Christa Loughlin has always had a passion for crime fiction. She attributes that to having six police officers in her family and listening to their many stories over the years. As a result, she became familiar with the various aspects of policework including procedures and terminology. Christa’s love for murder mysteries grew even more through reading, watching, and listening to anything that left her trying to figure out the who’s and why’s of the story.
Christa had a 28-year career as a Registered Massage Therapist, with a large part of that time spent practicing in Little Britain, Ontario. She recently retired from massage therapy, and is living in Peterborough, Ontario with her husband, Paul, their cat, Scout, and their dog, Dexter—who is absolutely named after the serial killer.
About the Book – Young women aren’t safe in Oshawa with a sadistic serial killer on the loose. Detective Sergeant Hannah Phillips is fierce and dogged as she tirelessly works to find out who is behind the abductions and murders of young women around the Ontario city. After one of the missing women is found alive, Hannah and her Durham Regional Police Service special task force, hope to finally solve the mystery and put a stop to The Pallbearer once and for all.
At the centre of the police investigation into the The Pallbearer is Matt Davidson, the son of a wealthy and renowned plastic surgeon. Matt continues to find himself on the wrong side of the law, being charged for criminal offenses multiple times in the past three years. He claims he is innocent and being framed but nobody—not even his father—believes him. When Matt’s charges are upgraded to murder, he finds an unlikely ally in Bobby Ross, a tenacious investigative reporter with a Toronto newspaper.
Meanwhile, Kelly Griggs awakens alone in a cold, dark room, held captive and tormented by the Pallbearer. She scrambles to find an escape before her captor exerts his twisted desires.
Slowly, dark secrets from the past are revealed, and the present becomes clearer. Can Hannah solve the mystery and save Kelly before it’s too late? Who is The Pallbearer?
Bobcaygeon resident publishes his first book of poetry, Expressions of a Poetic Posty. Now a retired postal worker, Morgan published the book at his daughter’s insistence.
Books:
Expressions of a Poetic Posty (2020) – One man’s journey through life’s hardships, high points and life-defining moments expressed through the art of poetic writing. A compilation of moments spanning a lifetime, written by a retired postal worker who has deep emotions and puts pen to paper to help himself process all that life throws at him. His writing will take you to these places with him and his beautiful written voice is one that many can relate too.
Three Kawartha Lakes writers were the judges for the 1941 anthology, Voices of Victory: representative poetry of Canada in wartime, a publication of the Canadian Authors Association, sponsored by the Seven Seas chapter of the IODE.
The anthology was the idea of the Poetry Group of Toronto. The project was taken on by the Canadian Authors Association, overseen by an editorial board with selection by a committee of judges. The final volume was compiled by Amabel King with a forward by Charles G.D. Roberts.
The purpose of the anthology was two-fold: to send the proceeds from sales to the Canadian Red Cross British Bomb Victims’ Fund, and “to let the poetic genius of Canada and of the Canadian people sound a spiritual challenge to the brutality of enemy despots and tyrants.”
The judges were A.M. Stephen, Watson Kirkconnell, E.J. Pratt, E.A. Hardy, S. Morgan-Powell, and V.B. Rhodenizer. The editorial board consisted of Nathaniel Benson, W.A. Deacon, John M. Elson, and Amabel King.
(Kirkconnell, Pratt, Hardy, and Deacon were all residents of Kawartha Lakes and active members of the Canadian Authors Association. Click on the links to see their pages for more details. Kirkconnell’s page is coming soon.)
The anthology featured poems from three Kawartha Lakes writers: Dorothy C. Herriman, Watson Kirkconnell, and E.J. Pratt.
Some writers were invited, some were included as sponsors (the Poetry Group of Toronto), and 766 others from every province and territory submitted their work to be judged for inclusion and for the chance at winning a prize. First prize was a silver medal donated by His Excellency the Earl of Athlone, Governor General of Canada, Alexander Cambridge, a patron of the Canadian Authors Association. The top three poems received prizes donated by Robert Young Eaton, Sir William Mulock, and the Poetry Group of Toronto. The prize for Honourable Mentions was being included in the anthology and went to 20 entries.
The male-to-female ratio of judges that made up the committee was somewhat controversial:
In addition, the volunteer work of the judges is acknowledged in print in the association anthologies, usually in a preface or foreword, whereas most editors are unnamed. Border Voices, edited by Carl Eayn in 1946, and Voices of Victory (1941), in which Livesay’s “The Child Looks Out appears, constitute the two exceptions to this rule. The editorial board of Voices of Victory consisted of three men and one woman and its judges were all male. The preponderance of female writers in association anthologies, including those both edited and judged by male writers, suggests the articulation of gender with democracy, that is, with the power of numbers; most of the submissions to the poetry contests of association anthologies were from women writers, a fact that reflects the female domination of the CAA’s membership lists.
Second place – Isobel McFadden for “Canadian Crusade”
Third place – Carole Coates Cassidy for “Chosen of Men.”
The editor, Amabel Reeves King, was a Volunteer Ambulance Driver oversees during the First World War. She was a neighbour of poet John M. Nelson, who also contributed to the volume.
The volume was published by McMillian Company, Toronto, 1941.
In March of 1883, the editor of the Canadian Post called out rival paper, the Warder, for spreading fake news. In a column titled, “A Specimen Warder Lie,” the Post reprinted the paragraph of “untruthfulness” and followed with a cheeky rebuttal.
The Fenelon Falls Gazette asks . . . us to say why the Dominion government took so deep an interest in the counties of Victoria and Peterboro as to vote $390,000 for Trent navigation on the eve of an election. This is easily answered. The Dominion government DID NOT VOTE A CENT OF THE MONEY TILL AFTER THE ELECTION WAS OVER AND DONE, and had Mr. Keith been returned instead of Mr. H. Cameron there never would have been a cent granted to this day. [Warder, Feb 23.]
This above is a characteristic specimen of the Warder’s unblushing mendacity. We are amazed that even the Warder should venture on a statement the untruthfulness of which is patent to everyone. It is perfectly well-known that the sum in question was voted in the session of 1882, prior to the elections, and for the express purpose of influencing the ten or twelve ridings along the line of the work. The Warder could not possibly have been so hopelessly ignorant as not to know this fact. Stand up, there, Ananias, and declare on Mr. Fee’s affidavit whether you did, or did not, knowingly tell a lie in the above paragraph.
The Canadian Post, Friday, March 2, 1883.
In fact, the Post called out the Warder for spreading lies on more than one occasion, and editor Sir Sam Hughes even faced charges of slander.
Fake news has been around forever. It is the reason we need ethics in journalism and diverse newspapers and not a single conglomerate controlling all media. Imagine if the Warder had been the only newspaper in 1883.
William Albert Sherwood (1859-1919) was born in Omemee on August 1, 1859. His father, William Sherwood, was born England, settled his family in Omemee, where he worked as a shoemaker. His mother was Eliza from Ireland, and his siblings included five brothers (Henry, Thomas, George, Joseph, Arthur) and three sisters (Ann, Jane, Laura.)
In 1881, The Canadian Post began publishing Sherwood’s poetry, starting with lines dedicated to the Rev. Dr. Jeffers, titled, “Mind and Matters.” At the time, Sherwood was living locally in Kawartha Lakes (then Victoria County.) The editor took a shining to Sherwood’s work and went on to publish many of his poems. Then, in the June 11, 1886 edition, the Post published this brief note about Sherwood, “We notice that Mr. W. A. Sherwood, artist, has taken charge of the department of drawing, painting and perspective at the Toronto business college.”
Even after Sherwood moved to Toronto, the Post continued to publish his poems, but by this time so were the Toronto papers and other papers across Canada and editors of poetry collections. It wasn’t long before Sherwood had his own volume of poetry published.
LAKE COUCHICHING
Oft have I loitered listening, Couchiching,
To the soft lull of distant waving trees
At evening, and the sweet murmuring
Of waters waken'd with the evening breeze
To one, whilst wandering thy shores along
Unseen, sweet voices hymn their evening song.
Long since the Red Man named thee Couchiching,
Or built his wigwam rude upon thy shore;
But longer after shall the minstrel sing
Of him that named thee but knows thee no more.
Unlike with thee had I that minstrel power,
I'd sing thee long, I'd sing thee every hour!
Hallowed that mourn when first we learn to know
How near to Nature are the hearts we prove;
More hallowed still in even's after-glow,
How dear to Nature is the one we love.
Thus thy bright waters, joyous Couchiching,
O'er one I love for ever seem to sing.
From, Songs of the Great Dominion, edited by William Douw Lighthall, Walter Scott, England, 1889.
Sherwood also wrote about Canadian art and gave speeches at events with his speeches being reproduced as essays in the Toronto papers. His most well-known essay was “The National Aspect of Canadian Art” that was included in Canada: and Encyclopaedia of the Country: History of Presbyterianism, edited by John Castell Hopkins, Linscott Publishing Company, 1898.
The want of a broad sympathetic interest in national Art has, however, deterred the progress and, to a large measure, fatally injured this branch of the Art life of our country. The evil has been increased by the taste of men of wealth in Montreal and Toronto, who have covered their walls with foreign pictures largely to the exclusion of native work. The contention that the native work is not equal in artistic treatment is advanced, and that it does not possess names which are world-honoured.
“The National Aspect of Canadian Art” by W.A. Sherwood, 1898.
Sherwood painted his first portrait at age 15 and soon rose to prominence in Canadian art circles. In the 1881 Census, at just 26 years of age, Sherwood’s occupation is listed as ‘Artist.’ The best known of his paintings included, “The Gold Prospector,” which was in the possession of the Ontario Government at the time of Sherwood’s death, “The Canadian Rancher,” “The Canadian Backwoodsman,” “The Entomologist,” and “The Negotiation,” (pictured below) which was purchased by the Dominion Government.
His most controversial portrait was that of Sir George Ross.
In 1901, the Ross Club decided to have a portrait painted of the Premier of Ontario, Sir George Ross, for whom the club was named. They commissioned Sherwood, and the portrait was presented to Ross at a meeting in November that year at St. George’s Hall in Toronto.
Sherwood’s requested fee of $500 went unpaid. He claimed the frame alone cost him $100. He was paid $50.
Turns out, Ross despised the painting. He insisted that after the presentation the picture be “turned to the wall and shoved aside.”
Instead, the painting was shipped to his home. Where his future wife, Mildred Peel, painted over it with a portrait of Laura Secord. The Secord painting was hung in the Provincial Legislature and she was paid a commission. Ross and Peel were married in 1907.
“Laura Secord” by Mildred Peel, 1904. At the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. (https://www.ola.org/en/photo/laura-secord)Detail of “Laura Secord” (left) and a 1936 x-ray of the same painting revealing the George Ross portrait beneath (right)
Among others, portrait subjects included Rev. Dr. Scadding, S.P. May, Lieut.-Col. A. E. Belcher, Alexander McLauchlan, the poet Sir Aemilius Irving, and Miss Pauline Johnson.
Sherwood exhibited in Canada, Great Britain and the United States. He was one of the founders of the Central School of Art and Design of Toronto and the Anglo-Saxon Union. He served as president of the Progress Club of Toronto in 1898 and also of the Victoria County Old Boys’ Association. He was a member of the Ontario Society of Artists, an Associate of the Royal Canadian Academy, and life member of the Canadian Institute.
In 1899, his painting, “St. Bernard,” was one of several selected by the Provincial Education Department and purchased by the Provincial Government. (Report of the Minister of Education, Ontario, 1899. Ontario Sessional Papers, 1900, No. 12-14.)
Sherwood died December 5, 1919 in Toronto and was buried at the Mount Pleasant Cemetery. He was unmarried with no children.
Works:
Sherwood, W. A., Lays, Lyrics and Legends, Hunter-Rose, 1914.
“Temperance soldiers: song and chorus,” lyrics by W.A. Sherwood, music by J.F. Johnstone. 1887.
“THE ROSS CLUB MEETING.” The Globe (1844-1936) Nov 12 1901.
“W. A. SHERWOOD, LOCAL ARTIST, PASSES AWAY: NOTED AS PAINTER OF PORTRAITS AND CANADIAN SCENE PICTURES END COMES SUDDENLY.” The Globe (1844-1936) Dec 06 1919.
“Funeral of W. A. Sherwood to Mt. Pleasant Cemetery.” The Globe (1844-1936) Dec 09 1919.
“TORY PAINTED ROSS PORTRAIT, LATER HEROINIE: PRESENTATION OF “LAURA SECORD” OIL 30 YEARS AGO RECALLED.” The Globe (1844-1936) Feb 26 1936.
Hollay Ghadery. Image from author’s facebook profile.
On the afternoon of Saturday, April 22, 2023, Hollay Ghadery launched her poetry collection, Rebellion Box, at the Kawartha Lakes Museum & Archives.
The occasion was a drop-in event, allowing guests to arrive anytime between 1pm and 4pm to visit with the author, buy her books, and enjoy the refreshments she brought.
My visit with the author was brief, but included chatting about women’s issues and the ghosts that haunt the old jail that houses the museum.
The museum is an excellent location for the launch since the title poem, “Rebellion Box,” was inspired by small wooden boxes made at Fort Henry by prisoners from the Rebellion of 1837.
The collection includes 63 poems of various types, and presents a portrait of the author as she pushes against the limitations of gender roles, race, bodies and minds.
That portrait is at times intimate, as in “Postcard, Santa Maria,” where the author writes,
I'm not that girl
anymore. I
have the
conviction
of dust and
the cervix
of a fifteen-year-old,
my doctor says.
Not bad
for four kids
so I believe
in anything
so I can
belive
at all.
Other poems like “Search History” and “Fight like a Girl” feel universal and vast. The collection conveys many relatable experiences.
What follows is my interview with Hollay Ghadery about Rebellion Box.
KLW: What made you first take up writing poetry?
HG: I started writing poetry because it seemed the most fitting way to process my understanding of the world. I live with OCD and anxiety and from the time I was a young child, I needed someway to make sense of the way I experienced life, which I recognized was at odds with what most people experienced. Poetry—this small, exacting form—gave me a manageable way to try to make sense of the enormity of what I was feeling, as I was feeling it, without having to have the vocabulary to analyze it—which I didn’t have as a kid.
Poetry is, for me, a way to take control of something, but also, to let it go—very important when living with OCD.
KLW: As someone who also lives with high anxiety, I very much understand the need to find something that can be controlled or managed. How do you keep anxiety and OCD from turning into paralyzing perfectionism or otherwise preventing you from publishing and sharing your work?
HG: My OCD and anxiety centre around existential dread that I may not have time to do and say everything I want to, so I definitely don’t have an issue sending my work out there into the world.
KLW: Some of your poems feel like they come from a deeply personal place, while others have a clearly separate voice to them. Do you write all of your poetry from your own self, or do you adopt a point of view or persona when you write?
HG: Everything I write is from my own experience; my own self. Even if I am writing through another persona, it’s because I’ve seen something in that individual that resonates with me; I’ve found a connection. Usually, a connection that makes me feel less alone in something I struggle with. For instance, I wrote a poem for Thomas Foster–the former mayor of Toronto and a businessman. On the surface, we have little in common but Foster also created (or had created), The Foster Memorial: a Byzantine-inspired mausoleum located outside Uxbridge, Ontario. It was erected1936 in honour of his daughter, Ruby, who died just before her tenth birthday of pneumonia, and his wife, Elizabeth, who died a few years later of an undocumented cause. Living with existential OCD, I understand the very existential impulse to create art as a means to immortality.
KLW: One last question: what advice do you have for someone just starting to write poetry?
HG: Great question! I’d say to read poetry and read it widely. There are so many different types and styles and I find many people new to writing it have a relatively narrow understanding of the scope, and as a result, can really stunt their own development. Also, read interviews with poets. Read reviews of books of poetry. Really immerse yourself on the more technical side of the art. It’s not glamorous but I think it’s necessary to write well.
In the 1920s in Bobcaygeon, there arose a constellation of writers, including some of Canada’s most decorated poets and influential newspaper editors. At the heart of this constellation was a group of men who cottaged together and were at the forefront of defining Canadian culture. And they seemed to have a hate on for Lucy Maud Montgomery.
It all started with Arthur L. Phelps, who came to Bobcaygeon as a youth, again as a minister, and finally bought a cottage in 1919. He invited the friends he’d made at Victoria College in Toronto to visit him during the summers. They fell in love with the area on the banks of the Sturgeon Lake, and some bought cottages of their own, while others became regular visitors.
[Arthur L. Phelps] was part of a group of men who spent their summers in cottages at Bobcaygeon, Ontario, where their families socialized and the men themselves talked over their ideas about the state of Canadian literature, world literature, and politics. This group included other academics, journalists (like [William Arthur] Deacon), and writers invited to join them (like Frederick Philip Grove).”
Lucy Maud Montgomery: the gift of wings. Mary Henley Rubio. 2008.
The next to snap up a cottage was E.J. Pratt, the three-time winner of the Governor General’s Award for Literature for his poetry. After visiting Phelps, Pratt fell in love with the place. Pratt had a grand old time in Bobcaygeon. He established a garden, built a writer’s shed on the shore where he composed most of his poetry for the time while he owned the cottage, and hosted many guests.
The next to buy a cottage was William Arthur Deacon, who became Canada’s first full-time book reviewer, fulfilling one of his life’s ambitions, as editor of Saturday Night magazine and the Globe and Mail.
“ln 1925, for $400 in easy instalments, they also acquired a piece of land at Bobcaygeon, in the Kawartha Lakes district near Peterborough, a part of the summer colony that included the Pratts and the Phelps.” (“William Arthur Deacon: A Canadian Literary Life.” Clara Thomas and John Lennox. 1982)
In those days, writers and poets alike joined the Canadian Authors’ Association (CAA), where membership afforded connections to other writers, along with workshops and other learning options, to say nothing of publishing opportunities in the organization’s anthologies and magazines.
For many, writing is a solitary profession, and organizations such as CAA are a lifeline, giving writers the chance to get out and commiserate and network with other people who can immediately empathize, no explanation needed.
Where a chapter of the CAA did not exist, many writers opted to create one, as Deacon did when he lived in Winnipeg.
At the same time, the sources of literature and radio in Canada were primarily Britain and America, and there arose a need to produce and promote Canadian content. This became a highly debated topic, as no definition of “Canadian” had been made, but in very short order, a plethora of Canadian literature was produced and the CBC was created.
In addition to his professorship duties, Phelps became host to a number of CBC programs that debated and defined Canadian culture, broadcasting throughout his career, even from his deathbed in 1970.
Deacon, in his editorial positions, decided which books got reviews and which were passed over. And Deacon was instrumental in the creation of the Governor General’s Award for Literature, and which Pratt won three times. Other visitors to the cottages also won this prestigious prize and cash award.
When it came to Lucy Maud Montgomery, this crew from Bobcaygeon did not feel her work was worthy of inclusion as part of the nation’s culture, nor as being worthy of winning a prize.
They excluded Montgomery’s work because it was written for children and well-loved by girls and women all around the world. They were jealous of her sales numbers– which none of them had achieved more than a fraction in comparison.
Their jealousy and misogyny frustrated Montgomery. When she ran for president of the Toronto branch of the Canadian Authors Association and learned she was up against Deacon, she withdrew because she knew of his connection to the Bobcaygeon crew and how vast this network extended.
It does not matter in the least to me that I am not on the executive. Deacon has always pursued me with malice and I am glad I will have no longer to work with him. He is exceedingly petty and vindictive and seems to be detested by everybody who knows him.
L.M. Montgomery (Rubio, 2008)
On the occasion of Canada’s National Book Week in September 1935, the Toronto branch of the CAA hosted an event to celebrate those who had received the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE) that year; advertising stated the occasion would honour “three knights and two OBEs”: Sir Ernest MacMillan, Sir Wyly Grier, Sir Charles G. D. Roberts, L.M. Montgomery, OBE, and Dr. E. A. Hardy, OBE. It was a hugely important event for Canada’s literary scene.
One of the organizers was Pelham Edgar, a professor, and at that time, president of the national level of the CAA. Pelham was a good friend of Pratt and the other Bobcaygeon boys, had been invited to the cottage, and was no friend to Montgomery. Pelham proposed a toast to each of the five honourees. He spent considerable time delving into the accomplishments of the first three, and then finished with “The other two who are included in this toast are Dr. Hardy and Mrs. Macdonald.”
Montgomery’s biographer, Mary Rubino, supposes Maud could have been overly sensitive since a knighthood is a higher award than an OBE, but Montgomery was certain that it was a snub and that if Edgar had stopped to sing the praises for Hardy, he would have had to admit that she was of literary merit. She believed Edgar “would have died any death you could mention rather than admit I represented Canadian literature.”
A write up in the Globe corroborates Montgomery’s version of the event. After being toasted, each of the five made replies, but the write up by Deacon in the The Mail and Empire omits any mention of Hardy’s and Montgomery’s replies. It’s as though the Bobcaygeon boys had decided Montgomery simply didn’t exist.
By this time, Montgomery had shifted to writing books for adults, including A Tangled Web and The Blue Castle, sales had slowed, and her work was called “provincial” at a time when books were prized for being “cosmopolitan” and favoured for having “universal” themes. For a while, The Blue Castle was banned.
This was the beginning of Montgomery’s descent from publishing. She was a victim of the Bobcaygeon boys’ bullying that became cultural programming that ascribed “literary” works as better than “commercial” works.
Had any of them even read her work?
No.
At least not while she was alive.
When Phelps wrote his book, Canadian Writers (1951), he included a chapter about Montgomery, but proceeded to call her work “naïve” and “easy reading” that “lacks realism and penetration.” In fact for most of the chapter, he didn’t mention her work much at all, but wrote about other writers: Robert W. Service, who had his own chapter, and Mazo de la Roche. He said Montgomery’s readers were “nostalgic” and “sentimental” and only for “the uncultured and unsophisticated.” Finally, the last two pages of the chapter covered Montgomery and her work. He checked out her books from the library, where he was told not to keep them too long as they were in high demand. He finally read the Anne novels, and decided “there may still be a place for the stories of L.M. Montgomery.” He ended the chapter with “get a copy of Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery and read it.” Unfortunately, Montgomery had passed away in 1942, wanting to believe she had a place in Canadian literature, but never actually achieving it until after the deaths of the Bobcaygeon boys.
But even today, the idea that “literary” fiction is superior to “commercial” fiction lingers. The literary community still has much work to do to detangle this particular net cast by the Bobcaygeon boys and their constellation of friends.
Further Reading:
Phelps, Arthur L. Canadian Writers. McClelland and Stewart Limited. 1951.
Rubio, Mary Henley. L.M. Montgomery: The Gift of Wings. Doubleday Canada. 2008.
Lindsay native turned stagecoach robber, Pearl Hart (1871-1935), was also a poet.
On April 19, 1871, Lillie Naomi Davey was born in Lindsay, Ontario to parents, Albert Davey and Anna Duval. (Anna was also born in Lindsay in 1846.) She had eight siblings. Her father was a drunken lout who sexually assaulted a young girl. He was many times sentenced to jail in Lindsay for drunk and disorderly conduct, but after attempting to rape the young girl at knife point and being sentenced to a year in prison along with twelve strokes of the cat-o-nine-tails, he moved the family to Belleville, then to Orillia. It’s speculated that he sexually abused his eldest daughters, including Lillie and her sister Katy.
In her teen years, she called herself Lillie de la Valle, meaning Lillie of the Valley, and would eventually become Pearl Hart. Her upbringing was traumatic and violent. The family lived in poverty and frequently moved.
When she was 13, she and her younger sister, Katy, 11, cut their hair, dressed in their brother’s clothes, and stowed away aboard a lake steamer. They ended up in Buffalo, New York, where they found jobs in a local factory. It was two months before their mother found them.
After the family moved to Rochester, the Notorious Davey girls, Lillie and Katy, continued their charade as boys and thieved their way across the American mid-west, making headlines and telling their stories to reporters. They were arrested many times, and eventually Lillie was placed at Mercer Reformatory in Toronto.
After completing her term at Mercer, she rejoined Katy in Buffalo. By this time Katy had been working for a brothel and adopted the name, Minnie Hart. The brothel’s owner was named Pearl Hart, her common-law husband was Joe Hart. After she’d earned enough for Joe to open a saloon, Pearl closed her brothel. And Katy, as Minnie Hart, opened one of her own. She was only sixteen. Her sister joined her and they both worked as prostitutes.
Lillie hooked up with a young man and went west; the relationship didn’t last. While in Phoenix, Arizona, she worked as a prostitute using the name Pearl Hart. She scandalously wore men’s clothing, chain-smoked cigarettes, which she laced with opium, and became addicted to morphine. Her addicted, abusive husband found her Phoenix, she took him back, and through their tumultuous relationship, they conceived two children, a boy and a girl, which she sent to be raised by her family. When he resumed his abusive ways, she left him again. In 1898, opium use was legal, but prostitution was not, and Arizona began to crack down on its brothels, prompting Pearl to look for new work.
In 1899, she headed for a small mining settlement, set up her own tents for prostitution and learned how to shoot guns, but felt she could make more money in a larger town, so she relocated to Globe. Her abusive husband found her again, and took all her money before she kicked him out. Then Pearl received word that her mother was sick and wanted to see her before she died. Pearl said the news made her temporarily insane. She had no money to make the trip.
At that time, stagecoach robbery was becoming fashionable for criminals near Globe. So, to get enough money for a trip home, Pearl and her companion, Joe Boot, conceived the idea to rob a stagecoach.
On May 2, 1899, Pearl, dressed in a man’s clothing, and Joe robbed their first stagecoach. They made out with more than $300 and a pair of pistols, but gave back a silver dollar to each of the passengers. No one was hurt, but as soon as the coach arrived in Globe, the manhunt began.
They were captured on June 2. The woman stagecoach robber made national headlines. Reporters came from all over, and Pearl happily told her story to all of them, and even posed for photos. The sheriff let her wear men’s clothing and pose with unloaded guns.
Pearl was locked up in Tucson, where she struggled with her morphine addiction and was allowed visitors, which were frequent and included the pair of journalists who interviewed her for Cosmopolitan.
On October 11 and with the help of another prisoner, Pearl escaped, making headlines again, and this time her recently adopted feminist views were included in the stories; feminism was fast becoming fashionable at the time. Pearl’s significance as an icon was debated in the papers across the nation.
I shall never submit to be tried under the law that neither I nor my sex had a voice in making.
Pearl Hart
Nine days later, the pair were captured in New Mexico. Pearl and Joe faced trial in November, and were found guilty. He was sentenced to thirty years, while she was sentenced to five at Yuma prison.
While at Yuma, Pearl fought off her morphine addiction. She discovered she wouldn’t be able to escape this prison, but found a well-stocked library, and took up both reading and sewing.
This was also where she wrote poetry.
On June 2, 1900, the Arizona Star printed a news brief about Pearl kicking the morphine habit and taking up poetry writing, “unwinding it by the yard.” The brief said she wrote about being a girl bandit and her childhood. Two of her poems were mentioned: “The Girl Bandit” and “When She Was Young and Knew No Sin Before the Tempter Entered In.” The brief said that after the title, what followed was “a lot of doggerel of the rapid decent.”
Sounds like they weren’t fans of her poetry.
The following poem was the only one that survived. It was printed in the 31 July 1903 edition of Yuma’s Sun.
(to the tune of "The Fatal Wedding," a popular song at that time)
The sun was shining brightly on a pleasant afternoon.
My partner speaking lightly, said, "The stage will be here soon."
We saw it coming round the bend and called to them to halt.
Then to their pockets we did attend, if they got hurt, 'twas their own fault.
While the birds were sweetly singing, while the men stood up in line,
And the silver softly ringing as it touched this palm of mine.
There we took away their money, but left them enough to eat.
And the men they looked so funny as they vaulted in their seat.
Then up the road we galloped quickly, then through the canyon we did pass.
Over the mountains we went swiftly, trying tin find our horses grass.
Past the station we boldly went, then along the river side.
And our horses now being spent, of course we had to hide.
Now for five long nights we travel, in the day time we would rest.
Now we would throw ourselves on the gravel, and to sleep we try our best.
Around us now our horses stamping, looking for some hay or grain.
On the road the posse tramping, looking for us all in vain.
One more day they would not get us, but my horse got sour and thin,
And my partner was a mean cuss, so Bill Truman roped us in.
Thirty years my partner got, and I was given five.
He seems contented with his lot, and I am still alive.
The last line is a reference to Pearl’s decision to kill herself before going to jail, something she vowed at the times of her two captures.
Joe Boot managed to escape the Yuma prison in 1901, and when Pearl was interviewed, she told reporters that she planned to write “a poem extolling the virtues of Boot and his gallant escape.”
Due to a smallpox outbreak, Pearl was granted early parole and released from the prison in December 1902. She headed straight to Kansas City to live with her mother and sister Katy, and where she opened a cigar shop.
John Boessenecker’s book, Wildcat, is the most truthful and comprehensive account of Pearl Hart’s life. The level of research is remarkable. He has fact-checked Pearl’s outlandish tales told to reporters, and still presents Pearl honestly, as both victim and criminal. Over 300 pages long, the book leaves nothing out. Boessenecker also includes the fascinating stories and fates of Pearl’s family members and the lawmen that captured her, and of course, the story of her wild and traumatic childhood in Ontario and here, in Kawartha Lakes.
Further Reading:
Boessenecker, John. Wildcat: the untold story of the Canadian woman who became the West’s most notorious bandit. Hanover Square Press. 2021.
Originally from Bobcaygeon, Vanderzwet is a writer living in Omemee.
A certified lifestyle and wellness coach and personal trainer, she published her first book in 2012, Be Well: unlock the health and wellness that you deserve.
Books:
Be Well: unlock the health and wellness that you deserve (2012)
Charles Cooper at Beeton, ON end-of-steel 1999. Photo: Andrea Percy from author’s website.
Charles Louis Cooper (1933-2023) was born on 2 July 1933 in Berlin to a German father and English mother. His family hid in the Germany countryside during the Second World War. After the war, Cooper moved to England and studied at Cambridge. He moved to Canada in 1957.
He got his love for trains when lived in Europe and always wanted to work on the railway. He ended up working in insurance and trains became his pastime. He was an honorary member of the Lindsay & District Model Railroaders and had a large model train set-up in his basement.
Cooper also spent his time researching railroad history and writing books. Rails to the Lake was published by Boston Mills Press in 1980. Hamilton’s Other Railway expanded on the first book and was published in 2001.
Narrow Gauge for Us recounts the history of the Toronto-Nippissing line that partly ran through Kawartha Lakes. It was published in 1982.
After Omer Lavalleee passed away, leaving his manuscript incomplete, Cooper took on the role of seeing the book to completion, and Canadian Pacific to the East – the International of Maine Division was published in 2007. That year the book won the Canadian Railroad Historical Association’s book award.
kawarthalakeswriters.com 