00:05:52.380So it's like a big old family living in oldie times America.
00:05:58.760But in the post-American Revolution era, Thomas, he didn't care for how the loyalists, which is the name for people who fought on the British side, how they were being treated.
00:06:10.700Like after the American Revolution side, the rebels, a.k.a. patriots, when they won and there's a Declaration of Independence and whatnot,
00:06:17.520a lot of loyalists like british red coat people fled but a lot of them stayed because like that's
00:06:23.060where they were from that was they'd lived there for a long time and the people who stayed were
00:06:27.300being persecuted but also his hat business not thriving his farms not thriving things were not
00:06:34.560going well because in the wake of this war that just happened and how many people had died and
00:06:38.780stuff so he knew that he was not going to be super prosperous anytime soon staying in this place with
00:06:46.580like all the people around him not really able to buy hats etc he had his own debts and at this time
00:06:53.780england or britain the british crown was encouraging white people to move to what was
00:07:01.920called then upper canada which is kind of like toronto ottawa area now you might think but that's
00:07:09.380not upper upper Canada is one might think further north like the northwest territories that would
00:07:17.120be what you would call maybe or northern Ontario no upper Canada is Toronto Ottawa area so Britain
00:07:25.180was like hey Americans why don't you go to upper Canada clear some land like build some towns like
00:07:31.540let's let's make Britain great again and so Thomas was like I think this is the move for me right now
00:07:37.720He hadn't fought on the British side during the American Revolution, but he's like, I think this is how I can make some money for my Duggar-sized family.
00:07:45.880So he and four men, who were his friends, pooled the resources together.
00:07:51.820They filled out the paperwork to get a land grant, which they received.
00:07:55.160They received 66,000 acres in the Thames River Valley.
00:07:59.500And they founded a place that they called Oxford-on-the-Thames, which is later and still now known as Ingersoll, Ontario.
00:08:07.720And the contract that they signed said, like, we will found this place. And we promise that in exchange, we will populate it with 40 other families within the next seven years. Which I guess they're just going to do by word of mouth and make such a cool place, lots of people are going to want to go there.
00:08:22.960And so Thomas, his daughter, Laura Secord, their caravan of children and his wife, Sally, all moved up to Upper Canada in 1795.
00:08:34.540So while there, like while he was, he and his associates, you know, and they hired people and stuff to clear the land, Thomas supported his huge family by running a tavern just so that they were getting some income while the land was being cleared and stuff.
00:08:48.240and they lived in queenston at this time like they couldn't live in oxford-on-the-tames aka
00:08:54.600ingersoll because that like it wasn't a city yet it was just trees so living in a place called
00:08:59.280queenston running a tavern but then two years into this whole situation like he had promised
00:09:04.420that in the next seven years he would make this prosperous town but his contract was cancelled
00:09:10.680two years later for not having all of its conditions fulfilled and so he's just like0.99
00:09:15.960what the fuck? Like, what am I going to do? And so he moved most of his family to a place called0.96
00:09:21.220Credit River, close to where present day Toronto is. And he opened an inn. Like, this is a skill
00:09:27.000he had. I guess he was personable. He's good with books, although maybe not because he had all these
00:09:30.720debts. And they just ran the inn there. That's what he was doing. After he died in 1812, his
00:09:35.900wife, Sally, continued to run the inn. But I said most of the family moved there. Laura did not.
00:09:41.420But Laura stayed in Queenston to get married.
00:09:44.820And the person she married was named James Secord.
00:09:47.700So James Secord was the son of a loyalist who had served on the British side of the American Revolution.
00:09:55.080He was a young person, but his dad had been on the red coat side of the American Revolution and then fled up to Upper Canada in the wake of that.
00:10:02.880And so they lived in a house built in a place called St. David's.
00:10:06.700I'm saying a lot of place names in case people listening are familiar with that area and live
00:10:11.140in one of those towns, because wouldn't it be delightful for you to hear your town's name
00:10:15.180set on this podcast? Anyway, so I live in this house in St. David's. The first floor was a shop.
00:10:19.400So like this is an entrepreneurial family, like running inns, taverns, and a shop.
00:10:24.600Laura had her first child named Mary in 1799. And then later on, well, actually pretty short
00:10:31.420succession, she had several more children. Charlotte, Harriet, Charles, Badeau, and Apollonia.
00:10:37.200Great names. But then her first child was born in 1799. Time is passing. They're running their
00:10:43.420little shop. They're living in Queenston. Her dad is not too far away in Toronto, running his inn,
00:10:50.900and then 1812. A thing happened that we now call the War of 1812. So this is not a war-based
00:10:59.660podcast like honestly we're here just to talk about laura secord and what did she do so to get0.97
00:11:05.980this over with as quickly as possible it was a war between the united states and britain but it0.96
00:11:11.960was a war between united states like the people who were there and the people who lived in what
00:11:16.760is now canada who were british people the sorts of people who like to talk about technicalities
00:11:21.760of war-based things which is not me are like it wasn't a war between united states and canada
00:11:26.900because Canada did not become a country until 1867. And that's with 1812. It's the place that
00:11:32.340is now Canada. It's the same way that if you're looking at American history and it's like, oh,
00:11:36.960they landed on Plymouth Rock. Like, okay, but it wasn't American then. So why are you starting
00:11:42.620that in American history? Like it was Canada. Just at that point, Canada was a British colony.
00:11:49.020And so the war, which might sound familiar to you, was based on where the border was
00:11:53.380between Upper Canada and the United States.
00:11:56.660And the United States wanted to take over the land around like Niagara Falls,
00:12:00.600like again, that like Upper Canada area.1.00
00:12:02.200And Canada was like, fuck you, no.0.99
00:12:04.300And so, fun fact, during this war, which is called the War of 1812,1.00
00:12:11.200Later on in the war, the Canadian side, aka the British side,
00:12:16.100stormed into Washington and burned down the city,
00:12:19.020including burning down the White House and the Capitol building.
00:12:21.600So that is a thing that, you know, a proud Canadian moment that some would say, well, it wasn't really Canada. They were British people. But like, you know, in this time and our unprecedented times, I think it's sort of a nice memory of the time that the people who now living in what Canada is now, our ancestors, went to Washington and fucking burned down the White House. Like, I love that French Revolution adjacent energy.
00:12:48.620Anyway, so the war started 1812, and Laura's husband, James Secord, enlisted to fight on the British side slash Canadian side.
00:12:57.580His militia unit was responsible for doing things like moving guns and ammunition during military engagements.
00:13:03.440So it sounds like he wasn't out there shooting himself, but they were sort of like support type people.
00:13:09.160So this all started in the summer, like June 1812, October 1812.
00:13:14.200Americans landed near Queenston, which is where Laura and her children and James were living.
00:13:20.040So Laura took her children and they took shelter in a farmhouse about a mile out of town.
00:14:34.920Maybe a lot of people had those skills during this sort of frontier era.
00:14:38.700And so she tended to him in the immediate aftermath of his injuries. And when he was a bit better and able to travel, she took him and the children to St. David's, which is the city, another city where they spent some time. And so James's relatives were there and they spent the winter there with his relatives.
00:14:56.840At this point, so the war had been going on now for about a year, significantly affecting Laura's life, obviously. And so May 1813, like a year after the war started, the American army launched an attack across the Niagara River and Queenston and the whole area, the whole Niagara area fell to the Americans.
00:15:18.840This was the sort of war where like, you know, the Americans would get like a little bit of land on the Canadian side and then the Canadians would get it back and take a bit of American. It was not significant amounts of land are not being changed because they were very equally balanced, is my understanding of this, as a not war historian.
00:15:38.720anyway so men of military age in queenston were sent as war prisoners of war to the u.s
00:15:46.140but james was not sent because he was still recuperating from his injuries and not only
00:15:51.460that because the americans took over this land it's like where are they going to live they're
00:15:54.860not from here so they were billeted which means they just became house guests of people in
00:16:00.760queenston including at the secrets house so suddenly they had these like house guests that
00:16:05.420were also enemy soldiers living with them and all of her young children and her husband
00:16:11.420recuperating from bullet wounds. So it's like quite a situation for Laura to be living through.
00:16:17.740But she was smart. She was canny and she was clever and she kept an ear open to hear what0.81
00:16:25.640the American soldiers were talking about. And on the evening of June 21st, 1813, she overheard
00:16:31.880these soldiers, her unwanted house guests, were talking about these soldiers, like, you know what,
00:16:37.900I'm glad that they were bad at being spies, because that's why Laura Seacord could become
00:16:43.800a hero. So they were just like literally in her house talking about, hey, so like there's this
00:16:48.860surprise attack the Americans are going to do. They're going to go to this place called Beaver
00:16:53.460Dams, where the lieutenant was James Fitzgibbon. And so the Americans were talking out loud,
00:16:58.860like we're going to go beaver dams. We're going to go capture James Fitzgibbon. Um, and then by
00:17:04.000capturing him and we would get some more territory in this like Niagara peninsula area. And so Laura
00:17:10.040is like, I need to go and tell him, I need to go find James Fitzgibbons and give him the heads up0.93
00:17:14.500to like, he's about to be attacked by these Americans. James was not able to travel at this0.54
00:17:20.100time, still recuperating from his like olden days, gunshot injuries, understandably. And so Laura,
00:17:26.780who again, she's just like, she's a doer. She's like, well, fuck this. I'm going to go myself.1.00
00:17:31.440So she decided to go to walk all the way to Fitzgibbon to warn him that this was going to
00:17:37.680happen. How far away was he? It was about 12 miles away. So she set out early in the morning,
00:17:43.700sneaking away, like walking. There were some people wrote about this later and said that
00:17:48.320she brought a cow with her. So in case it looks suspicious, she'd be like, oh, I'm just walking
00:17:52.240my cow, which apparently would make it all less suspicious. But she never said she brought a cow
00:17:56.660I just want to mention that there could have been a cow. Some other retellings of this said,
00:18:00.340and she went out in bare feet. It's like, girl, no, she wore shoes. Like, what are you talking
00:18:05.480about? Maybe one of her shoes came off or something. But anyway, she set out early in0.98
00:18:10.280the morning for this 12 mile walk. Well, technically the walk, it was about 12 miles if
00:18:15.520you just walked straight there, but she wanted to avoid running into like American guards or anyone
00:18:20.320who might stop her. So instead she walked like more circuitously a distance of 20 miles, which
00:18:25.200should be about 32 kilometers in this more roundabout route. At one point, she stopped
00:18:29.920in St. David's and she was joined by her niece, Elizabeth Secord, but Elizabeth did not have the
00:18:35.020endurance and the stamina and the determination. Elizabeth became exhausted and had to stop to
00:18:42.180rest. And so Laura continued on her own. And this is like, it's not just like she doesn't have a map.
00:18:48.700it's like woods like there's not roads but she's just like confident she's the moana of this time
00:18:57.640she i don't know i was gonna say she was reading the stars but she couldn't because it was daytime
00:19:01.440so she just kind of knew the way she was going because she was following this creek
00:19:05.040um and she knew that the creek would lead to where fitzgibbon probably hopefully was and now
00:19:10.440for a quick advertising break chew on this bold question from dentine gum is it ever okay to
00:19:17.460compliment a millennial on their skinny jeans in 2026 dentine chew bold the war is over and both
00:19:31.100sides lost kingdoms were reduced to cinders and armies scattered like bones in the dust
00:19:37.400now the survivors claw to what's left of a broken world praying the darkness chooses someone else
00:19:44.460tonight but in the shadow dark the darkness always wins this is old school adventuring
00:19:51.460at its most cruel your torch ticks down in real time and when that flame dies something else
00:19:57.480rises to finish the job this is a brutal rules light nightmare with a story that emerges organically
00:20:03.880based on the decisions that the characters make this is what it felt like to play rpgs in the
00:20:08.50080s and man it is so good to be back join the glass cannon podcast as we plunge into the shadow
00:20:13.920Dark every Thursday night at 8 p.m. Eastern on youtube.com slash the glass cannon with
00:20:19.000the podcast version dropping the next day.
00:20:22.000See what everybody's talking about and join us in the dark.
00:20:29.120Welcome to the realms of peril and glory.
00:20:34.340Explore the mechanically magical vistas of Vale, the paranormal mysteries of liminal
00:20:41.400London and the cyberpunk chaos of cyborg be awed by our incredible guests from familiar shows
00:20:51.700like Oxventure and no roles barred search realms of peril and glory to find out more
00:20:58.880do you love Disney do you love top 10 lists then you're going to love our podcast Disney
00:21:06.700countdown hi i'm megan the magical millennial and biscuits i'm jeremy aka jaron dell and we
00:21:12.420are the hosts of the hit disney podcast disney countdown on every episode of our fun and family
00:21:17.260friendly show we count down our top 10 lists of all things disney the parks the movies the music
00:21:23.080the food the lore there is nothing we don't cover on our show right jeremy oh girl you know we are
00:21:29.740famous for rabbit holes disney themed games and fun facts you didn't know you needed but you
00:21:34.040definitely need in your life so if you are looking for a healthy dose of disney magic
00:21:37.600check out disney countdown wherever you get your podcasts
00:21:40.380and we're back at one point she crossed the creek because there was a fallen tree had fallen so she
00:21:49.220could use a sort of like makeshift bridge and then just as she's like and this is what we all know
00:21:53.320from the canadian heritage minute she's exhausted she's just been like not just like walking this
00:21:58.220great distance in olden times but also like being constantly on the alert that like she could be
00:22:05.440caught by american soldiers at any time she's walking through like a war she's so exhausted
00:22:09.860and then she comes across an encampment of allied mohawk warriors who and she's just like i'm on
00:22:16.340your side like at this point the mohawk were on the team british i guess um because all the
00:22:23.480different tribes were very important in in many of the battles that happened here and they some
00:22:28.380allied with the americans and some allied with the british and luckily for her these are people
00:22:33.180who are on her set and so she's like take me to fitz gibbons which is what she says in the
00:22:38.360canadian heritage minute and they're like oh yeah we know him so they helped her um the rest of the
00:22:44.320way to fitz gibbons headquarters and she was like here's what's up like the americans are going to
00:22:48.780come and attack you, like be prepared. Based on her warning, so Fiskeman sent a small British force
00:22:54.060and a larger contingent of Mohawk warriors out to be ready. They were ready for this attack and1.00
00:22:59.440defeated the Americans who were surprised. Like they thought the Americans thought they're going
00:23:03.480to surprise them, but instead they themselves are surprised. Most of the Americans involved in this
00:23:09.680battle, which is called the Battle of Beaver Dams on June 24th, which is three days after
00:23:17.660Laura heard about this. Her walk, I think, took something like 32 hours. So no, it was 32
00:23:23.660kilometers. 17 hours, I think I saw. She walked for a very long time. Anyway, Battle of Beaver
00:23:29.520Dams happened. British side won. Americans lost of casualties and no mention of Secord. Laura
00:23:36.040Secord was made in reports that immediately followed the battle, which is like, we'll talk
00:23:40.000about why that is in a second. So after the war, like they had, you know, Americans had stomped
00:23:46.720through they'd been living in her house remember the house was upstairs from this store so the
00:23:51.080store was in ruins like they didn't have stuff to sell anymore her and james her family did all
00:23:56.640these kids and they were impoverished they didn't have money the only thing that was getting them by
00:24:02.120was james's small pension from his time he served in the war like dragging the cannons around and
00:24:08.960they made a small amount of income from 200 acres of land that they happened to own and then they
00:24:15.160another child. Their sixth child, Laura Ann, was born in 1815. And then one more child, another
00:24:21.760daughter, Hannah, was born in 1817. So the children were so spread out. Like their oldest daughter,
00:24:28.620Mary, got married in 1816, which is like a year before Hannah was born because Laura had started
00:24:34.020having children very young. Anyway, so the daughter, Mary, married a doctor and then moved
00:24:39.820with him to Ireland and had a child and then Jamaica and had another child. And then her
00:24:44.280husband died of um i don't let's say tuberculosis and she came back with these children and to live
00:24:51.540with laura and this is like an extended family situation there's a lot of um people are turning
00:24:58.400to laura for support and so it's not just like oh it's me and my husband and our small children it's
00:25:03.260like no it's me and our adult daughter and their children it's like they they were in dire needs0.93
00:25:08.420of money to support all these people because no one was able to support themselves because women
00:25:11.860couldn't have jobs, etc. James and Laura both kept trying to do what they could to get some
00:25:19.640income going. So James petitioned the government in 1827 for some sort of employment, just being
00:25:24.960like, hey, I'm a loyal person to the British. I serve in the army. I got these wounds. Like,
00:25:30.660please, can you help out a veteran to get me a job? At the time, the lieutenant governor
00:25:35.400was named Peregrine Maitland, which is a great name. So he didn't offer him a position, but
00:25:41.740interestingly he offered a position to Laura he asked her to be in charge of a place called
00:25:46.980Brock's Monument which was which I think still is a place that you can visit so it's sort of like
00:25:53.040a museum slash national park and it's interesting that they asked Laura to be in charge of it
00:25:57.760almost like he knew Laura was a significant person who had done something impressive that
00:26:02.120was worth rewarding so she accepted this job this is like 1827 and then Brock's Monument
00:26:09.840opened in 1831, so a few years later. But by that time, Peregrine Maitland was no longer the
00:26:14.840lieutenant governor. It was a different guy. And this different guy intended to give the job to
00:26:19.780a different woman. So I guess for some reason, this is a job just for a woman to do. Laura1.00
00:26:25.860petitioned. She and her husband were big on petitioning. It's this sort of, it's like a
00:26:31.420Karen energy brackets positive way, just like writing letters to the editor, you know, just
00:26:37.280being like, excuse me, like, the previous lieutenant governor said, I can have this job.
00:26:41.400Like, please, can I please have this job?
00:26:42.940And as part of her petition, she got Fitzgibbon, the guy who she had warned in the battle.
00:26:48.920He wrote a letter being like, hey, this is Laura Secord.
00:26:55.540So this is one of the first recorded things saying that, or just in writing,
00:27:00.560confirming that Laura Secord had done this, that she had been the person who helped out.
00:27:03.620But the family continued living in poverty until eventually James was appointed registrar and then judge of the Niagara Surrogate Court. So maybe that was like the lieutenant governor hooking him up with a job. Finally, then you get a job becoming collector of customs at Chippewa, which I guess is people coming into town being like, did you buy anything in the US? Like, did you claim it all, etc?
00:27:28.860so an okay paying job like just like so this huge extended family could all survive
00:27:36.440but then he died of a stroke in 1841 leaving laura without financial resources um she no longer like
00:27:46.560he was receiving this war pension but she did not get a widow's pension from that this reminds me of
00:27:52.640some stories that we talked about last year on vulgar history the main podcast
00:27:56.380in the american revolution how a lot of people fought as soldiers in the american revolution
00:28:01.520and then later on as veterans were screwed over without money um i'm thinking of uh deborah samson
00:28:07.740slash robert shirtloff was one of the people who had to go on like a speaking lecture tour because
00:28:12.800they couldn't get a pension anyway so but laura is just like kept writing petition she wrote a
00:28:20.660petition to the governor general saying, Hey, can my son, Charles take over the job with the
00:28:26.160customs? Like my husband used to do it, but he died, but like, could my son do that? And that
00:28:29.220would be a good job. But that was denied. She also asked, she wrote a petition asking for a
00:28:34.280pension for herself, for her military service, for the fact she like saved the day, um, in this
00:28:39.840major battle. But that was also denied. She, so she started running a school for children, um,
00:28:46.560in her cottage for a brief period, even though she was not trained in how to be a teacher. But
00:28:51.720who was back then? I don't know. There were so many children she had raised and her children
00:28:56.920had their children. She clearly had trained children in various things. But eventually,
00:29:03.060the school was closed because the public school system was introduced in the 1840s and people
00:29:10.360couldn't just run random schools out of their houses anymore. But just to keep track of who's
00:29:14.020living in her house at this point. So her daughter Harriet, now an adult, and her two daughters
00:29:19.320joined her after Harriet's husband died of alcohol poisoning. And then her youngest daughter Hannah
00:29:25.420moved in when she was widowed as well, bringing two daughters with her. So it's just like Laura
00:29:29.180Secord, her adult daughters, her widowed adult daughters and their children just all living
00:29:33.840together in this house, trying to do what they could. And through the years, Laura continued
00:29:41.400petitioning the government for some kind of acknowledgement of her contribution to the War
00:29:45.080of 1812. Finally, in 1860, so she's 85 years old at this point, and the Prince of Wales came to
00:29:53.420visit, still not yet Canada, but basically Canada. This is one of Queen Victoria's sons.
00:29:59.400He came over to visit Canada and Laura Seagord had presented, she made a presentation. When I
00:30:05.000say presentation, she wrote a letter to be presented to him saying like, I'm Laura Seagord,
00:30:09.420here's what I did. Here's like a letter from other people supporting the fact that I saved
00:30:13.460the day. I'm poverty-stricken and 85 years old. And can you please give me some money
00:30:17.640for what I did? And the Prince of Wales read this and he's like, okay, cool. And he sent
00:30:22.240her an award of 100 pounds, which would be a cool one to about $12,000 today. And this
00:30:27.420is the only official recognition that she ever received during her lifetime. She died
00:30:32.560eight years later in 1868 at age 93. And she was buried next to her husband in the Drummond
00:30:38.840Hill Cemetery in Niagara Falls. Now today, her grave is marked by a monument with a bust on top
00:30:44.920because now she's a famous heroine. But how did this happen when she wasn't really acknowledged
00:30:51.780at all during her life? So Fitzgibbon himself, in his initial reports about the battle where
00:31:00.140she saved the day, he wrote, he received information about the impending attack,
00:31:04.560but he did not say where he got it from or who he got it from. This is potentially because he
00:31:09.340wanted to not mention her by name to protect her family because they were at war and that
00:31:13.700might put her in danger. But he did when she was writing that one petition, he wrote a letter being
00:31:20.300like, yeah, no, she did save the day. Totally. He wrote another one in 1820 to support one of
00:31:25.360her husband's petitions for license to operate a stone quarry. So he confirmed in these letters,
00:31:32.120these references. Like, yeah, she took this long walk. She passed along this message. She truly
00:31:36.800saved the day. Her name is Laura Secord. Now there is some contradictory information. Was the story
00:31:43.400as straightforward as it was? Clearly, she walked there and she gave him that information. But did
00:31:49.220he already have that information? A Mohawk chief named John Norton, he wrote about a loyal inhabitant
00:31:56.160brought information that the enemy intended to attack. He does not name who it was. It was probably
00:32:00.040Laura Secord. Dominique Ducharme, leader of the Kawanaga Mohawk in the Battle of Beaver Dams,
00:32:06.200didn't mention Laura Secord in his reports, nor of receiving information from either her
00:32:10.840or Fitzgibbon about the impending attack. So one of the accounts also later said that maybe
00:32:17.800the Mohawk scouts had found this information and they told him at around the same time Laura also
00:32:23.500did. But in any case, she did her work thing trying to pass on this message, whether or not
00:32:28.200she was the first person to share this news or not so she wrote two accounts of her walk like
00:32:33.200again just trying to get acknowledgement and slash money um so in 1853 and then in 1861
00:32:40.420but it's like this happened to her decades earlier and when you've lived through a really
00:32:47.260traumatic experience like that like your memory could change or it could shift so neither of her
00:32:51.320written accounts contain details that can be corroborated with military accounts of the battle
00:32:55.640such as specific dates or details about troops but like okay that doesn't mean it's not true
00:33:02.800so and the way that she told the story and remembered it changed throughout her life which
00:33:07.140some people claim means that she was making it up or that she was lying about it she never actually
00:33:12.280stated how she learned about the impending attack so some people just sort of glean because these
00:33:18.020Americans are staying in her house that she heard them talking about it but then she might have
00:33:24.260maybe the husband heard and then told her. What Laura Seacord told her of her granddaughters
00:33:29.780later on was that she had overheard the plans directly from the American soldiers and maybe
00:33:33.440her memory shifted or changed. It could also be maybe an informant, like maybe she didn't hear
00:33:39.680it by accident. Maybe somebody told her on purpose, knowing that she would pass this along.
00:33:44.680So there's unclear information about what actually happened, but how did she become famous?
00:33:50.560So in the 1880s, in what was then Canada, Confederation happened in 1867. So upper class women were like the suffrage movement was starting, like we're wanting to have the vote, etc.
00:34:08.580And so they wanted to strengthen these women, these upper class Canadian women. They wanted to strengthen the emotional ties between Canadian women and the British Empire. They really needed to have sort of a female heroine that they could all unite behind to show like, you know, there's been strong, powerful women here since before Confederation. Like British people came here, including strong women, and we should get the votes, etc.
00:34:34.920And so, Laura Secords, whose story was known a little bit because of, like, this is the 1880s, and it was, what, like, 20 years earlier that she had gotten the official recognition from the Prince of Wales.
00:34:50.360So, I mean, her daughters would have known about this.
00:34:52.500Like, people in Queenstown would have known about this.
00:34:54.120Like, her story was kind of informally known.
00:34:56.000So, the first product of this campaign to make Laura Secord a heroine to sort of advance the cause of women's vote.
00:35:04.000was a play written by Sarah Ann Curzon called Laura Secord, the heroine of 1812.
00:35:13.060And this play was, it just brought her name.
00:35:16.180It just got more people talking about her.
00:35:17.740So suddenly people really interested because it's like so shortly after Canada had like become a country.
00:35:23.020And so there was a sort of a real appetite and excitement to really show like we're a country and here's our national heroes.
00:35:30.080So there was a lot of articles and things written about Laura Secord that would fill Canadian histories in school textbooks right up to the early 1900s.
00:35:43.320And then a woman, Emma Curry, who was an early feminist, she discovered a newspaper clipping about Laura Secord.
00:35:49.920And she just was like, I want to learn everything about it.
00:35:52.880Like very relatable to me, somebody who's in a pre-Wikipedia era trying to learn all this stuff.
00:35:57.500So she tracked out information from Laura's still living relatives, all the way down as far as Great Barrington, where she had been born. And she published a book in 1900 called The Story of Laura Secord. And then Emma Curry later successfully petitioned, you know, finally someone's petition works, to have a Laura Secord memorial erected in Queenston Heights.
00:36:18.460And so it was. This monument is seven feet tall and it was dedicated in 1901. In 1905, a portrait of Laura Secord was hung in Parliament here in Canada. So in 1913, so this is the 100 year anniversary of Laura Secord's walk.
00:36:35.440and there was again like he's canadian patriotic feelings of this like still new young country
00:36:42.040um a man named frank o'connor founded a business he called laura segord chocolates
00:36:47.700frank o'connor has nothing to do with laura segord he's not a descendant he's not a relative he's
00:36:53.740just a guy who's like oh this is popular it's just like if i was like oh i'm gonna start a
00:36:58.960new company it's gonna be called like princess diana chocolates because people like princess
00:37:03.080diana he was just choosing a name of someone that people were excited about and made a chocolate
00:37:07.040company um and this chain the first location opened in toronto and these the chocolates were
00:37:15.220packaged in black boxes adorned with uh like the profile of laura secord by the 1970s this was the
00:37:21.820largest candy retailer in canada um today i would say including for myself the name laura secord is
00:37:28.280more strongly associated with the chocolate store, which is in every mall, um, than with the actual
00:37:34.100person. And the, I don't know if it's irony or tragedy or what, but the fact that Laura Secord
00:37:40.580struggled her whole life trying to get income and money and acknowledgement. And now this business
00:37:45.920that's not owned by her descendants that has nothing to do with her, except her name is on it
00:37:49.880is like doing really well for a lot of people, people making money who are not her. So Laura
00:37:55.660Secrets, Queenston Homestead was restored in the late 20th century and given to the Niagara
00:38:01.820Parks Commission. And now it operates as a museum slash gift shop. And if you want to walk the walk
00:38:09.400that she did, take a cow with you, put on shoes or not, the Lower Secrets Legacy Trail is a route
00:38:15.500that you can hike. So it covers the 32 kilometer route of the journey that she took from Queenston
00:38:20.780over to Fitzgibbon's house where she delivered the message. The Great Barrington in Massachusetts
00:38:28.320Historic District Commission made October 18th, 1997, Laura Secord Day and dedicated a plaque in
00:38:34.620her honor at the site of her father's, where her father's house used to be, which is now the Mason
00:38:39.540Library in Great Barrington. And in Canada, I mean, the goal to make her a heroine was very successful.
00:38:48.940There are a number of schools named after her, which is interesting because to go to those schools and be a kid, and it's like, why was my school? My school's named after the chocolates, I would think. Beaver Dams, where there's a Battle of Beaver Dams, Battlefield Park has a plaque dedicated to Laura Secord. And in 1992, there was a Laura Secord commemorative stamp.
00:39:10.920In 2003, Laura Secord was declared a person of national historical significance by the Minister of Canadian Heritage.
00:39:17.740And in 2006, there was a statue of Laura Secord, was one of 14 statues dedicated at the Valiance Memorial in Ottawa.
00:39:25.680In 2013, to commemorate the 200th anniversary of her walk, Laura Secord's image was put on a quarter by the Royal Canadian Mint and a postage stamp as well.
00:39:36.800and that is the saga of Laura Secord and I've on my regular episodes of Vulgar History I have
00:39:42.940a scoring scale where I have different categories and I measure the the women we talk about and how
00:39:49.400do they score in various categories and with a friend of mine who's also a fan of Canadian
00:39:54.140history we came up with a specific scale for these Canadian episodes to score them
00:39:58.940in various Canadian categories and the first category is called NNA which is the French word
00:40:05.580for pineapple. And if you grew up on the East coast of Canada, then you would have in your
00:40:10.340French class, watch a series of videos called Telefrancais, which taught you about how to
00:40:16.680speak French. And we're hosted by a pineapple puppet called Anana, which actually, if you're
00:40:22.520a fan of Anana and you remember that at all, first of all, that's in the image of this vulgar0.68
00:40:26.800history, Canadian history, but also there's a company out of Toronto called Retro Kid,
00:40:30.920and they have some licensed Anana merchandise at the moment. Anyway, so the first category is
00:40:35.280called Anana. And that means, does this story involve more than one language? And I think
00:40:41.820barely, I think like almost everybody in the story is speaking English, except for the Mohawk
00:40:48.460scouts were there as well. But I feel like Laura Secret spoke English to them. So I'm going to give
00:40:53.820this on a scale of one to 10. I'm going to give this like, I'm going to give this a one out of 10
00:40:58.700for Anana. Like it's mostly just an English language story. But the next category is called
00:41:04.120CanCon. And CanCon is the official term that's used for Canadian content. All of our television
00:41:10.380stations or radio stations, there's a certain amount of, like you need to play certain amount
00:41:15.860of Canadian musical artists on the radio. You need to, on television, you have to have a certain
00:41:20.040amount of Canadian produced television. This is why there's some songs that became huge hits in
00:41:25.320Canada that people in other countries I realize now have never heard, but that's because you have
00:41:29.940to play Canadian music here all the time. So CanCon, was there any, did Laura Seacord inspire
00:41:34.880a TV show, a movie, a special podcast series? And I'm going to say not that I'm aware of.
00:41:41.340I know that we'll get to the Canadian Heritage Minute in a separate category,
00:41:45.580but I don't think there's a TV show, movie, or podcast specifically about her, but there should
00:41:49.400be. So I'm going to give her a one out of 10 in that as well. The next category is just called
00:41:54.020heritage, like Canadian heritage minutes. Was Laura Secret honored with a stamp? Was she put
00:42:00.200on a commemorative coin? Is there a Canadian heritage minute about her? Like those are the
00:42:03.960three major ways that Canadian heritage, you know, is there a statue about her? Is there a portrait
00:42:07.720from parliament? I feel like she gets 10 out of 10 for this because she has, yes, all of those
00:42:13.060things. She has been commemorated in every way that a heroine can be commemorated in Canada.
00:42:18.420There's schools named after her. But I mean, to get the trifecta of stamp, heritage minute,
00:42:22.600and coin i think is pretty elite of her and the final category is called trans canada we have
00:42:29.780in canada there's the trans canada highway which you can drive to go from coast to coast
00:42:34.380of canada and so for trans canada does this mean i'm going to give one point for every province
00:42:41.260and or territory that was mentioned in this story but she spent her whole life in um well i guess
00:42:47.080she's born in the u.s which doesn't count for this and then she was in upper canada which is
00:42:52.460now Ontario. So it's just, so that's just one. That's just one. So on the, you know, on the
00:42:58.440total score, and she's the first inaugural person to be measured on this, I don't know what we'll
00:43:03.220call it, like the Celine Dion Memorial Canadian Heritage scoring scale. So she's got a score of
00:43:11.36013, which sure, Taylor Swift's favorite number. It's a good number. It's auspicious for this
00:43:18.360whole situation anyway i'm hoping to do one of these canadian history episodes maybe like one
00:43:25.200a month or something like that they're going to always be a bit shorter than the regular vulgar
00:43:28.680history episodes and that's partially because there's not that much information about a lot
00:43:32.340of the canadian people that i want to talk about but if you want to stay up with this podcast you
00:43:38.460know make sure that you're subscribed and wherever you listen to your podcasts and you can also
00:43:43.980follow me on various social media at vulgar history and yeah if you want to stay super
00:43:50.320up to date i also have a patreon or if you pay a dollar a month canadian um whatever that turns
00:43:57.100into in in other currencies you can get early ad free access to all episodes of vulgar history
00:44:02.480including the canadian heritage minutes anyway um until next time keep your elbows up um and0.60
00:44:09.160your tits out vulgar history is researched scripted and hosted by ann foster that's me0.55
00:44:15.820editor is christina lumagi theme music is by the severin duo transcripts of this podcast are0.99
00:44:21.960available at vulgarhistory.com by aveline malik you can get early ad-free episodes of vulgar
00:44:27.440history by becoming a paid member of our patreon for as low as one dollar a month at patreon.com
00:44:32.900slash ann foster writer vulgar history merchandise is available at vulgarhistory.com
00:44:37.900slash store for americans and for everyone else at vulgarhistory.redbubble.com follow us on social
00:44:44.400media at vulgarhistorypod and get in touch with me via email at vulgarhistorypod at gmail.com
00:44:50.220legendary stories awe-inspiring sound and endless adventure welcome to the realms of peril and glory
00:45:04.160Explore the mechanically magical vistas of Vale
00:45:09.420The paranormal mysteries of liminal London