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CBC
26 minutes ago
- CBC
Current N.L. wildfires reminiscent of the devastating summer of 1961
"There's a type of flower that closes up at night when it gets dark, and those flowers were closing up in the middle of the day, at noon-hour. The smoke was just so thick." That's how Marvin Barnes, who was six years old and living in Valleyfield at the time, remembers the summer of 1961 in Bonavista Bay. That year, record dry conditions on the island of Newfoundland led to a spate of wildfires that burned for more than three months. Then, as now, crews had to contend with blazes in several different locations at once. Then, as now, thousands of people were evacuated from their communities and could only wait for news on the fate of their homes. The province took steps that will sound familiar to those of us living through this year's ferocious wildfire season. Authorities banned open fires, prohibited travel through the woods, and ultimately declared a state of emergency and asked the Canadian government to send military support. When the flames finally guttered out, they left behind millions of acres of scorched earth and a province determined to change its approach to forest fires in the future. Fighting for the life of the town The summer of 1961 was an unusually dry one. Less than an inch (25.4 milimetres) of rain had fallen on Newfoundland's east coast from late May to early August, compared to an annual average of almost 200 millimetres The dry spell made a tinderbox of Newfoundland's forests and fields, and by mid-June there were a dozen major wildfires burning out of control. One of the most destructive of them was in Bonavista North. First spotted on June 12 near Traverse Brook, it spread rapidly up the coast to Hare Bay, where hundreds of women and children were forced to spend the night in schooners offshore. That was only the beginning. The conflagration would burn for three months and, at its peak, extend over 200,000 hectares. When then-minister of Mines and Resources W. J. Keough flew over the area in early August, he said the smoke from the blaze furled tens of thousands of feet into the air "like the burst from an atomic bomb." Dr. Rex Gibbons, a geologist who would eventually become minister of Mines and Energy himself under the Wells government, was fifteen years old in 1961 and had just graduated from grade eleven when he and his family learned the fire was moving up the shore toward them. "We'd heard of houses burning in Hare Bay and other places along the way," he said in an interview, "and we knew the fire was heading towards Lumsden, towards all the towns here on the coast." While his mother and six younger siblings evacuated to Lumsden North, which was out on a sandy peninsula and safe from the flames, Gibbons and his father stayed behind with the men of the community to help build a fire break. "Every capable person in Lumsden was on the fire line," he remembers. "We were fighting for the life of the town and our own livelihoods." Beating down the burning grass with shovels and spraying hotspots with water from the cans strapped to their backs, they managed to stop the flames from reaching the town. Gibbons and some of his friends later went west along the shore to Carmanville to help fight the fire there. Wildfires lead to improvements in N.L.'s forestry service To prevent further outbreaks, the government banned open fires except at designated sites in public parks and restricted outdoor smoking. They prohibited travel through the woods on the Avalon and Burin peninsulas, including for the purposes of camping, fishing, and berry picking. Officials also introduced mandatory jail sentences for anyone found to have started a fire in the forests, whether intentionally or through negligence. Two young men were sentenced to serve six months in the penitentiary for deliberately setting a fire in a forest in central Newfoundland. Eventually, the provincial government declared a state of emergency, and Ottawa dispatched over 1,200 Canadian troops to help get the blazes under control. By the end of summer, the fires had obliterated dozens of homes and, according to estimates at the time, more than half a million hectares of wilderness. They wiped out Bonavista North's thriving logging industry, which many residents relied on for their winter livelihoods, and, in the words of then-deputy Resources minister Stuart Peters, destroyed "a combination of soils, plants and animals that took from fifteen to twenty thousand years to establish." All that remained across great swaths of the province were ghostly white spruce trunks and ashes on bedrock. But for all its tragedy, the summer of 1961 led to permanent improvements in the way Newfoundland and Labrador deals with wildfires. The scope of the disaster revealed that the province's forestry service lacked the resources to fight such large fires, so the province purchased six aircraft: two Canso water bombers, one large helicopter for transporting firefighters and gear, and three small fixed-wing planes. The government also established a network of 12 weather stations to monitor for hazardous conditions across the province. The fires left an indelible mark not only on landscapes and institutions, but on the people of the province. For Gibbons, the experience is something that those who lived through it will never forget. "We all remember '61."
CBC
40 minutes ago
- CBC
Historian tracks down family of N.B. veteran George Mann and returns his WW II medals
After four months of searching, a Saskatchewan historian finally got the address he needed to return the Second World War medals that belonged to a New Brunswick veteran. John Brady McDonald has now been in touch with the family of veteran George Mann, who was born in Liverpool in 1905 but immigrated to Canada after the war. According to McDonald, Mann was a sailor with the Royal Navy, serving in the Royal Fleet Auxiliary. After he immigrated to Canada, he married Alice Margaret in Saint John. McDonald's research doesn't say where Mann specifically lived, only that he lived in New Brunswick. For his Second World War service, Mann received the 1939-1945 Star, the Atlantic Star for specific service in the Atlantic Ocean, and the Africa Star for being a part of the campaign in Africa. McDonald has been returning veterans' medals and other possessions to their families since 2022 as a way of honouring those who served. The majority of medals he's received have been sent to him by people who stumble across them. He has been trying to find Mann's relatives since April and said it wasn't an easy task. Mann didn't have any children of his own, so it took some effort to find a living relative. It was just last week when he finally found one, and McDonald said it wouldn't have been possible without community support, including from people who read a CBC News story about his search. "As a result of the story CBC did, I received hundreds of emails of people who went on their own onto the internet, onto different genealogy websites and provided a ton of information," he said. McDonald said someone who had better access to a genealogy website was able to track down some of Mann's relatives living in the U.K. He obtained a list of different names that he cross-referenced until he got in contact with Jane Crane, the daughter of Mann's niece. McDonald initially approached Erica Burton, the niece, who showed Craig the article written about Mann and put her in contact with McDonald. After confirming that Craig and Burton were related to Mann, McDonald said, he felt a sense of accomplishment because the medals had finally found their home. "For me, when I make that connection, there's this feeling of the job is nearly done," he said. "The mission is nearly done. It's one step closer." McDonald mailed the medals to the family on Monday, and according to the tracker of the parcel, the shipping will take between a week and 10 days to arrive in Liverpool, where Craig and the rest of Mann's family live. Craig, the great-niece of Mann, said her family knew about him but didn't know about his service during the war or about the medals he received. She said it was a "lovely surprise" when McDonald first approached her mother, who showed her the article about Mann and told her the history behind her great-uncle. "Once he moved [to Canada], I don't believe there was any contact," she said. Craig explained that Mann briefly returned to Liverpool after the war, but once he moved to Canada, he didn't keep in touch with his family in the U.K. Mann came from a big family and had five siblings. Craig's grandmother Josephine was Mann's sister. According to Craig, the closest living family member of Mann's is her mother, Craig's main source of information about Mann. Despite that, Craig said everyone in the family is excited to receive Mann's medals, which will be kept mainly at Craig's mother's house but will be passed around the rest of the family, too. "We are all very happy," she said. "They will be passed [to] all of our youngers members of the family as well. And they can have look at them, and then they'll be able to piece together all this story and this information."
CBC
40 minutes ago
- CBC
Volunteers from across North America giving crumbling N.S. lighthouse a facelift
On an uninhabited island just off the community of Westport, N.S., a part of the community's past is quietly disintegrating. But this summer, a group of volunteers will be arriving on Brier Island from across North America, to bring that structure back to life. The Peter Island lighthouse was built in 1909 to guide ships through treacherous tides and thick fog at the mouth of the Bay of Fundy. "The lighthouse is such an iconic looking lighthouse on … this rugged island with the tides and the huge waves smashing against the rocks," says volunteer John Schwinghamer. "It really doesn't get more beautiful than that." The Canadian Coast Guard decommissioned the lighthouse in 2014. By the time the Municipality of Digby acquired it in 2023 after years of effort, it was already falling apart. Since 2015, volunteers with a community group called Save an Island Lighthouse have been working to preserve the structure, along with two other lighthouses on Digby Neck. This September, volunteers will spend three weeks repairing the Peter Island lighthouse, which is covered in lichen and at risk of being destroyed in a major storm. The lighthouse is recognized under the federal Heritage Lighthouse Protection Act, which designates and preserves historically significant lighthouses. But when the community group applied for funding through Parks Canada to cover the cost of repairs, it was unsuccessful. That meant the prospect of hiring contractors for $200,000 worth of work. 'It was time to step up' Schwinghamer lives in Westport, where he runs an artist residency with his wife; he can see the lighthouse through the windows of a 19th-century church he owns, and restored, on Brier Island. He said the quotes the group were getting from contractors were "outrageous," in part because of the logistical challenge presented by the site. "It's a bit of a nightmare to work on an island that not only is it only accessible by boat, but you've got the tide issues also." So, he made a suggestion to the group. It would ask volunteers to come do the work and he would co-ordinate. "It was time to step up, and I have the skill set, and it was really, I thought, a cool idea to bring in all these volunteers from all over." Repair job a unique opportunity The first phase of the work will involve replacing rotten sections of wood and weather-proofing the structure. New shingles and fresh paint is part of the plan for next year. Starting at the end of August, about a dozen volunteers from Saskatchewan to the southeastern U.S. will spend three weeks doing repairs. They'll be fed and housed in the community. John Penner is joining from Saskatchewan. Before retiring, he worked on heritage architecture with the Municipality of Saskatoon. "The project was so unusual, it piqued my interest." He said heritage buildings are being lost on the Prairies, too, which made the opportunity to save a historic building on the East Coast appealing. "[Heritage buildings] are not only symbols, but physical representation of history." Steven Sparks first heard about the project through social media. As a longtime fan of the show The Curse of Oak Island, Sparks had joined several Nova Scotia community Facebook groups, and saw the call for volunteers posted there. Sparks, a contractor who lives in Greensboro, N.C., has never been to Nova Scotia, but saw the project as a unique opportunity. "How many times in your lifetime do you have the opportunity to say, 'Yeah, I worked on a lighthouse?' I can understand a community's desire to preserve the work of its past and have that as a beacon." Sparks said he's been struck by how welcoming and friendly people in the community have been, even at a time when the relationship between Canada and the U.S. has been on the rocks. "I support all people. I support Canadians, I support Americans. I think working together, working peacefully, being respectful of our neighbours and our community is what makes us a great and successful society, both Canada and America. And I think that we need to continue to look at ways to work together." Heritage buildings important to community, volunteers say Tyler Pulley, the CAO of the Municipality of Digby, said the municipality sees the lighthouse as an integral part of the community, and has committed $60,000 of its budget to repairs. "We chose to take over these lighthouses. And ultimately, we have a responsibility to ensure they're maintained for years to come." But the cost of even minor repairs can add up, which is why Pulley said he admires the work of the community group, and of volunteers, who are willing to pitch in on preservation. "They've worked very hard for a long time to acquire and restore the lighthouses and their diligent work and the pride they have in the community is admirable," he said. "It's amazing, it honestly is." When the lighthouse was decommissioned in 2014, it was replaced by a simple metal structure with a light to guide seafarers. Though the lighthouse is no longer needed for navigation, Schwinghamer said preserving it can still offer a guiding light. "If you reduce everything to sheer numbers, then … maybe it doesn't make sense to save these buildings, but that just doesn't capture at all what makes a community a good place to live," he said. "If we just eliminated everything that was rotten or falling down … we would lose a lot of beautiful, beautiful buildings."
