Grey Roots is closed to the public today, Tuesday January 21, due to weather.
We have images of Capt. Savage, who disregarded a weather warning, one of Miss Morrison after she survived and was photographed at Toronto, and another image of her. Miss Morrison eventually married Albert Fleming in 1892, and lived in the Kilsyth area, but newspaper articles show that the trauma of the sinking likely was something she felt hurt by for the rest of her life (d. 1937). Her cousin was a First Mate aboard the ship and perished. The other survivor, Duncan Tinkis, lost his uncle, who was travelling with him. Robert Higgins' book about the tragedy could provide more names of locals who were aboard this ill-fated vessel.
Christy Ann Morrison had intended to visit her sister by travelling aboard the vessel known as THE NORTHERN BELLE, but unfortunately, she missed this ship, and instead had to take the ASIA. The S.S. ASIA was lost on Georgian Bay on Thursday, September 14, 1882, with approximately 125? persons aboard her. Before the sinking, the ship personnel tried to lighten the vessel by throwing the horses and other livestock off, but this was not able to help save the passengers, as the ship was caught in a gale. Miss Morrison and 17 other people (including Captain Savage and a Mate), took refuge in a life boat, but she and Mr. Duncan Tinkis were the only ones to survive the ordeal of 18 hours on open water, having the life boat overturn, having the few remaining men in the life boat die, and being marooned on shore for another two days. Luckily, they were seen by a First Nations man, who assisted them by taking them to Parry Sound in his craft when Mr. Tinkis gave him his pocket watch. Miss Morrison (had an injured leg) and Mr. Tinkis were both eighteen years old at the time (another source says he was 17), and their youth likely helped in their survival of the ordeal. The word “teenager” didn’t come into usage until c. 1937.
Like most Grey County residents I took the snowstorm of early January in stride, after all, this region of Ontario is hit by so many winter storms that it is practically a regular occurrence, but when the words “blizzard” and “polar vortex” were being bandied about it reminded me of the much love
Grey Roots acquired a very interesting lantern for the artefact collection earlier this year, and I wish that it could talk, and tell us some stories. It is a brass kerosene lantern, very similar to a railway conductor’s lantern, but its glass chimney (globe) was custom-etched to have a shi
In the spring of 2011, Grey Roots was approached by Clive Morgan on behalf of the Bluewater Modellers, with a proposal to build a diorama (a three-dimensional miniature scene) representing the east side of the Owen Sound Harbour circa 1875.
Until 1860, the only dock in Owen Sound was Boyd’s Wharf, owned by the government and located just outside the mouth of the Sydenham River. The Owen Sound Harbour, as it is located today, was inaccessible, due to a sandbar that ran across the mouth of the river.
On June 27, 2015 an exhibit entitled Arrivals and Departures: The CPR in Grey County opens at Grey Roots Museum & Archives.
This is the story of an extraordinary Canadian family, the John Frost Family, who in the early 1840s, discarded their comfortable, upper-middle class life in Bytown – now Ottawa – for the insecurity and uncertainty of life in the wilderness on western Georgian Bay. 
Your membership will grant you access not only to Grey Roots, but also to our partner museums!
Volunteers participate in learning workshops and seminars, meet new people and make new friends, and receive many benefits.
We rent our multi-media theatre and Delton Becker Room to the community. The 75 seat theatre is an excellent venue to host films, lectures and other events.
