Anne DeGrace
In my 37 years in Nelson I’ve experienced a dozen municipal elections, from the relatively undramatic to the seriously feisty. Local candidates — committed, enthusiastic and occasionally bombastic — generally make for a campaign season as colourful as the changing leaves.
I’m a bit of an election nerd: I like nothing better than settling in to watch/listen to/social-media-track election returns be they at the municipal, provincial or federal level. Throw in a pizza and a bottle of wine and I’m one happy camper. But there’s a whole lot more that comes first.
Last week I invited Touchstones Nelson archivist Jean-Phillippe Stienne (JP) to join me on our monthly radio show on Kootenay Co-op Radio (also called Check This Out, it airs every other Monday at 8:30 a.m. or online anytime). I had been thinking about current events viewed through the lens of history, and I wanted to let listeners know about opportunities for instructional hindsight on elections and other turning points.
We discussed the library’s local history collection, comprised primarily of books, pamphlets, and newspapers, as well as our collection of regional newspapers on microfilm as far back as 1894. We talked about UBC’s searchable digital collections of historic newspapers and other materials, wonderfully accessible to the historically curious.
JP brought in a fat file of ephemera: posters and pamphlets celebrating local civic highlights and democratic process and we talked about the physical memorabilia collected by Touchstones, including physical copies of local newspapers.
Anyone who has sat for hours scrolling through reels at the microfilm reader and knows what a neck-crooking experience that can be may like this alternative.
Because we were talking both history and collections, I decided to delve into John Norris’s entertaining book Historic Nelson: The Early Years. I was hoping to find some early election colour, and Norris’s narrative didn’t disappoint. Here’s his description of Nelson’s first election, which pitted John Houston against John Turner for the coveted top seat, and the town’s incorporation that set the whole thing off.
“On March 6 (1897) The Miner, under the headline NELSON INCORPORATED, announced that the bill, having been given assent by Lieutenant-Governor Dewdney on Thursday, March 4th, was now law. By his act ‘the town had cast off its village swaddling clothes and assumed the dignity of self-government in all local matters and laid the foundations for its future greatness.’”
What followed wasn’t especially dignified. The two local newspapers of the day each took up a candidatorial cause, with The Tribune backing Houston and The Miner backing Turner (Houston, a newspaperman, had himself established The Miner, sold it, and then started up The Tribune). Editorials in both papers attacked the character of the challenger; in the electoral arena things became heated, and fists flew.
Election day eventually arrived, and John Houston was declared mayor. Upon the news, writes Norris, the victorious candidate “was lifted and placed in a waiting carriage to be conducted along the length of Baker Street, pulled by ‘six solid citizens, each weighing over 200 pounds,’ and preceded by a band. Following the carriage came ‘the Smith-Fisher glee club with their Houston yell.’” The celebration, we’re told, lasted until early dawn.
You can get in on all the colourful pre-election action by attending any or all of the four events coming up before voting day on Oct. 20. First up is the 2018 Municipal Election Candi-dating and Forum at the library on Thursday at 7 p.m., presented in partnership with Social Planning Network. You can get the full local forum schedule at nelsonstar.com and candidate information at nelson.ca.
Become informed, because for all the fun and frolic elections are serious business. After the glee club settles down and the band goes home, there are foundations to be laid for future greatness.
Anne DeGrace is the adult services co-ordinator at the Nelson Public Library. Check This Out runs every other week.