Mailbag

VISITORS LOVE THE MAGAZINE

Watershed has been instrumental in bringing new visitors to my gallery as well as reminding existing guests to return. I was featured in Amuse-Bouche in the Spring 2023 issue and had a number of guests remark that they had read the article and that the content was well done. The magazine is well-written, curated with beautiful photography and designed with sophistication. The complimentary issues do not sit long and are never stale-dated, with guests snapping them up as soon as they notice the new delivery.

Brandy Calvert Ringelmann
these4walls gallery, Trenton

GO OUTSIDE AND PLAY!

George Smith’s article “How Did We Survive?” sent me back to my youth in the 1950s on Hiawatha Road in East Toronto. Our experiences were very similar: no phones or watches, just a universal understanding that you were to be home when the streetlights came on. We played stick ball and baseball in the schoolyard without a permit or adult supervisors. Our rules were unique and were passed down from previous generations. Our major rule was “a tie goes to the runner.” Maple Leaf Stadium on Sunday afternoons was our Mecca, accessible by the TTC and affordable with one’s weekly allowance. Parental advice as we set out on our own was very simple: “be careful” and “come straight home.” We understood perfectly what both rules meant. I believe that is exactly “how we survived.”

Douglas Peacock

THE LITTLE HORSE OF IRON

As executive director of the Equus Survival Trust, I am writing to sing the praises of your well-written Spring issue feature, “The Little Horse of Iron.” We are a conservation non-profit specializing in endangered historic breeds of equines. I commend Watershed for publishing this article. The author, Marie-Lynn Hammond, is a person who strives for educational accuracy in promoting Le Cheval Canadien. The layout is engaging with its wealth of good photos and descriptive photo credits, bringing attention to the plight of one of Canada’s oldest living treasures. A hard copy of this issue is now part of the Equus Survival Trust Archival Library’s permanent collection in North Carolina. Bravo Watershed!

Victoria Tollman, Executive Director,
Equus Survival Trust, North Carolina
www.Equus-Survival-Trust.org

The future of the Canadian horse is far from certain, but some determined folks from Upper Canada Village at Morrisburg launched a fundraising drive last September, aimed at creating a life-sized bronze of the horse. More than 80 percent of the $300,000+ required for the project has now been raised. The hope is that the statue at the Village – which receives a quarter-million visitors a year and is home to 25 Canadian horses – will help raise the breed’s profile and safeguard its future. I owned a Canadian horse for twelve years, and in 2001 I wrote a book about the breed, its rich history and my experience. The book was called, of course, “The Little Horse of Iron.”

Lawrence Scanlan

My sister-in-law just sent an article from your amazing Watershed (I can’t wait to explore it further) – “The Little Horse of Iron” by Marie-Lynn Hammond. A very dear friend of ours, David Sheridan, a local artist and retired teacher is currently building a life-sized model of the Canadian horse, which is to be on permanent display at Upper Canada Village.

Peggy McKenzie, Brockville

ENTERTAINING AND WELL-WRITTEN

I just wanted to let you know that I look forward to reading Dan Needles’ Fence Posts in every issue. Always interesting, insightful, entertaining and well-written! The same can be said about the columns by Norm Wagenaar (Habitat) and Roger Thomas (Field Notes). Keep them coming.

In your Spring 2024 issue I should also tell you that I found especially interesting: “A Fierce Flame”, about local healthcare issues, “Second Time Around”, about local thrift shops, “Net Zero Neighbourhood”, about local environmental and housing developments and issues and “Meanderings”, about local history with photographs. I encourage you to fill your magazine with as many articles of a similar nature as you can. Thank you.

Doug McBean, Toronto and Prince Edward County

ENJOYING WATERSHED’S SPRING ISSUE

We love your magazine so much! I think your articles cover such a wide range of topics and interest to all of us. Thank you for this wonderful publication!

Becky Williams, Elizabeth Crombie Real Estate

JAM YESTERDAY & CANADIAN HORSES

I was at a gathering in Port Hope, and in conversation I mentioned a book titled “Jam Yesterday”, written by Kathleen Cannell. I mentioned that Kathleen was the woman who invented Port Hope’s nickname: “open air asylum.”

I thought the woman I was speaking with would love the book and I suggested she should read it. Someone then asked me if I had read about Kathleen in Watershed, but I had not. I put up a post-it note in my brain to pick up the Spring issue ASAP, which I did on the way home.

Thank you, Tom Cruickshank, who knows all the secrets of lives lived in Northumberland and east down into the County. I loved reading Tom’s piece on Kathleen. He also wrote the wonderful book “The Settler’s Dream” which has Kathleen’s grand – father’s Picton residence, Maplehurst, in its pages.

It was shortly after I had moved to Port Hope and was able to buy a copy of “Jam Yesterday” from an estate sale and I realized what a hidden gem this book was. Walking up Walton Street one night with a friend just in front of the Presbyterian Church I looked up and I could see shadows of “bats flying in the belfry.” I stopped dead in my tracks, we crossed the street and watched those shadows as I told my friend the story of Kathleen Cannell.

When I finally got to the back page of Watershed, there was Uncle Cliff, an accommodating man with a kind heart. If he were here today, he would tell you about the pair of Canadian horses they had on the farm. They had them for a few years but once the depression came along, they had to sell them. They still had the draft horses for working in the bush and field, but it broke Uncle Cliff’s heart about the Canadians. He said you could hook them up to the buggy, runner or buckboard and they would do the job. The buggy was for when the family went out, the runner was what was used in the winter months on the snow-covered roads, and the buckboard was used to haul lumber or grain.

Amy Quinn, Grafton

Editor’s Note – Correction: In the Spring issue we misspelled the names of photographer Christine Reid and Blue Violin owner Kim Fedor. Watershed regrets the error.

These are just a sampling of the jumble sale of notes we received in response to Karin Wells’ article “Second Time Around”:

Thrifters Unite! I just wanted to let you know I love, love, loved “Second Time Around.” I was totally (and hilariously) captivated right from the start with the triumphant presentation of the crystal glass. Another excellent publication, and the artwork on the cover of this issue is just beautiful!

Jessica Russell

THRIFTY INSPIRATION

I have been a thrifter since the 1950s when as kids we shopped at church bazaars. And then Barbra Streisand made thrifting popular in the 1960s when I was a student nurse in Montreal. In 2006 my daughter spotted a suitcase full of my Buchan Thistle stoneware from Scotland in the window of a church thrift store in Florida for $100. Fortunately, a friend was in the area with a truck and could bring them home for me. Best thrift day ever!

Meredith MacKellar

MORE PRAISE FOR THRIFTING

Oh! How I loved reading about the Cobourg thrift shops in your magazine. I hope you will run another such article which includes Petticoat Lane, the Northumberland Hills Hospital thrift shop. I am one of the 50+ volunteers who love what we do, the friendships forged over the years, the interesting donations we receive.

I am writing to tell you of a thrift shop “find.” Back in 2009, I wanted to celebrate my 70th birthday in a big way, so I put posters around Northumberland County inviting ladies born in that unforgettable year of 1939 to come join me for lunch at the Best Western. Well, 84 of us showed up and had a wonderful time.

To bring the occasion to life, I thought it would be nice to have a table of memorabilia. To this end, I searched through the books at Petticoat Lane and found two printed in 1939. Some days later I checked them out on the internet. As soon as I typed in Bertram Brooker, up came the Lunenburg Museum in Nova Scotia. The curator was offering $300 for the book! So off it went – not a bad return on $2, don’t you think? Bertram, amongst other things, was an artist whose art was sometimes compared to that of the Group of Seven.

Alma Draper

In response to your article, “Second Time Around,” my friend and I would like to share a real-life treasure found while antiquing in a local vintage shop. I found a cast-iron stove side panel from a raised oven that sat on an old wood burning box stove. I fell in love with the pioneer scene. I had no idea what to do with it but had to bring it home. My friend spotted it in the garage and said, “I know what to do with that,” and he took it. He constructed a unique frame using old reclaimed pine flooring and a hand-hewn hemlock barn beam.

Laura Burnett and (friend) David Clark

THOUGHTS ON “SECOND TIME AROUND”

“Second Time Around” in your Spring issue ended with an account of a boy in rural Uganda wearing a Blue Jays’ T-shirt, with the commentary that “At least one piece of clothing has found a good home.” I have lived in several African countries and know first-hand the dumping of used clothing from the West. In Uganda it has resulted in the end of domestic cotton production. Most Africans cannot afford to buy the bright and beautiful traditional kitenge fabrics because buying used ready-made clothing is so much cheaper. As a result, President Museveni of Uganda has enacted a law to ban the import of used clothing in an attempt to revitalize Uganda’s domestic clothing industry.

Diana Boot