8/19/2014 Nova Scotia, Canada

Lunenburg

Lunenburg, Nova Scotia is a designated World Heritage Site for being the best example of planned British colonial settlement in Canada.  If you put dirt on the roads, remove the cars and 1960's style telephone poles, it would look much like it did 200 years ago.  Debra's ancestors were one of Lunenburg's founding families in the mid 1700's. Christoph Harnish emigrated aboard the boat GALE in 1751, aged 50, a brewer from "Ganda" (Goetha, Germany) with wife Cathrina Hoffman. They begat Johann Gottlieb, who begat Johann George, who begat Elizabeth Margaret Harnish, whose first marriage to a Mansfield begat Deb's mother's line and whose second marriage to a Wamboldt begat Deb's fathers line.  Ya see, Deb's parents are related 5th generation on one side and 6th generation on the other. Aw jeez, doesn't that explain a lot of kooky family behavior!  



Caledonia

 A one hour drive West from Lunenburg takes us to Caledonia in central Nova Scotia were the majority of Debra's Canadian family has lived for generations.  Caledonia is the major village in the area known as North Queens, which has a radius of approximately 20 miles and a population of approximately 1500.  It was so wonderful to trade stories with cousins from Debra's mother and father's side of the family. Life is pleasantly simpler and slower paced and the people are wonderful and are always ready to help each other out.  We went to a community supper at the fire house and cousin Erma looked around and said "yep, you are related to most of the people in this room in one way or another".  Erma said if you throw a stone anywhere in town you will surely hit a relative.  If you want to see what life was like in the United States in the 1950's, come visit Caledonia.  The main roads were paved once in 1952, the phone system was upgraded in the 1970's from the old crank phones with switchboard, and cousin Judy was excited to qualify for home mail delivery a couple years ago when a third house was built on the dirt road within a mile of hers.  With Debra's passion for black and white movies, she feels right at home here.

Replaced in 1970

Steve, Norma, Erma, Judy, Deb and Eric

On a visit here last year, while talking to cousin Judy (French side) and husband Eric about genealogy, Deb described her family tree whereupon Eric said, "who did you say your mothers's grandmother was?"  Sure enough, that was his father's grandmother too! So I am related to Eric on the Smith side, and their late in life marriage makes them "kissin cousins".  Aw Jeez.