Island Life

With the furore that exists in some quarters about the sale of our
coastal islands, I sometimes think what it must have been like when many
of the coastal islands were populated; My wife and I were light keepers
on Liscombe (Crooks) Island from July '63 to July '67 and like many
other island along the eastern shore Liscombe Island once was populated
to an extent that warranted a school that sat beside a listed road the
length of which was one and one half miles, meandering from the slipway
to the light station. The ruins of the school house foundation was near
the road about halfway through the island; the road forked a short
distance from the slip, the left fork(which was becoming overgrown) led
down toward the pond which is where the Crooks lived.

Farther along the right hand side of the road were quite a few
foundations, and some cleared land remaining in the fields, which were
rapidly falling victims to the encroaching spruce and alder growth. We
used to drive the station tractor out through these fields to go to the
spring near the western shore of the island.
I always found that a feeling of peace and serenity pervaded this spot. The land here sloped gradually to the north becoming thickly wooded. If one walked parallel to the road in this direction they would reach the cemetery, one of
three purported to be on the island, but I never found the other two.
The grave site were sadly overgrown with pulp sized spruce which had
in some cases up rooted the grave markers, most of which were slate, cut
from the islands cliff's, there were three, I think, which were marble
stones, one of which was that of Samuel Whiston and his wife. Samuel was
master at the island's school. If my memory serves me right, the date of
his death was 1888. I would visit this melancholy, yet somehow peaceful
spot, and sit and meditate on how it must have been back in the early
days for those who lived on and fished from the coastal islands.

Harbour Island across the Sound from my place on Darby Point was the
early home for the Burkes (and I suspect others as well) When I was a
boy all the front of the island was cleared land, and the old cellar
foundations still had remnants of the sills and summers, fastened with
mortise and tenon joints. The "Hollering Rock" which once was in my
field, (it's now on the beach, due to erosion) was used to call for
transportation to the island. Can you imagine what kind of lung power
one would need to hail the island against thirty mile per hour south
west wind!?!

What a pity that more people hadn't kept a day to day journal of the
lives and times back then. What fascinating reading it would make today.
A few mysteries would be solved as well, i.e.; the Bark house, which was
still standing when the earliest settlers arrived in Seal Harbour/Drum
Head. Why was it so named? Was it because, as my dad told me, it was
covered with birch bark?? Or was it built and occupied by a Barkhouse???

The answer lies in the ruins of it's root cellar and will never be
known. Adrienne Bayer(sic) did a dig around the foundation, but found
nothing significant; a few shards of pottery and broken glass, I
believe.Can anyone shed any light on the 'bark house'?

Regards,
Don.