1966 Prospect Road Telephone Directory

Telephone books are kind of obsolete these days, however, they were a very important tool for looking up and talking to people for over one hundred years, if not longer.

One of the newest additions to the Prospect Genealogical Website is a copy of the 1966 Supplementary Telephone Directory for the Prospect Road Exchange - which for those in Halifax is famously 852.

Like the Business Directories of the 19th Century the telephone book is a good genealogical source for locating whether someone was living at a place. The amazing thing about small villages like those along the Prospect Road is that families listed in 1966 still maintain their phone number today or it has been passed down to their descendants who have moved into their homes. I can look through this list and see people within the village of Prospect whose phone numbers I know from memory.

Cover of the 1966 Prospect Road Exchange Supplementary Telephone Directory

One of the fascinating things about this telephone book is on the first page. Not only does it provide some information about the Emergency Numbers and how to go about dialing phone numbers but it has a whole section on How to Call Another Party on Your Line wherein it provides instructions for how to add people to a two, four and ten party-line. A function that we don’t necessarily have today if you have land lines.

As mentioned above, the great thing about telephone books, like that of business directories, is that they provide a secondary source for locating individuals and where they lived when doing genealogical research. For example, this image of the page 4 of the telephone directory which shows all of the people who have telephones on the 852 exchange with the surname COOLEN.

This list of COOLEN’s doesn’t necessary indicate every single person living along the Prospect Road and in its villages with that surname, but it gives you a good point in time reference for some of the families. The reference to Coolen’s Grocery, Prospect is almost certainly the little store that my great-grandparents George and Viola Coolen ran in the village. Below is a picture of them in their store.

George and Viola (Christian) Coolen in their store at PRospect Village, ca. 1969

Have a look through the PDF which is linked above and see if you can locate people that you know or knew living in the area.

Land Grant Maps, 1854-1957

Between 2000 and 2002 the late Doug Grant and Ed Rogers worked together to develop the amazing land grant maps that are showcased on this website. They have been a huge resource for people undertaking land and genealogical research.

Though the maps of Doug and Ed put the puzzle pieces of land together a lot of people have never seen the original grants. Below is an example of the maps that Doug and Ed used to create their digital version of the land grants at Prospect.

This grant map is for a piece of land that James Coolen purchased in 1879 for thirty dollars. As you can see the piece of land which today is located in the stretch of road between the Old and New cemeteries on the hill overlooking the Barrasois.

Nova Scotia Archives, Halifax County Land Grants, 1854-1957, vol. 4, p. 220, no. 12893, Land Grant of James Coolen, fisherman, Prospect.

This plot of land has, of course, today been sub-divided into smaller plots, especially along the road where houses have been purchased.

You can view these land grants and more on www.familysearch.org.

Aerial view of Prospect ca. 1959

Social media websites such as Facebook are a great way for people to share photos and there are plenty of Pages on these websites for people who like looking at old photos and remembering what things used to look like.

The other day a photo by George Hunter was posted to one such group by a Gary Merrick. The photo was attributed to Hunter and dated 1959 (see below).

Its a great photo because it captures a lot of homes that are no longer present in the village, as well as a good shot of what was Christian’s factory but was known as Victor’s Wharf when I was a child. This large multi story cannery was built in the 1880s and stood till 1996 when it was blown over in a Hurricane.

This is a really great photo as it shows this part of the village before a lot of the houses were changed in the 1960s and 1970s. You can see the original house on Saul’s Island. Just above the roof line of the Church Hall is a small house owned by Mary Saul, this was replaced in the 1970s with a more modern house that still stands today. Next to that is the home of Olive Ryan, which again was torn down in the late 1990s and replaced with a much larger modern home. Similarly, the home just adjacent to the Christian Factory has been modified into a more modern home.

Updates, August 2018

After much delay (2 years) we have finalized the transfer of content from the old website to the new website. This means that the content that existed in 2016 when we moved servers has now been entirely updated.

Our next steps over the next few weeks is to begin adding new content - including hundreds of new photos that have been donated to the website over the last few years. 

-Nat

Prospect Genealogical Website Blog

The Prospect Genealogical Website has been online since 1998 and over the course of that time I have researched every aspect of life in the village.

As the website is updated to get the original content back online, and new information and photos is added I hope to use this blog to present some of the research in snippet form.

The picture that I have chosen for the Banner above was taken by Matt Madden Photography of Halifax. 

Enjoy

Nat