Do you know this woman? The Newfoundland Folklore Archives wants to give women the status they deserve

For decades, folklorists at Memorial University have credited Mrs. WR King with spreading the local superstition that leaving the lid on the kettle while brewing tea was a sure sign that a stranger would soon knock on the door.

But it wasn’t until a project called Missus Monday got rolling that researchers at the University of Newfoundland and Labrador were able to give their mysterious source a full name. They now know that Mrs. King’s first name was Myrtle and that she worked as a telephone operator in St. John’s, NL.

The project, run by the university’s Folklore and Language Archives, aims to find the first names of women who contributed remedies, recipes and local beliefs but were listed only as “missus,” with her husband’s surname and often his first name or initials as well. Nicole Penney, an assistant archivist at the center, said first and last names were given for men and unmarried women, but the tradition was to identify married women by their husband’s name.

“We basically wanted to bring attention to the fact that these women have lost their names,” Penney said in a recent interview. “They are all amazing pieces of folklore, and these women deserve the recognition.”

From fairies who lure berry pickers over cliffs to “wizards” who can cure toothaches, Newfoundland has a rich folklore tradition that began with the English and Irish fishermen who settled on the island in the 17th century. Fascinated by this tradition, American anthropologist Herbert Halpert founded the Folklore Archives at the Memorial in the 1960s.

Researchers and students began collecting anecdotes from people across the province and writing them on index cards, along with the names of the source and where the anecdotes came from. Over the next three decades, more than 120,000 cards were filled with wisdom and anecdotes from many of the far-flung fishing villages along the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador. The cards now sit in a huge filing cabinet in the records office in St. John’s, organized chronologically in 25 drawers, Penney said.

The maps illustrate the beliefs, expressions and rituals that shaped everyday life in these communities and help scholars better understand the social history of the province.

According to a 1977 card, Mrs. Lloyd Head of Carbonear said a spruce bow tied to a gatepost would ward off evil spirits and protect crops. According to another card from 1984, Mrs. L. Hynes of Bishop’s Falls made cough drops she called “bull’s eyes” by boiling molasses and Vicks VapoRub together.

Mrs. ME Breen in St. John’s had heard that blowing a kiss to a crow brought good luck, according to a 1985 card.

In 2019, folklore archive staff wanted to know who these women were. They began posting the cards on Facebook and Twitter (now known as X), asking if anyone could identify the “woman” in question. They posted the cards on Monday and called the campaign “Missis Monday.”

So far, they have published 165 maps and identified 21 contributors, she said.

Last year, Marilyn Butt saw a Missus Monday post about a certain Mrs. Thornhill, who said that people in Pool’s Cove, Newfoundland, a remote community of about 150 people on the south coast of Newfoundland, would describe dancing as “touching the wood.”

Butt, also a Pool’s Cove native, is a member of a Facebook group where former and current residents gather information about their roots in the community. With the help of group members, she was able to confirm that the dancing woman was Rhoda Thornhill, who died in 2015 at the age of 92.

“Rhoda’s husband and my father are first cousins,” Butt said in an interview, adding that Thornhill was “very musical.” She is glad that Rhoda Thornhill is receiving due recognition for her contribution to the province’s folklore history.

Penney said she plans to continue the Miss Monday project as long as possible.

“We know we won’t be able to identify all of these women, but we just want to put it out there. It’s good to know who they are and to give them credit,” the archivist said.

“Without this, the names of these women might have been lost entirely.”