Chair of the Valkyries

Working in a museum isn't all lace doilies and petticoats. Some artifacts found in the storage areas of the museum can be described as unsettling, disturbing, or just plain scary. Generally speaking, I've gotten used to some of the less quaint artifacts that the museum houses, but every now and again I’ll find an artifact that makes me nervous.

For example, this chair. This chair makes me nervous. It’s found a home in a storage room and has been there for quite some time, but it still surprises me every time I open the door. Staff members have taken to giving the object pet names such as “Satan’s Chair”, “Demon Chair”, “Loki’s Chair” and “Seat of the Damned”.

Part of our collective discomfort may stem from the fact that we know so little about the chair. It was donated in 1962, and was described as being “many years old”, which though true is peevishly vague. The piece is crafted out of black-lined brown leather which is button-tucked in places, and pairs of animal horns styled around the edges. Even the feet of the chair are embellished with horns, though supported with cylindrical brace bars. The estimate is that this chair is probably from the early to mid-1800s, and it’s my personal guess that it belonged in a gentleman’s office, billiard room, or hunting cottage, simply because no Victorian lady of taste would possibly have let this object into their parlor or salon.

The research for this piece suggests that the horns are from buffalo, but pieces of horned furniture, which were popular throughout Europe and North America in the 19^th century, could be crafted with the horns of any animal, including elk, moose, and even cattle. Its provenance is likely similar to a mounted moose head or bear skin rug, as generally, items like horns and animal skins were used as trophies as signifiers of a successful hunting trip.

The chair lives in an upstairs storage room. I've taken to calling it the Chair of the Valkyries, because it reminds me of the typical depiction of an opera singer with a horned helmet, especially typical of Wagner’s opera Die Walküre, specifically the third act’s “Ride of the Valkyries”. Also, Elmer Fudd in the Looney Tunes cartoon “What’s Opera, Doc?” who sings “kill de wabbit!” to the tune of Wagner’s most recognizable piece.

So the chair doesn't belong to a villainous demon, plotting anti-hero, or a mythic Norse soprano, and instead likely originated from the private quarters of a wealthy Victorian gentleman with a penchant for hunting. It still creeps me out.

Carlie M.

Program Coordinator, Brant Museum and Archives

The Harvest Moon

Harvest season was a very busy time of back breaking work for pioneers. Today, farmers can harvest their crops quickly and easy by using modern mechanized farm equipment. But for the pioneers, fall was a busy season, as all members of the family had to participate in order to ensure there would be enough food to survive the winter. It would start in late August, beginning with the wheat; pioneers would harvest the wheat by hand, cutting it by using a sickle or a scythe. The stalk of wheat was turned into straw, which could then be stuffed into mattresses or used as bedding for animals. The harvester that farmers use today combines many steps that the pioneers had to do by hand. After cutting the wheat and placing the stalks in shocks to dry, pioneers would need to separate the kernels from the stalks, using a piece of equipment known as a flail.

Flail

Winnowing Tray

 The kernels would land on the barn floor and would be swept up up and placed in a winnowing tray. Winnowing was done on a windy day. This process would separate the wheat from the chaff. Eventually, a fan mill was used to separate the wheat kernel from the chaff rather than relying on nature to provide the wind power. Farmers would then take their wheat to the Grist mill, and grinding stones were used to grind the wheat into flour. Again, natural resources were used as the grinding stones were usually powered by a waterwheel. Today, we have flour mills that grind wheat into flour by using a roller mill. Corn was also harvested by using a sickle or a scythe.

The fall was also a time when animals were slaughtered. The meat was hung on hooks in the smoke house and smoked for several days before being preserved by salt. The soft fat from pigs was used to make soap, and beef or sheep fat was used to make tallow candles. Vegetables and fruits from the garden were preserved with sugar, salt, and spice, while herbs and apples were dried. Females in the family spent many hours preserving and pickling food for winter storage. Many families would host a harvest bee where neighbours would come and help each other with the work and it would finish off with a barn dance after.

Farmers planned to harvest when there was to be a full moon, so that they had enough light to work until midnight, if necessary. In September, the full moon seems to linger in the sky for several nights in a row; hence, the expression, Harvest Moon.

School groups can learn more about Harvesting during our “Harvest Moon” Program presented at the Myrtleville House Museum. Students get the opportunity to take tour of the workshop, shell corn, make apple cider with our apple cider press, bake apple cookies, and learn about the harvest season with this program.

Fanning Mill

For more information about booking programs, please visit our website or call Lisa Anderson, Education Officer at 519-752-3216 or Lisa.anderson@brantmuseums.ca

Traditional Healing Herbs

Aloe Vera

Life in 1812 was anything but easy. It was a struggle to complete the daily chores, and survival was incredibly laborious. The daily struggle was often compounded by diseases, accidents and injuries, that we may now view as insignificant given our multitude of available medicine. In the early 19th century, any community in Upper Canada that had a physician living within 10 kilometres of town was considered fortunate, but even then, response to a medical emergency could take hours or even days if the doctor was making a round of house calls. Before this time, traditional doctors didn't exist in Upper Canada. Women were the healers of the earlier European settlements and could make up home remedies to aid the sick or injured. The knowledge of herbs and natural remedies was often times passed down through generations by mothers, as well as learned from the First Nations communities.

Below is a list of natural elements that would be used by early Canadians to make up home remedies to help ease what ailed them.

Aloe Vera
Properties: Soothing, cleansing, and vulnery (wound healing)
Uses: Burns, Sunburns, infections, and wounds

Chamomile

Burdock 
Properties: Alterative (to restore health), Diaphoretic (Inducing perspiration), Diuretic (to increase the flow of urine)
Uses: Blood Purifier for acne, eczema, boils and rheumatic infections

Calendula 
Properties: Antispasmodic (to stop spasms), diaphoretic, and vulnery
Uses: Cramps, colitis, skin boils, and fever

Chamomile 
Properties: Anodyne (pain killing), antispasmodic, carminative (relieving flatulence), sedative (inducing calm or sleep), stomachic (increase appetite), and tonic (create feeling of well being)
Uses: Headaches, insomnia, and menstrual cramps

Catnip 
Properties: Anodyne, antispasmodic, carminative, diaphoretic, emmenagogue (stimulates menstrual flow), and vermifuge (to destroy parasites)
Uses: flatulence, insomnia, headaches, worms, and nervousness

Cayenne 
Properties: Carminative, irritant, stimulant, and tonic
Uses: Congestion, sore throat, colds, circulation, and digestion

Eucalyptus

Camfrey 
Properties: Astringent (contracts tissue), cell proliferant (cell growth), demulcent (soothes), expectorant (clears mucus), moisturizes, styptic (stop bleeding), vulnery
Uses: Anemia, congestion, hay fever, hemorrhage, and bone troubles

Dandelion 
Properties: Depurative (remove impurities), diuretic, stomachic, tonic
Uses: Anemia, eczema, circulation, warts

Elder 
Properties: Bark: Catharic, stomachic
Flowers: Diaphoretic, emollient
Uses: Fever, flu, kidney, skins, Caution: all parts of plant can be poisonous especially if not prepared with heat.

Eucalyptus 
Properties: Antiseptic, expectorant, stimulant
Uses: Oil added to sauna or steam bath, aids respiratory ailments. Diluted extract is anti-septic

Garlic

Ginger Root 
Properties: Carminative, diaphoretic, diuretic, stimulant
Uses: Chest and stomach spasms, suppressed menstruation, body resistance, diarrhea

Garlic 
Properties: Antibiotic, carminative, diuretic, expectorant, vermifuge
Uses: Bronchitis, colds and flu, liver and gall bladder problems, digestion, body resistance

Ginseng 
Properties: Demulcent (relieves irritants), stimulant, tonic
Uses: Central nervous system, longevity and vigor (especially for men)

Golden Seal 
Properties: Antiseptic, astringent, diuretic, laxative
Uses: Mucous membranes, buildup of mucous, colds, bites, gum and mouth sores

Golden Seal

Mint 
Properties: Antispasmodic, carminative, stomachic, stimulant
Uses: Cramps, digestion, colds, circulation, fevers

Raspberry 
Properties: Demulcent, purgative (laxative), vulnery
Uses: Menstrual cramps, diarrhea, morning sickness, other symptoms of pregnancy 

To learn more about how pioneers used these natural resources, read Mr. Carroll's Concoctions. 

Celebrating Myrtleville House

             On November 22, 1836 Allen Good and his family; wife Eliza, daughter Anne, and sons John and Charles, left Cork, Ireland for Canada. They first moved to Montreal where Allen had been appointed Bank Manager for the Bank of Montreal. By 1837, Allen had been let go and they decided to relocate to Brantford, Ontario where he had previously purchased 108 acres of land. His family, now including a new daughter Charlotte, made the difficult journey to Upper Canada.

             Upon arriving in Brant County, the Good family stayed in a rental house for some months at the corner of Colborne and Dumfries Streets. Allen began drawing up contracts for their new family home which detailed a two-story, nine room house with seven fireplaces and no cellar, at the cost of four hundred and sixty-seven pounds, five shillings and nine pence halfpenny. This is equal to about sixteen thousand dollars today.

Myrtleville house was designed after a home in Ireland with the same name. It had been owned by a Thomas Daunt, a partner to Eliza Good’s Father, Mr.Carroll. The original house was a country home located on the bay of the Atlantic that got its name from the green myrtle shrubs which grew all around it. As a child Eliza spent many holidays at this house and no doubt wanted to bring a little piece of Ireland to their new home in Brantford. The Canadian Myrtleville house was given the same name and built in the same Georgian style with stucco siding, which was well out of fashion by this point.

The property was passed down through generations of the Good family and in 1903 William Good, the grandson of Allen Good was in possession of the farm and house. Ten years later William Good began construction of a new house on the current property next door to Myrtleville house. This house, unlike the original, was to be equipped with all the modern conveniences of the time. This included a coal furnace; stationary washtubs, bathroom upstairs, hot and cold water in the kitchen, laundry, and bath. Although the house was wired for electricity it did not receive it until 1917 when the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Canada was created. The first house’s main use from then on was as a summer home for family visitors, or for farm hands to stay.

William married Jennie in 1908 and purchased the Myrtleville property from ‘Aunt Annie’; after her death he became the figure head of the family. When William took over operations of the farm he started to make improvements such as the addition of an orchard. In 1921 William was elected to Parliament for four years. While he was away he put the farm on hold and rented out most of the property to a family. In 1925 William retired from politics and returned to Myrtleville. He was ready to go back to the family legacy of farming. He maintained his position as President of the Cooperative Union of Canada which he started in 1921, as well as being on the Board of United Farmer’s Cooperative of Ontario. When he returned to farming he built up a herd of purebred Holstein-Friesians and began what would come to be a dairy farm.

During the Great Depression William hired as many men as he could afford to help out on the farm and brought fruit to the Social Service Centre to be distributed to the unemployed. Jennie was also a very practical and thrifty woman, obtaining many unbleached soft muslin bags used to transport unprocessed silk from Japan and constructed sheets, nightclothes, and aprons for her family.

           Upon William Good’s death in 1967 the possession of Myrtleville was passed on to his son Robert Good. Many restorations in the 1960s preserved the homestead and began considerations of donating the house as a museum. In 1978 the documents were signed that donated five-acres of land, containing two houses, a swimming pool and a number of octagonal silos, to Heritage Canada.

           Many of the artifacts in the museum have found their way back to Myrtleville from previous family members. Original pieces from Eliza Good such as the big four poster bed in the master bedroom, her Collard piano now located in the parlour, and the dollhouse they gave to their daughter Anne still remains in the house. Likewise, William Good’s handmade camera still remains in the library along with shelves and shelves of books that the Good family enjoyed.

          Along with being a great example of living history of the Good family , Myrtleville has remained a place of learning and family gathering. The property is host to camps that are run throughout the summer and school year as well as annual celebrations such as the Easter Egg Hunt, and the Family Day event. Myrtleville house has changed over the years, but one thing has always remained true: Myrtleville is a place of family and community, a place of gathering for everyone.      Once upon a time Myrtleville was a place of learning and gathering for the Good family; now Myrtleville has come to encompass a broader family; that of Brantford.

           Visit Myrtleville House today to see 175 Years of Myrtleville: A Story of Family, Community and Nation on display now.

The Best and Most Bizarre Things About Being a Camp Counsellor.

If you've ever wondered what it's like to be a Brant Historical Society camp counsellor, then you've come to the right place. It's an incredibly rewarding experience, but it does come with side effects!

The 10 Best Things About Being a Myrtleville Camp Counsellor

10) You get to act silly every day
9) You get to play on a slip ‘n’ slide

8) You get to get your face painted

7) You get to act like a kid again
6) You get to meet interesting people 

(police, firefighters and balloon-animal artists)
5) You don’t have to get dolled up for work
4) You start writing your daily notes on the back of colouring sheets
3) You learn important life skills 

(balloon-animal art)

2) You get to bake weird things every day, and then eat them
1) You develop multiple personalities (Alexander Graham Bell, Lucy) 

 

Top 10 Side Effects of Being a Myrtleville Camp Counsellor

10) You start talking in accents at home 

9) You can no longer colour in the lines
8) You talk in a high pitch voice all the time
7) You start laughing at things that you normally wouldn’t
6) You add ‘Y’ at the end of a lot of words (want a snacky?)
5) You develop the habit of a scheduled snack time
4) You feel the need to always wear a name tag
3) You start spelling like you are in grade 1 again
2) Your sentences no longer make sense
1) You miss your fellow counsellors and campers when camp is over

If you're interested in becoming a camper, or you just want to come see all of this for yourself, information about our camps, which run throughout the year, can be found on our Camps & PA Days page.

Erin's Farewell

Before I started working for the Brant Historical Society I didn’t know much about the City of Brantford and its surrounding area except for two things: that Gretzky was from the area, and that Brantford was known as the Bell City.

In my position as Curator for the museum over the past 3 years, 2.9 years to be exact, I've learned much about this community’s rich and mixed history. One of the first things I learned that has stuck with me is the very first bylaw created for the Town of Brantford. Written in 1847, it states residents are: “not to let animals roam free on their property.” I also learned when King George VI and Queen Elizabeth visited in 1939, they came in by rail, stopping for just 15 minutes and they received a gun salute both on their arrival and departure. Both a royal chair from their visit and a crest from the side of their rail car are part of the Brant Historical Society’s collection.

I love sharing the fact that Brantford was at one time the third largest industrial city in Canada, after Montreal and Toronto. From farm equipment to manufacturing pottery, Brantford’s industrial past was strong. I know I haven’t come close to learning everything there is to learn about the history of this community, but life has a funny way of changing your path and at of the end of August I’m moving on to pursue opportunities in England.

 I am forever grateful for the warmth and openness I’ve experienced from the historical society’s membership, volunteers and visiting public. The passion held by the community is infectious and I hope that this same warm welcome will be given to the Historical Society’s new curator, Chelsea Carss. Chelsea joins us from Ottawa after graduating with her Master’s at the University of Toronto Museum Studies program. I encourage you to come by the Brant Museum and Archives soon and say hello to Chelsea.

Erin Dee-Richard

Curator

A Change in Direction

Being only a year away from going to university can be scary, especially if you’re still unclear about what you would like to do. This was me in grade twelve at Pauline Johnson Collegiate. 

I was creating my schedule for second semester and realized I had two credits to fill and nothing to fill them with. At this point I thought I wanted to be a museum librarian and started to consider a co-op in that field, so I could really know if that was the right job for me. I was accepted for a co-op position at Brant Museum and Archives. I was over the moon happy! I was finally going to be doing something I enjoyed.
Unfortunately, it became apparent to staff and myself that it wasn’t for me. I loved cataloguing pictures of the different parts of Brantford that have gone through astonishing development; from the filled in canals of Greenwich Street to the blue prints for the bridge that turns Paris Road into Brant Ave. The co-op was an amazing experience that broadened my historical knowledge of Brantford but the problem came when my need to socialize was not being fulfilled. I am very much a social butterfly and after a good forty-five minutes in a quiet office I needed to get up and talk to someone! Anyone!

One morning I was called into the museum director’s office for a talk. I was sure I was doomed; this was my verbal pink slip. Fortunately, what I did get would help change my career plan in a very positive way. Instead of being scolded for my sociability I was encouraged to embrace it. The director at the time, Joan Kanigan, told me that my co-op was going to be moved to Myrtleville House Museum where my more energetic personality would be appreciated and put to good use. It’s incredibly refreshing to be told to continue being yourself, to have an individual go out of their way to accommodate you, not force you to be something you’re not. For that I will always be grateful.

The next week I started at Myrtleville House Museum. I was going to be doing Christmas programming in the mornings with other volunteers. A cool, calm, and collected Lisa Anderson filled me in on everything that goes on during the programs but could not have verbalized the crazy mornings that were ahead. Every morning there was a group of loud and excited students from any number of grade schools from Brantford and Brant County. I led the tour groups while other volunteers baked, made toys, and created Christmas crafts with the students. I fell in love with working with the children, and telling them all about history. It was the most gratifying experience to have enthusiastic students come through asking insightful questions and really getting involved with the lessons. I soon became increasingly interested in the job of Education Officer and I started seriously thinking about doing what I saw Lisa do every day. 

I ended my co-op with the promise of coming back for March break camp. For that week I soaked up every moment I had, leading the kids in games and crafts that were not only fun, but learning based. Currently, I am the Historical Interpreter for Myrtleville House Museum and I love it. Along with giving tours and developing interactive ways of doing so, I also get to help with education programming. Sharing our heritage with others has to be the most amazing job there is. Thanks to the people that share my passion for the past, I am moving forward in my education with peace of mind that there is a profession in history that truly fits me.

Come visit Myrtleville House Museum and meet our enthusiastic Heritage Interpreter, Shelby.

         For more information regarding volunteer opportunities, please visit us here!