The flowery language of historical wedding announcements

Like most genealogists, I have found the births, marriages and deaths published in our local newspapers, invaluable. Finding an old edition is a matter for celebration and I still diligently read The Record, The Independent and The Post page-by-page each week.

It is not only the dates of events and the names of extended family members that excite me but I treasure all the news items that describe the everyday existence as well as special events that were a part of my family’s life.

I am amused to compare the style of reporting over the years and I get a real chuckle from the flowery language of days gone by. The wedding write-ups for Grandpa and Grandma Pollock and Uncle Bob and Aunt Rachel are excellent examples.

Grandpa’s and Grandma’s special day was “a pretty wedding” and a “pleasing event” which took place as “the soft sweet breezes that came panting across the meadows fanned the blushing cheeks of the happy couple.”

No effort was lacking in complimenting the young people involved: “The bride is one of Huron’s fairest daughters, is educated and accomplished, and has every physical and intellectual qualification for the founding of a home.” The writer goes on to a most positive description of the groom and ends with “this union amalgamates two of the most powerful families in the township.”

As for Uncle Bob and Aunt Rachel, whose wedding is reported in the same column as that of Aunt Alice and Uncle Nelson Graham, they managed to catch the reporter by surprise. “Robert Andrew Pollock, one of our most popular young men, made a sudden break about two weeks ago, when he secured for himself an estimable young lady in the person of Miss Geddes of Kinloss. This affair was worked up so secretly that the report of it came down on us like the crash of a thunderbolt. And such a wonderful change has come over Robert ... ”

Mum and I enjoyed immensely the effort we put into a presentation on the “Value of Newspapers in Genealogy” for the Bruce and Grey Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society (BGOGS). We used mainly Durham papers to point out all the questions answered and posed, as one reads the columns for local communities.

No wonder so many scrapbooks have been made featuring newspaper clippings! Where will we look in the future to answer such questions?

Ruth Anne Hollands Robinson
September, 2021