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Saint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for Farewell... For NowUnfortunately, Season 1 of the podcast is coming to an abrupt end. Greg is unable to continue with the show. As we said in the last episode, there is a lot of work that goes behind the podcast. If you know Greg, he is very active in the Saint John community through music and volunteer organizations, as well as being a busy academic at the University of New Brunswick. He took some time to evaluate his workload and priorities, and came to the conclusion that the podcast was proving to be a bit too much. I am sure all our...2025-04-1501 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for Season Two?In this episode, Saint John - Nothing Happened Here goes back to the 80s. Also, it is revealed that a big decision must be made.If you would like Saint John -Nothing Happened Here to come back for a second season, vote by giving the podcast a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts and/or Spotify!2025-04-0150 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the Fenian Threat of 1865/1866In this episode, we discuss the Fenian movement of the 1860s and its effects on Saint John during security scares in late 1865 and the spring of 1866, including its political impacts in the latter year and beyond. Founded on both sides of the Atlantic by former members of the Young Ireland movement of the late 1840s, the Irish Republican Brotherhood was dedicated to the liberation of Ireland from British rule and the establishment of an independent republic. A secret society whose membership and activities were far from secret in the United States, it was opposed by the hierarchy of the...2025-03-181h 05Saint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the Fight for Women's Voting RightsThis episode, released close to International Women’s Day (March 8), recalls an important political reform cause in Saint John’s past that was part of a national and international movement: the fight for women’s voting rights. Starting in the late 1800s, the Saint John Women’s Enfranchisement Organization, which was a spinoff from a national organization, worked tirelessly for the provincial franchise for New Brunswick women as a citizenship right.The Saint John suffragists, who had male allies, were the most active group in the Maritime provinces working on the issue. The stories of its key members...2025-03-041h 08Saint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the 1914 Street Railway RiotTwo weeks before Great Britain declared war on Germany in 1914, the Saint John central business district was the site of another type of conflict, a labour struggle that pitted more than 100 members of the street railway union against the unpopular streetcar company. The three-day strike drew thousands of onlookers and supporters to the uptown area and produced the most iconic image from early 20th-century Saint John, two tram cars resting on their side in Market Square, observed by curious citizens. Despite its significance, the strike and riot are not commemorated by a plaque or found in any tourism promotion...2025-02-181h 02Saint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the First Skyjacking in Canada - Part 2In this episode, we return to Sept. 11 1968 and the early moments of the first skyjacking in Canadian history on board Air Canada Flight 303. The flight had arrived from Moncton, New Brunswick to pick up passengers at Saint John with a final destination of Toronto. In addition to pilot, Ronald Hollett, and second officer, Robert Bromley, the crew consisted of flight attendants Christine Waud and Beverley Atkinson. Christine and Beverley were the first people on board to realize that a hijacking was being attempted.According to a list released to the press by Air Canada, the passengers who...2025-02-041h 10Saint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the First Skyjacking in Canada - Part 1In 1968, Saint John made aviation history as the starting point for Canada’s first skyjacking: an Air Canada Vickers Viscount passenger plane headed for Toronto. This was the first of several acts of air piracy during the golden age of skyjacking in Canada. We begin our episode by discussing the golden age of commercial aviation in Canada, when passenger travel was associated with glamour, passenger comfort and convenience. Relatively expensive compared to later decades, air travel from the late 1950s to the early 1970s was not a mass phenomenon and the typical passenger was a male business executive. Female fl...2025-01-2147 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for Naming the StreetsIn Saint John, as in other cities, residents’ sense of geography is based on streets and neighbourhoods, but few stop to ponder why streets were given certain names or, in some cases, re-named. It turns out that many of the names of the city’s thoroughfares are a direct link to the colonial past and reflect the priorities of Saint John’s elite, as well as reflecting the power structure at the time. Simply put, the names of streets, parks and public buildings can tell us much about who dominated a community in the past and who was excluded. Sain...2025-01-0755 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for Victorian ChristmasesIn this last episode of 2024, we explore how Christmas was celebrated in Saint John in during the Victorian era (1837-1901). In this episode, we are honoured to include a discussion with Saint John’s “Mr. Christmas,” local author David Goss, who has published more than twenty books on Saint John and New Brunswick history.As residents of a British colony, Saint Johners avidly followed trends from the ‘Mother county’, but because of their Loyalist roots and economic, social and cultural connections with the United States, celebrations in the city were also influenced by trends south of the border. P...2024-12-2357 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for Benedict Arnold - Part 2This episode examines Arnold’s attempts to set up a business empire in the pioneer colony of New Brunswick, based in the struggling and divided Loyalist town of Saint John from 1785 to 1791. As one of the few prominent residents with money, he bought and sold land, leased or purchased sailing vessels and established trading establishments in Saint John, Fredericton and on Campobello Island. He also advanced credit to customers and suppliers and became a partner with Munson Hayt, a Loyalist who had served in the Prince of Wales Regiment. Part 2 also examines Arnold’s personal and social life...2024-12-1059 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for Benedict Arnold - Part 1Little remains to show that the controversial American military leader, Benedict Arnold (1741-1801), lived in Saint John for several years after the American Revolution, except for a plaque on a building in the uptown area of the city. His name became synonymous with treason because of his involvement in an unsuccessful plot to turn over the Continental army’s fortifications at West Point on the Hudson River to the British in 1780, and his later appointment as an officer in the British army. In that capacity, he led successful expeditions against Charleton, South Carolina and New London, Connecticut before leaving Am...2024-11-2656 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for Boy Soldiers of the First World WarIn this episode, Mark and Greg have a conversation with Saint John author, Heather McBriarty, on underaged soldiers in the First World War. As in other cities in Canada , Saint John was swept by a wave of patriotism that encouraged many young men to volunteer for the Canadian Expeditionary Force. Much of this patriotism was channeled into support for Great Britain, which most Canadians viewed as the ‘mother country’. More than 600,000 Canadians served in the army, most of whom were posted overseas. Until conscription was introduced late in the war, the Canadian military depended on volunteers and by 1916 these were...2024-11-1148 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the Irish Famine ImmigrationIn early Saint John, most years saw an equal number of Protestants and Catholics coming to the city. In the second half of the 1840s, increasing numbers of Catholic immigrants, fleeing the Famine in Ireland, arrived in distress. During ‘Black 47,’ more than 100 vessels brought Irish emigrants to New Brunswick. A record number died at sea enroute to Saint John, in quarantine on Partridge Island, in the alms house, or at an emigrant hospital/sheds on shore. Children who lost one or both parents were placed in a temporary emigrant orphan asylum,We begin with a discussion of the f...2024-10-2955 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the York Point Riot of 1849This episode examines one of the darker chapters in the history of New Brunswick and what would become Canada - social violence in Saint John in 1849 that took up to a dozen lives. Join us to hear about what happened on July 12, 1849, when several hundred Orangemen from Saint John, Portland, Carleton and as far away as Woodstock, began to parade towards the Irish Catholic immigrant ghetto of York Point. The marchers, led by a member representing their hero, King William of Orange riding on a horse, were determined to humiliate their enemies, who they regarded as undesirable aliens. The...2024-10-1548 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the Cholera Epidemic of 1854In the summer of 1854, Saint John and the neighbouring town of Portland were hit by cholera, which killed between 1100 and 1500 people. The highest death tolls were among poor and immigrant populations who lived in low-lying tenement districts with poor drainage, limited access to clean drinking water, and primitive methods for disposing of human waste. Although the elderly and very young of the working class were most vulnerable, the disease also affected citizens living in middle class and elite city blocks and even those in rural areas surrounding the city. In this episode, Mark and Greg discuss how cholera...2024-10-0152 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereExcept for the 1785 Election RiotIn our opening podcast episode, we examine the dramatic 1785 provincial election in Saint John, the colony’s largest settlement, which was punctuated by a riot. This contested election, the first in the colony, revealed simmering tensions among the Loyalist migrants that had been imported from New York. Show Notes: https://www.nothinghappenedhere.ca/post/except-for-the-1785-election-riot-12024-09-1754 min
New Brunswick TravelerNothing Happened HereToday I am interviewing Greg Marquis, the co-host of a brand new podcast about Saint John history. Greg is a local university professor and president of the New Brunswick Historical Society. His co-host is Mark Allan Greene, an Alberta university professor and the author of The Great Saint John Fire of 1877. The podcast launches on September 17 and will be produced every two weeks. Link to the podcast is https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/saint-john-nothing-happened-here/id1766391411
2024-09-0913 minSaint John: Nothing Happened HereSaint John - Nothing Happened Here PromoJoin us on September 17, 2024 for the first episode of Saint John - Nothing Happened Here.Many people think that nothing significant ever really happened in Saint John, New Brunswick. This history podcast challenges those thoughts by uncovering little known tales from the city and providing fresh perspectives on the people, places and events of the past.Mark Allan Greene is a history enthusiast who loves a good story. Greg Marquis is an academic historian who uncovers the past. Together, they bring you Saint John - Nothing Happened Here.2024-09-0301 min