Articles

The young boy was standing in front of a small wooden table on which laid a birthday cake with four lit candles. You could see the gleam in the little guy’s face, and his underlying smile of knowing that this was his day to be celebrated, and his day alone. Dressed in a clean white shirt, dark slacks, and a clip-on bow tie, we could sense what he was thinking as he continued his bright-eyed stare into the candles. We could almost feel his wonder at what other miracles life would bring, and that this birthday was certainly one of them.

The early history of the Eastern Townships Telephone Company is also the story of Carlos Skinner. A jeweller and watchmaker by trade, and a native of Waterloo, Skinner, according to writer Paul Delaney, was a "man of boundless energy with an abiding curiosity in new scientific developments."

Mail delivery in the Eastern Townships dates to about 1800. At that early date, virtually all of the settlers in the region were recent arrivals from New England. These people were anxious to maintain their ties to their old country and to the friends and family they left behind.

The first newspapers in the Eastern Townships served the New England settlers who populated the region at that time. They provided news (lifted from other papers, and mainly from Europe and the U.S.), political speeches, texts on religion and morality, farming techniques and technological advances, and advertisements and articles of local interest.

Several commercial steamers have operated on Lake Memphremagog over the course of its history. This 44-km (27-mile) international lake, whose southern quarter lies within the state of Vermont, is the longest stretch of navigable water in the Eastern Townships. Newport lies at the south end of the lake, Magog, at the north.

(Continued from Steamers of Lake Memphremagog, Part 2)

(Continued from Steamers of Lake Memphremagog, Part 2)

A catastrophic flood wreaked havoc throughout northern New England and the Eastern Townships in the fall of 1927. The disaster was the worst flood on record.

Born on December 12, 1912 in Coaticook, third child of Stewart Curtis and Mary Wellman (Lovell) Smith, a fifth generation Canadian and descendent of the prominent Lovell family, respected for its diverse business activities, and its many years in Federal, Provincial and local politics representing Stanstead County.

The shores along lakes and rivers were often the most suitable routes for railway lines. Level, low-lying terrain free from major natural obstacles (especially steep grades and river crossings) offered the most inexpensive, if not necessarily the most direct, route.

Up until the 1840s, the bridge in Sherbrooke was the only one across the St. Francis River. Like many rivers in the Eastern Townships, the St. Francis was crossed by means of ferries at villages situated along its course. Such was the case in Richmond until the first bridge was erected there.

The 19th century saw a massive railway boom all across the Eastern Townships. Driven by the need to access raw materials, the desire for rapid transit, and a mania to build more and more branch lines, companies vied for territory and markets. By 1900, a network of local and regional railway lines crisscrossed virtually every corner of the region.

For many years roads in the Eastern Townships were primitive and impassable to wheeled traffic for most of year. Travel on horseback, by sleigh in winter or on foot, were the norm. People going to market could drive their animals or carry their goods by oxen, but travel was slow.

The first commercial ferry on Lake Memphremagog, and certainly one of the first in the Eastern Townships, was Moses Copp's ferry, in the aptly-named village of Copp's Ferry (later Georgeville). About 1797, shortly after his arrival in the area, Copp built a scow, which operated by manpower (oars) between the east and west sides of the lake.

The first settlers found no roads. They came to a land of virgin forest. They had to blaze their own trails, and find their way around swamps and over streams. They travelled in winter from New England, because snowshoes and a laden sled required a narrower path than an ox cart, and because they could save time by travelling over frozen lakes and rivers.

The major lakes and rivers provided the only way to travel in the Eastern Townships before the area was opened for settlement. The two major lakes were Champlain and Memphremagog. Both stretched on either side of the international border, partly in Canada and partly in the United States.

The early routes travelled by the Abenaki Indians of the Eastern Townships included the big lakes, like Memphremagog, Champlain, and Massawippi, and rivers, such as the St. Francis and the Missisquoi. The Abenakis used birch bark canoes as well as dugout canoes made from single logs.

Richard Baldwin Jr. (1808-1877), who is considered the founder of Coaticook, settled on what is now Child Street in Coaticook in the early 1800s.

One of the most important men to arrive in a pioneer community was the blacksmith. The term "blacksmith" is derived from the words "black", meaning black metal, and "smite", meaning to strike hard. The blacksmith performed a number of services vital to the community, the primary one being to keep horses' hooves in good condition.

The first trade in the Eastern Townships was the making of potash. It was found that North American ashes contained a larger percentage of pure potash than those of the Baltic region. Consequently, there was a steady demand for potash. Potash was used to clear the sand in the manufacture of glass.