Yes, Virginia There Is A...

...book here for you. I had the pleasure of meeting Virginia Rescorla and Peter Bernhardt today. Virginia and Peter were taking advantage of a semiseptcentenary special on my newest book on Kingston's industrial waterfront. I haven't heard of a single event marking Kingston's 350th year, though the tercentenary in 1973 was chock full of civic events. So this week-long 35% discount was my way of marking the milestone. I only offered the discount on the Vintage Kingston Facebook group, of which Virginia is an involved member.

Virginia and Peter love to travel and appreciate history and technology. So it was natural that during a sweep through Eastern Ontario from their home in Elora that we would have a chance to meet. We discovered that we have many things of common interest - Sydenham, industrial history, the Davis Tannery and River Street bridge, railways in Canada and Britain, Wolfe Island, enjoying our retirements, and many more.

We visited on the front step before the interesting pair left with a pair of my books in hand, on their way to the Sydenham High School 150th 'reunion' (though I don't think anyone from the inaugural class is going to make the reunion!). SHS was also where my Dad taught for 15 years.

I mentioned an engaging hand-drawn Davis Tannery diagram from the an earlier era when we made things here' as in here in Kingston. This is a 1965 Finishing Machines Drying Tunnels drawing on graph paper. It's remarkably clearly-drawn and neatly-presented:

Peter's interests in agriculture and Canadian Pacific Electric Lines led to me mentioning my brother's blog post on the Beatty Brothers manufacturing efforts in the area.

We could have talked for hours.