Hi List, In the spirit of Christmas I wish to share with you some stories of folks at The Forks. This article was published in the Casket in 1935 telling stories of the olden days. Because it is long I will break it up into 2 or 3 postings. I have underlined names to make them stand out in the text. I hope you enjoy the stories and that they bring a smile to your lips on this Christmas Season. Merry Christmas to All Marleen (MacDonald) Hubley Addington Forks The Casket, August 22, 1935 About a mile and a half from the parish church at St. Joseph's, on the highway leading to James River station from the valley of Ohio, the West River is crossed by an iron bridge. A short distance to the north, the road forks, one branch swinging sharply to the left towards Beaver Meadow, and the other veering off to the right and becoming the old mail route to Antigonish. Located near the crossroads today are two substantial dwellings, which wear pleasantly the dignity, conferred by age and good craftsmanship. These, the former homes of Norman MacDonald and John Cameron, are the sole remains of the village of Addington Forks. Three score years ago, The Forks was a trading centre of considerable importance - a self-contained community which gave the shiretown itself a hard run for honors as chief commercial centre of the county. The Forks was in a sense a shiretown itself. It was the only village located within the boundaries of the Hartshorn Grant, a tract of 28,000 acres taken up in 1804 by one Lawrence Hartshorn of Halifax. The southeast corner of the grant was near the present crossroads at Purl Brook. From there the line ran six miles towards the Keppoch Mountain to the westward, its southern line skirting the north side of the property of the late John MacDonald and R. A. MacDonald at St. Joseph's. Toward the north the tract extended to the James River hills. The grant recites that on April 29, 1796, Jotham Blanchard, Truro was given license to take possession of the land. Probably he lacked funds to go ahead with the settlement of the area, for nothing more was done for eight years. Then Blanchard was joined in the venture by Hartshorn, who was probably the financier of the firm, and the grant was made April 18, 1804. Blanchard received 5,750 acres, and Hartshorn 17, 250 acres. The conveyance has often been referred to as the Addington-Hartshorn grant, but there was no "Addington" about it, accept in an indirect way. Speculation in crown lands in previous years had resulted in a tightening up of the issuing of grants. It is probable that, Hartshorn had to deal directly with London in getting possession of his estate, and that the grant was arranged through the prime-minister, Henry Addington, first Lord Sidmouth. It was likely in complement to this noble that when the village came into being it was called Addington Forks. Tradition has it that the "forks" part of the title does not refer to the branch in the highway but to the river forks in the neighbourhood, where the Beaver and James streams within a few yards of each other join the waters of the West River. Nowadays, it is sometimes suggested that a return to the old self-contained community would solve the economic problems of the country. Seventy-five years ago, or so, Addington Forks was just the kind of place that the economists now have in mind. Its constituency had little need to go abroad for anything which the question of living in comfort called for. The village businessmen included two merchants, several blacksmiths, two carriage-makers, an undertaker, a turner, a shoemaker, a tanner and harness maker, a dressmaker, a weaver, a carpenter, a tailor, a miller, several rum-sellers and a horse trader. The chief business house was John Cameron's General Store. This was no mere crossroads emporium, where only the rude necessaries of life were vended. Quite the contrary. Of course, Cameron stocked in large quantities goods of the more useful type, ranging from wooden shoe pegs to "Pendleton's "Penasee", and Pictou Twist, but he was in addition an importer of rarer and more luxurious articles. The girls of the countryside could do their shopping there, sure to find a good range of dress silks, cotton stockings and hair ribbons. A gown from Paris nowadays can give its wearer no more confidence than could a Sunday dress sold by "Iain Camaran" in the olden days. The second store was carried on as a part time occupation by Norman MacDonald, school teacher, and man of letters. The teacher farmed his land and taught the young, wrote the letters of the community, and composed Gaelic verse of better than average quality in a day when bards were plentiful. In his spare time he once re-issued MacKenzie's "Beauties of Gaelic Poetry" and sold it around the countryside. He was likewise village postmaster and gauger for the parish. Tradition tells he once captured a still belonging to a local manufacturer and put it in his cellar for safe-keeping, while the wheels of the law were being set in motion. Next night the owner of the still gathered a party of his friends and they set out for the Forks to recover the plant. In the gauger's possession it was evidence that would send the owner to jail. When they came to the brow of the hill overlooking the Forks, the men, all young and perhaps a trifle wild, dropped to their knees and said the Rosary that Almighty God might deign to prevent serious harm to anyone in the scuffle for the "black pot". Then they pressed forward, surrounded Norman's house, and breaking in, seized the still. The gauger fought strongly, but was wounded in the arm and overpowered. Norman MacDonald taught nine years at Beaver Meadow and a term or two at Pinkietown. When John Cameron died his business was carried on for a while by his sons Hugh and Alex, but success passed them by, and eventually the store was closed, to remain vacant until time and weather brought about its destruction. Other merchants there in years that followed were Rory Archie Chisholm, Ashdale; Hugh John MacInnis, Dan and John MacDonald, Cross Roads Ohio. To be continued . . . -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Marleen & Jim Hubley Rose & Thistle B & B 4143 South River Road Antigonish, NS B2G 2L4 Phone: 902-735-2225 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~