Month: March 2018

A Name is Still a Name by Any Other Name

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Roots to the PastThe following genealogy article was written by Diana Tibert, the genealogy columnist for The Citizen (Amherst, NS) and The Lunenburg County Progress Bulletin (Lunenburg County, NS) and author of Roots to the Past. It appeared in newspapers in January 2006.

Quarter Castle Publishing will publish Tibert’s columns in book form. Roots to the Past – Book 1 will be released in late 2018. It will contain columns written from October 2005 (when the column began) to December 2006.  Stay tuned to learn more about this book as the release date approaches.

A Name is Still a Name by Any Other Name

Diana Tibert

William and John TypertPhoto: My grandfather William (right) had a few nicknames, including Wil, Bamp and Pop. His son, John, was recorded in the family Bible as William John, but was later known as John William (1942).

While growing up in Nova Scotia, I had three friends by the name of Michael. At an early age, they were given their own variation of Michael in the neighbourhood so everyone knew which Michael was being talked about without adding last names: Michael (who sometimes was called only by his last name: Harrison), Mike and Mikey.

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The Coldest December

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A Short Story Collection to Remember the Halifax Explosion

Original Stories by Nova Scotia Authors: Sheila McDougall, Phil Yeats, Lawren Snodgrass, Catherine A. MacKenzie, Polly J. Brown, Diane Lynn McGyver, Cheryl Lynn Davis, Bronwen Piper, Barbara-Jean Moxsom, Liana Olive Quinn and Annemarie Hartnett.

Business as Usual

Phil Yeats

The Coldest December“JENKSINS,” MORROW, THE DUTY SERGEANT, called out as I followed two other patrolmen into the Halifax Police Station. “Get over here. Now!”

After finishing school in the spring of 1916, I’d volunteered for the army. I’d been declared unfit for service because of my poor vision and thrown back onto the streets, an outcast as I’d been through my school days. I’d always been excluded from sports and treated as an invalid because I wore spectacles.

Rejection by the army turned me into a different sort of pariah. Everyone saw me as a big, strong lad shirking my responsibility to fight the Hun. It didn’t matter that I squinted at them through thick lenses and protested that I’d attempted to join the army. I was seen as a failure, a weak, passive coward who wouldn’t fight for his country.

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Not Enough Blood

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Diana Tibert admits upfront that, “I am NOT a doctor. I am NOT a nurse or a medical practitioner of any type. I have no formal education in the medical field.”

But she has a problem, one that started in her late 30s. In her upcoming book, she tells her story in simple terms because there is no need for text-book language when the message is meant for the common person.

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The Coldest December

/ Diane / Leave a comment

A Short Story Collection to Remember the Halifax Explosion

Original Stories by Nova Scotia Authors: Sheila McDougall, Phil Yeats, Lawren Snodgrass, Catherine A. MacKenzie, Polly J. Brown, Diane Lynn McGyver, Cheryl Lynn Davis, Bronwen Piper, Barbara-Jean Moxsom, Liana Olive Quinn and Annemarie Hartnett.

Blue

Sheila McDougall

The Coldest DecemberHIS EYES WERE AS BLUE as the May forget-me-nots on Citadel Hill where they first picnicked on the cool spring earth. As blue as the cornflowers Mother grew in her summer garden. As blue as the harbour below, reflecting the summer sky.

When she’d go on, he’d colour up and shake his head in protest. “Don’t be daft,” he’d scold, but she could tell he liked it.

He liked her, too, more than her friends Jane and Mary who accompanied her to the waterfront that day. His cheeky compliments, spoken in accented English foreign to her ears, told her so.

He was short, not much taller than Kate, and slight of build. He looked no more than a boy, a handsome youth in his middy and seaman’s cap, but his wit set him apart from the other young men jostling for notice.

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Throw Away Kitten

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Throw Away Kitten by Candy McMudd

Children’s Novel – ages 6 to 12

Charlie McBean has always dreamt of a kitten of his own, but he’s already ten and doesn’t have one. His family moves from the city to an old farm house where he discovers a box of kittens left in his neighbour’s yard.

When his neighbour says he’ll take the throw-away kittens to the shelter, Charlie and his sister Cavell volunteer to find homes for them. As potential owners start to arrive to see the kittens, Charlie worries his plan of keeping one for himself will fail.

Get it now at Amazon.

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Catholic Irish and Protestant Irish in Canada

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Roots to the PastThe following genealogy article was written by Diana Tibert, the genealogy columnist for The Citizen (Amherst, NS) and The Lunenburg County Progress Bulletin (Lunenburg County, NS) and author of Roots to the Past. It appeared in newspapers in 2016.

Quarter Castle Publishing will publish Tibert’s columns in book form. Roots to the Past – Book 1 will be released in late 2018. It will contain columns written from October 2005 (when the column began) to December 2006.  Stay tuned to learn more about this book as the release date approaches.

shamrockHappy St. Patrick’s Day

Catholic Irish and Protestant Irish in Canada

Diana Tibert

I haven’t studied any religion in depth. I’m more of a browser, reading bits and pieces of various religions and cults that have been created over the centuries to try to understand why people lived the way they did. With this curiosity, I began reading about the religions that separated the Irish.

During most of my early life, I heard news reports about Catholics and Protestants battling in Northern Ireland. When I was younger, I thought they were stories from long ago because no one in my small world hated another simply because of their religion.

As a young teen in the late 70s, I learned the stories were current and told about a religious war fought in the modern-day world. It was foreign to me, and I couldn’t wrap my brain around it because—to my knowledge—it didn’t happen in Canada. Why couldn’t they just get along?

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