Decoding the life lines of Almira Bell's 1833-1836 diaries : Barrington, Nova Scotia

Abstract

The diary of Almira Bell, a young unmarried school teacher living in Barrington, Nova Scotia during the 1830s, enables one to reconstruct the history of a rural pre-industrial Maritime community and to map the inner and outer life of a private individual.

The focus of this study has been to examine the diaries of Almira Bell for the purposes of historical reconstruction. Three kinds of historical reconstruction have been attempted: the social and cultural history of Barrington in the 1830s; the history of women in a given time and place; and the story of Almira Bell's personal life between 1833 and 1836. Historical reconstruction is the piecing together of an event, of an environment, of a person's life or of a community, based on bits of evidence drawn from documents created in the past. The diary is one such source, providing clues and actual data to be inserted into the historian's puzzle. By placing the diary clues into their political, social, economic, and cultural contexts, based on evidence drawn from other more traditional primary and secondary sources, the historians can reconstruct the past, and thereby, gain an understanding of what took place and why. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)