Submitted By Ruby Smith- Heritage Arts
Feb 17th, 2022, VOL. 3 ISSUE 13
Since the early 2000s, Heritage Arts members have focused on and showcased four elements of Fort Erie’s history through the arts. The elements are SITES, MILITARY, BLACK, and SPORTS. By the end of January 2020, we were well underway with the year’s project – 2020 YEAR OF THE WOMAN.
We planned to showcase in Heritage Arts SPORTS gallery and Research Centre, located in the Leisureplex, twenty women athletes. Included were greats like Francine Villeneuve, who rode 1000 horses over the finish line and Ethel S. Wharton, Fort Erie’s first female jockey in 1909. The Fort Erie Racetrack has been an important industry in the town since 1897. Another great to be featured was Dodie Pepper, the best lady’s softball pitcher in all of Canada in 1967. And then COVID hit.
On reflection, we decided to honour four women who were instrumental in promoting our focus areas. SITES – Marci Jacklin, MILITARY – Pat Street, BLACK – Wilma Morrison, SPORTS – Marlene (Mazie) Davies.
In a four-part series, we will honour BLACK HISTORY month and begin with Part 1, Wilma Morrison.
Wilma Morrison is Canadian born, admired, respected, and loved. She was born in London Ontario in February 1929. Her career work was as an assistant nurse, because of discrimination at the time, she could not get a nursing licence. After her marriage to Lorne Morrison in 1955, she settled in Niagara Falls. She died there of COVID in 2019.
Over the years, Wilma has received countless expressions of recognition from all levels for her tireless efforts in raising Black History awareness. She was considered the custodian of Black History in Niagara. Among her many awards, Wilma received a doctorate from Brock University, was inducted into the Niagara Falls Arts and Culture Wall of Fame, and she received the Order of Ontario, the highest official honour that the province can bestow.
Wilma felt strongly that Black people were a big part of early history in Canada but overlooked. She worked tirelessly to change that. She was determined to raise and elevate that profile in Niagara, including in Fort Erie. “The history of the Underground Railroad is almost forgotten. We don’t exist as the history books are concerned.”
She was versed in the history of the Underground Railroad freedom seekers in Canada and made it a priority to learn family histories, especially of those in Niagara.
Wilma was instrumental in the fight to save the British Methodist Episcopal Church in Niagara Falls from demolition in the 1990s. The Peer Street church is where many former slaves congregated after fleeing slaving in the United States.
Wilma strongly believed that Bertie Hall located in Fort Erie and given its controversial and historical Black history would be a perfect civic centre from which to tell Fort Erie’s extensive and rich Black history story. A tourist destination!
Wilma worked passionately to educate young people about Black History in Canada and donated all her research files and BLACK library to the St. Catharines Library.
In 2017, as part of the BLACK FILM Festival, Ayo Adewumi of Ayo Adewumi Films made a film called WILMA…the story of a Black Canadian.
I may have taken part in one of Wilma’s last acts, to promote and educate Canada about Black History. After my last visit with her, I let her know that I was going to stop by the Military Museum in the Falls and visit Jim Doherty, the Museum Curator. She said, “Let him know that I want to see him about documenting Black men and women in the Military.” They met and as a result, Cathy Doherty, Jim’s wife, assembled an impressive room display in the Military Museum in Niagara Falls telling the lost story about Niagara’s proud Black military history. She also designed a travelling exhibit honouring Niagara’s Black servicemen and women.
From 1995 to 9/11, Lilion Batchelor on the American side of the border and Wilma Morrison on this side of the border hosted an annual Underground Railroad Re-enactment titled Steal Away for Freedom. At dusk by lantern light, boats left Broderick Park in Buffalo to cross the Niagara River to Wilma’s Point (Nichol’s Marina) in Fort Erie where re-enactors told stories and sang about Freedom in Canada. Fort Erie is really at the tip of the North Star – the star that the slaves followed to freedom. Heritage Arts would like to place a plaque in that area dedicated to Wilma, called WILMA’S POINT.
We first met Wilma in the early 2000s when we showcased CHURCHES, our first symposium on sites. This event was held in the town hall with speeches made in town chambers. Wilma spoke about three major receiving points for the Underground Railroad – Windsor, Fort Erie, and Niagara Falls.
She also spoke about Canada having 40 Black settlements and that Fort Erie alone had three – Bertie Hill Settlement, Erie Beach Settlement and Little Africa Settlement. She was most pleased to speak about the BME church located on Murray Street, in the Bertie Hill Settlement from 1870 to 1970. Chuck Dennahower, whose mother lived on the corner of Murray and Stanton Streets, played the organ for the Black services. In the summer with the windows open, the hymns heard were memorable. The very first BME church was located at Ridgemount in the 1860s in the Little Africa Settlement, which ran across the land from Ridgemount near the Coloured Cemetery to the Marina on the Niagara Parkway. Two hundred black people were registered with the census at that time.
From then on, we were in contact with Wilma about our Black History activities. If she did not attend events, she advised and encouraged us to continue with our BLACK HISTORY work.
We hosted a Black History bus tour of Fort Erie, held a one-man art show in Bertie Hall in 2010 titled IMAGES OF A MOMENT – Ray Ordinario created photo portraits of our black community and newcomers. Wilma came and spoke at that three-day event held at Bertie Hall.
Our proudest work was in getting the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) plaque installed at Erie Beach Park. In our work, we like to leave tangibles for posterity. In this project, we worked with Town officials, Cynthia Skinner and Debbie Cohan, who initiated the project and with Black (committees) from both sides of the border. Wilma was involved and attended.
ERIE BEACH PARK
On July 25, 2015, on a perfect summer day in Erie Beach Park, over 250 people assembled to unveil a commemorative inaugural plaque honouring the 110th anniversary of the Niagara Movement, which evolved on July 12, 1905, when W.E.B. Dubois, an educator and advocate for black rights, met with 28 black men from across the United States at the Erie Beach Hotel. There these men drafted a visionary platform for black Americans. It was the Niagara Movement, which later evolved into the NAACP, The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Rob Nicholson, Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister, represented Canada and said, “The struggles continue to this day, so these are the moments we must remember to celebrate.” Megan Smith, U.S. Chief Technology Officer and Assistant to the President, and Ruby Smith’s daughter, represented the United States and read a letter from President Obama congratulating us in our efforts to preserve this important moment in Black History. Megan Smith: “It is in the spirit of diversity that we do our best work.”
Richard Bell, a civil rights activist quoted the Niagara Movement’s three key goals: organize, agitate, advocate. Fort Erie Mayor Wayne Redekop welcomed his friend Mayor Byron Brown.
The plaque was placed in Erie Beach Park, near the site of the Erie Beach Hotel in November 2014 by the Fort Erie Museum. The text and photos displayed on the plaque were sourced from an extraordinary article written by historian Cynthia Van Ness and published in the Buffalo Heritage Magazine, winter of 2011. This article dispelled the myth that Black people were not welcome in Buffalo’s hotels. The Erie Beach Hotel, at the time, boasted 65 rooms, 36 of which had private bathrooms with hot and cold running water. There was also a telephone connection to Buffalo.
After the ceremony, Wilma, on behalf of the black people involved, presented Cynthia Skinner and me with a bouquet of flowers. She was thrilled and thankful for this significant advancement of Black History in Fort Erie.
The day was momentous and the dedication inspiring. The bringing together of country leaders, officials, groups, and local volunteers, all working together for a common goal builds community, world pride and the spirit to inspire. Heritage Arts was proud to be involved in this historic event.
Photo: Ruby Smith with Wilma Morrison
