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Catharine Parr Traill, Author of Natural Histories for Children
Catharine Parr Traill (1802-1899) was a prolific author who published children’s books, emigrants’ guides, and popular natural histories. Under the name Catharine Parr Strickland, she published at least 15 moral tales and natural histories for children between 1818 and 1831. Catherine had a great deal of knowledge about natural history, and in her books she…
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A Derry Merchant’s Memoir, 1830s
While doing some other research in Library and Archives Canada some years ago, I came across a reference in the catalogue to an anonymous diary describing a journey from Derry to Canada in 1830. Intrigued, I took a copy of the manuscript and filed it away for later. But the author’s anonymity bothered me, as…
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John Ross’s Arctic Artefacts on Display in Oxford
The Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford, is home to thousands of treasures. Many of those treasures were taken from (or “gifted by”) indigenous peoples around the world for study or as status symbols in European museums, universities, and private homes. Among the artefacts on display in the Museum, is a collection of Inuit hunting and fishing tools.…
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A Rupert’s Land Nativity, 1807
With Christmas just days away, my mind has turned to seasonal tales I have come across in my research. One that stands out is the story of Isabel Gunn. Isabel, alias John Fubbister, alias Mary Fubbister, was born in Orkney in 1780. In 1805–6, she met John Scarth, a Hudson’s Bay Company fur-trader who was…
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Dublin Obstetrician Meets ‘Ideal Man’ in the Arctic, 1812
In 1812, Thomas McKeevor, a young Dublin obstetrician, crossed the Atlantic as physician to around 70 Irish and Hebridean migrants to the Red River Colony or “Selkirk Settlement” in Canada. In 1819, he published a short, 76-page account of the journey, describing Canadian natural history and the Inuit and First Nations. The book bore a long, descriptive title typical…
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Peter Fidler: the fur-trader who trekked 48,000 miles
Peter Fidler was one of Canada’s greatest exploratory surveyors and his work formed the basis for the mapping of Western Canada. He produced two large-scale shoreline sketch maps, eight smaller-scale maps, and 373 segmental sketch maps, representing 7,300 miles of track and river. While travelling an estimated 48,000 miles by foot and canoe, he assisted in the establishment…