Written by staff member, Vicky
You go into Staples on Gottingen Street. You buy a ream of paper.
You toss a stack into your printer and print off your tax return.
You grab a loose sheet and jot down a phone number.
You walk through your kitchen, pen and paper in hand, making this week's grocery list.
Each page becomes one of five hundred different things.
And you don't know it, but every piece of paper in that pack was made possible by Charles Fenerty from good ol' Sackville, Nova Scotia.
Meet the Man
Charles Fenerty was born in what is now Upper Sackville in January 1821. The land on which Charles was born had been in the Fenerty family since 1784, when Charles' grandfather William was granted 500 acres of forest by the British government. Two years later, he was granted 500 more, and 1,000 more again in 1811. This meant that the family land was approximately 1,515 football fields in size! When Charles' grandfather passed away in 1816, his father, James, inherited a portion of the estate on the old road between Halifax and Windsor (now Sackville Drive), nestled between the Spectacle Lakes. The family called the property Springfield. Today, the Spectacle Lakes are called Springfield Lake and Little Springfield Lake in honour of the estate that once thrived there.
The Fenerty Family used their land for several purposes. Like many families, they farmed their land - the tracts for agricultural plots can be seen on the above survey map from 1817 - but the primary benefit of Springfield was that it was surrounded by woodlands, lakes, and the Sackville River. This made the site a prime location for the lumber trade. Trees could be cut - or felled - at one location on the property and floated to the nearest saw mill to be processed into boards, planks, etc. with relative ease. And the Fenertys made sure the "nearest saw mill" was quite nearby indeed. They established saw mills on Lewis Lake to Springfield's north, Square Lake to the northeast, Spectacle Lake and Drain Lake near the family homestead, and many more. It is also believed that Charles' father, James, operated a sawmill off the Lucasville Road near Webber Lake. Webber Lake connects to McCabe Lake, which in turn connects back to Drain Lake, so a mill in that location would have been very advantageous.
Farming and milling were activities for the summer months when crops were plentiful and the water for running the mills ran freely. But the felling of trees was a task saved for the winter. In the winter, the flow of tree sap slows down considerably, which dries out the wood, making it easier to cut. In addition, when logs needed to be moved overland it was easier to transport them over packed snow than dirt roads: "The roads from Sackville to Halifax at that time were muddy and in terrible condition. It made it very difficult for hauling lumber, and they stayed that way well into the 20th century" (Burger, pg.9). However, despite whatever difficulties they may have faced with transportation, the Fenertys had no shortage of business: "Lumber was in great demand. Its primary use was for shipbuilding, but between the years 1812 and 1849, Halifax also consumed large quantities of lumber for its booming expansion in both public and private buildings. The Fenerty operation was at the heart of this growth" (pg. 9). From his very early years, Charles was involved in all aspects of the family business. And although he favoured farming, it was working with lumber that would inspire him to reinvent the paper industry.
Paper doesn't just grow on trees... except when it does
As early as 3,000 BCE, Egyptians had created paper made of papyrus. In 150 BCE, the Chinese had developed paper made from hemp, tree bark, and water. Records also show treated animal skins were used as paper across many cultures, but by the 1200's the preferred method of papermaking in Europe was using linen or cotton rags:
Rag pickers bought old clothing to sell to mills. At the mills, workers sorted the clothing by color, grade, and condition. After buttons and hooks were removed, the rags [were] washed to remove dirt. A rag knife cut the rag into strips. Wet strips were rolled into balls and coated with lime and fermented for a few weeks... about 1/3rd of the rags rotted and were unusable. The other 2/3rds were ready to beat into pulp.
Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermaking, pg. 4
It was this style of papermaking that reached the Americas as the British, French, Spanish, and other European colonial powers expanded their empires.
Unfortunately, this technique, using rags, was not a particularly effective method for making paper. As mentioned, sometimes during processing, the rags simply rotted away. Equally as problematic, rags were not always readily available. During times of conflict, cloth scraps were used as bandages and dressings for wounds and became very difficult to source. Rag scarcities were such an issue that laws regarding commercial paper use had to be introduced. For example, in early 1800s England, it was illegal to make a newspaper larger than twenty-two by thirty-two inches due to the shortage of available rags (Fergusson, pg. 6). In addition, the quality of the rags determined the condition of the paper. If the rags were overly threadbare or otherwise worn, the paper that they produced would be of a poorer quality and therefore less valuable on the market. Even more to the point, rags were expensive! This meant that paper materials, such as books and newspapers, were also expensive in turn. Alternative paper materials, such as moss, leaves, the "cods" of caterpillars, vegetable fibres, straw, and asbestos, were tested, but none were quite up to the task. Despite all of its detriments, rags continued to be the predominant base for papermaking in Europe and North America well into the 1800s.
In 1819, on the Nine Mile River and Paper Mill Lake in Bedford, Anthony Holland, owner and publisher of the Acadian Recorder newspaper, opened a rag-based paper mill. Anthony opened the mill as a way to satisfy his own paper needs, as exporters from the United States were unable to meet his demands. Referred to as the Holland Mill or the Acadian Paper Mill, this enterprise was the first of its kind in Atlantic Canada.
Even though the technology for creating rag paper had advanced significantly in the hundreds of years since its discovery, the Holland Mill did not rely on modern machinery; instead, it continued to make paper by hand. When Anthony died in 1830, the mill was taken over by Alexander Kissock and later by his sons William and Alexander.
Charles grew up with this mill on the trade route between Sackville and Halifax and knew it well. In fact, he frequently visited the site and took an interest in how the rag paper was made. It was during one of these visits that Charles had an idea: could wood be used in place of rags for papermaking?
Charles was not the first person to consider wood as a paper replacement. In the early 1700s, French scientist René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur took inspiration from wasps' nests and their paper-like construction. In the 1800s, Matthias Koops, a British author and papermaker, wrote a book that was, in part, printed on both wood and straw, but the pages were not pulped in any way. Unfortunately, after 1802, Koops "mysteriously disappeared" (Burger, pg. 31) and was not heard from again.
If there were two things Charles had in abundance, it was wood and water. The floors of the family saw mills were covered in finely chipped and nearly pulverized wood pieces daily, and the mills were surrounded by lakes, rivers, and streams. Charles knew from experience that wood left in the water for too long would absorb the moisture and eventually fall apart, just as the rags did when soaked in water and lye. Once the wood pieces were broken down into pulp, Charles theorized he could rework the fibres in a similar manner to the broken-down rags. And so, Charles began to experiment.
This investigation spanned a few years, perhaps starting as a hobby, then eventually becoming a full-length investigation: finding ways to effectively soak the wood and extract the fibres, then giving it the required pressure to squeeze out the water, and drying the paper. His experiments also included whitening the paper. All of this was done without any chemical agents
Burger, pg. 20
In time, Charles found a method and recipe using spruce pulp that resulted in a good quality paper. And so, in October of 1844, Charles sent a sample of his new paper to the Acadian Recorder along with a note:
In his letter, Charles asks then-owners of the Acadian Recorder, John English and Hugh Blackadar, to "perceive the feasibility" of his wood pulp paper as an alternative to rag paper. He confesses in his letter that he does not have the machinery required to properly press his example sheet to make it both completely flat and smooth, but his sample acted as a well-constructed proof of concept.
However...
Across the sea in Hainichen, Saxony (now a part of Germany), at nearly the same time, a weaver named Friedrich Keller was also experimenting with utilizing ground tree pulp as a method of producing paper. In 1841, Friedrich wrote down his idea for a machine that could grind wood to use the fibres in paper production, which was then reinforced with a small amount of rag content. He developed a prototype, and in 1845, he partnered with paper maker Heinrich Voelter to make his idea a reality. Heinrich purchased Friedrich's idea for $300 American (or about $17,400 Canadian today) and they were issued a joint patent. Heinrich then began mass-producing Friedrich's paper. In 1852, when the patent came up for renewal, Friedrich could not afford to renew it, and so Heinrich took full ownership of the patent, leaving Friedrich in the dust.
Friedrich's invention led to the all-important question: Who really came up with the idea first?
Author C. Bruce Fergusson has this to say: "Which succeeded first in making paper from ground wood pulp is not known with certainty, but if Charles Fenerty's experiments of 1838 or 1839 antedated those of Keller which led to his application for a patent in 1840, the Nova Scotian deserves credit for priority" (pg. 12). In Fergusson's opinion, Charles began his experimentations earlier which ultimately trumps Friedrich's patent. The tragedy of this story, regardless of who is credited for the invention, is that neither Charles nor Friedrich truly benefited from their discoveries. Friedrich received payment when his patent was purchased, but it included no royalties or subsequent payments. Charles did not patent his discovery, which allowed any paper manufacturers to use the method without compensating him. In fact, it is Charles' methodology that is used to create wood pulp paper to this day.
Thankfully, Charles did not rely on his invention to support his life or his passions.
The Traveller and the Poet
In the 1850s, Australia was experiencing a gold rush. On the southern portion of the continent in New South Wales (now Victoria) a man named Edward Hammond Hargraves was the first to strike gold in 1851. News of the find spread quickly, and in 1852 alone, 300,000 new immigrants arrived in Australia to seek their fortunes. As a former prison colony for the British Empire, Australia welcomed these new immigrants. New people brought with them additional skills and professions that helped develop and grow the local economy as the continent became a modern British settlement. Advertisements for "Australia and the Gold Regions" helped entice would-be prospectors to come to Australia in search of their fortunes.
Did Charles see one of these advertisements? Was he driven by a want of striking it rich, or was he simply lured by a sense of adventure? We'll never know!
But, in 1858, Charles did indeed set sail for Port Philip Bay on Australia's southern coast. The journey would have started with a trip to the United Kingdom, followed by a trip down the western coast of Africa and around the Cape of Good Hope, before reaching Australian shores. After upwards of four months of life at sea, Charles settled near the town of Ballarat, Australia.
Not much is known about Charles' time in Australia. There's no record of him making millions, getting involved in local government, or otherwise making himself a notable figure in town. What we do know is that he did not stay in one place, but travelled throughout Australia, living in places like Gulgong, just north-west of Sydney and Inkerman in Queensland's north-east; he also spent some time in New Zealand before returning to the Melbourne area. We know as well that on his expedition, Charles took up his pen to pursue his second passion: poetry.
Charles began his poetry career years before he began his adventure across the seas. In 1839, he wrote a poem titled Passing Away about the decaying state of The Prince's Lodge property, an estate that had been built by and for Prince Edward, Duke of Kent, and his mistress Thérèse-Bernardine Montgenet. In the poem, Charles relates the sad condition of the property:
Yon moss-covered portals, where festal lamps shone,
Are now lit by the cold spectral moon-beams alone,
And the wind through the casements wails mournful and drear,
Where the notes of soft music enchanted the air.
...
A moment, and lo! the fair pageant has fled,
And I seem as if standing alone with the dead.
And the shadows of evening grow darker apace,
And weird spirits seem haunting the desolate place.
- Charles Fenerty via Burger, pg. 92
Charles was right to mourn the condition of the estate. In its prime, the property - located where Hemlock Ravine Park is today - had multiple buildings including a large main house, a library, a smith, a coach house, a garden house, a music room (on the opposite side of the road to Bedford/the Bedford Highway), a telegraph station, a Chinese temple, and a heart shaped pond. Today, the heart pond and the music room, or rotunda, are the estate's only remaining structures.
In 1855, Charles composed a poem entitled Betula Nigra, or The Black Birch. The poem is a tribute to a particular tree of this species, likely found on the Fenerty property, that is a lengthy forty-three stanzas long. A prelude to the poem states that at its root, the tree was twenty-four feet around, no less than sixty feet tall, and estimated to be at least one thousand years old.
As upwards I direct my eye,
To yon green arbor board and high,
To me it would appear
As though a prophet of the past,
With Nature's mantle round him cast,
Held converse with me here.
...
And yet, old tree, thy rugged form
Has stood, unscathed, the wintry storm;
They foliage bright and new
Still flutters in the passing breeze,
As when, thou ancient king of trees,
Thy sapling branches grew.
- Charles Fenerty via Burger, pg. 96
This poem was showcased at the 1854 Nova Scotia Industrial Exhibition and received a great deal of acclaim. So much so that it was published the following year.
Charles continued to write poems throughout his life, and his writing was a major part of his travels in Australia and New Zealand. Poems like The Tao-Aspiring Poet and To a Rich Miser reflect life and his adventures on the southern continent, but it is perhaps A Farewell to Australia that was the most significant, as it marked his abrupt goodbye.
From Australia with love
In late 1864, Charles had gotten involved in a sheep farming business in New Zealand. His mail, however, was still being sent to a post box in Melbourne, Australia. After returning to Melbourne from a stint in its neighbouring country, Charles discovered he had received a letter from his brother, Wellington. In this note, Wellington stated that their other brother (or perhaps cousin; sources differ) had jilted a local woman named Ann Hamilton. This name was one that Charles was familiar with. In his youth, he had been enamoured of one of Ann's sisters, but his feelings were not reciprocated. The idea of Ann being thrown over did not sit well with Charles. In fact, it sat so poorly that in 1865, he packed his bags and took the four-month journey back to Nova Scotia. The story that followed reads a little like the script of a Hallmark movie.
According to legend, upon arriving in Halifax, Charles immediately sought out Ann Hamilton. According to author Peter Burger, Charles was aware that Ann was staying with a sister in Falmouth, and so Charles supposedly walked the approximately fifty kilometres from the Halifax harbour front to the town of Falmouth (pg.62) (using Google Maps, it actually looks like this journey would have been closer to seventy-five kilometres)! If one were to take the same trip today on the current paved Number 1 Highway between Halifax and Falmouth, this walk would take more than sixteen hours. By the time he got to town, it was late at night; it was dark, and most people had gone to bed. As he walked, an angry dog spotted him and began to chase him through the streets. Charles ran until he was able to take refuge in the home of one of Ann's in-laws. It is said that the dog stayed outside waiting for Charles until sunrise. In the morning, Charles headed to Ann's house, and she was more than delighted to see him. He spent several weeks living in Falmouth before returning to Sackville, but the connection he and Ann had made (or perhaps always had) developed into a permanent bond. On December 28, 1867, Charles and Ann were married in the town of Kentville by Minister J. O. Ruggles. He was forty-seven, she was forty.
Following their marriage, the couple settled in Middle Sackville less than two miles from St. John's Anglican Church. Since arriving home, Charles had become heavily involved with St. John's Anglican, and so the location of the house couldn't have been better. Charles spent the rest of his life farming, writing, and serving his congregation with Ann by his side.
In May 1892, Charles became ill. He reduced his duties at the church, hoping this would help improve his health, but it was to no avail. Only a few weeks later, Charles passed away on June 10 at age seventy-one. He was buried in the St. John's Anglican cemetery. On June 13 The Halifax Herald printed an obituary noting that Charles was "...one of the best known and mostly highly respected citizens of this county. Mr. Fenerty was a man of wide culture, and a writer of no mean ability" (pg. 2). Without a doubt Charles made a positive impact on the people in his community, both at home and abroad, but even in this publication praising his life there's no mention of his wood pulp paper invention. Charles' work was at risk of being forgotten completely.
Thankfully, the Nova Scotia Historical Society (NSHS) stepped in to ensure Charles' gift to the world was not lost. On September 25, 1926, the NSHS erected a monument on the site of his family homestead to honour Charles' legacy. A plaque was mounted on a black birch tree that read:
Here, in January 1821, was born Charles Fenerty, who, after experimenting from about 1839, produced paper from spruce wood pulp, which invention he made public in 1844. He died at Lower Sackville, June 1892.
Burger, pg. 80
When the tree was damaged in a storm, many years later, a new monument was put in its place. In 1955, a cairn—a pillar of stones serving as a marker of significance—was erected, with the same plaque mounted to its face. However, time was also cruel to this homage. By the 1980s, the stones forming the cairn were coming loose, and it was decided that a large marble boulder should be used to mark Charles' significance, so that it would stand the test of time.
Modern technology even allowed for a picture of Charles' face to join a new plaque, which reads:
Charles Fenerty
1821-1892
A native of Springfield Lake, Upper Sackville, Charles Fenerty began experimenting about 1839 with a process to make paper from Spruce Wood Pulp. In 1844, he made his invention known to Halifax, but left it to others to develop and profit from this single revolutionary invention. This discovery made the printed word inexpensive and therefore more available to the reading citizens of the world. Charles Fenerty died at Lower Sackville and is buried in St. John's Cemetery, Middle Sackville.
This monument remains on his historic family land, a testament to his ingenuity and good works.
The Finishing Lines
In 1993, more than 150 years after Charles first began his experiments with spruce pulp paper, the internet became available to the general public. The information superhighway revolutionized communication, and the idea of a paperless society quickly travelled along its telephone and fibre-optic cables. Was Charles' invention now obsolete? Had the age of paper come to an end? Was the internet taking us all down a road made of limitless paper in a paperless world?
Some thirty years later, we can confidently say: no.
Although the internet has certainly made its mark and many things that were once made in print have found a new life in the digital space, paper is still very much a part of the modern world. As Nova Scotians, we should take pride in the fact that one of our own has made such a profound and lasting impact on the world... even if many people don't realize it.
Library Resources
Charles Fenerty and His Paper Invention
Additional Resources
Acadia Paper Mill, Bedford, Halifax County, Nova Scotia, Canada, Hughes Paper
Australia and the Gold Regions!, Antipodean Books, Maps, and Prints
Journeys to Australia, Immigration Museum
Charles Fenerty, The Canadian Encyclopedia
Charles Fenerty Official Website
Eureka! The rush for gold, State Library NSW
Fenerty, Charles, Dictionary of Canadian Biography
For the Acadian Recorder, The Acadian Recorder, October 26, 1844, pg. 3, Nova Scotia Archives
Friedrich Gottlob Keller, Friedrich Gottlob Keller Museum Krippen
Friedrich Gottlob Keller, Paper Industry International Hall of Fame
Hastings, Patrick, Papermaking: A Rags to Riches Story, Library of Congress Blog, December 5, 2024
History of Papermaking Around the World, Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermaking
Holland, Anthony Henry, Dictionary of Canadian Biography
Prince's Lodge, Halifax Military Heritage Preservation Society
Prince's Lodge, Halifax's Own Royal: Prince Edward, Duke of Kent, Halifax Public Libraries
The Province of Victoria Australia, 1855, Edward Stanford, Old Maps Online
Pulp and Paper Industry, The Canadian Encyclopedia
Timeline of Paper and Papermaking, History of Paper
The Manufacture of Paper - Paper Made from Rags, Scientific American, September 18, 1869
Rags, Rags, Rags, Acadian Recorder, November 14, 1818, pg. 3, Nova Scotia Archives
Ruins of Acadian Paper Mill, Nova Scotia Archives
Timber Trade History, The Canadian Encyclopedia
Wharf, Melbourne, 1841-1845, Henry Gilbert Jones, eMelbourne
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