20-03-25_Feature

Dr. Louis Joseph

I should warn you that this starts with a grave. It’s only fitting, it’s a tragic story after all. There is a modest cemetery in The Bight where I’d walk, reading the names on the aging gravestones. That’s all they were to me then, just names. This ...

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Pittman, Thompson and Lamb

I'm building timelines to cover the lives of Little Bay's prominent historical figures in a series of Facebook notes. It's an attempt to keep track of some of my sources both publicly and chronologically while also potentially drawing the attention o ...

20-02-25_Feature

Admiral Kennedy’s Visit

The following is an excerpt from Admiral Kennedy's 1885 text "Sport, Travel, and Adventure in Newfoundland and the West Indies" in which he recounts his visit to Little Bay in 1881. Soon after we had anchored, the " oldest in- habitant" came on boa ...

20-02-24_Feature

Her Lady of Carmel Parish

https://youtu.be/vTiqLNid-YYBuildings are strange and social things. Churches have especially complicated relationships. Little Bay’s Catholic church and its first priest are entwined. Their relationship exemplifies this project as a whole. I uncover ...

20-01-28_Feature

Otis Boyden

The story of Little Bay’s first photographer is incomplete. It’s an unfinished puzzle which hints at a fascinating whole if it could only be put together. The pieces I’ve assembled, however, resist joining neatly. The first piece was the name Otis ...

20-01-15_Feature

A Tinsmith’s Tale

The first tinsmith in Little Bay was a man named Robert Malcolm. He is first documented in the town in 1882. He was married to Catherine Morisey and the couple had four children. In the late 1880s Little Bay was experiencing something referred to as ...

20-01-03_Feature

Mine Manager E.C. Wallace

Little Bay was a prosperous and cosmopolitan town in the 19th century. It was unusual for its time and place. However, while there was variety in its resident’s nationalities and a mixture of languages could be heard spoken on its streets, the popula ...

19-12-27_Feature

Big Dan Courtney

Daniel “Big Dan” Courtney was the proprietor of the Little Bay Hotel. He came to Little Bay from Halifax and first appears in my sources in May of 1885. Innkeepers of the time were big men. They had to be. Big Dan was the exception. He wasn’t a lar ...

19-12-20_Feature

Baron Franz von Ellershausen

The Baron drew me in. I’d started researching my mother’s hometown of Little Bay while working on her genealogy. Growing up I’d often heard it said there that the town had once been one of the biggest on the island but the true scale of the history ...