Ancestral Roofs

"In Praise of Older Buildings"

Thursday, September 24, 2015

Bright On!

Bright On! Not mine but I like it.

Heard it on the car radio while I was (briefly) a citizen of this lovely town last week, encamped outside the walls, at Presqu'ile PP.



beautiful site of  the former town hall, post 1973 tornado




On my several errands to the town's lovely welcoming library, I captured a couple of very appealing buildings. On my drives through its green residential streets, finding a new route 'home' after each town trip, I vowed to return for a wander, resisting just once the lure of the shore.


Brighton has great appeal.
Brighton Funeral Home - great house

Great history.
A tornado. An appalling passenger train fire. The downtown fire. Newcastle, the townsite that never developed, as a result of a terrible shipwreck in 1804. A great restored historic home, Proctor House.

Great historians.
I wrote about Dan Buchanan 'the history guy' at the end of this recent post which introduced you to Ralph and Eugenia Bangay, the creator/curators of Memory Junction railway Museum. Dan just published a super history whodunnit, about (the only) nasty branch of his family tree.

And of course, there's my friend Florence Chatten, another local historian and a lovely soul, who has had a large role to play in many local histories. Including her own Brighton Township, where she shares neighbours' memories of the area.

Great history event. This coming February (to banish all reluctance about falling into winter) will bring us the third annual Brighton History Open House, with events on February 18, 20 and 21. This year will focus on the area's railway history.





Great independent bookseller. Lighthouse Books. Of course Mia Woodburn and Ann Dobby had all my favourite local histories; managed to pick up one I didn't have, That's Just the Way We Were. And yes, Florence was a willing and able contributor.
Proctor House





Mia told me about Lighthouse's regular book events; the photos include a signing by my favouite Canadian author - Jane Urquhart, almost a local. Another reason to love Brighton.


Now. Back to the shore.







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