Homes of Paradise

Written by Barbara Bishop

The work crews of a small band of French explorers and entrepreneurs who built the “Habitation” at Port Royal in the summer of 1605 were the first ripple of a tsunami. The people and events that followed would forever change the lives of the First People who lived here, and all the people groups that followed.

There is an old wisdom that when giants clash, the rest of us get hurt. That is what happened to the “Inhabitants of this River”, as both Mi’kmaq and the French who lived beside the beautiful Annapolis River were known. Paradise Terrestre was the easternmost Acadian settlement upriver from Port Royal. It was shaped by world events; we too are inhabitants of this river, our lives too shaped by forces beyond the walls of our own homes.

“The Homes of Paradise” was a project our community launched as part of the 400 Years celebrations.  It was essentially a storytelling project- a story of how history shaped a people and a community, the assumption being that this story speaks to us through our homes and the land on which they stand.

Who owned the land and why?  When did land get divided and why? When might a home have been built on that land, and why then? How did a home get “sold out of the family”?

Our committee had such a good time working together on this project: Anne Marie Pearle and Marian Leonard provided photos and edited text; John Johnson was the “Infrastructure” person who built the display holders and frames; Linda Hankinson, Chair of the Hall Trustees, pitched in to paint walls, organize people, and cheer us on; Rita Torlen, artist, helped us to do a mural. My part as the “Storyteller” was to research deeds, family stories, and records of vital statistics, interview homeowners, and ultimately, make the hard choices of which homes were especially salient in telling the stories –  how “Paradise Terrestre” became the Planter village of Paradise as the vacant Acadian lands were resettled.

How these Planters, hopeful New England transplants who sought good land and a new start at the end of the French Indian war (1756-1763), were a unique population caught in unique circumstances. The French Indian War was the reason the Planters came, and the reason the previous owners of the land, the Acadians, were brutally forced out.  Another war, another group was forced from their homes, and before long the Loyalists arrived in Paradise, and after initial tensions, the groups intermarried, settled in, and welcomed yet newer “comers” as the New Englanders would say.

Years and generations and centuries passed. Paradise became the bustling, prosperous centre of agriculture, education, and commerce those pioneers and settlers had hoped to build. World events emerged and disappeared, wars were fought and won, sacrifices were made, and Paradise played its own part in these dramas.

It was our hope that newcomers would enjoy knowing the stories of the homes they bought, and descendants of those early settlers would reconnect with their roots. I regret that the project did not encompass every home in our village. Still, it does, I think, acknowledge the importance of each group of people, whether First People, Acadians,  pioneers or later “comers” as they used to say in New England.

I do want to acknowledge that we benefited greatly from a previous county project conducted by Wendy MacDonald, Ruth Burgess, Shirley Brooks, and Mitchell Banks, who had searched deeds and determined architectural style for Century Homes some years before. The deeds can not tell us when a house was built upon the land but provide valuable clues.

Since we did the project there have been other changes in homes and homeowners. Some homes included or not in this project have been beautifully maintained over the years, some have been saved from decay and restored to glory, some not. But each has been a home, each inhabitant a valued part of our community.

“The Homes of Paradise” is the product of a certain year and a certain mood of the community. Each story interacts with others. Each family in most instances has connections with other families. I hope those who read the stories enjoy them and are assisted in their own storytelling or research.