The 162-year-old Trinity United Church in Cookshire came to life on March 8 as about 100 people gathered inside on a cold and blustery Saturday evening to celebrate music, community, women’s rights, and a hopeful new future for one of the region’s architectural jewels.
The classical concert was organized under the theme of Bouquet de Femmes on International Women’s Day. It also coincided with the transfer of ownership of Trinity Church from the United Church of Canada to Espace Culturel Cookshire-Eaton, a non-profit group under the leadership of local businessman, Gilles Denis, a frequent buyer of heritage properties in Cookshire.
His daughter, flutist Myriam Genest-Denis, emceed the event and welcomed the audience, with subsequent speeches by Cookshire-Eaton mayor Mario Gendron and La Passerelle women’s centre representative Marilyn Ouellet.
Beyond the music devoted to women composers, the church’s amazing acoustics, and the awe-inspiring wood craftsmanship, the event’s highlight was perhaps the homage to community leader Chantal Ouellet.
“Community activism and municipal politics became the foundations of her social militantism,” said Cookshire-Eaton resident Jean-Paul Gendron about Ouellet during his intermission tribute. “The library, cultural activities, the Cercle des fermières, the arboretum, promotion of Scotstown’s natural attributes, the environment… here was a political drive that led her to municipal council, first as a councillor from 1978 to 1982, then as mayor from 1986 to 1994.
“And as a member of the MRC’s council of mayors, which at the time covered 24 municipalities, the femme de Scotstown was not the type to be intimidated by a boardroom of mayors… all men. From 1978 to 2012, she held seven municipal mandates! That’s called a career that’s as inspiring as it is exemplary in municipal politics!”
Gendron went on to list the region’s 10 women mayors of the past 15 years or so, and noted that the Haut-Saint-François currently has 35 women municipal councillors out of a total of 84 elected officials. “That gives us optimism during these troubled times,” he said. “They deserve our full confidence.”
Special recognition also went to the former custodians of Trinity Church in Myriam Genest-Denis’s introductory address. It was the event’s only words in English, spoken directly to the row of audience members who have cared for the church for so much of their lives.
The Bouquet de Femmes concert was billed on its social media page as a one-hour event, from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. With such a rich and important agenda, it in fact lasted until 10 p.m. That so many people came out for so long on a cold, wintry night just before losing an hour to the time change was a testament to the organizers, musicians, women being honoured, the church, and the program.
