Harold Elliott still remembers the first seal he killed.
He grew up in Raleigh, on the Great Northern Peninsula, where winters come early and linger long. As a boy, he and other lads would keep busy with chores and fun, and setting coucou - whelk - pots on the bay.
"This Sunday I was on my way to my grandfather's house, and I seen something around my coucou pot. Grandfather got the spy glass and said, 'that's a seal!'" Then 12-year old Elliott took off across the ice, his grandfather in hot pursuit, and grabbed the seal by its two hind flippers just as it ducked back through the hole in the ice. His grandfather delivered the final blow.
Elliott never took to the ice as a proper spring sealer. His father sold out of the fishery before Elliott or his brothers could join. Instead, he stayed ashore as a pipe fitter, working the trade across the province and the country.
But in Elliston last week, Elliot and 65 others remembered all those great sealers who did go to the ice, and who never returned.
The Elliston Heritage Foundation is on a mission to erect a sealer's memorial by 2014 - the 100th anniversary of the great sealing disaster in which 252 men lost their lives on the ice.
They've established a committee, secured artist contracts and signed John Crosbie on as Patron of the campaign.
At a fundraising dinner on June 17, Crosbie spoke at length on the history of sealing in the province, the economic boom and the human sacrifice offered up each year by the hooded and harp seal hunt.
Speech on the seal hunt and why we should continue to support it, reviewing some facts of our Newfoundland history so that the unknowing and censorious critics of the seal hunt might better understand their mistaken attitudes and so they, and we, might better understand from whence we came and why we are as we are," was Crosbie's roundabout way of introducing his thesis: that Newfoundlanders can, nay, ought, to be proud of the hunt.
For more than 300 years, settlement on this rock of ours was discouraged by the British crown. Those who jumped ship and tried to build permanent camps were prosecuted. With sealing came settlement, and from early 19th century on, Newfoundland's population began to grow.
"What permitted and galvanized greater settlement ... was the boost to economic activity that the ... seal fishery gave." says Crosbie. "It is the seal hunt together with the cod fishery that are a part of our collective memories of survival and endurance, and this helps to explain why we resent so greatly the vicious attacks upon the seal hunt or fishery for the last 50 years."
"Of course, those who oppose the seal hunt today never think of the danger that was and is involved for men who prosecute or prosecuted the seal fishery. They never think of the many hundreds of Newfoundlanders who died in sealing disasters."
Elliston Heritage Foundation has found a fine champion in Crosbie.
Eight men from the community perished in 1914, including a father and son, Reuben and Albert John Crewe. Other Elliston men who lost their lives were Benjamin Chaulk, Charles Cole, Alexander Sanger Goodland, Samuel Martin, William Oldford and Noah Tucker.
In Ellsston, Crosbie helped unveil a moquette of a statue being considered for the memorial.
Sculptor Morgan MacDonald crafted a detailed scene of two men - the familial likeness evident - representing Ruben and Albert John Crewe.
With arms around each other and collars turned up against the wind, MacDonald has turned heavy clay into drifting snow around the men's legs. It is one of the models being considered for the memorial.
While the memorial will be representative of the 1914 disaster, the committee is researching all other lives lost to the hunt, as a means to honour the historical significance and ongoing importance of the trade.
"All those that took part in this very dangerous seal hunt deserve to be recognized. It's nothing to be ashamed of," says Crosbie.
The project comes with a price tag of $500,000 to $1 million, but Crosbie figures that with Myrtle Stagg at the helm, they've no choice but to succeed. "Stags should be able to attract doe," Crosbie joked, the double-entendre meant for Stagg to bring in dough - money - for the memorial.
"You've got to make it front and centre this year, take advantage of the fact we're also celebrating Bartlett this year - another great sealer and seafarer - the time is right to capture the imagination of fellow Newfoundland citizens that this is the right time to recognize those tragically lost in the seal hunt," he advised the committee.
"We've got to get ourselves in public attention, which is not easy if you're not in St. John's."
And though he's left politics behind, Crosbie has not discarded his opinions.
"I do not know how the Newfoundland government would be able to resist putting up a memorial."
To contribute to the sealer's memorial fund, contact the Elliston Heritage Foundation at www.ellistonheritagefoundation.com
lbutton@thepacket.ca
