A Canadian Family

A Canadian Family in the Census: 1911 Lagace – Doucet

The 1911 census shows a Joseph J. and Elizabeth Legacy who were living in Bathurst, Gloucester County, New Brunswick with their children Adelard, Amanda, Lorette, Arthur, Martina, Francis, Joseph, William and Mary. We know this couple as Joseph Lagace and Elizabeth Doucet and in our lineage, they are the 8th generation of Lagaces in Canada.

The census confirms what we already knew– that the Lagaces were Catholic, French-speaking New Brunswickers living in a rural area near Bathurst, but I’ve also learned that they understood two languages (French and English) and that they could read and write.

A Canadian Family Vintage Postcard Collection

Something else we knew was that Joseph was working as a labourer at the Bathurst Lumber Mill and that he earned his living there for most of his adult working life. What we didn’t know, however, was that his son Adelard was already working there even though he was only 16 years old.

In addition a closer inspection of the document shows that Adelard and his son worked 60 hour work weeks. It’s hard to imagine doing such hard work for that many hours per week and I wonder whether the work was distributed over a five or six day work week? The census form doesn’t have that information but it does tell us that in 1910 Joseph worked only 20 weeks at the mill, whereas his son worked 32 weeks. I notice also that many of their neighbours worked twice as many weeks (in 1910) so it would be interesting to know whether Adelard and his son worked less hours by choice. You might wonder how much Adelard and his son earned for their labour. According to the census record their total earning for the year 1910 were: Joseph – $210 and Adelard – $192. Read more »

January 15, 2009 Posted by Evelyn Yvonne Theriault | . | census, Doucet, Genealogy, Lagace, New Brunswick, Pitre, postcards, Work | 10 Comments