By Ruby Pratka
Local Journalism Initiative
Six heritage preservation projects from around the Townships are among 15 from around the province that will receive funding from the Sherbrooke-based Quebec Anglophone Heritage Network (QAHN) as part of the SHARE grant program, a Canadian Heritage-supported initiative to make the history of the province’s diverse anglophone communities more visible.
The Eastern Townships Resource Centre at Bishop’s University will get funding to preserve the archives of Townshippers’ cofounder Marjorie Goodfellow, explained QAHN SHARE grant program co-ordinator Julie Miller. The Société d’histoire de Haute-Yamaska will run an outreach project with members of the local English-speaking community, and anglophones around the country with roots in the area, aimed at making the society’s archives better reflect the region’s anglophone history. Richmond Histoire & Coopération will produce and screen a documentary about a local business. The Stanstead Historical Society will use the support to digitize its collections and improve its visibility. The Sherbrooke-based monthly Townships Sun received funding for a writing project encouraging teens and young adults to write about local history in English, for publication, emphasizing outreach to English language learners in schools with mostly francophone student bodies, including Drummondville Elementary School and the Cégep de Granby. Miller said the Townships Sun project was “a great way to make second-language learners feel like they were not just learning a language, but becoming part of a community.”
In Brome-Missisquoi, the Musée des communications et d’histoire de Sutton will create bilingual, web-based educational materials for local primary and secondary schools, aimed at showing the varied contributions of anglophones to Quebec society, through the life stories of real people featured in local archives, explained museologist Michel Harnois. Among the people Harnois plans to feature will be a pioneering journalist who became the first woman to edit the Stanstead Journal; a small-town hairdresser who became an acclaimed photographer; a family doctor turned wartime conscientious objector; and a teenage orphan who was one of the tens of thousands of impoverished “home children” shipped to Canada by the British government in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. “He had gotten off to a bad start in life and the U.K. got rid of him with a one-way ticket to the colonies, where he was placed with a farm family and put to work,” Harnois said. “In the end, he became an artisan carpenter and built houses.”
“By design, we wanted to talk about ordinary people,” Harnois said. “They are easier for teenagers to identify with than, say, premiers. [Telling ordinary people’s stories] creates a sense of closeness – maybe there are kids in these classes who want to become carpenters, or who know someone who is a hairdresser or a journalist. QAHN wants to move away from stereotypes, and we agree with that. The rich merchants who exploited their francophone staff, we know they existed, but we don’t want to glorify it.” Harnois said he hoped the tools would be in classrooms for the 2026-27 school year, after consultation with local school service centres.
“We’re at the beginning of the process and we’re very enthusiastic,” Harnois said, adding that the museum may organize meetings with members of the local English-speaking community to get suggestions about who to feature.
Miller said there will be a third round of SHARE grant funding distributed to heritage projects in February 2026. Organizations must be members of QAHN to apply for funding. To learn more, contact her directly at julie@qahn.org.