You think of French-Canadians as being in Quebec; that's their turf, and the rest of Canada is historically British in origin.
Wrong.
Think about the analogous territory and settlement of it farther south, when everything north and west of, say, Philadelphia was wild frontier, disputed, thinly populated, the land of Indians and fur traders, missionary priests and isolated forts. Think about the French and Indian War. I'll wait.
Winnipeg is pretty far from Quebec, but it has one of the largest francophone communities west of the Great Lakes. You drive out of town toward the east just a few miles, and you could swear you've leapfrogged Ontario and materialized in La Belle Province. In fact, cross the Esplanade Riel bridge in the middle of Winnipeg and you are in St. Boniface, where you will get a friendly "bonjour." It used to be a separate city, and not wildly keen on its big anglophone neighbor, until it was swallowed in the early '70s and became part of Winnipeg. (Not without a fair amount of grumbling.) Its magnificent former hotel de ville (city hall) is now the home of Tourisme Riel, the tourism and heritage organization for St. Boniface, final resting place of the (in)famous patriot/traitor and founder of Manitoba, Louis Riel.
The St. Boniface Museum, which houses a vast collection of Riel artifacts, is housed in the oldest building in Winnipeg and oldest log structure in North America, and St. Boniface Cathedral is actually a basilica. The wooden roof of the original building burned, but the stone walls remain next to a modern replacement next door. The skeleton reminded me of England's Coventry Cathedral, the stone ruins of which are now a kind of war memorial (it was bombed and burned during World War II) next to a modern replacement. My enthusiastic student tour guide, Michelle, told me that all the windows, including a huge rose window, exploded to smithereens in the blaze, so, unlike Coventry, St. Boniface doesn't have any evocative bits of colored glass clinging to the edges of the holes in its walls.
It does have a historic cemetery in which Riel and most of his immediate family are buried. He was hanged in Vancouver for essentially making a career out of fighting British hegemony in what was evolving into Canada and carving out a place and rights for those of French and Indian descent -- particularly mixed French and Indian descent, which is designated Metis and has special legal standing in Canada. Riel himself had a French father and Indian mother. It was quite common for French voyageurs -- 18th- and early 19th-century traders in furs and other goods between the frontier and Quebec -- to have a wife at home in, say, Montreal and an Indian "country wife" and kids in Manitoba. Boys will be boys, if they can get away with it.
Anyway, Riel is a very controversial figure, being a freedom-fighting hero in French and a pernicious rebel in English. They definitely dig him in St. Boniface. His name and likeness are everywhere. He's a big part of the francophone heritage here, along with the voyageurs. The Festival du Voyageur is Western Canada's biggest winter blowout, second only to the marquee Winter Carnival in Quebec.
Michelle also showed me some of St. Boniface's other treasures, like the firehouse and the train station -- Winnipeg's first and only for many years until Union Station was built. The firehouse is a particularly charming old building, with a couple of vintage fire engines displayed in it and a tower used for drying hoses in the old days. As with a lot of Winnipeg, St. Boniface's funky old structures have ducked the wrecking ball -- and a very good thing, too.
After lunch, I tried to find the Royal Canadian Mint and largely failed. It's on the outskirts of town and not overly signed. It's almost like they don't want too many people to know where it is, which is understandable. I didn't have time for a tour, so I just stared through the glass at the rows of machines stamping out jillions of Canadian coins and hefted the giant gold bar held in place by a chain and a security guard. It was fascinating -- I wish I'd had more time.
But I needed to get back to Fort Gibraltar, a reconstructed version of the fort at the forks of the Red and Assiniboine rivers that kept trade safe for the North West Company, competitor of the Hudson's Bay Company. A boatload of voyageur re-enactors had landed earlier in the day, and the fort was full of men, women and children dressed as period fur traders, bourgeois company men, Indians and Metis. I was invited to share tea provided by a bourgeois gentleman, and it was a real treat and authentic as possible. There was tea in ceramic mugs or tin cups -- without the luxury of sugar -- wedges of scone with double cream and lemon curd, slices of cake, candied ginger, small dark squares of chocolate and crustless sandwiches. I joined a table of mostly rough characters in the men's quarters (I think they lured the kerchiefed Metis women in with the chocolate) and enjoyed the easy bilingual fluctuations of the conversation.
Afterward, there was an archery demonstration. In what had to be nearly a full gale. (It didn't rain till evening, but the wind was fierce.)
I had dinner at a cafe/bakery called Baked Expectations on trendy Osborne Street. Something for everyone: decadent pastry AND beer and wine. A place like this would be a truly dangerous addition to any neighborhood.
Tomorrow: Toronto. Let me remind you to scroll down now and then to look for new pictures in old posts. I'm catching up more every day.
Wrong.
Think about the analogous territory and settlement of it farther south, when everything north and west of, say, Philadelphia was wild frontier, disputed, thinly populated, the land of Indians and fur traders, missionary priests and isolated forts. Think about the French and Indian War. I'll wait.
Winnipeg is pretty far from Quebec, but it has one of the largest francophone communities west of the Great Lakes. You drive out of town toward the east just a few miles, and you could swear you've leapfrogged Ontario and materialized in La Belle Province. In fact, cross the Esplanade Riel bridge in the middle of Winnipeg and you are in St. Boniface, where you will get a friendly "bonjour." It used to be a separate city, and not wildly keen on its big anglophone neighbor, until it was swallowed in the early '70s and became part of Winnipeg. (Not without a fair amount of grumbling.) Its magnificent former hotel de ville (city hall) is now the home of Tourisme Riel, the tourism and heritage organization for St. Boniface, final resting place of the (in)famous patriot/traitor and founder of Manitoba, Louis Riel.
The St. Boniface Museum, which houses a vast collection of Riel artifacts, is housed in the oldest building in Winnipeg and oldest log structure in North America, and St. Boniface Cathedral is actually a basilica. The wooden roof of the original building burned, but the stone walls remain next to a modern replacement next door. The skeleton reminded me of England's Coventry Cathedral, the stone ruins of which are now a kind of war memorial (it was bombed and burned during World War II) next to a modern replacement. My enthusiastic student tour guide, Michelle, told me that all the windows, including a huge rose window, exploded to smithereens in the blaze, so, unlike Coventry, St. Boniface doesn't have any evocative bits of colored glass clinging to the edges of the holes in its walls.
It does have a historic cemetery in which Riel and most of his immediate family are buried. He was hanged in Vancouver for essentially making a career out of fighting British hegemony in what was evolving into Canada and carving out a place and rights for those of French and Indian descent -- particularly mixed French and Indian descent, which is designated Metis and has special legal standing in Canada. Riel himself had a French father and Indian mother. It was quite common for French voyageurs -- 18th- and early 19th-century traders in furs and other goods between the frontier and Quebec -- to have a wife at home in, say, Montreal and an Indian "country wife" and kids in Manitoba. Boys will be boys, if they can get away with it.
Anyway, Riel is a very controversial figure, being a freedom-fighting hero in French and a pernicious rebel in English. They definitely dig him in St. Boniface. His name and likeness are everywhere. He's a big part of the francophone heritage here, along with the voyageurs. The Festival du Voyageur is Western Canada's biggest winter blowout, second only to the marquee Winter Carnival in Quebec.
Michelle also showed me some of St. Boniface's other treasures, like the firehouse and the train station -- Winnipeg's first and only for many years until Union Station was built. The firehouse is a particularly charming old building, with a couple of vintage fire engines displayed in it and a tower used for drying hoses in the old days. As with a lot of Winnipeg, St. Boniface's funky old structures have ducked the wrecking ball -- and a very good thing, too.
After lunch, I tried to find the Royal Canadian Mint and largely failed. It's on the outskirts of town and not overly signed. It's almost like they don't want too many people to know where it is, which is understandable. I didn't have time for a tour, so I just stared through the glass at the rows of machines stamping out jillions of Canadian coins and hefted the giant gold bar held in place by a chain and a security guard. It was fascinating -- I wish I'd had more time.
But I needed to get back to Fort Gibraltar, a reconstructed version of the fort at the forks of the Red and Assiniboine rivers that kept trade safe for the North West Company, competitor of the Hudson's Bay Company. A boatload of voyageur re-enactors had landed earlier in the day, and the fort was full of men, women and children dressed as period fur traders, bourgeois company men, Indians and Metis. I was invited to share tea provided by a bourgeois gentleman, and it was a real treat and authentic as possible. There was tea in ceramic mugs or tin cups -- without the luxury of sugar -- wedges of scone with double cream and lemon curd, slices of cake, candied ginger, small dark squares of chocolate and crustless sandwiches. I joined a table of mostly rough characters in the men's quarters (I think they lured the kerchiefed Metis women in with the chocolate) and enjoyed the easy bilingual fluctuations of the conversation.
Afterward, there was an archery demonstration. In what had to be nearly a full gale. (It didn't rain till evening, but the wind was fierce.)
I had dinner at a cafe/bakery called Baked Expectations on trendy Osborne Street. Something for everyone: decadent pastry AND beer and wine. A place like this would be a truly dangerous addition to any neighborhood.
Tomorrow: Toronto. Let me remind you to scroll down now and then to look for new pictures in old posts. I'm catching up more every day.
1 comment:
Sam! Fascinating entry. Sounds like a great place to visit. I'm enjoying your blogs and am envious of your Canadian tour, something I've always dreamed of doing one day! --Erin
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