Genealogy, New France, Quebec, Resources Outside of Montreal

Seigneuries of the Lower St. Lawrence and of the Côte-du-Sud

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If some of your ancestors lived along the south shore of the Lower St. Lawrence River (the Bas Saint-Laurent, as it is often called today,) the attached PDF compilation is designed to help you learn more about their lives.

See PDF:  Seigniories of the Lower St. Lawrence – Revised Version 2018-09-03

The river is tidal here, and so broad that the far north shore is hardly visible. This beautiful area of rolling farmland and salt marshes has been settled for generations, with many residents making a living fishing, building boats and transporting goods and people on the river.

south shore egret
South shore of the Lower St. Lawrence River

Until the 1850s, almost all the land was owned by a few individuals, known as seigneurs, who rented it out to the censitaires, or tenant farmers. Most seigneurs were honest and caring individuals who took care of their tenants. They granted lands to the settlers and financed their first years with money, food, cattle and other animals, farm equipment, wood-cutting tools, building tools and rifles.

In return, the censitaires would repay on a yearly basis their seigneur with beaver furs and other types of fur. They also repaid them with hard-wood, a precious commodity in the 17th century in Europe, for most hard-wood forests no longer existed on the European continent. If the seigneur and his family resided on the seigneury, the censitaires would bring them eggs and meat, as well as fresh milk.

south shore famrland
Farmland along the south shore of the Lower St. Lawrence

Many of the seigneurs on the attached list were merchants or fur traders, and obtained most of their revenue from the sale of wild furs and hard-wood. Some were importers and exporters and dealt with merchants in French port cities such as La Rochelle, Bordeaux, Rouen and Le Havre.

The compilation on the PDF attached includes six main sections:

The Seigneurs: this section focuses on the historic landowners on the south shore of the Lower St. Lawrence, including links to biographies of these individuals.

Regions: the geographic regions described in this compilation are Montmagny, l’Islet, Kamouraska, Témiscouata, Rivière-du-Loup, Les Basques, Rimouski, Neigette, La Mitis (Métis), Matapedia and Matane in the Gaspé.

Cemeteries: a list of historic cemeteries in this area.

Notaries: this compilation includes the names of notaries who worked in this region, the places and years they practised, and the archives where their acts can be found today. The notaries handled important legal documents for people, including wills, marriage contracts, business agreements, land rental and sales agreements, and protests in cases of disagreement.

Bibiothèque et Archives nationales du Québec (BAnQ): locations and contact information for the archives, and how to order documents online.

Genealogical and historical societies in the region: contact information

With regard to the notaries listed in the attached PDF, the majority of the notarial acts can be obtained through the BAnQ online (free, http://bibnum2.banq.qc.ca/bna/notaires/ or http://www.banq.qc.ca/archives/genealogie_histoire_familiale/genealogie_banq/guide/archives-notariales/index.html), FamilySearch.org (free), or Ancestry.com (subscription). Ancestry has two distinct databases covering different time periods during the lifetime of a notary. Also listed are the notarial acts which can be obtained through Généalogie Québec (Drouin Institute online), (https://www.genealogiequebec.com/en/.

For each notary selected, if a URL address has been posted, this indicates that the genealogy provider’s online databases contains notarial acts. If a URL address has not been posted, this simply indicates that the provider does not own fonds of this particular notary.

Genealogy, Quebec, Technology

Keeping Up with the Montgomerys

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autoshow

Montreal Auto Show. 1914. McCord Museum photograph

Roads trips. They have been a staple of life in North America for over one hundred years and it all began around 1910 in American and Canadian towns.

In big cities like New York or Montreal there was little need for an automobile, what with the streetcars and subways. As silent film footage from the era shows, the city roads were preposterously chaotic.

But, in the  towns during the warmer months, anyway, an auto was both useful to get around and quite the status symbol for the well-off professional man.

Case in point: Dufferin Street in Richmond, Quebec, a leafy stretch lined with red-brick homes in the Queen Anne Revival style.(1)

In 1910, the Skinners, the Nicholsons and the Montgomerys are neighbours on the north side of Dufferin.

Floyd  Skinner, a dentist, buys his first auto in 1909. So does Nathan Montgomery, a man in his forties who is already retired. (2)

Margaret Nicholson, my husband’s great grandmother, living in the pretty house called “Tighsolas” between them, doesn’t think much of these extravagant testosterone-fueled impulse purchases. She writes this in a letter to her husband, Norman, who is away in Northern Ontario working on the railroad:

“Mr. Montgomery is going to buy an automobile. He is getting rid of his horse. Don’t you think he’s foolish?  I would not want one. They are too dangerous.” (3)

TheNicholsos

Norman and Margaret Nicholson, daughters Edith and Marion and Aunt Christine Watters.

 The Nicholsons, you see, never, ever, get to own an automobile. In 1910, they are house-rich but cash poor. They cannot begin to afford a ‘motor’ because in 1910  autos can cost as much as a fine house, in the 2,000 to 4,000 dollar range. (4)

If Margaret Nicholson is very wary of the newfangled horseless carriage, her daughter, Marion, my husband’s grandmother, is not. In fact, she accompanies the Montgomerys on their 1909  auto-buying excursion in Montreal.  Marion, a teacher in the city, tells her mother about it in a letter but wrapped in a little white  lie. “I bumped into the Montgomerys on the street. He is buying an auto and she is in for a shirtwaist suit.”

I suspect this is a lie because in the Nicholson family album there is a photograph of Marion and Mr. and Mrs. Montgomery posing in front of the Motor Import Company of Canada on Atwater and St. Catherine. Marion likely had planned to meet the Montgomerys all along.

MarionMON.PNG

Marion, left, caught in the act of accompanying her neighbours on an auto-buying excursion.

If Margaret felt autos were dangerous, her eldest daughter, Edith, also a teacher, clearly did not.  In the summer of 1911, Edith traveled all the way to Montreal by motor with the Skinners.  Here’s how Edith described her trip in a letter to her dad:

“As you will see by the address, I am in Montreal. I came in with Dr. and Mrs. Skinner in the motor Friday. Left home at 10 am and got to Waterloo at 12.30 had dinner. Saw all we could of the town and left at 2 for Montreal, got here at quarter past six. Without one break down. It was a beautiful day and we enjoyed every minute of it.

I will name the places we passed through so you will know the country we passed through. Melbourne, Flodden, Racine, Sawyerville, Warden, Waterloo, Granby, Abbotsford, St Caesar, Rougemont, Marieville, Chambly, Longueil, St. Lambert, Pointe St Charles.

Don’t you think I was a very fortunate girl to have such a trip?

 

Itineray

1911 itinerary.  6 ½ hours for 93 miles.  The speed limit in the city was 8 miles an hour and 15 miles an hour in the country.

 The Eastern Townships is a very hilly place so this pleasure trip must have been quite the  roller-coaster ride for Edith and possibly a bit hard on the, ahem, lower body, especially if Edith was wearing a tight corset under her ‘duster coat.’ (5)

In 1910, autos were considered toys. Motoring was considered a fad, a pastime. The preface to the special insert promoting the 1910 Westmount Horse Show in the Montreal Gazette claims, “The automobile will never replace the horse in Man’s affection.” (6)

So wrong.

Although it was wealthy males who kick-started the automobile revolution, it was women and teenagers who had the most to gain from it.  They were free at last to travel far and wide on their own.

freeatlast.PNG

Free at Last! Margaret’s youngest daughter Flora and friends on an automobile ride in the country circa 1920.

So, here we have three houses on Dufferin Street in Richmond, Quebec – and already two automobiles.

Still, if you pay attention to her actions and not her words, it  is clear that Margaret Nicholson doesn’t really hate autos. Margaret often allows Mr. Skinner or Mr. Montgomery to take her to the mail to post letters to her husband.

 What she says to Norman in her letters is to soothe his prickly pride, that’s all.

To make things worse, just around the corner on posh College Street live Isabella and Clayton Hill, Margaret’s sister and brother-in-law. Clayton is a prosperous stone-mason and, much to Margaret’s chagrin, he owns an especially fine automobile.

Clayton'sauto

Magical Mystery Tour Car. Clayton’s Auto. A Pierce Arrow, perhaps. Very expensive at about 5,000 dollars.

Margaret is always feuding with Clayton and her sister mostly over the care of her elderly mother.

She remains bitter about her relations’ good fortune. In another letter to her husband she writes: “Clayton’s auto has broken down again. Isabel says the repairs are costing a fortune. Aren’t we lucky not to have one.”

Then, again, she accepts rides from her brother-in-law on occasion.

In 1910, there was no resisting the lure of the motorcar. The swanky male ‘toy’  was already proving to be indispensable even to its most vocal female critics.

Nichsolsonhomeafewdaysago

Tighsolas as it looks today.

  1. Richmond was a railway town, on the decline, between Portland, Maine and Montreal, Quebec. Queen Anne Revival style homes had irregular roofs, turrets, and lots of gingerbread moulding.
  2. On the 1911 Canada Census
  3. Nicholson Family Letters. Author’s collection.
  4. This was all changing with the Model-T Ford, and mass assembly. In 1910 Ford claimed his factory was putting out 1,000 autos a day. And he paid his people good salaries so they too could buy an auto. Soon, average middle class families could own a motorcar at around 400 to 600 dollars.
  5. Duster coats were long affairs meant to keep women’s clothes clean. Cars with an internal combustion engine were notoriously dirty.  Steam driven cars were dangerous and noisy. Electric cars, clean but slower-moving, were aimed at women in advertising, and, maybe, just for that reason, they did not catch on, at least until 100 years later.
  6. Magazine articles of the era were already pointing out that ‘the Billion Dollar Toy’ was creating significant waves in the economy, a sign that the auto wasn’t merely a toy but here to stay. By mid-century automobiles and automobile parts were the driver of the US economy.

 

Genealogy, Scotland

Regular and Irregular Marriages in Scotland

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My dad always said that my grandmother, Elspeth Orrock McHugh, was warm and generous and ready to do anything for the family. I was not surprised to find out that she hosted her sister’s wedding in her home in Dundee, Scotland on November 1, 1901.1 They would have just moved into this home2 and it would have been quite an event in her already busy life.

Elspeth had three young daughters, Anne and Elsie, aged three and two, 3 and Sarah Jane who was just 3 months old.4 Imagine hosting a wedding with three children under the age of three. Then again, the extended family would have been there to help.

Elspeth’s sister, Jemima Kinnear Orrock and Duncan McMillan Bissett had a regular marriage even though it took place in a private home. The certificate of marriage states that it was performed in accordance with the rites of the Church of Scotland and after banns were read,5 sometimes referred to as “crying the banns” or “crying the siller.”6 Banns or proclamations of marriage were read in the church three weeks in a row in case there was an impediment to the marriage.7 It is clear from the information on the marriage registration that this marriage was religious and therefore regular. This is just one of the ways that couples could legally marry in nineteenth century Scotland. In England, marriage was a religious sacrament whereas in Scotland it was a legal contract.8

Scotland’s distinctive marriage laws were based on mutual consent, rather than religious ceremony.9   Even so, the most common type of marriage took place in accordance with the rites of the Church of Scotland. The Marriage Act of 1836 also allowed priests and ministers of other churches and religious groups to perform marriage ceremonies.10 Marriages in accordance with the rites of other religions were also considered regular marriages.

Unlike England, Scotland did not allow civil marriages until an Act of Parliament in 1939.11

Interesting enough, Scotland also allowed other distinctive marriage arrangements, termed irregular marriages, that were considered legally binding and, as noted above, based on mutual consent.

A couple could simply pronounce themselves married in front of witnesses. They could also just pronounce themselves married, but it was more common to have witnesses in case they needed to prove it at some point.12

A promise of marriage, followed by a sexual relationship was also considered a binding legal marriage. Although this had to be backed up by some sort of proof, often by a written promise of marriage.13

And there was also the marriage by ‘habit and repute’ whereby the couple simply presented themselves in public as man and wife. 14

Even though the Church of Scotland frowned upon irregular marriages, it was preferable to ‘living in sin.’ Therefore these irregular marriages were tolerated. Their children were considered legitimate and were entitled to inherit property.15

Any irregular marriage could be registered if the couple presented themselves before the sheriff or magistrate. They usually had to pay a fine. Even though Scotland was tolerant of irregular marriages, they were not common in the 19th century. Most citizens preferred to be married either in church or in accordance with the rites of the church in a private home.16

 

  1. Scotland’s People web site, Statutory registers Marriages, marriage registration of Jemima Kinnear Orrock and Duncan McMillan Bisett, November 1, 1901, accessed July 31, 2018.
  2. The 1901 census, taken on the night of March 31/April 1, 1901 gives the family’s address as Milbank Road. The registration of Sarah Jane McHugh to Elpeth and Thomas McHugh on August 10, 1901 gives the Fleuchar Street address, the same as the address at which Jemima and Duncan were married. Therefore they would have had to have moved between March and August 1901. See references 3 and 4 below.
  3. Scotland’s People web site, 1901 Census, National Records of Scotland, entry for Thomas McHugh, accessed April 6, 2018.
  4. Scotland’s People web site, Statutory registers Births, birth of Sarah Jane McHugh, August 10, 1901, accessed December 1, 2017.
  5. Scotland’s People web site, Statutory registers Marriages, marriage registration of Jemima Kinnear Orrock and Duncan McMillan Bisett, November 1, 1901, accessed July 31, 2018.
  6. Rampant Scotland web site, Did you know? – Marriage customs in Scotland, http://www.rampantscotland.com/know/blknow_marriage.htm, accessed August 19, 2018.
  7. National Records of Scotland web site, Old Parish Registers – Marriages and Proclamation of Banns, https://www.nrscotland.gov.uk/research/guides/birth-death-and-marriage-records/old-parish-registers/marriages-and-proclamation-of-banns, accessed August 22, 2018.
  8. University of Glasgow web site, School of Social and Political Sciences, Scottish Ways of Birth and Death, Marriages, https://www.gla.ac.uk/schools/socialpolitical/research/economicsocialhistory/historymedicine/scottishwayofbirthanddeath/marriage, accessed August 20, 2018.
  9. Ibid.
  10. Ibid.
  11. Ibid.
  12. Ibid.
  13. Ibid.
  14. Ibid.
  15. Ibid.
  16. Ibid.
Genealogy, Quebec

Uncle Paul to All

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(Updated – “Be Kind” is my new motto and Uncle Paul was one of the kindest people ever!)

The headline read: “Bachelor awaiting his 11th child”. The 1969 newspaper article covered my Uncle Paul’s month-long trip to Korea, Hong Kong and the Philippines to visit “all his children”[1]. He sponsored his first foster child in 1961 and, eight years later, he had 11 foster children.

IMG_3028
1969 – Uncle Paul travels internationally to visit his foster children.

My uncle, Paul Lindsay (1923-1987), was my mother’s only brother. He was interested in how the money raised by the Foster Parents Plan[2] was spent helping children and their families in developing countries. So, in 1969, he booked the first of several trips at his own expense and visited all his foster children in person. He was greeted like a hero everywhere – sometimes with a banner across the main street reading “Welcome Uncle Paul”.

Foster Kids 1969
Uncle Paul with some of his foster children and their family.

He served for 20 years as a director of both the Canadian and international organizations of Foster Parents Plan (now known as Plan International).  His ultimate dream was to have two children, a boy and a girl, in each of the areas served by the organization.

Uncle Paul worked as a stockbroker with the Montreal brokerage firm MacDougall, MacDougall, MacTier.  Every weekday afternoon, he left work early and volunteered two hours of his time at The Montreal Children’s Hospital, playing with the kids in the orthopaedic ward. He was much appreciated and recognized as one of their principal volunteers during that time. Years later, I wrote and dedicated a children’s book to him called Bonnie – The Car with a Heart.[3] All proceeds from the sale of the book were donated to the Montreal Children’s Hospital in his memory. But not even “Bonnie” had a heart as big as Uncle Paul!

After his retirement in 1983, he moved from Montreal to Amberwood, a small community in Stittsville  just west of Ottawa. He quickly became a well-known member of his new community. One of his proudest moments was being approved as a “block parent” with their official sign posted in his window. In the year 2000, shortly after his death, the local park he helped develop for the neighborhood children was named after him.

Paul Lindsay memorial
Paul Lindsay Park Dedication
IMG_0839
Uncle Paul’s Nieces, Nephews and Family – May 2018

Another of his passions in life was music, listening to his high-end audio system as well as singing with the Montreal Elgar Choir for 30 Years[4]. When I was very little, he would cup my ear and say my pet name, “Little Lou”, in his deep baritone voice. The vibration tickled and made me shiver with delight.

Uncle Paul loved games! Perhaps it was the child in him. All kinds of games: golf, bowling, cards, Scrabble … and betting games at racetracks and casinos! He had a holiday apartment in the French Riviera (possibly purchased with his casino winnings? Who knows!) When in town, the French children would gather at the local café waiting for “Oncle Paul,” eager for the promised coin or two. I stayed there with him one night in 1974 while backpacking around Europe with a friend. The next day, he bid us “au revoir” both of us with our own bottle of French perfume as a gift.

My cousins and siblings all have fond memories of our Uncle Paul.  We never minded sharing him though; after all, he was Uncle Paul to all!

Paul Sydenham Hanington Lindsay (1923-1987)

[1] The Province, Vancouver, BC – August 12, 1969

[2] https://wiki2.org/en/Plan_Canada – as referenced August 12, 2018

[3] Bonnie – The Car with a Heart, written and published by Lucy H. Anglin – September 2010

[4] https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/montreal-elgar-choirchorale-elgar-de-montreal-emc/ – as referenced August 12, 2018

Genealogy, Ontario, United States

Hattie’s Story

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IMG_9139
Hattie, Admiral, Hollis, Norman and Jack Bailey abt. 1904.

In 1918 Hattie Bailey wrote a letter to her niece, Minnie Eagle Sutherland and marked it “private”. What would you do if you found such a letter? I read it!

“My dear Minnie, I am sure you wondered what has become of your Aunt Hattie. Well dear it is not because I have forgotten you that I have not written.”

I had never heard of Hattie until I found her letters. Harriet Anne Stuart was born in Canada in 1876. A few years later her family immigrated to North Dakota. There, Hattie met and married William John Bailey. Jack as he was known, was my great grandmother’s brother. He was born in Toronto and also immigrated to the United States where he began his career in the lumber industry.

IMG_9493
Hattie’s “Private” letter

Jack was a successful man. He started with a carpentry business, then operated a small sash and door factory and later opened a lumber yard in Inkster, North Dakota. He was an Inkster councilman on the 1st council and a pioneer retail lumberman in the upper Mississippi Valley. He was much older than Hattie. They had three sons, Norman, Admiral and Hollis. Jack’s business did well, they had a nice house and life was good or was it?

Jack’s sister Isabella “Bella” Bailey came for a visit. While in Inkster she was ill and bedridden for a number of weeks. The minister, Mr Richmond would often come to the house as his visits really cheered up Bella. Hattie also enjoyed the visits as he was a good listener. “Well the sad thing happened that comes into many lives, we became very fond of each other.” She and Jack had already gone through some rough times, mostly to do with Jack’s drinking. Then one day, Jack came home and overheard the minister comforting his wife. He was “wild with jealousy”. He made Hattie write down everything they had said to each other. Although she thought that was to be the end of it, he then forced the minister to leave the church without even saying goodbye to the congregation. Hattie thought she was forgiven but, “The fire of jealousy burned day and night”. “He fancied that I was immoral and accused me of dreadful things. Never during the friendliness with Mr Richmond was there ever a thought of wrongdoing”.

They continued to live together for a couple of years. Jack never gave her even a dollar and she was forced to earn money by sewing, baking and doing fancy work. Finally, her sons encouraged her to leave Jack as everyone was unhappy. “The boys said I must have the home and their father must live elsewhere.”

Then Jack became sick, he moved back home and she nursed him back to health. During that time he was “his dear old self again”, but as soon as he was well and back to his drink and old associates, life for Hattie became unbearable once more.

 It was hard to avoid Jack in a small place like Inkster so Hattie moved away to Larkin, North Dakota, near her sister Cora. In Larkin, she had a number of boarders to help make ends meet. When she left the family house her youngest son was still in school so he stayed with his father. The two older boys were away, serving in the Army and Airforce during WWI and both parents continued to have close relationships with their sons.

Through all the years Hattie continued to love Jack, they just couldn’t live together. He was on route to spend Thanksgiving with his son Norman when he had a heart attack. He was taken off the train and died in hospital. Hattie was devastated as now they would never get back together. She dreamed about them sitting on the porch in their rocking chairs. “As long as he was living I hoped that someday we would sit side by side and forget all our mistakes of the past.”

Notes:

Letter from Hattie Bailey to Minnie Sutherland from Larkin, North Dakota, November 1, 1918. In possession of the author.

Letter from Hattie Bailey to Minnie Sutherland from Walker, Minnesota December 17, 1930. In possession of the author.

Letter from Norman Bailey to Eliza Jane Bailey Eagle, Amy Eagle and Jim Bailey, Duluth, Minnesota, November 23, 1930. In possession of the author.

Harriet Anne Stuart 1874 -1947.

William John Bailey 1854 – 1930.

Genealogy

Stanley Anthony Savaryn, Staff Sergeant USAF

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In the fall of 1945 World War II had drawn to a close. The troops were coming home, rationing was over. It was hoped that the war  was behind us. Nations from around the world gathered together to form the United Nations, their goal, to establish peace in the world, yet there was still unrest on the horizon. Before long, there was another war. This time it was in the Korean Peninsula, which even today, 70 years later has not been resolved. Treaties have not been signed by the North Koreans, the South Koreans and the United States of America, although discussions are still ongoing.
mige

Stanley Anthony Savaryn

Stanley Anthony Savaryn was born on the 16th of August 1931 in South Bound Brook, New Jersey, the son of Stanley Savaryn Sr., a cabinet maker and Rose Luta. Shortly after completing High School, Mige, as he was known by his friends and family joined the United States Air Force. He became a mechanic and served his country for four years. (1950-1954). During this time he was an in-flight refueling operator.

The Americans had a base in Kevlafik, Iceland and most of the refueling of aircrafts was done over Greenland during the Korean War.

planes                                                   In Flight Refueling Operator

“In Flight Refueling Operator – Operates air refueling systems aboard aircraft tanker to refuel airborne aircraft: Confers with receiver aircraft pilot to direct aircraft into air refueling position, using radio. Presses buttons and switches on control panel to extend in-flight boom and connect tanker and receiver aircraft. Presses button to start refueling process. Monitors control panel light to detect equipment malfunctions. Contacts receiver aircraft pilot, using radio to inform pilot of progress being made during refueling, to advise pilot of action necessary to maintain safe refueling position, and inform pilot of steps to be taken during equipment malfunction or emergencies. Calculates in-flight weight and balance status of aircraft and notifies tanker pilot of necessary flight correction..”

 After his tour of duty in the Air Force, Mige returned home and worked as a mechanic. In the summer of 1957 he married my sister, Ruth and they settled in Martinsville, New Jersey and had two sons, Peter and Joey. Mige was a handy man. In his spare time he could be found in his workshop or in fine weather tending to his huge vegetable garden. One of Ruth’s loves was their in-ground pool. Mige kept it pristine.

Mige began working as a purchasing agent for a chemical company and although it was a long daily commute, it still gave him more time to work on projects. He always had a project on the go and if he didn’t, you can be sure Ruth would find one.

Years went by and Mige never talked about his time in the service and it was only in his later years that he would often think about his buddies who didn’t come home. He informed his sons that he wished to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery outside of Washington, DC. and that my sister, Ruth was to be buried with him.
arl cem

Arlington National Cemetery Photograph by Paul Lindell

Mige passed away in November of 2008 and Ruth followed him in February 2010. It took quite some time to plan the burial ceremony. November 1, 2012, a bright sunny autumn day, we gathered in Arlington National Cemetery to witness an emotional ceremony. There was a twenty-one gun salute, the playing of taps in the distance and the traditional folding and presentation of the flag to the oldest family member of the immediate family. In this case it was my nephew Peter, their oldest son. We then made our way to the columbarium section and placed several items within. I asked nephew Joe to place a Canadian dime with the ‘Bluenose’ in the columbarium for the couple to sail away to Paradise and in honour of Mige’s service, a Canadian Quarter with the bright red poppy in the centre was also placed beside the dime.

 colum

Photograph by Claire Lindell

Our day was not over. We made our way to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and the Changing of the Guard. There, while witnessing the changing of the guard we experienced tearful moments watching, with many others, as the soldiers honoured their fallen comrades. It was a very moving tribute that is repeated continuously day in day, day out.

 unknown

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier  –  Changing of the Guard

Photograph by Claire Lindell

 Sources:

https://higginsfuneralhome.com/tribute/details/1844/Stanley-Savaryn/obituary.html 

https://www.bing.com/search?q=public+photos+of+aircraft+refueling&form=EDGSPH&mkt=en-ca&httpsmsn=1&refig=12e67f9c30554fce80eaddba38630a75&sp=-1&ghc=1&pq=undefined&sc=0-19&qs=n&sk=&cvid=12e67f9c30554fce80eaddba38630a75 

https://arlingtoncemetery.mil/Explore/Changing-of-the-Guard

https://arlingtoncemetery.mil/Portals/0/Web%20Final%20PDF%20of%20Brochure%20March%202015.pdf

Genealogy

The Gray Child

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Undocumented. Today that word screams illegal immigrant and deportation. Yet in 1975 my five year old Montreal-born son was classified as undocumented in his birth-province and not entitled to an education in his mother-tongue.

The 1959 death of Premier Maurice Duplessis ushered in a turbulent period of political and cultural change in Quebec that ultimately led to violence and threats to secede from Canada.1 The new Liberal government of Jean Lasage promised to improve the economic and social standards of the province and to win greater respect and recognition for French Canadians.

The rights to develop many of Quebec’s natural resources – water, forests, and minerals – had been sold off by Duplessis to foreign and out-of-province companies. Management jobs in most industries were largely held by Anglophones leaving French Canadians to feel they were the “water haulers” of the province and not the masters.

In 1974 the Official Language Act, or Bill 22, 2 was passed. It made French the language of civic administration and services, and of the workplace. Only children who could demonstrate sufficient knowledge of English were exempted from receiving instruction in French. No longer could French Canadians and immigrants send their children to English schools to ensure they would eventually find good jobs.

“Testers” were sent out across the province.

In 1975 my family was living in Fermont, a small town in northern Quebec built to service the huge US Steel-owned iron ore mining enterprise at Mount Wright accessible only by rail and air. Anglophones were a minority but they did have an elementary school. Kindergarten was shared with the French school board and provided in French. High school students were bused to English schools in Labrador City 20 kilometers away.

My son Stephen was in kindergarten in 1975 and thus was required to be tested before entering English grade one. His father and I were not concerned. English was his first language. He had spoken early and by age five had a well-developed vocabulary. He was an outgoing, curious, and very chatty child and, although we were not allowed to be with him during the testing, we were confident he would be comfortable with what we were assured would simply be part of his regular school day. He expressed no concerns following the test saying only that he knew the answers to the questions.

Some months later we received the results. Our English son had failed the English test and would not be permitted to attend English school! Imagine our disbelief. What could possibility have happened? When we dug deeper with Stephen, he said he was only asked questions in French and he could answer them. What was the politics behind the French questions? And how was a five year old to know the consequences of using his newly acquired fluency in French?

We made inquiries and petitions everywhere – the Ministry of Education, the schoolboards, a legal firm. The best advice was to stay calm – the testing process was proving to be costly and unmanageable. A new system for determining eligibility for English schooling was being developed.

Meanwhile the English school board accepted Stephen as a “Gray Child”. Their term. They would receive no government funding for him and consequently he would receive no documentation from them. That would ultimately mean no high school leaving certificate, the pre-requisite for any post-secondary education. Still we took the chance. English education was our minority right and we would fight for it.

For three years Stephen was classified as a “Gray Child” saved only by the 1977 passing into Law of Bill 101, The Charter of the French Language.3 According to this new law, one parent had to have been educated in an English elementary school in Quebec. Both Stephen’s parents had.  The English school board reclassified Stephen as being legal and he and his descendants became eligible for an English education. The precious blue eligibility certificate remains in a safety deposit box to this day.

 

  1. http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/quiet-revolution/

 

  1. http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/bill-22/

 

  1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_of_the_French_Language
french-canadian, Genealogy

Montreal Movie Mysteries

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rialto

The Rialto ceiling today from Google Earth.

When I was a little girl in the 1960’s, whenever my family crossed the Cartierville Bridge in Montreal’s Ahunsic area to go to Laval, my mother would claim, “That is Uncle Louis’s bridge.”

Her much older brother, Louis, who died of a heart attack in 1965, had been a civil engineer and it is likely he worked for Dominion Bridge, the company that made that structure in the 1930’s.

The Cartierville Bridge wasn’t much to look at, so I wasn’t at all impressed.

I recently learned that back in the day my mother had a much lovelier family creation to brag about. Her Uncle Isadore’s glass company, Ceramo, had manufactured the beautiful stained-glass panels on the ceiling of the Rialto Theatre, the opulent 1924 movie theatre on Park Avenue decorated to look like the Paris Opera House.1

According to reporter Dane Lanken, who wrote the definitive book on Montreal’s old cinemas, this ceiling is rare, if not unique, among the grand movie houses of the day.*2

My mother’s Mon Oncle Isadore, an Outremont-based insurance broker, was also the VP of the United Amusements Corporation, a company that distributed films for Famous Players and that built the Rialto and dozens of other lavish Montreal movie houses, so it was all very convenient.3

Mummy rarely spoke about her Uncle Isadore during her life-time and she never talked about his many interlocked businesses.

She clearly didn’t know anything about the Rialto Cinema ceiling.  She never mentioned how Isadore had welcomed the audience at the opening of the magnificent Monkland Theatre in 1930, not in-person but from up on the screen in a talkie film.*4

(How cool that must have seemed just a few years after sound technology was introduced.)

In 1930, my mother would have been only nine years old and not entitled to enter movie houses.  Children under 16 had been banned from cinemas in Quebec 2 years before, in 1927, after the infamous fatal Laurier Palace fire.5

And my mom was only 11, in December 31, 1932, when her Uncle Isadore fell to his death from his 7th floor office window at 414 Saint James Street West.

She never ever mentioned that shocking event, either: I suspect no one told her about how her Uncle Isadore died.

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From La Patrie, online.

 

Lanken mentions Mon Oncle Isadore more than a few times in his beautiful book. He doesn’t discuss the manner of Isadore’s death.

However, Louis Pelletier, a Concordia scholar, does mention Isadore’s demise in his PhD thesis about the movie distribution industry in Montreal – with a sly aside.  Was it a suicide? Who knows. *6

Pelletier also says that Isodore was likely brought on as VP of United Amusements in 1921 as a ‘token’ francophone.

The 2012 thesis is brilliant, but here Pelletier (like Lanken) fails to make one key connection. Isadore’s brother was Jules Crepeau, my grandfather, Director of City Services in the 1920’s. Isadore’s appointment wasn’t token: It was tactical.

If you conduct a search of the Digital Media Database which contains many era Hollywood Trade Magazines, Jules’ name comes up more than Isadore’s.*7

Jules also died relatively young, in 1938, about a year after he had been hit by a car driven by a plain clothes policeman on Royal Avenue in NDG.*8

He had retired from his lofty post at City Hall in 1930.*9

Back in 2008, when I asked my mother if the 1937 car ‘accident’ had been a ‘hit’ *10 she replied an emphatic “No.” The policeman in question had been very upset about it, she told me. She died in 2009.

Ten years later, knowing what I now know about Isadore Crepeau and my Grandpapa Crepeau’s controversial and scandal-ridden career at Montreal City Hall,*11 I imagine that my mom’s recollection of this very contrite cop was a second-hand memory planted there, perhaps, by her older brother Louis.

Uncle Louis. Now, he’s the one I should have been able to talk to.  Had he lived, what twisting tales he might have told me.

  1.  Lanken, Dane. Montreal Movie Palaces. Great Theatres of the Golden Era 1884 – 1938.  Penumbra Press. 1993. This feature is likely why the Rialto has been deemed a National Historic Monument, and why it still stands today. Most other Montreal movie houses were destroyed or left to languish.
  2. Ibid. These United Amusement theatres included the Belmont on St.Laurent, and the Monkland on Monkland Avenue and the fabulous Art Deco Snowdon Theatre where I saw The Sound of Music in 1965 – at 11 years old. We lived on the adjacent street.
  3. Ibid.
  4. Ibid
  5. It’s a ban that stayed in place until 1962. Over 70 children were crushed to death escaping from the balcony of a Sunday showing after a small fire.
  6. Pelletier, Louis. The Fellows Who Dress the Pictures: Montreal Film Exhibitors in the Days of Vertical Integration (1912-1952). Concordia PhD Thesis, Communications Department. 2012. The Montreal Gazette, December 31, 1932. The official story is Isadore fell trying to build a device to hang a flag to signal his chauffeur. This happened after his secretary had left his office. After dark. In the depth of winter. Supposedly, Isadore’s unfinished cigar was found on the sill. The police cited unnamed sources for this report, not the secretary, not the chauffeur, not the wife.
  7. www.digitalmediahistory.org. In 1921, Jules was interviewed by Variety about the controversy over Sunday showings. In 1924, he was interviewed about risqué movie posters. In 1926, during the Coderre Commission into Police Impropriety and Malfeasance, his name is brought up in connection with the police. It is said he forced police on the beat to look the other way when movie houses broke the bylaws by letting children in unattended. The New York Times rehashed this bit in 1926 in a two-page story covering testimony during American Senate hearings into Prohibition. In 1927, Jules is mentioned in relation to the Laurier Palace Fire. Jules was the first to testify at both the initial inquest and the later Royal Commission.
  8. Family lore says his death was due to bone cancer from the X-Rays he received from a broken leg from the accident. Upon his death the Montreal Gazette reported that Jules spent 2 months in hospital for this broken leg. Seems a long time, especially for a man with a comfy home and wife and 3 grown daughters to look after him.
  9. Jules had been forced to retire by new Mayor Camillien Houde. Jules negotiated a huge pension of 8,000 dollars a year that was rescinded in 1937 with an emergency measure due to the Depression, just two weeks before he was knocked down by that policeman on Royal Avenue, a block from the United Amusement Offices on Monkland.
  10. In 2008, I asked my mother to tell me all she remembered about her childhood and my grandfather. She didn’t know much about the political intrigue but she did know that her father and brother received numerous death threats and that on occasion big shots like the Mayor or the Chief of Police visited their home on Sherbrooke Street West in secret meetings.
  11. According his obit in Le Devoir, he had a mind like a bank vault and each drawer was filled by a City Hall by-law or other fact. A Gazette article about Mayor Mederic Martin in 1937 claimed “Jules Crepeau’s hair went gray teaching aldermen their jobs.”
  12. Jules and Isadore were the sons, two of four, of Joseph Crepeau and Vitaline Forget-Depatie who, according to Jules’ marriage certificate on Drouin (1901 – Maria Roy) were from St.Louis de France, which would be Trois Rivieres. Montreal City Hall records (his file) claim Jules was born in Laval and that Joseph was a house-painter. Joseph’s paternal line can be traced back to Maurice Crespeau (curly-haired ones) of Poitou-Charentes, born 1637. Vitaline’s Forget line goes back to Abraham Martin, owner of the Plaines of Abraham, known as “L’Ecossais.” https://www.geni.com/people/Abraham-Martin-dit-l-Écossais/6000000000397138666  Jules and my mother did have very curly hair and this is perhaps due to deep Sephardic Jew and Algerian roots. My mother has some Sephardic DNA, to the tune of 4 percent. Crespeau (Crespin) is understood to be one of the Sephardic French Canadian names. https://www.jewishgen.org/Sephardic/nameorig.HTM  Jules’ wife’s Maria Roy’s MT DNA has traces of Sephardic as well and can be traced back to a Lily Rodrigue in Normandy. Rodrigue (Rodriguez).

 

Genealogy

Family Jewels

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No one in our family ever had any pieces of magnificent jewellery but even the most ordinary piece has its story.

My mother always wore her wedding band and engagement ring. The diamond in the ring wasn’t big and the band was plain but they were what my father could afford in 1947. As she got older and her fingers were thinner, she kept losing them, one or other or both. Luckily, the staff at her residence kept finding them. Eventually, they encouraged me to keep them.

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After, when I would visit my mother, she would look at her hands and the freshly done nails and say, “You have my rings and I want them!” She thought her hands were naked without them and nobody would know she was married.

“I really want them!” she would say.” She would tell others that Mary had her rings in a Birk’s box in her bureau drawer.

I bought her costume jewellery replacements. She had stories for those too. One, a ‘diamond ring’, she said a policeman found on the street and gave it to her. That one disappeared. Another set she said was her grandmother’s and she was sad when they were thought to be lost. Even a couple of days before she died she still said to me, “I want my rings!”

When we divided up her jewellery there was a large blue glass pin in the shape of a flower. None of us remembered her wearing it or even seeing it before. I gave it to my cousin Sharon. When her brother died recently I looked for pictures of him. There was one when he was a new baby being held by his Grannie, Beatrice Raguin and she was wearing that pin. So now Sharon has something that belonged to her Grannie.

Beatrice Raguin also had a thistle pin, silver with topaz coloured stones. She belonged to a sewing group where all the other ladies were from Scotland. She was French Canadian although born in Greenbay, Wisconsin. So as to fit in, she bought the pin and told everybody she was from Aberdeen. My mother gave me that pin.

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Minnie Eagle Sutherland, my other grandmother worked for Ryrie Brothers in Toronto as a jeweller. I have a stick pin that I think she made. It has a spiral of gold on the top with a tiny diamond and a pearl and now rests in a tiny rectangular box. It might have been a wedding present for her husband as she didn’t work after they were married. There is also a picture of a Union Jack made out of stones and on the back it says made by Minnie Eagle. Unfortunately, we don’t have that piece of jewellery!

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Dad did give my mother a few other pieces of jewellery. He once bought her a silver bracelet at the Tower of London on a business trip to Britain. He said the intricate metalwork reminded him of her tatting. She gave it to me because I could also tat.

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Mom was right. Her rings are in a Birk’s box in my bureau drawer. We haven’t yet decided how their story will continue.

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