Program

Tea, coffee, and lunch will be available both days.

DAY 1: (May 22), Archives of Ontario, Spragge Classroom

8.30 Breakfast

9:00 Registration

9:30 Welcoming remarks

9:45-11 Keynote 1: Mark McGowan (University of Toronto), Suffer the Children: Finding the Irish Famine Orphans in the British North American Colonies

11:15-12:30 Paper Session 1: Resettlement and Remembrance

  • Laura Smith (Ireland Park Foundation), The Burial and Commemoration of Deceased Irish Famine migrants on the Burlington Heights, Hamilton, Canada West
  • William Jenkins (York University), Exploring Hidden and Unhidden Irelands in Toronto in the 1850s and 1860s

Tour: Archives of Ontario lunchtime tour and exposition of Hawke Papers

2:15-4:00 Paper Session 2: Famine Experiences and Narratives

  • Jason King (Irish Heritage Trust), Unpublished Irish Famine Journals in Ontario: A Preview of a Virtual Exhibit
  • Robert Grace (Université Laval), The Famine Irish in Quebec City: After the Shock
  • Max Smith (York University), Toronto’s Temporary Lunatic Asylum and Famine Immigrants, 1841-1850

5:00-9:00 Great Famine Voices Roadshow Oral History Workshop and Reception. Madden Hall, St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto. Host: Irish Heritage Trust and Irish National Famine Museum.
website: www.strokestownpark.ie/great-famine-voices-roadshow/

DAY 2: (May 23), Archives of Ontario, Spragge Classroom.

9.00 Breakfast and Registration

9:30-11:15 Paper Session 3: Creating Famine Memory

  • Robert Kearns (Ireland Park Foundation), Ireland Park Foundation and the Unveiling of Dr. George Robert Grasett Park
  • Dan Horner (Ryerson University), Irish Famine Migration and the Making of an Orderly Urban Landscape in Montreal
  • Colin McMahon (York University), “‘A People without Ancestry’?: Great Famine Memory in Montreal and Boston at the turn of the 20th Century”

11:30-12:30. Documentary Screening: The Famine Irish and Canada’s First Responders., introduced by Kevin Moynihan

1:30-3:00.  Play: Emigrants, by Rose Marie Stanley

3:15-3:30.  Closing discussion.

Field Trip to Ireland Park (Eireann Quay)

7:00-11:00.  Reception at Biagio Ristorante, 155 King Street East, downtown Toronto. http://www.biagioristorante.com/

7:30-8:15. Keynote 2. Booker Prize-nominated author Michael Collins pre-dinner reading about his Irish Diaspora Run in the footsteps of the Famine Irish in Canada.