Articles

About 100 kilometres southeast of Montreal, on the shores of a magnificent five-kilometre wide lake, Knowlton is at once a blooming, shady and festive village, especially during the summer and weekends.

Pioneer schoolhouses were built to accommodate about thirty students from grades one through seven. Most schools were made of wood, with a simple cast-iron wood stove for heating in winter. Outhouses were set apart from the school building or located at the far end of an attached woodshed.

Archibald McKillop, better known as "Blind Bard of Megantic," was born in Loch Ranza, on the Isle of Arran in Scotland, on July 4, 1824. His father, Archibald McKillop collected taxes for the Duke of Hamilton. In April 1829, when a group of Scots from Ranza Log took to crossing of the Atlantic towards Canada on the Caledonia under the leadership of Mr.

Mack Sennett was an innovator of slapstick comedy in film. During his lifetime, he was known as "the King of Comedy." Born Michael Sinnott in Danville, Quebec, in 1880, Sennett was a son of Irish immigrants. His father was a blacksmith in the small Eastern Townships village.

"Brownies, like fairies and goblins, are imaginary little spirits, who are supposed to delight in harmless pranks and helpful deeds. They work and sport while weary households sleep, and never allow themselves to be seen by mortal eyes." --Palmer Cox

Folk art is a general term that can be said to describe art that has been produced by men and women with little or no artistic training. It is the product of natural, if unrefined talent.

Born in the village of Way's Mills in 1902, Orson Wheeler was a professor in the fine arts department at Concordia University in Montreal for much of his professional career. A sculptor by training, he is perhaps best known for his bronze busts of noted Canadians. Wheeler was also a talented designer, however, and produced some 200 architectural models.

Frederick Simpson Coburn, one of the greatest artists to come out of the Eastern Townships, was born in Melbourne (Richmond) in 1871.

Born in Arthabaska (now a part of Victoriaville) in 1869, Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté is one of Quebec's most celebrated artists. The youngest of ten children, Suzor-Coté studied art in Montreal and Paris. He began his art career as a church decorator with the firm of Joseph-Thomas Rousseau.

A WOMAN WITH A PASSION Born in Brome Township in 1857, Sally Wood had a passion for photography. After learning the art in Montreal's prestigious Notman Studios (the premier photography studio in Canada), Wood worked as a substitute for John A. Wheeler, a photographer based in Knowlton and Cowansville.

Louis-Philippe Hébert, of Acadian background, was born in Sainte-Sophie-de-Halifax in 1850. At age 19, Hébert left his parents' farm to join the Papal Zouaves, an army created by the Catholic Church to defend Rome against the forces of Italian unification. In Europe, Hébert was exposed to a world of art and culture such as he had never seen before.

Landscape painter Aaron Allan Edson was born in 1846 in Stanbridge, Missisquoi County. Studying painting in Montreal, London, and France, Edson became a charter member of the Royal Canadian Academy in 1880.

The son of an English father and a French Canadian mother, William S. Hunter was born in St-Jean-sur-Richelieu (St. John's), Quebec in 1823. Hunter lived for many years in Stanstead, where his wife Nancy Parsons was born.

The Lovell Family of Barnston and Coaticook, Quebec is recognized as one of the most prominent and distinguished families of the Eastern Townships. The surname was originally “Lovewell” which over time evolved in to “Lovell” the form which remains in use today.

British American Land Company: Born in England in 1817, Alexander Galt immigrated to Sherbrooke in 1835 to work for the newly created British American Land Company, which was chartered to settle large tracts of land in the Eastern Townships. Galt rose steadily in the company, eventually becoming high commissioner in 1844, a post he held until 1855.

Born in Ste-Agathe-des-Monts in 1916, Jean-Jacques Bertrand attended the Séminaire de Saint-Hyacinthe and later, the Université de Montréal where he studied law. His political career began in 1948 when, under the banner of Maurice Duplessis' reigning Union Nationale, he was elected to the National Assembly.

To date the only Premier of Quebec native to the Eastern Townships is Daniel Johnson Sr., who was born in Sainte-Anne-de-Danville in 1915. The son of an Irish Catholic father and a French Canadian mother, Johnson first entered provincial politics in 1946 in the by-elections held that year.

Although not an Eastern Townshipper by birth, Joseph-Adélard Godbout adopted the Townships in midlife, buying in 1930 a century-old farmhouse near Frelighsburg, where he was later buried, and where his family still resides.

To date, Louis S. St-Laurent is the only Canadian Prime Minister born in the Eastern Townships. His life began in Compton in 1882. St-Laurent's parents, a French Canadian father and an Irish mother, ran a general store and were of modest means.

Sir Wilfrid Laurier, one of Canada's most illustrious Prime Ministers, spent much of his adult life in the Eastern Townships. Laurier, who was born in Saint-Lin in the Laurentians in 1841, studied law at McGill University where he received his degree in 1864.