Author: Paul Dunne

Annual George Story Lecture – ‘Go to the Devil to the River Head to Your Own Bogs’: Unsettling Femininity in Early Irish-Newfoundland Fishing Communities

Dr. Willeen Keough

April 24, 2025

Threats, curses, common assaults, and communal actions involving Irish-Newfoundland women provide intriguing insights into gender, ethnicity, and class relations in Newfoundland fishing communities during early settlement. For a variety of motives — self-defense; defense of reputation, property, or family business; employment disputes; enforcement of community standards; and maintenance of ethnic boundaries—these women deployed power in… Read More

Child Health and Welfare in Newfoundland before 1949

Dr. Rick Cooper

March 27, 2025

Pre-Confederation Newfoundland was a challenging place to grow up, especially for children in low-income families. Infectious diseases – including cholera, typhus, smallpox, tuberculosis, diphtheria, gastroenteritis, and whooping cough – circulated unchecked. Poverty, meagre sanitation, inadequate transportation, ignorance, and isolation compounded the effects of poor health. Health care was difficult to access, particularly in outport communities…. Read More

“I couldn’t see why a woman couldn’t go to war too!”: Newfoundland Women and Overseas Service in the First World War

Terry Bishop Stirling

February 27, 2025

Newfoundland women who served overseas as nurses and Voluntary Aid Detachment workers (VADs) during World War One left remarkable stories that reflect their varied experiences based on where they served, the people they worked with, and their own unique personalities and backgrounds. In this talk, Terry Bishop Stirling will share her research on these women,… Read More

OF SHIPS & (WO)MEN: Stories from the Crew Agreements

Julia Stryker

January 30, 2025

After 1850, every British ship carried a Crew Agreement and Official Log for every voyage it undertook. In addition to unprecedented information on the lives of average, laboring people, they preserve the wild, the weird, the tragic, and the beautiful moments of everyday life at sea at a time of monumental change. This talk will describe… Read More

Premier’s Heritage Medal

News · January 21, 2025

The NLHS was honoured to be chosen as a recipient of the inaugural Premier’s Heritage Medal, the “highest honour of recognition for the heritage sector in our province”.  We  were acknowledged by Premier Dr. Andrew Furey during a ceremony at the Colonial Building on December 9, 2024, for our “invaluable contribution to heritage practices and preservation… Read More