BY KIRK STARRATT
Kings County Advertiser/Register
The centennial of the publication of Arthur Wentworth Hamilton Eaton’s The History of Kings County, Nova Scotia, Heart of the Acadian Land has been officially commemorated.
Kings Historical Society board member Ed Coleman noticed recently the 100th anniversary of the 1910 publication had arrived, and suggested to the society the Kings County Museum recognize the milestone. A columnist for the Kings County Advertiser and Register, Coleman wrote a piece about the idea.
The White Family Funeral Home of Kentville was approached and graciously agreed to fund a commemorative plaque. Keith Berry supplied portraits of Eaton and Paul Illsley took the photo of Eaton’s tombstone. Lark Photography cleaned up the portraits and Perfect Corner framed the plaque.
Eaton’s history covers up to 1901 and, although it focuses heavily on the Planters and Loyalists, Coleman says, “he didn’t miss much.” Also of interest, Eaton made a speech in the early 1890s about the need for a local historical society.
Museum curator Bria Stokesbury, who provided the text, says Eaton has a very interesting tombstone in Kentville’s Oak Grove Cemetery.
The historical society was very supportive of Coleman’s idea. Although it was written a century ago, Stokesbury says Eaton’s book is considered the definitive history of Kings County.
“It’s one of the first works people refer to when researching Kings County,” she says, “It stood up pretty well.”
“We try to give back to the community that has supported us all these years,” says Greg White of the White Family Funeral Home. The family feels fortunate to get to work in the small community they grew up in.
Information from Stokesbury’s narrative says Eaton - historian, writer, educator, poet and priest of New England Planter ancestry, was born in Kentville in 1849. In 1913, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. While pursuing his education in New England, he studied and wrote about theology, intent on a career in ministry. He was ordained a deacon and, later, a priest in the Protestant Episcopal Church.
A contemporary biographer of Eaton stated, “Soon after his ordination his mental aptitudes and tastes led him to adopt the profession of teaching instead of parish work.” He went on to work for many years as a professor of English literature at the New York College. As an author, his topics included theology, poetry, history and genealogy. His contemporary biography states, “but it is on his many publications that Dr. Eaton’s claim to be remembered will no doubt chiefly rest.” When his history of Kings County was published in 1910, it was greeted as a “graphic account of the County’s varied history.”
Eaton passed away in 1937. While he lived, he was highly lauded for his academic brilliance, educational contributions, poetic ability and prolific writing.
kstarratt@kentvilleadvertiser.ca
