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President’s Message
Winter is fast approaching, and today’s Georgina is much different from what it was about 150 years ago. Instead of using good weather to lay in firewood and supplies for the upcoming winter season, we are basking in warm sunshine, enjoying fall drives in the car, or getting in those last rounds of golf. What a different world we live in!
Our upcoming general meeting will be held at the schoolhouse at the Georgina Village Museum on Tuesday October 21. Long-time local residents Barb and Dick Munro will be entertaining us with stories of Georgina. Thanks go out to Barb and Dick for their years of dedication to the GHS, and for sharing their stories with us.
Your Georgina Historical Society Board of Directors has been busy organizing the upcoming AGM, booked in for Thursday November 20. Our venue this year is Cayley Hall in historic Roches Point, with dinner catered by Eddie B and Tootsies, AKA Les and Michele. Our speaker will be well known local photographer Tom Zsolt. Please mark Thursday November 20 on your calendar; we are looking forward to a wonderful evening and hope to see you there.
Signage and a contemplation bench at the Mann-Sprague cemetery on the Queensway in Keswick are moving forward, and should be in place before the snow flies. The bench and signage are sponsored by GHS member Karen Steele; thanks so much for your donation Karen! If you haven’t been to see the hard work by the Town of Georgina in rehabilitating this historic cemetery, please drop by. The before and after of the transformation is stunning, and thanks must go out to the Town of Georgina, and especially Courtney Rennie, the town employee who has pulled this all together.
I hope to see you all soon, Paul
Mann-Sprague Cemetery – An Update
On October 2nd members of your GHS Board met with Courtney Rennie, Town of Georgina’s co-ordinator for pioneer cemetery renewal, to select the site for signage and a second reflective area for visitors to the Mann-Sprague Cemetery and its 180 gravesites. Kudos to Courtney and the Town for the wonderful work of restoration to the cemetery completed thus far. There’s still more work to be done; footings for the entry arch and a concrete pad with seating benches are in place at the entry area and the arch itself should soon follow with appropriate signage. A similar pad with benches as well as signage is planned near the rear right-hand corner of the property. A map of cemetery plots is also to be included for this location as part of the signage.
New concrete pad and seating at the entrance to the cemetery
GHS Board members meet with Courtney Rennie to determine where the second pad will be located
Courtney pegs in the location for the second pad
View of the Mann-Sprague Cemetery before rehab work
Harvest Time with Our Ancestors
The following is the second in a series of articles using materials from early diaries, journals and books as well as the internet that describe and illustrate everyday activities and experiences of our ancestors in the early days. This one is focused on beekeeping, honey gathering, and apiarist activities. Ed.
Beekeeping: Then and Now
Initially, our pioneers and the Indians would try to locate hives of wild bees and then rob them of their hard work by killing the bees off and then removing their honey for consumption. Horace Kephart, a woodsman and early author describing ways of living off the land in his book on woodcraft, devoted a section to finding the locations of native bees in the wilderness. Wild bee hives could be located in many ways; the colour of the bees often gave away the type of tree in which their hive might be found as over time the colour of the insects themselves would slightly change to camouflage them. (1) For example, “light coloured bees in pines, poplar, chestnuts; darker ones in oak, beech, maple.” (2) He also goes on to explain how to backtrack the bees to their lairs and what to look for; abandoned squirrel holes, or knot holes where they may be seen flying in and out, or even in rock crevices. Usually the bees were killed off and the honey was removed. Eventually it was discovered that wild bees could be subdued with smoke and the honey harvester could protect himself with some fine netting and a means of smoking them into a somewhat safe stupor.a
Traditional bee hive or skep
https://beekeepinginsider.com/different-types-of-bee-hives-with-pictures/
“Honey Gathering, Straw Hives, and Superstitions about Bees.”
“Sitting around the garden walks were to be seen the conical-shaped straw hives. When the season for honey gathering was over, the bees were suffocated with smoke, or by the fumes of burning brimstone, and the honey taken from the hive, a few hives being reserved for breeding purposes the following year. Some peculiar superstitions, too, prevailed regarding bees. If there happened to be a death in the family, the duty devolved on some one of tapping on the hive and notifying the bees, else it was believed the bees would die also.
When the bees swarmed and were taking their flight all hands would get out and hammer on tin basins and pails, and it was the custom to flood sunlight into their midst by the use of a mirror. The noisy sound made was supposed to represent thunder and the flash of light lightning, so as to give the bees the impression that a thunder storm was coming up and so cause them to alight near home. This practice cannot exactly be called a superstition, and whether or not it was of any value in preventing the bees from getting away out of reach is doubtful. It was considered unlucky to sell a hive of bees. If it were known that a man had more hives or “skips” of bees than he wanted, any person wishing to get a hive would simply go to this man’s place and carry away one of his hives. He would not pay for it in person, but would leave an equivalent in money lying around where it could easily be seen.
A fermented liquor called “methigelum” was made by some of the people from honey. After most of the honey had been drained from the comb, the residue, partly honey and partly wax, was put into a vessel and covered with water ; after a few days it fermented and became quite intoxicating. It was an imitation of the ancient ‘mead’. (3)”
“The straw beehives were quite common fifty and sixty years ago. A strand of straw was twisted into a coarse rope, which, as it lengthened out, was coiled (commencing at the top) into a conical-shaped hive. The coils were bound together, as the hive took shape, with cords or strips of elm bark. This kind of hive, although light, was lasting and made a warm home for the bees during the long winter months.” (4)
Sources:
(1) Kephart, Horace: Camping and Woodcraft, The Macmillan Company, New York !917, vol II Woodcraft, pp. 360-366.
(2) Ibid, p. 361
(3) Scherck, Michael Gonder: Pen Pictures of Early Pioneer Life in Upper Canada, W. Briggs Publisher 1905, p.163
(4) Ibid, p.150
Image of bee skep https://beekeepinginsider.com/different-types-of-bee-hives-with-pictures/
Traditional bee hives
Traditional beehives called ‘skeps’ are rarely used nowadays. But they do sometimes get used to capture swarms. This is because they are just the right size and shape for gathering a swarm of bees. A skep is the kind of hive you often see printed on pretty honey labels. These dome-shaped hives are usually made out of straw or wickerwork, a bit like an overturned basket.
Some were still being used up to the 1950s and before hives with removable frames were invented, they were an incredibly destructive way to rear bees. After the bees had worked hard to build comb during the summer, the beekeeper would drive away the bees. Then recover the entire contents of the hive, including all the brood and honeycomb. Bees would be left without shelter or supplies for the winter. Not an eco-friendly option these days! In fact, today, you cannot legally keep bees in a skep!
Source: https://beekeepinginsider.com/different-types-of-bee-hives-with-pictures/
The Langstroth Hive
Though there are other types of hives, this is the most widely-used type of beehive in North America. Both hobbyists and commercial apiaries use them. As measurements are pretty standard, it is easy to find widely available parts.
The Langstroth hive was invented by Lorenzo Langstroth, an American clergyman, and beekeeper. He is considered to be the “father of American beekeeping.” He patented his first hive in 1852.
What Is Mead?
Mead, or “honey wine,” is an alcoholic beverage made by fermenting honey. It’s one of the oldest alcoholic beverages ever made, as it was consumed as far back as 4,000 years ago. Interestingly, mead was common across ancient cultures around the world including those in Asia, Europe and Africa. Though similar to beer, wine or cider, mead occupies a beverage category on its own since its primary fermentable sugar is honey. All you need to make basic mead is honey, water and a yeast or bacterial culture. However, ingredients such as fruits, herbs, spices, grains, roots and flowers are often included as well. Mead’s alcohol content varies but is typically around 5–20%. Its flavor profile ranges from very sweet to very dry, and it’s available in both sparkling and still versions.
https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/mead#what-it-is
The Beekeeping Project by Bob Holden
In grade nine we moved from Montreal to the small town of Renfrew, Ontario in the Ottawa Valley. In my new high school, Renfrew Collegiate, over half the students were bussed in from farms in the surrounding area. I was also introduced to several new subjects not encountered before: Agriculture and Agricultural Science (the latter one instead of the normal science I’d had in other schools). Most school projects seemed more tuned into the needs of those rural students. Even in wood shop; the boys in each grade had to participate in the construction of a barn on school property – a buddy of mine and I did roofing! In shop we were also introduced to the basic elements of blacksmithing, again something more focused on the needs of rural families and their farms.
In Agriculture class we had to do a major project with a buddy…what to do? My buddy Pete and I didn’t live on a farm; we were “Townies” and a gardening project was not allowed as it wasn’t a new learning experience (most families had small vegetable gardens back then). After discussing our problem with friends and parents, a neighbour suggested beekeeping as he had a friend in the business. This friend was willing to donate the nucleus for two colonies of bees; two Langstroth style hives with some extra “supers” and the necessary frames with wax bases to put inside them (a super is the wooden box containing the frames of wax onto which the bees manufacture wax cells that they will fill with honey…a hive is usually made up of several supers stacked 3, 4, or more high). We now had two hives of bees which we placed at the back of my buddy’s property that overlooked a ravine. On the other side of the ravine was a field of clover; perfectly suited for the bees as honey produced with clover nectar is light coloured and very desirable.
The beekeeper that supplied us with everything also gave us a couple of queen separators to keep the queens of each hive in the brood chamber which is usually a deeper “super” on the bottom of the hive and is used for the queen bee to lay her eggs for new worker bees (other females), and the drones which are males; the queen is larger than the other bees and can be confined in this way to the brood chamber. You don’t want her to lay eggs in honey that is to be harvested later for human consumption. Sometimes the brood chamber is expanded to two supers allowing for more honey storage for the bee colony in colder weather as they will feed off of it until spring. The bees not only feed on their own honey but also consume the nectar and pollen found on the flowers they visit. They will also drink water. When stored honey becomes hard and crystalizes they will dilute it with water so that it is easier to consume.
Once the hives were all set up we left the bees to do their work. At this point we learned that a beekeeper’s work was just beginning; they had to maintain and check the hives on a regular basis as well. To do that we had to obtain a beekeeper’s uniform and headgear to protect ourselves from being stung, and a smoker to calm the bees when opening a hive to check it; the smoke makes them more docile and less aggressive allowing the beekeeper to get into the hive without being stung. Later on, we would go into the hives wearing long sleeved clothing, the headgear, and use the smoker as the bees got used to our attentions. Only once did we have any problems; one day Pete accidentally dropped a super he was working on and the bees inside went after him sending him to the hospital with bee stings. He was OK but it gave us a scare and we learned to be more cautious.
Extracting honey in the fall was quite a process. Our manual extractor was no more than a garbage can fixed up as a centrifuge inside and had a spigot at the bottom outside allowing removal of the honey into cans or jars. At the top there was a crank to spin the frames locked into the centrifuge. Commercial apiarists used larger motorized extractors that could process multiple frames; ours was manual and could only do 4 eight inch frames at a time. Before they were mounted into the centrifuge, each frame had to have the wax capping each cell of honey removed with a special hot capping knife that would melt the wax cap. Then the frames were placed into the extractor and spun until all cells were emptied and the honey gathered in the bottom of the extractor. Once all of the honey was extracted from each of the frames, the spigot at the bottom would be opened and the honey would pass through special cloth filters to remove any stray bits of wax, pollen or bee parts as it was poured into containers for storage. Our honey was very good; we got an A on our project and as a bonus won third place for our honey at the Renfrew County Fall Fair. Best of all we could sell our honey at a decent price. When winter came we had to winterize each hive with insulation covered by a heavy water-proofed paper barrier to protect the bees from the cold…the Ottawa Valley can get very cold in winter months.
One additional piece of excitement took place in the second spring of our beekeeping: we hived two swarms …one from each hive (Pete and I were in Grade Ten by then). In the spring the old queen lays several eggs that are served royal jelly producing new queens. When these larvae become adults they become new queens. The problem is no hive may have two queens, so the extra queens are either killed or must leave the hive. When a new queen leaves the hive, a large number of workers and drones will leave with her in a swarm. Our first swarm gathered in the crotch of a tree overlooking the ravine. The bees of the swarm had gathered there with their queen while several scout bees (worker bees) went looking for a new home. Bees in a swarm are in a stupor and do not normally sting. I had to climb up the tree and saw off the limb where they’d gathered, lowering it gently by rope. We then took the swarm, and locating the new queen, gently brushed them all into a new brood chamber creating a new hive. One week later we had to repeat the process. No-one got stung and we gained two new hives, doubling our honey production. When my family later moved away from Renfrew to Brockville, my buddy Peter and his brothers continued on as beekeepers looking after the hives.
Where in Georgina?
This month’s mystery location should be a no brainer. Where and what is it?
This Month in Ontario History
1813 October 5 – At the Battle of the Thames (also called “Battle of Moraviantown”), American General Harrison, with 4500 infantry intercepts the retreating British and Indian forces and wins a decisive victory. British power in western Ontario is ended, Tecumseh is killed, and his Indian coalition collapses. Americans take control of western Ontario for the remainder of the war, and permanently end the threat of Indian raids into Ohio, Indiana, and Michigan.
1957 October 4 – The Avro Arrow fighter jet roll-out ceremony took place at Avro Canada’s plant in Malton, Ontario. It was later scrapped by John Diefenbaker’s Conservative government in favour of a cheaper jet fighter built in the USA. At the time, the Arrow was considered to be the most advanced fighter jet in the world.
Did You Know?
- Ontario is similar in size to Egypt. If it were a country, it would be the 28th largest one in the world.
- Ontario has more First Nations people than any other province or territory (around 375,000), but they only make up around 3% of the province’s population. They mainly include Algonquian speakers (Cree, Ojibwa, and more) and Iroquois speakers (Mohawk, Oneida, and more.)
Sources:
https://funworldfacts.com/ontario-canada/
News
Some sad news; Melissa Matt’s father, James William Matt passed away on Friday, October 3rd. He is survived by his wife Shirley, son Robert, daughters Melissa and Kathryn, and their children. Our condolences go out to Melissa and her family.
The Georgina Village Museum will present “Family Fright Encore” at 7:00 PM on Sunday, October 19th and “Two Dark Nights” at 6:30 PM on Friday October 24 and Monday October 27th. Bring your families and enjoy the fun!
We have in storage, at the GHS headquarters in the Quilter’s Cabin, Victorian tea cups and pots previously loaned or donated for use in teas at the Village available for return to their owners or available to others if they’re not wanted. Some of these are very fine and beautiful collectables.
Details for our Annual General Meeting and dinner are almost completed. It is to be held on Thursday, November 20th at Cayley Hall in Roches Point. We will be having a turkey dinner with a vegetarian option (only available with notice two weeks’ prior to November 20th) and will cost $35 per person. For further details please see the promotion for this event on the second to last page of the newsletter or contact any member of the Board for tickets.
Help us! Your Board has seven hard working members who serve in positions as your President, Secretary, Treasurer, three Directors and a Past-President. Past GHS Boards have had three additional members serving as a Vice-President and two Directors. The Board would love to welcome some new individuals to bring us back up to ten members once again. If you or someone you know would be interested, please contact anyone on the last page of this newsletter for information. While there is some time and work involved, it can be very rewarding and gratifying, especially when we see what we can accomplish working together in preserving our history and heritage.
Events
Sunday Oct 19th – Georgina Village Museum, “Family Fright Encore” at 7:00 PM
Tuesday Oct. 21st – General Meeting, Georgina Village Museum Schoolhouse, Barb & Dick Munro will reminisce of old days in Sutton, 6:30 Meet & Greet, 7:00 pm start
Friday, October 24th – “Two Dark Nights”, Village Museum at 6:30 PM
Monday, October 27th – “Two Dark Nights”, Village Museum 6:30 PM
Monday Nov. 3 – Board Meeting 2:00 pm Quilter’s Cabin at Georgina Village Museum
Thursday, Nov. 20th – Annual General Meeting and Dinner, Cayley Hall at Christ Church in Roches Point. $35 per person for dinner – Guest speaker local photographer Tom Zsolt; meet and greet 5:30 PM and dinner at 6:00..
Tuesday January 20th – Bring and Bragg …location to be determined
GHS Annual Meeting and Dinner
This year’s AGM will be held at Christ Church’s Cayley Hall, 508 Turner Street in Roches Point on Thursday November 20th; meet and greet at 5:30 PM, and dinner at 6:00 PM. Our meal will be a turkey dinner with a vegetarian option available by request two weeks prior to the AGM and will cost $35 per person.
Our guest speaker for our Annual General Meeting and Dinner will be Tom Zsolt, local resident and Canadian photographer, who has been documenting landscapes, towns, and life across North America for 50 years. His exhibition, Ontario Gothic, during Contact ’98 in Toronto, caught the imagination of publisher Kearns, Vander Meersch & Boulton, who in 1999 published County Matters, Zsolt’s first book. Showing the land, villages and people of rural Ontario, Country Matters was short listed for the Roloff Beny Award for the best book of photography by a Canadian published that year.
Zsolt’s work was selected for a 2009 exhibition in Beijing, followed by a 10-city tour in China, titled Canadian Cameras at Work. Zsolt’s photograph Niagara Falls, depicting Asian tourists being photographed before Niagara Falls in winter, was selected as the poster image for the exhibition.
As part of Contact 2015, The Georgina Centre for Arts & Culture hosted Reluctant Subject, Portraits by Tom Zsolt exhibiting 40 years of his portraits, which was followed by the release of the book of the same title.
The Georgina Gallery (GCAC) selected seven of Zsolt’s images in 2023 for their exhibition and literary contest 7 STORIES. The exhibit, which featured very large photographs, was accompanied by release of the book 7 STORIES, An Anthology, which included Zsolt’s photos with over 80 short stories and essays.
We hope to see you all there; for further information please Contact us.