October 16, 2006

Curious George curious of local history. What's some local history from your neck of the woods?

Last week, we had a highway renamed after local hero Sir Isaac Brock, a general from the War of 1812 who saved Canada a couple of times and died in the process. Renaming a short, crappy highway seems inadequate, as there's no lack of better, more significant tributes around. But, he saved Canada from U.S. invasion (most likely with his death serving as a rallying call than any impact on the battle itself, but still) and it's the big event in our local history. So what's the main bit of local history in your neighbourhood?

posted by Capt. Renault 17 years ago
  • The prehistory around here is a lot more interesting than the history (I can say that, I work in the historical society.) Everywhere they dig in town they find fossil footprints. Of course, the town to the north of us had a bunch of witch trials; they benefit from having 'The Witch of Blackbird Pond' set there, too. I'm just trying to keep my museum from taking in taxidermied fish as 'historic items'.
  • The main bit? Is there a main bit in every place? What do you mean "main bit"?
  • I work across the road from Western Approaches Command where they co-ordinated the Battle of the Atlantic in WWII.
  • The main bit? Is there a main bit in every place? What do you mean "main bit"? OK, it doesn't have to be the "main" bit. Just a bit.
  • There was a lot of Underground Railroad activity here in Central New York. Harriet Tubman's house is nearby.
  • IIRC, I just read about this new exhibit at the NY Historical Society, Slavery in New York. Fascinating, disturbing, etc.
  • Funny you should mention that, TUM, we have Tubman sites, too. The BME church is always part of the Doors Open circuit, and their continued participation is amazing, considering that the church has a big problem with American tourists coming up and stealing slavery artifacts. Stealing. From a church. Bad.
  • (Odd, but that site doesn't mention that the BME was the end of the railroad. Which is kinda important.)
  • Hey, did we ever thank you guys for all that asylum? Ta, fellers.
  • HeHe,, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colfax_Avenue Colloquially, the arterial is referred to simply as "Colfax", a name that has become associated with prostitution and crime. Playboy Magazine once called Colfax "the longest, wickedest street in America." I call it home.
  • Birthplace - Bedford, Bedfordshire, England, UK, Europe, Earth, Space. Historical figure - John Bunyan, author of the gripping Pilgrim's Progress, required reading for every Bedford pupil. Paula Radcliffe comes from Bedford too. I read her autobiography a couple of years ago. Well, I got about two-thirds through, but couldn't be bothered to finish it.
  • My claim to fame is that I live in a teeniny town in the shadow of Stone Mountain, Georgia. A former camp resort for the well-to-do of Atlanta, the town declined into where the leadership of the KKK lived and met. History had the last laugh however. Stone Mountain now has a black mayor and my town is full of lesbians and liberals in a predominantly black county.
  • The Halifax Explosion. There are Titanic victims buried here. More recently, the Swissair Flight 111 disaster. It's a happy place! Is it safe to click on tubman links?
  • I am currently in WI, but I call Tampa FL home. There is a great deal of history there. Ybor City hosts many of the old attractions. There is the prohibition era tunnels for rum runners. Ybor also has a great deal of old cigar factories and a lot of history in that industry. The Rough Riders operated out of the Tampa port. There is also the Gasparilla festival celebrating the landing of Jose Gaspar.
  • Where I was born, though: Concord, Massachusetts, is where the Shot Heard Round the World which started the American Revolution was fired. I didn't do it.
  • I live near The Spite House in Alameda. The story I heard when I toured the place was that two friends built a home together - one owned the land and the other paid for the house. When they had a falling out, the owner of the land couldn't legally force out the owner of the house, so he built a second house on the lot just to obstruct the view. There is about a foot of space in between the houses, and the Spite House is only 8 or 10 feet wide.
  • And people really do live in the Spite House.
  • OK, then. The Viking ship, with the form that everyone now knows, was invented aroud these 'ere parts. The Norse chieften Raud den Rame (Raud the Strong) lived down the road. "Raud had a large ship with a gilded head formed like a dragon, which ship had thirty rowing benches, and even for that kind of ship was very large." When Olav Trygvason came north (see §84ff) and tortured and killed Raud, he took the boat and copied it numerous times, thus immortalising the design. Perhaps that's the main bit.
  • Washington Crossed the Delaware. William Penn Worshipped at the Quaker Meeting house in my neighborhood. Washingston slept in numerous places.
  • Good idea, Capt.!
  • Don't make me take this thread over.
  • The last tsunami we had in my area was over 8 metres high! *considers moving*
  • The only local history that interests me is the geologic history, and I don't think many of you would be too interested in that. But if you like, I can reconstruct California for you.
  • i spent much of my childhood near this round tower. more details. until recently, i lived near the area of paris where the 1789 revolution began (bastille/faubourg st antoine). since last week, i live in lille, which has an interesting mix of flemish and french architecture but is dominated by post-ww1 constructions (much of the area having been flattened from 1914-18). pierre degeyter composed the score of l'internationale in lille (words were written by eugene pottier while a member of the paris commune).
  • Some people renting a house nearby have moved out. How local do ye want this to be?
  • I live in Ottawa. So we've got Canadian history. All of it. We have been known to rent small bits of it out for casual use (to stalwart citizens of good repute).
  • In an amazing coincidence, I was raised in my boyhood home, a historic landmark if ever there was one.
  • I live near The Spite House in Alameda Okay, when did I miss out on yentruoc moving to this side of the Bay? ::pages es el queso and medusa for another meetup::
  • Twas recent - just a month ago. But I grew up in Alameda, so the landmarks are familiar.
  • There's not much local history in my suburb, but generally speaking, you can't swing a dead cat without hitting something historical pretty much anywhere in Greater Boston. Yesterday, the wife and kiddie and I drove down to Plymouth to check out the Plimoth Plantation historical site and visit the Mayflower II
  • I live in Ottawa. So we've got Canadian history. All of it. Bytown (later Ottawa): established 1850 Halifax: established 1749 Ptoo
  • Hey Bees, that wasn't "the main bit".
  • And yes, we should have another meet up. Maybe sushi? There is a brand-shiny-new sushi place at South Shore since I lived here last. And for, um, historical perspective, it sits upon the foundation of ye olde Lyons where you could show up drunk at 2am and still be served. Yay history!
  • I live just round the corner from the house that Sun Yat-sen died in. The rest of Beijing has a bit of history too...
  • My tiny town has little in the way of notable history, but the nearest city is the birthplace of Col. John McCrae, who penned the Remembrance Day (Veterans Day/Armistice Day) classic In Flanders Fields. The City of my birth, however, has history to spare.
  • Hey, briank, I visited Plimouth Plantation as a kid, and had a wonderful time. A very happy memory indeed.
  • My family is kind of tied up with the history of Ft. Worth, Texas. A great (great great...etc.) grandfather of mine was a stonemason on the Tarrant County Courthouse and helped start the first stonemason's union west of the Mississippi. Another great- great- grandfather was the first paid fire chief of the town and worked at Fire House No. 1 (now a museum). Then my Paw Paw's dad was commissioner of roads in the 30s when they put in red brick roads. These are among the reasons why my mom thinks I'm nuts for moving away.
  • My two cities are Washington, DC and London, UK. Quite a bit of local history in those two places. Favourite bit of DC local history: Some of the oldest buildings on Capitol Hill are houses that were once boardinghouses, built for politicians to stay in while Congress was in session (before DC was a proper city where people lived.) Voting records show that in those days, Congressmen and Senators voted more consistently by boardinghouse than they did by party or by state. London local history: well, one day there was this whale that got lost in the Thames...
  • I live a couple of minutes from the end of the Natchez Trace Parkway, which follows an old trade route between TN and MS. It's a perfect place for those Sunday drives searching for great scenery. My favorite is this bridge.
  • Historically speaking, I had sushi last night, but that was in San Fran. I agree that it's for an eastbay sushi-thon!! let's show up those "europeans" with their visiting tools :P
  • and um, some Oakland history. we had a really big fire here, back in 1991. very big, very bad. I lived in SF at the time but I could see it. big bad fire...
  • *puts the mane bit in the horse's mouth for Skrik*
  • Nanaimo, as did many towns in western Canada, began as an outpost of the Hudson's Bay Company. The bastion is our main bit of history. Also home to the legendary Nanaimo Bar. The history of the Snuneymuxw people goes back a little further.
  • Islander, I guess the taverns in your neck of the woods are pretty famous, as people here are always talking about Nanaimo bars... The Compleat History of My Lot: 1. It was forest (0-circa 1850). 2. It was part of a farm field (1850-1977). 3. Trees were re-planted (1978-1980). 4. It is mine (now).
  • 5. Profit?
  • 6. Ultimately part of Canada, owned by Ottawa.
  • 7. Right. So when does Ottawa mow my lawn?
  • 8. Correction - when are you going to mow Ottawa's lawn?
  • Nice bird sounds on the Snuneymuxw site, islander! I enjoyed frightening the cats with them.
  • My town started as a railroad destination for shipments of sheep, which would them graze on what little grew in the desert condititions an sometimes alkaline soil. Basque shepherds (mostly French) settled nearby, where some of their descendents are still wool growers, and others still run wonderful restaurants. South of here, where the Tehachapi Range of the Sierra Nevada and the Coast Range come together, The southernmost passes into what became the San Joaquin Valley brought Spanish monks to this area of California in the 1700s. They met up with the original residents, the Yokuts, but didn't set up missions where the aborigines were "civilized" en masse. It was too boring, even then. Oil was discovered in the most blighted areas to the south and east of where I live in the late 1800s. My grandfather come to the area in around 1910, having run away from his family's Illinois farm at the age of 15, and worked his way up from roustabout to derrick carpenter. He was a tough son of a bitch (though he would have objected to my swearing.) When I was a kid, I was fascinated by the wooden derricks that surrounded the town of Taft, where my grandparents lived, and the sound of the pumps booming in the night. Now the oil patch is running out of oil. Sorry, I know you didn't ask for personal history, but I find it hard to separate that from the rest.
  • Bytown (later Ottawa): established 1850 Halifax: established 1749 Ptoo also So when does Ottawa mow my lawn? Why you pesky provincials! I'm gonna git you sassinfrassin' varmints! *raises GST by 200%*
  • *aligns kelp catapult*
  • *readies the salmongut sling*
  • I live just a few miles from Mesilla, New Mexico, which was once the capital of the NM-AZ Territory, and is the place where Billy the Kid was tried and jailed. I'm also not far from Chope's Cantina, a local Mexican food legend.
  • Between 1840 and 1862, more than 250,000 emigrants traveled through Elmore County on their way “west”. They traveled the historic Oregon Trail, a grueling 2000 mile trail that was referred to as the “longest cemetery in the nation”. One of the more hazardous parts of the journey involved crossing the Snake River. A popular ford was located in Elmore County at Three Island Crossing above Glenns Ferry. Seven miles northeast of 1-84 Exit 95, (exits to the current site of the town of Mountain Home) on Idaho Highway 20, the highway meets the Oregon Trail and the junction of the old Kelton (Utah) Boise stage road. The junction was known as Rattlesnake Station. This is the original site of Mountain Home. Oregon Trail folks often laid over at the Rattlesnake Station site if they needed to, however the main stop was the Hot Springs below Teapot Dome. One of my favorite rides is the loop out to Rattlesnake across to Hot Springs (which dried up in the 40s) and back around for a total distance of about 15 miles. The ruts are prominent, and the views are great. There's lots of places it's easy to imagine the wagon train is just over the rise. Favourite bit of DC local history: Some of the oldest buildings on Capitol Hill are houses that were once boarding whorehouses, built for politicians to stay in while Congress was in session. And the whoresons are still there! Pallas, I know you wanted to have that correction made. You're welcome.
  • Hi and welcome new monkey MelancholyPlatypus! superior by far is dulse with little seashells that go crunch crunch to the Nanaino bar so cloying sweet to munch
  • The Tragedy of My Late Neighbour's Cock Rooster: A True Tale of Loss and Mystery A few mornings ago, while having breakfast, we looked out the kitchen window and saw our elderly Australian shepherd had something dangling from his jaws. Much to my dismay, I was appointed to investigate the matter. Going outside, I discovered the something was a cockerel that had apparently flown into the dogpen where the dogs were taking their usual post-breakfast exercise. The bird was dead. The shepherd reluctantly surrendered it to me. Apart from some saliva on its head, there was no visible damage. So ... a politely apologetic note was written (over my objections). Hindsight tells me I should have stayed in bed. The upshot was I went to the neighbour's house with the note and the dead bird in a brown paper bag. No one answered when I rang the bell. Nor when I knocked. The bag had a handle most conveniently placed for hanging on the doorknob of the neighbour's porch (that's why I chose it). I left the bag and its contents dangling, and hoped fervently that was the end of the matter. But it wasn't. The following day the brown paper bag and its contents were still hanging from the front doorknob, quite visible from the road. An addition of discarded furniture and some trash bags at the foot of the drive looked like the folk were moving out. Or had done so. And the day after that the bag still dangled. Well, 'twas warm for this time of year. Dead birds don't keep well. I decided I didn't want to give it another day. So I retrieved the bag with its contents and the note. The End (I hope)
  • There's an old Native American legend that says there's a sleeping goddess buried underneath the old part of Tulsa (where I was born), and that's why that part of the city never gets hit by tornadoes, despite being in the middle of Tornado Alley, because the wind gods are afraid of her and don't want to wake her up. Of course, it's probably the Arkansas River and the presence of several good sized hills that break up the weather patterns and make most storms that form out west hop over the main part of the city. But it's a great legend. (And way more fun to talk about than the Race Riot, Oral Roberts, or Hanson.)
  • Thank you, BlueHorse, I stand corrected! Bees, hope your neighbours haven't left behind any more stray critters!
  • Got the owner to check the place out, Pallas Athena. Haven't heard anything else. Which is good news. ;]
  • It woz murder most fowl.
  • Now I've that said, will respond to fish tick's comment above. There was actually an another explosion in Halifax during spring of 1945. Can't say I actually remember being flung onto the floor, but my mother, a great-aunt, and my older siblings remembered (and often described it vividly) because of what happened in 1917. My mother and I and siblings were ready to embark for England the minute the fighting in the Atlantic ended, which it did shortly after. [I do, however, recall the VE Day celebration just before we sailed, being far more impressed by seeing a white tram car (they were always green and yellow in my previous experience) with red and blue streamers run across it, like the old Union Jack. But then I had nothing familiar to relate the hollow booming and the building shaking to, so perhaps that's why the explosion made no more imprint on my mind than a passing thunderstorm might have, which is to say none at all.]
  • *insert joke about choking the chicken*
  • But it could have been worse as some 50,000 depth charges were reportedly saved from the fire. That's putting it mildly.
  • Next time, we have to remember to build our ammo dumps in Sudbury. That way, if it explodes, a) no-one could tell by the mess, and b) we don't need to bother rebuilding.
  • Hey, Underpants! I came out of lurk mode to say Yo to a fellow CNY dweller. I'd like to add that many folks involved locally with the Underground Railroad were also heavily into Women's Rights... and Matilda Joslyn Gage, whom history has slighted due to her radical views on religion, lived hereabouts and heavily influenced her son-in-law, a fellow named L. Frank Baum who went on to write some books indirectly expressing some of her utopian ideas (The Wizard of Oz, for starters). Many CNY people were kept up-to-date by that very modern "highway," the Erie Canal, which flows nearby bringing radical new thinking. Quite the fascinating and historic locale.
  • I think it would have been more popular if it had been called the Underpants Railroad.
  • There was actually an another explosion in Halifax during spring of 1945. Yep, Halifax is a real boom town.
  • I'd say Halifax is .... DY-NO-MIIIITE!!! /laugh track
  • Halifax: More Bang for the Buck
  • The thing i know about Halifax is that the people there call themselves Haligonians....and er, if you are in trouble they are always eager to kelp.
  • *wracks StoryBored*
  • Here on t'other coast, we prefer to put a little planning into our big bangs.
  • Here on 'other coast ... we look down our long blue noses at those who canna sail round a stationary rock
  • ... and weep for those who canna adequately tether a t'other
  • oh b'other!
  • said mother