Edith and handsome guy. On that trip to Potton Springs. 1910 era
We just had the quadracentenary and the same thing happened with Paul McCartney being chosen as the headliner.
Now, until I started writing Flo in the City (about a girl coming of age in 1908-1913, based on the real letters of Tighsolas at http://www.tighsolas.ca/ I never realized that the 1908 trip Margaret took to LaTuque and Quebec was to see the Prince.
I don’t have any letters describing what happened in Quebec, just what happened in La Tuque. But I do know that she left Richmond for Levis on the 21, and that she stayed at the Kennebec Hotel and that she was there for the 22nd and 23rd, and that is when the Prince of Wales, the future George V arrived and the day all kinds of ceremonies, with Sir Wilfrid Laurier and Earl Grey the Governor General were held. There were pyrotechnics, too
I also learned that this event was a massive military exercise. It was a HUGE show, according to a military writer whose essay I’ve dug up. Of course, with WWI this show was overshadowed by the real thing.
PS. I have no way to stick this in the story (as the Nicholsons would not have known about it, but on June 31st a giant meteor fell on Siberia, wasting miles and miles and knocking people miles away out of their beds. It was another HUGE event.
What this means is that I have to read some commentary on the event, from English and French sides and figure out how to sum it all up. Margaret’s visit is a great opportunity for me to get some Canadian History into the story. This event was initially about celebrating the 300 anniversary of Samuel de Champlain’s founding of Quebec. They re-enacted the Battle at the Plains of Abraham, among other historical scenarios. It morphed into a vanity exercise more about British military might, from what I can read.
