Our 2024 proposed year’s programme can be seen here.
Members receive the Zoom link on the Friday before the Wednesday meeting. Non-members: for the Zoom link, please email before 6 p.m. on the day of the meeting.
The Kingsbridge Retirement Community at 950 Centennial Drive is the tall building just south of Princess Street. Enter on the east side (the other end from Centennial Drive). Staff will be at the door to give you directions. Park in any unmarked parking space; there is also parking around Shoppers Drug Mart. Express buses #501 and 502 serve Upper Princess Street with a stop very near Kingsbridge. Bus #4 offers slower service along Princess Street from downtown. Use the Centennial Drive bus stop.
Wednesday, November 20th: Well-known local architectural historian and archaeologist John Grenville will discuss the interesting career of architect Ernest R. Beckwith (1879-1963), who worked in Kingston as City Engineer and operated as an architect in the years before World War I, leaving a built legacy in both residential and commercial Kingston still evident today. Non members please email kingstonhs@gmail.com for the Zoom link before 6 pm on the 20th. Members will be emailed the link.
The 2025 programme will be available in January.
Meetings held in 2020 to 2023 are indexed by topic and by speaker here. You can download a Word document with live links to YouTube.
January: Professor Gordon Dueck : “Barbers in Blackface? African-Canadian Musicians in Fin-de-Siecle Kingston.”You can watch the presentation here The original recordings are lost but the sheet music survives and one can find renditions of the songs from “In Dahomey” on YouTube at
https://youtu.be/Mki_FLAMnXc?si=BKCBI0DNV71Uu7Q5
https://youtu.be/Gnf-tja58-g?si=AGNQQEn-d1cd7OaJ
https://youtu.be/KnM__IAMnl4?si=OXRc7Mj3PPa9RBTk
Annual General Meeting. The Agenda is here . The YouTube video is here. The Financial Statement for 2023 is here
March: Eric Gagnon: “Two Miles, Two Tracks, Two Railways, To Obscurity.” You can watch the presentation here
April: Margaret Ross ‘Your Town is Rotten’: Prostitution, Profit and the Governing of Vice in Kingston, Ontario, 1860-1920s, You can watch the presentation here..
May: Ian Macpherson McCulloch : John Bradstreet’s Raid 1758. You can watch the presentation here
June 6th: Dr. Stephen Smith Macdonald’s Four Lives at Bellevue House. You can watch the commemoration here
The 2024 OHS Annual General Meeting Keynote Address The Paradox of Slavery and Freedom in 19th Century Ontario by Dr. Natasha Henry-Dixon can be viewed here
September: Peter Gower: The ups and downs of the Kingston Historical Society’s first 131 years … and the future? You can watch the presentation here
The new By Law #2, approved at this meeting,is here
October: William Galbraith: John Buchan: Model Governor General You can watch the presentation here
You might want to catch up on your reading about Kingston. We have produced a Reading List – click here to see it! Contact us here with suggestions for additions to the list. We also recommend you viewing a video describing the 22 National Historic Sites of Kingston. You can find it here . If you have comments on it, please contact Greg Anderson at gpanderson191@gmail.
Saturday November 2, the Frontenac Heritage Foundation is sponsoring an Open House at Ham House in Bath, Ontario. Members will recall that Ron Tasker and his family have been working on this huge project. Starting at 2 p.m. you can tour the Ham House and hear from Ron about their progress. Refreshments will be provided by the FHF. Please RSVP to contact@frontenacheritage.ca
Sunday November 3rd at the Isabel Centre for Performing Arts, 390 King St West. A gathering for Mac Gervan will be held. Tributes for Mac will begin at 2 pm in the Performance Hall followed by a reception in the Grand Lobby.
Monday, November 4, 7 pm, the Coalition of Kingston Communities. are holding a meeting to help you if you have problems when using DASH (Development and Services Hub for City of Kingston), the online portal for submitting and reviewing development applications. Here is the LINK to the poster.
Thursday November 14, Kingston Canadian Club: 11.30 for lunch at 12 and speaker at the Cataraqui Golf and Country Club: Brigadier-General (Ret’d) Ken Watkin “Iran, the U.S. and Israel: Conflict Without End?” All are welcome. Register one week in advance of an event through www.canadianclubkingston.org. Payment by e-transfer, credit card or by cash or cheque at the door.
Monday, November 18, 7 pm, the Frontenac Heritage Foundation is holding its annual Heritage Conservation Awards on at the Renaissance Event Venue. It is time to honour those who take special care of their historic buildings! Thanks as always to Paul Fortier for his generous support of this event! Here is the LINK to the poster.
Thursday December 12, Kingston Canadian Club: 11.30 for lunch at 12 and speaker at the Cataraqui Golf and Country Club Dr. David Taylor, an internist and a member of the division of General Internal Medicine at Queen’s University “My journey towards Indigenous allyship in healthcare”.All are welcome. Register one week in advance of an event through www.canadianclubkingston.org. Payment by e-transfer, credit card or by cash or cheque at the door.