Bouctouche of the Past

by Pierre-A. Cormier
Preface by Antonine Maillet
Bouctouche Bicentennial Committee, 1984, 204 p.

 

CONTENTS

 

Preface
Foreword
Arrival of the First Settlers of the Parish
The First Inhabitants
Saint John the Baptist
A Few Faces
The Harbour
The Railway
Automobiles, Roads and Bridges
Fishing Industry
On the Farm
Businesses and Services
A Few Houses
Religion
Education
Music and Song
Sports and Recreation
Mayors of Bouctouche since 1967

PREFACE BY ANTONINE MAILLET

Chebooktoosk, as it was originally called, became Bouctouche, meaning big little harbour. Could the Micmacs, in so naming their bayside camp ground, have foreseen the tremendous mandate they were leaving to Bouctouche? Little harbour, big little harbour! The contradiction in terms is more than evident. For Bouctouche, on her christening day, was given a two-fold mission: to be the safe harbour and refuge of the deported Acadians on their return to New Acadia, and to be one of the largest of the small ports in and on which would be built the future of this renascent people.
The day my father advised me, in all his Maillet wisdom, never to aspire to be the greatest woman in the world, but only to be the greatest “Tonine”, he also gave Bouctouche and perhaps all of Acadia their true place in the world. We need not compare ouselves to anyone but ourselves. When we measure by this standard, there are no little ones.

And Bouctouche has kept her promise. She has stayed in place, balanced between two extremes: between a billionaire Irving and a Sagouine on her knees before her scrubbing pail, between the adventurers of the seas and the tillers of the earth; between the wealth of her traditions and her progressive ambitions; between her memory of the past and her dreams for the future.

This one village is a world in miniature: politically, she gave Acadia her first Members of the Legislature, a senator and a premier, not to mention electoral campaigns the equal of the best popular theater; in business, she produced K.C. Irving, the Canadian peer of the Rockefellers and the Rothschilds; in the artistic world, she has her singers, her musicians, her painters and sculptors as well as writers whose works are read even in the old country; and as if all this were not enough to put Bouctouche on the map, one might add that she enjoyed a certain fame, perhaps dubious, but far from negligible, during the glorious years of Prohibition!

However, all these “beautiful people” do not forget that their blood is mixed with that of a multitude of scolds and gossips, tinkers and peddlers, story tellers and foot stompers who are the glory and joy of a people still far from the end of their reserves of imagination and energy. At the root of each violinist was a fiddler; of each novelist, a teller of tall tales; of each orator, preacher or politician, a handful of scolds and gossips.

As for the Church, Bouctouche has contributed monsignors, the sound of a hundred bells showered over the countryside, a more than centenarian convent, vocations and religious brotherhoods and a born and bred bishop from within her walls.

All the same, to stay as close as possible to the truth, let us say that in spite of her legendary sunsets, in spite of her many waterways caressing hills as green in summer as they are white in winter, in spite of her colourful, noisy, mocking, ever-moving people, of whom the better half make faces at the other half throwing rocks at them; let’s say that in spite of her many splendours, Bouctouche is not the greatest town in the world, but it is the first, the only and the most beautiful Bouctouche!

And it’s mine.

Antonine Maillet
Le Phare, August 14, 1984

FOREWORD BY PIERRE-A. CORMIER

On June 24, 1785, François and Charlitte LeBlanc carved a cross in the bark of a huge pine tree to mark their taking possession of Bouctouche. The bicentennial of this event is celebrated in 1985.
The commemoration of an outstanding historical event always brings with it a collective return to our roots. In our case, the return is easy as the parish history has already been written. Marguerite Michaud’s book, La reconstruction française au Nouveau-Brunswick Bouctouche paroisse-type, published in 1955, gives us all the opportunity to brush up on our history.

Today, a collection of old photographs put together during the past few years is being published. Here, then, is another way of discovering the past, or at least part of it. We are well aware that we do not have all the photographs necessary to make this collection a complete representation of the past or of all areas of the parish. Poverty, just to name one aspect of our history, is rarely evident in photographs taken by the well-to-do.

Photography was not a common hobby among the Acadians. Thus, this book is not a history of Bouctouche as such but a series of photographs with comments which may bring back interesting and revealing memories during the bicentennial year of Bouctouche.
It is hoped that this book will become an educational tool to help teachers develop a sense of local history in the visually-oriented children of the television era.

Pierre-A. Cormier