All Hands on Deck – summer 2023, the first steps of a regional maritime heritage project
We are living the final days of August 2023. Peggy has sailed again on the St. Lawrence after over 70 years on the land. Even lay spectators acknowledged her grace as she sailed in Bic, Rimouski and Métis-sur-Mer. The sailors who sailed her on her first day, well, if you had seen their smiles…
My heart is filled with gratitude for the community revolving and gathering around Peggy. Métis-sur-Mer residents, including descendants of the hotel owners, staff and perhaps even patrons; sailors of all ages and origins as well as the boat craftsmen based in Bic, all passionate enough to spend hours in meetings and hands-on sessions with the aim to bring Peggy back to a sailing life.
Please allow me to name you:
Owners of the sailboat and instigators for the project: Sean & Ted Veit, John E. (Ted) Savage and Daniel St-Pierre;
Professionals and also passionate volunteers: Pierre-Luc Morin & Corentin Briand;
Sailors, riggers, advisors: Cornelius Hammer, Michael Scarratt, Becca Scarratt, Louis Arsenault, David Gleeson, Ted Savage, Léandre Couture;
Owners of sailboats on display in Rimouski, who even took visitors on board: Félix Charbonneau, Louis Arsenault, Daniel St-Pierre, Michael & Becca Scarratt, David Gleeson;
Bill & Doreen Pearce for their hospitality on the celebration of Peggy’s return to Métis-sur-Mer;
Diana Lafleur and Wendy Turriff for letting Peggy through their property between land and water, while we wait for a publicly accessible ramp in the city;
Tea-room hostess and baker Rita Turriff;
Filmmaker who shared his short documentary (Une main pour l’homme, une main pour le bateau): Guy Collet;
Sound system operator and other practical help: Jonathan Boucher.
All the visitors at the mill and all who came to watch Peggy sail, whether in a St-Jean-Port-Joli parking lot in the pouring rain or on the water in Bic, Rimouski or Métis-sur-Mer, who visited our joint exhibition in Métis-sur-Mer or participated in the first storytelling workshop. Special thanks to all those who shared their photographs or videos of the events with us.
And our precious partners, Maison de la Culture du Pic Champlain (Zornitsa Halacheva, Bic), Comité du patrimoine culturel et naturel du Bic (all board members and Jean Munro), Garde Côtière Auxiliaire Canadienne – Québec (GCAC-Q), Unité 14 – Rimouski & Unité 54 – Matane, Pompiers volontaires de Métis-sur-Mer, Marina de Rimouski, Club de Voile de Rimouski, Incontournable Productions (Laurie-Edwidge Cardinal, photographer), Latitude Marine, Parc National du Bic (Mélanie Sabourin), Archipel Aventures (Bernard Dugas), Festival Chants de marins in St-Jean-Port-Joli (Gwenn Amice & Alexandre Caron), Quebec Writers Federation (Felix Chau & Erin Linsday), Association socio-culturelle de Métis (Margaret Marrugg) and Comité du patrimoine de Price (Mario Bélanger and his team).
These summer events are but the beginning of a longer and broader project funded by Canadian Heritage, aiming to bring people together around various aspects of the regional maritime heritage.
Upcoming events:
– Friday, September 29. 5:30-7 pm, for the Journées de la Culture, focus on Peggy and the restoration process with Pierre-Luc Morin and Corentin Briand, boat builders at the marina in Rimouski.
– October 2023 to May 2024: series of monthly hands-on (and some hands-off!) workshops on boat maintenance, shipbuilding, navigation, rigging. These workshops will be led by a bilingual team of experienced sailors and boat builders to encourage all interested individuals to join. This is a unique opportunity to come in close contact with a heritage wooden boat and to learn theoretical and practical aspects of navigation and other boat-related skills. Come and join the sailing family!
For more information and to register, please contact Claire Newton at cnewton@heritagelsl.ca
While we were preparing for these events, it came to our ears that the last shipbuilding workshop standing in the village, Samuel and later Leonard Meikle’s workshop, was to be destroyed before the blasting of Killiecrankie Rock, in order to make way for roadworks on the 132. This workshop was a key component of the working built maritime heritage, as some of the older wooden sailboats still “alive” in Métis were built there by a Meikle. HLSL did not have the time or means to move the complete building, but with a diverse handful of dedicated volunteers, we managed to document the building and save meaningful tools, raw materials, and the large workbench with its attached wall.
I would like to thank here Marie-Eve Morrissette, Marielle Esclapez, Tony Turriff and John E. (Ted) Savage, as well as my HLSL colleagues Melinda Turriff and Milène Bélanger, for their skills, hard work, for the use of their trailer or for housing the resulting collection of artefacts. And my colleague Micheline Williams for keeping an eye out on Killiecrankie Rock!
Meikle workshop before demolition (left photo) , Meikle workshop wall being stored indoors (right photo)
Peggy in the rain on the parking lot at Festival des chants de marins, St-Jean-Pört-Joli – by Rachel McCrum
The team hoisting mast in the parking lot… – by Rachel McCrum
Team & Peggy in Bic by Incontournable Productions (Laurie-Edwidge Cardinal)
Peggy sailing in Bic by Incontournable Productions (Laurie-Edwidge Cardinal)
Peggy sailing in Bic by Guillaume Marie
View from Peggy, sailing in Bic – by HLSL (Annie Lecavalier)
Peggy in flotilla of small boats in the marina, Rimouski – by HLSL (Claire)
Peggy sailing in Metis by Luc Tellier
Crowd in Metis by Luc Tellier
