The Boer War 1899-1902

Speaker: James (Jim) Vanstone, M.A., Ph.D.

When: Thursday, November 15, 2018, 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where:  Centennial Hall,

       288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in English, followed by a bilingual question period

In 1899 the South African Boer War begins between the British Empire and the Boers of the Transvaal and Orange Free State. The Boers, also known as Afrikaners, were the descendants of the original Dutch settlers of southern Africa. Britain took possession of the Dutch Cape colony in 1806 during the Napoleonic wars, sparking resistance from the independence-minded Boers, who resented the Anglicization of South Africa and Britain’s anti-slavery policies. In 1833, the Boers began an exodus into African tribal territory, where they founded the republics of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. The two new republics lived peaceably with their British neighbours until 1867, when the discovery of diamonds and gold in the region made conflict between the Boer states and Britain inevitable. Minor fighting with Britain began for the second time in the 1890s, and in October 1899 full-scale war ensued. By mid-June 1900, British forces had captured most major Boer cities and formally annexed their territories, but the Boers launched a guerrilla war that frustrated the British occupiers. Beginning in 1901, the British began a strategy of systematically searching out and destroying these guerrilla units, while herding the families of the Boer soldiers into concentration camps. By 1902, the British had crushed the Boer resistance, and on May 31 of that year the Peace of Vereeniging was signed, ending hostilities. The treaty recognized the British military administration over Transvaal and the Orange Free State and authorized a general amnesty for Boer forces. In 1910, the autonomous Union of South Africa was established by the British. It included Transvaal, the Orange Free State, the Cape of Good Hope, and Natal as provinces.

James (Jim) Vanstone was born and raised in Windsor, Ontario. While majoring in History and Philosophy at the University of Windsor, Jim was elected President of the history society called the Lord Acton Club. Graduating with an Honours B.A. and the University’s gold medal in history Jim went to Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario majoring in “Imperial”, now more popularly called Third World history. He obtained his M.A. (1967) and Ph.D. (1974) from Queen’s. Doing research for his Ph.D. in Southern Africa (1969-1970) Jim spent a year in Africa. Returning to Queen’s, Jim taught Imperial History for one year before going to John Abbott College in Ste. Anne de Bellevue in 1972 where he taught history for 45 years until he retired in 2017. Jim was elected member of the Academic Council of John Abbott College (1974-2017), Chairperson of the Faculty Professional Development Committee (1975-2017), on the college’s Board of Governors (1979-1985), served on the Academic Programs Coordinating Committee, as well as being involved over the years in the United Church of Canada. Jim is also member of the Board of Governors of the United Theological College of McGill University and is currently the Chair of the Montreal School of Theology of McGill University.

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Interethnic Relations in the Great War;

Demystification of the Oppressed French-Canadian Soldier's Myth

Speaker: Céleste Lalime

When: Thursday, October 18, 2018, 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where:  Centennial Hall,

       288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in English, followed by a bilingual question period

The First World War inevitably brings back painful memories in the province of Quebec. Quebeckers have a negative recollection of the war, viewing themselves as victims. Events related to the Great War such as the conscription crisis, the Easter riots and the inhospitality expressed by the Canadian Forces towards French Canadians are emotionally-charged memories that have nurtured this conception. Integrated in both the historiography and popular beliefs, the idea of the oppressed French Canadian will be questioned through this lecture. This presentation aims at re-examining this idea by surveying contemporary sources: the Anglophone press and testimonies from soldiers. Its objective is to reassess the attitude and perception of Canadian Anglophones towards French Canadians, and more broadly the nature of interethnic relationships in the army during the First World War.

Céleste Lalime is a historian, speaker and history teacher. She received the highest distinction for her master’s thesis in history at Université de Montréal. She has worked on First World War battlefields at Vimy and Beaumont-Hamel as a guide-interpreter and research agent in history. She participates in the elaboration of a work about the Mont-Royal Fusiliers led by the National Defense, teaches history at College Bourget and collaborates to international and interuniversity conferences and seminars about World War 1.

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Sir Wilfrid Laurier: The Man, the Collectables

Speaker: Jean-Pierre Dion, Ph. D.

When: Thursday, September 20, 2018, 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where: Centennial Hall,

         288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in English, followed by a bilingual question period.

Wilfrid Laurier (1841-1919) has been leader of the Liberal Party of Canada for over 30 years and Prime Minister of Canada for 15 consecutive years (1896-1911). Very popular during his lifetime as well as after his death, Laurier remains one of the most admired Canadian statesmen. Not surprisingly, there are more memorabilia (collectables) related to Laurier than to the other Prime Ministers all together. This lecture will describe some Laurier collectables: painting, photographs, furniture, ceramic plates, glassware, tobacco items, books and so forth, connecting them to special events in the life of Laurier.

Jean-Pierre Dion, Ph.D., is a retired professor at l'Université du Québec à Montréal. For nearly fifty years, he has been collecting, with his wife Jacqueline Beaudry Dion, the Canadian heritage of the 19th and 20th centuries, including ancient books, ceramics and glass, subjects on which the couple has made many Conferences and publications. A few days ago, the couple also launched a tenth book: Peinture sur porcelaine dans les institutions religieuses au Québec, 1890-1955. Over the years various mementos by Wilfrid Laurier have accumulated. Our speaker today presents them to us by situating them in their context.

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In 2018-2019, the Beaurepaire-Beaconsfield Historical Society hosted various lectures on history.

Our lectures take place on the 3^rd Thursday of the month, from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

January 17, 2019 – Jacques Ruelland – Freemasonry

February 21, 2019 –Alexander Reford – Model Farmer-Robert Reford and the Origins of Macdonald College in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue

March 21, 2019 – Denis Gravel – Explosions à LaSalle (in French)

April 18, 2019 – Michel Belisle – LA VILLEGGIATURA

May 16, 2019 – Hélène Jasmin – THE LAKE DISTRICT, a jewel in the British Crown

Everyone welcome. 

Free for members; $2 for non-members
Become a member for $5 per year 

Information: Contact us

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Pierre LeSueur and Marguerite Messier travelling from Montréal to Louisiana in 1704 and 1705 for a new life, in a new colony

Guest Speaker: Marcel Lussier, Eng., M.Sc.

When:  Thursday, May 17, 2018, from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where: Centennial Hall

            288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in English followed by a bilingual question period.

Pierre LeSueur, coureur des bois, explorer and trader, decided to migrate to Louisiana and to establish his family in the Biloxi area, a new French fort on the Golf of Mexico. He travelled by sea on a boat called the Pélican from France to the Caribbean’s. First stop in Saint-Domingue (Haiti), then in Cuba.

During that time, his wife Marguerite Messier and their five kids left Montréal by canoes heading to the Great Lakes, spending the winter at fort Michillimakinac. In springtime, she travelled south down the Mississippi River and arrived at fort Biloxi in June 1705.
The lecture will explain the path, the difficulties and the surprises met by both members of the LeSueur couple!

Our speaker, Marcel Lussier, Eng., M.Sc., has been sanitary engineer and environmental adviser for 22 years for Hydro-Québec (on the retired list in 2003).

Three years (2003-2005) as president of an Environmental Consulting Group of the International Joint Commission Canada-United States studying the water levels of Lake Ontario and of the St-Lawrence River.
Searcher (or inquirer) and lecture in historical or environmental conferences, such as FRONTENAC, LASALLE, D'IBERVILLE or CLIMATE CHANGES and WATER PROBLEMS.
Member of different Historical Societies and also Member of Parliament for Brossard-LaPrairie (2006-2008).

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Murder Will Out – Two Centuries Later

Guest Speaker: John Kalbfleisch

When:  Thursday, April 19, 2018, from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where: Centennial Hall

            288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in English followed by a bilingual question period.

Robert Watson was a member of the prominent Ogilvie flour-milling family. When a shotgun blast tore into his back in 1827, it not only horrified the bustling city of Montreal but also launched a mystery that endures to this day: who killed the unsuspecting Watson, and why? Mr. Kalbfleisch has long been fascinated by the crime, and his new novel, A Stain Upon the Land, wrestles with those two haunting questions.

Longtime Montreal Gazette journalist John Kalbfleisch began writing a regular column on the city’s history for the newspaper in 2000. His novel A Stain Upon the Land was published in June 2017. He is also the author of Le cadeau royal: Histoire de la ville de Mont-Royal / The Royal Gift: a History of Town of Mount Royal (2013) and This Island In Time: Remarkable Tales from Montreal’s Past (Véhicule Press, 2008), and is the co-author of Montreal’s Century: a Record of the News and People Who Shaped the City in the 20th Century (Trécarré, 1999).

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Sir Henri-Gustave Joly de Lotbinière

followed by

Les droits des femmes dans le Bas-Canada

Guest Speakers: Jean-Pierre Raymond and Andrée Aubut

When:  Thursday, March 15, 2018, from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where: Centennial Hall

            288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in French with English PowerPoint slides, followed by a bilingual question period.

First, Jean-Pierre Raymond will talk about "Sir Henri-Gustave Joly de Lotbinière", first leader of the Quebec Liberal Party 150 years ago and first Prime Minister of the Quebec Liberal Party in 1878-79. He is a descendant of the two engineers Michel Chartier de Lotbinière and Gaspard-Joseph Chaussegros de Léry. He is the father of two engineers who will be generals in the First World War and his four daughters married engineers one of which will be general. He is also the father of sustainable development in forestry.

Following this, Andrée Aubut will commemorate the 100th anniversary of women's right to vote in Canada with a presentation entitled "Women's Rights in Lower Canada", recalling that women have already had the right to vote in Lower Canada between 1791 and 1849. She will explain how women like Louise-Magdeleine Chaussegros de Léry, her daughter-in-law Mary-Charlotte Munro de Fowlis and her granddaughter Julie-Christine Chartier de Lotbinière benefited from the peculiarities of the French law known as Coutume de Paris enshrined in the Act of Quebec for the second version of the province of Quebec (1774). Julie-Christine is the mother of Henri-Gustave.

Both presentations will be in French and the Power Point in English, allowing for a bilingual presentation.

Jean-Pierre Raymond is a retired engineer, passionate about history who studies the first Canadian engineers.

Andrée Aubut is a retired teacher who is interested in the history of women in Nouvelle-France and under British regime and in particular the laws that applied to property rights.

The two personifies in period costumes historical figures like the couples Gaspard-Joseph Chaussegros de Léry and Marie-Renée Legardeur de Beauvais, Michel Chartier de Lotbinière and Louise-Magdeleine Chaussegros de Léry, Ralph-Henri Bruyère and Janet Dunbar and finally Henri-Gustave Joly and Margharetta-Josepha Gowen.

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Pirates of North Atlantic

David Kirke and Elcid Barrett

Guest Speaker: Roy Wright

When:  Thursday, February 15, 2018, from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where: Centennial Hall

            288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in English followed by a bilingual question period.

Although less notorious than the Caribbean, the North Atlantic has had its share of romantic swashbucklers.
The Atlantic Provinces and Quebec claim buried treasure and other folklore, but some truly significant historical figures as well. We will focus on one exponent of each tradition: Elcid Barrett, folklorically more famous today than even Captain Kidd, thanks to Stan Rogers, and David Kirke, who was knighted for capturing Québec from Champlain in 1629. Their stories illuminate the role pirates and privateers have played in our history and mythology, and their fate in retirement highlights the societal advances made since then, if not more enlightened political policy. Indeed, we still live in an age of piracy.

Join us for a singalong with Roy Wright.

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 West Island, 1667-2017

Guest Speaker: Pierre-F. McDuff

When:  Thursday, January 18, 2018, from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where: Centennial Hall

            288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in English followed by a bilingual question period.

Pierre-F. McDuff has contributed to many important published biographical books including the just released book on the Mayors of Montreal edited by our board member Jacques G. Ruelland.

After a short introduction, we will look at the evolution of the parishes of Lachine, Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue, St-Laurent, Pointe-Claire, Ste-Geneviève and the Ile-Bizard. These parishes delineated the first municipalities on the island of Montreal, created between 1845 and 1855.

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St. Lawrence Seaway:

from Procrastination to Realisation

Guest Speaker: Fred Parkinson

When:   Thursday, November 16, 2017, from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m.

Where:  Centennial Hall

             288 Beaconsfield Blvd, Beaconsfield, H9W 4A4

Lecture in English followed by a bilingual question period.

First talks between Canada and the United States were held in 1895 considering a water navigation system from Montreal to Lake Ontario. Commitment was lacking, however the discussions did lead to establishing the International Joint Commission (IJC) in 1909 to deal with questions on rivers shared by both countries. By 1949 the need for the waterway connection had become pressing, so serious negotiations were undertaken with the IJC playing an important part. Progress was hindered by vocal opposition from the railways and various other well established business and political interests, but in the end the economics of the mining, industrial and agricultural sectors out-weighed these negative arguments, so an agreement was in place, and construction of the Seaway began in 1954.

Building the two American locks and 5 Canadian locks as well as the powerhouse at Cornwall-Massena required major modifications in the river and along the shorelines. A total of 11 communities were inundated, with two being removed to locations above the final water level. Highways and railways were re-routed. The overall system was hailed as the largest navigation project ever undertaken in the world.
The Seaway was completed and operational in 1959, and in 190 days that year transited 25.1 million tonnes of cargo. Ship traffic grew steadily until 1979, when 80 million tonnes went through, but since has decreased so it now carries about 40 million tonnes per year. Lock and channel improvements have been gradually extending the navigation season, so that in 2006 ships had access for 283 days.
Annual economic benefits shared by many industries and agriculture in both countries resulting from reliable water transport to the Great Lakes provided by the Seaway have been estimated at more than $ 35 billion US.

Fred Parkinson, Retired Consulting Civil/Hydraulic Engineer, spent a 45-year career working in the fields of hydro-power development and river navigation. He was associated with a number of studies to improve the Seaway lock operations during ice conditions and participated in studies on physical hydraulic models to widen and deepen the navigation channel downstream from Montreal. At the same time, he was retained to develop new operating systems for several locks on the Rideau and Trent Canals and overseas for the Panama Canal. 

Working in the hydro-power field, his first project in Québec was Carillon on the Ottawa River. Hydro-Québec was embarking on a major development programme, and Fred worked on hydraulic design studies for projects on the Manicouagan and Outardes Rivers in the Lower St. Lawrence Region and on the La Grande, Eastmain and Caniapiscau Rivers in the James/Hudson Bay Regions. He also did key design and development studies on major hydro-power schemes in British Columbia and Manitoba. This experience led to short term expert consultations overseas: Iraq, Pakistan, Nepal, Madagascar, Philippines, Viet Nam, Nigeria, Sudan, Bolivia, Belize, Venezuela and Columbia. His final consulting work was as an expert witness in court concerning the flooding along the Rivière des Ha Ha in the Saguenay Region in 1996.
Following retirement, he served for eighteen months on an International Joint Commission sub-committee to study and make recommendations on modifying Seaway operations to provide water level control of Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River that was more acceptable to the many different stakeholders, in particular, environmental interests.

Last Minute special guest at the lecture:

Dr. Murray Clamen, retired Secretary of the Canadian Section of the International Joint Commission, will give a short slide presentation describing the operations of the I.J.C. and describe a few typical studies involving rivers and lakes along the border between Canada and the United States.  Prior to becoming the Secretary, Dr. Clamen was the IJC lead technical advisor for over a decade on all issues related to trans-boundary water management in the Great Lakes – St. Lawrence River System.

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