HARMONY
By Jordan Rombaut 2-W, Age 8 of Harmony
The original community was called Conquerall. It was located near what
is now Crystal Falls. The original settlers were the United Empire Loyalists.
About 40 or 50 people originally settled the area. They only had oxen to
use for travel. Most people worked sawing wood because there was lots of
wood. Some lumber went as far as Halifax. Soon the families spread out
and moved closer to the valley. They worked and lived together in harmony
so they called their new community Harmony. They lived in very small buildings.
They started clearing land and planting seeds brought from England. The
Harmony school house was built in the mid 1800's at the top of Morse Mountain.
Morse Mountain is where many people now stop for the wonderful view of
the Annapolis Valley, CFB Greenwood and to watch the Snowbirds do their
flying show from the base. A new school was built in 1881. It was a school,
hall and church all in one. It is now the Harmony Community Hall and a
new church and a new church was built in 1916 beside the hall. Each family
had a few pigs and cows to kill and families would share with one another
"living in harmony". There were no stores like the Greenwood Mall or Wades
so they had to make and look after their own food.
The first Harmony post office was opened in 1911 where Mr. Collins
lives now. The mail came twice a week and was brought by horse. In the
winter it might come once a month because most roads were not kept clear
as they were just small dirt roads.
Almost no one had indoor plumbing at their houses or at the church or
the hall. They had to use catalogues instead of toilet paper in the outhouses
and the few shiny pages were always used last.
In the late 1880's some local farmers began planting apple trees on
land cleared by oxen. Most of the orchards are now gone as they were cut
down to make way for newer houses.
In the olden days, some of the businesses were lumber mills. There were
many along the mountain. In the late 1800's there was also a gold mine
on the Fales River near Rockville Noch. It was not successful but it was
200 feet deep. There were also farms. a blacksmiths shop, a cooper shop
and a post office. Today there is a dairy farm, a pig farm, an auto repair
shop, a U-fish, a goat farm and other farms. There are also some new families
who work on the base at CFB Greenwood.
The lumber sluice that used to be in Harmony was about 5 miles from
the mill to the top of the Rockville Notch Hill. The lumber was stacked
four planks deep and then connected to more stacks by chains. The sluice
was only used in the summer. It took the lumber one hour to arrive at the
end of the line. The men that worked at the mill used to ride the lumber
down the sluice on their day off.
The Harmony Ghost Story
At what is now Joudrey's U-Fish on Harmony Rd. the Keddy family used to
live. Mr. & Mrs. Keddy had children and then grandchildren. One granddaughter
was named Mary Evangeline. On June 10, 1910 when she was about 2 1/2 year
old, she came into the barn where her grandfather was cleaning out cattle.
There was a pit in the barn where a lot of manure was cleaned into. Mary
Evangeline wasn't looking where she was going and fell in the pit and drowned
before her grandfather could get her out. Whenever Mr. Keddy would go to
the barn on June 10th he would see the ghost of Mary Evangeline going back
and forth from hay mow to hay mow. Only her grandfather ever saw her. Every
year on June 10th Mr. Keddy would not let anyone into the barn.
Mr. Keddy also had a horse that always got loose. Some friends said
to put a cross in chalk or something like it across the horse's chest.
This would keep the horse from going off. This did work except on June
10th it seems that the horse got loose on June 10th every year until Mr.
Keddy died.
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