Dr. Louise Manny's Legacy

I chose this picture taken from the Facebook site "Old Pictures of Miramichi City and River", it belongs to Daniel Matchett's collection.  It is a gathering of people, although not around a table.  Instead of paper, there is a tape recorder.  The lady with the white hat and flowery dress is Dr. Louise Manny from the Newcastle/Miramichi area.  This would have been in the early '50's.  She is visiting a native family, Chief John Augustine in Redbank, NB.

Dr. Manny went around recording songs of the area from mostly lumbermen, who sang them accapella. The tape recorder seen here was donated by her very dear friend Lord Beaverbrook who was also from the Newcastle part of Miramichi before he went on to England and became a cronie of Prime Minister Winston Churchill.

What Dr. Manny did was preserve these songs of our heritage.  Many songs told of the life in the bush and on the river.  She went on to start the Miramichi Folksong Festival which is still running after 53 years.  There has been a couple of directors of the festival, Maize Mitchell and the present one, who has been director for a good many years, Susan Butler, whom I am proud to volunteer every year, the first week of August, at this wonderful function.  Susan Butler has been awarded the Order of New Brunswick and the Order of Canada, we are very proud of her.  She started her singing career on the very stage of the festival that Dr. Manny started.  Dr. Louise Manny's dying words were."Don't let the festival die".  She would be proud to know it is still going on long after she departed.

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