Pontiac Archives

The original Shawville Tennis Club donated records dating back to the early 1970s.   They will be made available for researchers in the New Year.  

Pontiac Archives Holiday Schedule for 2011 is as follows:

Closed on Thursday, December 15, 2011, at 4 pm

Open on Tuesday, January 10, 2012, at 9 am.

Happy Holidays

Researchers came from all across Canada and even the United States: Victoria, B.C., Washington D.C., Bristol, Norway Bay, Chelsea, Smiths Falls, Kanata, Manotick, Nepean, Ottawa, Ajax, Calabogie and Bancroft.

Walter Brown from Smiths Falls brought us an updated version of his genealogical records, 180,000 entries. He has been supporting our work since we started in 1987.

He attended all four days of our open house from July 5 – 8, gathering more data and helping researchers.

Pierre Louis Lapointe and his wife Marielle came from Montreal to see how the Pontiac Archives have progressed since 1987 when he helped us form the Pontiac Archives.  Lapointe worked at the Centre regionale des Archives nationales du Quebec en Outaouais from 1977 to 1989.

Then he moved to Quebec City to be an archivist at the Archives nationales du Quebec until he retired. He recently moved to Montreal where he is now working on the history of Buckingham.

We showed them all our holdings. Then Venetia Crawford dressed up as Marguerite Charlesbois who married Joseph Mondoin in 1786 and settled at Mondion Point on Pontiac Bay below the Chats Falls on the Ottawa River and told her story.

Elsie Sparrow dressed as Mary Jane Sparling who married John Black in 1853 in Thorne Township in the County of Ottawa.

Their first two years they lived in a tent.  They had 10 children.  When five of them died quite young, they adopted a home child, William Sparrow.

Lorna Reynolds from Norway Bay, Qc, donated Dori Tripp’s book The Book of Agnes.

Reporters from The Equity came to interview us during the week. 

Gloria Beek brought the Beek Family History, including the Maitland family tree.   Eliza Ann Beek (1798 – 1868) married John Maitland (1801-1891) in 1821 in Ireland.

John Maitland was a Scot.  He became a preacher in Ireland.  He moved to Uncle James Maitland’s farm on the Rideau River at Kilmarnock.  Six or seven children were born in Clarendon, Qc, where J. Pendergast asked him to set up a school in 1834.

A Grand Adventure by Ron Corbett.  

George McLean from Campbell’ s Bay, Qc, was the first person to drive a truck across North America in 1911.

Alligators of the North  by Harry B Barrett & Clarence F Coons.

Peter Haughton from Bristol, Qc has the alligator from Simcoe at his lumber museum at Haughton’s Bay on the Ottawa River for the summer of 1911.

The Pontiac Archives will host an Open House from Tuesday, July 5 to Friday, July 8th.  Open 9:00 am and close 4:00 pm.

New material is available on a weekly basis.  Volunteers will be happy to assist you with your project.  

The building is air conditioned and very comfortable on hot days.   Food is available within the block. 

 Free parking is available with entrance from King Street to parking lot on south side of Pontiac Library and Pontiac Archives.

Barry McGowan, coordinator of the SEVEC (Society for Educational visits and Exchanges in Canada) exchange program for high school students from Saskatoon and Shawville organized a tour to Peter and Barbara Haughton’s Lumbering Museum in Bristol.  There were four stations with a variety of activities for the students.  Venetia Crawford brought a poster that she had prepared at the Pontiac Archives displaying the map of the Ottawa River near Chats Falls.  The poster displayed the trading posts, the lumbering slide and mills, the paddle wheel steamers and the Horse Railway past the Chats Falls.  She also wrote a play about the history of the area which the students read outdoors under the trees overlooking the river and boats used in the lumber industry – pointer boats, barges and voyageur canoes.

This same poster and other binders depicting the life at Mondion Point _ the site of the trading post, Pontiac Village, Union Village and the present Tim Horton’s Camp will be on display at Norway Bay on June 25, 2011 at 9:30 am.  This is one of the events of McNab Days.  There will be a Boat Flotilla going from Norway Bay to Red Pine Park in Braeside across the river to near Gillies Lumber Yard and the Sand Point pier.  an alligator boat will be on display as well as steamboats, tug boats, scows and dragon boats.

On June 1, 2011, Wednesday, the press will be invited for a sneak preview of the events at Peter and Barbara Haughton’s house by the river.  Venetia’s poster and other archival material will be on display.

Suzanne Wilson, from Renfrew, ON has been researching the “Rollande” family. She has obtained considerable information about other relatives from the Archives but is looking for more about the Rollande.   If anyone has information on this family, please contact the P0ntiac Archives in Shawville by email: archives@pontiacarchives.org.

Tom Murdock  from Quyon, QC has a photo taken in the early 1980′s believed to be a travelling team on the ‘Rocket and Friends Tour”.   Seven names are still missing.   If anyone has information, please contact the Archives.

The Archives has in their Library of Books, a new one “Waltham  – A gem in Pontiac County”, written by Betty Ryan. It contains very interesting stories and photos about Waltham and her neighbours, The Pembroke Electric Light Company, The Pontiac Pacific Junction Railway, Ferries, and Bridges, Churches, Schools.  Please drop into the Archives and explore this history.

The Historical Project done by Opportunities for Youth 1972 grant to gather and preserve records of Historical Value of Thorne, Clarendon and Shawville.

The students who worked on this were Maydon Dods, Brian Harrison, Brenda Strutt, Ralph Bretzlaff, Jane Bretzlaff, Wendy Woodman, Charles Dickson, Ginny Stones and Merlin Tubman.

They had to work hard to research older people and early history, copy names from headstones in the cemeteries and do their own typing.   Mrs Rosaleen Dickson from The Equity, Pontiac Printshop loaned them a number of typewriters.

They had to keep a record of their purchases such as binder or poster material. 

2010 Robert Wills digitalized  the cassettes to DVDs.  These DVDs are for public use.   They can be viewed and listened to at the Pontiac Archives or signed out according to procedure and taken home to enjoy.  They must be returned and signed back in as returned to the Archives.  

Interviews were with Herman Emmerson, Mr and Mrs Edmund Hodgins, Beulah and Edmund Hodgins, Claude Lemay, Ernest Schwartz, Mrs Ernest Schwartz, Bill Yach, Edna Mitchum, Richard Earl Dagg, Annie Gamble and Irene Gamble Emard, James Turotte, Elard Johnston, Orla Mee, James MacCuaig, Wyman MacKechnie, Harvey Smiley, Cyril and Rae Dale, Leonard Horner, Mrs Hulbert Armstrong, Charles Zimmerling, Clifford Cone, Evaline Hodgins, Lennis and Emma Tubman, Laura Murphy, Herbert Cuthbertson, Verner Thrun/James Crick, Lu McDowell/Heman Elliott/Irene Shaw, Louisa Olm/Mrs Vertal Smiley, Mosey Murphy/Mildred Elliott, Mrs Arthur Dagg/Mrs Arthur Horner.

http://www.town.shawville.qc.ca/  This is a new web page for the Municipality of Shawville.  It is well worth the time to read all about this town, available in English and French. Information is available from the weather today, links to Pontiac Archives, Museum, Library, Churches, council minutes, information on by-laws, fire department, garbage and upcoming events to name a few.

Local taxpayers are welcome at the Archives to read this material if they need access to a computer.

http://lamothefamily.com/   This is a web site with great information on many familes.

The Pontiac Archives is the recipent of 87 pages of information on the Lamothe Family. This binder also contains family history of the Derouin, Paquin, Turgeons, Doherty,  Barrand, Marcotte, and many other families of Calumet Island, Qc, also known as L’Ile-du-Grand-Calumet, Qc.   This was produced by Mike Lamothe.

The story takes place commencing at 1850.  The family tree section of the binder goes back to 1811.

There is an interview of Willie Lamothe, son of Francis, grandson of Joachim and Mary, conducted by his son, Ross Lamothe shortly before Willie’s death.

This material is printed out and placed in a binder at the Archives available for researchers to visit and work with.