in Chatsworth, Grey Highlands, Southgate, West Grey
September 04, 2024
BY JOHN BUTLER — Annemarie Hagan loves the “why” questions of history. She will explore “why” questions, as well as “how” questions, in her upcoming Probus Club presentation entitled The Lost Queen’s Bush Settlement: The Story of an Early Ontario Black Community. Her presentation — free and open to the public – will be held on Wednesday September 11 at 2:00 pm at the Flesherton Kinplex, 102 Highland Drive in Flesherton (adjacent to Flesherton’s Library branch and arena.) Doors open at 1:30 PM. This is the latest in a series of free public talks sponsored by the Grey Highlands Probus Club, the Grey Highlands Public Library and the Kimberley Community Association.
Annemarie has had a distinguished career in history and in museum curatorship in Ontario — a career path that led her to work at The Royal Ontario Museum, to take charge of all of the City Mississauga’s museum and heritage holdings, and to serve as Senior Curator, History, for Region of Peel’s Archives, Museum and Art Gallery.
Annemarie is now in a well-earned retirement of sorts, but she’s still available for special heritage projects and for opportunities to give public presentations about often-overlooked but important aspects of our history. And her passion for communication matches her passion for history. She has a Master’s degree in Public History, a field of study and practice that aims to bring history beyond the walls of academia to make history available, in useful ways, to the general public.
“The story of the Queen’s Bush Black Settlement in Wellington County will interest people in Grey County,” she says, “because Grey County was also founded in part on the challenges and triumphs of many Black settlements, connected by blood and common pursuit of a safe place in the sun, that dotted our pioneer landscape in Southwestern Ontario — their history is our history.” In particular, Annemarie likes to bring into the sun stories that have been overlooked. The Queen’s Bush settlement is one of them.
Annemarie came to her interests early in life. One of five children in her family, she grew up in Newmarket in a family environment where book discussions and visits to galleries and museums were common occurrences. Her father, Frederick Hagan, was a noted Canadian painter, lithographer and art instructor — a man who, in his life and career, never forgot his working class roots in Toronto’s Cabbagetown. Social commentary was part of his art, not an adjunct to it, and Annemarie credits him with sparking in her an interest in what history means for everyone. By the age of twelve she was already involved in historical research for her father — research that found its way into his art and his teaching. Later, in the 1980s, she helped her father with research that led him to complete a whole series of history-themed postage stamps for Canada Post.
She cites other childhood events that shaped her career path too. On a field trip in Grade Three to the Mackenzie House Museum in Toronto (the home of firebrand William Lyon Mackenzie), she was captivated by the knowledge and expressiveness of a tour guide there. It was her first realization that a person could actually have a career talking about history. And a visit with her father to the Sharon Temple near Newmarket — home church to the Children of Peace (a Quaker denomination whose members were entwined with Mackenzie Rebellion of 1837) — helped her understand and share her father’s passion for the role of ordinary people in extraordinary times.
Annemarie also offers praise for the Jackdaw folders of her youth — an inexpensive series of reprints of original historical documents that brought the reader closer to voices of the past. Not least, she credits one of her high school teachers for enlivening history for her.
Before receiving her degree in Public History, Annemarie was enrolled in Women’s Studies at the University of Toronto — a background that sensitized her to the often overlooked role women have played in our history.
One of her earliest jobs was delivering social history programs for the Toronto Board of Education — a gig that gave her an “aha!” moment. One day while she was addressing a group of boys who seemed uninterested in history, one of them asker her, “How does Hitler fit into what you’re telling us?” From that question, she realized that for many people, history is a jumble of facts and events not rooted in what interests them — but if one starts from what does interest them, one can turn history from a confusing jumble into a compelling story.
Annemarie followed that with a stint as an interpretive planner at the Royal Ontario Museum. Her job was to represent the viewers’ and visitors’ points of view. She learned how to find the essence of a story, and to build everything else in the story to shine a light on its essence.
Her career took second place for several years as she raised her identical twins. She remains proud of the exploratory careers both of her twins have taken — now in their 30s, one is an economist, and one is a professional archivist.
Her time as Manager of Mississauga’s historical sites and assets taught her much about the art of negotiating that’s necessary to preserve and disseminate history. But her subsequent role as Senior Curator, History, for the Region of Peel’s Archives, Museum and Art Gallery (PAMA), brought her back to the “hands-on” work she loves best.
It was while she was at PAMA that Annemarie met and worked with historian Dr. Natasha Henry-Dixon on exhibits reflecting the Black historical experience. This sent her learning curve upward again. Dr. Henry taught her that it was important not to talk about “slaves” (yes, Annemarie points out, Ontario once legally condoned slavery), but rather “people who were enslaved”, since this term emphasizes their essential humanity before introducing the horrific social condition they experienced. And in the absence of a robust photographic record of early Black Ontarians, Annemarie and Natasha developed a series of profile images of Black women, men and children that help bring to life Black people from our past.
As a White person, Annemarie endeavours to present a respectful approach to exploring and presenting the history of Black people, and the importance of society-inclusive partnerships to explore Black history. “I am not a Black voice,” she says,” but I can help amplify Black voices. This is important Canadian history.”
Annemarie welcomes everyone to her September 11 presentation. She promises you an interesting and important story from our sometimes fractious and sometimes glorious past.
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