WHITEWATER REGION (Cobden) — Visiting family while growing up began a life-long love with history.
Fay Bennett, who recently joined the executive of the Whitewater Historical Society, recalled visiting family on weekends while growing up. As she sat and listened, there was no shortage of family stories.
In high school, she began writing the stories down, realizing that some day those people won’t be around to tell the stories.
And from there, her love of genealogy has grown, something she’s been doing for 45 years. She is an accomplished genealogist, having published several family books. She has gathered information on most of the former Ross and Westmeath townships families during the last 15 years.
When Ms. Bennett and husband Earl moved into their new home on Morris Street, she was quite happy to have a genealogy closet. However, she’s outgrown it and has since created a website, www.faysgenealogy.com When you go to Ms. Bennett’s website, she noted you will notice that if someone is still living, you will not be able to view their information, as it is to be kept private until they die.
While researching takes a lot of time, Ms. Bennett will take the time to help others do research if it pertains to what she’s doing or if her interest is tweaked.
She is currently working on a project she was hoping to finish last year – Cobden’s businesses and buildings. It was an idea brought to her by Muriel Buttle as a project for Canada 150.
Ms. Bennett said she had a lot of information, but, has gathered so much more.
When Jason Gould began Cobden, the businesses were located at the lake. But, when the railroad came through, they began moving to the current location today.
The first business in Cobden arrived in 1879. It was in the Blackwell building on Main Street (a home now beside Barron Insurance). It has gone through many names – Delahey, Coxford and now Barron.
Ms. Bennett has also gathered photos of the old Cobden and has taken photos of the current Cobden for comparison.
She has also began going through old Cobden Suns. She is scanning the pages and getting them onto her website.
Looking at her website, she has documented 55,000 people, most of them in Ross and Westmeath townships and her family in Admaston/Bromley, England and Ireland.
She has photos of 2,700 headstones and 4,000 documents – mostly newspaper clippings. She has photographed all of the headstones in the Cobden cemetery and has some photos from surrounding cemeteries.
Ms. Bennett noted people arrive at her home with scrapbooks and she now has more than 2,000 photos. She received a package in the mail one day, and it was an assortment of scrapbooks from Australia, but pertained to people from this area, she said.
It’s very unfortunate, but many scrapbooks and clippings and photos are disappearing into landfills and auction sales.
“That’s a lot of work to just disappear,” she said. “Never throw out scrapbooks or photos. There have been generations of wonderful scrapbookers.”
She encourages people to bring them to her and she can eventually get them onto her website.
She noted family lines have disappeared from this area, mostly because there wasn’t enough room for all the sons on the family farm, so they began moving north and then west.
Ms. Bennett said she has even helped people get together. There are families who have never met each other and she has brought them together at her home. She has even taken people who have moved away but come back for a visit, a tour of the area.
Going back to the Cobden business and building project, Ms. Bennett laughed as she said, “I’m still working on this. I think it’ll be a 10-year project, I’m sure.”
She welcomes anyone to provide her with information on the people, buildings and businesses of Cobden.
She is currently gathering information on barbers and barbershops. She knows there have been George Patterson, Stewart Ross, JT Anderson, Graham Spence and the current barber, Tom Redmond.
Barbershops have sometimes been the hub of towns, some having pool halls, Ms. Bennett said, adding, it’s the place where the men gathered. She slyly noted while there is no great proof, some may even have been bootleggers.
“It would be nice to get stories and photos,” she said.
You can reach Ms. Bennett through her website or emailing her at [email protected] or Box 426 Cobden, ON, K0J 1K0.
