First Day in the Field

Walkway leading to St. Stephen's Anglican Church

One before photo we took of a particularly dirty monument.  

This last week has been fairly productive. I finished the ethics form required for certain aspects of my project (I may be interviewing the custodian of the Church), volunteered with the OCSV, went to an OCSV tour of Ross Bay, and completed my first day at St. Stephen's Anglican Church! For the last two Saturdays I have made my way to Ross Bay to join cleaning sessions held by the OCSV. Last Saturday it was raining pretty heavily and so only one other volunteer showed up. Instead of cleaning, the other volunteer, a member of the OCSV, explained to me how to clean a monument and showed me the tools that the OCSV uses. This Saturday was gorgeous and so we worked on scraping off moss on many of the burial enclosures (before and after pictures provided below). This was the last cleaning session the OCSV is going to hold this year, but next year (probably beginning in the Spring), they will be holding them every Saturday. Volunteers are welcome, so please join if this is something you may be interested in! The tour of Ross Bay was great fun as well! They have a few exciting tours/ events coming up. Of most interest to me is the Murder Most Foul tour planned for November 3. They have a list of tour themes on their website, here.

After we finished cleaning. 

Area of the cemetery I was working in.

My first day at the Church went quite well. It was a beautiful day out! Firstly, I want to thank St. Stephen's Church for allowing me to do this research and giving me so many great resources to work with! I spent some time walking around the monuments to the south of the Church, marking on a map which ones fell into the date range I am using (1827-1911, although burials at the Church did not begin until 1869). I then spent ALOT of time trying to figure out how to make an Access database more accessible. I realize this is not necessary, but if I can create a database that is easy for people to use that would be ideal. This requires a lot of fiddling with forms and buttons and it is definitely a learning curve! I also found out today that a detailed copying of monument inscriptions did not occur at St. Stephen's in 1994 as had previously been thought. So for next Thursday I plan to haul out the necessary cleaning equipment (gentle soap, buckets, soft plastic bristled brush, toothbrush), clean monuments, and copy inscriptions. I am looking forward to it! Here is one more photo from my day on Thursday. Fall is definitely my favourite season!!