By Rhonda Akey
Like any job, there are monotonous jobs that require our attention in a museum. Changing the paper in the monitors that record fluctuations in temperature and relative humidity is one of them. But it doesn’t prevent us from having a bit of fun sometimes. So for kicks and giggles, one day, the conservator and I decided to do a little snooping in the archives after performing said job.
Curious, we started to look around at some of the books and discovered an interesting little hard covered book entitled “Lessons on Houses, Furniture, Food and Clothing” printed in London, England in 1849. Truthfully, I thought the book was an instruction manual, but was surprised to discover that it was, in fact, a lesson book for young children. The content was much more simplistic in nature than one might imagine from the title. Regardless, the book was intriguing and we flipped through a few chapters reading what they had to say about such subjects as “How to Build a House”. To give you an idea of how simplistic the book is, the first sentence states “Houses are built of bricks, mortars, tiles, slates, stone, wood, and iron.” Now read that line again and imagine some stodgy English nobleman reading to his gathered children about the ways of the world as they sat in front of a warm fire and you get the vision that I see in my head as I read the excerpts.
Images of the book "Lessons on Houses, Furniture, Food & Clothing"
Of course, we flipped through some of the chapters, reading small excerpts to see what the author had to say about various subjects. “Lesson XI. Lighting a Fire” naturally caught my attention. The reality is that I can’t imagine educating my own child about how to light a fire. I know very few parents who don’t keep the matches and lighters out of reach. Nevertheless, the 19th century was a much different time, so we were curious about what they had to say. The exert states as follow:
“The Common method of obtaining fire is by striking flint and steel together, and thus producing a shower of sparks. By the violence of the striking, small portions of the flint and steel fly off; the particles of the steel burn in passing through the air, and form the sparks. These set fire to the tinder, or burnt linen; from which, on applying a match dipped in sulphur, we easily obtain a flame, as sulphur readily takes fire.
In countries where the above use of flint, steel and sulphur is unknown, savages light their fires by rubbing together two pieces of wood; in doing which much time is lost. The saving of time by lighting a match, therefore, shows the advantages of a civilized country, like that in which we live, over countries where the arts are unknown.”
Say what? Did you just read that right? I assure you I was completely caught off guard by this blunt reality. There, in black and white print, was the superior attitude of the British in the Victorian era, as dictated in a lesson book for their children. I always knew that this attitude existed. All we need to look at is the history of our neighbours to the south. Not only did they systematically slaughter most of the Natives community, the biggest event of the 19th century was a civil war about slavery.
So why was it less predominant in our Canadian history? Allow yourself a moment to imagine that you are a “civilized” British pioneer that has just come to Upper Canada in the 1840s, having been taught the above lessons as a young child. As a best case scenario, you arrive at your plot of land in early spring. You discover that it is nothing more than a virgin forest, which is not what you were told back in Great Britain (though that is another story altogether). You set to work clearing the land, all while under attack by a cloud of vicious black flies. After weeks of back-breaking work, during which you have accumulated a mass of welts all over your body, you do your best to plant a garden and build a structure that will shelter you from the elements. You are blissfully unaware of just how brutal the Canadian winter will be. Winter sets in earlier then you may have anticipated and you only have a scant amount of food stored away. Your garden hadn’t produced near enough food for the long winter ahead.
About mid-winter, you stand outside chopping more fire wood, in sub-zero temperatures and three or more feet of snow. Your food stores have quickly dwindled and you are starving. Then you notice a nice, healthy looking “savage” merrily walking by. He’s wearing funny shoes strapped to his feet that allow his to walk on top of the snow and he is carrying some rabbits in his hand. You begin to imagine how delicious rabbit stew would taste right now. You’re hungry, cold and downright desperate. Now imagine having to ask these “savages” for help in order to survive because you have no idea how to hunt and survive in this harsh new climate. There’s nothing like a good old Canadian winter to curtail a superiority complex from a person. Nonetheless, I’m sure there are many graves of long-forgotten men that couldn’t swallow their pride and ask for help from a “savage”.
We know from the books of Catherine Parr Traill, a well-bred British woman who came to live in Lakefield, Ontario as an early 19th-Century pioneer, that this is one of the ways she learned to survive in the Backwoods of Ontario. That must have been one big pill to swallow, and a huge lesson in humility. Good thing those “savages” were willing to overlook the ignorance of these “civilized” British folk and lend them a helping hand.
May this also be a lesson to all of us about keeping an open mind about cultures, traditions or lifestyles of which we are unfamiliar with. They may not be as forgiving to our ignorance as the First Nations communities once were.
Rhonda Akey is the Records Management Intern at Lang Pioneer Village Museum. She has been working and/or volunteering at the Village since September of 2010. Rhonda is fascinated by all things historic – and loves to share the neat tidbits she discovers behind the scenes in the Lang Pioneer Village Museum collection with everyone.
