Pamela Smyth dismisses the idea of an interview at first, laughingly declaiming, \u201cOh, I’m really yesterday’s news.\u201d She reluctantly agrees when she is reminded of the vibrant theatre community that exists in Huntsville today thanks to the foundation that was already there and to which she contributed along with many others. For Smyth, it began with the storied Rotary Club musicals that welcomed Pamela when she and Dr. Thomas Smyth arrived in Huntsville in the late 1970s.<\/p>\n
The Smyths came to Canada after leaving Northern Ireland during “The Troubles” in 1972. Pamela was raised a Presbyterian and Thomas was an Anglican, which, as Pam recalls, \u201cwas the next worst thing to being a Catholic in my neighbourhood.\u201d Pamela was working as a psychiatric nurse and they had a two-year-old named Tara who would be joined by sister Claire a few years later in Canada.<\/p>\n
Directed by the Canadian government to an under-serviced area, the young family settled in Iroquois Falls, which Pamela loved. But the extreme cold bothered Tom’s ‘bad’ leg, which was a result of osteomyelitis in childhood. When they saw an advertisement by Dr. Dan Jones to join he and Dr. David Hillier in a clinic in Huntsville, Dr. Smyth applied and they moved south to Huntsville.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’ll be honest,\u201d Pam recounts, \u201cI was depressed at first and I missed Iroquois Falls terribly.\u201d She explains, \u201cMoving from Northern Ireland to Iroquois Falls I was introduced to an entirely new culture: I became interested in the archaeology of the area and therefore the First Nations who lived there. I admire the Indigenous peoples’ relationship to nature.\u201d The knowledge of the natural world \u2013 the plants, animals, seasons and cycles of nature \u2013 has been a central tenet of their lives and worldviews since the dawn of time.<\/p>\n
While Smyth is very sensitive to the issue of appropriating another culture, she believes that attending Pow-Wows and supporting First Nation, Inuit, and M\u00e9tis art is a pathway to understanding and respecting their culture. The beautiful paintings and sculpture that adorns their more than century-old farmhouse speaks to the Smyths’ respect for the culture.<\/p>\n\n\t\t