Anne of Green Gables post office damaged by fire

CAVENDISH, P.E.I. — A popular Prince Edward Island landmark and historic post office that pays homage to the home of Anne of Green Gables author Lucy Maud Montgomery has been damaged by fire.

New Glasgow Fire Chief Jason Peters said firefighters were quickly able to contain the Monday afternoon fire at the Green Gables post office in Cavendish, but the roof was damaged.

The building was modelled after Montgomery’s white house with green trim and a red door, and contains a small museum that details her time as an assistant postmaster in the area.

“When we arrived, there were flames coming off the roof of the post office,” Peters said, adding that the building’s facade was not damaged.

The site also houses a Canada Post office that operates from May to October.

Bianca Gendreau, manager of the research division at the Canadian Museum of History, said Montgomery’s work in the post office is not widely known, but it helped spark her career.

“She used a lot of letterheads, official documents that you use in a post office, she used those to write her stories and novels,” Gendreau said from Gatineau, Que.

“It was while working that she could send her manuscripts over to different editors without the village knowing about it. It was so important to her to retain her privacy. Until she was accepted as a published author, she did not want to let all the village know that this was her goal, her dream.”

Montgomery’s writing was a secret she guarded very closely — something the author discussed in her diaries, said Gendreau.

“In those days, Cavendish was a small town and the post office was a place to meet, exchange news, share information and where you received information about government services,” said Gendreau, adding that Montgomery started working at the post office in 1898.

Gendreau said the post office was located in the house where Montgomery lived with her grandparents.

The original house had been destroyed, so a similar house was moved in the 1970s from elsewhere in Cavendish to the site of the historic post office. It was eventually renovated to serve as a post office and museum.

Cavendish Mayor Matthew Jelley said the property is one of several popular Anne of Green Gables tourist sites in the area.

Canada Post said it was assessing the damage. “We are grateful that our employees and customers are safe and that the fire department responded quickly to limit the damage to the post office,” spokeswoman Hayley Magermans wrote in an email.

The cause of the fire was under investigation.

Montgomery was born in Clifton, P.E.I., in 1874 and died at age 67 in Toronto.