Downhome March 2019

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8 pancake recipes you’ll FLIP for

$4.99 March 2019

Vol 31 • No 10

Great Jiggs Dinner Debate Craft Beer Cheat Sheet

Pirate Treasure Tour

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life is better Published monthly in St. John’s by Downhome Publishing Inc. 43 James Lane, St. John’s, NL, A1E 3H3 Tel: 709-726-5113 • Fax: 709-726-2135 • Toll Free: 1-888-588-6353 E-mail: mail@downhomelife.com Website: www.downhomelife.com Editorial Editor-in-Chief Janice Stuckless Assistant Editor Elizabeth Whitten Special Publications Editor Tobias Romaniuk Art and Production Art Director Vince Marsh Graphic and Web Designer Cory Way Illustrator Mel D’Souza Illustrator Snowden Walters Advertising Sales Senior Account Manager Robert Saunders Account Manager Barbara Young Marketing Director Tiffany Brett Finance and Administration Senior Accountant Karen Critch Junior Accountant Marlena Grant Operations Manager Alicia Brennan Operations Manager, Twillingate Nicole Mehaney

Warehouse Operations Warehouse Operator Josephine Collins Distribution Sales & Merchandising Joseph Reddy Sr. Customer Service Associate Sharon Muise Inventory Control Clerk Heather Lane Warehouse Associate Anthony Sparrow Retail Operations Retail Floor Manager, Water Street Jackie Rice Retail Floor Manager, Avalon Mall Carol Howell Retail Floor Manager, Twillingate Donna Keefe Retail Sales Associates Crystal Rose, Emma Goodyear, Jonathon Organ, Nicole French, Elizabeth Gleason, Janet Watkins, Melissa Wheeler, Rebecca Ford, Darlene Burton, Erin McCarthy

Subscriptions Sr. Administrative Assistant Amanda Ricks Customer Service Associate Ciara Hodge Founding Editor Ron Young Chief Executive Officer / Publisher Grant Young President Todd Goodyear Chief Financial Officer Tina Bromley

To subscribe, renew or change address use the contact information above.

Subscriptions total inc. taxes, postage and handling: for residents in NL $39; AB, BC, MB, NU, NT, QC, SK, YT $40.95; ON $44.07; NB, NS, PE $44.85. US and International mailing price for a 1-year term is $49.00.

Canada Post Canadian Publications Mail Sales Product Agreement #40062919 The advertiser agrees that the publisher shall not be liable for damages arising out of errors in advertisements beyond the amount paid for the space actually occupied by the portion of the advertisement in which the error occurred, whether such error is due to the negligence of the servants or otherwise, and there shall be no liability beyond the amount of such advertisement. The Letters to the Editor section is open to all letter writers providing the letters are in good taste, not libelous, and can be verified as true, correct and written by the person signing the letter. Pen names and anonymous letters will not be published. The publisher reserves the right to edit, revise, classify, or reject any advertisement or letter. © Downhome Publishing Inc. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without permission of the publisher.

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada.

Printed in Canada Official onboard magazine of

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99

got me Shrove!

Contents

MARCH 2019

46 Unexpected Irishness Dennis Flynn explores seven strong, some surprising, connections between Ireland and Newfoundland and Labrador.

88 Forest Bathing A new movement reminds people that sometimes what they need is a walk in the woods.

Elizabeth Whitten

99 Everyday Recipes

112

good for what ales you

www.downhomelife.com

Get ready to make the most of Pancake Day with these 8 different and delicious pancake recipes.

112 Stumped about Stout?

We have your craft brewery cheat sheet.

Tobias Romaniuk

March 2019

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Contents

MARCH 2019

homefront 10 I Dare Say A note from the editor 11 Contributors Meet the people behind the magazine

12 Letters from our Readers The first $100 winner, cruising with Downhome, and treasured snapshots of the past

20 Submission of the Year

22 g’day mate

22 Downhome Tours Explore Australia with Downhome

24 Why is That Why do dogs turn in circles before lying down? And why does Newfoundland and Labrador have its own time zone? Linda Browne 26 That’s Amazing Wild news from around the world

28 Life’s Funny Dangers of Driving David Roche

26

you otter know

29 Say What A contest that puts words in someone else’s mouth

30 Lil Charmers Chillin’ 32 Pets of the Month Posers 34 Blast from the Past Remember Chewing Frankum?

36 Poetic Licence Between the Rock and a Hard Place by Vicki Schofield, and Ode to Harry’s Harbour by Richard Taylor 4

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64

northern exposures

38 Reviewed Denise Flint interviews Annette Martin and reviews her book, The Alder Bed.

40 What Odds For Paul Warford, fashion is in the eye of the beholder.

features 42 Always On Air Inside VOWR, Newfoundland and Labrador’s oldest radio station Elizabeth Whitten 52 Designed to Impress Thanks to these creative designers, high fashion is in style in Newfoundland and Labrador. Elizabeth Whitten 62 Declutter for a Cause

52 flair for fashion www.downhomelife.com

64 Sure Shots Featuring photographer Samantha Jacque

explore 72 What’s on the Go Exciting events happening around NL March 2019

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Contents 74 Pirate Treasure Tour Dennis Flynn takes us on an adventurous romp, chasing down leads on pirates and rumours of their buried treasure.

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interesting stuff

80 Forest for the Trees How to know your juniper from your snotty var Todd Hollett

92 A Famous Fisherman Seen by millions smiling from the front of a popular postcard, this “jolly” fisherman was a joy to meet in real life.

Mel D’Souza

94 Stuff About What do the redeyed tree frog, Chinese philosopher Confucius and the movie Shaft have in common?

food and Leisure 96 The Everyday Gourmet Apple Butter Andrea Maunder

110 Tasty Top 10 Readers’ favourite NL foods, plus a debate about Jiggs Dinner

96

butter me up

116 Down to Earth Introduce children to gardening with their own rows to hoe Ross Traverse

reminiscing 122 Flashbacks Classic photos of people and places

123 This Month in History The Daily News gets its start

116

wee green thumbs 6

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124 mystery woman

124 Who was the Mysterious Margaret Carter? An upcoming museum exhibit in Mount Pearl is hoping to shed light on the major players of an historic transatlantic air race – including the St. John’s woman who played a part. Linda Browne

128 If This Old House Could Talk Lester Green lets the house do the talking in this imaginative retelling of his family history in South West Arm.

132 A Treacherous Trip Home About the cover This boil-up photo by Candace Pilgrim of Griquet, NL, was taken during an enjoyable day in the woods. It's the perfect illustration for this month’s feature on the health benefits of being in nature. Story starts on p. 88.

Cover Index 8 Pancake Recipes • 99 Inside VOWR • 42 Designed to Impress • 52 Wellness in the Woods • 88 Great Jiggs Dinner Debate • 111 Craft Beer Cheat Sheet • 112 Pirate Treasure Tour • 74

How a family excursion was almost sunk by a series of dangerous shoals Kim Ploughman

138 Between the Boulevard and the Bay Ron Young revisits the pros and cons of marijuana legalization

140 Collective Memories The Americans in Ship Harbour Andrea McGuire

142 Mail Order 146 Real Estate/Marketplace 148 Puzzles 160 Photo Finish

www.downhomelife.com

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The story behind Newfoundland Time, pg. 25

Ron Hynes book giveaway Head to downhomecontests.com between March 11-18 to enter to win a copy of One Man Grand Band: the lyrical life of Ron Hynes by Harvey Sawler.

8 March 2019

Where you might find hidden pirate treasure in NL, pg. 74

Apple Crisp to Zucchini Carbonara Looking to cook something new?

EverydayRecipes.ca has nearly 3,000 recipes for you to try.

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Submission Guidelines and Prize Rules

You could WIN $100!

Every reader whose PHOTO, STORY, JOKE or POEM appears next to this yellow “from our readers” stamp in a current issue receives $10 and a chance at being drawn for the monthly prize: $100 for one photo submission and $100 for one written submission. Prizes are awarded in Downhome Dollars certificates, which can be spent like cash in our retail stores and online at shopDownhome.com.*

Submit Today!

Send your photo, story, joke or poem to

Downhome 43 James Lane St. John’s, NL, A1E 3H3 or submit online at:

www.downhomelife.com *Only 1 prize per submitter per month. To receive their prize, submitters must provide with their submission COMPLETE contact information: full name, mailing address, phone number and email address (if you have one). Mailed submissions will only be returned to those who include a self-addressed, stamped envelope. Downhome Inc. reserves the right to publish submissions in future print and/or electronic media campaigns. Downhome Inc. is not responsible for unsolicited material. www.downhomelife.com

March 2019

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i dare say When life makes your head spin, sometimes you have to put your foot down.

It’s like when you go to bed after having a few too many drinks, and you put one foot on the floor to stop the room from spinning. Sometimes you just need the world to stop spinning so fast.

Most of us lead hectic lives these days. Where technology was supposed to do all the work for us and give us more leisure time, it has instead made us busier.

Modern transportation just means we can go more places in one day; cellphones mean we can make and take calls while we’re travelling; and computers, rather than do the work for us, have become our taskmasters.

Every day is like a race from start to finish, and we could all use a breather.

There is a way to stretch the day, to slow time. You can even make the world stop, at least for a moment.

The key is to lose yourself in that moment. The Japanese have figured it out. They invented Shinrin-Yoku, or “forest bathing,” in which you immerse yourself in the sights, sounds, smells, tastes and touch of the woods.

The practice has travelled around the world and has arrived in Newfoundland and Labrador (see story on page 88).

I haven’t yet tried forest bathing (though now I will), but there are times when I get lost in the moment and all other things cease to exist: working out, baking, gardening and, lately, watching my grandson sleep in my arms. During those moments, nothing else matters and everything else can wait. And when the moment has passed, life just picks up where I got off, and I am better able to ride it out.

Thanks for reading,

Janice Stuckless, Editor-in-chief janice@downhomelife.com

10 March 2019

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Contributors

Meet the people behind the magazine

Todd Hollett

Todd Hollett is a longtime Downhome contributor, covering science and nature in ways that range from identifying local animals to exploring the environment with your kids. “I’ve always loved the outdoors, loved animals, had an interest in enforcement, so put it all together [and] this is what I am,” says Todd, a wildlife conservation officer who lives on the Burin Peninsula.

In this issue, he walks us through the forests in the province, identifying various tree species. Along the way, he drops some fascinating facts about them. For instance, “The deep roots of the alder not only provide soil stability, but also fix nitrogen in the soil thanks to a symbiotic relationship with a bacteria,” Todd explains. Those famous spruce tuckamores? Some of them are hundreds of years old, but because they tend to live in cold and windswept areas, they can only grow about a foot high while their branches spread out along the ground.

For an arboreal tour with Todd, turn to page 80. www.downhomelife.com

Susan Herdman

Though Susan Herdman now lives in the US state of Georgia, she was born in Corner Brook, NL, where her father worked for Bowater’s paper mill.

When she was six years old, her family relocated to the States, but her parents wanted them to have strong ties to home, so for 20 years they returned to NL every summer, she recalls.

“I’ve kept my Newfoundland roots, I tell ya,” she declares. She’s even mindful of the hour-and-a-half time difference when it really counts. “On New Year’s Eve, we always toast at 10:30 down here!”

The last time she was home was in 1997, but this summer she’ll return, she says. You can hear the anticipation in her voice.

Susan has been a dedicated Downhome reader for 30 years and still has copies of the original Downhomer when it was published in Ontario.

Susan has been sending us cherished photos that once belonged to her parents, including the picture on page 122 of a young Bill Cross and her father, Robert Herdman.

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Days Gone By I consider this photo to be one of the better pictures I have ever taken.

Some years ago, I was on my way back from Webber’s Cove, walking out to Lawn lighthouse, on to Rageddy Head then back around to L’Anse aux Barque when I happened on these fine fellows at the hay. At that time, making hay was beginning to decline somewhat as people got rid of their cattle and horses in favour of mechanized means of transport, ATVs and such, and I thought I’d better grab this shot of Duff (Dolph) and Jim Jarvis making a hay reek. They helped by waiting until I was ready to snap the photo and continued making the reek as I took the shot.

It was the end of an era, or close to it. People still make hay these days, 12 March 2019

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just not to the degree it was done then.

Most every family in Lawn made hay in those days. It was part of the culture: you watched the skies and hoped there were no showers or fog closing in, and if there were, it was a mad scramble to get the hay made up so it didn’t get wet.

This photo was lost to me because of damaged negatives, until my dear sister, Margaret, used her negative scanner to save it from oblivion and post it to Facebook.

Patrick Tarrant Lawn, NL

This is certainly a snapshot of a different time, Patrick. How many readers have memories and photos from activities that were once common but now are hardly done? Send us your stories and photos from the olden days of working the fields with horse and cart, splitting fish on the stage, hauling water from the well etc. You can write to us, as Patrick did, at Downhome, 43 James Lane, St. John’s, NL, A1E 3H3.

Or email your stories and photos to editorial@downhomelife.com.

First $100 Winner!

It was an exciting surprise to open an envelope from you to reveal two $50 coupons, related to my story that you published in the January issue. Much appreciated – in fact, I placed an order this afternoon, and mailed in the coupon.

I had previously sent a couple of letters to the editor about incidents, so perhaps I’ll manage to offer another story from my memories of living in St. John’s from 1933 to 1940 (ages 8-15), and perhaps also from 1966 to www.downhomelife.com

1987, when, as a corporate manager for Atlantic region based in Halifax, I visited businesses across the island and proudly opened a company branch in St. John’s employing all Newfoundlanders.

I have much affection for Newfoundland and Newfoundlanders.

Even Joey [Smallwood] once called me “an honorary Newfoundlander” when I was introducing to him some of my Ontario bosses.

John Williamson Halifax, NS

Congratulations again, John, on winning our new monthly submission grand prize. As always, everyone whose photo, story or poem appears in an issue with a From Our Readers stamp on it is rewarded with Downhome Dollars coupons, but this year we’ve increased the bonuses paid to our generous submitters. Now every qualifying photo and every qualified written submission goes into a draw for $100 in Downhome coupons that can be used like cash in our St. John’s and Twillingate stores, and online at ShopDownhome.com. See page 9 of this issue for details.

Memories of Newfoundland I received my January issue of Downhome and it was a joy to read Danny Delancy’s letter about the cod fishery and past culture of Newfoundland.

Memories of Newfoundland flood my mind daily. I’ve often thought some of these memories would be considered silly ones until I read Danny’s letter and he mentioned “The Blackbird” song. I could not tell you how many times I’ve sung that song while driving.

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find corky sly conner Hidden somewhere in this issue is Corky Sly Conner.

Can you find him?

Look carefully at all the photographs and in the text of the stories. If you spot Corky, send us your name, address and phone number, along with a note telling us where he’s located. Your name will be entered in a draw and the winner will receive a coupon worth 25 Downhome Dollars redeemable at our store, or through our website.

Send your replies to: Corky Contest

Congratulations

Photo by Doreen Fish

to Nancy Hynes of Noel’s Pond, NL, who found Corky on page 148 of the January issue.

Yes, life has changed a lot in Newfoundland since my summer visits. I was very sad on my last visit in 2010, when I stood on the broken wharf in Lower Island Cove, imagining life when the fishermen would haul in their nets.

I just pray that one thing never changes, and that being the Newfoundland humor. I could use some of that right now.

43 James Lane St. John’s, NL, A1E 3H3

mail@downhomelife.com www.downhomelife.com *No Phone Calls Please One entry per person

Deadline for replies is the end of each month.

Watkins. He was the lighthouse keeper on Baccalieu, Notre Dame Bay until he retired. At 84-and-a-half he still loves his boat and going cod jigging.

Audrey Watkins Twillingate, NL

Judy (Sparks) deMare Leominster, MA, USA

Thanks for your letter, Judy. And don’t worry about us losing our sense of humour. Newfoundlanders and Labradorians always have the last laugh!

Out in Boat This photo was taken on a day in boat with retired lighthouse keeper Harvey 14 March 2019

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Thanks for sharing this photo of Harvey. No doubt he kept many boaters safe during his time as a lightkeeper.

Cruise Companion My mom has enjoyed your magazine and we renew it every year. She is 88 and went on a cruise with my sister down South with her magazine to read. Her name is Marg Dunn (Sweet) and she was raised in Petries Crossing near Corner Brook, NL. When she was young, both her parents passed away.

There were three girls in the family that were split up and raised by uncles and aunts. Two ended up staying in Newfoundland, and my mom moved with her aunt and uncle to Ontario.

She married and had five children, and made trips back home whenever she could. When the kids were old enough, my mom and dad would take a month every year and go home to visit her sisters and family. She loves the Downhome and reads it front to back.

Peter Dunn Via email

Found on Facebook Elaine Lynch Here is a picture of my cat (Cosmo) and his new friend he met the weekend at our cabin.

Tammy Green 4th Pond for fish cakes and tea

Nice to see you enjoying the January issue, Marg! Maybe next year you can join us on the Downhome Cruise. www.downhomelife.com

March 2019

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RECENT TWEETS

Alick Tsui @positively4ever Beautiful NL afternoon for an outdoor winter hike/snowshoeing after fresh snow #QuidiVidi

Blast From the Past I love your magazine. My sister, Shirley Birmingham, sends it to me all the time.

I left Newfoundland and Labrador in 1954 and go home every summer to visit.

I’m enclosing a picture to see if I can find out who the lady third from the left is. It was probably taken while we were in Grade 8.

Sheila Patrick, Lewiston, ME, USA

Anyone recognize any of the girls in this photo? Email us at editorial@downhomelife.com or write to Downhome, 43 James Lane, St. John’s, NL, A1E 3H3.

We’ll print responses in follow-up issues.

16 March 2019

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Guinness and Smithwicks are like any other young brothers. The 9-year-olds spend most of their days playing, running around and chasing each other.

The stunning registered Newfoundland Pony stallions live in Westport, Ontario at J&D Farms with proud owners Dave and Joan Moloughney. From time to time, duty calls when a mare is brought to the farm to be bred! Guinness (#772) and Smithwicks (#773) are sought-after studs for breeding, owing to their valuable bloodline in the Newfoundland Pony breed - and their large size. Guinness is 14 hands high and Smithwicks is over 14 hands. Their father is the majestic Captain Sweetapple (#591) and their mother, the beautiful Pallas Athene (#763).

In the Newfoundland Pony world, the brothers are a bestkept secret, as their physical characteristics and temperament deliver the best of what this pony is known for.

Dave says, “I swear they remember everything. When Joan suffered a stroke a few years ago, they would watch out for her and follow her around. It’s as if they knew something had happened.”

Some people are quick to geld stallions in order to control aggressive behaviour. Thankfully, Dave and Joan are committed to working with the stallions to ensure their bloodline is passed on to a new generation of Newfoundland Ponies. Dave has been around horses all his life and cautions against isolating these herd animals: “the more you isolate them, the meaner they get.”

He ís a big fan of Newfoundland Ponies and finds the breed sure-footed, easy to train and wonderful with children.

His grandchildren, aged two to seven, spend time in the ring with Guinness and Smithwicks. The ponies are gentle with them, as if they know somehow that they are children.

Top: Guinness (left) & Smithwicks To reach Joan and Dave Moloughney, you can email: moloughneyjoan@gmail.com, or call: 613.273.7335.

Middle: Lianna Spies & Guinness Bottom: Smithwicks (left) & Guinness

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“As per my dad, this is a stamping, scoring tool for marking wooden drums or barrels. The left hand point digs in while the right hand point scores/marks, as a compass would turn. The lower blade leaves a gouge while pulling toward you. The correct term is apparently very long-winded.”

– Sandy Williams

The Mystery Continues In December we published a letter from Patricia Baker, who was trying to identify this item found in a tool shed. By January, we thought the mystery was solved when John Sinclair identified it as a timber scribe used by surveyors.

Well, recently we received new responses from readers with more suggestions as to what this item was used for: “Looks like a lucet, or knitting forks.

Very similar to the lucet that I have.”

– Audrey Reid

“This was used somewhat like a can opener. Used when making stovepipe to cut the metal, usually to fit one piece of stovepipe into the next.”

– Roy Bannister

Well, now we’re as confused as when we started. All of these responses seem plausible, and it’s interesting that we got no two responses alike. Are there any more suggestions? Can anyone break the deadlock? Contact us by email at editorial@downhomelife.com or write to Downhome, 43 James Lane, St. John’s, NL, A1E 3H3.

In a recent poll on DownhomeLife.com we asked:

Who was your favourite kids’ TV show host?

Visit DownhomeLife.com and chime in on our latest poll: Which of these NL foods would you find hardest to give up for Lent?

18 March 2019

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www.downhomelife.com

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homefront By public vote, the

2018

SUBMISSION OF THE YEAR IS‌

A Reel Fisherman Congratulations to Dana Walsh of Labrador City, NL. She submitted this photo, taken by Brad Dillon Photography. It was originally published with the Lil Charmers in the May 2018 issue of Downhome. It was the top votegetter in our online Submission of the Year poll, and for winning, Dana receives a three-year subscription to Downhome and an iPad mini!

20 March 2019

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Runner-up Colours of Burin, Jim Costello, Mount Pearl, NL

Second Runner-up Diving with Downhome Connie Wettlaufer Cambridge, ON

Thank you to all those who submitted their photos and those who voted.

Who will be the winner of our next Submission of the Year? Will it be YOU? Turn to page 9 to find out how you can get published in Downhome in 2019. www.downhomelife.com

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homefront Downhome Tours...

Australia

Game for an Adventure Lidy Vokey (posing here with the Sydney Opera House in the background) and her husband, Keith Vokey, of Spaniard’s Bay, NL, visited Sydney, Australia last year to support their son Mark, who was competing in the 2018 Invictus Games.

The Sydney Opera House’s construction began in 1959 and was completed in 1973. It’s one of the most famous and distinct buildings of the 20th century, making the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2007. It receives an estimated 8.2 million visitors each year.

22 March 2019

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Koala Cuddle Time Josh White travelled from British Columbia to Australia to visit his mother, and while there, he stopped by the Cohunu Koala Park for some fun.

Photo submitted by Valerie Leaman, Perth, Australia.

Located just outside the Australian city of Perth, Cohunu Koala Park is a wildlife sanctuary for parrots, dingoes, kangaroos, emus and, of course, koalas you can cuddle. There’s also a miniature railway and pioneer railway museum on site.

Trekking the Trails Irene O’Brien of Kentville, NS was visiting friends in Warburton, Australia, when she decided to walk the Lilydale to Warburton Rail Trail.

Located in eastern Australia, the Lilydale to Warburton Rail Trail is a 38km-long former railway line. Decades after the railway had been abandoned, it was turned into a trail for walkers, cyclists and horse-riders in 1996. www.downhomelife.com

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Expert answers to common life questions.

By Linda Browne

Why do dogs turn in circles before lying down?

Have you ever observed your furry, four-legged friends and chuckled at the seemingly endless circle spinning they do before they finally plop down? Turns out there’s a perfectly good explanation for your pooch’s puzzling behaviour.

“Our pet dogs circle before settling down to sleep because their ancestors did it – it is an ingrained and inherited behaviour,” says Dr. Maggie BrownBury, Emergency and Critical Care Veterinarian at the Veterinary Specialty Centre of Newfoundland and Labrador in Mount Pearl.

“There are a lot of theories as to why wild canids such as wolves circle before laying down,” Dr. Brown-Bury says, from flattening down the terrain and moderating the temperature (e.g. “reposition snow for wind protection, scuff away topsoil that had been heated by the sun to expose cooler undersoil,” she adds) to make a comfy bed, to making a 360-degree assessment of their surroundings to ensure their safety before slumber. This ritual also ensured that the animal would lay with their nose pointed windward, allowing them to catch a whiff of potential threats.

Other theories suggest that pack 24 March 2019

animals, like wolves and coyotes, turn in circles to flatten the area, leaving a sign to other animals that “This spot is taken!” or to drive out snakes and other creepy crawlies from their sleeping space.

“Of course, these are just theories – we can’t ask a wolf why it circles and have to try to figure it out through observation and reasoning. But we are confident the reason our pet dogs do it stems from their ancestral roots,” says Dr. Brown-Bury.

While this behaviour is normal, excessive circling can be an indication that something is wrong. Any change in your pet’s behaviour should be noted, Dr. Brown-Bury adds.

“If a dog who hardly circles at all is circling a lot, I would be concerned that dog is finding it difficult to get comfortable. If your dog has always circled many times, that may just be their personality.”

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Why does Newfoundland have its own time zone?

As one of our famous tourism ads states: “When you’re always a halfhour ahead, you never feel the need to catch up.” Perhaps that’s why life seems to run a bit slower here in Newfoundland (and parts of Labrador).

Our unique time zone has long been an item of intrigue and it definitely comes with a few perks (we’re the first in North America to ring in the New Year and the first to greet the sun). So how exactly did Newfoundland Standard Time come to be?

Our system of Standard Time sees the earth, theoretically, divided into 24 time zones of 15 degrees, each differing by an additional hour. In reality there are more, as their exact locations are often based on political rather than geographic boundaries. When time zones were being established, Newfoundland was a separate dominion and had the option of establishing its own time zone – which is exactly what it did.

“If you’re using straight 15 degree cycles, all of the Maritimes, the island of Newfoundland and almost all of Labrador would be on one single time zone... At the time when this was first being set up in the 1880s and 1890s, Newfoundland was not part of Canada… So that was a political decision

and a social decision. It was because the government of Newfoundland at the time wanted to make it very clear that they were distinct from Canada, from the Maritimes. And so they set up their half-hour time zone to make that clear statement,” says Dr. Norm Catto, head of the Department of Geography at Memorial University.

To really throw visitors to our province for a loop, while most of Labrador observes Atlantic Standard Time, parts of the coast operate on Newfoundland Standard Time. In 1963, the provincial government, under Joey Smallwood, suggested the possibility of switching the island to Atlantic Time, but public outcry was fierce and the idea was abandoned.

Newfoundland and Labrador’s distinct time zone, Dr. Catto says, has become part of the cultural identity.

“If you’re trying to separate yourself from Nova Scotia, this is one more indication of how separate you are. So for some people, it’s a matter of pride in Newfoundland.”

Do you have a burning life question for Linda to investigate?

Turn to page 9 for ways to contact us. www.downhomelife.com

?

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homefront

That’s

AMAZING Wild news from around the world

Follow the Chocolate Paved Road Due to a technical failure at a chocolate plant in December, liquid chocolate spilled into the streets of Westönnen, Germany. Due to the cold, the chocolate quickly hardened on the ground, creating a chocolate road. Firefighters had to chip away at it with shovels, hot water and torches to pry it off the ground.

He’s Dairy Tiny A miniscule calf named Lil’ Bill was recently born at a farm in Mississippi, US. Weighing 4.5 kg and about the size of a house cat, he was about one-tenth the size of an average newborn calf.

Screaming Bloody Murder

Police officers arrived at a house in Perth, Australia expecting to find a bloody murder scene, only to meet an apologetic man. A neighbour had called authorities after hearing someone scream, “Why don’t you die?!” Turns out the man has arachnophobia and was trying to kill a spider. There were no injuries, except to the spider.

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Did Not Disturb

Archaeologists recently uncovered an undisturbed Egyptian tomb, a rare find because many tombs have been looted by grave robbers. But this one had remained sealed for 4,400 years. It belonged to an Egyptian high priest who had lived during the Fifth Dynasty.

Smooth Criminal The Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Garden in Vancouver, BC is home to muchbeloved koi fish, but for a while it was also the crash pad to a river otter who’d managed to sneak into the Classical Chinese garden. While there, it snacked on the fish one-by-one. Attempts to capture the otter were unsuccessful. In fact, traps were laid out and the otter managed to sneak in, eat the bait and slip out.

Foiled by Science

Flat Earthers believe our planet is flat with corners (Brimstone Head, Fogo Island, NL is claimed to be one).

They reject the idea that Earth is round. In 2020, the Flat Earth International Conference will set sail on their own cruise. However, they might be bummed to find out that nautical navigation is based on the planet being spherical.

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homefront life’s funny

Dangers of Driving My Uncle Adrian Hunt from Rushoon, NL is a salt-of-the-earth guy and was a hard-working fisherman all his life. He’s also been known to make the occasional slip of the tongue. My favourite Uncle Adrian story occurred when the family was discussing the dangers of driving on the Burin Peninsula. After hearing a story on the evening news about a car accident, my uncle (who never drove) got a pensive look before solemnly stating, “Yes, b’y, driving is pretty dangerous.

You can’t take your eyes off the road for five minutes!”

David Roche Athens, Ohio (originally from Conception Bay South, NL)

Do you have any funny or embarrassing true stories?

Share them with us. If your story is selected, you’ll win a prize! See page 9 for details.

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“Smile for the birdie!”

- Trace Stagg

Say WHAT? Downhome recently posted this photo (sent in by Harold Feiertag) on our website and Facebook page and asked our members to imagine what the puffin might be saying. Trace Stagg’s response made us chuckle the most, so we’re awarding her 20 Downhome Dollars!

Here are the runners-up: “I waited all day to get the perfect shot of a human. I need to send it to the Downnest.” – Heather Harding “I need to get a bird’s eye view on this shot.” – Doug Hicks “So this is what tourists do here all day, eh?” – Cal Burge

Want to get in on the action?

Go to www.downhomelife.com/saywhat

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“Like” us on Facebook www.facebook.com/downhomelife

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chillin’ Pan-oramic View Nine-month-old Kelti is just loving her sleigh ride in what may have otherwise been a fish pan.

April Duhamel River of Ponds, NL

Baby’s First Boil-up Kate Pye experiences her first cookout in the country with her family.

Cynthia Slaney Point May, NL

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Taking a Break Beau is going to leave all the hard work of packing the wood to his poppy Russell.

Sami Budden Fort McMurray, AB

Pile on the cuteness Ethan Bennett takes a spell while helping pile wood with his poppy.

Stephanie Alexander Stephenville Crossing, NL

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homefront pets of the month

posers Dash Hound?

Penny the Yorkie waits in the car outside Bidgoods, hoping someone brings her back a treat.

Joe Sobol St. John’s, NL

Shades of Cool Murray looks ready to Netflix and chill.

Helen Rose Pasadena, NL

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Ideal Evening Out With the snow dusting his fur, Berg the Newfoundland dog is in his element.

Stephen Hawco Nova Scotia

Double Double Take If anyone were ever accused of being hopped up on caffeine, it would have to be these two cuties.

Kaeleigh Fitzgerald Clarenville, NL

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Remember Chewing Frankum?

The act of chewing any kind of gum dates back thousands of years.

Most sources for early gum leads to some kind of tree or plant. Ancient Greeks chewed resin from the mastic tree, Mayans and Aztecs chewed chicle (a resin of the sapodilla tree), Scandinavians chewed black-birch tar, and indigenous North Americans chewed hardened gobs of spruce sap – similar to the frankum “gum” our parents and grandparents savoured when they were kids.

Don’t believe it? Here’s an essay sent to us recently by reader Gary Rideout. It explains the process of chewing frankum in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Growing up in an outport in the 1950s you appreciated nature and all it had to offer. It provided your work, fun and some challenges. One of those fun challenges was the chewing of frankum.

I looked forward to my father returning home from cutting firewood because I knew he would have his Sea Dog matchbox full of frankum.

Becoming a successful frankum chewer is sort of a process, which begins with selection. Avoiding the softer sap in favour of the harder brownish sap is most important. A beginner would be wise to place just one knob of frankum into their mouth. An accomplished frankum chewer could master more. You need the right combination of saliva, chewing pressure and patience to transform the frankum into a workable state. Frankum doesn’t have the consistency to enable stretching or bubble blowing; if you open your mouth during the softening procedure and allow cooler air to enter, all will be lost. The frankum inside your mouth will become brittle and no amount of coaxing will put it back to a chewable state. You’ll be left with a mouthful of rubble.

When the process is complete, you will have a pale pinkish gum with little flavour. Your jaws will soon tire from chewing frankum because of the lack of elasticity and ductility, and you will experience an overwhelming desire to spit it out.

With so many tasty alternatives to frankum and the lack of patience of today’s generation, I somehow doubt the resurrection of frankum chewing anytime soon.

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homefront poetic licence

Between the Rock and a Hard Place

By Vicki Schofield • Stratford, ON When I went back, it seemed the same, the saltbox houses still remain.

Some were built especially new, others bent backwards, falling through.

There were hubs of houses left behind, abandoned, reluctantly free, slipping, sloping, dripping into the sea.

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These boxes are shadows for us to bereave, reminders of locals who were pulled to leave.

A generation of scattered folk, decisions made on that last bit of hope.

It became an age of de-settlement, not resettlement.

Someday, perhaps it will be, that there will be a saltbox shadow left there for me.

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Ode to Harry’s Harbour Richard Taylor • Ottawa, ON There aren’t many places where you can hear life The rustling of paper and the slicing of a knife The whispers of the wind and the rhythms of the sea The fluttering of birds and the humming of a bee.

From the earliest days of Nehemiah, Solomon and John There’s been a fisherman’s wharf and church filled with song A safe mooring for boats, in from the stormridden sea A place to call home for the whole family.

Up over the trail, down amongst the wild cedar trees Through a blueberrycovered garden to a cool ocean breeze To a kingly cove where eagles soar and gannets dive and play With a view back in time to a long bygone day.

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On a starlit night, with the harbour’s waters alight Moonbeams ease your path on even the darkest night And as you pass like a ghost down along by the shore Peace and tranquility fill your soul forever more.

Fog and drizzle swirl amongst the old clapboard houses Scattered dots of colour nestled in the misty grey cove And the smell of burning wood drifts across every rooftop As families gather around their old cast-iron stoves.

Out of the harbour, on and around the rocky head Down along past Old Billy to the old homestead There’s Three Arms Island at rest in the arm Where families were built with the fish and the farm.

Memories live on of Nellie, Emma and Aunt Bess Of old Uncle Phil, Ralph Moore and the rest Lives lived in toil, on the sea and the shore Souls now in heaven who will pass here no more.

At the end of the road there is no finer a spot To sit back and take stock of the world and its lot On a bright summer’s day down by cool Bottle Pond Where insects hum gently and sea breezes respond.

The message they bring speaks of generous, hardy folk Of lives simply lived and the fond memories they stoke In a town built by baymen with axe, hammer and saw In a place filled with kindness named Harry’s Harbour.

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reviewed by Denise Flint

The Alder Bed Annette Martin Friesen Press $16.49

It’s 1914 in New Perlican, and Lexie Fisher, the spoilt only daughter of a successful sea captain, is in her last year of high school and about to go jannying for the first time.

So begins The Alder Bed by Annette Martin.

Lexie gets a bit of a fright out on the roads after dark, but alas, doesn’t learn from it. A year later her life has lost all its early promise and that bright anticipation of adventure ahead will never be recaptured.

Instead she becomes pregnant and marries Dan, a man who will spend the rest of the book terrorizing her and their three daughters. The Alder Bed is a multi-generational tale about the effects of one woman’s misguided choice and how it can ruin so many lives.

It’s easy to sympathize with many of the characters, but at the same time I wanted them to show a little more backbone. Everyone seemed to do Dan’s bidding without question, and no one else, not even Lexie’s protective brothers, interferes.

Otherwise, there’s a good sense of both place and of time passing as things slowly improve for people over the course of the 20th century.

Conversations are authentic and there’s a lot to enjoy in the fairly slender novel.

Martin has managed to avoid most of the pitfalls that seem to plague a lot of self-published authors. Her book not only looks good, with a nice cover and typography, but it’s also been well edited and is free of the typos, grammar mistakes and other annoyingly amateurish, and far too frequent, hallmarks of a vanity project.

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Q&A with the Author Denise Flint: Was this a behindclosed-doors project or did you take classes and/or join a writing group?

Annette Martin: I went about it

strong. Dan was a rascal and she was very strict with him and had a good sense of humour. I liked her a lot.

backwards. I never thought about a writing group. I had retired and I’d always loved to do paperwork and I started doodling, and then at a certain point it started to come together and I hired a couple of editors from WANL (Writers Alliance of Newfoundland and Labrador), and then someone here. I couldn’t do it the easy way. I just charged ahead. But mostly I was interested in writing. I had no thought for publishing.

DF: Do you wish you’d started sooner?

AM: …I do wish I had started when I

DF: Was it fun to write a book?

AM: Yes, I really liked it – especially as it’s about New Perlican. Every time I sat down to write there I was, right back home. We used to live on the Harbour Road, and there I was going places I used to go when I was a kid, like the Alder Bed where we went swimming. When I shut down the computer it would take me a while to come back to the present. It was hard to write about the ’20s, but when I got to the ’50s and ’60s I loved that because that was my time. I had to research WWI and the Depression.

DF: Who was your favourite character?

AM: I liked Lena, Dan’s mother. She’s www.downhomelife.com

was younger. Even if I’d just done it on Sundays, I would have been a lot further ahead. This took me six or seven years. The anniversary of Beaumont Hamel was a spur, and [so was] Kevin Major’s No Man’s Land. I really enjoyed putting in the things that were happening at the same time [as the events in the book], like Ray Guy and the stuff he used to say about Joey.

DF: Do you have any advice for would-be writers, especially older ones?

AM: I certainly am an older one myself. I would say, just start writing. I didn’t have any idea of turning it into a book. It was a mess for ages. If you like to write, you have to keep pushing and pushing at it. Get into a writing group if you can. I never thought of it at the time. I wrote this on an old manual typewriter, then a friend gave me an electric typewriter and then one day someone persuaded me to get a computer. If I did another one, it would go faster. If you have an interest, you can make it into a story. It can be anything.

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homefront what odds

i’ll wear it out

By Paul Warford

While I’ve I’ve been to a baby christening, but never a christening. I know the concept is basically never owned a boat the same for both, though; it’s a welcoming into ship, I did have the world – an introduction. If I ever make it to the festivities of a vessel christena well-travelled champagne-smash ing, I’m going to lean to the guy standing closest T-shirt that I to me as they launch and I’m going to say, “She’s a boat.” referred to as clever Since the days of trading rum in the islands of “she.” I met her the Caribbean, every ship has been a she. While never owned a ship, I did have a well-travelled in Nova Scotia I’ve T-shirt that I referred to as “she.” I met her in at a used Nova Scotia at a used clothing store.

As my buddy Josh and I rifled through the upclothing store. right bins of Vuarnet discards and Tim Horton’s soccer jerseys, I found this bizarre item. A garment the colour of sand, it had a large print of a striking young woman, her hands raised languidly above her head. Beneath the image was one three-letter word: Pia. I stretched the shirt to its length and called to Josh, asking him who the hell Pia was. He replied, “I dunno, but you gotta buy that shirt.”

This was the style at the time; kids in their late teens wearing long-forgotten clothes of ambiguous design, sold at a bargain to be purchased with Mommy and Daddy’s money. Even back then I saw the irony of the trend.

Anyway, Pia became my showpiece shirt because of her sheer oddity: I’ve always been passionate about wearing one-of-a-kind clothing. After some research, we discovered that Pia was actually Pia Zadora, a childhood Broadway actress who failed to hit it big following her starring role in a highly criticized film in 1981 (a year before my birth). In time, she became a somewhat successful lounge singer. I couldn’t explain why, but these details made the shirt even more charming to us. And so, Pia and I went everywhere together, and when I 40

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“There was German wording on the back, and though I really wanted to buy the thing, I was a bit concerned the foreign phrase would prove an insult to cultures I’d never encountered before, and I’d find myself being beaten mercilessly in a Holland parking lot by thugs offended by something my new jacket had said to them.” graduated university in 2004, she came home with me. She’d developed a hole or two around the neck, but, much like Pia Zadora of real life, she wasn’t ready to be counted out. Years later, when my brother Brian got married and my family flew to Toronto for the ceremony, I made sure Pia was among my packed belongings. She’d become a part of things.

A few years ago, my wife Andie and I went on a pre-honeymoon to Amsterdam, where we toured the cobblestone streets (I regretted my choice of footwear – Converse sneakers, though stylish, are not suited for foot treks in Europe). One day we wandered into a vintage clothing store. While she tried on pencil skirts, I found a beautiful aqua track jacket with navy stripes running down its arms. There was German wording on the back, and though I really wanted to buy the thing, I was a bit concerned the foreign phrase would prove an insult to cultures I’d never encountered before, and I’d find myself being beaten mercilessly in a Holland parking lot by thugs offended by something my new jacket had said to them. In the end, I took the risk and the coat should be in my upstairs closet right now.

Two of my closest friends were a married couple with young children at www.downhomelife.com

the time of our trip. As I wandered the store’s kids’ section, I decided to buy shirts for their twins. The boys were only two at the time, but as I held the disco button-ups to the light I decided they’d probably fit.

The boys are celebrating their sixth birthday today and now the shirts fit them. Their dad uploaded a picture of the boys modelling the duds to his Facebook this morning. Their mom is no longer with us.

As for Pia, I don’t know where she is now. I’d be lying if I said that didn’t make me sad. She might be at Mom and Dad’s, ready to go out on the town again if I just did some digging to find her. Sometimes, though, I think she’s lost to the wind, maybe stuffed into the bottom of a canvas bag while packing up from a cabin sleepover, but the bag never made it to the trunk with the coolers and ball gloves. Sometimes I imagine she made it back to the bin where I found her in New Minas, Nova Scotia. I can’t articulate why, but there’s comfort in the thought.

Paul Warford began writing for Downhome to impress his mom and her friends. He writes and performs comedy in Eastern Canada.

Follow him on Twitter @paulwarford

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Settle into a cozy chair, tune the radio to AM

800 and expect to hear almost any type of music coming from the speaker. It could be the trumpets of a military band, a Bruce Springsteen single, or the familiar traditional Newfoundland sounds of Bud Davidge or The Wonderful Grand Band. Or you could get a talk show, a church service or community announcements. It’s the variety of programming that defines VOWR.

For almost 95 years, VOWR has been broadcasting from its studio adjoining Wesley United Church on Patrick Street in St. John’s.

“We’re kinda like a time machine in that way, we’re kind of stuck back here. But it’s cool ’cause there’s so much good music from back then,” explains Kenney Purchase, broadcaster and host at the station.

VOWR is the province’s oldest radio station, founded while Newfoundland and Labrador was a country (it is included in a special section of the 1949 Terms of Union with Canada). Originally called 8WMC, it first went on air in July 1924, and was founded by Reverend Joseph Gilbert Joyce as a way to reach parishioners who couldn’t make it to church. Using cutting edge technology of the time, people could use their telephones to call in and listen to the broadcast. It was the first church-run radio station in North America.

“It wasn’t even a radio station, it was a small booth, which is now the cleaner’s closet down in the basement of Wesley Church,” says station manager Doreen Whalen. It grew from that tiny space into one of the rooms in the church. “I think Reverend Joyce was a great visionary in his time,” she says. “I marvel at the man because as a minister who had absolutely no training, to envision that was just an incredible thing.”

Decades of Dedication

A team of approximately 70 volunteers keeps VOWR on the air 24/7, and there’s a whole host of jobs that need to be done. Some work with their library of music, or tidy the place up. Not everyone wants to host

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a show, and if they do there’s an audition process. No one is paid and people commit the time they’re able, so while some are here once every two weeks, others are at the station almost every single day. It also poses some challenges, Doreen says. A lot of their volunteers are retired and want to head down South in the winter, and sometimes a volunteer will call in at the last minute because they can’t show up to their shift. But they make it work. Their listeners make it worth the effort.

“Here at the station, literally every 10 minutes somebody’s calling and you really hear so many beautiful things from people,” Kenney says.

“Every day I’m here I receive a phone call saying ‘Can’t believe you guys are still on the air, you’ve been around since I was a child,’ all this stuff. People are anticipating the program and paying attention.”

Doreen has a folder filled with letters they’ve gotten from fans, with messages like, “‘You’re with me 24/7,’ ‘You help me make it through the night,’” she recites. Sometimes these letters come with donations, cheques valued up to $100. VOWR runs completely on donations to cover their costs, which is about $100,000 a year.

In fact, up until the past year VOWR was also operating with donated equipment. While it all worked, there were some problems. “It was routine a tape machine would go; it would just stop working. Or the record players were scratchy, or strange problems with the broadcasting. Thankfully, that’s been eliminated with the new equipment,” Kenney explains.

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Above: Kenney Purchase, broadcaster, and Doreen Whalen, station manager, help keep VOWR on the air 24/7. Below: Volunteers Bill Dyke and Joan Dawson host “The 50 Plus Show” on VOWR.

them enough funds to pay for the $60,000 upgrade. “When you’re doing everything live and analogue, there’s so much that can go wrong.

You kind of get a feel for it. And you figure out what to do when all these little problems happen.”

The station also gets donations of a musical variety. The VOWR library is stocked with more than 300,000 selections, and “that’s only a portion of what we’ve got,” Doreen says. On the floor below the station there are even more records and CDs. They 1-888-588-6353

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VOWR, being the province’s oldest radio station, is part studio-part museum and archives. There are more than 300,000 music selections in the VOWR library.

received some 46,000 albums from CBC over the years, and local artists will drop off their CDs to the station, hoping to get some airtime. Thanks to all those donors, VOWR has a wide variety of music to choose from, in all sorts of formats. During a walk through the station, you can find www.downhomelife.com

cassette tapes, CDs, 45s and 78s. The station doesn’t purchase any of the music they play.

While the broadcast is enjoyed by radio listeners in Newfoundland and Labrador, its reach goes far beyond the province. Its signal is beamed around the globe through the VOWR website. “We hear from people all over the world; they’re not just Newfoundlanders. A lot of them are expats, there’s no doubt about that.

But we heard from people, just a couple of weeks ago, people from Finland and Norway,” Doreen says.

Many of those listeners have no connection to the province but find the station on their own.

Almost 100 years after Reverend Joyce made his first broadcast, the mission of VOWR has largely remained the same. “Outreach to the lonely, sick, the shut-in, the people who are working all night,” Doreen says.

“There are so many people who want a human voice to hear in the evening or want that feeling of closeness… making people feel good and welcome,” Kenney adds.

Rev. Joyce died in 1959, long before the internet, and now the church service is on YouTube. “So it’s crazy how far we’ve gone,” he says.

“Crazy in how far we’ve gone in terms of technology, but how close we are to Reverend Joyce’s major intent when he started the station,” Doreen agrees. “He started it as an outreach and it remains as an outreach. It’s an outreach to the community, whether they’re local here or whether they’re listening on the internet or watching a church service on YouTube. That’s what we do.”

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Rounding the bend on the Boulevard in St. John’s, NL, where the concrete sidewalk dramatically weaves from the straight and narrow to accommodate the base of a very old tree, I stop on a Sunday morning to gaze out on the still waters of Quidi Vidi Lake. As I linger there, reflecting that in rural Ireland similar accommodations have been made to divert roads and pathways around special trees and even a fairy ring or two, I spot something remarkable. A gigantic leprechaun, replete with red beard, a fine felt hat, a splendid green suit – and running shoes! – sashays along the lower path. Nobody else even gives him a second look. He’s as much at home here as he would be strolling down O’Connell Bridge in the heart of Dublin.

That wildly Irish sight, likely a mascot heading to or from a charity run, is just one of numerous wonderful encounters I’ve had with unexpected Irishness in this province. To mark the upcoming St. Patrick’s Day celebration, here are seven of those subtle (and not so subtle) connections I have found between Ireland and Newfoundland and Labrador.

St. Patrick’s Day Let’s begin with the obvious. St. Patrick’s Day is a big deal in St. John’s – a much bigger and longer celebration than exists in its homeland of Ireland. We can thank the former proprietors of the legendary Erin’s Pub on Water Street for that.

In 1986, Ralph O’Brien, a native of Ireland, bought Erin’s Pub and his band, Sons of Erin, had its own home stage after 20 years of hectic touring. In a chat last year, he tells me that when he was growing up in Ireland, www.downhomelife.com

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St. Patrick’s was a fine time but always only a single day. That’s how it was in Newfoundland and Labrador, too, until Ralph had a bright business idea.

“We had made some ownership changes and I was looking for a way to get a few extra folks in, make a little more money for the pub, but also to showcase all that great local musical talent we had by giving them a place to play,” Ralph says with a smile. “So we were the first venue that extended St. Paddy’s Day to make it a full weekend, and then it was natural to take the Thursday night before and so on.

“Now everybody here does it and St. Paddy’s has grown to a week-long celebration and, in the traditional music scene, we always joked it became much bigger in Newfoundland than even New Year’s. You still don’t see the duration of this kind of thing many places in the world, and not even back in Dublin.”

and written extensively on Newfoundland vernacular furniture.

“There was at least one motif employed by outport furniture makers which was used elsewhere only in southeast Ireland to embellish furniture. Yet, it has long been used to decorate items of glassware, ceramic ware and other objects throughout the Western World. It is referred to in southeast Ireland as an ‘incised star’ and is a derivative of the Celtic compass star. It is suspected that the source of this motif for both outport and southern Irish furniture makers might be the Waterford Glassworks Factory. It is noteworthy that this

Waterford Crystal Some links are surprisingly crystal clear. Waterford, Ireland is famous for its crystal, and some of the Waterford crystal patterns appear in traditional outport furniture. For instance, a common crosshatch pattern on furniture is rendered as hobnails.

“The inspiration for hobnail carving in Newfoundland can be traced to Southern Ireland where they were used to decorate cut glass in the Waterford and Cork glass-making areas,” explains Walter Peddle, a retired curator of history at the Newfoundland Museum who has studied 48

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Irish inspired designs such as crosshatch patterns and incised stars can be found in the craftmanship around the province.

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factory is located in the city of Waterford in southeast Ireland and that about 85 per cent of all Irish who settled in Newfoundland came from within a 30-mile radius of that city.

Its location, and the fact that the incised star finds its home there, gives reason to suspect that some of the motifs and strategies employed to decorate glassware at the Waterford Glassworks Factory were adopted by Irish furniture makers and were transmitted to Newfoundland.”

St. Brigid’s Day In terms of Irish calendar customs that have made their way to Newfoundland and Labrador, St. Patrick’s Day is only one of many, and a relatively recent arrival at that. A much older religious day is St. Brigid’s Day (February 1), and although it is not commonly celebrated in Newfoundland and Labrador, there are places where it was well known. Rose Connors of Colliers recently told me about marking St. Brigid’s Day when she was a child.

“We used to go out on St. Brigid’s Day when I was a little girl with some of our relatives in Avondale. It was just the girls, and I remember we would take a little doll or even a doll’s head with us when visiting houses. There wasn’t anything in particular we had to wear or to say, but we’d get a little gift or maybe just a bit of cake or candy. It wasn’t very much, but people thought the visit would bring luck or protection from St. Brigid, I guess.

We enjoyed it.”

In Ireland, the custom of visiting www.downhomelife.com

with a doll as an effigy of the saint was one of the elements of the tradition. Another was men and boys, called “biddy boys,” wearing straw headdresses and costumes. The late Frances Laracy of Conception Harbour once told me that when she was a girl her older relatives would recall visits from the “strawmen” in the winter. While she never saw them personally and did not know the specific reason for them as it had died out by her day, she said they definitely were not mummers or wren boys, but something different. I sometimes wonder if they were a local version of the biddy boys, a term I’d heard but never realized had anything to do with St. Brigid’s Day.

Fear of the Fairies Irish poet William Butler Yeats once wrote, “Being Irish, he had an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustained him through temporary periods of joy.” The Irish and Newfoundlanders

A ring of trees in the forest is often thought to be the work of fairies, folklore brought over from Ireland.

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and Labradorians both enjoy happy times but really love a good scary story, so many tales of Irish fairies, ghosts, mermaids, miracles and monsters came across the ocean and took root here. Irish fairies, in particular, are very much celebrated in Newfoundland, with fairy gardens, fairy doors and wellworn advice to keep fairies at bay. Such things as tossing a glove into the centre of a fairy ring, carrying bread in your pockets, wearing an item of clothing inside out and never wearing red, and carrying a religious medal were said to protect against being taken.

A special concept that has carried over from the Old World is the fairy ring, a naturally (mysteriously?) occurring circle of trees, shrubs or flowers. If one stumbles upon a fairy ring, they must be careful not to disturb it or offend the local fairies. Even today, the locations of fairy rings in Newfoundland and Labrador (as in parts of Ireland) are closely kept secrets, be it for reasons of superstition or simply to protect delicate areas from unwanted traffic and damage.

coins or a piece of Christmas cake.

The Wren visitation still happens in places such as Colliers, Renews, and Riverhead in St. Mary’s Bay, to name a few.

The Wren

Tiddly

The Irish tradition of going around with the Wren, the King of All Birds, still makes an appearance on St. Stephen’s Day (December 26) in Newfoundland and Labrador. The Wren visitation is an ancient custom of “Wren Boys” going house to house with an effigy of a tiny bird and reciting a particular song/poem on December 26, in exchange for a few

You may know diddly about Tiddly, but folks in the town of Carbonear could give you lessons in this ancient Irish game played with sticks and stones. In fact, Carbonear has hosted the annual Tiddly World Championships for more than a decade.

Longtime volunteer organizer Judy Cameron says, “The event is familyoriented, played for fun, and normally

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The author (right) and a couple of other “Wren Boys” take part in the Irish tradition of visiting with an effigy of a bird on December 26.

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Two sporting traditions with Irish roots have found their way across the pond, tiddly (above) and hurling (right). held during the annual Carbonear Days Weekend. Of course, the ability to argue and maybe lie a little is considered an asset in Tiddly. While the game had pretty much died out by the late 1960s or early 1970s, it had very deep roots in the town.” Based on locals’ stories, she estimates the game goes back at least 150 years in the Carbonear area.

Hurling When in doubt, speak softly and carry a big stick, especially in the Irish game of hurling, which has a history in St. John’s dating back to 1788. An exhibition game held on September 26, 2009, in Bay Bulls with combined teams from Ireland and Newfoundland and Labrador may have been the first formal match hosted in this province in roughly 125 years. www.downhomelife.com

Hurling is an ancient Gaelic outdoor team sport played for at least 3,000 years. Teams of 15 players (hurlers) compete using ash sticks called hurleys and a ball called a sliotar (pronounced slit-er). In hurling, a strong strike can drive the ball as fast as 150 km/h and as far as 110 metres. It is thought to be the world’s fastest field team sport in terms of game play.

Ross Houlihan, a native of Waterford, Ireland, was one of the referees at the Bay Bulls game. He says, “Hurling was played in Newfoundland up until around 1880, when the Catholic Church began to crack down on it. Games regularly ended in fights and bloodshed as rivalries turned nasty if a game was not going to one’s hopes.” This particular match ended in all smiles and camaraderie as part of the Festival of the Sea. March 2019

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When it comes to clothes shopping, many of us head to the nearest mall. There, we wander store to store, browsing through the racks of similar styles imported from around the world. But we could instead get fitted out in an original designer piece, made right here. High-end fashion has recently popped up in Newfoundland and Labrador, enabling us to be just as fashionable as boutique shoppers in the big cities like Toronto and Montreal. Downhome chatted with three businesses making a scene in the fashion world, while at the same time supporting local businesses.

Dave Howells photo

Newbornlander Standing

on the water’s edge in Quidi Vidi village is the Plantation, a space for artists to work and sell their crafts. It’s also the home base for Newbornlander, a new business with a line of chic children’s clothing. You won’t find cartoon bears or overdone pastel colours here, and that’s on purpose. These designs are simple and elegant.

When Constanza Safatle was looking around for baby clothes, she didn’t like what she saw. So she bought a sewing machine and fabric, watched a few video tutorials and started to make her own baby bibs. “Then I started to develop other kinds of products and then never stopped,” she says. And that’s how Newbornlander got its start in 2017.

Constanza is from Chile and came to Newfoundland and Labrador so her husband could attend the Marine Institute.

She was expecting their first child at the time. As a lawyer, she couldn’t work in her profession here, “but I can develop my own business.”

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Newbornlander’s cute and classy designs are on display at Quidi Vidi Plantation in St. John’s. Elizabeth Whitten photos She was joined by Kerri Ivany in 2018. They met while working on a community program, “and we ended up taking to each other,” Kerri recalls. “And after a few months we decided to become business partners. I was a textile artist at the time, just sort of looking for direction, and she was looking for a business partner to take her business to the next level.”

Newbornlander makes bonnets, hats, booties and other items, as well as tents for newborns to two-yearolds. The fabric patterns are classy, with animal and floral prints. Constanza’s husband is a fishing engineer, so she likes to use nautical themes in the fabric, which blends www.downhomelife.com

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nicely with this province. “They’re stylin’,” Kerri adds.

Constanza explains that while babies are wearing Newbornlander, it’s being sold to the parents who actually dress their kids. She’s seen it with her own firstborn, now two years old and starting to point out what patterns he’s drawn to. “I think when you go to the babies and the newborns, you need to think of the mom,” she says.

People can purchase items at Newbornlander’s studio at the Quidi Vidi Village Plantation or order online through their Facebook page. A website is next on the wish list, Kerri says, which will make it easier to reach new clients, especially as they’re getting more orders from outside the province.

Newbornlander helped Constanza set roots in the province when she first moved here. For the immediate future, she and her young family will be staying here, but she does miss being a lawyer. “One of the things that attached me to Newfoundland is this, to have the opportunity to make a business. Now I have a partner like Kerri.” So even if she relocates back home, Newbornlander can continue with Kerri here and Constanza in Chile.

Sooley Designs When Megan Sooley of Sooley Designs sits down to create a

new piece, she gets her inspiration from the fabric. When she sees a fabric in a store, she can envision what it will be after she gets her hands on it. “The fabric, pretty much to me, builds the piece.

It screams what it is to me. I’ve got this new piece of fabric and it’s kind of a furry, pink thing, I don’t even know what to call it.

And it’s a sweater. It’s a big, comfy, cozy, over-the-top sweater,” she says.

Megan’s designed everything from loungewear to wedding dresses. “I can make clothes for any size woman, any body really.

And I get a lot of inspiration from my clients in that way. So if somebody’s looking for a dress that is flowing, comfortable, but they want to show a little bit of skin but not too much – trying to work with all those elements.” It’s a challenge she enjoys.

With a professional artist for a mother, Megan had an artistic childhood. She got her first sewing machine at age nine. Using

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Wild & Heart Photography

Megan Sooley (left) designs everything from loungewear to wedding dresses, “ for any size woman, any body, really,” she says.

Jon Loder photo

www.downhomelife.com

whatever materials she could get her hands on, she made purses out of old jeans and dresses from curtains.

At the age of 20 she decided on the spur of the moment to travel to Montreal, hitching a ride with a friend who was headed to Toronto. “And I had no plans whatsoever, really to go,” she says. “I just had noticed this school. I hadn’t applied or anything like that. And the next day he came March 2019

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Sooley Designs photo

Katie Goodwin Photography

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and picked me up, and I had a suitcase and a sewing machine and I left.” Megan then applied to LaSalle College and graduated in 2010.

After school, she lived in Europe for a while before returning to Newfoundland and Labrador to work as a technical designer. Her work led to a repetitive strain injury from sitting at a desk, and she lost her job.

With no money, Megan moved back home. Borrowing $20, she bought enough fabric to make a sweater “because it was the only way I knew how to make any money,” she explains. She quickly sold it online, which brought in enough money to make two more sweaters, which also sold. Sooley Designs started from there, and has been so successful that in 2018, the Newfoundland and Labrador Organization of Women Entrepreneurs (NLOWE) presented Megan with the Young Entrepreneur Award.

Currently, Megan employs two seamstresses and a saleswoman in her downtown St. John’s store, plus she recruited her mom as a third seamstress and bookkeeper. At any given time, Megan can have 150200 orders to fill, as well as people scheduled for fittings in the store. “I like to get to know my clients, each and every one. And I like to give them enough time with me.” So she typically only has two or three consultations a day for that reason.

Most of Megan’s clients are locals, but she does get some people from out of town and some from out of province. Just the other day a woman come into the store who’d lost her luggage and had a wedding party that night. Megan says it made her think, “If she doesn’t find 1-888-588-6353

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something here, I’m not doing it right.” The client ended up leaving with navy blue polka dot dress.

Megan says she has no interest in going to the big fashion shows (think Paris, New York etc.), which costs a lot of money to attend.

Instead, she uses her position to promote local talent, helping host fashion shows with the proceeds going to charity. Vogue photographers and models come here to do photo shoots, Megan says, “and I’d much rather show my clients and my people what I’m doing and let them experience it,” she says.

In the last few years she’s seen a lot of people coming back to Newfoundland and Labrador for the music, food and the fashion scene.

“It’s all been coming up a bit more because people are coming home again, I feel. Because there is no better place, really. We’re the luckiest people in the world, I think. And I love the weather here… I love rain and fog and cold. So it’s like this place is made for me.”

Melanie Jacqueline

Dave Howells photo

www.downhomelife.com

designs are a whirlwind of colour, and she has a simple reason for it: “It makes me happy,” she laughs. “You’re dressing in bright colours, people are kind of drawn to that… It really is just about being happy, and I just love bright colours, and I love working with bright prints. To me, it just makes it a little more unique.”

A former preschool teacher, MJ founded Melanie Jacqueline in 2011. It seems to have been her calling. “I’m a creative soul. I thrive from being creative, for sure. My mind never slows, there’s always ideas happening,” she says. For her, clothing is a way for people to express themselves. “There’s a lot of colourful people in this province, and so I think I’m helping those people.”

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using store-bought patterns, she remembers the first thing she made was a green crepe mini skirt. Now she’s making a name for herself with her own designs, attracting clients all over Canada and the US, and the list is growing. A highlight so far was MJ’s invitation to fashion week in

Dave Howells photo

London and New York City last year.

“It was pretty wild, it was definitely a great experience,” she says. Since then she’s continued to focus on growing her business in St. John’s.

Currently, MJ has a studio on Bates Hill where she sells her clothing and meets with clients by appointment.

Shoppers can also find her pieces nearby at Johnny Ruth on Water Street, and she’s in the process of developing an e-commerce website in hopes of reaching new clients and giving them an easier way to shop. www.downhomelife.com

A lot has changed since starting Melanie Jacqueline, but some things have remained the same. MJ is the only person sewing and has a sales assistant who works at the shop.

“I would love to expand, it’s just a work in progress. We’ve been working for the last year on some new ideas and plans, so we shall see,” she hints. “But it’s very important to me that my hand tag is always ‘Made in Newfoundland’ and is true to that.

It’s very important for me to keep this local.”

Always looking to innovate with other locals, for MJ’s recent collection she teamed up with artist Sara Dillon of SJ Artworks to create a series of fabric prints. “It was custom Melanie Jacqueline fabric, not to be found anywhere else. And it was very true to me and my personality and some of my story. So that was really exciting,” MJ says.

MJ was one of the first designers to do high-end fashion in the province, and she has watched the fashion scene expand in last few years. “It’s definitely growing,” she says.

“There’s more opportunity, I think, for people to shop locally, which is a great thing. I think the people here have always been pretty fashionable, you know. I think just being in Newfoundland makes it a little tougher to find unique things or quality things that are actually handmade here.”

Not too long ago, people would leave the province to go shopping for higher-end items or local designers wanted to get out, but MJ has her feet firmly planted here. “I don’t want to go. I love it here. I mean, in the wintertime I might say differently,” she laughs. “It’s a good place to be creative.”

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SO, HAVE YOU HEARD OF MARIE KONDO?

If not, maybe you’re buried under all the stuff in your house and can’t find the TV or a clear spot to watch Netflix. Maybe her books are among the dozens you’ve bought over the years and put on a shelf but never got around to reading.

OK, enough teasing. For those who haven’t been taken up by the household craze of 2019, Marie Kondo is a Japanese organizing consultant and author of several books on how to declutter your life, organize your stuff and keep only the things that bring you joy. In January, Netflix dropped a season of “Tidying Up with Marie Kondo,” and everybody and their dogsitter are gutting closets, emptying shelves and repacking all their drawers.

Meantime, with everyone ridding themselves of stuff they don’t need, hopefully they’ll think of others in dire need, for whom new and previously loved things could bring them joy. Here are some places in Newfoundland and Labrador where you could rehome some of the things that no longer have a home with you. You can also scan Facebook and make some calls in your neighbourhood to see who you could help nearest you.

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EYEGLASSES

TOWELS AND BLANKETS

Are you still hanging on to old prescription eyeglasses and sunglasses?

Pack them up and deliver them to your local Lions chapter. They collect used eyeglasses, make any repairs, sterilize them and distribute them to needy folks in many countries. Also, check with your eye clinic – Vogue Optical and LasikMD are two local businesses that collect eyeglasses for the Lions program.

Clean towels and blankets can be put to good use at animal shelters, helping to create a warm bed or post-bath comfort to cats and dogs (and other furry critters) who are in need of kindness.

FOOTWEAR Gently used (or never worn!) shoes, boots and sneakers are welcome at secondhand stores as well as charitable organizations like The Gathering Place in St. John’s. Call other neighbourhood groups, such as Single Parent Association of NL or Association for New Canadians, who might be running a drive for particular items, including footwear.

FORMAL WEAR Looking to rehome a prom dress, bridesmaid gown or cocktail dress?

Or a suit, dress shoes or jewelry? Any of these would look good in a thrift shop, but they could also be used to help make high school graduations more affordable for families. Single Parent Association of NL runs a Prom Dreams campaign, and Holy Heart high school in St. John’s hosts a free prom dress drive. Alyssa’s Attic (on Facebook) is run by the Sunshine Squad, a goodwill group founded in memory of teenager Alyssa Davis, who was killed in a car crash in Conception Bay South, NL, in 2015.

Alyssa’s Attic collects gently used grad dresses (and shoes and jewelry) to help ease the financial burden of prom on some families. www.downhomelife.com

CELLPHONES The CNIB operates a Phone It Forward program, where it matches your old smartphone with a new and grateful owner, for free. Smartphone access can be a matter of safety, independence and enablement to someone who is blind or partially sighted.

TOOLS You can donate your old, usable tools (not broken or unsafe ones) to thrift stores or to more specialized centres, such as Habitat for Humanity Restore or the St. John’s Tool Library.

BICYCLES Memorial University accepts used bicycles for its BikeShare ‘n’ Repair program. It rents out bikes and helmets to MUN students and members of the general public in St. John’s.

TOYS Children often outgrow their toys before they wear them out; these toys still have joy to give. Single Parents Association of NL is one group that accepts toy donations (no plush toys) as well as books (except textbooks), housewares and small appliances.

And in a special recent callout, The Fluvarium in St. John’s was looking for leftover Lego blocks for their children’s programming. They may have enough now, but you could call local daycares, doctor’s offices etc. where children’s toys are often provided for their little clients.

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sureSHOTS Featuring photographer Samantha Jacque

Some people take up photography as an excuse to get out and experience things. Others take it up to capture the beauty in what they’re already doing.

“Taking photographs is always second to what I am actually doing. Usually, I am hunting, travelling on Skidoo, working etc., and my camera [a Nikon D5300] is always with me.

Rarely do I ever go somewhere just to take photographs,” says Samantha Jacque. “But anywhere I travel in Labrador I am always inspired to take pictures. I love my home, and I am so fortunate to have grown up in such a beautiful place that is still unspoiled.”

Samantha is from, and still lives in, Postville, Nunatsiavut. She’s temporarily in Barrie, ON, studying carpentry and renovation, but she’ll return again to her seasonal job on a salmon counting fence in Kaipokok 64

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Bay, near Postville. When she’s not working outdoors, she’s exploring the wilderness somewhere, somehow.

“I love anything to do with being outside: hunting, fishing, getting firewood etc.,” she says. “I actually spent spring break-up at the cabin once, with no way to get home. I was dropped off by snowmobile and picked up in boat after the ice melted three weeks later.”

She continues, “It’s difficult to capture how beautiful nature truly is, and how relaxing and therapeutic it is to spend time in nature. You can never get tired of a beautiful sunset or the frost sparkling like diamonds on the trees. My favourite nature 1-888-588-6353

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photo is one I took of Postville from out of the bay. The sun is setting and the snow is drifting on the bay...

Postville is barely visible in the background, but it is a picture of my home... the cold, isolated, beautiful Labrador.” (see photo on page 66) There is one place she would like to travel to for the express purpose of photography: Torngat Mountains.

Maybe there she’ll get her second chance at photographing a polar bear in its native habitat. The first and only time she’d seen one in person, she wasn’t packing her camera. “It was swimming in the water and it went ashore on an island and stood on a cliff looking at us,” she recalls.

While nature is generally her favourite subject to shoot, her most treasured photos are ones she’s taken of her two daughters. “Capturing memories of them are the photos I take the most pride in: a glint of sunlight on my daughter’s red hair, a www.downhomelife.com

genuine smile of pure happiness on their faces, a zoomed-in photo of their chubby fingers as they drew a picture. My favourite photo is a black-and-white of my oldest daughter kissing my younger daughter when they were just babies,” Samantha says. (see photo on page 68) Samantha is “just a hobby photographer,” she says, but her photos have garnered some serious attention. “One of my photographs was purchased by The Rooms Provincial Art Bank, and I have photographs in the Nunatsiavut Government building and the CDBC office in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. I also have photos in the SakKijâjuk exhibition, which is still touring different galleries in Canada,” she says, adding that the SakKijâjuk (“to be visible” in Inuktitut) exhibition is an extra special achievement. It is a showcase of modern Nunatsiavummiut (Labrador Inuit) art and craft.

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Are you an amateur photographer with a great portfolio?

Would you like to be featured in an edition of Sure Shots?

Tell us a bit about yourself and send us a few sample photos by emailing editorial@downhomelife.com (subject: sure shots). www.downhomelife.com

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We’re wasting no time preparing for the next

Downhome Calendar, . . . and neither should you!

Submit your best photos of scenery, activities and icons that illustrate the down-home lifestyle. We’re looking for a variety of colourful subjects – outports, heritage animals, laundry lines, historic sites, seascapes, hilltop views and so much more – and photos from all four seasons.

In addition to free calendars and a one-year subscription to Downhome for all those chosen for the calendar, one lucky winner will receive a free trip for four aboard O’Brien’s famous whale and bird boat tours!

Here’s how to submit: Online: www.downhomelife.com/calendar By mail: Downhome Calendar Contest 43 James Lane St. John’s, NL A1E 3H3

Digital photos must be at least 300 dpi, files sizes of about 1MB Must be original photos or high quality copies. We can’t accept photocopies or photos that are blurry, too dark or washed out. Include a self-addressed stamped envelope if you want your photos returned.

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March 1-3

March 4

Various locations

St. John’s

Sherman Downey, a contemporary singer-songwriter, and Matthew Byrne, a traditional music singer and guitarist, are once again pairing up to bring their music to smaller venues across the island on their nearly annual Winter Island Tour. The pair share stories and songs and banter with each other in a collaboration that brings together their two styles for an evening of folksy songs. After a slate of February shows, their final three performances are at The Oceanview in Codroy (Mar. 1), Rotary Arts Centre in Corner Brook (Mar. 2) and Bonne Bay Marine Station in Norris Point (Mar. 3).

Ever wonder how deep your roots go, or what the branches of your family tree look like? Then you’d likely be interested in genealogy, the study of families and their history. The Rooms is hosting Beyond the Attic: Introduction to Genealogy, which includes getting to know your way around the Archive’s genealogical collection. If you can’t make the March session, the workshop happens the first Monday of the month in April and May, as well.

Meatloaf

March 8, 10 & 11

Various locations If you would do anything for your love of Meatloaf (the musician, not the meal) then you’ll get All Revved Up for this tribute show featuring Tony Thompson and Janet Cull, backed by Newfoundland musicians. Book your night out at the Corner Brook Arts and Culture Centre (Mar. 8), Joseph H. Smallwood Arts and Culture Centre in Gander (Mar. 10), or the Clarenville Eastlink Events Centre (Mar. 11).

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March 8-17

March 15

Labrador City

Clarenville

There’s “snow” place like Labrador in the winter, where the season is worth celebrating. The annual week-long Labrador West Winter Carnival returns this month, featuring outdoor and indoor fun, competitions, community meals and the Miss Teen Chill pageant.

The Masterless Men have been playing their brand of Irish Newfoundland music with a hint of bluegrass since 1991. While they may serve no master, these musicians are masters of their instruments and put on a great show.

Check out their St. Patrick’s Day Special concert at the Eastlink Events Centre.

March 14

St. John’s

March 16

Prepare your palate, it’s time for the annual Savour Food and Wine Show at the Delta Hotel in St. John’s. Billed as the premier food and drink show in Atlantic Canada, it brings a range of restaurants together in one room, combining food, drink and good times with the feel of a cocktail party.

Deer Lake St. Patrick chased the snakes out of Ireland, brought Christianity to the pagans, stopped a flood, brought a horse back to life, and, uh, brought craft beer to Newfoundland? Sort of, if you consider that without Patrick the Saint there would be no St. Patrick’s Day Craft Beer Festival. Hosted by Crooked Feeder Brewing, a new craft brewery based in Cormack, the event features samples of craft beer and tasty eats, plus live music.

March 17-23

Happy Valley-Goose Bay

RANL. Michael Ritter Photography

March 14

St. John’s Writing a book is a long, solitary endeavour. The completion of a book is cause for celebration, which is exactly what Pedlar Press and author Heather Nolan will be doing at the launch of This is Agatha Falling, the author’s debut novella. The book launch takes place at Pedlar Press on Bond Street.

www.downhomelife.com

2019 marks the return of The Labrador Winter Games. Some 500 athletes and just as many volunteers from all over Labrador, plus spectators, gather for a week of sporting competition and cultural celebration.

March 28-30

St. John’s “Never swim alone” is pretty good advice. It’s also the name of a play written by Daniel MacIvor, in which two businessmen try to determine who is the better man. The GroupHug Productions presentation will transform the Johnson Geo Centre on Signal Hill Road into a theatre venue for the special three-day run.

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THE ROAD FROM Deadman’s Bay is behind me and a stiff breeze blows cartwheels of green sea foam that kiss the strand before retreating to the ocean. It is a wild old day when I run into the legendary Cat Cove pirate Billy Murrin, who was most famous in what is now the Cape Freels and Lumsden area of Newfoundland and Labrador. He regards me with cold eyes beneath a hat that would make Long John Silver proud; a brace of ornate daggers and a menacing pistol adorn a belt crossing his chest. His ruby-hilted sword stuck into a treasure chest at his foot punctuates the premise that whatever loot he plundered he intends to keep, so come near at your peril.

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Fortunately, he’s only a lifelike statue in the overly romanticized style of piracy popularized in Hollywood movies, placed outside Rich’s Convenience Plus by shopkeeper Richard Parsons. The legend of pirate Billy Murrin has been told in Richard’s family for generations, and he and his wife recently decided to give him more of a profile in town.

“Of course, this statue looks a bit more like a Captain Morgan ad or something from the movies than the real Billy Murrin, but we wanted something to be a symbol,” says Richard, who explains they bought the statue from a seller in Kensington, PEI. “The story is that nobody knows where the real Billy Murrin came from sometime in the mid-1880s, and he was a quite a mystery as a bit of drinker and a salver [an old expression for one who salvages ships], and was supposed to have a large treasure of some kind, perhaps taken from fellow pirates, hidden somewhere. One of the local folks who looked after Billy in later years, perhaps hoping for some financial reward before he died, was chatting with him one evening and Billy asked her, ‘Can you keep a secret?’ She grew very excited, thinking he was about to reveal the location of the treasure, and said, ‘Yes, I can keep a secret, Mr. Murrin!’ To which Billy replied, ‘Aye, and so can I.’ So whatever the treasure was, he never told and it is still here to be found.

There were so many shipwrecks in the Lumsden area, with all the storms and shifting sandbars and hidden reefs, so who knows what the sea may reveal in the future.”

This holds true all over the province.

Go into almost any outport and linger for a day or so chatting with locals. They may share a story of shipwrecks or salvation from the sea, or lost travellers taken or legendary tasks tendered, but This roadside statue in the Cape Freels area calls attention to the local legend of pirate Billy Murrin and what treasure he may have hidden here. www.downhomelife.com

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Historian and writer Pat Collins points to some of the local pirate lore on display at the Conception Bay Regional Museum in Harbour Grace. there can be no more fantastic and captivating tales than those with a hint of pirate treasure.

The enormous popularity of books, movies and even the History Channel TV series “The Curse of Oak Island” (now in its seventh season) attests to the universal appeal of the search for hidden riches. While “The Curse of Oak Island” follows brothers Rick and Marty Lagina as they attempt to crack the Oak Island mystery that has puzzled adventurers for over two centuries and reach a treasure believed to be buried on the small island off the coast of Nova Scotia, similar lesser-known tales abound in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Most hard evidence of any piraterelated treasure in the province is lost to time and there are rules related to such hunts. So enjoy these sites of local legends shared with me and 76

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others, but take their tales of treasure with more than a grain of sea salt.

The real undiscovered treasure is not coins or currency of any kind, but spectacular scenery, sensational stories, and an excuse to safely explore for fun these places through which pirates are said to have passed.

EASTON’S TREASURE IN HARBOUR GRACE The best-known Newfoundland pirate was perhaps Peter Easton, and his story can be explored at the Conception Bay Regional Museum in Harbour Grace.

Local historian and author Patrick Collins says, “According to writings

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this area,” he says, indicating a section of coastline running from Point of Beach, passing near the former 1870 brick Customs House that is now the museum building, and ending near Ugly Head.

“There are all kinds of stories about how Easton came here and one is that Queen Elizabeth I requisitioned him to come as part of the navy, but while he was here the war ended with France. So finding he had nothing to do, he realized a lot more could be made by building his own army of fishermen and attacking the French and Spanish and Basques.”

He adds, “Now a lot of this is lore and can’t be proven historically without much more archeological research, but we do know that Easton captured Sir Richard Whitbourne and kept him prisoner for 11 weeks, attempting to get him to join him in piracy. Whitbourne refused, but did eventually manage to help get Easton a pardon.

“There is another great folklore story of Easton sailing into Harbour Grace harbour with the captured Spanish vessel San Sebastian in tow.

Easton saw that the flags on his fort were in the wrong order and realized his stronghold had been captured.

Five Basque ships sailed across the mouth of the harbour to blockade him, but Easton knew the harbour and the winds better and was able to escape. In the process he fired on and sank the Basque ship St. Malo somewhere near Easton [also called “Easter” or “Eastern”] Rock close to the Harbour Grace islands. Somewhere ashore it was said 47 pirates were buried in a mass unmarked www.downhomelife.com

grave, but the exact location remains a mystery.”

Other local legends claim that after Easton left Newfoundland for good in 1618, he captured treasure ships en route to Europe, got his pardon, and retired a very wealthy man in France with the title of Marquis of Savoy.

Some say he buried treasure somewhere in Newfoundland, perhaps Harbour Grace or surrounding islands (or the Southern Shore, by some accounts), before departing, but owing to his great fortune later in life, he never returned to claim it.

PLUNDER PLOT IN PORT DE GRAVE The Green Point lighthouse area near Port de Grave has been the site of much speculation about buried pirate treasure – in particular, the Peter Easton plunder he supposedly hid before attempting to break a blockade of ships at nearby Harbour Grace. The short trail to the iron tower of the 1883 Green Point lighthouse at the very tip of the Port de Grave peninsula is a favourite site for berry pickers and hikers.

WHERE THERE ARE SHIPS, IS THERE TREASURE? Happy Adventure, near Eastport, shares its name with Peter Easton’s flagship (a model of his vessel Happy Adventure is on display in the Harbour Grace museum). For this reason, the community has made the list of possible Easton hiding places.

Oderin, an island in Placentia Bay, sometimes also gets named as a March 2019

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Where this sailboat passes by Port de Grave, so, too, did pirate ships long, long ago – if rumours of their treasure buried nearby are to be believed. hiding spot for pirate treasure, as bits and pieces of non-native woods were said to be found there – perhaps from ship building or repairs more so than hidden chests, but who knows for sure?

UNNAMED & UNCLAIMED An area of Sandy Cove (also near Eastport) was supposedly called “Silver Buckle” after an unspecified pirate who buried his treasure there.

Close by, tiny St. Chad’s (near Salvage) was once supposedly known as “Damnable,” since a pirate ship in hiding there was captured when the ship’s bell accidentally rang out, alerting the enemy, to which the pirate captain allegedly said, “Damn the bell!” Further afield, likewise in the category of unnamed pirates, somewhere on the South Coast between Boxey and Deadman’s Bight there is said to be hidden pirate treasure. As well, Baccalieu Island and Old Perlican islands are claimed 78

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to hold their own unfound and unspecified pirate treasures.

BOUNTY IN CONCEPTION BAY Kelly’s Island in Conception Bay, said to be the base of Irish pirate John Kelly, has a number of treasure and ghost stories associated with it – as do nearby Bell Island and Little Bell Island. As is par for the course, details are scanty, but pro diver Rick Stanley of Ocean Quest Adventure Resort in Conception Bay South keeps an open mind. “Just because it hasn’t turned up yet doesn’t mean it won’t,” he says. I joined Rick and other scuba divers, kayakers and more volunteers to clean up the main beaches on Kelly’s Island in June 2008. And while there may not be much remaining hard evidence of John Kelly himself, there is a very distinctive bum-shaped rock along the edge of the island that has gotten the nickname of “Kelly’s Arse.”

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The view from atop Tracey Hill in Red Bay. There are rumours of pirate treasure buried here.

Divers and adventurers sometimes go ashore to have a good-natured photo with it. Even a pirate can be the butt of a joke now and then.

In James Cove (an abandoned section of the community of Colliers), ghosts are said to guard Captain Kidd’s treasure. Local prospectors ran into some troubles hunting for it 50-70 years ago and it resulted in an anonymous humorous recitation called “Captain Kidd’s Treasure.”

There is no evidence that the Scottish privateer-turned-pirate William Kidd (1645-1701) ever made it to this location or elsewhere in the province.

It’s a fanciful tale, adopting a wellknown pirate name, to warn adventurers against the dangers of strange expeditions late at night.

Turk’s Gut (in present-day Marysvale) is named for an encounter with a Turkish pirate. There is even an outdoor pirate mural and a “Turkish Spring Water” fresh water spring near the Heritage House. On the right days and in calm seas, caves and arches come into evidence from the ocean side. And if you know www.downhomelife.com

where to look, so does a turbaned pirate head in the cliff face, making this a favoured location for experienced and prepared sea kayakers.

WHAT REMAINS IN RED BAY Hauntingly beautiful in its starkness, Red Bay, Labrador has a wonderful hiking trail that leads to a pond atop Tracey Hill. This spot is said to hide Captain Kidd’s pirate treasure and is supposedly guarded by a ghostly protector.

HIDING IN THE HUMBER Just outside Corner Brook near Marble Mountain Ski Resort, a buried treasure is said to rest on Shellbird Island in the Humber River. “The Old Man in the Mountain,” a natural, scowling face in the cliff looking down on the island, is said to be a marker for the treasure. An information board at the exit off the Trans-Canada Highway will help you find the “Old Man” as he stares down from the confines of Breakfast Mountain.

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Many of us head into the woods during all seasons on snowmobiles or snowshoes, hiking or biking, and encounter many types of trees. However, beyond being able to tell a birch from a spruce, what do you know about them?

The relatively small, primarily coniferous forests of Newfoundland and Labrador form the eastern edge of the Boreal Forest Region of North America. Black spruce forms about one-third of the forests on the island and two-thirds of the trees in Labrador. The west coast of Newfoundland, in particular, is dominated by pure stands of balsam fir. Conditions are not generally favourable for large stands of hardwood species, but white birch and trembling aspen are significant components of mixed wood and hardwood stands in the province.

There are 21 native species and 16 introduced species of trees populating Newfoundland and Labrador. The following is a brief guide to the seven most commonly found native species, including some helpful tips to identify each one.

Cathy Gale photo

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WHITE SPRUCE Picea glauca

a.k.a. Skunk spruce, Canadian spruce, cat spruce, pasture spruce, field spruce

ID Tip When crushed, the needles emit an unpleasant, skunky odour.

White spruce is a common evergreen coniferous tree in Newfoundland and Labrador, though less common than balsam fir or black spruce. It can attain a height of 25 m, but usually reaches less than 15 m in this province. The bark of younger trees is light reddish-brown, turning greyish-brown, rough and scaly with age. The yellowish-green to bluish-green needles are shiny and stiff with sharp points. They are spirally arranged on the twig and twisted upwards to crowd the upper side. The oblong, cylindrical cones are 3-5 cm long. These are green tinged with red at first, then turn pale brown as they mature.

HABITAT White spruce is found throughout Newfoundland and as far north as 600 latitude in Labrador. It’s more common along the coast than inland as it prefers moist, well-drained sites, but it also grows in abandoned fields and on coastal headlands. It is particularly plentiful as tuckamore on the Avalon and Burin peninsulas. www.downhomelife.com

USES White spruce is used in the production of wood pulp and lumber, and frequently planted for landscaping and forestry purposes. The young shoot tips have antiseptic properties and are often used to treat respiratory infections.

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BLACK SPRUCE Picea mariana

a.k.a. swamp spruce, bog spruce

ID Tip The needles have a pleasant resinous or menthol scent.

This slow-growing wetland tree usually grows to 12 m, but can be as tall as 18 m. The upper part of the crown is often oddly shaped, very dense and heavily laden with cones. The stiff, straight, pale bluish-green needles often have white stripes and blunt tips. The reddish-brown or greyish-brown bark is scaly or shredded when young, becoming darker with larger scales as it ages. The 1-4 cm long cones are oval, blunt-tipped and purplish-green at first, turning brown as they mature. They often stay on the tree for many years.

HABITAT Found throughout Newfoundland and north to about 570 latitude in Labrador, the black spruce is, in fact, the most abundant tree in Labrador (it is featured on the Labrador flag). It occurs mostly on poorly drained soils and wet, boggy sites. This species actually benefits from forest fires because the intense heat opens the cones, releasing seed to naturally regenerate burnt-over areas.

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USES Traditionally residents have used it to make spruce beer. It has antiseptic properties and has been used in the treatment of many respiratory ailments such as asthma and bronchitis. The wood is considered one of the best firewood species and is commonly used as a source of lumber and pulpwood. It is also used in the manufacturing of soundboards for musical instruments including guitars, violins and pianos.

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BALSAM FIR

Abies balsamea a.k.a. Canada balsam, vir, var, snotty var

ID Tip When crushed, the needles have a strong pine scent.

Fir can tower to 25 m, but it doesn’t often exceed 15 m in height in this province. The needles have rounded or notched tips and are shiny dark green on the upper surface and paler underneath with 10-12 lines of white dots. The bronze to purplish bark has many resin blisters that turn grey and somewhat scaly on older trees. The oblong cones are cylindrical, erect, 5-8 cm long and green at first, then purplish, and then rusty brown as they mature, usually with resin droplets on the surface.

“Snotty var” is a Newfoundland term for an old fir tree with resin clotted on the bark. It is considered too greasy to be good for burning because all the sap (turpentine) comes out of it, making it very sticky.

HABITAT Fir is found throughout Newfoundland and north to about 540 latitude in Labrador. It is very adaptable, occurring in a variety of habitats including moist, acidic soils; organic soils; swamps and mountains. It is the most common tree of insular Newfoundland and in windswept tuckamore along the coast.

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USES It is favoured as a Christmas tree and for making wreaths. The hardened sap is used in optical and microscope products. The tree is a common source of lumber, firewood and pulp.

The needles and twigs are used as a moth repellent. Parts of the fir have also been used as an effective antiseptic and healing agent for cuts, burns, sore throats, coughs, headaches and toothaches.

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WHITE PINE Pinus strobus

a.k.a. Northern white pine, eastern white pine

ID Tip White pine is the only native pine with clusters of five needles.

Once a common tree in Newfoundland, it was almost completely wiped out due to major pine harvesting that began in 1890. Additionally, in the early 1900s, a lethal parasitic fungus called white pine blister rust devastated much of the remaining mature pine.

Often growing in stunted form in bleaker habitats, this tree can reach a height of 25 m. The straight, slender, bluish-green needles measure 4-8.5 cm, are soft and flexible with finely toothed edges and grow spirally on the twig in clusters of five or, rarely, three. The bark is smooth and greyish-green on younger trees, but looks darker and deeply furrowed with broad, scaly ridges on older trunks. The brown cones are elongated, 7-15 cm long, and drop from the tree during fall and winter after the seeds have shed.

HABITAT White pine is found throughout most of Newfoundland but is absent from the Northern Peninsula and Labrador. It is most common in western and central regions of the island. Inhabiting a variety of sites, from rocky ridges to sphagnum bogs, it actually thrives in moist, sandy, acidic or loamy soils and cool upland forests with full sunlight.

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USES This is the most valuable softwood lumber in Eastern Canada. Its silver-tinted needles make it a handsome ornamental tree, and it is an important source of food and shelter for wildlife.

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LARCH Larix laricina

a.k.a. Tamarack, Eastern larch, juniper

ID Tip Its top usually leans northeast (a natural compass if you’re lost in the woods).

Commonly called juniper in this province, larch is the only native coniferous tree that loses its needles in the fall. This small-to-medium sized deciduous conifer is rarely more than 15 m high and in exposed habitats may grow flat along the ground. The pale bluish-green needles are slender, soft and flexible, growing in clusters of 12-30, and turning yellow and dropping by early November. The bark is smooth and grey when young, turning reddish-brown and scaly as it ages. The cones are erect, often egg-shaped and about 1.5 cm long. They are reddish at first, but light brown when mature, and on short, curved stalks.

HABITAT Larch occurs throughout Newfoundland and Labrador in various habitats including bogs, fens, heaths, serpentine barrens, hilltops and forests.

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USES Larch trees produce a heavy, durable wood used mainly as a firewood due to its fairly high heat value, but also as pulpwood and in making snowshoes, utility poles, posts, boats and boxes. The resin can be chewed to relieve indigestion. Tea made from the bark is used in home remedies to treat jaundice, anemia, rheumatism, colds, sore throats and skin ailments such as sores, swellings and burns.

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YELLOW BIRCH Betula alleghaniensis

a.k.a. Witch Hazel

ID Tip Identifying the various birch species can be a challenge. Yellow birch can be distinguished by the distinctive wintergreen smell of the broken twigs.

Yellow birch is the largest of the eastern birches, often reaching heights of up to 23 m. Its coarsely toothed leaves are oval or oblong, gradually tapering from the middle to the tip, with a heart-shaped base. Leaves are dark green and hairless on top, but paler and usually hairy underneath. Young bark is dark reddish, becoming yellowish and peeling into thin, papery curls that give it a ragged appearance. Older trees have darker bark that is broken into platelike scales.

HABITAT It occurs mostly in southern Newfoundland south of Deer Lake, in the Bay D’Espoir area and in sheltered parts of the Avalon and Burin peninsulas. It is absent from northeastern sections, the Northern Peninsula and Labrador. Yellow birch prefers rich, moist woodlands.

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USES The wood is used to make furniture, cabinetwork, flooring, doors and veneer, and it’s an important source of hardwood lumber.

It has a high heat value and, therefore, makes excellent firewood. Extract from its bark and twigs produces commercial wintergreen flavouring.

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Todd Hollett photo

WHITE BIRCH Betula papyrifera a.k.a. Paper Birch

ID Tip Look for the white papery bark, for which it is named, which peels easily and sheds in narrow bands, exposing an orange or pinkish inner bark.

White birch, our most common hardwood species, can grow to a height of 20 m. The coarsely, irregularly toothed leaves are ovate, tapering at the tip with a wedge-shaped or broadly rounded base. Leaves are dark green and hairless on top, and paler with hairs near the base underneath. Each leaf has, on average, 23 teeth per side. The bark of younger trees is reddish-brown with transverse whitish lenticels (raised pores on the bark). Mature bark is chalk white or cream coloured and peels easily into horizontal strips.

HABITAT White birch occurs throughout Newfoundland and north to about 570 latitude in Labrador. It’s more plentiful in central and western Newfoundland, found in various habitats from mixed forests, open woods, and cutover areas, to hillsides and exposed coastal barrens.

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USES White birch has a high heat value, making it excellent for firewood. Other uses include craftwork, pulpwood, tongue depressors, high-end furniture, canoes, ornaments and skateboards. The sap appears in beer, syrup, wine or vinegar. The dried inner bark can be added to soups as a thickener or added to flour. A tea can be made from the bark and young leaves.

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A new movement reminds people that sometimes what they need is a walk in the woods.

By Elizabeth Whitten

Photos courtesy of Tina White

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In the 21st century,

life can feel like a rush from one place to the next. Speed is considered a virtue and completing a task as fast as possible is a point of pride. However, it can come with a price – most often exhaustion or burnout. In response to that, there’s an increasingly popular way to disconnect from the hectic pace of city life and take a few calming breaths. It’s called forest bathing.

“It is a practice of immersing ourselves in nature, and using our five senses to deeply connect with the forest and natural environment,” explains Tina White, a forest bathing guide. “A forest bathing walk typically lasts between two and three hours, but covers little distance. It is not a hike, nor a walk, but more of a wandering, while engaging our senses and taking part in ‘invitations,’ or small, simple exercises that deepen our connection and experience.”

Originating in Japan where it’s known as Shinrin-Yoku, forest bathing dates back to the 1980s and has been linked to positive health benefits. Tina says as an avid hiker, she herself has Left: Tina White pours freshly brewed tea for guests of her forest bathing tour somewhere in the woods on the Avalon Peninsula. www.downhomelife.com

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Forest bathing is not about how far you go into the woods but how deeply you experience it. experienced the health advantages of time spent outdoors. It made her curious about the connection between nature and wellness. So she turned to the internet to research it and came across the Association of Nature and Forest Therapy.

“After visiting the website several times over the coming years, I eventually took the plunge and signed up for a four-day forest bathing immersion in Ontario – that was in the summer of 2016. I was hooked; it felt amazing and was also wonderful to connect with a fellowship of other like-minded souls who just loved nature like I do. I knew after that week that I wanted to become a guide and share this new modality with whoever is willing,” Tina says. She is now one of more than 600 guides spread out across 40 countries on six continents.

The training program included learning about plants, how to lead a group and pick a trail, marketing tips and more. “I found the most enjoyable part was learning about the plants,” she adds. Finally, Tina got 90

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her credentials last October and became the first certified forest therapy guide in Newfoundland and Labrador. Since then, she has led several walks in and around the St. John’s area, including Pippy Park and other natural environments.

Walking in the Woods “The Japanese government has done a great deal of research and studies on the effects of forest bathing, and have made it an integral part of their preventative health care and healing,” Tina explains. “The benefits can include reduced stress and blood pressure, a boost to immune systems and cardiovascular systems, increased creativity and focus, [and] it can help with anxiety and depression.”

As a certified forest therapy guide, she stresses she isn’t a counsellor, so any benefit people get is from nature.

She helps people connect to the nature around them.

When Tina begins an excursion, she asks that people put away their cellphones. They’re here to take in nature with all five senses, not 1-888-588-6353

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capture it on camera or take a call.

Then she leads the group with a meditation session, taking them through the five senses and how to use them to take in everything around them.

“It’s forcing you to be where you are in that moment,” she says.

Then there might be a few activities. Sometimes Tina sends the group off to collect items they feel drawn to, such as a pine cone or flowers. Other times she’s handed out magnifying glasses for people to explore the area more closely. “They’re delighted, they come back with things they never ever noticed before,” she says.

At the end of the experience, there’s a tea ceremony with some snacks and tea made from local plants for which she has foraged. She explains to the group the names and health benefits of the plants they are consuming.

In the two-to-three hour trip, they cover very little distance, Tina says.

“And that’s probably one of the things people find a little bit uncomfortable, is the slow pace. Like really slowing yourself down.” We’re so used to getting things done as fast as possible that taking our time can feel strange.

“I’ve hiked for years; there is no comparison between hiking and forest bathing,” Tina says. Hiking, for Tina, used to be about completing the task as fast as possible. If the trail rating recommended it would take a hiker nine hours to finish, it was an accomplishment for Tina to do it in seven, she remarks.

“Now I’m the complete opposite…

Now I tend to wander off the trail and touch the trees and smell the trees and maybe climb a tree. I might lie down in the moss.”

Curious about forest bathing? Read up on it online, as Tina did, at www.natureandforesttherapy.org, or contact Tina at NatureMinded.ca.

At the end of a forest bathing session, Tina holds a tea ceremony with tea made from foraged ingredients. www.downhomelife.com

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A Famous Fisherman Seen by millions smiling from the front of a popular postcard, this “jolly” fisherman was a joy to meet in real life.

By Mel D’Souza

I have always been fascinated with iconic photographs and the stories behind them. In Newfoundland and Labrador there are three images that are uniquely representative of the province and which have featured on postcards for decades.

The first one is of the little boy in Battle Harbour standing between two giant codfish. The other is of three children watching their house being floated across the bay during the resettlement years. The third postcard is that of three fishermen, whose smiles reflect the humour and warmth that is so typical of the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

It was just over 25 years ago that my friend Ern Warren of Norman’s Cove-Long Cove told me that the three individuals were local fishermen named Ern and John “Bobby” Newhook (brothers now deceased) and Doug Newhook (far right). Ern then introduced me to Doug at the Norman’s Cove-Long Cove summer festival. I met Doug on several occasions during the next few years, but as time went by, I lost track of him... until a couple of summers ago.

I was visiting Ern and his wife, Kathleen, when Ern suggested we drop in and say hello to Doug. We found Doug in his shed – the “castle” of any true Newfoundlander – steaming miniature planks into shape for the hull of a longliner model he was working on. In one corner was a finished model, and in 92 March 2019

another corner was yet another one under construction. He was the embodiment of contentment!

Doug was 90 years old and a bit hard of hearing, but we had a brief chat before continuing on our walk to the harbour. As we stepped off the pavement onto the road leading to the floating docks, we were welcomed by a large reproduction of the famous postcard emblazoned on the side of a red shed with the words “Welcome to Long Cove, Home of the Jolly Fishermen.”

Of all the welcome signs that I have seen in the various communities in the province, this one is my favourite... and one that I can brag about when I say, “I know one of the jolly fishermen personally!”

(As of press time, Doug is 92 and still living in his own home.)

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Did you meet a Newfoundland and Labrador celebrity in your travels?

Tell us about it – and we’ll make YOU famous! Send your story (and selfies with the celebrity if you have them) to us by email at editorial@downhomelife.com, or write to us at Downhome, 43 James Lane, St. John’s, NL, A1E 3H3. www.downhomelife.com

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explore stuff about

Trees A revolutionary discovery in cancer treatment made in the 1990s was rooted in the Yew tree.

Researchers discovered anti-cancer properties in the Yew’s bark and needles. Two drugs now made synthetically, docetaxel and paclitaxel, were originally made from Yew tree extracts.

American writer Joyce Kilmer, perhaps best remembered for his poem “Trees” (“I think that I shall never see / a poem lovely as a tree”), was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey. He died a soldier, killed by a sniper in France during the First World War.

The largest known family tree in the world belongs to Chinese philosopher Confucius. His genealogy has been traced from today all the way back more than 80 generations to King Tang of 1600s BC, and has more than two million recorded family members.

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The colourful frog in the Telus commercials is a red-eyed tree frog. It can change colour to blend in with its surroundings and, like most frogs, it closes its eyes when it chews because the eyeballs help push food down its throat!

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Located, appropriately, in the Giant Forest is the world’s largest living tree. The General Sherman looms over all others in Sequoia National Park, California, at 83 metres (275 feet) tall, and still growing.

Tea tree oil, an essential oil used in various home remedies – for everything from head lice and dandruff to eczema and acne – is harvested from the tea tree, found only in Australia.

Real-life roadrunners can be seen racing across the desert of Joshua Tree National Park in southern California.

These long-legged birds can reach land speeds of up to 32 km/h.

Richard Roundtree, most famous as the titular detective in the 1970s “Shaft” movies, battled male breast cancer in the 1990s. He underwent a double mastectomy and chemotherapy to beat the disease and has become a figure in cancer-related fundraising and awareness.

For more than 30 years, the Health Care Foundation has been collecting donations through its Tree of Memories and using those funds to deliver Christmas gifts and comfort to seniors in long-term care under Eastern Health in Newfoundland and Labrador. www.downhomelife.com

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food & leisure the everyday gourmet

Apple Butter 96

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the everyday gourmet

By Andrea Maunder

Andrea Maunder is the owner and creative force behind Bacalao Restaurant in St. John’s, NL, and Saucy & Sweet – Homemade Specialty Foods & Catering.

www.downhomelife.com

Have you ever had apple butter? I’ve noticed that it’s not widely popular in Newfoundland and Labrador, but it has wide appeal in other parts of the country – and the world. It doesn’t contain any butter: the name refers to the spreadable texture.

Apple butter got its start in European monasteries in the Middle Ages as a way to preserve the fruit and, of course, to have something sweet to eat.

I love it! It’s delicious on toast, as you can imagine, but great with yogurt or ice cream, on oatmeal or muffins, with pork or cheese and crackers. It’s so delicious, you’ll want it on everything.

In selecting apples, avoid using all McIntosh or Delicious apples. They are great for applesauce, but they go to mush so quickly that it’s hard to get the texture we’re after. I don’t recommend Granny Smith, as they are just too firm and difficult to break down. You could use a mixture of apples. I recommend Fuji, Braeburn, Cortland, Spartan, Idared, Jonathan and similar. I used Ambrosia apples; I found a big bag of mixed sizes (marked “imperfect”) at the supermarket for a good price.

Use a larger stainless steel (or copper) pot, not aluminum, and the wider the base the better for the second part of the cooking process. The more surface area, the quicker the evaporation, turning your juice-filled apples into creamy, luxurious apple butter.

A food mill is handy for the step where you separate the cooked apple flesh from the skin, core and seeds. If you don’t have one, you can use a medium-coarse sieve (with holes smaller than apple seeds) and a rubber spatula or wooden spoon, or a potato ricer.

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Jam making trick: Chill small plates in the freezer. When you want to test the thickness of your jam while cooking, drop a bit on a cold plate where it will cool and set quickly.

Sweetness and spiciness of the apple butter: You can customize your apple butter to your taste. The naturally occurring fruit sugars intensify as the moisture evaporates, so apple butter will become sweeter as it cooks. Depending on the apples you use, and your personal taste, you

may need to add more or less sugar.

Use my guide as a starting point and adjust to your liking as you cook.

Same with spices.

You can store your apple butter in the fridge or can it in mason jars.

(Follow proper canning procedure, with sterilized jars and new snap lids, piping hot apple butter, and hotwater processing for 15 minutes.) If you don’t want to can it, it freezes pretty well.

Apple Butter 6 lbs apples 2 cups water 1 1/4 cups good apple cider vinegar Good pinch salt 1 1/2 – 2 1/2 cups sugar 2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground allspice 1/2 tsp ground cardamom 1/2 tsp ground ginger 1/4 tsp ground cloves Juice of 1-2 lemons

Wash apples well with warm water, removing any waxy coating. If they are average size, cut them into quarters. If large, cut into sixths. Leave skin on and cores intact (the naturally occurring pectin in the skin and cores will help thicken the apple butter). Cut away any bruises.

Place apples in large pot with water, vinegar and salt. Cover and bring to a boil, then simmer 15-25 minutes, until apples are soft, almost mushy.

Using a hand-crank food mill, or a medium-coarse sieve and spatula (or a potato ricer), press the apples and any remaining cooking liquid through, into a bowl, leaving the skin, cores and seeds behind.

Return apple flesh to the pot, add spices and lemon juice, and start with 1 1/2 cups sugar. With the heat on low (not lowest setting or it’ll take all day, but not too close to medium or the apples will burn on), simmer the apples, stirring frequently to keep it from sticking, until thick and smooth. You’ll notice the colour will darken throughout the cooking process, which takes about 2 hours. Taste after the first hour to see if you’d like to add sugar, and again a half-hour later – it will naturally sweeten more as it cooks. Check the texture with the freezer-plate trick.

You are looking for a thick, spreadable consistency. When at the consistency and sweetness you like, pour into jars for refrigeration, or complete the canning process, or let cool and pour in freezer-safe containers for longer storage. Makes four to six 250 ml mason jars 98

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everyday recipes.ca

This year Pancake Day (Shrove Tuesday) lands on March 5. This Christian holiday marks the last chance for indulgence before giving up luxuries for Lent. With this rich selection of pancake recipes, you could fry up a feast this Pancake Day.

Plain Pancakes 1 1/2 cups flour 3 tbsp sugar 1 1/2 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt 1 1/2 cups buttermilk 1 egg 3 tbsp coconut oil, melted

Sift together dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, blend the buttermilk, egg and coconut oil together. Add the wet to the dry and mix until just combined. (Note: do not over mix, as this creates a very dense and heavy product – lumps are OK.) Heat a frying pan over medium heat and add enough coconut oil to evenly coat the bottom of the pan. Use an ice-cream scoop to drop batter in the hot pan, keeping pancakes about 1" apart. When bubbles start to form on top of batter and edges start to dry out a little, flip the pancake. Cook until pancake is puffed up and springs back when lightly poked. Serve immediately. Suggested topping: maple syrup.

Yield: 10-12 pancakes

All of our recipes are brought to you by the fantastic foodies in Academy Canada’s Culinary Arts program, led by instructor Bernie-Ann Ezekiel.

www.downhomelife.com

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Partridgeberry Ricotta Pancakes 1 2 1 1 1

cup flour tbsp sugar tsp baking powder tsp baking soda cup milk

1 egg 1/2 cup ricotta cheese 2 tbsp coconut oil, melted 1 cup partridgeberries

Sift together dry ingredients. In another bowl, blend the milk, egg, cheese and coconut oil together. Add the wet to the dry and mix until just combined (do not over mix, as this creates a very dense and heavy product – lumps are OK). Gently fold in the berries.

Heat a frying pan over medium heat and add enough coconut oil to evenly coat the bottom of the pan. Using an ice-cream scoop to portion, place scoops of batter in the hot pan about 1" apart. When you see bubbles start to form on the surface of the batter and the edges start to dry out a little, flip the pancake. Cook until pancake is puffed up and springs back when lightly poked. Remove from pan and serve immediately.

Suggested topping: maple/birch syrup. Yield: 10 pancakes

table For prin rds a c e ip c re visit

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Pumpkin Pancakes 1 cup flour 3 tbsp brown sugar 1 tsp cinnamon 1/2 tsp ginger 1/4 tsp nutmeg 1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda 3/4 cup milk 1 egg 1/2 cup pumpkin purĂŠe 1 tbsp butter, melted

Sift together dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, blend milk, egg, pumpkin and melted butter together. Add the wet to the dry and mix until just combined (do not over mix, as this creates a very dense and heavy product – lumps are OK).

Heat a frying pan over medium heat and melt enough butter to just evenly coat the bottom of the pan. Using an ice-cream scoop to portion, place scoops of batter in the hot pan about 1" apart. When you see bubbles start to form on the surface of the batter and the edges start to dry out a little, flip the pancake. Cook until pancake is puffed up and springs back when lightly poked. Remove from pan and serve immediately.

Suggested topping: molasses. Yield: 8-10 pancakes

www.downhomelife.com

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Apple Pancakes 1 cup flour 2 tbsp brown sugar 1 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp baking soda 3/4 tsp cinnamon 1/4 tsp nutmeg Pinch cloves

3/4 cup milk 1 egg 1/4 cup whipping cream 2 tbsp coconut oil, melted 2 apples, peeled, cored & sliced 1/4� thick

Sift together dry ingredients. In another bowl, blend the milk, egg, whipping cream and coconut oil together. Add the wet to the dry and mix until just combined (do not over mix, as this creates a very dense and heavy product – lumps are OK).

Heat a frying pan over medium heat and add enough coconut oil to evenly coat the bottom of the pan. Fry some apple rings until they start to caramelize. Using an ice-cream scoop to portion, place each scoop of batter over an apple ring, keeping pancakes about 1" apart.

When you see bubbles start to form on the surface of the batter and the edges start to dry out a little, flip the pancake. Cook until pancake is puffed up and springs back when lightly poked. Remove from the pan and serve immediately.

Suggested topping: caramel syrup/sauce. Yield: 8-10 pancakes 102

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Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Pancakes 1 cup flour 3 tbsp brown sugar 1 tsp baking powder 1 tsp baking soda 1/2 cup mini chocolate chips

1 1/2 cups milk 1 egg 1/2 cup peanut butter, melted 1 tbsp butter, melted

Sift together dry ingredients and add chocolate chips. In another bowl, blend the milk, egg, peanut butter and melted butter together.

Add the wet to the dry and mix until just combined (do not over mix, as this creates a very dense and heavy product – lumps are OK).

Heat a frying pan over medium heat and melt enough butter to just evenly coat the bottom of the pan. Using an ice-cream scoop to portion, place scoops of batter in the hot pan about 1" apart. When you see bubbles start to form on the surface of the batter and the edges start to dry out a little, flip the pancake. Cook until pancake is puffed up and springs back when lightly poked. Remove from pan and serve immediately.

Suggested topping: traditional pancake syrup. Yield: 10 pancakes

table For prin rds a c e recip visit

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Potato Pancakes 1 large potato, peeled and grated 1/2 cup onion, grated 1/4 cup flour

1 egg 1 tbsp parsley, minced 1/2 tsp black pepper 1/2 tsp salt

Mix everything together and allow it to sit while you prepare your pan. Heat the pan over medium heat and add enough clarified butter/oil to coat the bottom of the pan thoroughly. Mix your potato batter again, and portion out six pancakes in the pan (cook in batches if you have to). Cook, flipping at least once, until they are golden on both sides and the potatoes are cooked completely through (approx. 5-8 minutes).

Suggested topping: sour cream/ranch dressing Yield: 6 pancakes For printa recipe ca ble rds visit

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Cinnamon Roll Pancakes Pancakes

Cinnamon Swirl

1 cup flour 1 tbsp sugar 1 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp baking soda 1 cup milk 1 egg 2 tbsp butter, melted

1 tbsp brown sugar 1 tsp cinnamon 1/4 cup pancake batter (from this recipe)

For the pancakes: Sift together dry ingredients. In another bowl, blend the milk, egg and melted butter together. Add the wet to the dry and mix until just combined (do not over mix, as this creates a very dense and heavy product – lumps are OK). Reserve 1/4 cup of batter to make the swirl.

For the swirl: Mix all swirl ingredients together and place in a sandwich bag with the corner cut out, or in a piping bag fitted with a small round tip.

Heat a frying pan over medium heat and melt enough butter that it evenly coats the bottom of the pan. Using an ice-cream scoop to portion, place scoops of batter into the hot pan about 1" apart and, using the piping bag, swirl the cinnamon batter over the surface of the pancake. When you see bubbles start to form on the surface of the batter and the edges start to dry out a little, flip the pancake. Cook until pancake is puffed up and springs back when lightly poked. Remove from the pan and serve immediately.

Suggested topping: thin icing/glaze made by combining 1/4 cup icing sugar and 2-3 tsp water. Yield: 4 large pancakes www.downhomelife.com

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Bacon Pancakes 1 cup flour 2 tbsp sugar 1 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp baking soda

3/4 cup milk 1 egg 3 tbsp butter, melted 3 strips bacon, cut in half

Sift together dry ingredients. In another bowl, blend the milk, egg and melted butter together. Add the wet to the dry and mix until just combined (do not over mix, as this creates a very dense and heavy product – lumps are OK).

Heat a frying pan over medium heat and add two of the bacon halves. Fry lightly on both sides, until they start to become somewhat crisp and golden. Using an ice-cream scoop to portion, place scoops of batter in the hot pan, covering the bacon strips, about 1" apart.

When you see bubbles start to form on the surface of the batter and the edges start to dry out a little, flip the pancake. Cook until the pancake is puffed up and springs back when lightly poked. Remove from the pan and serve immediately. Repeat with rest of bacon halves.

Suggested topping: maple syrup. Yield: 6 pancakes

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food & leisure

We asked our Facebook friends to share their favourite pancake toppings, and they offered up some delicious alternatives to everyday pancake syrup.

How do these toppings “stack up” to yours?

“Homemade blueberry sauce.”

– Todd Hollett

“My own maple syrup tapped from maples on Blackmarsh Road.

YUM!”– Jennifer Stamp “Butter and bananas.” – Lee Benoit “Molasses!” – Stephanie Bennett “Fresh fruit and whipped cream.”

– Cathy Murphy

“Brown sugar sauce.” – Gloria Young “Eggs over easy.” – Alice D’Huyvetter “IHOP’s Butter Pecan Pancake Syrup!”

– Kim Hynes

“Real butter & 100% Canadian maple syrup!” – Kimberley MacIntyre-Nurse “Peanut butter topped with an over medium egg and then syrup over everything.” – Linda Lewis Golden www.downhomelife.com

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food & leisure

We asked folks on Facebook to name their favourite traditional Newfoundland and Labrador food. Here are the top 10 (in no particular order), followed by a Downhome reader’s recipe for one of the favourites.

6. Fries, dressing and gravy

1. Mom’s cooked dinner 2. Jiggs dinner

7. Homemade bread

3. Salt fish and brewis, with drawn butter and scrunchions

9. Bologna stew

4. Home-baked beans 5. Cod tongues

8. Bakeapple pie 10. Baked seal flippers and pastry

Bologna Stew Submitted by Gertrude V. Sweetapple 1 lb bologna, thickly sliced and cut in quarters salt to taste 1 med. onion, chopped

1 carrot, diced 1 small turnip, diced 2-3 potatoes, peeled and cubed 2-3 tbsp ketchup (if desired)

Fry bologna until slightly browned. Put bologna and all the vegetables in a soup/stew pot. Add enough water to barely cover everything. Let boil slowly until vegetables are tender. Stir in ketchup near the end for added flavour, if desired.

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Is it Still Jiggs Dinner?

When it comes to food, everyone has their way of making things and nothing ever tastes as good as mom, dad or nan makes it.

But when it comes to Jiggs dinner, there is almost unanimous – and most definitely passionate – agreement. That’s what we found out when we asked our Facebook friends this question:

If you put gravy on it, is it still Jiggs dinner?

About 150 people wasted no time putting their opinion on the table. The vast majority (more than 85%) declared “No!” When you put gravy on Jiggs dinner, or add a side of beef, chicken or turkey, it becomes cooked dinner (often served on Sundays), most said.

As commenter Dave Gill explained about Jiggs’ history, “It is generally agreed these days that the name Jiggs dinner, referring to the common Newfoundland meal of salt beef (or salt pork spare ribs), boiled vegetables and steamed pudding got its name from the popular comic strip ‘Bringing Up Father,’ which began back in the early 1900s.” Indeed, this boiled dinner was known as the favourite dish of the strip’s main character, Jiggs.

Still, there were some, like Cal Burge, who enthusiastically pours gravy on Jiggs: “Oh my god, yes!!” And at least one person confessed to an existential crisis due to this debate: “My whole life is a lie,” quipped Zachary Hatcher.

By the end of the day, this topic made for lively dinner conversation. Here are some other tasty morsels that came from our debate: “We always called it corned beef and cabbage growing up, and it was without gravy unless it was served with some kind of roast on Sundays or other special occasions.” – Karen Drodge “Jiggs dinner is covered with ‘pot liquor’ and sometimes beets and pickles, and there is no meat with it, only salt meat and the veggies and doughboys.” – Melanie Dawn Rideout “Don’t forget sweet mustard pickles.”

– Chic George www.downhomelife.com

“Molasses on the doughboys.” – Verna Bixby

“ w

“The gravy comes from ‘fresh meat’ as opposed to ‘salt beef.’ It then becomes a ‘cooked dinner.’

Newfie law!” – Daphne Kinden

W

“I am a mainlander and enjoyed Jiggs dinner many times whenever I visited and stayed there, and I am going to say NO [to gravy]. I like the taste of the food not covered up with gravy or spices etc.”

– Dorothy Partridge March 2019

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Back in 1995,

the craft beer scene in Newfoundland and Labrador was pretty flat.

Then Storm Brewing blew in, followed by Quidi Vidi Brewery in ’96 and Yellowbelly Brewpub in the early 2000s. Then things went relatively quiet, until recently.

In the span of a few years, Newfoundland and Labrador has gone from three breweries to 13, with another seven scheduled or hoping to open in the next couple of years.

In Ontario, about 60 craft breweries exploded to 260 and counting in the past few years, says Chris Conway co-owner of Landwash Brewery, a new craft brewery in Mount Pearl that opened in late 2018. He and Christina Coady were living in Ontario at the time of that province’s craft beer boom and helped with the startup of Folly brewpub in downtown Toronto. They also visited more than 100 breweries, meeting industry peers and gleaning insight into what did and didn’t work for these breweries. And then they brought all that knowledge back home to be a part of what has grown from a few businesses to an upstart industry.

For beer lovers, these are exciting times. For the brew-curious, walking into a craft brewery and choosing a beer can be a bit overwhelming, with all the varieties, types and codes. IPA, whitbeer, wheat beer, stout, sour, and on and on – what does it all mean?

That’s what brought Downhome to the Landwash Brewery recently, to ask Chris to explain it all to us.

Beer, he begins, is a combination of malted barley, yeast, hops and water.

The malted barley is kilned, (roasted), www.downhomelife.com

and, like coffee beans, the longer the roasting process, the darker the beverage. Nearly all beer is created with these four basic ingredients. The way these ingredients are prepared or chosen is what makes the different styles and flavours of beer. The way the malt is prepared, the choice of hops and when it is added to the brew process, the choice of yeast, and extra ingredients (such as blueberries or coffee) all contribute to the final look and taste of the brew.

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Beer Types (as explained by Chris of Landwash Brewery)

STOUTS AND PORTERS • Dark, nearly black beer with a heavier mouth feel • The colour comes from the roasted malt – it’s not an added colour

and tend to be bright, juicy and more fruity, with a haziness imparted by the yeast.

Blonde Ale

• A light-coloured beer with a crisp, refreshing flavour • It showcases malt in a different way – it’s really showcasing lightness and cleanness

• 5 per cent roasted barley will make your beer black – a little goes a long way

• Landwash version: One Wave, which uses Old World hops to give it spicy, citrusy flavours

• Stouts showcase malt

SOUR ALE

• Hops and yeast are not a main flavour element • Landwash version: Hazures Rock, brewed with oats to give it body and thickness, and Jumping Bean coffee beans for flavour – a nice warming-up beer

IPA

• It’s what really launched craft beer in the States in the ‘70s • Showcases hops, with the malt and yeast flavours serving as a backup. There are more than 50 varieties of hops, with a wide range of flavours and aromas, from melon to citrus to pine.

• These beers tend to be more bitter, with West Coast IPAs being among the most bitter of the IPAs. New England IPAs focus on aromatics over bitterness, 114

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• A newly emerging style, sour beers have a tart flavour, and may be fruity, with almost no bitterness. There are all sorts of flavour profiles that come from the souring process, so one sour beer may not taste anything like another sour beer.

• Can be similar to a white wine, in the way wine is a balance of acidity and sweetness • Landwash version: Brackish uses salt from the Newfoundland Salt Co. The sour flavour particular to Brackish is a result of adding a bacteria – similar to the one used in yoghurt – to the beer, in a process called kettle souring.

The bacteria is then boiled off to kill it.

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RED ALE • Named for its reddish colour, these beers showcase malt flavours • The red colour comes from a caramelized malt, which also lends toffee and caramel flavours to the brew

SAISON • Belgian style of beer • Fermented at a higher temperature than ales or lagers; really crisp and refreshing • Usually a little fruitier, sometimes a little peppery, sometimes a burnt orange peel sort of flavour • Sometimes called farmhouse ales because that’s where they originated

WHEAT BEER • Uses wheat in addition to barley to give the beer its unique flavour • Tends to have a light colour and is often described as crisp and refreshing • Want to try a wheat beer?

Look for terms like hefeweizen, witbier and anything with “wheat” in the name. www.downhomelife.com

TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE

and sample some beers from any of these craft breweries in Newfoundland and Labrador

CURRENTLY OPEN

Quidi Vidi Brewing Co., Quidi Vidi Baccalieu Trail Brewing Co., Bay Roberts

Secret Cove Brewing, Port au Port Storm Brewing, Mount Pearl Port Rexton Brewing Co., Port Rexton Landwash Brewery, Mount Pearl ScudRunner Brewing, Gander Crooked Feeder Brewing, Cormack Bootleg Brew Co., Corner Brook YellowBelly Brewery, St. John’s Split Rock Brewing Co., Twillingate Dildo Brewing Co. and Museum, Dildo Western Newfoundland Brewing Co., Pasadena Mill Street, St. John’s*

SCHEDULED FOR A 2019 OPENING

Ninepenny Brewing, CBS Bannerman Brewing Co., St. John’s Boomstick Brewing, Corner Brook Iron Rock Brewing Co., Labrador City

BREWERIES IN THE PLANNING STAGES

RagnaRock Northern Brewing Co., St. Anthony

Brigus Brewing Co., Brigus Union Electric Brewing Company, St. John’s * A franchise brewpub with craft brewery roots that’s now owned by Molson.

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food & leisure down to earth

Kid Friendly Garden Introduce children to gardening with their own rows to hoe

By Ross Traverse

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Gardening teaches many important life skills, and children love to learn by doing, so why not create a little garden space just for them? The trick is to start small and grow plants that will be of interest to children and are easy to grow in the short season.

First of all, choose a sunny location that is, preferably, sheltered from the wind. If the soil is less than a foot deep, you will have to bring in soil from another source. The hard work, like mixing in organic matter, lime and nutrients (fertilizer), is probably best done by adults. An area about 10’ x 10’ is large enough to start. Consider making a raised bed, even just a foot or so high, which will make it easier for children to work the soil and take care of the plants.

If space is limited, try container gardening in large pots or window boxes. Let the children choose their containers. Whatever they choose must have drainage holes and be filled with good quality potting soil.

There are quality gardening tools suitable for children available at most garden centres and online. Beginner tools should include a rake, a hoe, a trowel and a spade. A child-size watering can with a fine nozzle is useful to show how to properly water plants. A small wagon is helpful for carrying supplies and storing the child’s tools.

As for what to grow, choose a variety of edible plants, fragrant plants, vines and ornamental flowering plants – a good spread to feed all their senses. Choose plants with seeds (or bulbs) large enough for a small child to handle when they are planting them.

Avoid using seed that is chemically treated.

To help get you started, here are some plants that are ideal for a children’s garden:

Sunflowers

Growing their own sunflower plant is bound to impress a child (as well as an adult!). Choose a variety of sunflower that can grow to a height of 6 feet or more. Early Russian is such a variety and it produces edible seed from their giant flower heads, which can reach 10 inches across. Sunflowers can be easily grown from seed planted directly in the garden or by transplants started inside in pots. They must be given support, as they grow tall on a single stem. It may be best to plant them in the corner of a garden so that they have lots of space. Teach the child to feed the plants every few weeks with a soluble fertilizer like 20–20–20. This generally applies to all the plants in the garden.

www.downhomelife.com

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Sugar Snap Peas

There are lots of lessons to be learned from growing a row of sugar snap peas. The sweet, edible pods are produced on vines that cling to a support and are easily picked by small children. The seeds are planted directly in the garden and are ready to be harvested in eight weeks or so. The bright white flowers on the vines demonstrate how it climbs to get sunlight and how the pea pods with the seed develops.

As the pods are picked, new ones are produced.

Pumpkins

Growing pumpkins is a favourite gardening activity for children. But there is nothing more disappointing than having a large green pumpkin on the vine just before Halloween. In the Newfoundland and Labrador climate, in order to ensure that the pumpkin will ripen to a bright orange colour in time for Halloween, you must start off the plants inside four or five weeks before the last danger of frost in the spring. When the plants are set in the garden they need to be protected with a covering for a few weeks until they adjust to the outside environment.

Pumpkins grow best in very fertile soil that has been enriched with compost or other form of organic matter. One technique is to dig a hole about 2 feet 118

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deep and fill it with nutrient-rich organic matter like manure and/or compost. Put a foot of soil over the organic material, then plant three or four pumpkin plants in that area.

When the vines start to spread out, the child can observe the difference between a male and a female flower.

The female flower will have the little immature pumpkin at the end of it.

You need at least three plants in order to ensure that the bees will have enough pollen from the male flowers to pollinate the female flowers. Once the female flower has been pollinated, the pumpkin will start to grow. This is an exciting lesson for young children.

When the pumpkin is half-grown and the skin is still soft, the child can carefully scrape their name with a blunt instrument on the surface of the pumpkin.

When the pumpkin is displayed for Halloween, the child’s name will be clearly visible on the surface of the pumpkin.

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Sweet Pea Flowers The fragrance of a flower is one of the most amazing things that people remember from childhood.

Sweet peas were always a favourite to grow in Newfoundland and Labrador gardens. Like garden peas, they can be easily grown by sowing seed directly in the garden in the spring. The vine of sweet peas must be supported with a trellis.

Make sure you select the varieties that are very fragrant (some modern-day sweet peas are actually grown just for the flowers and they have no scent). When the fragrant flowers bloom they can be cut and put in a vase, so the child can enjoy the fragrance in their room.

strawberries also teaches children how some plants use runners to reproduce and spread.

Potatoes

Most children are familiar with the common potato.

However, not many know how they actually grow. Potatoes do not grow from real seed, but from a piece of the stem that grew and enlarged underground. When a piece of potato is planted in the spring it will produce many more potatoes during the growing season. Conveniently, potatoes can be grown in containers. For added fun, children can compete with each other to see who grew the largest potato and who had the most potatoes under each stalk.

Strawberries

All children love picking strawberries that they can eat right away in their garden. A strawberry patch teaches children that you must have patience if you want to get strawberries the second year; the plants must be planted one year in order to get a big crop the next year.

Weeding the strawberry patch is another lesson in how to keep a weedfree garden. Growing www.downhomelife.com

Ross Traverse has been a horticultural consultant to gardeners and farmers for more than 50 years. downtoearth @downhomelife.com March 2019

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life is better Ice in Bonavista harbour Helen Durdle, Bonavista, NL

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reminiscing flashbacks

On the Rails

An unknown man poses for a photo on the railway track running near Kilbride, NL. Frances Buckley St. John’s, NL

Fishin’ Fun

This is little Bill Cross with his Uncle Bob Herdman, taken in 1949 after catching two fish, and one is the size of Bill!

Susan Herdman Lincolnton, GA, USA

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Mystery Family

While Mary V. Dayberry and her husband lived in St. John’s, NL, in 1954-55, they were friends with a woman named Loraine. Mary would like to get in touch with Loraine’s family (featured in the photograph).

If you know how Mary might be able to contact them, please email us at editorial@downhomelife.com.

Mary V. Dayberry Haughton, LA, USA

This Month in History In the latter half of the 19th century, various technological advancements in printing and a growing population in Newfoundland and Labrador made it possible to support more than one daily newspaper in St. John’s. On March 3, 1894, a teacher named J. Alexander Robinson registered The Daily News, which would become the third daily newspaper operating in the capital city at that time. According to The Encyclopedia of Newfoundland and Labrador, it started off as a conservative publication with Robinson as the proprietor, printer and publisher. In 1898, the paper was sold to News Publishing Co. Ltd. with a new editor, but in 1906, Robinson bought it back. The Daily News closed its doors in 1984 due to financial strain, and by then the Telegram was the last remaining daily paper in St. John’s.

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reminiscing

An upcoming museum exhibit in Mount Pearl is hoping to shed light on the major players of an historic transatlantic air race – including the St. John’s woman who played a part.

By Linda Browne

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Sifting

through Margaret Carter’s photo collection offers a rare and intimate glimpse into one of the most exciting events in Newfoundland’s past. In one sepia-toned image, the fur coat-clad Carter and an acquaintance examine a Sopwith biplane in an open field in Mount Pearl. In another, she looks out from under a wide-brimmed hat as she bids adieu to Australian pilot Harry Hawker and Scottish navigator Kenneth Mackenzie-Grieve – one of several teams who had come to the island in an attempt to become the first to fly non-stop across the Atlantic Ocean.

It was the first spring after the end of the First World War and spirits were lifted – perhaps none more than those of high-flying pioneers vying for the London Daily Mail’s £10,000 prize and, most importantly, a coveted place in aviation history. Newfoundland was an ideal starting point for such an adventure, due to its proximity to Europe and prevailing winds.

Ultimately, Hawker and Mackenzie-Grieve were not successful (they were rescued by the crew of the Danish steamer SS Mary after radiator trouble forced them to ditch at sea). On June 14, 1919, the British team of John Alcock (pilot) and Arthur Whitten Brown hopped into their Vickers Vimy in Lester’s Field near St. John’s and took off into an overcast sky. They landed in a bog in Clifden, County Galway, Ireland just over 16 hours later, securing first place, the cash prize and immortality in aviation history.

Left: Margaret Carter at Mount Pearl Aerodrome. Note the Sopwith aircraft in the background.

Top: Margaret Carter and Margaret Frew in front of an aircraft All images Courtesy of Archives and Special Collections, Memorial Libraries from “Margaret Carter Race across the Transatlantic, 1918-1919 Collection,” (18-013)

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Of course, it takes many hands to make such a daring feat possible, and Margaret Carter played a small, yet pivotal, part. But who was this woman who rubbed shoulders with these swashbucklers of the sky and how did she come to be involved? An upcoming exhibit at Admiralty House Communications Museum in Mount Pearl hopes to peel back some of the mystery.

Up, Up and Away Terra Barrett, a folklorist with Heritage NL, has been working with members of Carter’s extended family, as well as Memorial University’s Archives and Special Collections, to help paint a picture of this woman and her place in aviation history.

Margaret Carter, Terra, says, was born in St. John’s on December 1, 1895, to Annie Jessie (nee Baird) and Henry George Davis Carter. She grew up on Church Hill in a house built by her maternal grandfather, James Baird, a merchant. Her paternal grandfather was Sir Frederick Carter, prime minister of Newfoundland (1865-1869 and 1875-1878). Her family also had a summer home called Hawthorne Dell (located in the Freshwater/Thorburn Road area near where the Avalon Mall sits today), and it is here where they stored plane parts for Alcock and Brown prior to their successful flight.

Terra’s research reveals a woman who was an active member of the community and acted in several plays during the war years to raise funds for various causes. After Carter’s first husband died, she married a senator. They split their time between Ottawa, ON, and their Hawthorne Dell home, where they 126

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raised chickens and ran a farm.

While Terra says she hasn’t quite pinned down how the Carter family became acquainted with the aviators, she believes their penchant for collecting stamps may provide a clue.

Alcock and Brown carried a batch of letters on their flight – the first airmail delivery across the Atlantic – and the Carters were keen to obtain a small piece of history.

Of course, such an arduous journey required fuel of another sort, and it was Margaret Carter who packed a lunch for Alcock and Brown.

“She packed them sandwiches in this linen table napkin. And then they took it on the plane and when they got to the other side, they mailed that back to Margaret. And that also was passed down to her great-nephew,” Terra says.

A Snapshot in Time The napkin, signed by Alcock and Brown, will be one of the items on display during “Field to Flight: Mount Pearl and the Transatlantic Air Race,” to be housed in the Admiralty House Annex from mid-May until August 31. The exhibit (funded by the province and the City of Mount Pearl) will tell of this historic event and its aftermath, the pilots involved, the Mount Pearl connection and the Lester and Glendinning families (from whose farms several of the planes departed), and, of course, Margaret Carter.

“Margaret Carter is going to be the common voice that brings people through the exhibit,” because she’s connected to every section of the display, says Sarah Wade, museum manager at the Admiralty House Communications Museum.

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Maragaret and Australian pilot Harry Hawker and Scottish navigator Kenneth Mackenzie-Grieve Other items to be displayed include Carter’s personal album, which includes candid shots of various pilots, as well as photos of the Carter family enjoying meals with them at the Cochrane Hotel (both the album and linen napkin are on loan from Memorial University’s Archives and Special Collections at the Queen Elizabeth II Library). Visitors will also see the auger that Alcock and Brown used to secure their Vickers Vimy prior to their flight, a wheel from Hawker and Mackenzie-Grieve’s Sopwith plane, one of Carter’s mink fur coats, and more.

Besides adding a female perspective to what is often a maledominated story, Sarah is looking forward to sharing the important role of the historic Admiralty House.

The Marconi Telegraph Co. built it in 1915, as the top secret H.M. Wireless Station for the British Royal Navy.

Today, it’s the last standing of 11 identical buildings around the world.

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In addition to housing reservists who decoded German naval transmissions, the station tracked icebergs and received distress calls from ships. Interestingly, Brown visited H.M. Wireless Station prior to his flight with Alcock and, since they had wireless technology aboard the Vickers Vimy, he communicated with the station during take-off.

“It’s just such an exciting story to tell,” Sarah says. “It’s a celebration for something that was so spectacular that happened in Newfoundland in 1919, especially where it was just after the war, the armistice was signed...the hustle and bustle of all these people coming to Newfoundland to set off on this journey.”

Know anything about Margaret Carter or her connection to the transatlantic air race? If so, contact Admiralty House Communications Museum at 709-748-1124 or email admiraltyhouse@mountpearl.ca.

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reminiscing

Lester Green lets the house do the talking in this imaginative retelling of his family history in South West Arm.

My foundation

was laid at Little Heart’s Ease, NL, in the early 1920s, on land given by William Jacobs to his son, Levi, and daughter in-law, Susie. They had two children: Lewis and Jennie.

In the early years, wind whistled through me on stormy nights.

Levi and Susie struggled to keep the draft out. They covered my floor with old newspapers and stuffed straw into my walls, while keeping the old woodstove burning. They did everything to keep their family warm during the winter months.

I became darkened with sadness at the passing of Jennie in 1937. She caught tuberculosis. So many children died from this dreadful disease in houses around the harbour.

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Levi and Susie moved their family to Baie Verte in 1939, where he found work in the lumberwoods, eventually becoming a foreman. I lay abandoned for a few years. Those were my lonely years. There was no smell of kerosene or flickering shadows of children on my walls. Youthful laughter had drifted away through the cracks. There was just darkness and silence during the night. I could only hope that some new family would find me strong enough to provide shelter to raise children.

In December 1948, happiness returned with the sounds of laughter and celebration at a wedding in the lane for Levi’s niece, Ollie Jacobs, to William Green of St. Jones Without.

I could only wish that they would find me large and strong enough to raise a family. My hopes were soon dashed when they decided to live in St. Jones Without.

But luck was on my side when, a few years later, St. Jones Without became an abandoned community.

Ollie and Will decided to move to Little Heart’s Ease with their three children. They bargained with Levi and Susie in 1953, and once again there were puffs of smoke billowing out of my brick chimney. My boards began to squeak again and children ran around, shouting and hitting my walls. I was overcome with joy.

Some of my floors were painted, while others were covered in canvas.

My walls were plastered with the latest flowery patterns. My exterior even got a fresh coat of paint. I felt important and proud to be among the houses in the lane that provided comfort and warmth to a young family.

As the family grew from three to 10, so many memories were being developed. Some of the ones I recall involve special times like Christmas.

The kids gathered upstairs, peering down through the round hole above the wood stove hoping to catch a glimpse of old Saint Nick. The excitement the next morning of the children running down the stairs to get their stockings, to discover simple gifts like a small toy with fruit, candy and a bar. Everyone seemed so happy

Left: Back of our old house owned

by William and Olive Green.

Photo courtesy Lester Green

Right: Levi (1897-1980) and Susie (1896-1960) Jacobs.

Courtesy of granddaughter Maxine

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Five of Will and Ollie’s oldest children: Wayne, Mary, Doris, Hilda, Irene and Lester. with so few things.

I remember when the roads arrived in the lane and the old tractor would clear the narrow path of snow. The vibration of the tracks hitting the ground would make my frame shiver as the children would peer out the windows at the plow.

The old woodstove was a gathering place on wintery nights. They would warm their feet by placing them on the oven door. Just before bedtime, several bricks were placed in the oven, removed hot, wrapped in a towel and given to the children as they marched upstairs. These bricks were placed beneath the bed sheet to 130

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keep their feet warm when they first crawled into bed.

How cold did it get? Well, let me tell you. Ollie would place the goldfish bowl in a wool cap and hope the water would not freeze. She would have to crack the ice in the morning and hope the goldfish survived. Her flowers were placed on the kitchen table during the night and placed in socks or wrapped in towels – anything to keep them from the frost.

Sure, the children would write their names in the frost on my single-pane windows in the morning.

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“Every Sunday during the summer months, Will would open the front door and sit at the old organ, peacefully pumping out old religious tunes. The sounds of ‘In the Sweet Bye and Bye’ and ‘Oh Happy Days’ drifted through the door and my cracks into the evening air.” frozen on the ballycaters along the shore. Ollie took the lamb, wrapped it in blankets and placed it on the oven door in the warm. You know, that lamb survived and was raised on a baby’s bottle. As the lamb got older it became a bit of a terror to the children because it would chase them and buck them to get food.

One of my saddest times with the Green family was in 1963. Little Glenise took sick and died on her way to the hospital. She was only 20 months old. They said she died of meningitis. It was a sad time in the lane.

Every Sunday during the summer months, Will would open the front door and sit at the old organ, peacefully pumping out old religious tunes. The sounds of “In the Sweet Bye and Bye” and “Oh Happy Days” drifted through the door and my cracks into the evening air. The serene religious music, mixed with the smell from the old lilac tree, gave the lane a mystical surrounding 1-888-588-6353

before the church service at the old Salvation Army Barracks on the hill.

When the Salvationists gathered for service, sounds echoed off the cliffs of the harbour.

With the passage of time, the family left the nest and I was considered too old (I was only about 60). My owners wanted a modern house and I was again filled with silence. This time no new family would be moving in. I was taken apart board by board, post by post, beam by beam, until I was only a memory in front of the new house.

With the passage of time, modernization and smaller families, our usefulness had come to an end. Like many old homes in Newfoundland and Labrador, we provided shelter for larger families and served our time. However, like the Newfoundland pony that was replaced by the snowmobile, we were replaced by modern homes that now overlook the harbours of Newfoundland and Labrador.

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reminiscing

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How a family excursion was almost sunk by a series of dangerous shoals

By Kim Ploughman

For a sea-based society like Newfoundland and Labrador, shoals are a catch-22. They can be a bonanza in attracting fish, but they are also dangerous to vessels that get too close. Many fishermen have lost their lives on treacherous shoals around our coastline.

John Plowman, an expat living in Ontario, still holds very strong memories of shoals he wishes he’d never encountered as a young lad growing up on the west coast of Newfoundland.

The year was 1947. John, seven years old at the time, and his parents were embarking on what would be an unforgettable boat trip from Port Saunders to visit his older siblings 12 miles down the coast. Port Saunders is a small fishing village on the west side of the Great Northern Peninsula, where high hills nestle the long, snug harbour. John’s father had told him it was “one of the best harbours on the west coast,” he says.

John recalls the boyish cheerfulness he felt that day as he followed his mom down to the wharf to the family boat.

“I made my way down the narrow footpath on the side of the hill. The sun was bright, and the weather was warm and cozy. I felt

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excited and full of joy at the thought of visiting my married brothers,” he says. Watching from the boat as they pulled away, the buildings of Port Saunders were slowly left behind, “and as we turned the first point of land to go into Ingornachoix Bay, all the houses disappeared.”

When the family trio arrived at their destination, they were welcomed and showered with hugs and kisses. All three of John’s older

John Plowman, age 7 brothers (Mike, Guy and Clarence) had recently returned from serving in WWII and, together with their wives, had enterprisingly decided to found their own village at Gould’s Point, a remote area behind Hawkes Bay. “The weekend went too fast and, before you knew it, it was time to return home to Port Saunders,” John recalls.

The weather that day was less than favourable to be on the water. “Even though the weather was warm and waters calm, the fog had moved in 134

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and the day was dark grey.”

Despite pleadings from the older siblings not to leave in such thick fog, his father would not be deterred.

After all, his father was an expert mariner from the First World War. “My father was a stubborn cuss and would not listen to reasoning,” says John. “We knew better than to argue with him when he ordered us aboard the boat.”

The Treacherous Trip Home Back on the water, the seven-yearold’s fears got the better of him. “It would be mild to say I was scared.

Terrified would be a better word for it,” John admits.

John recalls that, as the youngest of 17 children, he was teased a great deal by one of his older brothers. “He would jump out of unlikely places, dress up in scary clothes and use every conceivable trick to make me scream. So, all those things combined, and I was primed with fear for this experience.”

The boat with the young boy and his parents slowly made its way northward through the fog. Miles passed and John huddled close to his mother, who repeatedly patted his shoulder for reassurance.

Then his worst nightmares came true – the boat hit a shoal!

“The boat heaved to one side as we veered away from it. The fear I felt seem to burn into my brain,” says John, who recalls screaming, “We are going to drown!”

“If you are not aware of what a shoal is, they are very sharp rocks that lie just below the surface of the water and can rip the bottom out of a boat as easily as ripping open a stick of chewing gum,” John explains.

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Fortunately, there didn’t seem to be any damage from hitting the shoal and John’s fears began to abate.

Until they hit a second shoal.

This time, John’s father was swearing, bringing back John’s panic.

“That burning fear shot through my whole being, as I screamed even louder that the bottom must surely be torn from the boat.”

To his surprise, his father had manoeuvred the boat away from the shoal and spared them from imminent danger once again, and they lumbered on through the deep, dark waters towards home and safety.

As the boat rolled on through the pea-soup dense fog that haunted his quivering heart, young John remained at his mother’s side. But his mind wandered. “I remembered my warm, cozy bed at home and the security of feeling my feet on solid ground. I looked at my mother, whose face, though afraid, was reassuring by her smile.”

John looked at his father, who was in deep thought trying to see or hear through the dank and maddening grey fog.

“I thought of the rest of my family at home and wondered how they would feel if we never returned. My mother had already experienced the loss of her first husband by drowning, and it seemed to me that now her own life was in peril.”

As the distance grew between them and the last shoal, John’s fears quieted and the tension aboard lessened.

His father began humming the tune of “The Squid Jigging Ground,” then checked his watch and remarked to his mother that it had been an hour since they had left Gould’s Point.

“My heart fell. I thought we had 1-888-588-6353

been four or five hours and almost home. It was not to be!” John recalled.

Then things took a nasty turn when they struck a third shoal. This time, seawater was squishing up through the bottom of the boat.

“I heard my father yell, ‘Grab the bucket and help me bail!’ His voice seemed so far away. I had to force myself to act, as I felt glued to the seat,” says John.

The boat started to move again and so did young John. He grabbed the pail and began to bail like there was no tomorrow. Meanwhile, his father was operating the hand pump to keep disaster at bay. Still, the water kept sucking in faster than the father and son could throw it back out of the leaking vessel. “I was now standing in water up to my knees.”

Finally, John’s arms seized and he could bail no more. His mother moved to his side and relieved him of the bucket.

Then, John heard something before he saw it through the thick fog: the scrape on the side of the boat when it hit the wharf. “When I heard that noise and saw the pillars, I knew we were safe.”

John remembers there being many people on the wharf that fateful night, including family members.

“They said they could hear the engine getting closer, but had no way of signalling so they could be heard.”

Though it had a happy ending, this harrowing trip aboard a small boat with his mother and father on the west coast of the island had a long lasting effect on John, now 78.

“For many years after this, I would wake up at night screaming, ‘We hit another shoal!’”

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reminiscing

between the boulevard and the bay

Marijuana Pros and Cons

By Ron Young

Canada actually Recreational marijuana has been legal in Canada for months now, and the only big news since became the the law changed was the difficulty in making first country in enough weed to meet demand. As someone who the world to was a police officer, I dealt with marijuana users the related laws of the day and formed my adopt a system and own opinions on the subject. Recently I was going regulating the through old writings of mine and I came upon medicinal use this column I wrote in March 2003 about the pros cons of marijuana. While the times have of marijuana, and changed, my views haven’t. and this is one of the reasons For years there has been an ongoing behind debate in Canada about the legalization of marijuana. Before I elaborate on both sides of the the call for debate, here’s a clarification: at no point in our legalizing pot. country’s history has it been illegal to smoke pot.

That said, in the 1923 Opium and Drug Act, it was made illegal to possess, sell, cultivate or import the substance into Canada. It’s pretty hard to smoke it if it’s illegal to possess it.

Seriously though, drugs, like alcohol and cigarettes, are a major health risk, and we would probably be better off had they never been discovered. But marijuana, which we equate with the harmful effects of cigarettes and alcohol, also has some beneficial properties, particularly in the medical field. Just as the opium poppy (the common source of illicit heroin) has its benefits in the form of morphine (painkiller used in hospitals), marijuana has been found to relieve pain in those suffering with diseases such as cancer and AIDS. Moreover, it has helped such patients restore their loss of appetite, a side effect of their medication.

Canada actually became the first country in the world to adopt a system regulating the medicinal use of marijuana, and this is one of the reasons behind the call for legalizing pot.

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Just as the opium poppy (the common source of illicit heroin) has its benefits in the form of morphine (painkiller used in hospitals), marijuana has been found to relieve pain in those suffering with diseases such as cancer and AIDS. Marijuana was against the law when I graduated police college in 1971, and as an officer, I had to uphold that law. But over the years my coworkers and I began to realize that taking someone to court for possession of marijuana was a waste of our time and the court’s time. The purpose of the justice system is to provide general and specific deterrents, but the $25 fine for marijuana possession didn’t deter the convicted person from using it again.

Of course, it’s one thing to catch a person with a dime-bag (small amount) of pot, but it’s another to find them with a full suitcase of the stuff. I had no problem arresting someone for possession for the purpose of trafficking because, in my mind, young kids were being lured into something of which they had no understanding.

Conversely, I had adult friends and neighbours who smoked pot. We never talked about it, but I knew.

People have been smoking marijuana socially for years, albeit illegally.

There are reasons why marijuana should be legalized, and reasons why it shouldn’t. On the positive side are the medical applications of marijuana and the benefits of making it more easily available to those who could use it for pain management, for example. Another positive would be the safety of the product. Legal weed 1-888-588-6353

would be regulated, and chances are it would be exactly what it is purported to be, and not laced with God knows what.

A downside to legalization is that it may lead to more dangerous drug use. Also, indiscriminate use of marijuana could compound the social problems that alcohol and smoking have created.

One final negative aspect to consider is the impact legal marijuana will have on underage youth. There have been concerns raised in the medical community about the effect that frequent marijuana use has on developing brains. Despite years of regulation, access to alcohol and tobacco is still easy for children.

Should we make another drug more readily accessible?

Each and every one of us is responsible for our children. Before a decision is made on marijuana, the affect it will have on children should be the utmost priority on the agenda.

After all, if we don’t look out for our children, who will?

“If you can’t be a great person, be a good one.” – Ron Young Ron Young is a retired policeman, published poet and founding editor of Downhome. ron@downhomelife.com

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reminiscing

Mary King Collective Memories

Photo by Andrea McGuire

The Americans in Ship Harbour

By Andrea McGuire

“Nobody ever prepared us for people coming that we

didn’t know, or where they came from, or what they were coming for. So here we were.”

During the 1940s, the United States suddenly set up a military base in Ship Harbour, Placentia Bay. Mary (Murphy) King (born 1937), who grew up in the community, has vivid recollections of this time. In their dealings with the Americans, the people of Ship Harbour seemed to experience a strange mixture of fear and luxury.

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ily, had to deal with the trappings of warfare on their family land.

“One of the first things they did was take some of my father’s garden and put a missile there for the people that were working,” Mary recalls, “because people from the community got work in the missile, right there on our property. And so, we didn’t – we weren’t allowed to – go near it, you know. Mom wouldn’t let us.”

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“There’s no recipe, you just mix a bit of this and a bit of that.” But as Mary puts it, “Now, they were just as wise as my cat would be, you know, because they couldn’t understand – if you didn’t have a recipe, how would you make bread?”

Americans, too. A few of the men “worshipped Mom for her bread and her stews and stuff like that,” she says. “Another thing they never could understand were toutons.” The men often asked Mary’s mother for her bread and touton recipe, which baffled her mother a little. She’d say, “There’s no recipe, you just mix a bit of this and a bit of that.” But as Mary puts it, “Now, they were just as wise as my cat would be, you know, because they couldn’t understand – if you didn’t have a recipe, how would you make bread?”

The Americans asked around for the names and ages of all the children, and delivered clothing and shoes at Christmastime. They also invited the children aboard the battleships docked in the harbour, which seemed a bit less menacing from the inside out. During Christmas, the ships were adorned with gleaming decorations and Christmas trees, the likes of which no one had ever seen before.

“We thought we were in fairyland,” says Mary.

The Americans also showed movies (otherwise, as Mary says, “We would have never seen a movie in a million years”) and offered ice cream. “We thought we were in seventh heaven.”

However, these parties could sometimes take a turn for the worse. Once, while settling in for a movie at Christmas time, “this ungodly noise rang out.” An air raid was taking place, right then and there. The children had to hide under tables and were sent home straight afterwards – no gifts, no ice cream, no movie.

Mary recalls the shock of waking up to “four, or five or six battleships, anchored, and you’re saying to yourself, ‘What are they, or where did they come from?’” She also remembers the fears that were stoked by the sight of an old landing barge.

“I remember once the frightening experience of looking out and seeing a landing barge coming ashore where the front of it went down, and what came out of it was a big old tractor, and it crawled its way in. And they had a garage, I guess, built for it. And here were we, frightened to death, because was that going to go into our house? You know, we didn’t know.

I’ll never forget – I can see the picture of that big old landing barge, and the whole front dropped out of it, and then the tractor. It all frightened the wits out of us.”

But as Mary reflects, “There were good points, too, you know. A lot of good points.”

The Collective Memories Project is an initiative of the Heritage Foundation of Newfoundland and Labrador to record the stories and memories of our province. If you have a memory of old-time Newfoundland and Labrador to share, contact Dale Jarvis at ich@heritagefoundation.ca or call 1-888-7391892 ext 2 or visit www.collectivememories.ca.

1-888-588-6353

March 2019

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COZY WINTER MUST HAVES!

The Murder of Minnie Callan: A True Newfoundland Crime Story - Tom Gruchy #76027 | $17.95

Darkest Before the Dawn: A Sgt. Windflower Mystery - Mike Martin #76208 | $19.95

Agnes Ayre’s Notebook: Recipes from Old St. John’s - Roger Pickavance & Agnes Marion Murphy #76323 | $29.95

An Exile’s Perfect Letter: A Novel - Larry Mathews #76057 | $19.95

We All Expected To Die: Spanish Influenza in Labrador, 1918-1919 Anne Budgell #76322 | $26.96

Saltwater Mittens: More than 20 Heritage Designs to Knit - Christine LeGrow & Shirley A. Scott #76056 | $29.95

The Mindful Turtle: Teaching Coping Skills to Kids - Florence Strang, B.A; B.Ed; M.Ed. #76213 | $12.95

Numbers in Newfoundland - Bonnie Jean Hicks Illustrated by Leanna Carbage #75941 | $9.95

Final Report Rick Mercer #76348 | $32.00

PRICES IN EFFECT FOR MARCH 2019

• For larger images visit www.shopdownhome.com • While supplies last

1903 mail order5_Mail order.qxd 1/30/19 5:15 PM Page 143

FOR MORE SELECTION VISIT: www.shopdownhome.com

Dark Tickle - Bakeapple Tea - Tin - 40 g #11874 | $13.39

Dark Tickle - Partridgeberry Tea - Tin - 40 g #11875 | $13.39

Dark Tickle - Blueberry Tea - Tin - 40 g #11876 | $13.39

Plush Puffin 11" #56137 | $16.99

Plush Morrison Moose - 8" #59728 | $12.99

Plush Newfoundland Dog w Ribbon 8" #56143 | $11.99

Newfoundland Flag Scarf - Royal Blue #57038 | $14.99

Gloves - Newfoundland Crest - Blue with White Stretch - One Size #72923 | $9.99

Toque - Newfoundland Royal Blue w Pom pom #61222 | $12.99

TO ORDER CALL: 1-888-588-6353

1903 mail order5_Mail order.qxd 1/30/19 5:15 PM Page 144

COZY WINTER MUST HAVES!

Sherpa Throws 50" x 60” Newfoundland Pictorial Map #75516 | Newfoundland Town Names #75518 Newfoundland Tartan #75517 | Mummers #75515

$39.99 each

Adult Hoodies Home with Pink Lettering #75516 | Flag Place Names #75719 Proud Newfoundlander - The Rock - Teal #76196 | Proud Newfoundlander - The Rock - Red #76202

$39.99 each

PRICES IN EFFECT FOR MARCH 2019

• For larger images visit www.shopdownhome.com • While supplies last

Item #

Description

Central and Western Canada. 2-3 weeks USA. Guidelines set by Canada Post.

Delivery Time 3-5 days NL, NS & NB. 7-10 days

isfied, please let us know. We will exchange any item in resaleable condition. Sorry, no returns on earrings, books, CDs or DVDs. If you do not receive your order or it is damaged upon delivery, please let us know within 3 business days. Overnight delivery available: please call for details. Product prices and shipping costs may be subject to change without notice.

Service Guarantee If you are not completely sat-

Qty.

Colour

TOTAL

*

Tax (your provincial sales tax )

USA add 15% (+ Shipping)

Shipping & Handling

SUB TOTAL

Size

$15.00

Price

*

NL, NS, PE, NB 15%; ON, 13%; BC, AB, NT, YK, NU, SK, QC, MB, 5%

Please make cheques payable to Downhome Incorporated and send to Downhome, 43 James Lane, St. John’s, NL A1E 3H3 Toll Free: 1-888-588-6353 • Fax: 709-726-2135 mailorder@downhomelife.com • www.shopDownhome.com

*

Card #: ___________________________________ Expiry Date: _____ /_____

Payment Info : ❒ Visa ❒ Amex ❒ MasterCard ❒ Cheque/Money Order

Gift Card to read: _________________________________________________

City: __________________________ Province: _____ Postal Code: ________

Address: ________________________________________________________

Send Gift to:_____________________________________________________

Gift Service Information

Telephone: _____________________ E-mail: __________________________

City: __________________________ Province: _____ Postal Code: ________

Address: ________________________________________________________

Send to: _______________________________________________________

Please complete your order form carefully. Please send this form along with payment to the address at bottom, or fax to 709-726-2135.

Shop online for more selection Visit: shopdownhome.com

1903 mail order5_Mail order.qxd 1/30/19 5:15 PM Page 145

1903Mktplace_0609 Marketplace.qxd 1/31/19 6:08 PM Page 146

Marketplace TRINITY BAY

Beautiful Ocean Side Log Home

Cathedral Ceilings, 3 Bed 2 full bath.

Over 1 acre of landscaped property with shed. Close to hospital, restaurants, schools and all amenities! $199,000 MLS# 1182863

Contact Vicki • 709-682-3902 vchalker@hotmail.com

PRIVATE SALE BY OWNER

Town Square, Gander Building, Both Levels 3400 Sq. Ft. Total 709-221-8757 or 709-424-0757

f.tizzard@nl.rogers.com

FOR SALE • GULL ISLAND, NL

Ocean View Backyard!

4 Bedroom • 2 Bath • Large Country Kitchen Open Concept • Fully Furnished • Tax Free Area

$155,000 • Glabwils@gmail.com

Happy 50th Anniversary Dianne & Gord Gollop will be celebrating their 50th Wedding Anniversary on March 1st. 4 children, 7 grandchildren, and 5 great-grandchildren.

Congratulations Mom & Dad!

We Love You!

VACATION COTTAGE FOR LEASE

EMBREE • CENTRAL NL

Enjoy your vacation in this cozy, ready to move in cottage with full amenities! Private, fully equipped, fully furnished, 2-bdrm with a BBQ, large deck, washer & dryer, quality bed and bathroom linens, dishes, toiletries, satellite and free WiFi. Just minutes to a sandy beach & ocean! $700/week or $120 daily (min. 3 nights)

Call, text or email today for availability!

416-998-1960

facebook.com/EmbreeCottage

709-726-5113 1-888-588-6353

advertising@downhomelife.com

For Sale Beautiful Waterfront Property Deer Lake, NL Price Reduced to $449,900!

Listing ID: 1154568

Tel: 709-636-2904 • regberry10@gmail.com • www.rivermountainrealty.ca 146

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Marketplace Movers & Shippers SAMSON’S MOVING Let our Family Move Your Family Home

Newfoundland, Ontario, Alberta and All Points In Between Newfoundland Owned & Operated Fully Insured, Free Estimates Sales Reps. in Ontario and Alberta

April 2019 Ad Booking Deadline February 22, 2019

A&K Moving Covering all Eastern & Western Provinces and Returning Based from Toronto, Ontario Discount Prices Out of NL, NS & NB Newfoundland Owned & Operated 35 Years in the Moving Industry

Andy: 416-247-0639 Out West: 403-471-5313

Clarenville Movers Local & Long Distance Service Your Newfoundland & Alberta Connection Over 30 years Experience Toll Free: 1-855-545-2582 Tel: Cell:

709-545-2582 709-884-9880

clarenvillemover@eastlink.ca www.clarenvillemovers.com

aandkmoving@gmail.com

Call Jim or Carolyn - Peterview, NL 709-257-4223 709-486-2249 - Cell samsonsmovers@yahoo.ca www.samsonsmovers.ca

Moving you from Ontario and Newfoundland... or any STOP along the way!

DOWNEAST CONNECTION 709-248-4089 905-965-4813

Hawke’s Bay, NL (collect calls accepted) downeastconnection@yahoo.ca

FIVE STAR SERVICE Without The Five Star Price! ★ Local & Long Distance Moves ★ Packing

Voted CBS Chamber of Commerce Business of the Year

A Family Moving Families Professionally and economically

★ Door-to-Door Service Across Canada ★ Replacement Protection Available ★ NL Owned & Operated

MOVING INC. 709-834-0070 866-834-0070 fivestarmoving@outlook.com www.fivestarmoving.ca

Over 25 Years Experience in the Moving Industry www.downhomelife.com

Coast to Coast in Canada Fully Insured Newfoundland Owned & Operated

Contact: Gary or Sharon King

Toll Free: 1-866-586-2341 www.downhomemovers.com March 2019

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puzzles

The Beaten Path

Photo by Norma Sacrey

By Ron Young

Block out all the letters that are like other letters in every way, including shape and size. The letters that are left over will spell out the name of the above place name in letters that get smaller in size.

M

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m

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T I

n

H V

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L J N K

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p

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m I

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R S

Last Month’s Community: Twillingate 148

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Sudoku

from websudoku.com

Skill level: Medium

Last month’s answers

?

Need Help

Visit DownhomeLife.com/puzzles for step-by-step logic for solving this puzzle

www.downhomelife.com

March 2019

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Downhomer Detective Needs You

A

fter more than two decades on the Urban City Police Force, Downhomer Detective has come home to rid Newfoundland and Labrador of a new threat – cunning thief Ragged Rick. A real braggart, the slimy criminal sends DD a blurry photo of his surroundings plus clues to his whereabouts just to prove he’s always a step ahead. DD needs your help to identify where in Newfoundland and Labrador Ragged Rick is hiding out this month.

Use these 5 clues to identify where Ragged Rick is now: • Named for Scottish timber merchant Lewis Miller • Located at head of Burnt Bay • Former Labrador shipping port • Home of the Pilot newspaper (until 2018) • Popular recreational boating marina

Last Month’s Answer: L’Anse Amour

Picturesque Place NameS of Newfoundland and Labrador

by Mel D’Souza Last Month’s Answer: Lakeview 150

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In Other Words Guess the well-known expression written here in other words.

Last Month’s Clue: The adoration of my existence In Other Words: The love of my life This Month’s Clue: What expense to acquire that canine in the porthole In Other Words: ___ ____ __ ____ _____ __ ___ ______

A Way With Words HAND FIST

Rhyme Time A rhyming word game

by Ron Young

Last Month’s Answer: Hand over fist

1. To attempt tears is to ___ to ___ 2. A laptop thief is a _________ ______

This Month’s Clue

3. A stupid fruit is a ____ ____

KEEP

Last Month’s Answers 1. tote a coat 2. walk and talk 3. sweet treat

ANS: ___ __ ___ _____

Scrambled Sayings

by Ron Young

Place each of the letters in the rectangular box below into one of the white square boxes above them to discover a quotation. Incomplete words that begin on the right side of the diagram continue one line down on the left. The letters may or may not go in the box in the same order that they are in the column. Once a letter is used, cross it off and do not use it again.

, , B E E I H D N E A O H A A E T O R M E N H S T U H C I T U S I O N T W Y O Y W W Y V

A N R E A D H A H E D E T O H E L I L I N T T O U T W P T L T U Y W

Last month’s answer: Content is getting and achieving what you want. Happiness is wanting and being success with what you get. www.downhomelife.com

March 2019

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Rhymes 5 Times Each answer rhymes with the other four

1. cash 2. silly 3. liquid 4. brilliant 5. Bugs

___________ ___________ ___________ ___________ ___________

Last Month’s Answers: 1. glove, 2. love, 3. dove, 4. shove, 5. above

STUCK? Don’t get your knickers in a knot!

Puzzle answers can be found online at DownhomeLife.com/puzzles

Tangled Towns

by Lolene Young Condon and Ron Young

Sound out the groups of words below to get a familiar expression.

For best results sound the clue words out loud!

Goat Threw Them Oceans __ ______ ___ _______ Ace Cam Mar Test _ ____ ______ Last Month’s 1st Clue: Ease Owner Whole Answer: He’s on a roll Last Month’s 2nd Clue: Pat Chief Hog Answer: Patchy fog

A

nalogical

A

Unscramble each of the five groups of letters below to get 5 Newfoundland and Labrador place names.

1. SANPROS NPOD 2. DEALINS ROARHUB 3. PLANTORD ERKCE 4. BLURBLENS 5. RTOP ADSNURSE Last Month’s Ans: 1. Gaultois, 2. Belleoram, 3. Conne River, 4. Bay D’Espoir, 5. Millertown

nagrams

Unscramble the capitalized words to get one word that matches the subtle clue.

1. HEAL DINE – Clue: always seeking attention 2. ENACT MEN NOUN – Clue: hear ye, hear ye 3. PREY OH GAG – Clue: the lay of the land 4. SHY TRIO – Clue: yesterday’s news 5. ENTER RIFE – Clue: be the meddle man Last Month’s Ans: 1. jeweller, 2. parallel, 3. snowblower, 4. generation, 5. phenomenon 152

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Four-Way Crossword F o re Wo rd s • B a c k Wo rd s • U p Wo rd s • D o w n Wo rd s

By Ron Young

Unlike regular crosswords, in Four-Way Crossword each letter is not necessarily related to the letter in the adjacent row or column, but is part of one or more words in some direction.

1-4: crippled 1-10: sorrowful 1-31: heavy metal 1-91: activity of guiding 3-33: mongrel 6-10: furniture 8-6: flying mammal 9-29: boy 14-11: certain 6-46: bicuspids 19-17: assist 20-15: plunderer 22-52: excavation 26-22: soil 26-30: rust 27-24: back end 27-29: pole 31-33: period 33-35: foot digit 36-16: golf start 40-10: in this place 40-36: hangout 42-62: allow 44-4: equine 45-15: apparel 45-85: most evil 46-66: bonnet 48-50: argument 50-41: beneficial 50-46: value 51-31: crimson 51-54: remainder 53-73: amount 54-58: salute 57-60: remain 61-91: send parcel 64-62: not in 65-45: paddle 66-62: game fish www.downhomelife.com

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70-67: gown 70-68: steal 71-73: sew 75-72: more or less 75-79: stitched 77-79: marry 80-100: first woman 82-62: wager 84-54: debatable 84-82: throng 86-66: put 88-85: for fear that 90-85: most repulsive 90-87: despicable 92-62: assist 92-94: donkey 91-100: ardent

94-44: slick 97-47: latest 99-97: take sun 100-10: all over Last Month’s Answer 1

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S A L E S G I R L S

A R A N I L O U S E

CR I OAD D I R I D E N S A OWD T RE RAL A P I CON

F I C E S ADRAH BOOTO R E WO P I L LML CA I R I A TAE F T EMP T EM I N E DHAND

March 2019

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The Bayman’s

Crossword Puzzle 1

2

by Ron Young

3

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March 2019

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ACROSS 1. “Hard as the ___s of hell” 3. ___ -tac-toe 4. Ireland’s ___ – abandoned outport 5. “And Jack was ______ ___ ___ sea and swallowed by a whale” (3 words) 12. Toogood Arm (abbrev) 14. “Roses ___ Blooming” 15. dirty (colloq) 17. Harry Hibbs’ instrument 21. North East Island (abbrev) 22. “Slow __ ____ molasses” (2 words) 23. NL party (colloq) 24. ___ snow is good for sore eyes 25. initials of writer Eliot 26. “___ and boiled me kettle by a trickling little brook” 28. Thermal Energy Storage (abbrev) 29. factual 31. Arn? 33. ____ Haven, Placentia Bay, NL 34. Petty _______ 36. “Ten little turrs in the freezer __ better than a hundred in the bay” 38. net 40. Fogo, ___________, Moreton’s Habour” 41. hairstyle

DOWN 1. “God made Labrador in six days on the seventh __ _____ ______ __ __” (5 words) 2. “As old as ________ goat” www.downhomelife.com

6. method 7. Eagle River (abbrev) 8. _____ pudding 9. salary 10. late 11. excursion 13. Tickle___ – kittiwake 16. cat’s nickname 18. Cannings Cove (abbrev) 19. waves in Spanish 20. ____ and tail of the Grand Banks 22. morning (abbrev) 25. rotated 27. strong as __ ox 28. former premier Brian _____ 29. teacher’s aide (abbrev) 30. Random Island (abbrev) 32. jib 33. worry 35. The States 37. opposite of NE 39. in other words (abbrev)

A N N S B A T T E N E D D O W N

R E M I P T A Y V H E O S S E E L A S P R E O R N E

ANSWERS TO LAST MONTH’S CROSSWORD S L E C O D O R S S E A K Y D I L O P P I D E L O A R G G

A P D E C K T U C K K E R D O

N A L O N G

P A W F O B A R A C K R T R I E D L D E W A F I S

March 2019

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DIAL-A-SMILE © 2019 Ron Young

Pick the right letters from the old style phone to match the numbers grouped below and uncover a quote which will bring a smile to your face. ___ 687

______ _ 862783 7

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _: 7 3 884647 ___ 866

___ 427

___ 866

___ 896

____ 7666

__ 67

____ 5283

Last Month’s Answer: I now pronounce you man and wife, you may now change your Facebook status.

©2019 Ron Young

CRACK THE CODE

J

Each symbol represents a letter of the alphabet, for instance =N Try to guess the smaller, more obvious words to come up with the letters for the longer ones. The code changes each month.

N _

Jf

_ _ N

Hm J

_ _ _ _ _ _ _

h m ZLX l \ _ N _ _ _ _ N _

l Jpf0 Z Jb

_ _

ZK _ _ _

D kf

_

m _ _

ZK

_ _ _ _

LZhl

Last Month’s Answer: Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.

156

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Food For Thought

© 2019 Ron Young

Each food symbol represents a letter of the alphabet. Find the meanings to the words then match the letters with the food symbols below to get a little “food for thought.”

fashion = kiln =

hatred =

_ _ _

v`k

_ _ _ _ _

c z`nw

_ _ _

o}K _ _ _ _

c}nd

i }`K b tox

hinders =

_ _ _ _

}azo

tired =

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

_ _ _ _

}o i w

_ _ _ _ _

ozazn

_ _ _ _ _ _ _

b `vfznm

adheres =

_ _ _ _ _ _

mKt[ d m

’

_ _

_ _ _ _ _ _

c}vzo m

tm

_ _ _ _

k}oz ’

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

kz vtotKt}o

_ _ _

Kb z

_ _ _ _ _

d zzfm

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

[ b `oxtox Last Month’s Answer: What we call progress is the exchange of one nuisance for another nuisance. www.downhomelife.com

March 2019

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Different Strokes

Our artist’s pen made the two seemingly identical pictures below different in 12 places. See if you can find all 12.

ERN AND COAL BIN WITH A MODEL BUILDER

Last Month’s Answers: 1. Car; 2. Log; 3. Roof; 4. Cap; 5. Sleeve; 6. Hockey stick; 7. House; 8. Hill; 9. Door; 10. Glove; 11. Puck; 12. Coal Bin. “Differences by the Dozen”- A compilation of Different Strokes from 2002 to 2014 (autographed by Mel) can be ordered by sending $9.95 (postage incl.; $13.98 for U.S. mailing) to Mel D’Souza, 21 Brentwood Dr., Brampton, ON, L6T 1P8.

158

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HIDE & SEEK NL ANIMALS

The words can be across, up, down, backward or at an angle, but always in a line.

BEAR BEAVER CAPELIN CARIBOU CHIPMUNK COYOTE COD FOX FROG GROUSE HARE LYNX MARTEN MINK MOOSE H H Z O M D A E Q P D F E E A K A E

S G R E K E R W Y U H L S G Y A K E

K E N S T P C D T V A C U D P I X J

E E A O X A A C V H S H O I W Z K L

U Z Y G P E P B W F N W R R T L A K

SHARK SEAGULL SQUIRREL WHALE

MURRE OTTER OWL PUFFIN PARTRIDGE E S V U V A O S N R B O N K J A Z Q

Last Month’s Answers

N O R E U P Y W Z E O N G T N E I H

C K L R K L A F R Z H R J R S L T X

www.downhomelife.com

H I N X Z K L Z T V G H I A X C G G

N C V U N G E K W V O V J P M T Q Y

X M J Z M K O L I S U E O O L H B E

N U Z Z C P M R S J S M O T E X W G

R J X F A H I Z F W T S H R T M I N

A B N T R B N H Q O E Z P Y A E L D

A L B H T D W E Z P R O P J E E Q K

E E N O I U K M C N B W Z H M U R L

H N R U A F C J E A M A A P D J A M

H Y A C U T N S N E O W U N G Y M X

B C A E B I H X J L T E T P M A Y Y

W C O N A G E G L X Q O I S S H D N

Y V A R A Y E R R M L E A L E U J B

X P M A O K Z F I L Y M S P C J S B

A K I E A B S W L A R N P T M M J V

F N C M P K E N T L F I R G J F C F

O J Y F U N I F F U P C F B B G N Y

E C Q B L Q H N P V K T V H H D Q X

P O M E G R A N A T E N P P Y S C I

S H A R K F V D M P T G V M A B S D

C E T A D C J L P N O E H E F T P S

X E H B K Q A I A W G M K X A O I L

B Q U E R A H R U K W X J L F Q V M

T G K Y H H V M Y X N E I W K R N Q

T A X Q G E S E A E A L V H R U E Y

N R U Q T L E R R I U Q S W E O G R

Z I N Y Y B Y P D T M C X L N S A Z

F T U G N O L E M R E T A W N E P Q

K E R X Y F O X R Y Y S L Z S R K S

G A N R E G U A V A O A G D K C P E

O U X Q F R O L J U B Q P F A Y L I

C Z T N L Y F M E M O W J X V Z W F

D Q B W N E I U C S A C B P O E E Y

U M E H K E P N M I J F F H L Z W O

L O X R B E A V E R O N T Y Q Q E R

T U P K V I I A E A N L Y H M E M K

N K I X K N A I R E O N R E U F U A

V Y D Z A A Y D E X Q Y A Q P Q V F

March 2019

V W A P R I C O T G P P O P M D U Y

I F Z C Q Y R R E H C F P L U M Q P

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The sunset casts a warm glow on the ice candles frozen to this rock face in Campbell’s Creek, NL. Amanda Cornect Port au Port Peninsula, NL

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