When Photo Meets News

A major challenge to my research using Queen's University Archives' photos is that they're not connected to anything. There is perhaps a date or a brief caption. That's all. Did the photo appear in the Kingston Whig-Standard, and if it did, what is the rest of the story?

I was drawn to the above photo, 'Drowning search Anglin Bay with Bajus and Anglin in background June 3, 1949', for two reasons. One was the quality of the photo, taken on what looks like an overcast evening. The other reason was the Bajus and Anglin buildings on the shore of Anglin Bay. I was much less interested in why the boats and policemen were being photographed.

Now I know the rest of the story. In June 4th's Whig-Standard of that year, a sad story of an accidental drowning of a 10 year-old boy, Wayne Hepburn. The lad had been throwing rocks at bottles with his friend, Bobby Forbes. They'd been warned by their parents against 'playing near the Rideau River'. Interestingly, Wayne was identified in the news story as a grade 1 student at St. John's School.

The recovery, in the era before police dive teams, was described as a dragging operation. The water is shallow and the light was fading until the boy's body was located after one hour. The photo used in the paper was much smaller and tightly-cropped than the version that caught my eye. There was more news, and less room for airy, uncropped photos or full-page ads by telecom companies back then!

A sordid story, but an interesting connection and one that I'm sure won't be the last connection I'll be able to make! After all, there's a long winter ahead!