- The Move
A video on the resettlement of the Rumboldt family
in 1968.




Bibliography

Image Acknowledgements



  En français









Safe Harbour

Safe Harbour (pop. 1951, 155) is a resettled fishing community located around a well-sheltered harbour on the north side of Bonavista Bay, about 7 km southwest of Wesleyville.

Safe Harbour first appears in the Census in 1874, with a population of 98, but grew to more than 300 people by 1901. Tradition has it that the first settlers were the Sturge family. Other common family names included Attwood, Blackwood, Burry, Davis, Dyke, Jeans (Janes), Gillingham, King, Knee, Stratton and Wakeley. Jacob Attwood had established a general business by 1894, while a church and school were built between Safe Harbour and nearby Southwest Arm to serve both communities. The peak recorded population of Safe Harbour (326) was in 1921, by which time the community was already past its glory days. A downturn in the Labrador fishery became a virtual collapse in the late 1920s and 1930s, and by 1945 the population had declined to 181. Many of those who left went to work in the lumberwoods in Newfoundland, while others went to Canada. By the time of Confederation the Labrador schooner fishery was no more. But the remaining inhabitants of Safe Harbour were still absent from the community for much of the year, as loggers or mariners. Safe Harbour was one of the first communities to be abandoned during the first resettlement program, with most of the people moving across Valleyfield Harbour in 1954 and 1955 to the municipality of Badger's Quay-Valleyfield-Pool's Island.

From the Encyclopedia of Newfoundland and Labrador


Samuel King

Samuel King
Larger Version
Martin Sturge

Martin Sturge
Larger Version


Alfred Sturge's stage

Alfred Sturge's stage
Larger Version




single pixel single pixel
single pixel single pixel single pixel single pixel single pixel single pixel
single pixel

© 2003 - 2012 Maritime History Archive, Memorial University