Living Heritage Podcast Ep153 Thrill of the Dark: Katie Crane on Fairies, Coffins, and Pirates

Learning the stories of a place is one thing that tourists seek out when they travel.  But what if some of those stories deal with darker themes? Towns and tourism operators are coming to see the value of what is known in the industry as “Dark Tourism.”

In this podcast, Folklore MA candidate Katie Crane talks to us about her studies in the field, escape rooms, pirate lore, coffin hardware, and her recent participation in “The Thrill of the Dark: Heritages of Fear Fascination and Fantasy” Conference in Birmingham, UK.

Katie Crane is a graduate student in the Public Sector program of Memorial University’s Department of Folklore. She has worked for the Logy Bay-Middle Cove-Outer Cove Museum, the Historic Sites Association of Newfoundland and Labrador, and for Admiralty House Communications Museum. Her academic research interests include public folklore, museums, heritage interpretation, legends, linguistics, and language revitalization.

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The Living Heritage Podcast 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. Past episodes are hosted on Libsyn, and you can subscribe via iTunes, or Stitcher. Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

Living Heritage Podcast Ep152 Goatlore - The Goats of New Perlican

Goats wearing yokes on Pinsent's Lane, 1940s.
Photo courtesy of Heritage New Perlican.

Curious how goats predict the weather? Want to know what goats and Girl Guide cookies have in common? Need to know what a goat yoke is? Listen to this goatlore podcast to learn all about the goats of New Perlican. We’ve sifted through the archives for our favourite audio clips about goats. Listen to stories and memories from Bertha Conway, Ron Peddle, Susie Smith, and Max Warren of New Perlican, and Grant Tucker of Winterton. It’s a podcast for all goat lovers!

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The Living Heritage Podcast 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. Past episodes are hosted on Libsyn, and you can subscribe via iTunes, or Stitcher. Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

Today's Red Ochre adventure: from bucket to board, an experiment!

We've been doing some research here on the traditional use of red ochre (you can read our preliminary research right here) and how people used to mix it with some type of oil (linseed, seal, or cod liver) as a paint for outbuildings in Newfoundland and Labrador.

A while ago, Heather Fifield, the Coordinator of Laboratories and Services at the Department of Biochemistry at Memorial University, emailed me about some seal oil that Dr. Fereidoon Shahidi's lab no longer needed. So today, I picked up a bucket of the stuff and carefully transported it back to our office.

As an experiment Michael Philpott in our office treated one side of a piece of wood with the pure oil, and then we mixed the oil with some powdered red ochre I had been given by Pete Porter of Change Islands. Michael coated the other side of the board with the red ochre/seal oil mix, and now we'll see how long it takes to dry. Even just a small amount of oil and ochre gave us a beautiful first coat stain, and we're looking forward to seeing how it looks after another coat.

We've been floating around the idea of doing a bigger project, mixing up a larger amount of red ochre paint and testing its effectiveness on an outdoor project like a stage or store. Stay tuned!

If you've got a memory of red ochre (or have some in your shed) send me an email at dale@heritagenl.ca

Check out this amazing carved wooden butter stamp! #FoodwaysFriday

We continue our #FoodwaysFriday theme of wooden kitchen implements with this fantastic piece from Robin Dooley of Frederickton, NL. Robin writes,

This is a butter stamp that my grandmother, Olive Sanger 1929-2017 of Lewisporte, gave to me when I went out on my own. Although we didn’t make much butter (only as a science experiment), we did use it to stamp the homemade play dough or shortbread cookies nan would often make for us. And I let my own daughter do the same now. 

My nan was born Olive Boone Of Burnt Head, Cupid’s. Her parents were Arthur Roland (Rolly) Wilson Boone and Diana Carolyn Bishop. She grew up in the last house on the right before you go up around the loop, there is a shed at the end of the driveway that once was her families shoppe. The house was bought by Mrs Ingeborg Marshall in the '60-'70s and then bought again in the 2000s and restored by a Miss Mackey and her husband. 

Apologies for not knowing her married name. I wish my nan was still here as I am not 100 sure where exactly this came from. She used to say her own great grandmother used it and it was probably around even longer than her! The house was full of treasures when it was sold, I often wish we had more of them to remember her with.

Robin also included the photo below, of her nan in the early 1930s in front of her family store. She writes, "The store sign was a porcelain Sunlight Soap sign and used to say A R Boone and they were in the process of mounting it when this photo was taken."

If any of you have stories or photos to share of Burnt Head or Cupid’s and the Bishop/ Dawe/Boone families, Robin would love to hear or see them. And, as always, if you've got a beloved hand-made kitchen implement, send us a pic and story we'll share it here. Email me at dale@heritagenl.ca

Old Salts (and Herself) - help ID these mystery photographs! #TBT

P10768 Man in winter

Do you recognize this person? Please help us put a name to these faces!

The Research Centre for the Study of Music, Media, and Place (MMaP) at Memorial University is putting the final touches on a website dedicated to the folksongs collected by MacEdward Leach between 1949 and 1951 across Newfoundland and in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. We need your help to identify the people in his photo collection!

Please contact Gale at leach@mun.ca (or comment below!) We'll update captions here if we find out more information.

P10773 Woman on porch

P10779 Unidentified men on boat

P10781 Sailor smoking pipe 

P10780 Men and Boys on the dock

Fleming Street photos from the 1950s and 1960s

Tonight is our Georgestown Scanning/Mapping Party, where we are encouraging people to come share their neighbourhood memories and stories. We start at 7pm at The Lantern on Barnes Road.

To get you in the mood, here are a few photos of Fleming Street, sent to me by Channing Holland (formerly Catherine Channing) who grew up on Fleming Street.

Above is a photo of her sister and brother at the front door of 70 Fleming Street in 1955.  She writes, "The entrance changed in later years when the side windows were replaced by full length panes in a sort of rippled pattern." Today the entire front entrance has been replaced, but similar entranceways could be found all along that row of houses, known collectively as Maple Terrace.

The second one is again of her brother, sitting on the front fence.  She notes, "The cement fence was a much later addition sometime around the '60s I think." The bay window immediately behind the boy is 68 Fleming Street, which still has the same configuration in 2019. The open porch on 66 Fleming has been enclosed.

Finally, an interior photo of the living room of 70 Fleming, circa 1956. The mantel and tile surround remains in the house as of 2019.

At the time of these photos, the house was owned by James G Channing, civil servant, Companion of the Order of Canada, and cabinet secretary under Joseph Smallwood. 

Bring your neighbourhood photos to The Lantern tonight! We will share some of what we find in future posts.

Hobby Horses, Makerspaces, and Digital Literacies

Group displaying their completed horses.

Last week Dale and I led a hobby horse workshop as part of the SSHRC Conference on Makerspaces and Digital Literacies. The goal of the conference was to engage in scholarly discussion around how making is central the way that people practice literacies in their own lives. These can be both tangible and intangible objects and are very relatable to material cultures.

Pieces the horses together.

The aim of the conference was to consider how making and literacy can come together through the use of material culture to engage communities with concepts of citizenship. This conference also focused on how makerspaces can be developed in interesting and innovative ways through cultural institutions such as The Rooms and The Geo Centre.

Finishing touches.

As part of the conference Dr. Anne Burke asked Dale to give a presentation on intangible cultural heritage, and the work of the ICH office. We also led a very quick hobby horse workshop for the participants who came from different places around the world. Participants from the UK were familiar with hobby horses, and those from Finland recounted stories of a different breed of hobby horse which are ridden instead of worn. (If you want to learn more about the hobby horse revolution in Finland click here to watch a short video clip.)

Trimming up his chin.

For those who weren't familiar with hobby horses Dale gave an overview of the tradition and some of the mischief the horses were likely to get up to while mummering such as snapping clothes, stealing table clothes, turning off lights, and "eating" snacks. We split the group of fifteen into three smaller groups and led them through the process of creating and decorating a hobby horse from this template. The group had a lot of fun and were creative in the decorating process with one team adding braces to their hobby horse's teeth. If you want to learn more about hobby horses check out the Mummers Festival page, or keep your eye out come December and take in one of the hobby horse workshops offered by the festival.

Dentistry work.

Living Heritage Podcast Ep151 Field to Flight

In September 1913, flying was very new, very risky, and very exciting. Records were made, then broken. No one had ever flown across the Atlantic nonstop. Lord Northcliffe, the owner of Britain’s Daily Mail, wanted to change that with a contest. Many teams were ready to try in 1914—then the Great War broke out and the contest was put on hold. In November 1918, just three days after the Armistice, the race was back on. The right departure point would be key. For a few exciting weeks in the spring of 1919, the teams set themselves up here in Newfoundland.

2019 marks a century since the first nonstop flight across the Atlantic and Admiralty House is creating a new exhibit titled "Field to Flight". The exhibit will highlight some of the major players of a historic race and feature Margaret Carter, a St. John’s women and her perspective on the race. We chat with Museum Manager Sarah Wade about the air race, but also manage to talk about Twinkletoes the cat, fur coats, and beer!

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The Living Heritage Podcast 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. Past episodes are hosted on Libsyn, and you can subscribe via iTunes, or Stitcher. Theme music is Rythme Gitan by Latché Swing.

Now a #FoodwaysFriday tradition, another rolling pin! The Fahey pin, Chapel’s Cove

Another Friday, another hand-made rolling pin! This one comes to us from Linda Lewis, who writes:

This rolling pin has been at the Fahey Farm (est 1789) for many generations. It was either made by my husband’s grandfather Edward Fahey (1869-1925)or his father also named Edward Fahey (1826-1884) from wood from the farm. The Fahey Farm is a Century Farm in Chapel’s Cove, Conception Bay.

Got a handmade rolling pin or other hand-crafted kitchen gadget in your cupboard? I want to see it! Send me a pic and your story, and we'll keep sharing them on Fridays. dale@heritagenl.ca

You can read a bit more about the history of the Fahey Century Farm here.

Looking for helpful household advice on what to do with your old rolling pin? Do you have lumpy salt? Have no fear, the St. John's Daily Star of 1917-01-04 has your back in the "Mrs. Newlywed And Her Woes" column: