Macoun Club, Ottawa – David Smiley putting a crayfish on Jennifer Medd’s neck. March 22, 1963. Rosemary Gilliat Eaton. Library and Archives Canada
The latest in blog posts, news, and podcasts from the world of Canadian history.
Missed last week’s roundup? Check it out here.
Environmental History
- The most commonly-used words in #envhist last week, according to Jessica DeWitt, were: “Moore,” “Greenpeace,” and “Environmental.”
- NiCHE premiered a new series this week on environmental history and public engagement, coming out of a conference held in May 2018. John Sandlos introduced the series.
- David Siebert explored the historical links between the Royal Society of Canada and the oil industry and the consequences of disseminating knowledge, by examining the Public Transactions in Administration Files.
- Speaking of oil, the City of Richmond Archives blog remembered the search for the Steveston Gusher.
- This week on Unwritten Histories, we had a very special post by Stephanie Pettigrew about heritage gardening!
- This is an amazing look at the history of floods in Manitoba.
Military History
- The Canadian War Museum remembered Gander, a very special Newfoundland dog.
- A Dutch man is attempting to locate information on the 60 WW2 soldiers from Saskatchewan in the Holten Canadian War Cemetery.
History Education
- In their latest post for Active History, Krista McCracken shared their experiences using infographics to teach Canadian history.
- In the third post in NiCHE’s ongoing series about field trips and environmental history, Richard Pickard discussed his trips with English students at the University of Victoria.
- Over on the Pedagogy and American Literary Studies blog, Corinna Cook explained how she is wrestling with two questions: in what ways can and should an Indigenous literature course engage local Indigenous politics, and what are the special pressures/opportunities that local histories/memories/politics present to humanities education?
- Really not impressed with this move by the Newfoundland and Labrador government to combine history and social studies.
- In this fascinating piece, Prajwala Dixit explored ongoing work in Atlantic Canada to address the lack of knowledge about Indigenous communities, histories, and politics among Canadian immigrants. Dixit spoke with Kanani Davis (Sheshatshiu Innu Nation), Valeri Pilgrim (Kablunagajuk), and Stephen Augustine (Mi’kmaq) about the work each is doing to help correct the problem.
- Native-Land.ca has a new teacher’s guide!
- Depending on how long you’ve been an Unwritten Histories reader, you may remember that I profiled an article by Christina Burr on teaching the history of Canada’s flappers. This week she spoke with the CBC about this work and the creation of a new digital archive on the image of the Windsor, Ontario flapper.
Race, Ethnicity, and Immigration History
- Elamin Abdelmahmoud wrote a wonderful piece about the racialized nature of the Canadian cottage experience, and myth of the Canadian outdoors.
- In honour of St. Patrick’s Day, Borealia posted a new piece by David Wilson on the misuse of history with respect to Fenian Kim McDermott’s St. Patrick’s speech in 1865.
- In a new Twitter thread, Adam Bunch explained why the St. Patrick’s Day parade was banned in Toronto for over 100 years.
- The Canadian Encyclopedia published a new entry forAlbert Jackson, the first Black postal worker in Canada.
- They also have a new entry on the Chinese-Canadian of Force 136, part of the British special-ops branch in WW2 that mainly operated in Japan-controlled areas in southeast Asia.
- Doug Cuthand calls upon all Canadians to stand up to fight white supremacy, which is embedded in the fabric of this country.
- Check out this preview of a new exhibit on the immigrant construction workers who built Toronto.
- The Slocan Historical Society is trying to raise the money needed to restore The Merriwake, a gillnetter built by Isamu Matsumoto. The boat belonged to a Japanese-Canadian citizen, but it was confiscated during internment. The name of the owner is unknown.
Indigenous History
- Find out about the new Winnipeg Art Gallery Inuit Art Centre expansion, which will showcase contemporary Inuit art from 1949 onwards and provide opportunities for visitors to learn about Inuit culture, art, and history (including the legacy of colonialism).
- The latest blog post from LAC is all about First Nations blanket traditions, both historical and contemporary, from across northern Turtle Island.
- Anishinabek spoke with Alan Ojiig Corbiere (Ruffled Grouse clan from M’Chigeeng First Nation) about his work and reviving historical Anishinaabe heroes during Treaty talk.
- CBC spoke with five northern Indigenous survivors of Indian Day schools, including Millie Gruben (of Tuktoyaktuk), William Greenland, Jayne Konisenta (from Nahanni Butte), Cecile Ayah, and Wilbert Antoine, about their experiences. Content warning: descriptions of violence against Indigenous peoples, abuse.
- Another new entry from the Canadian Encyclopedia is on Cree sniper, Henry Northwest.
New France/British North America
- A team of four men is about to retrace nineteenth-century explorer and Franklin searcher John Rae’s journey in the arctic. Because reasons.
Political History
- This week in the Globe and Mail, J.D.M. Stewart argued that Canadian historians need to produce more biographies of prime ministers.
Social History
- Jason Ellis and Catherine Carstairs wrote an important piece on the importance of vaccine education for parents, based on both recent research and historical examples.
- Unpopular opinion: I don’t like Nanaimo bars. Please don’t hate me!
The History of Gender and Sexuality
- Morgan Seag looked at the history of women in polar research in both the Arctic and Antarctic.
- The latest Shekon Neechie blog post is by Sarah Nickel (Tk’emlupsemc (Kamloops Secwepemc), French Canadian and Ukrainian) on transracial relationships and second-wave feminism during the International Year of the Woman in 1975. I saw her present this paper this summer, and I am so glad to see it appear here for more people to read.
Local History
- Over on Twitter, @revrecluse shared some fun images from historical Edmonton newspapers.
- There were lots of new entries on Historic Nova Scotia this week, including:
- Sullivan Francis MacDonald and the Beaton Institute Archives on the Glace Bay Heavy Water Plant and Cape Breton’s lost nuclear dream.
- The Nova Scotia Museum on Mi’kmaq Chief Stephen J. Knockwood (of Indian Brook, now Sipekne’katik).
- The Nova Scotia Museum on William Dawson Lawrence.
- The Nova Scotia Museum on George Brown (the rower, not the politician).
- Malcolm Smith on the Prince of Wales Martello Tower.
- The Lake Charlotte Area Heritage Society and the Eastern Shore Archives on the Stoddard Hotel in Clam Harbour.
- This week, Whistorical looked back at the history of golf in Whistler.
- Have you ever heard of Toronto’s Thirteen Club?
- Find out what the interior of Vancouver’s Marine Building used to look like.
- Heritage Winnipeg profiled the Monte Cassino Court, which is currently at risk of demolition.
- The Saskatchewan Aviation Museum is currently trying to recover a Cessna 180 float plane that crashed into Peter Pond Lake in 1959.
- The City of Montreal will be removing both of its crucifixes at city hall and placing them in a new museum space. Excuse me while I pick myself up off the floor.
- The City of Saskatoon archives posted this historical video of the Saskatoon Ski Jump. It looks absolutely terrifying. I can’t tell when the video is from however.
- CBC spoke with Keith Carlson and Amy Jo Ehman about the legacy of the founder of Saskatoon, John Lake.
Digital and Public History
- Check out Joanne Hammond’s latest ReWriteBC sign!
- This week the UBC Digitizer’s blog shared some of the old library catalogues in their collection.
- Christopher Moore had his regular preview of the latest Canada’s History.
- The Friends of the B.C. Archives released a report this week calling on the BC archives to lower or eliminate licensing and reproduction fees.
- This piece in the New York Times by Anemona Hartocollis examined a very important issue: who should own the photos of slaves? And as a number of people pointed out on Twitter, this should be a question concerning images of Indigenous folks as well.
- The City of Vancouver Archives has completed digitizing the photographs and audio recordings of Paul Yee.
- Yee was also the focus of this week’s blog post from Eve Lazarus.
- The Exploration Place in Prince George is hoping to digitize their entire archival collection of 900,000 items.
- The latest online exhibit from the Virtual Museum of Canada is called “Crossing Cole Harbour: From Ferry to Duke then Rail to Trail,” developed by the Cole Harbour Heritage Farm Museum.
- The St. Catharines Museum has just launched their new online collections portal.
- Find out about the amazing work being done by Nigel Henri Robinson (Dene), who uses memes to celebrate Indigenous cultures and teach folks about Canadian history.
- Someone stole the plaque at the Bell Homestead National Historic Site in Brantford, and they want it back.
- Eryk Martin has written the latest blog post for the Canadian Committee on Women’s History, about the digitization of the second-wave feminist periodical, The Pedestal.
- Now is your chance to shape the future of the Royal BC Museum!
- APTN spoke with Ariane Xay Kuyaas (Haida), one of the latest Indigenous interns at the Canadian Museum of History about her experiences, and how she is bringing knowledge back home to her community.
- The Ford Ecoline van that supported Terry Fox during his run is currently on display in Vancouver. CBC spoke with Fox’s brother Darrell about the role that the camper van played.
Doing History
- Coll Thrush spoke with Erstwhile blog about his approaches to research and writing, particularly with respect to his publications on Indigenous visitors to the UK and on shipwrecks along the American Northwest coast.
- The Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives will henceforth be known as The ArQuives, and is doing some reorganizing behind the scenes.
- In this blog post, they explained why the name change was so important.
- Miquel Garcia-Martin explained why it is so important that the ArQuives represented all of the folks in their community.
- Mandy Byron showcased their new centralized database.
- And Ami Powell shared their latest donation, from the 2-Spirited People of the 1st Nations
- Did you know that the McGill Visual Arts Collection has a collection of Disney material?
- While not specifically Canadian, I think Jill Burke’s advice for historians using images as part of their research is a must-read for all historians.
- The PEI Archives have found a new home.
- BAnQ has just acquired the papers of former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour.
- And the papers of Pierre Laporte are also now available at BAnQ.
- Alban Bargain-Villéger posted the second and final part of his recent research diary on Active History.
- The Archives of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Toronto shared some of its census and statistical data.
- Meagan Breault shared what she has learned about George F.G. Stanley and his writing on Indigenous topics, including his research on Louis Riel.
Miscellaneous
- The latest entry from The Dictionary of Canadian Biography is for physicist Ernest Rutherford. Fun fact, there is a building at McGill named for him, and I took classes there.
Podcasts
- In the latest episode of the Living Heritage Podcast, local students share some of their favourite local stories, tales, and legends.
- The latest episode of The Feast podcast accompanied Janis Thiessen and Kent Davies on the Manitoba Food History Project Food Truck!
- David Lester spoke with Scott Neigh on the rabble.ca podcast this week about his latest graphic novel on the Winnipeg General Strike, made in association with the Graphic History Collective, as well as the long connection between radical politics and music.
- I almost forgot about this episode of The Secret Life of Canada on why we don’t have a Caribbean province! Eep! I’m sorry!
- The latest podcast episode of Juno Beach and Beyond looked at the film, The Devil’s Brigade, which was on the Canadian armed forces during WW2.
Calls for Papers
- NiCHE New Scholars is organizing a Twitter conference just before the CHA, called “New Directions in Environmental History.” Proposals are due April 30.
I’ve had my eye on including this picture in a roundup, and I’m glad I can finally share it with you. Make sure you read the caption. 😉 I hope you enjoyed this week’s roundup! If you did, please consider sharing it on the social media platform of your choice! And don’t forget to check back on Tuesday for my look at the best new articles from February 2019. See . you then!
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