History Of Muskoka Communities Documented But Not Revered

WHAT'S WRONG IN OUR MUSKOKA COMMUNITIES TODAY - "SEEING AS YOU HAVE ALL THE ANSWERS MR. CURRIE?"

REVERENCE TO THE PAST IS ALL BUT GONE - AND THAT'S CAUSING IDENTITY ISSUES ALL OVER THE PLACE

     There's the perception, amongst those who don't care much about the past, that historians must be a little like Dracula, the vampire bloke from uptown Transylvannia. We must therefore, dwell during the daylight hours, in a bolted-shut light-deficient coffin, in a concrete vault, with of course a trademark musty odor, and only emerge in the pale moonlight, to suck the blood of the unsuspecting citizens, who shows us a nice piece of open neck. When someone asks me my profession, responding that I'm an antique dealer, also gets some strange looks. "You mean you're a grave robber," they want to say, but are too polite to vocalize their suspicion, at least to my face. If I was to tell them I was an historian, it would be assumed that I robbed graves for my personal collection, and then crawled into one of the coffins at sunrise. Honestly, public perception of historians isn't all that great. No, we're not all history teachers. Heaven forbid. I might still be able to put you to sleep, but I don't do so, while standing in front of a classroom.
     It's the perception issue, that must obviously keep us apart, and this is a problem. Most of us practicing historians, would just love the opportunity, singularly or as a group, to be asked to contribute as municipal advisors on specific heritage issues. I mean, for gosh sakes, we're "living" history, and unfortunately terribly under-utilized. As we have been ignored for long and long, as nothing more than book writers and archive dwellers, some of us have become, in the meantime, occupants of those coffins and urns, having received our heavenly rewards. I expect there are some ghosts of former historians, still pecking at the ears of contemporary leadership, reminding them of precedents of which they need to be aware.
     The fact we are snubbed isn't as intolerable, as knowing how ignorance is eroding away the character of our respective communities. It's one thing to ignore us, but quite another to deny heritage its place in our future. If you look closely at the changes in the past quarter century, in South Muskoka for example, much of it has been imposed without even the slightest interest about historical consequence; either what has been paved over, compromised, bulldozed, contoured to suit a present need, or sold-off to facilitate something or other, that in essence, will one day become the history of grand folly. "Is it your opinion Mr. Currie, that regional historians need to be consulted on all civic matters up for discussion by our municipal councillors?" That would be nice, and it's not like we ask a lot of money for consultation. I would rather defend history without financial gain, that have it stomped on, and ignored because a council wasn't aware of a particular circumstance. But truthfully, it's not the case we need to be embedded in the municipal process; yet, it would be wonderful to be validated, for what we do possess of information. Stuff they don't have access to, that we have in our private collections.

     Do you have older brothers and sisters? Did you feel, growing-up, and in retrospect today, that one or more of them broke trail for you? They pushed the proverbial envelope, broke borders, trail blazed, and took the heat that inspired change! It's not a 100 percent situation, that the older siblings always did this kind of thing, but in a majority of cases, parents and their eldest children, sparred the most over household rules and social norms. Not always, but typically, parents learned how to be parents because of the rough ride of those first children that came to define "family". It's not the case the eldest child, or couple of children, broke a clear, wide, and long trail, but probably, the work they did to expand boundaries with parents, did ease somewhat, the rules and protocols for the younger family members. Call it the learning curve, but it has long been held, that parental skills have to be honed by the experience of total immersion in the occupation. Kids have it as their mission, to challenge boundaries, and find areas of flexibility. Reasonable theory? Well, I have a theory about history, and how the trail blazers of the past, and their accomplishments, are being ignored today, and it shows. To me its nonsensical. It's a failure of due diligence, to assume that history began yesterday, and that there are no consequences for stepping irreverently on past record.
    While there are heritage markers here and there, and monuments to the great men and women of our past, their biographies are lost in time and space. Today's leaders are not paying attention to what the founders of our community, created for us, as a legacy, not to follow blindly, but to respect as a foundation on which to build. Putting "historian" in front of my name, isn't any more significant than placing it behind, or not mentioning it at all. The only reason I use it, in the first place, is to qualify why a blogger, "Me" feels confident enough, to be writing about historically embedded stories and information, that in one way or another, defines us a home region. Believe me, telling someone you are an historian, does not get you invited to parties. I have never received preferential treatment, because I give myself this credential of profession. Yet it's also unfortunate generally, because our irrelevance also means that history is becoming less interesting, as our communities anxiously modernize, and diversify away from the standards by which they have operated since their pioneering decade. It comes generally, from our leadership these days, having little if any interest in historical precedent, or protocols; or anything to do with history as a road-map. They don't care about what was blazed as a trail by our founders, as long as they can march forward along whatever route they feel obligated to travel. To me, it's why there are so many disasters today, with contemporary planning, caused in part by self imposed ignorance to the advantages of being more closely associated with the secure platform, established for our benefit, by those now pushing up daisies in the local cemetery.
     Dismissing history and historians is a serious mistake, and it's not just my opinion. And when local elected officials push their agendas, blind to past initiatives, successes and failures, it's like building a skyscraper on quick sand, and then being devastated when it disappears into the quagmire. I can see disaster looming, in many of these municipal follies, but heaven forbid our elected officials should ask a so-called historian's opinion on the matter, before bringing in the excavators, or stripping a woodland of its trees; only to find out a burial ground will have to be dealt with first. Yet we may have been able to plot it out for them before they trod where they should have had respect first, excavation maybe later. There's a lot more to history than occasional remembrance, or watching historically themed movies and documentaries. More than viewing, for purposes of a newspaper photo-ops, historical plaques, museums and murals on brick walls, as a display of civic-mindedness; at that tiny fleeting moment in time. That's not exactly what we might consider as proper stewardship of our heritage. There's the actual reality of history and its impact, contained in those tall library cabinets, some even housed behind glass and locked doors, that seldom are even read these days, because they represent a bygone era that has little to no relevance to the present tense. In their deluded opinion of history, that is! Now that's sad and stupid. Sorry for being so blunt.
     History, if it is used as the resource it is supposed to be, will show the eager beaver modernists, the good, bad and ugly of the past; and it's a great learning opportunity, if contemporary politicians, for example, wanted to avoid the errors and misadventures notched already in history. For some reason, contemporary leadership feels, that the tethering of history, is like pulling an anvil 365 days a year; the only benefit being, the exercise of getting from here to there with a tad of health-enhancing resistance. If however, they were to look at history as historians face it, day in, day out, they would appreciate, that instead of heritage being a burden, it is actually a reality, like bearings in gear works, that can make dealing with the present, and future, much, much less burdensome and prolonged. Simply because it allows one to know what pitfalls, in the same area of interest, maybe even developmental matters, caused huge problems a hundred years or so earlier. Even ten or twenty years earlier. Yet it seems preferable in most cases, for our modern leadership, to simply burrow into projects, and initiatives, with a bare minimum of research and acquired knowledge, and thus, typically run into the same nightmare scenarios encountered by lot of ill-prepared folks in the past. Like researching the history of a century house. Maybe if you performed your own due diligence, before signing an agreement of purchase, you might have discovered a crime had been committed there, a century earlier, and two bodies had never been found. Gads, what else is down there in the recreation room under the floor tiles? It might not be bodies, leftover, but dangerous evidence of previous adverse property use, which may have included chemical materials, for work or bad habit; with poisonous residue still very much a health concern. I've heard hundreds of similar news accounts over the years, in my line of work, including the discovery of unexploded hand grenades left behind by previous owners; and there have been a lot of horror stories, that didn't only involve finding human remains. If the history, even recent past, had been known, there would have been no necessity to spend a lot of money on lawyers and contractors, to fix problems that were known, and even documented in the past.
     I knew a chap, locally, who was digging a pool for his yard, and by happenstance, came upon the earthly remains of a pioneer family. It was an unmarked yet known cemetery, and our family knew it existed, but had no idea the fellow was going to dig a pool in his rather nice backyard. It was as peaceful as a graveyard you might say. He quickly patched up the graves, notified the township about the stray bodies on his property, and was told to get used to his close proximity to the deceased. The graves were not going to be exhumed by him, or anyone else. So his basement wall, as it turned out, was only a few meters from skeletal remains, because the coffins were long since turned back to earth. Then he wanted to sell the property. Not exactly a selling feature, unless you're into that kind of thing; and by the way, there are those who would find this intriguing enough to throw down an offer. Generally, it's financially advisable, unless you're buying a church or large family estate, with an established small cemetery plot, to avoid this kind of intervention. If the same fellow had asked around, before buying the house, or digging in the backyard, he would have found out that the graves were spread out in all the wrong places for his concept of property enhancement. It's not like he didn't know there were several graves at least, because he found a broken tombstone buried by matted grass, resting below a tree, soon after he moved onto the property. The property did sell, but to someone who couldn't have cared less about the small cemetery, which has been marked now by the host municipality.
     Most municipal councillors today, might believe they have a handle on local heritage, but I would say, after hearing and reading some of their responses in this regard, they still haven't got more than a thumb-nail knowledge of how their communities were founded, and how and why they grew over the centuries. They believe with conviction, history is important, just not to them. They don't see it as an everyday necessity of governing, yet historical precedent is very much part of their stewardship, and framework of operation. But when it comes to the casual relationship with heritage, most of these same councillors prefer to operate with a clean-slate perspective, as if the only history that counts, is their own, regarding projects and initiatives they've pushed through the system.     What I look for in our leadership, is the willingness to allow history to be an active part of contemporary living. Our community character, here in South Muskoka is being lost by these same impatient modernist thinkers, who operate on the mistaken belief, they can blaze a trail where no one else has ever gone. I like the pioneering courage, but there's probably an historic precedent, why it isn't prudent or safe, to blaze a trail in that particular location. They look at the whole possibility of forewarning, by looking back before moving forward, as unnecessary and a waste of time; at the expense of "moving forward" properly and safely. Like when my father taught me how to drive a standard transmission Vauxhall as a teenager. Nope. I couldn't move forward without understanding the heritage of manual shifting and the clutch. I used to jackrabbit all over the place, jump the clutch on dangerous hillsides, until my father finally impressed upon me, after many hours, and yelling, trying to reach me; the know-it-all kid. So that I would understand the inner workings of the mechanism, and speed sensitivity of the gears, in order to shift them successfully. I needed to know the history of the car I was driving and all its intricacies. As a parallel, think of the councillor who finds this burdensome and inconvenient, yet is forced to make do, and drive it as a means of getting from point A to B. Getting used to this, and finding that a manual transmission works pretty darn well, would the same councillor, appreciate that history in general, has its relevance of study? In order to avoid jackrabbiting like the novice driver, it could be a lot smoother, if the time was taken to understand how the mechanism comes together, when used properly, and, yes, safely. It's about safe operation, and mitigating associated negatives. Believing that history can be bypassed, or trivialized, is about as imprudent as you can get. I see examples of this imprudence constantly, and most of it could have been avoided successfully, if a little attention had been paid to historical precedent. Is there quick sand, or a First Nations Burial Ground, on the spot you plan for a brand new structure? In terms of fiscal responsibility, wouldn't it make sense to avoid calamities that could cause thousands of dollars in expenses. Research might seem a boring, tiring pursuit, until you explain to folks about what due diligence can save, in terms of financial penalties. The modernists are the biggest users of retrospect, because they dig-in before they know what rests below. It doesn't have to be this way.
     One of the biggest concerns, I have, and restlessly dwell on, as an aging historian, is the distinct feeling our community character, grown from those same pioneer roots, I love exposing, is being watered down to the point of certain obscurity. I honestly feel it will become so diluted eventually, the only history worth referencing will be what occurred the year before. Of course it's troublesome for those who know the importance of maintaining historical record for future posterity. Some believe that as long as history is published in books or online, we're flush with knowledge. The only problem then, is actually using the material, which quite honestly, collects dust more than it inspires readership. If you were to track how many present, sitting councillors, actually enter the library where these relics of the past are shelved, what do you think that percentage would reflect to folks like myself, who have written some of those same history books? Yup, the ones we thought to research, write and publish for the benefit of others. What we want more than anything else, is to be asked questions personally, that we can speak to, in practically any forum, or venue, with our progressive-minded municipal leadership. There aren't many of us active historians kicking around anymore, so even if we called them all together to serve on an advisory panel, we would only reach halfway around the council table.
      Prior to the last municipal election, last October, I offered free, no-strings-attached tutoring, regarding all matters of local heritage, for any council hopeful, wishing to know more about the community they wished, as candidates, to help govern. This isn't the first time I've offered this service, on my dime not their's, and on each occasion the offer has been met with the same indifference and in some cases outright indignation. Yet I know a majority of these councillors have little to no idea, about the most important details of how our communities developed, and why they exist, as they do, today. They don't find it a good use of their quality time, to book-learn more about the community they now weakly represent. I'm the thorn in their sides, because I'm here, on this planet, (according to rumor), for the sole purpose of reminding them (councillors) with an incessant whine, that as they weren't born to adulthood, there is a good reason to appreciate the chronicle of time, as it etches everything around, and about us, with no "do-overs" allowed. As they are our contemporary history makers afterall, in their role as elected leadership, they have no choice but to deal with the past whether it pleases them or not. One day they will get those deep furrows on their brows, wrinkles where there was once tight skin, and resilience, and have sagging body parts, front and back, here and there, the tell tale signs of aging. It would be sensible in all proportion, to then appreciate history generally, as a preamble to their own advancement in years; and going to a museum occasionally, or being out on an historic steamship for a summer cruise, doesn't make one historically fit-enough, to then represent it responsibly! We will all regret this growing insensitivity, sometime in the future, when most of the population of our communities, won't have a clue about what we historians, once considered the hallmarks of our regional character and relevance to all else.
     Now I will just climb dutifully back into my tomb, slide across the lid with quite a loud grating noise, and pass the sunlit hours of day in slumber, to come out once again, at the urging of the milky white light of the old country moon. I will suck your blood if I get a chance. I'll close with this little fun story about being known as an historian in this locale:
     One sunny spring afternoon, I was wandering amongst the gravestones in my favorite urban heritage site, being the United Church  Cemetery, in Bracebridge, topographically attached to the larger Annie Williams Memorial Park on the Muskoka River. I was making copious notes, for a feature article I was writing about the heritage of tombstone graphics, and was finding some outstanding examples, to support my research. All of a sudden, a woman approached me from the left side, and you can imagine what this does to a fellow in deep concentration, walking silently through a graveyard. When my heart-rate returned to normal, I looked at the women, and asked if she could repeat her question, I had obviously missed the first time around. "It's okay Mr. Currie," she said, "I didn't know it was you when I saw someone wandering around the cemetery. We've been having a lot of vandalism here, so I always like to check who's coming and going through the gates." The point here, is that as a known historian in these here parts, I was welcome in the cemetery. In fact, my presence was expected. I guess as death's honor guard, I'm welcome to browse whenever I want. Is it any wonder historians don't get invited to parties, but are always welcome at wakes?
     It is our responsibility to be stewards of the past. Now try to make that stick!