October 24, 2024
In these letters we get a taste of what life was like for people at that time, and how they were engaging with Smallwood directly as political agents. We want to celebrate this political legacy, which encourages all of us to think about how we understand the Confederation debates and eventual outcome, and what… Read More
September 28, 2024
Please join us the Mockbeggar Plantation Provincial Historic Site in Bonavista – the home of confederation advocate and Newfoundland politician F. Gordon Bradley – for a joint talk by Newfoundland and Labrador historians Dr. Raymond Blake and Dr. Jeff Webb on the history of the politics of confederation to be followed by an open discussion… Read More
September 27, 2024
This presentation considers Confederation more broadly than just an issue from the 1940s. Through the long debates on union with Canada, Newfoundlanders made informed, though certainly personal and self-interested decisions on their relationship with Canada and on Confederation. Newfoundland voters were not ill-informed, not easily swayed by prejudice and hysteria nor by the emotional appeal… Read More
September 26, 2024
This lecture shows how Newfoundlanders and Labradorians made an informed and rational decision in 1948 to join Canada. It argues that the people and the nation itself had changed considerably since 1869 when it had rejected union with Canada. Immediately after the end of the Second World War, voters in the old colony looked to… Read More
April 25, 2024
The Cupids Cove Plantation, discovered by William Gilbert in 1995, is the first English settlement in what is now Canada. In this talk, Mr. Gilbert will give an overview of how archaeology at Cupids and documentary research at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, the National Archives at Kew in London, and archives here in Newfoundland… Read More