The community center is closed down now, 21 years later; but there were many happy functions and gatherings at this little old school house that was turned into a place to hold birthday party’s anniversary and wedding receptions, like when Ken and I were married in March of 1987 we decided to go to the Island for our honeymoon, and of coarse they surprised us with a reception, at the community center, now just to see a little different culture; here is a good place to show a different approach that I was fascinated with, Carol and Wayne’s 25th anniversary celebration in 1991, they held a surprise party , before they  sat down at the head table, that was all set up for them and the wedding party, when they were married;  immediately they were brought to the presents and chairs were arranged for the two of them, someone is assigned to bring them their gifts and this person takes the card that comes with the gift and a specific person that might volunteer, or might in joy reading out load, with an audience, reads the card; the verse and who it ‘s from, before the present is opened, such pains taking and consideration for others, in our culture, often the cards are not read at all by anyone, or read it to them selves and then they thank the giver, but many times I have seen this done and considered its because they take more time for one another, we seem to be in more of a rush, noticed at their funerals; there is a difference;  in the first place; they have the passing of someone announced on the radio for everywhere on the Island to hear, where we announce it in the newspaper of the town where it took place and where they grew up. Then the Dr.’s and nurses of that town take time to go to the funeral, anyone that might of come in to; any kind of contact, I think every citizen of an area; that didn’t have to be a good friend or a relative, they just take the time to show respect and give there condolences.  The culture is a little different in P.I. and you wouldn’t notice it on a weeks vacation, its like any other country; you have to spend some time with the people and live among them to ever pick it up. Prince Edward Island have a few different traditions because of there ethnic back ground, and the nationality being mostly Scotch and Irish, and the Acadian settlers, who named the Island, Ile St.Jean, but were deported in 1758 by the British, and they named the Island; St. John’s, it wasn’t until 1799 that it became known as Prince Edward Island, Canada’s “Cradle of the Confederation” which has hosted many events, from the historic Charlottetown Confederation” in 1864 to1997 opening of the longest bridge over ice-covered water in the world.  But the Scottish settlers arrived at Stanhope Cove in June 1770. A Captain John MacDonald was sent to colonize Stanhope, Captain John; was a proud and fearless Highland Scot whose temper and critical statements often created enemies. He was well educated and could speak seven languages and became the first Prime Minister; of the Island and persuaded P.E.I .to enter Confederation on July 1, 1873. Ken’s mother’s maiden name was MacDonald, and I was told that, Marie’s grandfather Willie MacDonald was the first, West Point lighthouse keeper for 50 years, from the year they built the light in 1874 until 1924.   Now that would make Carol MacLean Livingstone, Willie’s great granddaughter, but in a way Carol became, a lighthouse keeper of the West Light house 110 years later; and this is how it came about. The West Point Lighthouse, was owned by the Canadian government and was run by the Canadian coast guard.

In the year 1983; the coast guard decided that they no longer needed the old lighthouse, for it was in need of a lot of upkeep and repairs, so they were going to tear it down and put up a steel structure, for the light to keep flashing and to guide ships around the reef. Carol and the people of West Point, had a public gathering, to save; there community land mark; together they formed a board of directors and worked it out with the Canadian government, that with a grant; they could save the lighthouse and make it into a place that would create jobs for the community by adding a motel with a licensed dining room; keep the original old light house structure for a museum and an Inn; where people can make reservations to sleep, therefore it did become the only Lighthouse Inn, in Canada; and because it earned the honor, was put on a Canadian stamp, in the year 1995. Carol was appointed the lighthouse manager, that’s why I said; a hundred years later, she became the lighthouse keeper, Carol gave up her job as a school teacher at Holland College and took on a full time position with her first love of work and hobby, here; was the opportunity to care for and make it into something to share; for anyone in the world to come and visit and eat from the menu; your choice of lobster, scallops, P.E.I. famous mussels, steak, or there Lighthouse chowder. I found a secret recipe in the lighthouse, I began to talk a lot about and finally one of Ken’s redheaded Sister Elizabeth gave it to me (she is one of the cooks in the restaurant) and said it was their mother, Marie’s potato salad recipe.  It was a secret recipe and for me not to share it, but my family in Maine loved it also, so; of coarse I gave it out, but after all that’s a long way from this special Island far off the East coast of Maine. The Lighthouse sits, on a beautiful beach and you can swim with soft sand under your feet and in the evening walk the beach, in the moon light, up behind the beach and lighthouse is a forest and they made, what they have called; fairy trails all through the thicket of trees where little rabbits are seen hopping and eating around the paths and under brush, and they enhance; the charm of the trails for sure. One warm summer day Carol, her grandson Caleb, and I were walking a trail and came upon a large strange looking hole in the ground and she preceded to tell us a ghost story about Captain the Kid, the notorious pirate; came ashore and hid his gold on this trail and people have dug for this treasure from the 1800’s to as recent as the 1970’s they would plot out an area and stage it off and dig but its never has been found, Carol loves to tell ghost stories and evenings she would stay at her light house and talk with the guest that have come from all over the world, Carol would spin tales and keep children happy while telling stories of sea serpents and of seeing the burning ship, I have been going to P.E.I. for 21 years now and although we often stay up very late, looking clear across; to the lights of Richibuctou, New Brunswick I never got the opportunity to see the famous ghost ship that looks like it is on fire and I was told you also can see people aboard this, but as long as I continue to go back I will be watching, but do have to mention, I have seen some very different sights, sitting on the Northumberland Straight, that have not been explained. Carol would sleep at her lighthouse and stay up, as late as it took for all the guest to settle down for the night before locking the door and many times, people wanted to stay up and visit, and she would share all about the Island, and therefore people would return another year and ask for Carol, she always took time to tour people through the light house and explain about every individual piece of antiques that they had on display, where it originated from, who had it so many years, from an Indian cradle to an old organ that had been in her family, Carol became very famous and well none, in teaching of her folklore; some would request that Carol and Wayne stand up with them as they got married in the Lighthouse, they could have been from Sweden, Germany or Japan speaking of Japan. Perhaps the most unexpected tourists to the Island are the Japanese who flock to Cavendish to visit a recreated home of a Canadian girl who never existed, and to examine objects she might of used, had she been a real girl. Many Japanese women between the ages of seventeen and twenty-four break into tears when they first enter Ann’s “home”. Some Japanese tourists offer money to Island girls for a lock of their red hair. I read; when a Japanese travel magazine asked its readers, what location they would most like to visit, Prince Edward Island ranked fourth behind New York, Paris and London. In 1996, over 25,000 Japanese tourists visited the Island. The Japanese attraction to Anne of Green Gables may be attributed to the universal appeal of Montgomery’s novels, the situation in Japan at the end of the Second World War when Anne of Green Gables was first translated into Japanese and the cultural “fit” between Japanese beliefs and the values expressed in Montgomery’s novels. Maud Montgomery wrote her first novel Anne of Green Gables in 1908 and became an immediate international success. Montgomery married   Reverend Erwin Macdonald and moved to Ontario. There despite the demanding duties of being a minister’s wife and the mother of two sons, Montgomery published another nineteen novels. When Montgomery died in1942, she was buried in Cavendish. Tourism flourished in the 1950s and 1960s as people began to have more leisure time and the money to travel. The red soil, green fields and beautiful blue ocean of the Island offer a panorama of beautiful scenic contrasts and vacationers are attracted by the warm sandy beaches. The national park on the north shore in Cavendish is second in popularity only to Banff National Park in Alberta. Its 40 kilometers (25 miles) of scenic coastline include spectacular sand dunes, sandstone cliffs, freshwater ponds, salt marshes and woodlands. This is the area of the Island immortalized in Lucy Maud Montgomery’s book, Anne of Green Gables. Cavendish is approximately 25 miles from the beautiful town called Summerside, this town is second in size only to Charlottetown; owed its growth to shipbuilding, the timber to build ships or to export was usually cut in winter and hauled out of the woods by teams of horses or oxen. Some farmers earned extra money in the winters this way.  Shipbuilding began with the approach of spring, and the Island shipyards came alive with the sound of axes thudding into wood. The vessels’ keels and frames were made mainly from hardwood trees; juniper and spruce were used for planking the frames and the decks; pine made the best masks and spars Saws ripped timber into planks, and the planks from the hulls were then placed in steam boxes to soften. Shipwrights, carpenters, sail makers, chandlers, blacksmiths, riggers and spar makers were needed for the construction of a sound vessel. Shipbuilding encouraged the growth of these occupations, which in turn brought prosperity to the nearby villages.

Summerside also had an air port, When Prime Minister W.L.M.King agreed to take part in the British Commonwealth Air training program for Allied pilots, Canada had to select suitable sites, Fortunately for P.E. I., Canada’s minister of defense, R.L. Ralston, had lost his bid for election in 1935. In desperation, Ralston persuaded the Prince County Liberal Association to allow him to run there in a by-election. The victorious Ralston rewarded his adopted constituency with military bases at Mount Pleasant, Wellington and St. Eleanors, which created immediate prosperity in Prince County. The Mount Pleasant base became an air-gunnery school, where the men, would practice shooting ink-colored bullets at a white silk target pulled behind an aircraft. The British pilots were send here to train also because of P.I., not having to deal with fog, it made a perfect training base, like Britain; is none for the amount of fog they have; and they could practice their war maneuvers of hedgehopping; very low over the Northumberland Straight, that the Lighthouse keeper Benny McIssac would report, that; at the top of the Light he had to look down on the plane, and during, world war two; the beacon at the West Point lighthouse had to be working for the airplanes that flew in and out of P.I., even though the straight would be frozen over and the ships no longer would need it.   Ken said his grandmother MacDonald would be out in her garden working and would lift her rack to wave at them, and could look right at the pilot for they flew so low. The history of flying in Prince Edward Island began in 1912, when a young Cuban pilot flew a homemade plane over the Exhibition Grounds in Chalottetown. But it was not until 1941, when Carl Burke founded Maritime Central Airways, that Prince Edward Island became important in the aviation history of Canada. In 1939, after earning his commercial pilot’s license, Carl Burke became a pilot with Canadian Airways. During the Second World War, he flew planes from Canada to England. In 1963, when Carl Burke sold the airlines to Eastern Provincial Airways, M.C.A. had become Canada’s largest independent cargo airline. The St. Eleanors base, in Summerside; which served as a flying school and later as a reconnaissance school, remained after the war and quickly assumed a vital economic role in the area. Local Summerside merchants found a ready market for their goods at the base, and civilians secured employment there. With considerable local and provincial assistance, an aircraft manufacturing plant and other business moved to the former air base. In response to public pressure over the decision to close the base, the federal government established a Goods and Services Tax (GST) branch in Summerside. The lovely seaside town, has a few, must see, places; one is a new Atlantic super store; it would be very hard to describe it is so elaborate, with paintings on the walls, 2 floors high; to coordinate with their displays, of types of foods you are shopping for; the only other place we have found one of its kind, is in; St Stevens across the border of Calais Maine. In the year 1995 The School of Piping, was created, people have come from all over Canada, learn or progress further with it, and many come from the States; this is located in Summerside, and is very successful.  The boardwalk on the water front is named Spinnakers Landing, has little shops and the Wyatt Theatre for performing Celtic dancing, and Gaelic music, Ken and I have been to the theatre for several different occasions. One I remember and will never forget was the performance of the Coal Miners (The Men of the Deep) they entered on the stage of a choir of 50 men, and sang with no lights, in the theater; but for the lights on their hats. In the harbour of Summerside yachts, of rich and famous have been spotted; from new bike and joggers paths, lined with flowers; to the special newly made park, Ken said; when he was a boy during the second world war; Summerside had shoulder to shoulder, people walking the side walks, but now it’s a different look; but it has much to offer a tourist. Leaving Summerside on Rt.2 heading for West Point, often instead of going to O’Leary, we take a left turn at Carleton and follow Lady Slipper Drive to Coleman.  This tiny town has a post office but no store. Suddenly on the right is the Free Church of Scotland, built by Amos MacLean and on the top of the steeple the spire has a symbol in the shape of the Scottish Thistle. In the community at the Brae, you come to a second church built by Amos MacLean, built as a Presbyterian Church is now a United Church .A large modern tomb stone in a quaint cemetery behind the church commemorates John and Jannet MacLean, Kenneth’s great grandfather and grandmother. The Reading on this modern memorial stone, says he’s the patriarch of the Presbyterian Church in the Brae. Beside the new stone is another, which has the ancient metal symbol of the Scottish thistle.  It was standing very tall and erect, making a strong statement of exactly who were the first people to come and settle the area around the Brae, and the small black polished mirrored stone on the ground in front of the thistle read Laughlin MacLean and his wife Mary Moreshed. The third church Amos MacLean built is the Immaculate Conception Church, the Roman Catholic Church in the Brae, in a picturesque setting that’s located in an ocean front, where they; at one time, built ships.  So of course I would have to take pictures of this setting.  Many of these churches have a background of the ocean and the breathtaking landscape.

Soon you will come to West Point where you can follow the signs to the Marina; you will see a new million dollar building that was built, in 2002 and took the place of the little old school house; that was turned into the community hall, where our wedding reception was held in 1987, the new building is called The Harbourside Centre, this was constructed with many purposes to fulfill, the Marina not only has a harbour for their fishing and lobster boats but had a wharf made, in a designated area for pleasure boats, that are now coming into the West Point from other villages of P.I. also from Richibuctou, and Miramichi  New Brunswick and down from the St. Lawrence River, if they want to pull in; and stay for a day or two; and make a visit and meet the West Point People. This is one of the reasons The Harbourside Center was constructed, to comply with the community with a small grocery store and for these visitors they installed showers, a utility room with washer and dryer facilities to use.  There is a big community hall, for all the functions they have, and there are many for an emergency; something very serious happens in the community, they all get together for a pot luck dinner, have a fund raisers; donations, all coming together for one another, they have many dinner and dancing celebrations, like the West Point Lighthouse Days. And on the third floor of the Centre is an efficiency apartment for any one that would like to stay, and en-joy the harbour perhaps for a honeymoon suite. One day at home in Maine, on a Sunday morning, I remember, probably in 1998 we were watching the travel channel on the television, when they announced they had been to Prince Edward Island and had gone to West Point and visited with the people when all of a sudden on the television they show Carol and Wayne, they talk with Carol about the community, and then they showed segments of her telling stories to children, and of her, touring the filming grew and the spokes person or interviewer; through part of the lighthouse, and she was telling about the old living quarters turned into two separate, guest rooms; and here was where she told of how the light house has a ghost, and in the year 1955; AnnieLou, said it was the fall of the year, when they were digging for potatoes, when Benny MacIsaac the Lighthouse keeper, became very ill and was put in the hospital for a week, there-for, the son George MacIsaac and his wife, were asked to take his place. AnnieLou being a school teacher and George a carpenter, worked days; but the light did not need anyone to tend it, until the dark of the night; to guide the ships around the reef, so it worked well for the two of them to go, to the lighthouse to get settled down for the night’ George would go up to the light and clean the wick, clean the reflectors and the kerosene for the light would have to be pulled up on the dumb waiter; and hand crank the weights to the top, to keep the light rotating; now, at 1pm he would have to go back to the top of the lighthouse again, Benny had his sleeping quarters on the first floor, and had a routine when he would go up to the light and crank the weights to make sure it worked through the night. But George was afraid of not waking, for that second return, to the top; so he wanted to sleep further up to be closer to the light, so they settled in on the second floor, (this is where Carol was displaying the two new renovated bedrooms) and their story goes, sometime in the night, every night that they were there; they heard footsteps on the stairs all the way up to the light, it was so chilling and frightening in the dark of the night, in a cold damp wood structure, trying to be brave to help the light keeper out, asked; who do you think it was; and they replied,  Lighthouse Willie, which was Kens and Carols great grandfather; the first lighthouse keeper, who kept the light for 50 years. Is his spirit still working and climbing the same old staircase going from his living quarters on the first floor all the way up to the light that needs to be tended and cared for, and to make sure the beacon, lights the way and the ships stay clear of the reef, and she left us hanging in thought, with goose bumps. Then she moved on into another room made into an honeymoon suite where in renovating, they did a charming elaborate room, with a canopy up over the top of the bed with matching curtains on the two, 130 year old windows with thick alcoves with a ledge of about 2 feet, and a joining bathroom done up with frills and flowers, so intriguing. Then they moved on up to the top of the light, where you can go out onto a balcony and walk all the way around the structure and see the landscape at least 6 floors high. Then the tour took them to the new Restaurant and the motel rooms built above, in the year 1985 and because of saving the old lighthouse, people get to sleep in the lighthouse Inn, the only one in Canada. Then on came Wayne taking them down to the Harbour and showing off where they kept there fishing vessels, takes them aboard his, lobster boat, named the Tammy C. after his daughter; and has a lobster on top of a lobster trap and is showing how to hypnotize the lobster by standing him on his head and rub him on his back, this will put him to sleep, then they went on to demonstrate how to haul lobster traps up from the ocean floor; and then taking them for a ride on his boat in the Northumberland Straight. It was on for 15 minutes before they took you to another part of the country of Canada. Well we were pretty excited and the phone started ringing and my son Brent, who lives in Atlanta Georgia, had seen it and needed us to be sure and tune in to it, more calls came in, relatives from my hometown, they happened to be watching the Travel Channel that morning.  So have to say, this little Island has a lot of charisma.  That calls you back and back.

Too the only Island in the world.  Prince Edward Island, Canada.