We stopped in Vernon River to meet up with Aunt Donna. One of my ancestors had a hand in building this church.
PS16 - Selkirk Settlement Bicentennial
The way there:
We stopped in Vernon River to meet up with Aunt Donna. One of my ancestors
had a hand in building this church.
Grandma and I.
Aunt Donna (left) and Aunt Shirley.
Orwell Bay.
This is where the Polly and her sister ships came in, but the actual
ceremony and celebrations are being held at Lord Selkirk Provincial Park
down the #1 a bit.
Wow... it almost looks not-so-PEI-ish somehow.
Selkirk, my pictures:
Malcolm and Cheryl.
Some important people were in the area to give some keynote addresses.
"Augh, it never fails! Every time I try to line up a putt, some stupid
pipe and drum band comes along!"
Hey-o! The course is that way!
Hey, I think the bottled water puts him out of character.
This is another one of my photos that document the location-based changes
in... uh, volleyball nets.
Grand Uncle Neil (Ross) next to his namesake stone.
Marmalade's from Scotland
Rugs from Pakistan
Mexico has jumping beans
And cars are from Japan
Clowns are from the circus
Barking comes from dogs
Eggs come from a chicken
And log cabins come from logs
But where (where), where do they make balloons?
But where (where), where do they make balloons?
- from "Where Do They Make Balloons?" by They Might Be Giants.
The trees are shy and don't like being photographed, so you have be
subtle about it.
I was bored to tears, don't you know? =)
I think this is a re-enactment of the re-enactment.
The settlers arrive. "Look, Edith! Minivans!"
The history tent. I found the lecture on Lord Selkirk the most interesting
thing all day. Well, that and the "trees."
It's reassuring to know that we're not just piled up inside a (ugh!)
tent - we are in a Warner Shelter System!
Photographed from the (leaving!) car, during the pouring rain. There
is somebody performing now. Oh, you poor thing!
Uncle Shane's pictures, from the following day:
Of course this print-out-pedigree doesn't include my mother's or even
my grandfather Matheson's family - it's very Ross/MacLean-centric.
This is one way to look at things - with charts created by the magic
of computers...
OR you can do it by hand. Very elegant, but time consuming. (Uncle
Shane went down to Selkirk and took digital pictures of all the no-e-mail-addy-available
charts he found so that he could look at it later.)
Five stars for this one! I love the colour coding!
For a lot of people, once they hit Scotland (or wherever their ancestors
happen to be from), the data comes to an abrupt halt. You can easily reach
a point beyond which there is not much hope of ever learning anything.
The arrival of the Polly.
The little Belle River Church of Scotland. It's changed addresses a
couple of times, but is now safely nestled within Lord Selkirk Provincial
Park. Over here, the Church of Scotland became the Prebyterian Church while
the Church of England became the Anglican Church.
"The settlement founded in this area by Thomas Douglas, Fifth Earl
of Selkirk, was the first systematic attempt to direct to British North
America the tide of dispossessed Highlanders which had been flowing to
industrial Britain and the United States. The 800 settlers who arrived
here in 1803 aboard the Polly, Dykes, and Oughton
enjoyed Selkirk's financial support and personal supervision, and settled
on land which he had purchased. Together with earlier immigrants from the
Highlands and Hebrides, the Selkirk settlers established an enduring Scottish
tradition in Prince Edward Island."
Well, thank goodness they're getting more attention than that poor
violinist was.
