Historical Society of Ottawa: May meeting

This Friday, 26 May, exceptionally at 1:30 pm, in addition to the HSO Annual General Meeting, Stuart Clarkson will speak about the society contribution of historical books, documents and artefacts to the City of Ottawa Archives.

For over a century, through its mandate to promote the archival preservation of Ottawa's historical material, the HSO collected and catalogued a large number of books, documents, and artefacts. These materials help us today to describe and contextualize the people and places of Ottawa's past. They also help trace the development of this area's archival initiatives -- the very work to preserve that history -- as HSO has gradually given over this work to other heritage and archival institutions. Fortunate to have received a substantial portion of HSO's collections, the City of Ottawa Archives has made great strides in continuing HSO's work to collect local historical materials and to present Ottawa's past to its citizens. The Archives will gratefully commemorate its legacy with a talk by Stuart Clarkson, spotlighting a few transferred items of interest.

Stuart Clarkson is the Community Archivist at the City of Ottawa Archives, helping Ottawa's citizens connect with private historical documents. Stuart took a Masters of Arts in Scottish history in his hometown of Guelph before proceeding to Halifax to obtain a Masters of Library and Information Science at Dalhousie and can draw upon a heterogeneous background of work in libraries, archives and museums. With his wife, great-great-granddaughter of an asthmatic keeper of the Stewarton tollgate on Bank Street, Stuart has raised three children in Ottawa since arriving in 2009.

The meeting is at the usual location, the Routhier Community Centre, 172 Guigues Street