This is the first newsletter posted from my own site. There are still some bumps to fix but I've got it working enough to keep my Friday schedule. 

Canadian Inspiration

Trains used to go east, west, north, south and all over Canada. I feel sad when I see places the train tracks have been pulled up. Wouldn't it be so much better to bring back railways to Canada, not just for passenger trips but all that shipping they used to do too. How is it not better than keeping all those transport trucks on the road? (Considering fuel, traffic, accidents, wear and tear and assorted other issues). Trains seem like a much better option.

I love train travel across Canada. My brother and I did it as children, just the two of us from Western Canada back to Toronto and even then we caught the bus from Union Station out to our home in Port Union. It was a great trip.

Even before that long trip, I visited my Grandparents, taking the VIA Rail from downtown Toronto out to Woodstock, Ontario. I enjoyed seeing old movies about train travel, especially the rail cars for passengers. My brother and I explored as many of the cars as we could during our trip. We saw one with bunkbed sort of accommodations, but they looked messy and plain. Pretty sure they were no longer in use so it was strange they were still included on the train. I would guess some of the staff used them if they had a long shift for the cross Canada journey.

Your inspiration this week is to remember or (even better) travel on a train, somewhere in Canada to somewhere else in Canada. You don't have to spend a lot or go far. There are local groups who are keeping the shorter lines open with scheduled trips, usually on weekends. See what you can find.

• The Canadian Railway Preservation and Restoration Association
• Canadian Railroad Historical Association and Exporail, the Canadian Railway Museum
• Canadian National Railways Historical Association
• Canadian Pacific Historical Association
• Toronto Railway Museum
• Railroad Equipment Restoration Association Canada
• Rail Fans Canada
• Rail Pictures.ca
• Canada Rail
• CN Rail - History
• Via Rail - History
• VIA Historical Association
• Government of Canada - Heritage Railway Stations of Canada
• HeritageRail Alliance

The Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore: An Illustrated History of Railway Stations in Canada - Ron Brown

Ron Brown writes many Canadian history book, including more about Canadian trains and stations in Canada.

Canadian People

Merna Forster is from Victoria, BC. She ran a (successful) national campaign to have women depicted on Canadian money. She received the Meritorious Service Medal from the Governor General in 2018. Also, the History Award for Popular Media (the Pierre Berton Award) in 2016. She is part of the Unsolved Canadian Mysteries History Project. The list of her awards and achievements is longer, read more. 

Merna runs the site - A Guide to Women in Canadian History

If you want to read more about Canadian women, Merna has written two books:

• 100 Canadian Heroines: Famous and Forgotten Faces
• 100 More Canadian Heroines: Famous and Forgotten Faces

Canadian Places

Thunder Cape, Port Arthur, Ontario. The Sleeping Giant. https://www.ebay.com/itm/388151399956

Thunder Cape, Port Arthur/ Fort William, Ontario.

Canadian Things

Did you know the Canadian Tuxedo was started in Vancouver?

Bing Crosby had been in BC for a fishing trip.  Afterwards, he wanted to check into the Hotel Vancouver. But denim was not something people would wear to a fancy place like the Hotel Vancouver in 1951. A fancy hotel does need to mind its reputation and keep up standards for their clientele. A bellhop recognized Bing Crosby and all was resolved.

Levi Strauss & Company decided to create a fancy suit, tuxedo,  made with denim as a bit of a joke. Levi's called it the Canadian Tuxedo and presented it to Bing Crosby. Bing wore it once, at the event, but chose not to keep it. Maybe it was too fancy for his laid back style. The jacket was sold again in 2024.

I still hear people refer to someone dressed in denim as wearing a Canadian Tuxedo.

If you want something fancier than the standard denim and denim look - Amazon.ca has a denim suit.

Please help me support my fondness for groceries and the occasional new print book.

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One last thing… A Canadian Link or So

Transport Action Canada, Canadian citizen transportation advocacy group, founded in 1977.

Gordon Lightfoot - Canadian Railroad Trilogy

Canadian Military History

Canadian Register of Historic Places

National Trust for Canada

Canada's History

I've seen a trend for engagement rings to no longer be just diamonds. I know diamonds were not always the stone used in rings for weddings/ engagements. You could choose a stone, or stones, with personal meaning. Like your birthstone, or the birthstone of your groom, family, children.

Also, changes to bridal gowns. Not always so long, luxurious and expensive. I think it is a great idea to choose a dress you can wear again. No point in having something stuck at the back of your closet. Also, more likely the dress could be recycled for someone else to wear, wedding or not. My own wedding dress was red with a black faux fur collar. I loved it for my winter wedding. I did wear the dress again for other occasions too.

If you were planning (for real, or not) a wedding, what would you do to make it a bit greener, or ecologically friendly?

Would you try going without shampoo and other hair products? What if doing without modern shampoo was the real way to great, healthy (not just healthy looking) hair?

What's the longest you've waited to wash your hair? I've gone without washing mine for a few weeks. You can build up the time by washing your hair less often. The scalp does not get oily or greasy for quite awhile. Unless you get rained on or somehow messy, your hair can remain unwashed for quite awhile and still look good. For me, the hair itself began to look greasy before my scalp did. I've noticed shampoo needs a first and a second wash to really 'clean' my hair. Afterwards it is a scraggy mess unless I comb it out (I have a great wooden comb I bought from Amazon years ago) while my hair is still pretty wet. If I let it get too dry it is much harder to comb and being curly it looks like a heap of straw on my head, even though it is longer than shoulder length.

Brushing hair used to be something women (people with longer hair) did everyday, more than once even. In school (1970's) girls would carry a comb with them and brush their hair to keep the style. If you've seen movies from the 1900's, people did carry a comb and did use it often. Combing and brushing also help move the hair oil away from the scalp and down the hair to the ends which tend to dry out and split as they grow longer. So brushing and combing hair was good for maintaining a style and keeping hair healthy. Plus, think of all the hair products you can do without.

When you do wash your hair, with shampoo avoid shampoos that contain sulfates and silicones. They strip your hair of natural oil and healthy stuff (for lack of a better word). They can also irritate your scalp, especially if have eczema/ sensitive skin.

Instead of regular washing, women practiced a daily ritual of brushing. Brushing allowed the natural oils produced by the scalp to travel along the length of the hair, giving it a natural shine and keeping it healthy. This routine was seen as essential to proper grooming, and many women considered their hair one of their most valuable features. In a time before modern shampoos and conditioners, patience and consistent care with a brush were the keys to maintaining beautiful hair. - I lost track of the source for the above paragraph.

Synthetic shampoos were introduced in the 1930s. Daily shampooing became the norm in the US in the 1970s and 1980s, but hair washing is determined by cultural norms and individual preferences, with some people washing daily, some fortnightly, and some not at all. From a clinical point of view, "the main purpose for a shampoo is to cleanse the scalp", not to "beautify the hair". - Wikipedia

YouTube - Why medieval people didn't wash their hair, and how it stayed clean | Historical Myth Busting

This hair treatment is simple, cheap, and fast — my kind of beauty routine. All I have to do is wash with water, then brush my wet hair with a washcloth 100 strokes each side. This moves the oils from the scalp, spreading them evenly across the hair. Miraculously, within two weeks, my frizzy ends became less flyaway. My hair began to shine again, getting wavy instead of bushy. And, since the oils weren’t massed near the scalp, my hair didn’t droop, limp and greasy.

The more I used this washcloth process, the less I needed to shampoo (winnowing down gradually to every week, then every few weeks). After a month or two, I found I could stop shampooing entirely — except in rare circumstances, like that time I sanded drywall and appeared to have been dragged in from an archeological site.

Before you mutter anything about what a big fat liar I am, take a look at a book of old photos — maybe one featuring daguerreotypes from the turn of the century. As you peruse the photos, consider this: the first commercial shampoo wasn’t even invented (right here in Springfield, actually) until 1930: Breck. Before that, people didn’t rinse their hair more than a few times a year. Although soaps gentle enough for personal hygiene had recently been invented, they definitely weren’t used on hair. Sure, some historical photos might get retouched, but not a photo of a Yakama Native American, her hair thick, lustrous, and definitely not oily. And not a daguerreotype of an Irish maid, her curls vibrant even in black and white.

The above quoted content is from - The Boston Phoenix - The No-’Poo Do - Audrey Schulman

Ancient Egyptians, renowned for their focus on beauty and cleanliness, were the first to use a formula of animal and plant fats mixed with alkaline salts to create the world’s earliest known form of shampoo.

Fast forward to middle ages when Europeans were known to employ animal fats while warming themselves by fireplaces for caring their tresses! Women used boar-bristle brushes made from animal hairs that helped distribute scalp’s natural oils down through strands – ensuring smoother look & reducing breakage at same time.

In Ancient Egypt, for instance, people used castor oil as an effective treatment towards enhancing hair growth. Egyptians also shaved their heads regularly to maintain cleanliness due to the hot climate, wearing wigs instead that required diligent grooming daily with special combs made from wood or ivory.

Moving toward Asia – India specifically — has given world one of its most impactful beauty practices – Ayurveda. This 5000-year-old practice considers the health of your scalp and uses oils integrated with herbs such as Amla and Bhringraj — known for preventing premature greying—alongside coconut oil renowned worldwide today for stimulating healthier locks.

Quoted from History of Hair Care: A Glimpse into Ancient Traditions and Practices

• The Daily Mail, UK - Could you Survive without Shampoo? - Helen Drake

I don't wear a lot of hats, literally. But, hats are always interesting. Partly because people don't wear them often any more. People who do wear hats, unless they're hiding baldness, do seem more interesting, just because they chose to wear a hat. I was a kid when the Archie comics were around, long before the Riverdale TV series. But, the Jughead hat began before Archie and his comics. It is often called a whoopee hat.

The style is called a whoopee cap and, believe it or not, it was insanely popular among young people when Jughead made his comic book debut in 1941. Turns out, factory workers used to invert their felt fedoras and chop off the brims so their eye sight wouldn't be restricted while working. When they got new hats, they'd pass their old hat down to their kids and the crude fedora hack actually became trendy among their kids.

Quoted from Seventeen Magazine online.

Most of the whoopee hats I find online are crochet or knit now. An authentic hat would be made from felt, a thicker felt than I could find in craft shops. To make a whoopee hat now you would need to search for a better kind of felt, one that might even be washable a few times (at least) before it fell apart. Finding a better grade of felt would be harder than finding a pattern (if you need one) to make the hat. Instead, you might buy (try a thrift store) a felt hat with a brim you can cut, turn it inside out and wear a real whoopee/ Jughead hat you created yourself. Add your own pins or brooches to it. Now that you're a hat maker, think of other styles to work on and wear. Like the cloche hat from the 1920's or some Edwardian hats, romantic and elaborate but all made with felt. Maybe fascinators, all the hat trimmings without the hat (sort of). Maybe a more structured top hat with fancy trimmings leftover from those fascinators. Soon you will become a regular milliner/ hat designer and maker.

Here are some patterns I found, for your Mad Hatter inspiration.