Newfoundland Travel Diary 1990

I have visited Newfoundland 3 times: 1987, 1990, and 2003. Each time I kept a travel diary. Here is an excerpt from my 1990 trip. I was 27 at the time, and accompanied my great Uncle Nehemiah back from a trip he took to Boston to visit my grandmother.

June 19, 1990 St. John's Newfoundland
I walk around wondering if I could live here. I guess it is difficult to get a job teaching in St. John's, so I'd have to go to an outport community. I would like that though I'd have to find a way into St. John's occasionally. There are limited resources here. There's a feminist quarterly called "Waterlily,' a couple of bookstores, one record store, a few coffeehouses, and a nature food store. Some of the Victorian townhouses downtown are grand. They're painted orange and light green, like San Francisco. I suppose rent would not be that much cheaper; I don't know. It's worth looking in to. There are some young people here. I met a woman here working on her master's thesis in folk music. She was from New Hampshire. There seem to be a small number of American and British exiles here. I would like to visit Memorial University and see if I can establish a penpal.

Winterton 1990

Newfoundland Travel Diary 1990

My grandmother's brother- Nehemiah Andrews

Another excerpt from my travel journal to Newfoundland: 1990

June 18th, 1990
Today I walked around the older part of St. John's. This was charming. I want to go to Cape Spear if I can again. Tomorrow I plan to go to Signal Hill for lunch. Some Newfoundland phrases/ endearments I've noted:
my son; maid ;queer hand
duckie ;skipper; that's some good
my lover; misses ;give me that
buddy; me olde trout; grand ;
mate; hard case; oh me nerves

June 19, 1990
Today I met a man on Duckworth Street. He's the proprietor of a small shop called 'The World of Gifts.' He had watercolors selling there by my grandmother's first cousin, Arthur Andrews. He is the son of my grandmother's Uncle Thomas. Arthur lives on Franklyn Street in St. John's and has two brothers, George and Frank. Arthur lived in Winterton. Uncle Nehemiah knows him but says he hasn't seen him in twenty years.

Proud Grandmother

This blog is fueled by the love of a woman-- my grandmother. She loved Newfoundland, her children, her grandchildren, her husband, her great-grandchildren, and all her relatives. I would not be writing this blog if it were not for her. Here is a favorite picture of mine, with me, my sisters, and my cousin. Is that not the smile of a happy and proud grandmother?

What's it all About?

This blog is about my trips to Winterton, Newfoundland and about my record of family history. Winterton was formerly called Scilly Cove prior to the early 20th century. It was where my grandmother Rachel Charlotte Andrews was born in 1903. I traveled to Winterton for the first time in 1987, with my mother Judy, my father John, my sister Jennifer, and my maternal grandmother Margaret Gwendolyn (she also happened to be a Newfie). I returned to Newfoundland in 1990, then did not revisit until 2003. In 2003 I had the pleasure of traveling part of the way with my parents.

Winterton in the 1960's

This is a postcard of Winterton in the 1960's. My grandmother Rachel sent it to her brother Wilson in Niagara Falls, NY. It reads:
"Hi, arrived home ok. Had a lovely trip. Sadie was to meet me. Everyone is fine and sends love. Sister Lottie
p.s. Uncle Jakie and Aunt Ellie is arriving on Monday."

Postcards Winterton

Canada Travel Journal 1987

June 27, 1987.
Tomorrow we will be leaving for Canada. Our eventual destination is Newfoundland. Before we leave I would like to list some of the places we will pass by and some of the sights we will see. I would like to record my expectations-- so as to compare them at the end of the trip with my actual day-to-day entries. This journal is, I hope, one of the first of my many travel journals in life. I hope that I can keep it up everyday.
We will leave Boston and travel up Rt. 1 through the North Shore. We will be on the coast all along up to Maine. We will go through Hampton, NH and Portsmouth NH. We will go along through Wells, Maine and Kennebunk Maine, up to Portland. We will go through Augusta, the capital. I have never visited this city of Maine so it should be interesting. We will then travel through Waterville, and Bangor. Afterwards we will be entering a more rural part of Maine. We will go by Calais and St. George. At this point we will cross the border into New Brunswick. We will go through St. John's and pass through Moncton and Amherst into Nova Scotia. In Nova Scotia we will travel by Oxford and New Glasglow along to Sydney.
I am very thrilled about seeing New Brunswick and Nova Scotia and the upper areas of Maine I have not seen.

On the Way to NFLD 1987

My Dad in Maine, My Mom and Grandmother.

Canada Travel Journal pt. 2 1987

June 28th, 1987 Sunday
Today was our first day of travel. We drove about 340 miles from Boston to Calais, ME. We stopped for the night at a place called Calais Motor Inn. We had a very nice dinner there too. We noticed that the people in this area of Maine have very strong accents. From Bangor the ride along Rt. 9 was very beautiful. We went through a very mountainous region, and past farms and very deep woods. It was very hilly and one mountain loomed up right ahead of us suddenly. On the way we stopped in Grey, Maine for lunch. We stopped one other time for a rest. The ride was not bad except for the last 50 miles or so. Although very scenic the road seemed never-ending. Also it was a narrow route and large logging trucks zoomed by us all along the way.
Tomorrow morning we will eat breakfast and then cross the border into Canada. The air up here is good. During the day though there is a sulfuric odor of what must be a nearby papermill. That is the economy here--- logging, paper, hunting, and fishing. Another thing that struck me is that every town, small as they are, has a white church, usually Baptist, with a belfry. This is New England, after all, though we still feel far from home.

Me in Nova Scotia 1987

On the way to NFLD- 1987. Age 24.

Back in Those Days

Olden Days: Hen's Back Spansel; Button Hook; Gaiters; Cloth Spats; Bonnet; Birch Broom; Flour Barrel Chair; Girl's Bow called 'airplanes'; Dog Clog in Summer; Child's Cup 'noggin'; Wool cards; Two lookers; Mat in Frame; Yoke for Goat's neck.













The first time I visited Newfoundland in 1987 I had an interview with a lady in Winterton called Rhoda Maude Piercey. She knew alot about the history of the town-- mostly day- to -day life and customs of the 'old days.' In fact she was writing a book at the time and completed that book, "True Tales of Rhoda Maude: Memoirs of an Outport Midwife," in 1992. Above are the sketches I completed during my talk with her.

Rachel's Immediate Family in Winterton

For the time period, Rachel had a relatively small family. She was the eldest of four children. Rachel's father & mother were both born in Winterton. When I was a teenager I asked my grandmother about her parents. This note is her handwriting.

Samuel Andrews
b. Sept. 1879 d. June 1963
married in 1903
Jedidah Pinhorn
b. 1882 d. 1945
Children:
1. Rachel Charlotte Andrews (Taylor)
b. 1903 d. 1997
2. Wilson Andrews
b. 1905 d. 1977
3. Sarah Elizabeth Andrews (Parrott)
b. 1908 d. 1994
4. Nehemiah Andrews
b. 1911 d. 1997

1921 Census

The 1921 Census of Newfoundland listed 1099 people living in Winterton at the time. Among them were my grandmother's immediate and extended families. I found both the original census records in Utah at the LDS library, and the transcribed census records on various Newfoundland genealogy web sources.