Cultural institutions
The Provincial Museum, Art Gallery, and Archives are housed together in a large structure called The Rooms in St. John’s and are maintained under the auspices of the Department of Tourism, Culture, and Recreation. Smaller museums and cultural centers are located in other towns throughout the province. The history of the province is also reflected at locations such as L’Anse aux Meadows National Historic Site, which preserves the location of an authenticated Norse village that is the earliest known European settlement in North America; it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1978. Among other important historic sites are the lighthouses and other structures in St. John’s and Bonavista, the preserved 18th-century buildings in Trinity, and the cable house in Heart’s Content, where the first successful transatlantic cable was laid in 1866. A Moravian mission settlement at Hopedale, on the Labrador coast, also includes some buildings from the late 18th century.
Sports and recreation
Much of the recreational activity in Newfoundland and Labrador is related to the province’s abundant natural scenery and wildlife. The hunting and fishing there are considered among the best in Canada. Hiking, backpacking, camping, biking, skiing, canoeing, and kayaking are popular activities for residents and tourists. Newfoundland contains a generous amount of parkland and preserves, including Terra Nova National Park in the eastern portion of the island and the magnificent Gros Morne National Park (a World Heritage site [1987]) in the Bonne Bay region. Torngat Mountains National Park Reserve, in far northern Labrador, was established in 2005, and it became a national park in 2008.
Media and publishing
In the past, St. John’s was always well served by newspapers, but the score or more that appeared during the 19th century and flourished for various periods of time have now been reduced to the daily Telegram. The Western Star is published in Corner Brook, and several weeklies serve other communities and regions. Memorial University publishes a province-related general-interest cultural magazine and a scholarly journal. Radio broadcasting has been widespread since the 1930s, and the first television station was established on the island in 1955. The two Canadian television networks have stations in St. John’s, and cable television is available.
The distinctive cultures of Newfoundland and Labrador have been influenced considerably by mainstream North America since the early 20th century, especially with the advent of radio and then television. Nevertheless, provincial broadcast media have always carried a significant amount of local content, much of it of high quality, which undoubtedly has helped Newfoundlanders and Labradorians to retain their identities and strong sense of place.
History
About 1000 ce, Norse voyagers from Greenland reached Labrador and Newfoundland and probably explored the Gulf of St. Lawrence. They did not stay, however, partly because of hostile relations with the aboriginal peoples they encountered. Europeans again reached Newfoundland in 1497, when the Italian navigator Giovanni Caboto—better known as John Cabot—reached the island while sailing under the English flag. It is possible that the existence of the island and its resources had been known earlier, but Cabot’s reports opened the way for the development of an international European fishery in the region. During the 16th century, French, Basque, Portuguese, and English vessels fished in Newfoundland waters as well as the Gulf of St. Lawrence, while Basque whalers developed a profitable industry in southern Labrador. By the early 17th century, France and England dominated the Newfoundland fishery and shared the island’s coastline. The English fished along the “English Shore,” which ran from Bonavista Bay to Trepassey Bay at the southeastern tip of the Avalon Peninsula. The French used the rest of the coastline but concentrated their efforts on the southern coast and on the Northern Peninsula.
Early settlement
The European presence at Newfoundland remained migratory and seasonal throughout the 16th century. In the first half of the 17th century, however, there were several English attempts to create formal colonies on the Avalon Peninsula. The first of these, in 1610, at Cupids on Conception Bay, was the first English settlement in what is now Canada, and it marked the beginning of a permanent English presence in Newfoundland. The colony was a business failure, however, and was abandoned in the early 1620s. Similar attempts followed, most importantly at Ferryland, where Sir George Calvert (later 1st Baron Baltimore) established the colony of Avalon in 1621. None of these initiatives was able to emulate the success of similar projects on the American mainland.
Nonetheless, by the mid-17th century, there were between 1,000 and 2,000 planters on the English Shore who had some sort of permanent attachment to Newfoundland. These planters worked cooperatively with the migratory fishermen—e.g., protecting equipment during the winter, cutting timber, building boats, and providing hospitality. After 1860, however, the English West Country merchants, who ran the migratory fishing interest, began to argue that settlement in Newfoundland was undesirable. Because the fishery was considered to be of great importance, both in economic terms and as a training ground for mariners, the West Country lobby was successful, and the government adopted an antisettlement policy. In 1675 all settlers were ordered to leave Newfoundland. The order was never implemented, however, because the government soon realized that without a year-round English presence the island might fall completely to the French, who in 1662 had established a garrisoned colony at Plaisance (from 1713 Placentia) on the southeastern coast. By the end of the century, the British position was that Newfoundland was foremost a fishery, though settlement would be tolerated.
English settlers suffered severe losses at the hands of the French during the warfare that lasted from 1689 to 1713. But by the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), France recognized British sovereignty over the island of Newfoundland and agreed to leave Placentia. French fishermen were allowed to continue a seasonal fishery on what became known as the “French Shore,” situated on a stretch of the northeastern and western coasts.