• Our project
  • How to use our site
  • Authors lists
    • Authors completed
    • Authors to be included
    • Author “snapshots”
    • Authors to be evaluated
    • Authors using pseudonyms
    • Resource list
    • Authors not included (for researchers)
  • Comprehensive Index of Contributors to the Crucible Magazine, 1932-1943
  • Index of Female Contributors to The Canadian Poetry Magazine, 1936-1950
  • A series of lists
    • Canadian periodicals online at ECO
    • A complete list of Ryerson Poetry Chapbooks, 1925-1962
      • Ryerson Poetry Chapbook 4: The Captive Gypsy (1926), by Constance Davies-Woodrow
      • Ryerson Poetry Chapbook 5: The Ear Trumpet (1926), by Annie Charlotte Dalton
      • Ryerson Poetry Chapbook 77: Songs, Being a Selection of Earlier Sonnets and Lyrics (1937), by Helena Coleman
    • Pseudonyms: Known and unknown
    • Some anonymous texts online at ECO
    • Women of Canada (1930)
  • Resource websites

Canada's Early Women Writers: Authors lists

~ A growing list of Canada's English-language women writers from the beginning to 1950

Canada's Early Women Writers: Authors lists

Monthly Archives: August 2018

The Toronto Art Students’ League calendars, 1893-1897

30 Thursday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Other arts, Poetry

≈ 6 Comments

For a number of years, the Toronto Arts Students’ League published a calendar of their members’ art. Archive.org has these calendars for the years 1893-1904, but I am not sure of the history of the endeavour: when did they begin? when did they cease? I surmise that they did not continue long after 1900, as the quality of production and content deceased significantly in the first couple of years of the twentieth century. Significant, too, is that the years 1893-1897 contain both artwork (sometimes fabulous) by the students and poetry by influential and popular Canadian poets of the day.

Art Nouveau decorations

The decoration in some of the early volumes is beautiful. I might be biased, in that I am particularly fond of Art Nouveau, but even so… While some of the other volumes are more elaborate and glorious, the title page from 1899 is perhaps my favourite.

Some poems

1894 was a particularly good year for illustration, too: the decoration surrounds the poems, rather than pictures sitting on the opposite pages. I have included here the 1894 poems by Eleanor Corkhill Addison (using her maiden name, Eleanor Corquille Adams, with a twist on the spelling), Alice Maud Ardagh (Esperance), E. Pauline Johnson,  Agnes Maule Machar (Fidelis), and Nellie Spence. The second image is the full-page illustration accompanying Eleanor Corquille Adam’s poem.






 

The contents

Here is a list of the calendars that contain poetry, and the poets included therein. I have written down the names as recorded, with a gloss in brackets, as I find it interesting that some of the male authors are only mentioned by last name. It is also interesting that in the 1893 volume, Esperance  (Alice Maud Ardagh) is included as L’Esperance.

1893: Ninety-Three: A Calendar for the Year of Our Lord MDCCCXCIII (Toronto: Toronto Art Students’ League, [1892]).

Campbell, W.W. [William Wilfred]
Carman, Bliss
Crawford, Isabella Valancy
Fidelis [Agnes Maule Machar]
L’Esperance [Alice Maud Ardagh]
Lampman [Archibald]
Mair, Charles
McCarroll, James
Roberts, Charles G.D.
Seranus [Susan Frances Harrison]
Wilson, Daniel

1894: Ninety-Four: A Calendar for the Year of Our Lord MDCCCXCIV with Verses by Some of the Canadian Writers of Verse and Drawings by Members of the Toronto Art Students’ League (Toronto: Toronto Art Students’ League, [1893]).

1894, for all that it has lovely illustrations also introduces some problems. One poem is anonymous, and one author’s name cannot be deciphered. Can anyone help with these?

Adams, Eleanor Corquelle [Eleanor Corkhill Addison, née Adams]
Anonymous (“Reflections”)
Charlesworth, H.W. [Hector Willoughby]
Edgar, Pelham
Esperance [Alice Maud Ardagh]
Johnson, E. Pauline
Jykes, (Tykes?) W. Henry (?)
Machar, Agnes M.
McArthur, P. [Peter Gilchrist]
McKellar, D.A.
Spence, Nellie

1895: Ninety-Five: A Calendar for the Year MDCCCXCV with Some Selections from Canadian Writers and Drawings by Members of the Toronto Art Students’ League (Toronto: Toronto Art Students’ League, [1894]).

Campbell, W.W. [William Wilfred]
Carman, Bliss
Heavysege, Charles
Johnson, E. Pauline
Lampman, A. [Archibald]
Roberts, Chas. G.D. [Charles]
Sangster, Charles
Scott, Duncan Campbell

1896: Ninety-Six: A Calendar for the Year MDCCCXCVI with Verses by Charles G.D. Roberts and Bliss Carman, and Wayside Notes of Wandering over Canadian Roads (Toronto: Toronto Art Students’ League, [1895]).

Carman, Bliss
Roberts, Charles G.D.

1897: Ninety-Seven: A Calendar for the Year of 1897 with Sketches of Canadian Water-Ways and Appropriate Selections from Canadian Writers (Toronto: Toronto Art Students’ League, [1896]).

Campbell, W.W. [William Wilfred]
Lampman, Archibald
Roberts [Charles G.D.]
Sangster [Charles]
Carman, Bliss
Stewart, J.L. [James Livingstone]

The Elusive Identity of H.S. Caswell

27 Monday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Biography, Fiction and other arts

≈ 1 Comment

As promised, here is the third of our “Adventures in Research,” previously published on the now-defunct CWRC project blog.

H. S. Caswell ≠ Harriet Sophia, but perhaps H. S. Caswell = Henry Sheldon Caswell

by Karyn Huenemann

Another mystery of authorship surrounds H.S. Caswell, author of three texts issued in the 1870s by John Lovell, the major Montreal publisher of the time: Stories and Sketches (1872); Walter Harland; or, Memories of the Past (1874); and The Path of Duty and Other Stories (1874), also recorded as Clara Roscom; or, The Path of Duty, which contains the novel-length Clara Roscom, the full collection from Stories and Sketches, and another long story, Ernest Harwood; or, the Adopted Son. Ernest Harwood is listed on the title pages of Caswell’s published works, and may have been released as a single title, but no copy has been located. Caswell’s books appear in Early Canadiana Online, suggesting Canadian authorship, but it is often assumed that this H.S. Caswell was the American missionary Harriet S. Caswell (1834-1909). Evidence for this association is, however, tenuous.

Caswell’s longest work, Walter Harland, is a rather Tom Brown’s Schooldays “autobiography” of a fatherless boy from Elmwood, Quebec, who leaves his home to live with his maternal uncle near Hamilton for school, and from there to work in Montreal where he grows into the man who narrates the tale. No Elmwood exists today, but Elmwood Cemetery in northern Sherbrooke (established 1890) suggests that perhaps a village of that name once did. While Clara Roscom is set in Philadelphia and New Hampshire, and Ernest Harwood near Concord, Massachusetts, a significant number of Caswell’s stories in The Path of Duty are again set in Canada.

Harriet Caswell (1834-1909), the American author, was born Harriet Sophia Clark in 1834; she married Lemuel Caswell in 1869, and as a widow married Lewis Payson Broad in 1900. In 1892, Congregational Sunday-School and Publishing Society in Boston, Massachusetts, published Our Life Among the Iroquois Indians (1892), the only book issued under the name of Harriet S. Caswell (rather than H. S. Caswell). Harriet Caswell-Broad’s life is recorded in a posthumous biography, “Blue Sky”: The Life of Harriet Caswell-Broad (Boston, MA: Pilgrim, 1911), written by her brother, Dr. Joseph Bourne Clark. A great deal more can be found online about Joseph Clark, a noted American missionary to the Iroquois of New York state in the mid-1800s. In his biography of his sister, Clark makes reference to “her book” (explicitly Our Life Among the Iroquois Indians) as if there she had only written one (20). He later mentions her work as editor of the Home Missionary in the period between 1885 and 1900, but makes no other reference to literary endeavours. During the years when H. S. Caswell was published in Montreal (1872-1874), Harriet Caswell was in Boston where she had started a school for disadvantaged women, as well as a Relief Agency, and contributed to an extensive number of other local social causes. Given Clark’s detailed account of Caswell’s activities during this period, it seems odd that he would omit the publication of a novel as well as a collection of short stories, later reissued with two novel-length additions. It seems more likely that Caswell, who apparently never visited Canada, was not the author of these works, many of which are set in Eastern Canada (as Quebec was then known), with themes that are more social than religious.

To date, no biographical records have been found to confirm the existence of a Canadian author H.S. Caswell during this period. Although a Hattie S. Caswell lived in Quebec at the time, she was born in 1862, too late to have authored the stories. A more likely prospect is Henry Sheldon Caswell, a schoolteacher who according to Canadian Census records lived in Sherbrooke, Quebec—the location of much of H. S. Caswell’s writing—continually from his birth in 1838 until his death in 1900.

“Silver and Jade,”

25 Saturday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

We no absolutely nothing about Muriel L. Sheppard, although it is likely she lived in Vancouver. There was a student, Edith Muriel Sheppard, living at Roseberry and 25th in North Vancouver with her parents (Mr. & Mrs. William H. Sheppard) in 1940, but that is the closest I have come.

Sheppard, Muriel L. “Silver and Jade.” Vancouver Sun (3 July 1943): 2.

Fragment, by Lyn Cook

23 Thursday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Digital text, Poetry

≈ 2 Comments

Way back in September of 2012, I spoke with Lyn Cook on the phone. The call was initiated because of my interest in her work both through our project and my love of Canadian children’s literature. During that call, in amongst a richness of information about her life and family, she let slip that she had published three poetry chapbooks during the 1940s: Fragment, Harvest, and Soliloquy.

“That’s odd,” I commented, “we have no record of them.”

“Well,” she said (and I paraphrase), “I wrote my poetry under my grandmother’s maiden name: Margaret Culverhouse.” (Margaret Culverhouse is actually a combination of Lyn Cook’s middle name with her maternal grandmother’s maiden name.)

The lights went on for me, as Margaret Culverhouse was on our list of poets (as a contributor to the Canadian Poetry Magazine) that I could find absolutely no information about. One mystery solved, but I still had no luck locating the chapbooks. It turns out that the only known copies were those kept by the author and her family. She promised in a subsequent conversation to look them out for me, but it obviously slipped her mind (to give her her due, she was 94 years old at the time, although a very spritely conversationalist). In our entry for Lyn Cook, I had noted (given her comments) that the three poetry chapbooks were published under this pseudonym, but it turns out that my inference was erroneous: there is no publication information on any of the texts.

Yesterday, her son, Christopher Waddell, send me scans of his copies of the three chapbooks, with permission to post them online. I will upload them into the Canadian Writing Research Collaboratory collection, but I wanted to share them with you here, as well. So here is the first of the set, Fragment, signed in 1946 to “Judy” (her niece Judy Misener) ,as “memories of a war” during which she worked as a meteorological observer for the Royal Canadian Air Force.

“The Confessor,” by Gertrude MacGregor Moffat

21 Tuesday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Poetry

≈ Leave a comment

Moffat, Gertrude MacGregor. “The Confessor.” A Book of Verses (Toronto: Macmillan, 1924): 9.

“The Pines of Timagami,” by Mildred Low

16 Thursday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Fiction and other arts, Prose

≈ Leave a comment

A state of emergency was proclaimed yesterday here in BC as a result of the hundreds of wild fires that are engulfing our forests right now. Worse, it turns out that many of these fires have been caused by humans, and not even by accident. It is beyond my ability to comprehend, that anyone would be able to intentionally cause such devastation to our natural world, and the animals and indeed people who live in it.

In 1925, journalist Mildred Low wrote this article about the Temagami Forest Reserve in northern Ontario. She calls the forest “nature’s great university,” and expounds upon the benefits of understanding the forest, the trees, the waters, and our relationship to the natural world that sustains us. If only we all listened to such voices.

Low, Mildred. “The Pines of Timagami.” Nature Magazine (June 1925): 357-60.


Schoolday Impressions (1927), by Evelyn Craig Rusby

15 Wednesday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Biography, Digital text, Poetry

≈ Leave a comment

Evelyn Craig Rusby‘s daughter, Judy Schuett, has graciously sent me copies of her mother’s two chapbooks, the first of which I am sharing with you here. Schoolday Impressions is, as the name suggests, a collection of poetry that “Eve Lynne” obviously wrote during her high school years (her high school graduation photo is the frontispiece). Her second chapbook, Spring Fever, was written during her time at the University of Toronto, and is dedicated “To fellow members of the Women’s Press Club of the University of Toronto.”

“Eve Lynne” (Evelyn Craig Rusby). Schoolday Impressions. 1st ed. Vol. 1 (Burlington, ON: Author, 1927).

(Although the title of Schoolday Impressions page reads “FIRST EDITION VOLUME I,” Spring Fever, her only other known book, is not labelled as volume two of a set.)

“Summer Vacation,” by Isa Grindlay Jackson

12 Sunday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Poetry

≈ Leave a comment

You may remember that Isa Grindlay Jackson’s great-grandson, Jason Johnson, was in touch with us to share information and photos about his great-grandmother. Paths of inquiry led us to Sarah Carter, in the History Department at the University of Alberta, who in turn sent me a link to the digitized newspaper archive of Peel’s Bibliography of Prairie writing. There, I discovered the expected 400-odd submissions to the Western Farm Leader, but also a few select tidbits sent to newspapers such as The Carbon Chronicle and  The Wetaskiwin Times. Here’s a poem for summer.

Jackson, Isa Grindlay. “Summer Vacation.” The Wetaskiwin Times (2 July 1931): 5.

 

“My Forest,” by Emily MacNab

08 Wednesday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in Poetry

≈ Leave a comment

Searching the internet in an attempt to differentiate E (Emily MacNab) from ME (Mary Ellen) MacNab, I ran across this poem in the University Magazine, published at McGill University. My notes suggest that both were Mrs. William MacNab, which is possible, but I need to know for sure. Mary Ellen certainly was, but I can find no marriage details for Emily.

MacNab, Emily. “My Forest.” University Magazine 18 (1919): 378.

A sad goodbye: Lyn Cook (1918-2018)

02 Thursday Aug 2018

Posted by Karyn Huenemann in CEWW news

≈ Leave a comment

On 15 July 2018, the day after children’s author Lyn Cook died, her son Christopher contacted us with the news. Evelyn Waddell, who wrote her children’s books as Lyn Cook and poetry as Margaret Culverhouse, was one of the few authors in our project who was still living when we began our digital revisions in 2008. I spoke to her a number of times on the phone, and exchanged emails with her regarding our work and specifically her entry, which she helped to write. At 95, the age she was when we last spoke, Evelyn was a bright, intelligent woman with a sharp sense of humour and a delight in sharing her life and thoughts with us.

When I visited Ontario in 2012, I was really upset that I did not have time to drive up to Port Hope, where she was living at the time with her daughter Deborah; it would have been fabulous to meet her in person. I was honoured that she and her family appreciated to our project sufficiently that they let us know so soon after her passing.

The following is her obituary, published in the Toronto Globe and Mail on 17 July 2018.

 

Blogroll

  • Female Poets of the First World War

Links to other projects

  • American Verse Project
  • Canada's Early Women Writers at CWRC
  • Canada's Early Women Writers at SFU
  • Canadian Magazines
  • Canadian War Brides of the First World War
  • Canadian Writers Abroad
  • Canadian Writing Research Collaboratory
  • Database of Canada's Early Women Writers
  • Magazines, Travel, and Middle-brow Culture in Canada, 1920-1960
  • Orlando: Women's Writing in the British Isles
  • Winnifred Eaton Archive
  • Women in Book History, edited by Cait Croker and Kate Ozment

Pages

  • Our project
  • How to use our site
  • Authors lists
    • Authors completed
    • Authors to be included
    • Author “snapshots”
    • Authors to be evaluated
    • Authors using pseudonyms
    • Resource list
    • Authors not included (for researchers)
  • Comprehensive Index of Contributors to the Crucible Magazine, 1932-1943
  • Index of Female Contributors to The Canadian Poetry Magazine, 1936-1950
  • A series of lists
    • Canadian periodicals online at ECO
    • A complete list of Ryerson Poetry Chapbooks, 1925-1962
      • Ryerson Poetry Chapbook 4: The Captive Gypsy (1926), by Constance Davies-Woodrow
      • Ryerson Poetry Chapbook 5: The Ear Trumpet (1926), by Annie Charlotte Dalton
      • Ryerson Poetry Chapbook 77: Songs, Being a Selection of Earlier Sonnets and Lyrics (1937), by Helena Coleman
    • Pseudonyms: Known and unknown
    • Some anonymous texts online at ECO
    • Women of Canada (1930)
  • Resource websites

Posts and poems

  • December 2022
  • September 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • September 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • July 2011
  • April 2011

Visitors

  • 148,928 hits

Canada\’s Early Women Poets

RSS Feed RSS - Posts

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 730 other subscribers

Blog at WordPress.com.

  • Follow Following
    • Canada's Early Women Writers: Authors lists
    • Join 248 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Canada's Early Women Writers: Authors lists
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...