Backyard History

Giant squid attacked Newfoundland fishing boats in 1873. This was all the more shocking because at the time people didn't believe giant squid were even real. Soon, the entire world's attention would turn towards Newfoundland.

https://backyardhistory.ca/f/giant-squid-attacks-in-newfoundland

Camp B-70, near Fredericton,  held captured German Nazis and Fascist Italians during the Second World War. The prisoners and guards played an elaborate game of cat and mouse, with constant attempts at escape. Remarkably, one escape was actually stopped by an actual real live cat, who had been performing in the camp as part of a traveling circus..

When a bank robber gets stuck in a chimney on April Fools Day, nobody believes a 12 year old boy trying to save him..

On the cold and moonless night in the winter of 1848, the only ever attempted robbery of the Bank of New Brunswick in Saint John took place.

It was not the least bit successful, and turned into quite the bizarre -but true- night long incident.

https://backyardhistory.ca/f/bungling-bank-burglar-gets-stuck-in-chimney

“While I am writing to you the shells are screaming and the bullets are hitting but why should I care? I have just had a good meal!” wrote Emile Goguen, an Acadian lumberjack from New Brunswick who had volunteered to go fight fascism in the Spanish Civil War, and who would be interrogated about his activities while there.

More than 1500 Canadians volunteered to fight fascism in the Spanish Civil War. The only New Brunswicker to join was Emile Goguen.

Prince Edward Island was the first place in Canada to have a car ... and the only province to ban them!

https://backyardhistory.ca/f/when-pei-banned-cars

A beloved Canadian radio host and author had a radical past.

In the 1960s a Maritimer achieved Canada wide fame for his talent in gardening. Known as Mr Green Thumbs, this kindly old man put out no fewer than four massive bestselling books on gardening, and ran a popular regular radio show on how to grow plants.

Mr Green Thumbs’ many dedicated fans likely didn’t know that behind the friendly voice and the kindly writing style of the old man, was a devoted lifelong communist who was so dedicated to his cause that soon after the Russian Revolution and the establishment of the communist Soviet Union, the radical gardener went to that new country to see the revolution in action for himself…

Elizabeth Beard fought in the American Revolution ... against the Americans.

One New Brunswick woman became something of a worldwide sensation for her remarkable feats fighting in the American Revolution. She was fighting not for the Americans though, but against them.

Her heroics were completely overlooked and forgotten during that chaotic time, but late her life, the public learned about what she had done decades earlier, and stories of her youthful acts became widely known all over both Europe and North America.

backyardhistory.ca

Saint John's genteel Rockwood Park was once turned into a modern electric circus.

For several years Saint John’s iconic Rockwood Park –the largest urban park in Canada at the time– was turned into a summer fair grounds based on Coney Island. In the early 1900s it featured rides that had never been seen before like a ferris wheel and merry go around, nightly fireworks, bars and restaurants, and acrobatic performances so daring the daredevil chickened out, but a local waiter stepped in to perform them instead.

backyardhistory.ca

Like the Alamo, but in Fredericton.

Fredericton’s first European settlement was a French fort, which was attacked and besieged by a fleet from New England.

The story of the battle is kind of like the American myth of the Alamo. A small and beleaguered band of defenders is facing down a vastly larger and better equipped army of invaders. Except in this case they are coming up from what is now the United States.

The invaders have a reputation for massacres, and losing the battle would likely mean death.

However, just before the battle begins, the defenders' spirits are bolstered by a group of famous heroes of their time, who have come to aid the motley crew of defenders in their time of need…

backyardhistory.ca