The history of the Timmins Memorial Cemetery and highlights of some of the graves there will be discussed during a cemetery walk this Saturday. It’s part of Ontario Public Library Week. Timmins library reference librarian Karina Douglas-Takayesu will conduct one walk at 2:00pm, one at 3:00pm.
She points out how big the cemetery is, measuring about 570 metres along the east side.
“If we were going to do like a thorough walk of the cemetery, it’d take a few hours,” she says. So I’m just trying to highlight a few areas that could be covered in the one hour that we’re planning to do this.”
She’ll also point out parts of the cemetery that might be of interest for you to return to see.
One of the stops on the walking tour is the monument to the 39 Hollinger miners who died in the 1928 fire.
“It actually turns out that none of the miners actually passed away from the fire itself,” Douglas-Takayesu observes. “They died of asphyxiation from the fumes and the smoke.”
Nine of the victims are buried there. Eight were from Finland. The ninth was from the Spanish region of Galicia.
Pre-registration for the cemetery walk is required via email or telephone.