A HISTORY OF CANOE COVE

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his history was written as a project for the Canoe

Cove Women's Institute, and its aim was to gather information on the early settlers of Canoe Cove; who they were, their roots, and how they laid the foundation of our community. Because much of it is hearsay there will be inaccuracies and omissions. Information has been obtained from various minute books, a school register, a church history written by Rev. Gerald Sarcen and Velma MacPhee, scrapbooks, clippings, the MacNevin, the MacFadyen, the MacPhee and the Inman family histories and various other writings. The school history was researched by Betty MacPhee.

Effort has been made to name as many family members as possible of the Cove families but no doubt many are left out. The land has been identified by the 1880 Atlas (Meacham) and in most cases the people who lived on the land after that. The 1928 (Cummins) Atlas has also been used which gives further information on the families of the Cove at that time. Again there will be omissions and/or inaccuracies.

The early settlers were almost all Scots and if one goes back a few generations one would find that Gaelic (pronounced Gal-lie by our people) was spoken more often than not. At that time the church service was in English and Gaelic. This practise of having a service in both Gaelic and English continued in some areas until 1910 and 1 would suppose that the same would be true of the Cove.