. After catching their salmon, the fish would be cleaned and packed into wooden boxes filled with broken ice blocks before being shipped to New Harbour where it was then sent off to market.




Figure 4: Image reads: … they cut it and _ in _ in square blocks about two feet by two feet. They had ice-grips and they would stick the grips into the ice and _ and bring it through the ice house an' put sawdust on it. … They would have a rope over their shoulders an' they would haul it over the ice to the ice house which was near the pond.Ice house was made of wood; it was usually....just thick wood, an' sometimes not - just clapboard, not _ not even thick woods. .... Oh it was probably about forty feet long and about thirty feet wide an' as high as _ 'bout thirty feet high. .... It was in the open _ an open place right at the foot of the pond. Image courtesy of Memorial University Digital Archives Initiative.


Members of the Burgess family also have many memories of the family sawmill constructed in 1916, and their involvement with the salmon fishery. Robert Burgess recalls that his family would cut ice from Jimmy Rowe’s pond and then bury it in piles of sawdust at their sawmill. The Burgess’ sawmill is still intact on the property and the saws used to cut ice remain there. Robert recalled that:

Once the ponds froze over, the horse and sled would be driven across the pond in the morning, logs would be hauled out before lunch time, lunch was eaten and our uncles would change out the sweat-filled clothes, then head back across the pond to bring out more wood. This continued until the pond ice broke up in the spring.

When salmon was caught in the bay months later, the ice blocks would be dug up and used to transport salmon to keep it fresh. The family also manufactured the boxes that they were shipping the iced salmon in. There are many memories of the family catching and selling salmon. In 1912, a letter from Great Aunt Nellie to Henry Burgess, Bob’s great-grandfather, sent in advance of her travels back home to Whiteway from the United States: “I hope you will get a salmon after I get home. I suppose you got all the potatoes in the ground by this time. I am so glad that Rich is going to stay at home this summer” (Figure 5). The Burgess family also used the ice they cut and preserved in sawdust to transport freshly caught salmon to merchant families such as the Harnum’s in Hearts Delight, Cramm’s in Green’s Harbour and the Moores in Carbonear, and many others (Figure 6,7).




Figure 5: Part of Great Aunt Nellie’s handwritten letter to Henry Burgess in June 1912. June was the prime month to catch salmon. Image courtesy of Robert Burgess.




Figure 6,7: Receipts of salmon transactions between Richard Burgess, Robert’s grandfather, and Hedley Harnum, a merchant in Hearts Delight have been saved, recording that in June 1933, Harnum had purchased salmon from Burgess. Image courtesy of Robert Burgess.


Ice cutting also had domestic purposes. In Central Newfoundland, Corduroy Ponds was an excellent location to cut ice in the winter. Leonard Young, a Mi’kmaq man who grew up near the ponds, kept a dog team and horses in the late 1930s and 1940s (Figure 8). Young would cut timber in the area and his horse would haul sleighs full of wood to the sawmill Young operated on his property. In the winter, Young cut ice blocks from the pond and his horse hauled them back to the sawmill where they were stored in sawdust. Ice blocks were stored here until the summer where they were dug out of the sawdust and delivered to customers in Grand Falls Windsor. Young supplied ice blocks to households as some families in town were still using ice chests.



Figure 8: Leonard Young with his horse, unknown date. Image courtesy of Corey Sharpe.

Special thanks to Andrea O’Brien, Robert Burgess, Clifford George, Albert Legge, Corey Sharpe, and Doug Wells for providing us with many memories, details, and photographs about ice cutting and salmon fishing in Newfoundland.


Cited:

Barras, Maryssa., and Dale Gilbert Jarvis
2021 Burgess Property, Whiteway, NL: Site and Building Survey. Heritage NL Fieldnotes Series, 015, February 2021. https://heritagenl.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/015-Burgess-Property-Whiteway-NL-Site-and-Building-Survey.pdf

The ICH Blog 
2021 What Did You Do with Sawdust in Whiteway?
http://www.ichblog.ca/2021/02/what-did-you-do-with-sawdust-in-whiteway.html

Wells, Doug
2014 Putting Up Ice: Beaver Pond: A Municipal Heritage SIte in Harbour Breton. Intangible Cultural Heritage Update, Number 053 August-November 2014. https://collections.mun.ca/digital/collection/ICH_Update/id/469/rec/1



Tuesday, August 7, 2018

Tuesday's #FolklorePhoto: Hooking Away

Dale Wells assembles her mat hooking frame, St. Anthony. Photo by Lisa Wilson. 2010
Today's Folklore Photos come from St. Anthony collection on Memorial University's Digital Archives Initiative. St. Anthony is located on the northeastern tip of Newfoundland's Great Northern Peninsula. This site was first given the name of 'St. Anthony Haven' in 1532, for the way in which the area operated as a safe landing point for fishing fleets. The region was initially settled based on the fact that there were rich cod fishing grounds in the vicinity, a move that helped to establish a productive fishery that would last for several centuries. Despite the eventual collapse of the cod fishery, St. Anthony has had many development successes, making it a vital service center for residents of the broader GNP region.

Another important feature of St. Anthony is the community's historic affiliation with the legacy of Dr. Grenfell. Wilfred Thomason Grenfell (1865-1940) - a British doctor-arrived in St. Anthony in 1892 as a medical missionary, sent by The Royal National Mission to Deep Sea Fishermen. Within a year of his arrival, Dr. Grenfell commenced building a medical system that eventually grew to serve the regions of Northern Newfoundland and Labrador. As his medical mission grew, his mandate expanded to include the development of schools, cooperatives, industrial work projects, an orphanage, and other social programs. One such program involved utilizing local textile-based craft skills to help sustain the region's economy. Grenfell style embroidered coats and hooked rugs with Grenfell inspired designs are being produced by residents of the Great Northern Peninsula to this day. These objects are now referred to as being a part of the 'Grenfell tradition' and can be seen and purchased at Grenfell Handicrafts, located in St. Anthony.

The St. Anthony inventory is part of a founding collection for the Great Northern Peninsula Textiles Archive and Learning Center. This project, based in Conche, NL, is an on-going initiative to document and preserve the textile-based crafts that are being created on Newfoundland's Northern Peninsula. The items in this collection were gathered between May and July of 2010 and include photographs of textile craft objects such as patchwork quilts, knitted items, and Grenfell-style hooked rugs. This inventory also includes audio clips of craftspeople discussing their particular textile-based skills and practices.

If you want to learn more about this collection click here and if you want to listen to an interview with Dale Wells about quilting and knitting click here.

A nautical themed quilt made by Dale Wells, St. Anthony. Photo by Lisa Wilson. 2010
A tie dyed quilted wall hanging made by Dale Wells, St. Anthony. Photo by Lisa Wilson. 2010

Tuesday, June 13, 2017

The Church of England Cemetery in Harbour Breton. #folklorephoto

One of our former board members, Doug Wells, was inspired by the podcast we did last week with archaeologist Robyn Lacy (listen to that interview here). He sent us a few photos of the old gravestones at the old Church of England Cemetery in Harbour Breton, sometimes referred to as the Newman & Co. Cemetery.






Monday, February 27, 2017

Pierce’s Fish Store - Saved from Demolition. #NLheritage




Pierce’s Store on the north side of Harbour Breton, 1990s. (Doug Wells photo)
Special report by Doug Wells.

Seeing it is Heritage Week in NL, I visited the Elementary classes (Grade 4,5,6) at St. Joseph’s Elementary in Harbour Breton. We discussed the history of Pierce’s Fish Store and how the building was saved from demolition, relocated and restored. This community landmark is more than 100 years old and has changed hands three times in its history. It was built by a local sea captain, Mr. George Rose who needed a store for curing fish and storing fishing supplies, etc. In 1944 it was sold to another local fishing Captain, Pius Augot who used the store for 20 years. The last owner was the Pierce family of Hr. Breton, a fishing family. It has been known as Pierce’s store since 1964. However, its purpose had diminished after the construction of the new fresh-fishplant in Hr. Breton during the 1960s and time was started to show its effects on the old wooden structure. With limited use and showing signs of deterioration, the Town of Hr. Breton offered to purchase the building and make it a part of the Elliott Premises on the other side of the harbour. The Town wanted to preserve the heritage of this community landmark. Its present location was not suitable for restoration work or accessibility. After the fishplant (FPI) closed down in 2004, displaced workers were employed in the project of relocating it and restoring it. The photos will show the steps in the relocation. All work was done by local workers who had knowledge of tides, boats, and floating platforms, etc. They were very proud of their successful effort as the photo shows. In 30 minutes it was floated, transported across the harbour and put on the new foundation.

No longer is it a fish store but rather a modern facility on the interior and restoration work done to the exterior. It is well equipped and suitable for various group gatherings and performances.

~PIERCE’S STORE~

Moving Day – August 16, 2005
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On August 16, 2005, after 8 weeks of preparation, floating docks were slid under Pierce’s Store waiting for the tides that would lift it from its foundation.



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After many attempts, and while time and tide wait for no one, it was freed from its shores with a resounding crack. Settling back in the water many wondered whether or not it would stay afloat.

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A short 30 minutes later the Moving Crew celebrates with the rest of the community for the successful relocation.


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With its move came a complete makeover and is now a part of the Elliott Premises in Harbour Breton.


Class photo: Grade 4 and 5 students, St. Joseph’s Elementary, Hr. Breton. It was anti-bulling day.

Wednesday, November 2, 2016

Heritage Update for October/November 2016



In this month's edition of the Heritage Update, we explore the value and meaning of heritage places, look at photogrammetry as a tool for recording buildings, document the legacy of the merchants of Windsor in Central Newfoundland, take a peek at the Methodist Central School in Bonavista, announce the 12th Annual Heritage Places Poster Contest, and share the story of the Melita Hynes’ House in Harbour Breton. We also want your input on rethinking Heritage Foundation NL’s programs and services.

Download the newsletter here as a pdf

photo: Melita Hynes’ House in Harbour Breton, courtesy Doug Wells.

Thursday, May 21, 2015

Sailing in the Boat Till the Tide Runs High


Children Playing Circle Games VA 93-50
International Grenfell Association photograph collection
Photo: Courtesy of The Rooms
           
While researching children’s ring games last week I came across a game which I had never heard before.  The game “Sailing in the Boat (Ship) Till the Tide Runs High” is found in three sources on Memorial University’s DAI.  It is first found in a fictional short story written in 1950 and published in the Atlantic Guardian in which the youth of the community Come Again Harbour play a ring game to the tune:
Sailing in the ship ‘til the tide runs high,
Waiting for the pretty girls to come by and by, […] 
Choose your partner now today,
Give her a kiss and send her on her way.  
The other two sources mention the game being played in a community hall in Lumsden and the song being sung at the third annual Newfoundland picnic in Lynwood City Park, California in 1956.

I did a quick google search to see what I could come up with and I came across a couple of references to the ring game with more complete versions of the song.  The following version is from Otto Tucker and is found in Newfoundland author Robin McGrath’s book All In Together:
Sailing in the boat ’til the tide runs high, 
Sailing in the boat ’til the collar flags fly, 
Sailing in the boat ’til the tide runs high, 
Waiting for the pretty girls to come by and by. 
Choose your partner now today, 
Choose, oh choose her right away, 
I don’t care what the old folks say. 
Oh what a horrible choice you’ve made, 
And she can no longer stay. 
Since she can no longer stay, 
Give her a kiss and send her away.


There are a number of versions with different lyrics.  Here is William Wells Newell’s version from his book Games and Songs of American Children:
Sailing in the boat when the tide runs high,[x3]
Waiting for the pretty girl to come by'm by.

Here she comes, so fresh and fair,
Sky-blue eyes and curly hair,
Rosy in cheek, dimple in her chin,
Say, young man, but you can't come in.

Rose in the garden for you young, man,[x2]
Rose in the garden, get it if you can,
But take care not a frost-bitten one.

Choose your partner, stay till day, [x3]
And don't never mind what the old folks say!

Old folks say 'tis the very best way, [x3]
To court all night and sleep all day.

Folklorist Emelyn E. Gardner references the following version from the Michigan area in her article Some Play-party Games in Michigan written in 1920:
Sailing in the boat when the tide runs high, [x3]
Waiting for a pretty girl to come by and by.

Oars in the boat, and it won't go round [x3]
Till you kiss the pretty girl that you just found.

Do you have memory of this song?  Have you ever played the game yourself? Which version did you sing? Let us know where you are from, what song you sung or game you played.  Send an email to terra@heritagefoundation.ca.

I’ll leave you with the following YouTube clip I found of “Sailing in the Boat” sung by Elizabeth Austin and a group of women in Old Bight, Cat Island, Bahamas recorded by Alan Lomax and Mary Barnicle in 1935.  



-Terra

Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Hauling Pinkston's Forge: Heritage Building On the Move in Brigus



I've written before about the Pinkston's Forge in Brigus, Conception Bay. The Brigus Historical Society has been working to document it's oral history and stories. The photo above, from July 28th, 2014, shows Muriel Pinkston Wells, John Pinkston, and interviewer Dale Russell Fitzpatrick --  you can read and listen to their interview on Memorial University's Digital Archives Initiative (DAI).

It has been important to the Brigus Historical Society to document what they can about the forge, because the building had to be removed from its original location. Yesterday, December 15th, was moving day. The building had been covered in plywood to keep it together during the move, and hoisted up onto a sledge made of long wooden poles. A local company was hired to facilitate the move, and a crowd gathered to watch the old blacksmith shop be hauled to its new home near the Brigus Stone Barn museum. The old forge squeaked over the little bridge near Hawthorne Cottage, with only inches to spare on either side, and was then dragged to the new concrete pad that had been erected to receive the forge.

CBC has story on the move, and you can check out some photos on YouTube.


Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Playing games, putting up ice, and a trip to Paris


In this edition of the Intangible Cultural Heritage Update for Newfoundland and Labrador: the ICH office heads to Paris for UNESCO meetings; more from our Petty Harbour oral history project with memories from twins Gussie and Jimmy Kieley; Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador board member Doug Wells shares memories of cutting ice in Harbour Breton; the fall 2014 overview of ICH activities; introducing our "Hoist Your Sails And Run" project bringing together youth and seniors to talk about games; and the schedule for the 2014 Mummers Festival.


Contributions by: Dale Jarvis, Terra Barrett, Doug Wells, and Sharon King-Campbell.

Thursday, August 7, 2014

The Cut Bellows - a story from Pinkston's Forge, Brigus



I mentioned in an earlier post that the ICH Office helped record an oral history of Pinkston's Forge in Brigus. In this section of the interview, John Pinkston talked about a cut made in the bellows, and if you look closely at the picture above, you can see the repair work he mentions.

John Charles Pinkston: There's one other instance. Back, I guess, in the 20s and 30s, well there was at one time, there was something like six forges in Brigus, right?

Dale Russell FitzPatrick: Yes.
John Charles Pinkston: And then there was three, but anyway at this particular time, I think there was two blacksmiths in Brigus, so there was Harris and Jackson's. And previous to that I think there was another one, James. Anyway, at this particular time there was two operating: there was grandfather's and Jackson's down in Jackson's Quay. One Saturday morning dad and grandfather came down, of course eight or ten horses lined up, and the window was broken in the forge. So they thought no more about that, so they opened up and got the horse in and grandfather start pumping the bellows. The bellows wasn't working. 
He looked in, there was a cut in the bellows about ten inches long. So grandfather told all the men, b’y, he said I can't do nothing for you because somebody cut the bellows. So they said all right Mr. Pinkston, we're not going down to Jackson's. We're going to wait for you to fix the-- So grandfather went over to-- who's the person that fixes shoes? Cobbler or leatherer. He went over and this fellow, I don't know what his name is-- Keene? Anyway, he came over and he sewed up the bellows. 
So two hours later, had the bellows going, all the men waited for him, and they didn't go down to Jackson. So rumour was that Jackson broke the window and cut the bellows. 
Dale Russell FitzPatrick: And of course people today can still see those stitches. 
John Charles Pinkston: You can still see them. 
Dale Russell FitzPatrick: And they've worked ever since, haven't they?
Muriel Pinkston Wells: Yes.
Dale Russell FitzPatrick: That's a wonderful story.

Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Documenting Pinkston's Forge in Brigus


On Monday of this week, I travelled to Brigus to help the Brigus Historical Society with their work of documenting the history of Pinkston's Forge.

Pinkston's Forge has been a fixture of the community for a long time, and up to now has been in the hands of the Pinkston family. But maintaining a heritage building like the forge has been a challenge for the family, and the forge itself sits on a lovely piece of corner property. Recently, the family has decided they want to develop the property, but were concerned about the potential loss of the forge. So, the family has decided to turn the building over to the town, on the condition that it be moved.

Moving a heritage building from its original location is rarely the first choice for heritage conservationists, and moving an old forge will pose challenges for the historical society, but it will ensure that the building sees a new life, and hopefully, more educational opportunities.




Local heritage volunteers will be working on the documentation of the building and artefacts, and the ICH office has offered to help with collecting the associated oral histories of the building. On Monday, we helped with the first interview. The photo above shows (l-r) Muriel Pinkston-Wells and John Charles Pinkston, whose father and grandfather started the blacksmithing business, along with  local heritage consultant Dale Russell-Fitzpatrick, who conducted the oral history interview.

We’ll be posting more on the project as it unfolds.


If you have a memory of Pinkston's Forge, email me at ich@heritagefoundation.ca or comment below.

- Dale Jarvis

Friday, June 20, 2014

Reflections on Petty Harbour

Annie Lee and Ann Payne
This morning I had the pleasure of conducting my first interview as part of the Petty Harbour Oral History project. I interviewed Ann Payne from the Petty Harbour Maddox Cove Museum and her ninety five year old mother Annie Francis (nee. St. George) Lee.

Annie was born and raised in Heart’s Desire, Trinity Bay and moved to St. John’s for work. When Annie was nineteen she left work at Donovan’s hotel and moved to Petty Harbour where her sister Mary lived. Annie worked in Chafe’s shop in Petty Harbour for nine years and after nine years she married the owner’s brother Ambrose Lee.

Ann Payne was born in St. Claire’s hospital, but grew up and spent her whole life in Petty Harbour. Anne had many memories of growing up in the area and stories about the changes the community has seen.

The interview covered many aspects of life in Petty Harbour from beliefs about fairies to Christmas visiting to memories of children’s games. Annie and Ann discussed Chafe’s shop and how is carried everything from a “needle to an anchor”. The shop carried a variety of foods and also sold material. Annie mentioned the priest’s vestments were made out of the thick cloth which was sold at Chafe’s shop.

Ann described growing up in Petty Harbour and the different areas where she would play as a child. The river was a particularly important place and somewhere you would play during the day. Ann said you would never visit the river at night as you were afraid of the fairies. Ann’s father’s family was from Ireland and had a strong belief in fairies. Against advice Ann’s uncle cut across the river one evening, was caught by the fairies and held in the water and broke his leg. Ann said she felt the river was a magical place due to all the stories which surrounded it. The children would go skating on the river during the winter when parts of it froze and in the summer families often had to bathe in the river as their wells would run dry. The river was also a source of water for gardens or for washing clothes on Mondays in the days before indoor plumbing.

School plays, concerts, variety shows and dances were discussed as major sources of entertainment in Petty Harbour. The annual garden party was a particularly important afternoon where there would be turkey teas and tables. Years ago each lady would have their own table with their goods. For example Mrs. Marty made her own butter so she would have a table of homemade butter while Aunt Lucy would have one for desserts. In the years Annie was involved with the garden parties there were no individual tables although she did make a good pie. She won five trophies at the agricultural fair for her baked pies, jam jams or homemade bread. There were also cash prizes for the best vegetables and Annie’s husband Ambrose won a number of times. Community dances and in particular dances during the war were great fun. Annie told a story of how she went to a dance with Ambrose but barely saw him the whole evening as she was dancing with everyone who asked.

Another form of entertainment mentioned was weekly games of cards. Ann described her father and his friends playing games of 45s or 120s where they would gamble for a quarter or a half cow. Annie played cards on Monday evenings in the different spots in the community and continues to play today.

Ann said a favourite summer activity was a picnic to Cape Spear or an outing to pick berries. On a day when her father was not working the family would pack a picnic lunch and head over to Cape Spear. She described the roads as being worse than Petty Harbour’s and when you hit a pothole the whole car went in. Another outing the family would go on would be a berry picking excursion which would involve swimming for the children and lunches of corned beef and cabbage on the Coleman stove.

It was a really great interview and an excellent starting point for the Petty Harbour Oral History project. The interview touched on many aspects of community life in the harbour and sparked my interest in the folklore of Petty Harbour. If you have any memories about the concerts, times and social customs in Petty Harbour I would love to hear from you: terra@heritagefoundation.ca or (709)739-1892.

Friday, March 28, 2014

Wells and Springs Occasional Paper, and a Farewell

After finishing all the research, interviews, photographing, analyzing and writing, I have finally completed all the different projects I wanted to with the Wells and Springs project. It was a great summer of work, and I got to meet and chat with a lot of wonderful, interesting people. I also was able to create a bunch of resources for anyone to access about well stories, traditions, cleaning techniques, and more!

So far we have produced a wells and springs infographic, a guide on cleaning wells, months of newsletter articles and blog posts, and a couple presentations - one for the Harris Research centre and one for the ICH mini forum! The latest resource produced, and the one I am the most proud of, is an Occasional ICH Paper, entitled "The Folklore of Wells in Newfoundland", Occasional Paper of Newfoundland and Labrador 005.


The occasional paper is available online at the MUN ICH resources page. This is the most academically focused resource developed out of the wells and springs project, and something I hope can be used in the future for educational purposes!

With the completion of the occasional paper and the Baccalieu Trail Heritage Forum report, I am now finished my contract at the Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador ICH office.

Thank you to everyone who took time out of their busy schedules to chat with me, show me their wells, and tell me their stories over the wells and springs project. A special thanks to the Harris Centre and the RBC Blue Water Project for the support in allowing the project to go forward, and to everyone in the ICH office and the HFNL for being amazing coworkers over the nine months I was lucky enough to work here.

It has been an amazing experience, and I am now off to a new project with the Carbonear Heritage Society! I look forward to using the new skills I've learned, and applying my passion for heritage, history and its preservation to this next endeavour.

Cheers!

Friday, February 7, 2014

Well, Well, Well, a Google Map


Last summer when I was doing wells and springs work, I not only measured wells and photographed them, but I also recorded their GPS coordinates. I though it would be neat to look back after the fact at the distribution of some of the wells I'd seen. I was able to record the location of 35 wells over my summer of fieldwork, and have finally had the time to do something interesting with the information.
Google maps works really great for this, because you can create your own personalized maps, and store them either privately or publicly. Creating a map is incredibly simple - you can type either the address or the GPS coordinates to the points you want into the search bar, and then add a pin to mark that space on your map. Pins are customizable, so you can pin multiple types of spots onto a map, and then hide or show layers, depending on what you want to see.


If you want to take a look at the interactive Wells, Springs, and Folklore Google map you can find it here! Some of the points have links to videos or other information - and of course, all the wells and springs photos and information can be found on the DAI.

Friday, January 31, 2014

ICH Mini Forum Video Collection



In the middle of December last year (Friday the 13th to be exact!) we had an Intangible Cultural Heritage mini forum, where people who are in the heritage and ICH world could come together and share what they had been working on over the past year. This was our first mini forum, but hopefully not our last!

There were a range of topics: from policy, to wells, to wart remedies, and more. There is a full list of all the presentations, with links to their respective YouTube videos, below!

Frank Crews and Dale Jarvis - Introduction

Andrea O'Brien - Heritage Places Poster Contest

Chris Mouland - Digital Initiatives Archive Tour

Lisa Wilson - Bay Roberts Folk Belief Project

Claire McDougall - The Emergence of ICH Policy and Programs in Newfoundland and Labrador

Sarah Ingram - Wells, Springs, and Folklore

Ed Millar - Rugelach on the Rock

Nicole Penney - The Baccalieu Trail Oral History Collection

Chris Brookes - Inside Outside Battery

Christina Robarts - Newfiki: The Celebration of East European Culture in Newfoundland and Labrador

Jason Ross Sellars - 2013 Mummers Festival


Monday, January 20, 2014

How to Clean Your Well


Last summer I did a lot of work on wells and springs here in Newfoundland, and one question that I asking myself in the beginning was how people managed to clean their wells over the years. It's something that I had no previous knowledge about prior to beginning the project, and something that I found zero information about online. It seemed weird to me, because I thought I would find tons of resources and methods for cleaning wells, considering so many people use them*.

However, once I started asking people in my interviews how wells were cleaned, I heard the same method, or variations of it, time and time again. It seemed to me that although I couldn't find it online, it was a practice that had been long done across the province in a very similar fashion, and a tradition that was passed by word of mouth, through transmission, or through generations of learned behaviour.

I wanted to take what I learned and make it easily accessible to the public, so that in the future anyone needing to clean an old forgotten well would have a place to start, with an easy to follow step by step guide!



I first recommend getting the water tested, both before and after the cleaning. Water test kits can be picked up and dropped off at the Public Health Laboratory at the Dr. L.A. Miller Centre in St. John's, or the Service NL Centre in your area if you are outside the city. Specimens can't be older than 30 hours, so make sure you get these samples in ASAP. Once submitted, you will get both a phone call and mailed results, with a detailed explanation of what that means.

In order to clean your well you first need to drain it. Depending on the depth of your well and how quickly it fills, this can either be done by hand or with a pump. Once the water has been drained, you can begin cleaning. In the past, lime was used to scrub the sides, but a switch to Javex is more contemporary, and what is currently used today. Scrub the sides with a Javex and water solution thoroughly with a scrub or loofah, and then let the well fill back up with water.



Once the first scrub has been done and the well has filled, you need to drain and fill the well once or twice more. Many people suggested pouring a bottle of Javex into one of these refills - if you do decide to do that, then make sure you drain and fill the well at least once more to make sure that the bleach has worked its way out. Some well owners recommended running taps for a few hours afterwards as well, in order to both clear out the Javex as well as clean the pipes that lead into the house. Some also recommended dumping some Javex into the well at the end and leaving it in - but this is really up to you.

A second test is an important step, to make sure that the water is indeed cleaned and ready to drink, especially if the first test was questionable, or the well hasn't been cleaned or used in a while. Make sure to wait 48 hours after cleaning before you test, though!

It's a pretty straightforward process:

1. Test
2. Drain
3. Scrub
4. Rinse (and repeat as needed)
5. Test again!

If you use this guide to clean your well, or have a different method you would love to share, please feel free to contact me at sarah@heritagefoundation.ca, or by calling 1 (709) 739-1892 ext 5.

*After publishing this article, I was contacted by a couple people telling me that this process is called 'shock chlorination' or 'shocking a well' - a term that never came up in my interviews! However, once I knew the term I found some info on the internet, including a great guide found here. Thanks for the tips Andrea and Jane!

Friday, November 29, 2013

Reaching The Bottom of the Wells and Springs Project



Now that the winter is rearing it's head, the wells and springs project I have been working on over the past five months is finally being wrapped up. Over this time I have met a lot of great people, done some really interesting interviews, seen and measured dozens and dozens of wells, and learned a lot about traditional water sources here in Newfoundland and Labrador. And now that everything is coming to an end, I want to share with the blog what it is I have accomplished, and what's coming next!

At the most basic, water is crucial for daily life and survival, and so the majority of the traditions and folklore that I came across fell into three basic categories. The first is daily life, which includes securing, collecting, and cleaning your water sources. The second is community, which covers elements of protection, safety, and tragedy, and support between families. The final category is spirituality, which appears in a few different ways. These different categories mean that there are lots of different stories, traditions and folklore surrounding wells and springs in the province.

My favourite tradition around daily life is the trout in the well. All summer I hoped and actively looked for a trout in a well, and while I heard lots of stories and memories about their being trout down in wells (and one great story about a trout being fished up and fried) it took my until late in the summer to finally see one, out in Carbonear. The owners, the Fitzgeralds, have had trout in their wells for as long as they can remember, and the current one had been own there for almost 10 years!



One of the last traditions I heard about communities was one from Shea Heights, where families would gather on a communal well in front of the general store to take photos, or kids would meet there after school to plan the afternoons activities. Wells represent not only a water source, but can also mean a gathering place in the community, a location accessible and recognized by all. This is my favourite community folklore memory around wells and springs - the imagery of men, women and children gathered around a public well to gossip, take photos or play is a great one, and reminiscent of a time when life wasn't as busy or distracting.

The most endearing memory I hard around the final category, spirituality, had more to do with personal attachment than religion, and that was the stories of loved ones on death beds requesting water from a particular source. The best story was one which said that when their mother asked for water from a well far out of the way, they tried to skip a long trip to an old spring by bringing a grandmother water from somewhere else, but she could tell the difference, and sent them on their heels for the real thing.

Of course throughout the last few months I updated on my progress through the blog, which you can find in the archived blog posts by searching the keyword "wells" or "springs". I also wrote articles for the July, August/September and the October/November ICH Newsletters, available to read on the DAI website.



One of the first end goals we decided upon with this project was to create an infographic which neatly displayed all the interesting factoids and stats about wells and springs in one poster. Graham Blair did an amazing job taking my stats, measurements, quotes and imagery and turning them into a really grand looking display of everything I had done!

Finally, I've had the opportunity to share my work in a unique presentation style at a presentation through the Harris Centre at the end of last month, call a Words in Edgewise 20/20 presentation. This is essentially a set of 20 slides that cycle every 20 seconds out of your control, so while you're presenting you have to keep up! I will be presenting this work again at the ICH mini forum next month, which is open to the public through RSVP with me or on Event Brite. Information for both of these can be found here.

The biggest lesson I learned through meeting everyone and seeing all I did this summer is how important water really is. As someone who has always had the luxury of turning on a tap any time I was thirsty, I never really thought about how important it was to protect and care for your water. I met several people who had experienced dry wells, or were going through it when I visited, and had to deal with the issue of wondering where your water was going to come from. I have a much greater understanding and respect for water that I didn't have before.

It's been a great 5 months, and I'm happy to share that I'm able to stay on at the Heritage Foundation for another contract, with a few new projects to facilitate and help out with! If you have any stories about wells or springs you'd still like to share, or any other interesting folklore memories you want to chat about, feel free to email me at sarah@heritagefoundation.ca or call me at 739-1892 ext. 5

Wednesday, November 27, 2013

The ICH Mini Forum - you're invited!



The Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador is pleased to announce that next month we will be hosting the ICH Mini Forum on Friday the 13th of December. The mini forum will be an update on the projects carried out by the ICH over the past year. Topics include:

Newfoundland and Labrador’s ICH strategy – 5 years and counting
Bay Roberts ICH projectsHeritage Foundation of NL Poster Contest
A Review of the Baccalieu Trail Heritage Corporation Oral History Collection
Wells and Springs Research Project
The Quidi Vidi Folklore Fieldschool
…. With a few more guests!


MMaP (the old art gallery) in the Arts and Culture Centre
Friday the 13th of December 2013

1-3pm

If you would like to attend, please click the button below to RSVP! Space is limited, so please RSVP only if you plan on attending. We look forward to sharing chatting with you, and sharing some snacks!

Eventbrite - ICH Mini Forum

If you have any questions feel free to contact Sarah@heritagefoundation.ca, or call 739-1892 ext 5.