This book represents the twentieth volume of what will ultimately be twenty-five volumes in a series of verbatim transcripts of the diaries of Howard Leopold Morry, written by him starting in 1939 and concluding with the last known volume in 1965. It is important to note that there are gaps in the chronology and possible missing volumes at the end of the series which are unaccounted for but which are believed to represent diaries that are now lost. The gaps in the chronology in the earlier years cannot otherwise be explained. Also, Howard Morry died in 1972 and was clear of mind and continued to write letters to his family members in Canada, the United States of America and Scotland until shortly before his death, so it seems likely that there were other diaries written after 1965 which are now lost.
Howard was a raconteur and oral historian cast in the same mould as dozens of other men and women in Newfoundland in those days who carried forward the history of the small outport villages in which they lived. In many cases, their knowledge, gained by word of mouth from generation to generation, is our only record of the events that took place in these tiny villages for many decades and even centuries.
Howard was 54 years old when he took up pen or pencil to write the first of his many diaries in December 1939. What motivated him at that time was the belief (wrong, as it fortunately turned out) that he would not live much longer, as a result of a bad heart condition resulting from diseases he endured during his time in the trenches in Gallipoli, on the Somme and in Ypres during WWI. He was worried, and in this he was justified, that many of the stories of the old days that he faithfully retained would be lost forever if he did not record them in writing. The younger generation even then had lost interest in such things and the race of community oral historians of which he was one was coming to an end.
In his diaries, he spoke of his own personal experiences, at home in his youth and in his later years, his adventures in western Canada as a young man, and overseas with the Royal Newfoundland Regiment in WWI. But he also recorded observations on the significant and insignificant (to most historians) events of daily life in a small outport village on the Southern Shore of Newfoundland in the early to mid-1900s. And he also recounted events from the history of his village as passed down to him by earlier generations of oral historians.
The twenty five volumes in this series differ in composition between two diary formats: the first format is that of an unbroken narrative of events in the life of the author, Howard Leopold Morry, or of the history of the community in which he was born and raised, Ferryland, Newfoundland; the second format is that of a conventional daily diary reporting on events of the day, including the weather and sea conditions, the ups and downs in the fishery, births, marriages and deaths of family, friends and neighbours, and newsworthy events at the local, national and international level. None of the 25 volumes are actually all of one format or the other.
The current volume is, for the most part, an example of the daily diary type. There are only a few short anecdotes in this diary. But there are frequent comparisons made to life in the old days versus the current times.
In this Twentieth volume, the diary transcribed covers the period between June 16, 1958 and February 16, 1959. At this time in his life, Howard finds himself feeling his age, which is not surprising considering he will soon to 74. But he has thirteen years of life ahead of him, though of course he has no way of knowing this.
Howard has continued functioning as a small scale farmer and livestock owner and also continues his work harvesting wood from the surrounding woods and groves for a variety of purposes. But his age and increasingly limited mobility has reduced his efforts in these areas.