March 2023
Black History Month. February also was Black History Month. Along with news about earthquakes, the anniversary of the war in the Ukraine and the weather, the media carried any number of stories about the experience of being Black in Canada.
Locally, memories of our brief brush with Black history are likely positive and self-congratulatory. The Carman Cardinals were one of five teams that made up the Manitoba-Dakota or Man-Dak League. The league was formed in 1950 following integration of major league baseball and operated until 1957. It included a number of talented players from previously segregated American Black Leagues. Carman has always been a sports-minded town. The baseball team was the pride of the community, and the Man-Dak baseball league is one of the bright spots in local heritage.
It may be surprising, then, to look more closely at the broader context of Black history in Canada. It was a bit of a shock for some Canadians to see the new Chloe Cooley postage stamp acknowledging the presence of slavery in 18th century Canada. Weren’t we the chosen land at the end of the underground railway?
If Cecil Foster’s “They Call Me George” was one of your choices for reading during Black History Month, you likely had even more enlightenment in store. Foster relates how Black porters on our railways struggled until the late 1960s for the right to equal promotion, to bring their families to Canada, and to break the quota barrier that limited immigration of non-white applicants, including those who were British subjects. Foster points out that it wasn’t until 1973 that Canada, in the person of Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, officially declared the country ‘multi-cultural’, where every citizen, regardless of racial or ethnic origin, is ‘Canadian’. This included our Indigenous population, who, Foster notes, were as multi-lingual and multi-cultural as any of the early white European colonists.
It’s a part of our history that most of us didn’t learn much about in school. For much of the local population, the Man-Dak League was one of their first contacts with racial diversity. What we don’t find in our local recorded histories are stories of social interaction or of baseball players remaining in the district and becoming an integral part of local community. Nor do we have this history from the player’s perspective. Understanding the broader context may help fill in some of the gaps in our local history. It also may help us frame questions that should be asked about the experience of other ethnically and racially diverse members of the community.
September 2017
Multi-Cultural Committee Events. Congratulations to the Carman/Dufferin Multi-Cultural Committee who just wound up a successful month of events in the community. The committee reports that at least 28 different countries are represented locally. During September, the group hosted a series of cultural events including music, film, displays, ethnic foods and talks, winding up the series with a colourful ‘dress expo’ and dance display this past weekend at the Active Living Centre.
This is great news for other heritage groups such as the C/DMHAC. One of the messages we try to promote is that ‘heritage’ is more than just preserving buildings and putting up signs and monuments. It also embraces our traditions, culture, memories – all the individual and family experiences that enrich community life. Getting to know our neighbours and learning more about their transition to Canadian society takes on special importance at a time of reaction to worldwide movements of refugees and immigrants. It seems timely that this ‘one small step’ towards understanding our local diversity coincides with the installation of our new Governor General, a former astronaut whose message is one of global inclusiveness.
Our families have all, at some point, been new immigrants to Canada. Accounts of adapting to life in a new land are among the more striking stories that have emerged in interviews and family histories we have been collecting over the years. If you are one of the many local folks just getting started on the journey into your family’s past, be sure to ask yourself: ‘What do I know about my family origins – why they came to Canada, where they came from, what it was like when they arrived, what was their reception by those who were here before them, the ease with which they integrated into the community?’ Here is an excerpt from just one local story:
“Our family was of German origin but we had been in Canada many years already when we moved to [this] town. It was 1942, during WWII. A friend told me later that when we arrived, a local man said: ‘We’re going to get rid of those Germans.’ But two years later he told her: ‘You know, when you get to know that family, you wouldn’t find nicer people anywhere.’ That’s the thing, to get to know people….”
The Multi-Cultural Committee is making a great start in that direction.
October 2017
In our September update, we spoke about the great work being done this summer by the Multi-Cultural Committee and related a story told by a new arrival to the community back in the 1940s. This prompted a bit of feedback and recounting of similar tales. Here is one from an even earlier era that caught my attention. It’s from a book put out this summer in honour of the 125th anniversary of the family-owned Burrows homestead. The story was related by a family member and is reprinted with permission of the authors.
I was told that the first winter on the land was not an easy undertaking. The first temporary shelter for James, Betsy, Tom (4) and William (2) was quite sparse….Food and other provisions were limited and survival for the first winter meant that hunting and gathering from the land was vital to their existence. As the story goes, James was away from the shelter during mid-winter hunting for game when unexpectedly, a lone Indian entered the shelter and started rummaging around the meagre food cache obviously looking for something to eat. Betsy was shocked, alarmed, and uncertain about this intrusion and the only means of communication between herself and this apparent intruder was a hastily cobbled together form of basic sign language. There was absolutley no meat to be had in the larder and Betsy out of desperation hastily prepared some oatmeal porridge which, after his first taste of this gruel, was quickly rejected by the hungry visitor.
The visitor resumed his search throughout the shelter for something to eat that his palate was more accustomed to and finding nothing to his liking, finally left. Betsy’s relief was short-lived when, in what seemed like a short passage of time, the shelter entrance flew open once again. This time, the first thing through the door was a deer carcass closely followed by the hungry visitor. Through sign language and gestures Betsy came to realize that the visitor fully expected her to skin and butcher the deer, which was something she had never done without her husband’s assistance. She started to dress the deer and in the eyes of this hungry man must have appeared sadly lacking in terms of traditional food preparation skills and not a good choice for a frontier wife. She was promptly scurried away from the carcass and the visitor took up the task of preparing this anticipated feast in a manner more to his liking.
While Betsy was in the process of cooking the visitor’s choice of the tenderest cuts, James returned home empty-handed from his hunting expedition. Once again, sign and body language introductions cleared the air of caution and a hearty meal was shared and enjoyed by all. The vistor, however, must have concluded that James was not a capable hunter and if the family was going to survive the winter, some help would be needed. For the remaining months of that first winter a much appreciated skinned rabbit or skinned deer would mysteriously appear in the snow just outside the entrance of the family’s shelter. (The Burrows Family by Brian Burrows & Dianne Swain, 2017).
This photo of James and Betsy’s sons, Charlie and Tom, which was taken after a grouse hunt some years later, supports the authors’ speculation that this first winter may have been a prime motivator for males in the family who all became “excellent marksmen and very capable hunters.”