Canadian History Roundup – Week of October 22, 2017

” A Merry Hallowe’en. For Ways that are dark and tricks that are vain. Watch out!” 1910. Postcard. Toronto Reference Library. Arts department. ARTS-PC-102. Public Domain

The latest in blog posts, news, and podcasts from the world of Canadian history.

Missed last week’s roundup? Check it out here.

• Gord Downie died this week. Sean Carleton reflects upon his reconciliation work, Chanie Wenjack, and Hockey Night in Canada in this Twitter essay.
• Check out this cool map of Nehiyawak (Cree) names on the Prairies.
• Adele Perry has written a new piece for NiCHE on Shoal Lake No. 40 and how settler colonialism pervades all aspects of our lives, including the water that comes out of the tap.
• Oana Godeanu-Kenworthy has a new blog post over on Borealia this week, showing how literature can provide an important tool for historians studying the evolution of racial hierarchies at the beginning of the 19^th century in North America. She focuses specifically on the expanding definition of Britishness and its relationship to whiteness and citizenship.
• This week’s most popular words in #envhist, according to Jessica DeWitt, are: “New,” “Also,” and “One.” However, I can’t figure out what the picture is. Is it a present, an ornament, or a ninja turtle?
• Historica Canada has just released a new Heritage Minute, on Toronto’s Kensington Market. Check it out here!
  • Find out more about the Market and its history here.
  • You can see news coverage of the new minute, including information on how the minute was designed, here.
  • And see how the animation was done here!
• It’s almost Halloween! Here is a mini-roundup on related content.
  • The Stuff You Missed in History Class podcast took on a Canadian ghost story this week, focusing on the haunting of Amhearst, Nova Scotia’s Esther Cox. I love these kinds of stories….
  • Carmen Cadeau posted a list of “Yet Another Five Haunted Places in Canada.”
  • Archives and Research Collections at Carleton has put together a series on the #9DaysofHalloween, highlighting some items from its collections, specifically:
    • Day 1: Hans Holbein’s L’alphabet de la Mort (1856)
    • Day 2: Brenda Lee-Whiting’s The Way it was in the Ottawa Valley (1992)
    • Day 3: William Godwin’s Lives of the Necromancers (1834)
    • Day 4: Statues of Parliament Hill: an Illustrated History (1986)
    • Day 5: Charles Wentworth Upham’s Salem Witchcraft (1867)
  • Queen’s University’s The Watson blog is also doing a Halloween series.
    • Their first post looked at the history of Kingston’s Skeleton Park, officially known as McBurney Park. Apparently they built it on top of a burial ground.
    • On Day 2, they looked at the history of the Prince George Hotel, which is currently home to the Tir Nan Og Irish Pub.
    • On Day 3 they talked about the hangings and hauntings at Fort Henry.
  • The Atlantic Loyalist Connections Blog posted Part 2 of their look at the realities behind the Legend of Sleepy Hollow. This latest post focuses on the Hanging of Major André, better known as the spymaster who recruited Benedict Arnold for the British.
  • The Retroactive Blog took a look at some of Alberta’s haunted hotels.
  • Francesca Hannan has written a great editorial responding to a another editorial where a woman complained that it wasn’t fair for her daughter to not be able to dress up as a “Native Princess.” While many claim this is “celebrating Indigenous culture,” in doing so, they are actually ignoring what Indigenous peoples have been saying for centuries.
    • And for an important Twitter essay on why cultural appropriation is dangerous, go here.
  • Heritage Winnipeg is profiling their haunted heritage buildings this week.
  • Peel Art Gallery, Museum, and Archives, showcased some of their cool Halloween-related records.
  • McGill-Queen’s University Press has put together a reading list of “spooky” academic titles. Why isn’t Who Killed Canadian History on this list?
  • The UBC Digitization Blog shared some of the costume ideas available in their collection.
  • This week, Eve Lazarus shares the story of the Ghosts of the Fireside Grill in Victoria.
• The Age of Revolutions blog has released another post in their series on “Native American Revolutions.” This latest post, from David Andrew Nichols, examines how the Haudenosaunee, the Cherokee, and the Delaware adapted and developed strategies to survive the changing environment following the American Revolution. Content warning: as you can likely guess from the title, this is an American piece, so it uses American terminology that is no longer acceptable in Canada.
• Jan Raska has a new piece for the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 blog. This post looks at immigration from 1949 to 1972, focusing on the government’s commemorations of “milestones,” like the 50,000^th Displaced Person. This was a mechanism for the government to showcase idealized stories of immigration and improve popular perceptions of new arrivals. Sometimes they even lied! Shocking I know.
• Have you ever thought about using Google Maps in the classroom? Julia M. Gossard talks about how she uses them in her Global Early Modern Europe course. This includes assignment instructions and a worksheet!
• The remains of twenty-four Yupik peoples from the former settlement of Kaskanak, Alaska, that had been held in the Smithsonian since 1931, were returned this week, and ceremonially reburied by their descendants.
• A really cool performance piece called “The Mechanics of History,” by Yoann Bourgeois,” was posted to Twitter this week.
• Tina Adcock has kindly shared the syllabus for her upcoming course on “Problems in Environmental History: Science, Technology, and Nature in the Modern World.”
• The History Department at Concordia has announced that it will not enforce Bill 62 because it discriminates against Muslim women.
• This week on Unwritten Histories, I posted an editorial on the importance of history education when it comes to responding to racism, particularly in response to the passage of Bill 62 and the investigation into Masuma Khan’s comments. I was glad to hear that Dalhousie has since dropped the investigation.
• New on the LAC blog this week is a behind-the-scenes post about the role of the cataloguing librarian, who catalogues and describes new acquisitions.
• Western University has just launched a new online exhibit recounting the history of Labatt Brewing Company. The exhibit is called “Time in a Bottle,” and contains images, radio and tv ads, as well as interviews. See the exhibit for yourself here.
• The Graphic History Collective has released the latest poster in their Remember|Resist|Redraw series. This one looks at labour activist and kick-ass Jewish woman, Emma Goldman, and is by David Lester.
• As part of the 10^th anniversary of Open Access Week, Shawn Graham has announced the first issue of a new journal, Epoiesen: A Journal for Creative Engagement in History and Archaeology. Check it out for yourself here.
• Gregory Marquis has written a new post for the Acadiensis blog that historicizes the expansion and contraction of Saint John during the twentieth century.
• Tina Adcock shared this amazing story about how Nehiyawak (Cree) was written on RAF planes in WW1 to fool the Germans into thinking they were facing an imminent invasion by Indigenous peoples.
• Raymond Blake shared this story about Robert Wardhaugh, a Canadian historian, who has played the same Dungeons and Dragons game for 35 years. Will they take away my Ph.D. if I admit that I’ve never played….
• J.I. Little reviewed Colin Coates’ recent edited collection, Canadian Countercultures and the Environment for NiCHE this week.
• This week is the 100^th anniversary of the battle of Passchendaele.
  • LAC has a new post recounting the battle.
  • They also published a blog post looking at three Passchendaele Victoria Cross recipients, Sergeant Holmes, Major O’Kelly, and Lieutenant-Colonel Shanklan
  • The Canadian Centre for the Great War also remembers Passchendaele.
  • The South Peace Regional Archives posted an eyewitness account of the battle.
• Andrew Nurse has written another new post for Active History. This latest post reflects on the contested memory and commemorations of New Brunswick artist, Alex Colville.
• Robynne Mellor is organizing this year’s first NiCHE New Scholars digital meeting. The theme will be “Canada and the World.” She’s looking for feedback on which topics to discuss.
• This week, Instantanés profiled the MacDonald Tobacco Fire, which was the Montreal equivalent of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, and highlighted the dangerous conditions under which working-class Quebecers laboured in the late 19^th century.
• Adele Perry initiated a fascinating and important discussion the role of the historiographical/methodological articles in the field of Canadian history.
• Alyssa Hamilton has written a recap of the recent event, “Foodways and Fisticuffs: The Larger Than Life Personalities Who Shaped Quebec Cuisine,” featuring Nathalie Cooke and Julian Armstrong.
• The latest biography from the Dictionary of Canadian Biography is for noted sportsman, Francis Joseph Nelson.
• The Laurier Centre is back with another episode of their On War and Society podcast. This latest episode features an interview with Terry Copp and a discussion of the recently-released film, Dunkirk, and reality of the battle.
• The Ontario Museum Association has published the proceedings of their recent symposium on Indigenous collections.
• Jessie Thistle has published a really important piece on Indigenous homelessness, its definition, experience, and causes. History, culture, society, and family all play important roles.
• It’s Flu Shot season. Daniel Heath Justice has a great Twitter essay explaining why anti-vaxxers are apologists for colonialism. Get your flu shot.
• Joanne Hammond has written a new Twitter essay on heritage management in BC, and why the status quo is not workable under a reconciliation framework.
• LAC posted the latest in their series, Who Do We Think We Are. Their latest guest curator is Taryn Dewar, who discusses tourism posters and winter paintings.
• Krista McCracken posted a reflection on the recent Canadian History Edit-A-Thon that she organized with Jessica Knapp. 10/10 would do again!
• CHA released two new profiles in their series, “What Can You Do with a History Degree?” These profiles include Stacey Devlin, from Know History, and Crystal Pigeau, from Nipissing University.
• Russell Potter is back with another post in his “Franklin Searchers of the Month” series. This month’s focus is on Operation Northern Quest.
• Joshua MacFadyen has reviewed Ruth Wells Sandwell’s new book, Canada’s Rural Majority: Households, Environments, and Economies, 1870-1940 for Environmental History.
• The University of Manitoba is considering dropping its Archival Studies program. The Association for Manitoba Archives has issued a call to action.
• Jessica Parr has written a new blog post for Black Perspectives on Black mobility in the British Atlantic World, and how some enslaved peoples took advantage of the different laws in different locations to gain their freedom.
• Heather Read continues her look at Canada150 for the ROM this week with a look at the Manitoba Glass Company.
• See how some students at McGill are using Historypin to visualize the history of Montreal.
• In this week’s #TBT from the ROM, Dorothy Burnham showcases the final setup of the exhibit.
• The Department of Canadian Heritage has released the results of a 2016 survey on the digitization of Canadian museums collections. Read the report here.
• LAC has just released information about their latest acquisitions for Fall 2017. This includes documents from Jean-François Lépine and Timothy Findley.
• You can now take a digital tour exploring the history of the Grey Nuns of Montreal.
• Montreal Archives says goodbye to Expo 67, which closed 50 years ago this week.
• The Quebec City Archives takes a meandering look at the Saint-Charles River and its 20^th century evolution.
• The McGill-Queen’s University Press also shared an excerpt from the book, Everyday Sacred: Religion in Contemporary Quebec, looking at the history of Islamophobia in the 21^st century.
• The Toronto Reference Library Blog looks back at the history of their current site, from 1802 to the 1970s. I kinda wish they had also discussed the Indigenous history of the area….
• This week on the Archives of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Toronto is a blog post on Canadian attitudes towards the Church of England and the Reformation in the mid 19^th century. Spoler alert: Catholics and Protestants didn’t like each other. But they had some really good insults for one another!
• Adèle Clapperton-Richard and Camille Robert have written a must-read piece for Histoire Engagée this week about the problems with Women’s History Month. As she notes, this approach is dangerous because it assumes that the universal experience is always male, that only exceptional women are important, and it treats women’s history as a field that is separate from mainstream history. Hear Hear!
• Freddy Stoneypoint has written a great Twitter essay on the divide between Indigenous sovereignty and the white environmental movement.
• The Canadian Museum of History has shared an image of this beautiful Canada goose decoy, one of the oldest in existence. 
• Chris Ryan has written a new blog post on the Wood-Wellesley Improvement Area in 1969 Toronto, the first redevelopment area of the city.
• Russell Potter has a new blog post on the Franklin Expedition, exploring the question of whether or not either ship completed the final part of the Northwest Passage.
• This week on the Whistorical blog is a look at the history of Jordan’s Lodge on Nita Lake.
• Sneaking in right under the wire is a brand new blog post from Findings/Trouvailles by Peter E. Paul Dembski. This post examines Dr. Elizabeth Shortt’s diaries and her less-than-impressed view of British medicine.
• Canadian History in the News
  • Last week, game developer Elizabeth LaPensée, released “Thunderbird Strike,” a beautiful game where players use a thunderbird to destroy machinery related to the oil industry to protect Turtle Island.
    • Predictably, some people think that this is encouraging terrorism, and LaPensée is facing harassment. Chelsea Vowel talks about this in a new blog post, and is encouraging all of us to send letters of support.
  • In the wake of the ruling on stories from residential school survivors, the Independent Assessment Process (which collected the stories in the first place) is making plans to contact survivors.
  • Britain has just “gifted” the wrecks of the HMS Erebus and HMS Terror to Canada and the Inuit, who will share ownership. However, it will hang on to a small number of artifacts. There doesn’t seem to be any information on what they are keeping exactly, but it does include any recovered remains and gold bullion. Priorities, priorities…
    • Russell Potter provides context here.
  • Camille Robert wrote an article for Le Devoir detailing the history of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women, and whether or not it has had a lasting impact on women’s rights in this country.
  • BC Premier John Horgan included a territorial acknowledgement in a recent speech.
    • However, as Adam Gaudry reminds us: “all territory is unceded as treaties did not cede” in this great Twitter essay that explores the meaning of “ceded Indigenous territory.”
  • Ian Mosby was interviewed about his review of the TRC’s Calls to Action on CBC’s Unreserved!
  • For those of us who have seen Ryan McMahon’s documentary, Colonization Road, it is disappointing to hear that Fort Frances will not be changing the name of its Colonization Road.
  • The former Macdonald Elementary School in Vancouver will be renamed Xpey’, which means “cedar” in the henqeminem language, which is spoken by the Musqueam. This was done in consultation and cooperation with Chief Wayne Sparrow and the council members of Musqueam First Nation.
  • A British woman is confused by the negative response she has received after posting an auction for a Métis medicine bag, feather, and stick on Ebay. The items came with a note saying they were taken from a “Métis chief’s grave” near Batoche in 1885. Her explanation: “I didn’t rob the grave, for heaven’s sake, and it wasn’t anyone in my family.” As Chelsea Vowel noted, this is “literally THE settler colonial axiom.”
    • Members of the Métis community are working to ensure that the items return home, since the seller is refusing to take the auction down and sell it privately.
  • There is new census data showing a rise in the amount of people who self-identify as Métis or non-status First Nation. The CBC article mentions both Darryl Leroux and Chris Anderson, to explain the concept of “ethnic mobility.” However, as Leroux later noted, that didn’t include his concern about the rise of the “eastern Métis.”
    • Adam Gaudry wrote an important Twitter essay explaining these statistics.
    • And so did Chris Anderson.
    • Leroux and Gaudry wrote a piece on the Eastern Métis for the Conversation, in relation to the new census data. It’s an absolute must-read. This article was later picked up by the CBC and Postmedia.
  • The Halifax Municipal Archives is looking for help identifying individuals in some photos from the early 20^th century.
  • More racist teaching materials in Canadian elementary schools…
  • There is a new online video platform just for speakers of Inuktitut. It is called Inuktitube, and you can check it out here.
  • The Saskatchewan Party is in the process of selling Crown Land that is part of Treaty 4 and Treaty 6 territory. Valerie Zink and Philip Brass discuss the history of Crown Land, the Numbered Treaties, and the impact of privatizing lands.
  • In 1957, Jean Steel was experimented upon at Montreal’s Allen Memorial Institute as part of CIA-funded brainwashing experiments. Admitted with a diagnosis of manic depression and delusional thinking, she was subject to months of “de-patterning.” The federal government has just agreed to compensate her daughter.
  • You may remember that a couple of weeks ago, I mentioned an article from La Presse called “Territoire Mohawk Non Cédé?” by Alain Beaulieu, in the roundup. Well, the Mohawk Council of Kahnawà:ke has issued a smack down response.
  • APTN Investigates takes a look at Indian and Inuit Tuberculosis Sanatoriums, interviewing survivors across the country. Check out the full episode to see more, which is also available at the link above.
  • Naim Cardinal has collected all of the rookie cards for every single Indigenous player in the NFL.
  • CBC Books interviewed Robyn Maynard about her new book, Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada: From Slavery to the Present.
  • David Marples spoke with CBC recently about the commemoration of Canada’s past, arguing that a better knowledge of history is key to properly contextualising these monuments.
  • Jennifer Chutter explains the history of the Vancouver Special!
  • This week the Hairpin featured Jehane Benoît, otherwise known as the “Julia Child of Quebec.” I feel kinda bad that I’ve never heard of her….
  • The City of Halifax received around 120 emails over the Edward Cornwallis statue this summer, and most of them urged the city to take it down.
  • One of the items in the upcoming Vikings exhibit at the ROM is the “Beardmore Sword,” a mysterious sword that appears to be authentic, but was found in Ontario. Before you ask, no this does not mean the Vikings reached Ontario.
  • I know this isn’t really Canadian, but Carlo Ginzburg was interviewed by the CBC about his work on microhistories.
  • The new Alberta history curriculum for grades one through nine was unveiled this week, and it appears to integrate Indigenous history and culture more effectively and broadly.
    • There is more on the changes here.
  • Wayne Scanlan looks back on the history of the Ottawa 67’s.
  • International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons will receive this year’s Nobel Peace Prize. One of the leading figures in the campaign is Setsuko Thurlow, a Japanese-Canadian woman who survived the attack on Hiroshima.
  • MLA Adam Olsen has introduced the First Nations Heritage Protection and Conservation Act 2017, which will provide Indigenous historic sites the same protection as non-Indigenous sites.
  • The Ontario church where Harriet Tubman attended services is in dire need of repair. Go here to donate.
  • Find out all about the history of the city of Walkerville, Ontario.
  • CBC explores the history and transformation of Vancouver’s Woodward shopping complex.
  • Dennis Duffy has a new Historicist column on William Lyon Mackenzie King’s alterations to his grandfather’s grave.
  • NOW Toronto has published an excerpt from a new book by the late Arthur Manuel about the BNA Act and white supremacy.
• Better Late than Never
  • Remember the history of pay equity in Ontario? Progress has been stalled since the 1970s.
• Calls for Papers
  • The Age of Revolutions blog has issued a CFP for a new series on “Race and Revolution.” Proposals are due December 1^st.
  • The Northern Historical Student Society has issued a CFP for the second annual Northern History Conference,” to be held at UNBC in February 2018. The theme for this year is “Discovery.” Proposals for papers, panels, roundtables, and posters are due January 22^nd.
  • The Annual Conference of the Bibliographic Society of Canada is seeking paper proposals for their upcoming meeting at Congress 2018. This year’s theme is: “The Book at the Crossroads of Diversities,” and proposals are due January 15.
  • The Biennial Hockey Conference will be meeting in Edmonton in June 2018. Scholars from all disciplines are invited to submit abstracts by December 15^th. These papers will later be published in a peer-reviewed collection.
  • The Wilson Institute at McMaster is inviting proposals for an upcoming workshop on post-orientalism, in honour of the 40^th anniversary of Edward Said’s landmark book. Proposals are due November 1^st.
  • 2018 will see the first ever Interdisciplinary Trans Studies Graduate Student Conference! The conference is currently accepting proposals on the theme of “Trans Matters,” and proposals are due November 10^th.

I hope you enjoyed this spooky Halloween edition of the 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 when we will be having our very own Halloween special! See you then!

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