In the early 1950s, potato chips were quickly becoming a popular snack in the United States and Canada. Noticing the trend and discovering how profitable the sale of potato chips had become in New Brunswick, a handful of astute Valley entrepreneurs were convinced the snack had potential here and would find a ready market.

It turns out they were correct. As the story goes, in 1952 those businessmen somehow acquired a chip cooker and bagging machine from the States. Leasing an apple warehouse in Centreville they experimented with producing snack chips from various varieties of local potatoes. The entrepreneurs were M.W. Graves president John Shaffner (later to become lieutenant-governor of Nova Scotia) Bridgetown businessmen Harry Smofsky, Dave Hicks and Raymond Bent and PEI potato broker Les Simmons.

Shaffner, it is said, came up with the idea to produce potato chips here after he observed how profitable it was becoming in New Brunswick. Not one of these gentlemen knew how to make or marketing potato chips but a total lack of experience didn’t stop them. The story of the five pioneering entrepreneurs, as taken from a brochure produced circa 1980, tells us that after a few setbacks, including a fire at the plant and some growing pains, they eventually were successful. “On a shoestring investment of $35,000 and a $20,000 government loan,” reads the brochure, Acadia Foods was founded (in 1952) and potato chips packaged in 5 cent bags, under the brand name Scotties, were soon rolling off the assembly line.

Scotties quickly became a snack staple and a household name in Nova Scotia. The chips were so popular that within a few years Acadia Foods found the Centreville plant wasn’t large enough to meet production demands. In 1959 a new plant was opened in New Minas. About a year later Acadia Foods was purchased by General Foods and Scotties was rebranded under Hostess Foods, a GF subsidiary. The Scotties brand eventually disappeared when Hostess Foods partnered with Frito-Lay (owned by PepsiCo) in 1987.

That’s the official version on the origin of Scotties potato chips, as spelled out in the 1980s brochure, but there may be more to the story. I’ve been told that a prominent farmer was the first to bring in the machinery required to manufacture and package potato chips in Kings County and his operation was eventually taken over by what was to become Acadia Foods. While I’ve been told this by several reliable sources, I’ve been unable to confirm it.

Meanwhile, there was another attempt to produce and market potato chips in Kings County. The company was called Glendale Foods and the product was Tom Thumb potato chips. I believe the business started in Sheffield Mills or in Canning. If any readers are familiar with the history of the company I’d like to hear from them.

Sold throughout eastern Canada at one time, the once popular Scotties potato chips are now a memory.

Larry Keddy’s expertise, among other things, lies in the field of what he calls ‘historic photo identification.”

To give an example of how he works, Keddy identifies the photograph of Evangeline Beach accompanying this column as likely taken in the early 1920s. “I’m basing this on the kind of cars shown, the style of the license plate, which is unreadable, but looks like those issued in 1922,” Keddy says.

“Finally, the ‘boater’ style straw hat worn by one of the gentlemen standing near the edge of the bank was popular at summer events of all kinds during that period. My guess is the photo may have been taken by (Wolfville photographer) Edson Graham (1869-1956) who was very active at the time and it looks like his style.”

The photograph tells an interesting story so let’s take a closer look at it: The ladies and men appear to be dressed in Sunday going-to-church clothes rather than for a sojourn at the seashore. There are sunbathers on the beach, people wading in the surf; in the background on the bank are a couple of buildings that could be summer cottages; in the background also is a beach house on what appears to be either a jut in the bank or a man-made extension of the shoreline. A picnic is about to take place. Near the vehicles, picnic tables are set up and a couple of ladies are busy preparing lunch.

There’s much more to be read in the old photograph, which by the way was featured on a postcard. At the time the photograph was taken, Evangeline Beach was one of the most popular summer resorts in western Nova Scotia. Its life as a resort started when Nathaniel Eagles began selling portions of his Long Island land along the shore for private cottages. He also sold land along the Beach Road to one Percy Porter, whose aim was to build a tourist resort.

As the late Douglas Eagles tells it in his Eagles genealogy (published in 1982) around the time Porter was building cottages, a “Mr. Black and later a Mr. Manning bought lands to the east of the Beach Road and developed a thriving tourist trade, with cottages, a dance hall and a hotel. The cottage area became known as Millionaire’s Row and the resort as Evangeline Beach.”

Another source, an essay written by the late Eileen Bishop in a privately published booklet in 1996 has a different version of how Evangeline Beach became a popular summertime destination. Bishop writes that in 1896, Long Island resident Charles A. Patriquin formed a partnership with Franklin P. Rockwell to start a picnic and playground area for the general public near the beach. “The beach grew in popularity and by the time the hotel was built in 1900, a brisk tourist trade had developed.”

Bishop writes that the hotel was situated on the beach front and was three storeys high, contained a store, ice house and storerooms. Later, Bishop says, an Island resident, Alex Fullerton, “built a spacious farmhouse on the Front Island Road and opened the commodious building to summer visitors.” By 1909, Rockwell was no longer in the picture and the beach property was owned by W. Marshall Black of Wolfville. A few years later the tourist area was expanded by Black to contain 20 cottages, a stable for 40 horses, a picnic area and tennis courts. At one time, according to Bishop, there was a small postal outlet and a service station.

Looking at Evangeline Beach today, you wonder why it originally attracted so many people in earlier times. Perhaps it was the vista and possibly this was one of the few areas in Kings County where a natural clearing overlooked an inviting piece of seashore. A 1909 tourist brochure mentions a bandstand, picnic grounds, rental cottages and a large building – “The Casino” – that was available for concerts, dances, private parties. The Casino eventually became the Starlight Room, a dance hall that reached its peak in popularity during the swing band era of the 1940s and 1950s.

The Starlight Room is still there and a few dances are held in it today – two or three every summer. The hotel was torn down decades ago but there’s a motel near the beach, a popular 223-site campground with a swimming pool, canteen and a mini golf course. On the bank overlooking the beach is a viewing station which is popular during the annual migration of sandpipers.

The once attractive beach has changed over time, however. According to residents, much of the sand cover on the beach has been ravaged and swept away by changes in tidal currents after the Windsor causeway was built.

Evangeline Beach as it appeared in the early 1920s. The Beach once was the most popular tourist attraction in western Nova Scotia.

When a public meeting was held in Canning on January 8, 1887, to determine the feasibility of building a rail line westward from Kingsport- what was to become the Cornwallis Valley Railway – it was attended by “various public-spirited men of the vicinity and by J. W. King.”

The quote is from Marguerite Woodworth’s History of the Dominion Atlantic Rail. Woodworth describes J. W. King as the assistant traffic manager of the Windsor and Annapolis Railway. A few years later we find from Woodworth that John W. King had risen to the post of “Resident Manager” of the A & W Railway. What Woodworth neglected to mention is that in 1887, when King was prominent in influencing the direction the Cornwallis Valley Railway would take – either terminating in Kentville or farther down the Valley in Middleton – that this gentleman had in that year been elected the first Mayor of Kentville.

King would play a prominent role in management of the A & W and later with the Dominion Atlantic Railway. At this time he was one of Kentville’s most prominent citizens. When Kentville was incorporated in 1886, the citizens of the town honoured King by selecting him as its first Mayor, in which capacity he served until 1889.

Born in Scotland, John Warren King (1836 – 1922) was a lawyer who in his obituary was saluted as a railway pioneer. At first, he was a legal adviser for the railway, settling in Kentville when the railway made its headquarters here. He was still a resident of Kentville when he died and while I’ve been unable to locate it, there undoubtedly is a tombstone marking his resting site in Oakgrove Cemetery.

Today, most people don’t know who John King is or was. The Kentville chapter in Eaton’s History of Kings County lists him as only Kentville’s first Mayor and this probably is recorded somewhere in the town’s annals as well.

King isn’t entirely forgotten, however. When he was in office, King is believed to have worked at a magnificent ash and birch desk that according to family traditions he made himself. Nothing is known about what became of the desk after King’s death but by the early 2000s it resided at the home of the late Hugh and Bella Burns in Kentville. The desk was sold to a Member of Parliament who then donated it to the Kings Historical Society.

Today, the desk is on display at the Kings County Museum in the Victorian Room. A plaque describing the desk in detail and a photograph of John W. King can also be found in the Museum. The description notes that the desk is “handcrafted in the eclectic fashion of the mid-Victorian era” and is a unique piece of furniture. It also is the sole reminder that a fine Scotsman, who became a well-respected Kentville citizen, also ran the railway and for a time was at the helm of the town.

John W. King, who was the Mayor of Kentville while managing the A&W and later the Dominion Atlantic Railway Railway.

Mayor John W. King’s desk has been hailed as a unique piece of Victorian furniture.

In the pioneer days of the Windsor and Annapolis Railway, writes William Clarke, “ale, porter and other intoxicants” (meaning mostly rum and whiskey) were sold at train stations in Windsor, Kentville and Aylesford.

The W & A Railway officially opened on August 18, 1869, so the pioneer days Clarke refers to must have been the late 19^th century. Apparently serving alcoholic beverages at train stops was common in the early railway days, following a practice that likely started when stagecoaches stopped overnight at various inns in the Valley. In his book, Clarke’s History of the Earliest Railways (published circa 1925 in Windsor) Mr. Clarke indicates that passengers expected refreshments of the alcoholic kind would be available, if not at the actual stations then in nearby restaurants and lunch counters.

During its daily runs, the W & A also made stops at Mount Uniacke and Windsor Junction. At the latter stop at least four places close to the railroad tracks offered a “dock n’ doris” says Clarke. (Freely translated, the Gaelic expression, deoch n’ doris, means a final drink before departing and traditionally it was whiskey).

What made the imbibing of alcoholic beverages possible for train travellers in the early days may have been the long stops along the line for meals. “Previous to 1872,” writes Clarke, “trains stopped 20 minutes for meals.” At most of these stops along the line, “eating houses” were set up to cater to a travelling public that wanted hard liquor and ale.

When a new train station opened at Annapolis in 1891, a “splendid restaurant was also opened,” writes Clark, and this too catered to the belief that a wee deoch n’ doris before moving on was a necessity. The railway sponsored the opening of the Kentville Railway Restaurant, which at first was operated privately. Like other food stops on the line the Kentville Railway Restaurant served liquor, beer and ale, a practice that continued until prohibition put an end to it.

At the train stop in Aylesford the restaurant there became famous for its fish patties. Clarke writes that the “little restaurant recalls memories of the motherly Mrs. Patterson, who won the hearts of the ‘boys’ supplying daily, quantities of the appetizing fish patties.” The restaurant was taken over by Kentville’s Lyons Hotel, an establishment noted for catering to the drinking public, and no doubt certain beverages made the fish patties even more delicious.

When the railway was being constructed, tots of rum were often imbibed daily along the line. The liquor also flowed freely when the railway celebrated its grand opening. In her history of the Dominion Atlantic Railway, Marguerite Woodworth writes that during the grand opening of the Windsor and Annapolis Railway, the train crews celebrated by drinking too much alcohol – if that’s what Woodworth meant in noting that they celebrated the occasion “not wisely but too well.” The grand opening celebration was held in Kentville and Woodworth intimates that alcohol flowed freely.

Rum or whiskey may have been responsible for a riot involving Irish railway workers, who were primarily Catholic, and a group of Protestant rail layers. In her history, Marguerite Woodworth writes that the riot was caused by religious differences, but elsewhere we read that Irish labourers imbibed whiskey often when putting down the railway tracks through the Annapolis Valley.

Drive along Brooklyn Street from Kentville and a couple of kilometres out you’ll pass through what today could be considered a forgotten community.

Known at one time as Brooklyn Corner – there are people who still call it by that name – the community exists but is difficult to find on current maps, county directories and county tax rolls. In his book on Nova Scotia place names, Charles Bruce Fergusson mentions Brooklyn Corner, but along with West Brooklyn and Brooklyn Street, he lumps it under the write-up for Brooklyn.

However, the community hasn’t been completely forgotten and a historical researcher has made sure of that. Digging into files at the Kings Courthouse Museum and conducting extensive interviews, Linda Hart compiled material enough to write a book about Brooklyn Corner. The book, A Place to Belong, was recently published and is available at the Kings County Museum.

Basically, Hart’s book is more of a genealogy than a historical treatise. Hart gives genealogical accounts of more than 50 families who once lived in or still have descendants in Brooklyn Corner. This was quite an undertaking since, based on the genealogies in the book, Brooklyn Corner appears to encompass parts of Coldbrook, Lakeville and Billtown. This must have made it difficult for Hart to determine where these communities ended and where Brooklyn Corner starts. Even Fergusson, in his account of place names, was vague about Brooklyn’s location, noting only that it was four miles west of Kentville.

Genealogy basically is the tracing of descendants from your ancestors down to you, but in another sense, it’s also a linear history of your family. Looked at it this way, Linda Hart has done some excellent work in recording family histories starting in some cases with Planter grantees in the 1760s. The oldest family line in the book is the Rands. Thomas Rand received a grant in 1764 and his descendants settled in Brooklyn Corner. Other Planter descendants, such as the Eatons, Newcombs and Bishops settled in the community as well.

In addition to the genealogies, Hart also includes some history of the houses along Brooklyn Street. Hart says she started at least 20 years ago collecting facts and the lore floating around the community about the houses and it makes interesting reading. There are other nuggets as well; the story behind the famous Antoft Gardens, for example, which at one time was the best-known nursery in the Annapolis Valley.

Shedding light on one of our lesser known communities makes Hart’s book a valuable addition to the history of Kings County. I recommend it to readers who enjoy a mixture of genealogy, family lore and local history in their books.

Linda Hart signing a copy of her new book.

In Blomidon Rose, Esther Clarke Wright devotes an entire chapter to the various meanings of the word “gaspereau,” one of them being a fish. This fish, notes Wright, was an important part of the Acadian diet and was one of the reasons why they settled near the Gaspereau River.

What Wright left unsaid was that another fish was equally important with the Acadians in settlements around the Minas Basin. The Habitant, the Canard River, the Cornwallis River, the Avon River, as well as the Gaspereau River, had tremendous runs of shad in the spring; these were harvested and salted down by the Acadians, providing an important addition to their winter food stock.

In the Minas Basin, the shad was always more abundant than gaspereaux, yet it is rarely mentioned in historical accounts as an important food source of the Acadians. Nor do we read much about the importance of shad in the post-Acadian period. History, for the most part, is about people and events, historians rarely chronicling the harvesting of fish when more important events are taking place. Yet, to a degree, the shad is an important historical fish, if only because the Acadians and other settlers depended on it for sustenance.

Various documents exist that tell us the Planters and others who settled around the Minas Basin took advantage of the shad’s abundance, often netting them by the hundreds of thousands in a single year. In his book on early Kings and Hants County history, for example, Henry Youle Hind wrote that in 1787 over 100,000 shad were taken from the Canard River and 120,000 a few years later from the Habitant River.

In reports as early as 1683, shad were described as one of the most abundant fish in the Minas Basin. Writing of the Cornwallis River in 1782, Judge Deschamps said, “in July and August this river affords abundance of fish called shad.” So abundant were shad that settlers often harvested those stranded in pools at low tide. There are records of fixed shad nets extending for over a mile across the mud flats from the mouth of the Cornwallis River towards the Canard River.

Fast forwarding to today, those once abundant schools of shad that were a vital source of sustenance for the early settlers are long gone. All around the Minas Basin and in the Bay of Fundy, right up to the early 1900s, countless thousands of shad were harvested annually. But overfishing on major spawning rivers such as the Cornwallis and Avon, along with pollution and dam building ruined the fishery.

There’s no requiem for the shad, no historical treatises. Only government statistics on catches and entries in family journals record how important and how abundant they were in the colonial period.

Today, when Granny wants to talk to her grandsons in Toronto and in California, she goes to their Facebook pages, clicks on the camera icon and a minute or two later is having a face to face conversation with them. She can talk with them as long as she wants to, all day if she wishes, and won’t be billed a single nickel for the call.

What a contrast with the time Granny was a teen living in a community about five miles from Wolfville. When she wanted to talk with a friend that lived a kilometre or so down the road, she went to a big boxlike telephone that was on the wall in her kitchen; to call she turned a handle on the side of the phone, cranked out a pre-arranged combination of short and long rings, hoping her friend would answer and others connected to the line wouldn’t listen in. If she wanted to call Kentville or Wolfville, or any other nearby community, she had to push a button on the side of the telephone, then crank the handled to connect with an operator who would put the call through. Granny’s parents were then billed for a long distance call, which could be anywhere from 20 to 50 cents.

Granny’s parents were on a private line, or what was better known as a mutual or party line. As Granny recalls, there were no more than seven or eight other households she could reach without connecting with an operator. This was in the early 1940s; while telephones had been around for decades and decades, they were still relatively new at this time in many rural communities, in villages such as Canning and Port Williams and in towns like Wolfville, Berwick and Kentville.

In fact, at the time Granny started using the telephone for the first time, there were private telephone companies in many of the larger communities in Kings and Hants County. At first, most of these companies were connected to the Valley Telephone Company and eventually to the much larger Nova Scotia Telephone Company.

While there were central agencies, such as the Valley and the Nova Scotia Telephone Company, the onus to connect to them was on the community. Private telephone companies often were set up, some with less than a dozen subscribers. In Granny’s community, for example, the residents purchased the wiring, cut and set up their own poles, strung the lines and connected eventually to an agency with headquarters in nearby towns. This was a common practice in many communities if they hankered for communication with the outside world – the “outside” often being towns you reached only by horse and wagon and by walking.

Between 1905 and as recently as 1960, for example, private telephone companies existed in Kings County communities such as Scots Bay, South Alton, Blue Mountain, Blomidon, Canaan, White Rock, Sheffield Mills, Waterville, and Welsford. There was a similar scenario in Hants County. In the late 19th century the Hants & Halifax Telephone Company, operating out of Windsor, allowed private phone companies that were set up in outlying communities to hook up with them. But first these community companies had to establish and maintain their own lines, and at their own expense.

Crank ‘em up! Telephones such this were common in many rural communities well into the 20th century. Local calls were made by cranking out pre-arranged short and long rings.

Part two in a series saluting the historical writers of Kings and Hants County.

Glen Hancock (1919-2011) In the obituary saluting Dr. Hancock it was noted that the Wolfville native was first and foremost a writer. Hancock began writing and successfully selling short stories for Western and Mystery magazine while in his teens. After achieving degrees from Acadia University, the University of Toronto and Edinburgh University, Hancock followed a career in journalism and at one time wrote a syndicated column that ran in 35 newspapers. While he was a public relations adviser for Imperial Oil, Hancock founded the School of Journalism at the University of Kings College.

When he retired to Wolfville, Hancock wrote My Real Name is Charley in 2000, which was a memoir that also provided often amusing historical glimpses of Wolfville. Hancock followed this up in 2004 with a book about his wartime experiences, Charley Goes to War, and was working on a semi-historical book at the time of his death.

Hancock also wrote a series of columns for The Advertiser, many of them in a historical vein. He also taught short story and article writing at Acadia University, giving many aspiring local writers their start in journalism.

Henry Youle Hind (1832-1908) One of the most interesting writers of historical books in the Valley, Hind was British born but spent his late years in Windsor. As well as being an author, Hind was a teacher, professor, geologist and explorer. He spent much of his career working as a geologist, mapmaker and surveyor in little explored areas of Canada. He also published a series of scientific articles promoting Canada’s natural resources.

Hind came to Nova Scotia as a consulting engineer for the provincial government. In retirement he settled in Windsor where he was on the board of governors of Kings College in the 1880s and he wrote a history of the college.

Hind is best known for a book published in 1889 by the Hants Journal. Titled originally as a Sketch of the Old Parish Burying Ground of Windsor, the book was much more than a treatise on a graveyard. Actually there’s a lot of little known 17^th and 18^th century history about Hants and Kings County in the book. Hind writes, for example, about the Acadians, the Planter settlements and about the various dykeland catastrophes.

Hind’s book was reprinted in 1989 by Lancelot Press, again with a misleading title, An Early History of Windsor, Nova Scotia. A history of Windsor it is not and a better title might be Sketches of Early Kings and Hants County. The book is available from the West Hants Historical Society.

New Minas historical writer Daphne Frazee has three historical books in publication, two with a Gaspereau Valley theme. Frazee grew up in the Gaspereau Valley where her father, Dean Gertridge, worked the family farm. In her bio Frazee says that she “fell into the role of local historian.” After a history of White Rock appeared, interest was high in producing a similar work on the Gaspereau Valley, Frazee says, but no one stepped forth to do it. That’s when she decided to take on the task.

Frazee’s first book, Looking Back — A Portrait of Gaspereau — was self published in 2002. Her next book — A Second Look — was on the same theme and was published the following year. These books, which were combined into a single volume in 2004, were illustrated with numerous photographs from past days in the Gaspereau Valley.

In 2007, Frazee wrote Charles H. Wright — Building Memories. Wright, who was Frazee’s grandfather, partnered with R. A. Jodrey in establishing the Minas Basin Pulp and Power and in pioneering the building of electric power companies in this area. Wright designed and built many of the fine churches and other buildings that grace Kings County. In 2007, Frazee launched a community magazine called the Gaspereau Valley Gazette, which is still going strong and will celebrate its 10^th anniversary this spring.

Watson Kirkconnell (1895-1977) Including a distinguished scholar and university administrator the likes of Dr. Kirkconnell in a series on local historical writers may seem irreverent at first but let me make my case. Dr. Kirkconnell is internationally acclaimed as a translator, writer and scholar, was made an Officer of the Order of Canada and on numerous occasions was shortlisted for the Nobel Prize; he served as president of Acadia University from 1948 to 1964.

Despite his scholarly pursuits and administrative duties, Dr. Kirkconnell found time to write and co-write a couple of historical books. Along with B. C. Silver, Kirkconnell researched and compiled a book called Historic Homes (of Wolfville). Kirkconnell also wrote The Streets of Wolfville, 1650-1970.

Kirkconnell’s finest local history book — and my favourite historical work, I must add, is Place-Names in Kings County, which was published as a paperback in 1971. As per its title, the book explains the origin of many historical county place names. In the text, Kirkconnell harks back to some of the original Mi’kmaq and Acadian place-names and explains how many Planter place-names came to be. The book is really interesting and is a worthy addition to every amateur historian’s bookcase.

Like many people, I often wonder how street names originated and why once common place names disappear. Let’s take Lanzy Road immediately north of Kentville which runs west from Nichols Avenue/Road to Aldershot Road and a community name associated with it, Landsey Corner. How did people arrive at Lanzy as a road name and why did Landsey Corner disappear from usage? And what’s the connection between Lanzy and Landsey? The following column attempts to answer these questions.

On October 9, in 1913, The Advertiser carried a notice advertising an auction sale at Landsey Corner near Kentville. The sale would be held at the residence of Mrs. Eb. Landsey.

When I read the advertisement (which came from the archives of Kentville historian Louis Comeau) I assumed Landsey Corner was one of those place names “near Kentville” that for one reason or another had long gone out of local usage. The reference to the sale site as Landsey Corner, without any explanation as to where it was other than near Kentville, establishes that it was a recognized community name. I figured as well that it was an estate sale and Mrs. Eb. Landsey was a widow.

It was obvious also from the advertisement’s content that Eb. Landsey – we have to assume it was the late Eb. Landsey – had been a prosperous farmer. Listed in the advertisement were farm implements “comprising ploughs, harrows, mowing machines (and) garden tools.” Household furniture and effects were also being auctioned. On the block as well were the farm’s livestock which consisted of three horses, three cows and a pair of working oxen along with harness and wagons.

The advertisement in The Advertiser was significant in several ways. Gary Young has been researching the early landowners and roads in various areas north and northeast of Kentville – Aldershot, Pine Woods, Oakdene Avenue, Campbell Road and Middle Dyke Road, for example. The newspaper clipping helped to confirm what he’d discovered about the Landseys who were African Nova Scotians and early residents of land immediately north of Kentville, especially along what became known as Lanzy Road.

The Eb. Landsey mentioned in the auction sale was Ebenezar Landsey (1851-1913) whose ancestors, among other possibilities, may have been with the Loyalists that arrived here around the time of the American Revolution. Lanzy Road (also spelled Lanzie in municipal records) is named after his relatives. The Landsey farm was situated about where Lanzy Road, Campbell Road, Upper Church Street and Oakdene Avenue converge on Nichols Avenue/Road. This is the area that was once known as Landsey Corner. Ebenezar Landsey died early in 1913, hence the dissolving of his estate via the action sale. His widow apparently departed from this area shortly after Ebenezar’s death.

The Landsey family, writes Gary Young, was among the first inhabitants of African descent living in the area north of Kentville known as Pine Woods. The road on which many Landseys lived – Lanzy Road – was once known as Shadow Street. Young writes that Landsey is found today only in the name of a road, and that by the 1920s male Landseys either had died or had moved out of the area.

As suggested by the auction advertisement, Landsey was successful as a farmer, a livelihood curtailed when new roads were put in. Today the highway cuts through what was once the Landsey property. Much of Landsey’s land was expropriated when road changes were made around his farm. The changes provided a direct route north to communities, farm lands and the Minas Basin, eliminating the huge twist in Upper Church Street.

Now you know some of the story about Lanzy Road and Landsey Corner. What I haven’t gone into is the Landsey connection with some of the early settlers who were granted land in areas north of Kentville, the Chipmans and Belchers for example, the latter a slave owner. That, as they say, is another story and it’s a complicated one.

This advertisement, which ran in The Advertiser on October 2, 1913, wrapped up the estate of Ebenezar Landsey of Landsey’s Corner near Kentville. The Landseys were prominent African Nova Scotians. Shortly after the auction sale, the Landsey surname disappeared from Kings County. Lanzy Road is named after them.

For generations rural areas of the Valley were served by general stores; “general” in the sense that the stores stocked things families generally needed in the period when communication was difficult and travel usually restricted close to your own community.

At one time every community had a general store. This was the era when horses and oxen were necessary to eke out a living, when eight out of 10 people worked on farms and word of mouth was the way the news got around.

Typical of those old general stores was one that opened at the crossroads in White Rock well over a century ago. Exactly when it first opened for business is difficult to determine but it’s believed that Leslie Eagles had a store in White Rock before 1900. According to Bert Young in his book My White Rock, Eagles sold his store to John Cohoon, who then sold it to Ralph Anley Ells shortly after WW1 ended.

The R. A. Ells General Store served the community of White Rock for almost 70 years. Ells bought out the Cohoon store in 1919 and it was operated by him until his demise in 1976, and then by his son Anley until it closed in 1988.

Like most of the old general stores, Ells was a place where men would sit around the mandatory woodstove afternoons and evenings to discuss local news. Ells tells me people came expecting to find groceries, beef and pork (which for a time Ralph Ells peddled in a Model T Ford truck) clothing, footwear, dishes, dry goods, heating oil and over-the-counter cough syrups, liniments and rubs. The store contained the only post office in the area, an excuse for men to sit around and chat while waiting for the mail to be sorted. The store catered as well to the motoring public, offering Texaco gas from the pumps out front.

Anley Ells said the store “sold everything a farm family might need.” In many ways it was a miniature Wal-Mart of its time. Add 1930s, 40s or 50s décor along with the brown paper bulk packaging of many necessities and you have an idea of what the Ells store was like to shop in. If farm folks wanted overalls, work pants or rubber boots, for example, then this was the place to go. If people wanted molasses in a jug, or kerosene and stove oil, they brought their gallon containers in and had them filled. With a school just up the hill from the store, one of the display cases was always well stocked with penny candy.

For a while a second store serviced the White Rock community. Ora Scott’s store was located opposite Ells, on a corner of the crossroads. Opening in 1949, the store catered to a different clientele than Ells, offering some groceries but catering mainly to people looking for flour and feed, which was delivered countywide. According to Viola Pick, Ora Scott’s daughter, the store was in business until the late 1970s when it was converted to an auto repair shop. In 1991 the property was sold and became part of Longs mill.

The closing of these White Rock stores, especially the Ells store, likely was tied in with better transportation, better roads and the arrival of big box stores. “Our store was a victim of changing times,” Anley Ells says, which is likely true. The Ells store was one of the last of its kind in Kings County.