PAGE Io—A

.‘ Few Islanders can

MONDAY, AUGUST 81, 1964

GM OTTET

Worms remember the city like

this. Above and on the. Immediate right are met- cantile houses of the day. Centre top depicts the once-busy waterfront, and on the far right is one

bucket.

“Every member should rec- ollect that though he be mortal

he Corporation, of which he Is a part, is destined to im- mortality: and that the work ordered by the Corporation should be in accordance with this difference, so that, though the original founders have mouldered in the dust, the monuments to their good government and prudent administration will proudly rear their heads and serve as an example to their successors."

That was the advice given the first Mayor and City Council In an editorial' in Haszard’s Gazette in 1855 when Charlotte- town was incorporated as a city. That it would still serve as good guidance for present Council is self evident.

In one sense Charlottetown’s growth and improvement has been the result of disaster. It was not until after the great fire of 1866 that a real effort was made to provide an ef- ficient fire fighting force.

It was early in the morning of July 15. 1866, that fire broke out in a house on the corner of King and Pownal Streets. It raged throughout the day across streets, up and down blocks, as far as Great George Street and when it finally was out over 200 buildings had been destroye .

Similarly. it took the terrible

smallpox epidemic of 1885 to

of the several town pumps where the people got their water or had it delivered for a penny a .~

show the need for providing pure water and installation of a sewerage system.

Some people still living can recall the horrible cry of the driver of ‘the dead waggon' to householders as he assed “bring out your dead". a manner people were buried, and without ‘benefit of clergy'. STREETS A PROBLEM

From the earliest beginning village. town and city in turn were haunted by the question of streets. Wildly dusty in sum- mer, knee-deep in mud in spring and fall, and snow-clog- ged in winter, they offered every possible impediment to pedestrian navigation. When the Town or City fathers ex- pended money to improve them they were criticized for ‘waste'; when they left them alone they were bitterly upbraided. Which proves there are some things time does not change.

Sidewalks were non-existant excepting in some cases where more enterprising merchants, mindful of their customers’ wel- fare, constructed wooden walks in front of their business estab- ‘snments.

Charlottetown developed only as fast as the rest of the colony, later province. With its small population, largely of merchants and artisans. it was almost wholly dependent on the rural areas and there were no early roads.

.— .— 1

Biased trails through the heavy forests had to serve and visits to the Town Were made on foot or by horseback.

Dr. Frank MacKinnon, In a brief review of the city's his- tory at the time of its own cen- tennial in 1955, wrote of the feelings of one man from dis- tant parts of the Island. The man said: “If I go to Charlotte- town I am led into dissipation there and return home with an aching head, an empty pocket, and a half-starved horse."

which a people, though almost self-sufficient. were unable to create for themselves. That meant in turn more stores in town and a greater population. Charlottetown was t shipbuilding centre around the time of incorporation and many shipyards dotted the shore line rem the ferry wharf at the foot of Prince Street all the way up the Hillsborough River. When the ships were built and fitted they were generally laden with grain or lumber, sailed to England and there both cargo and boat sold. The crews got ome as best they could and repeated the process. ISLANDERS! LOAD GUNS Perhaps nothing else could more adequately refute the ab-

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surdity of statements made in Britain about this colony by a noted grammarian of the day, Cobbett. as recorded in Campbell‘s History of Prince Edward Island. Said Cobbett: "From Glasgow the sensible Scots are pouring out amain. Those that are poor and cannot pay their passage, or can rake together only a triﬂe, are go- ing to a rascally heap of sand, rock and swamp, called Prince Edward Island, in the horrible Gulf of St. Lawrence. But when the American vessels come over with Indian corn and poultry and eggs and butter. flour and pork and beef and cabbages and green peas, and asparagus for the soldiers. and other tax-eaters that we support on that lump of worth- lessness—for the lump itself bears nothing but potatoes— when these vessels return, the sensible Scots will go back in them for a dollar a head, and not a man of them will be left except bed-ridden persons." Mr. Cobbett may have been a celebrated grammarian. but obviously (he was neither a geographer nor a prognostic- ator. The foods he mentioned were those the Island was ship- ping out by the boatload as fast as ships could be built. And Charlottetown was pros- pering and becoming widely

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known thus attracting more settlers. Down

through the years since incorporation Charlotte- town has attracted to Its Council and its chief magistrate's post many of the outstanding men of the community. It would be impracticable to list all those who served on Council, but the following is a list of the Mayors since the first took office in 55: lion. Robert Hutchinson. Hon. T. Heath Haviland, Theophilus DesBrisay, Neil Rankin, The- ophilus DesBrisay, J. S. Carv- ell, Hooper, Henry Beer. . Heath Haviland, W. E. Dawson, James Warburton, M. D. Fred- erick F. Kelly. M.D., James Paton, Benjamin C. Prowse, Benjamin Rogers. Charles Lyons, R. Ii. Stems, P. S. Brown. G. D. Wright. D. J. Riley. R. H. Jenkins, John Mc- Kenna, Leonard B. Miller, Ira J. Yeo. M.D., T. W. L. Home. Hon. W. A. Stewart, Samuel Kennedy, M B. E.. P. W. Turner, E. A. Foster. B. Roy Holman. Dr. J. E. Blanchard, B. Earle MacDonald, 0.B.E., Col. J. David Stewart, Edwin C.- Johnson. A. Walthen Gaudet. When it came to police pro- tection the officers of a century ago would cause a bit of a smile in their ‘Mack Sennett' rigs of high hats and frock

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coats. The first City Marshall was Michael O’Hara who was followed by James Evans. Others of the olden days in-, cluded Angus MacLeod, Mar-l shal Cameron and others. Chief! of Police, for many' years was a

Thomas Flynn.

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