New bank note shines spotlight on Halifax’s historic north end
The new Canadian bank note honouring Viola Desmond had a satisfying surprise for many African-nova Scotians: an unexpected shout-out to Halifax’s historic north end, home to one of Canada’s oldest black communities.
“I’m ecstatic about it,” said Irvine Carvery, a prominent north ender who was thrilled to discover when the $10 bill was unveiled last week that it included a map of the community he has lived in his whole life.
“I just think it’s a wonderful way to advertise the north end and the people that live in the north end.”
The bill cements Desmond’s status as a civil rights icon for her refusal to leave the whites-only section of a movie theatre while visiting New Glasgow in 1946.
But behind her portrait, the bank note features a historic map of Halifax’s north end that pays tribute to another aspect of her pioneering legacy – her community and her entrepreneurship.
The map includes the stretch of Gottingen Street, the north end’s main drag, where the beautician opened a salon as part of a business that would eventually expand into her own line of cosmetics and a beauty school, which allowed her to mentor black women from across the country.
“This historic community in Halifax was where Viola Desmond lived and worked, and served as a source of invaluable support during her struggle for justice,” the Bank of Canada says in its materials on the new bank note.
“This artistic rendering of a historic map shows the waterfront, Citadel and Gottingen Street, the thoroughfare where Vi’s Studio of Beauty Culture was located.”
The north end was home to Africville, which was founded in the 1800s with many residents former slaves and black Loyalists. But residents were forced to relocate when the community was ordered razed by Halifax council in the late 1960s, and many moved into public housing elsewhere in the north end.
Historically, the north end has been populated by black-owned businesses, Carvery said, but many of them shut down in the wake of the civil rights movement that Desmond helped spur as an unintended consequence of desegregation.
“I would hope that (the bill) is going to inspire ... young black entrepreneurs to take a look at that whole history of black business ownership and inspire them,” said Carvery, 65, a former chair of Halifax’s school board. Leaders in Halifax’s north end say they hope an unexpected shout out to the neighbourhood on a new bank note featuring civil rights activist and entrepreneur Viola Desmond will inspire African-nova Scotians to launch their own ventures in the historically black community. A sample of the new $10 Canadian bill, featuring civil rights icon Viola Desmond, is seen in this undated handout image from the Bank of Canada.