GLACE BAY, N.S. — Although Davis Day ceremonies were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the public is invited to the Cape Breton Miners’ Museum on Thursday to commemorate the day on their own.
Mary Pat Mombourquette, executive director of the musuem, said at some point Thursday Cape Breton Regional Municipality Dist. 9 Coun. George MacDonald will lay a wreath at Miners’ Memorial Park behind the museum.
“The public is invited to come out and commemorate the day in their own way,” she said.
Mombourquette said she hopes people visit the site where there’s lots of room to social distance, adding businesses in the area will close today as a sign of respect.
“It is Davis Day although we aren’t having a ceremony,” she said. “It’s important that we honour that day.”
Davis Day is commemorated on June 11 in the former coal mining communities to remember New Waterford miner William Davis who was shot during a confrontation between striking miners and company police. On that day, the miners were protesting the coal company’s decision to shut down the town’s drinking water supply and electricity as part of the 1925 strike.
More than 5,000 people attended Davis’ funeral three days later, while a British Empire Steel Corp. policeman was relocated with his family to Massachusetts for safety reasons.
The date is also known as William Davis Miners’ Memorial Day throughout the municipality, in honour of miners who were killed on the job across the province.
