The Pictou Bee Press

“Bloom Where You’re Planted” – The Founding of The Pictou Bee Press

When they retired from StFX, bought an old stone house, and moved to Pictou two years ago as part of the large in-migration of new residents to Pictou County during COVID, history professor Laurie Stanley-Blackwell and research administrator John Blackwell, owners of the newly established Pictou Bee Press, had no idea what lay in store for them.

"We arrived in Pictou in a blizzard, but the old architecture and rich history of Pictou captivated us, and we knew we wanted to be a part of it," says Laurie with a smile. There were also personal connections. Laurie had grown up in an 1820 stone house built by an immigrant Scot in Kingston, Ontario, and her research interests include the Scots who settled in the Maritimes. And two of John’s Scottish ancestors settled in what is now Pictou County in 1775 and 1783. “Moving to Pictou felt rather like a homecoming for us,” adds John.

Their shared passion for history quickly led them to volunteer with several heritage organizations locally and provincially. “We also began researching the history of our house,” adds John. They learned that their house had been built almost two hundred years ago by Robert Dawson, a local merchant, and brother of James Dawson, a Scottish entrepreneur and publisher who had settled in Pictou in 1811 and had operated the first bookstore outside of Halifax in Nova Scotia.

“One day, we dropped in to see our friend, John Marshall, at his antique store on Provost Street in New Glasgow,” says Laurie. “We got chatting about the history of our house and he mentioned that he had a bound volume of original issues of The Bee newspaper, which James Dawson had published in Pictou in the mid 1830s.”

That volume got filed away on a bookshelf and left their consciousness until one day they were chatting with Teresa MacKenzie, now curator of the McCulloch House Museum & Genealogy Centre, about a joint book project they were trying to pitch to a publisher.

“In her typically modest way, Teresa let it slip that she was working on her own book project about Pictou’s old buildings. We asked her to share it with us and were blown away by her beautiful watercolours of Pictou’s old buildings and the charming poetic text she had written to accompany the images,” Laurie recalls. “We told her that her book was a gem and that it must be published.”

John and Laurie looked at each other and said in unison, “Why don’t we publish it?” They decided to start their own small publishing company to ensure that the book’s creative vision would be honoured and that the quality of the printed book would be of a very high standard. And what better name than The Pictou Bee Press, which would pay tribute to the early vision of James Dawson, who also has the distinction of having published the first Gaelic book compiled and printed in North America.

“One of my mother’s favourite sayings was ‘Bloom where you’re planted,’” says Laurie. “She lived many places in Canada during her long life and found many ways to make a positive contribution to her adopted communities.”

“The founding of The Pictou Bee Press is much more than an unexpected retirement project to keep us focused during COVID,” says John. “It’s our way of giving back to Pictou and helping to celebrate our community’s remarkable history for others to enjoy and appreciate, especially during this special 250th Hector and 150th Town anniversary year.”