Fogo Island, Newfoundland and Labrador

Fogo Island is the largest of the offshore islands of

Islands of Newfoundland and Labrador

This is a list of islands of Newfoundland and Labrador. The province of Newfoundland and Labrador is composed of mainland Labrador and the large island of Newfoundland. The coast of both the island and the Labrador peninsula are lined with islands of various magnitudes.-List of islands:-External...

Newfoundland and Labrador

Newfoundland and Labrador is the easternmost province of Canada. Situated in the country's Atlantic region, it incorporates the island of Newfoundland and mainland Labrador with a combined area of . As of April 2011, the province's estimated population is 508,400...

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. It lies off the northeast coast of Newfoundland, northwest of Musgrave Harbour

Musgrave Harbour, Newfoundland and Labrador

Musgrave Harbour is a Canadian town in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador.-Geography:Located on the Kittiwake coast of the island of Newfoundland, the closest major centre is the town of Gander.-History:...

across Hamilton Sound, just east of Change Islands. The island is about 25 km long and 14 km wide. The total area is 237.71 km² (91.78 sq mi).

The island had a population of 2,706 people in the 2006 census

Canada 2006 Census

The Canada 2006 Census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population. Census day was May 16, 2006. The next census following will be the 2011 Census. Canada's total population enumerated by the 2006 census was 31,612,897...

.

The original settlement

Town

A town is a human settlement larger than a village but smaller than a city. The size a settlement must be in order to be called a "town" varies considerably in different parts of the world, so that, for example, many American "small towns" seem to British people to be no more than villages, while...

of the island took place in the 18th century and the area remained isolated well into the 20th century. The English and Irish descendants of the first inhabitants retained traces of their Elizabethan English and Old Irish dialects which can be heard on the Island today. The Island has many ancient folk customs brought from England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

and Ireland

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

that are now disappearing.

History

Fogo Island is one of the oldest named features on the coast of Newfoundland. On French maps of the 16th to 18th centuries the island is referred to as Ile des Fougues. The island may have been first named by Portuguese

Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

explorers and early fishing crews in the 16th century (Fogo means Fire in Portuguese). Until 1783 Fogo Island was on an area of the coast called the French Shore. Though English and Irish were not supposed to settle there, under the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht

Treaty of Utrecht

The Treaty of Utrecht, which established the Peace of Utrecht, comprises a series of individual peace treaties, rather than a single document, signed by the belligerents in the War of Spanish Succession, in the Dutch city of Utrecht in March and April 1713...

, they did settle, and by 1750 Fogo was a thriving part of the British mercantile system of fisheries, based out of West Country English towns such as Poole, in Dorset.

Tilting Harbour

Tilting, Newfoundland and Labrador

Tilting is a town on the eastern end of Fogo Island off the northeast coast of Newfoundland. The community has been designated as a National Cultural Landscape District of Canada in 2005 by Parks Canada, and was also designated as a Registered Heritage District by the Heritage Foundation of...

on Fogo Island is a National Cultural Landscape District of Canada and is Newfoundland and Labrador's first Provincial Heritage District. Tilting is unique for its Irish culture and, some people say, its Irish dialect. The Irish Cemetery in Tilting may be the oldest in North America. The first Irish settled in Tilting in the 1750s, and uniquely for Newfoundland, Tilting evolved into an exclusively Irish and Catholic town by the 1780s.

Beothuk

Beothuk

The Beothuk were one of the aboriginal peoples in Canada. They lived on the island of Newfoundland at the time of European contact in the 15th and 16th centuries...

Indians traversed Fogo Island for many hundreds of years before Irish and English settlers arrived. The Beothuk pursued the seal

Pinniped

Pinnipeds or fin-footed mammals are a widely distributed and diverse group of semiaquatic marine mammals comprising the families Odobenidae , Otariidae , and Phocidae .-Overview: Pinnipeds are typically sleek-bodied and barrel-shaped...

and salmon

Salmon

Salmon is the common name for several species of fish in the family Salmonidae. Several other fish in the same family are called trout; the difference is often said to be that salmon migrate and trout are resident, but this distinction does not strictly hold true...

fisheries in the area. They also travelled out to the Funk Islands to collect feathers from the birds there. In the early years of European settlement at Fogo, there were incidents of violence between the Beothuk and the Europeans. This contact ended around the year 1800 when the Beothuk became extinct.

Fogo Island, like most of the Newfoundland outports, was built upon the fishery

Fishery

Generally, a fishery is an entity engaged in raising or harvesting fish which is determined by some authority to be a fishery. According to the FAO, a fishery is typically defined in terms of the "people involved, species or type of fish, area of water or seabed, method of fishing, class of boats,...

. Until the widespread depletion of fish stocks in the 1990s, cod was king.

Fishing has always been a hard life. Before Confederation with Canada, the mercantile classes of St John's, Newfoundland became rich by holding a near-monopoly

Monopoly

A monopoly exists when a specific person or enterprise is the only supplier of a particular commodity...

stranglehold on both the supply of goods to the Newfoundland outport

Newfoundland outport

An outport is the term given for a small isolated coastal community in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Originally the term was just used for coastal communities on the island of Newfoundland but the term has also been adopted for those on the mainland area of Labrador as...

s and on the sale of fish from them.

In the early 20th century, the Fisherman's Protective Union was formed in an attempt to break this stranglehold. It was a form of co-operative

Cooperative

A cooperative is a business organization owned and operated by a group of individuals for their mutual benefit...

with general stores owned by fishermen for fishermen. One of the Fishermen's Union stores still stands at Seldom-Come-By on Fogo Island, now open as a museum complete with general store, port installations, fishing implements and equipment for the manufacture of cod liver oil

Cod liver oil

Cod liver oil is a nutritional supplement derived from liver of cod fish. It has high levels of the omega-3 fatty acids, EPA and DHA, and very high levels of vitamin A and vitamin D. It is widely taken to ease the symptoms of arthritis and for other health benefits...

.

Today the Fogo Island Cooperative continues to successfully stake footholds in new fish markets. Communities began recognizing the appeal of their land and heritage as cultural tourism opportunities.

Crab

Crab

True crabs are decapod crustaceans of the infraorder Brachyura, which typically have a very short projecting "tail" , or where the reduced abdomen is entirely hidden under the thorax...

and lobster

American lobster

The American lobster, Homarus americanus, is a species of lobster found on the Atlantic coast of North America, chiefly from Labrador to New Jersey. Within North America, it is also known as the northern lobster or Maine lobster. It can reach a body length of , and a mass of over , making it the...

fisheries have largely replaced the cod fishery; a fish-packing plant

Factory

A factory or manufacturing plant is an industrial building where laborers manufacture goods or supervise machines processing one product into another. Most modern factories have large warehouses or warehouse-like facilities that contain heavy equipment used for assembly line production...

remains in operation in the town of Fogo.

A Marconi

Marconi Company

The Marconi Company Ltd. was founded by Guglielmo Marconi in 1897 as The Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company...

radio transmitting station was once operational atop a hill near the town of Fogo; operating with a spark-gap transmitter

Transmitter

In electronics and telecommunications a transmitter or radio transmitter is an electronic device which, with the aid of an antenna, produces radio waves. The transmitter itself generates a radio frequency alternating current, which is applied to the antenna. When excited by this alternating...

to establish maritime communications, the station was forced to close around the time that radio became common for household use as the spark-gap design generated unacceptable levels of radio interference

Electromagnetic interference

Electromagnetic interference is disturbance that affects an electrical circuit due to either electromagnetic induction or electromagnetic radiation emitted from an external source. The disturbance may interrupt, obstruct, or otherwise degrade or limit the effective performance of the circuit...

. Efforts to rebuilt this station as a historic site

Historic site

A historic site is an official location where pieces of political, military or social history have been preserved. Historic sites are usually protected by law, and many have recognized with the official national historic site status...

commenced in 2002.

In 1967, the island played a key role in the development of what came to be known as the "Fogo Process," a model for community media as a tool for addressing community concerns, when Colin Low

Colin Low (filmmaker)

Colin Archibald Low, CM, RCA is a Canadian animation and documentary filmmaker.Born in Cardston, Alberta, Low attended the Banff School of Fine Arts and the Calgary Institute of Technology, now known as the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology...

shot 27 films with Fogo Islanders as part of the National Film Board of Canada

National Film Board of Canada

The National Film Board of Canada is Canada's twelve-time Academy Award-winning public film producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary, animation, alternative drama and digital media productions...

's Challenge for Change

Challenge for Change

Challenge for Change was a participatory film and video project created by the National Film Board of Canada in 1967, the Canadian Centennial...

program.

Residents defeated the Smallwood Government's plans to resettle Fogo Island in the 1950s but by 1967 a downturn in the inshore fishery had forced many to turn to welfare support. While the island did recover—in part to the Fogo Process—the fishery state held negative impacts felt for years to come. The northern cod fishery closed in 1992, directly or indirectly impacting every resident of Fogo Island.

Communities

In the 2006 Census

Canada 2006 Census

there were eleven communities on Fogo Island:

Stag Harbour
Stag Harbour, Newfoundland and Labrador
Stag Harbour, with a population of approximately 250, is a community on Fogo Island, in Newfoundland, Canada.-See also:* List of communities in Newfoundland and Labrador...

223 (2001 population)
Seldom (together with Little Seldom) 444
Little Seldom
Island Harbour
Island Harbour, Newfoundland and Labrador
Island Harbour is a community on Fogo Island, in Newfoundland, Canada. Originally founded in 1864. It had a population of 207 people in 1940, and 275 people in 1956. As of 2001, it has a population of 185.-See also:...

185 (2001 population)
Deep Bay
Deep Bay, Newfoundland and Labrador
Deep Bay was a village of 106 , located south of Fogo.- External Links :*...

141 (2001 population)
Fogo Island Central 15 (2001 population)
Fogo 748
Joe Batt's Arm (together with Barr'd Islands and Shoal Bay) 778
Shoal Bay
Barr'd Islands
Tilting
Tilting, Newfoundland and Labrador
Tilting is a town on the eastern end of Fogo Island off the northeast coast of Newfoundland. The community has been designated as a National Cultural Landscape District of Canada in 2005 by Parks Canada, and was also designated as a Registered Heritage District by the Heritage Foundation of...

248

Since 2006 the 11 communities have amalgamated to form one community known as the Town of Fogo Island.

Name

Fogo Island was once called Y del Fogo, meaning Isle of Fire. There are two theories for the name:

Many accidental or natural forest fires destroyed the dense forests of the Northern part of the Island.

Europeans continually saw the burning fires of the Beothuks, when they were visiting from across the Atlantic.

Then, there is the more probable idea that some old salt with a sense of humour named Fogo Island (note its oval shape) after Fogo the Cape Verde Islands' active volcano. Note that many Newfoundland geographical features were named by the Spanish, the Portuguese and the French before anglophones (the English, the Irish and the Scots) arrived. Cape Bonavista, Cape Spear, Cape Race, Trinity Bay, Placentia Bay, Notre Dame Bay, Cape St Francis, Baccalieu Island, Baie Verte, Taslow, Baie l'Argente and even St John's or Catalina are place names that were originally named by non-English-speakers.

Fogo Island Brimstone Head Folk Festival

The town of Fogo in Fogo Island is home to the Brimstone Head Folk Festival, hosted by the Folk Alliance. This event attracts people from all over Newfoundland every year in early august, performers consist of many bands which have included 'Middle tickle',
'The Fogo Island Accordion Group', 'Shores of Newfoundland', 'The Affections', And many other local performers such as Aaron Brown, Sally Payne, Jason Hoven.

Brimstone Head is touted as one of the four corners of the world by the Flat Earth Society

Flat Earth Society

The Flat Earth Society is an organization that seeks to further the belief that the Earth is flat instead of an oblate spheroid. The modern organization was founded by Englishman Samuel Shenton in 1956 and was later led by Charles K...

.

Along with the Brimstone Head Folk Festival, other communities have festivals as well. Joe Batt's Arm hosts the Ethridge's Point Seaside Festival, which usually takes place during the first weekend in August, the weekend before the Brimstone Head festival. This festival involves many of the same performers as the Brimstone Head Folk Festival, along with many others.

Fogo Island Accordion Group

Fogo Island is also home to the island's one and only 'Fogo Island Accordion Group', which started up in the 1990s with 5 girls from the fogo island central academy with one of the islands teacher's 'Gerald Freake'. The group has been recognized by various communities, the province of Newfoundland & Labrador, not only for their talent, but their motto 'keeping tradition alive' and traveling the country, coast to coast, bringing Newfoundland music to many provinces as well as recording 5+ CD's and 3 videos.

The Fogo Island accordion group has been separated since 2001 since they've graduated from high school and moved on with their lives, spreading throughout Canada, getting jobs, but still playing their button accordions. They came together once again in 2006 for a reunion on Fogo island, and was approached by CBC (Canadian Broadcast Company) - Land & Sea, Where they did a 1 hour long show, telling their stories, playing the accordion, and keeping tradition alive once again.

Members Of The Fogo Island Accordion Group:
- Gerald Freake (Teacher, Group Manager, Guitarist)
- Melanie Penton (Accordion Player)
- Heather Penton (Accordion Player, Vocals)
- Angie Penton (Accordion Player)
- Serena Adams (Accordion Player)
- Jennifer Furlong (Accordion Player, Lead Vocals)
- Jamie Hancock (Guitarist, Vocals)

Various members of the past group still perform at both the brimstone head festivals and Ethridge point festival, Jamie Hancock who is seen ever year playing in Joe batt's arm with another band which he is apart of, as well as Melanie penton who still lives on the island, and has played with her cousin who is also an accordionist.

External links