Merry Christmas!

From all of us at the Victorian Society of Alberta to all of you, wishing you a very Merry Christmas! 

Canadian Christmas Dinner 1918

 This is the menu for the Christmas day meals served to Canadian troops in England in 1918.

Note that their supper was largely served cold. This would have given the cooks an easier afternoon, with just the blancmange to cook and the pies to bake.

The Victorian Society of Alberta.

2024 Heritage Park Ramble

 Yesterday, December 14 2024, we had our annual ramble at Heritage Park's "Once Upon a Christmas".

The weather was just around freezing with snow still on the ground from a recent snowfall here in Calgary. There was a lot of ice on the roads but the board walks were clear and the park did a great job of keeping the roads sanded.

This year was the largest group participation in this event, with VSA members, WWI re-enactors and a couple of Civil War re-enactors rounding out the group.

VSA members and Guests on the Porch of the Prince House

Joining us for much of the day was Clare Young who is a member of the Special Events team at Heritage Park and a VSA member. Clare snagged us a spot at the volunteer canteen for lunch and we did our part to help use up the leftover beef stew and deserts, after the regular volunteers had had theirs of course!

The Prince House

Heading into town

Meeting with the Town Crier

At the Midnapore station we watched the Heritage Park young telegraphers busily sending "Telegrams to Santa"  for all the kids. Especially important this year given the Postal Strike!  This group of eager budding telegraphers have been studying telegraphy under the watchful tutelage of Janice Povey and Marilyn Maguire and this was their first taste of actually sending messages across the wire. 

Junior Telegraphers
Keeping up a steady traffic to the North Pole.

Junior Telegrapher
Bravely manning the North Pole station (in the back room)

Marilyn (L) and Janice (R)
Marshalling the lineup and writing out the telegrams for the kids.

The park was really busy with lots of guests and frequent horse drawn wagons and carriages taking guest around the park  One of our favourite parts of our Christmas Ramble is to head to the Settlement part of the park.  This area represents the very early days of the colonization of the West and lies firmly in the middle of our period. It is also closed in Winter so it is a great place to wander apart from the hustle and bustle of the center of town. 

On the road to the "Settlement"

Laggan station, closed for the winter, was the original station from Lake Louise.

After a perusal of the very busy Christmas Market, in the large tents in the park, and after carefully sampling many of the wares of small distilleries, we bid adieu to Heritage Park and headed North to the town of Airdrie for their annual "Victorian Skating Party" during the town's "Festival of Lights".

The last two years have been incredibly cold but the temperature was quite pleasant, out of the wind, and we helped to add some period atmosphere to this great event.

Stunning light displays in the park

Another great Christmas Ramble.
Looking forward to next year. 

Wishing you all a very pleasant Christmas Season.

The Victorian Society of Alberta

November Fashion Friday

 This month a fascinating video from Nicole Rudolph on YouTube.

Travel clothes

Enjoy
The Victorian Society of Alberta

 

Lest We Forget

 

 Remembrance Day was first observed in 1919 throughout the British Commonwealth. It was originally called “Armistice Day” to commemorate armistice agreement that ended the First World War on Monday, November 11, 1918, at 11 a.m.—on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month.

From 1921 to 1930, Armistice Day was held on the Monday of the week in which November 11 fell. In 1931, Alan Neill, Member of Parliament for Comox–Alberni, introduced a bill to observe Armistice Day only on November 11. Passed by the House of Commons, the bill also changed the name to “Remembrance Day”. The first Remembrance Day was observed on November 11, 1931.

Every year on November 11, Canadians pause in a moment of silence to honour and remember the men and women who have served, and continue to serve Canada during times of war, conflict and peace. We remember the more than 2,300,000 Canadians who have served throughout our nation’s history and the more than 118,000 who made the ultimate sacrifice.

The Colour of Memory

Lest We Forget

by Kevin Jepson

When I was growing up history was something that permeated our house.

There were books and photos, and old records.

There were fossils, models, maps and artifacts.

I was always interested in military history, because the military and warfare runs like a horrible bloody thread through the history of civilization. Didn't matter if it was ancient history, Romans, Greeks, Persians, Celts, or Medieval sieges and battles, or 18th and 19th C wars, or the great upheavals of the 20th C. I was interested in them all. There was one thing that I remember very clearly though and that was the major difference in the way my Father treated the wars of the 20th C compared to those of history.

These wars were different, they were different because they were still MEMORY not just HISTORY. My Grandfather fought in the First World War and I had friends whose parents had fought in the Second.
The Ghosts of these wars were not ready to be history yet. They were real people still living, still working, still hugging their loved ones and trying to live with the MEMORY of chaos and destruction that they had been forced to live through. They also struggled with the memory of those they had lost.

As a kid my strongest impression of the difference between the Wars of History and the Wars of Memory was simply that History had colour whereas the modern wars of the 20th C were BLACK and WHITE.

We had photographs of these titanic struggles in all their gritty horror, you could see the face of war in its terror and its destruction, but there was no colour. That made them real in some senses but strangely unreal in others.

The Thin Red Line. 93rd Highlanders at Balaclava.
Illustration for Scotland for Ever (Hodder and Stoughton, c 1900).

The wars depicted in the history books were often illustrated in colour paintings, romanticized,
propagandized, draped with the colours of empire and the gloss of academic history. The Wars of living Memory were written of that way but they were illustrated with photographs that gave a glimpse of the true nature of war.

The first time I saw colour photos from the Second World War I was shocked, these were real people, they looked my age, they were not the Black and White ghosts that I had seen for so many years. Along with the colour came the realization that these great upheavals had been filled with REAL people who smelled the earth, the smoke the blood and the death just as I could.

Suddenly War changed from a historical event to a mass tragedy, necessary sometimes but never something to take lightly. Suddenly to stand with the dwindling numbers of veterans on November 11th became not only a duty, but an honour. These men and women had seen unimaginable horrors, they had lived through chaos and destruction and they were REAL people. People I could shake the hands of, people I could see standing with tears for their lost youth and their lost friends. The colour that is in their memories we can never see, we only have the black and white old photos.

There is now, no longer anyone alive who knows the colours of WWI, who remembers the smell of the mud of Flanders, the sound of artillery or the shrieks of dying companions. That war has become history.

Soon the same will happen for those who lived through WWII. And still, there are wars where young men and women fight because they are told to. There are still men and women now much younger than me who will have such memories. 

To stand beside them today is to stand beside all of those who are now history, to stand and remember is to make sure that History is not forgotten.

Tasty 19th c Sourdough Bread

 This fascinating video shows how Sourdough was made in the mid 1800's.

Enjoy
The Victorian Society of Alberta

 

October Fashion Friday

This month we have an outstanding video from the Living History Demonstrations  playlist by Katelyn Kearns on YouTube.

"How to Lace Yourself in a Corset"

Lots of good info here.

Check out all the videos in this list at the link above.

Enjoy
The Victorian Society of Alberta

Happy Thanksgiving!

This weekend is Thanksgiving in Canada.
Officially declared a national holiday in 1879 and celebrated on November 6th.
It was changed to the second Monday in October after the two World Wars so as not to coincide with Remembrance Day on November 11th..

Here is a great article from Canada History about Canadian Thanksgiving.

Enjoy your turkey!
The Victorian Society of Alberta

 The History of Thanksgiving in Canada

Where did the tradition come from?

Written by Alison Nagy — Posted October 4, 2018

 

Canadians celebrate Thanksgiving Day the second Monday of October.
Library and Archives Canada / e010933381-v8

Thanksgiving weekend. For many, this long weekend really kicks off the autumn season. People across the country will spend it raking leaves, harvesting, shutting down the family cabin, and hopefully eating a delicious meal surrounded by friends and family. But where did this tradition come from?

In 1621, the pilgrims at Plymouth Plantation, Massachusetts, held what is thought to be the first Thanksgiving in North America, giving thanks for the end to a drought and a bountiful harvest. Without the help of the Wampanoag, who shared planting, hunting, and fishing knowledge and techniques, the pilgrims would have died. Some records say the first official Thanksgiving likely predates this event by around fourteen years.

But let’s try again — we’re thinking of our neighbours to the south.

Believe it or not, Thanksgiving in Canada, or at least the land that would become Canada, has its own history, separate from our American counterparts.

Traditions of giving thanks long predate the arrival of European settlers in North America. First Nations across Turtle Island have traditions of thanksgiving for surviving winter and for receiving crops and game as a reward for their hard work. These traditions may include feasting, prayer, dance, potlatch, and other ceremonies, depending on the peoples giving thanks.

When it comes to European thanksgivings in Canada, we have a few tales to tell.

As the story goes, in 1578, English explorer Martin Frobisher and his crew gave thanks and communion was observed, either on land at Frobisher Bay, in present day Nunavut, or onboard a ship anchored there. The explorers dined on salt beef, biscuits, and mushy peas and gave thanks through Communion for their safe arrival in then Newfoundland. This is now accepted as the first “Canadian” Thanksgiving, forty-three years before the first “American” Thanksgiving.

Forty-eight years later on November 14, 1606, inhabitants of New France under Samuel de Champlain held huge feasts of thanksgiving between local Mi’kmaq and the French. Though not known at the time by the settlers, cranberries, rich in vitamin C, are credited with helping avoid scurvy. The neighbouring Mi’kmaq likely introduced the French to cranberries, or as they called them, petites pommes rouges (little red apples).

Champlain’s feasts were more than an annual affair. To prevent the scurvy epidemic that had decimated the settlement at Île Sainte-Croix in past winters, the Ordre de Bon Temps (Order of Good Cheer) was founded, offering festive meals every few weeks. Medical treatises recommended better nutrition (more food) and entertainment to combat scurvy.

However, despite this history of uniquely Canadian thanksgivings, our modern concepts of Thanksgiving were influenced by our American neighbours. Foods that are associated with a “traditional” Thanksgiving, such as North American turkey, squash, and pumpkin, were introduced to Nova Scotians in the 1750s.  After the American War of Independence, the arrival of the United Empire Loyalists ensured the continuation of spreading this “traditional” fare to other parts of the country.

Today Canadian Thanksgiving is held on the second Monday of October every year, or at least it has been since Canadian Parliament declared it so on January 31, 1957. Before this, Thanksgiving in Canada had been held sporadically, often coinciding with other major events and anniversaries.

In 1879, Thanksgiving was officially declared a national holiday to be held on November 6th.

The most recent date change to the second Monday in October was largely a result of the first and second world wars, which we officially remember each year on November 11, Remembrance Day. This was so that the two holidays would not fall on the same weekend.

As Thanksgiving in Canada has historically been celebrated on several different dates, it is fitting that, even though it is observed on Monday, families are equally as likely to celebrate on Saturday or Sunday.

Most Canadians embraced the change of date to October, since that period better coincides with the actual completion of harvest in much of the country.

Parliament officially declares Thanksgiving as “a day of general thanksgiving to almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed.” While this mandate for Thanksgiving may not be observed by all Canadians in its entirety, the ideas of being thankful, of spending time with family, and sharing a delicious meal still remain.

 
 
 

2024 National Day of Truth and Reconciliation

 

Orange Shirt Day

National Day of Truth and Reconciliation

Happy 119th Birthday Alberta

 

September 1, 1905 Alberta and Saskatchewan become provinces. 

Happy 119th birthday!

Alberta is the only province in Canada named after a princess, Princess Louise Caroline Alberta, the 4th daughter of Queen Victoria.

Thanks for reading.

Victorian Society of Alberta

August Fashion Friday

This month we delve into the "nitty gritty" of keeping all those fancy, and not so fancy, clothes clean.

This video by Bernadette Banner on YouTube has some interesting info.

Enjoy
The Victorian Society of Alberta

 

Come and see us at Days of Yore!

This long weekend we will be at the fabulous Days of Yore in Didsbury Alberta!

A massive event with historical re-enactor groups from all across Alberta.
Covering over a thousand years of history from the Viking age to WWII.

Each group has an historical camp setup and there are lots of demonstrations in the camps and on the field.
A schedule of the events is here.

The Victorian Society of Alberta encampment is the second largest of all the groups after the Vikings.

Pictures from last year's event are here.

Entrance fee is $10.00 per person, kids 6 and under are free.

The event is open to the public from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm both Saturday and Sunday.

Your editor will also have his three station working Telegraph network running and this year the network is part of the Alberta MTC Line project which will eventually connect 26 museums in Western Canada!

Come by and say Hi!

Enjoy the long weekend.
The Victorian Society of Alberta

Elegance on the way to the Regatta

This video from Yesterday Today on FB shows people getting off the train at the Henley Regatta in July of 1898.

A wonderful glimpse into the Upper Crust on their way to a see and be seen event!

Enjoy
The Victorian Society of Alberta

July Fashion Friday

This month we have a fascinating video about Victorian Corsetry.
From Abby Cox on YouTube.

Enjoy

The Victorian Society of Alberta

Lady Agnes MacDonald’s Adventure July 1886

 In July 1886 Sir John A. Macdonald and his Wife Lady Agnes Macdonald took a trip across Canada on the new CPR.

The trip was notable for the adventurous Agnes' trip through the Rockies perched on the Cowcatcher of the engine!

From an article in the William's Lake Tribune, July 2018.

Enjoy
The Victorian Society of Alberta

HAPHAZARD HISTORY: Lady Agnes Macdonald’s train trip west

 

Sir John A. Macdonald and Lady Agnes Macdonald (to the right) and their party at “the Jamaican” railway car. (BC Provincial Archives photo)

In 1885, the last spike was hammered into the Canadian Pacific Railway at Craigellachie, and for the first time, Canada had a transcontinental link from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

Sir John A. Macdonald, Canada’s Prime Minister, had never been west of Ontario. It had been his life’s ambition to see the joining of the country by rail, and so it was planned that he and his wife, Lady Agnes, should travel by train across Canada in the summer of 1886.

A private railway car named “the Jamaican” after the country where Lady Agnes had been born was outfitted, and a special train was scheduled to carry a party of political dignitaries from Ottawa to Granville (now known as Vancouver).

The plan was for the Prime Minister to stop in as many towns as possible along the way to do some campaigning and to take credit for the building of the railway.

However, at Calgary, Lady Macdonald began to steal the show.

She had been quite bored in the private car as they traversed the monotonous Prairies, and she wanted a little excitement.

She climbed up into the cab of the locomotive and asked the engineer and fireman to explain all the dials and levers, and to explain how the huge engine worked.

She became so intrigued with it that she decided to ride the next several miles in the cab, and she asked if she could blow the whistle at the next crossing.

She did, and she blew it many more times along the route, resulting in a note being sent up to the cab by Sir John A. himself, telling her to stop playing around as it was interfering with his reading concentration.

Then, just outside of Banff, while the engine was watering up, the engineer asked her if she would like to accompany him while he conducted a walk around inspection of the engine.

The minute Lady Agnes saw the huge cowcatcher at the front, she decided that she wanted to ride there for the remainder of the journey.

She felt that compared to the stuffy, boring, smoke-filled atmosphere of the private car, riding on the front of the train with the wind in her face would be exhilarating and would give her the best view from the best seat on the train.

The engineer was astounded. Lady Agnes later wrote: “he seemed to think it was a very bad idea indeed. To a sensible, level-headed man as he is, such an innovation on all general rules of travelling decorum was no doubt very startling.”

The engineer was firm. He would not allow her to ride on the front unless the Prime Minister himself gave his permission.

Sir John A. was sitting in the private car, having another drink and reading a magazine, when Lady Agnes rushed in and made her request.

He looked at her as if she was crazy and said: “Ridiculous!”

BC Provincial Archives photo Lady Agnes Macdonald.

That should have been the end of it, but being a politician, Sir John A. couldn’t resist saying more than one word.

So, he followed up with a question: “Could you hold on?”

Lady Agnes took this as permission granted, and back she went to the locomotive.

By now, the engineer had turned the problem over to the Superintendent of the journey, an aide to the Prime Minister who was in charge of the whole trip.

The Superintendent tried valiantly to talk her out of it, pointing out the danger, the inconveniences to her person and the lack of decorum for an upper class lady, but to no avail.

Finally, he asked her what she would use as a seat. She looked around and saw a small box which had contained candles sitting on the platform, and she declared that this box would serve nicely as a seat.

The Superintendent saw that he would not win the argument, so he helped her up onto the top of the cowcatcher and, feeling duty bound not to leave her there, he sat down on the other side.

Lady Agnes recognized that he was greatly distressed by her plan and tried to cheer him up, declaring that this was a great adventure, travelling at the very front of the train from the mountains to the sea.

By all accounts, the Superintendent was not very encouraged by her words.

Later, she described her feelings during her ride: “With a firm right hand grasping the iron stanchion, and my feet planted on the buffer beam, there was not a yard of descent in which I faltered for a moment.”

The drops down the west side of the Great Divide should have terrified Agnes, yet she was thoroughly exhilarated.

It was the poor Superintendent who was terrified.

July Book Tuesday

 This month's Book Tuesday is a delightful and informative collection of Victorian Slang collected in 1909 by J. Bedding Ware.

Available at the Internet Archive 

This book is a dictionary of "heterodox Engish, slang and prose" a glimpse into the common tongue of ordinary people in Victorian England.

Definitely worth a perusal.
The Preface is gold and included below.

Enjoy

The Victorian Society of Alberta

Passing English of the Victorian era : a dictionary of heterodox English, slang and phrase

by Ware, James Redding
    1909

 PREFACE

HERE is a numerically weak collection of instances of 'Passing English '. It may be hoped that there are errors on every page, and also that no entry is ' quite too dull '. Thousands of words and phrases in existence in 1870 have drifted away, or changed their forms, or been absorbed, while as many have been added or are being added. 'Passing English' ripples from countless sources, forming a river of new language which has its tide and its ebb, while its current brings down new ideas and carries away those that have dribbled out of fashion. Not only is 'Passing English ' general ; it is local ; often very seasonably local.
Careless etymologists might hold that there are only four divisions of fugitive language in London — west, east, north and south. But the variations are countless. Holborn knows little of Petty Italia behind Hatton Garden, and both these ignore Clerkenwell, which is equally foreign to Islington proper; in the South, Lambeth generally ignores the New Cut, and both look upon Southwark as linguistically out of bounds; while in Central London, Clare Market (disappearing with the nineteenth century) had, if it no longer has, a distinct fashion in words from its great and partially surviving rival through the centuries — the world of Seven Dials, which is in St Giles's — St James's being practically in the next parish. In the East the confusion of languages is a world of ' variants ' — there must be half-a-dozen of Anglo-Yiddish alone — all, however, outgrown from the Hebrew stem. ' Passing English ' belongs to all the classes, from the peerage class who have always adopted an imperfection in speech or frequency of phrase associated with the court, to the court of the lowest costermonger, who gives the fashion to his immediate entourage. Much passing English becomes obscure almost immediately upon its appearance — such as ' Whoa, Emma ! ' or ' How's your poor feet ? ' the first from an inquest in a back street, the second from a question by Lord Palmerston addressed to the then Prince of Wales upon the return of the latter from India. ' Everything is nice in my garden' came from Osborne. 'O.K.' for 'orl kerrect' (All Correct) was started by Vance, a comic singer, while in the East district, 'to Wainwright' a woman (i.e. to kill her) comes from the name of a murderer of that name. So boys in these later days have substituted 'He's a reglar Charlie' for 'He's a reglar Jack' meaning Jack Sheppard, while Charley is a loving diminutive of Charles Peace, a champion scoundrel of our generation. The Police Courts yield daily phrases to 'Passing English ', while the life of the day sets its mark upon every hour. Between the autumn of 1899, and the middle of 1900, a Chadband became a Kruger, while a plucky, cheerful man was described as a 'B.P.' (Baden Powell). Li Hung Chang remained in London not a week, but he was called 'Lion Chang' before he had gone twice to bed in the Metropolis. Indeed, proper names are a great source of trouble in analysing Passing English.