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Trama e riassunto di Alcuni ricordi della vecchia Victoria
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About 5 h 20 min to read.A chi è rivolto
You will love this book if you enjoy local history, pioneer memoirs, gold rush tales, old street maps, naval life, or the warm voice of a man who remembers his town.
Che cos’è questo libro
What would you do if a pistol shot rang out near your errand, and ten thousand people surged toward the jail shouting for justice? Edgar Fawcett, a schoolboy in San Francisco, ran straight toward it. He was always ready for an adventure, and that habit shapes everything in this book.
Some Reminiscences of Old Victoria gathers the articles, letters and sketches of a British boy born in Sydney who grew up in San Francisco and then on Vancouver Island. He collected them in 1911 at his home, Dingley Dell. You get a living map of a frontier town at the moment it changes.
In questo riassunto
- 1A boy watches San Francisco take justice into its own handsFree
- 2Arriving in Victoria, a fort town of logs and boulders
- 3Schoolboy adventures and a burial island turned to ashes
- 4The directory and the street walks bring a town back
- 5A first newspaper, closed streets and the Black pioneers
- 6Firemen, sailors and a navy that held the young town together
- 7Theatre, churches, music and a first Y.M.C.A.
- 8A graveyard, a few tributes and a restless curious mind
Punto chiave 1 di 8
A boy watches San Francisco take justice into its own hands
Fawcett begins in San Francisco, where his family lands in 1850 after leaving Australia. In Honolulu a planter's wife falls for two-year-old Edgar and asks his mother to give him up. His mother says no, and he jokes that he might have become king of the Hawaiian Islands.
He remembers the city as muddy, courteous and wild. Sent to buy a newspaper for his father, he hears a pistol shot near Washington and Montgomery Streets. The editor James King of William lies wounded, shot by the politician James Casey. Fawcett is swept along in a crowd of ten thousand. The Vigilance Committee soon takes over the city. His mother forbids him to watch the execution. He skips school, climbs an awning post opposite the gallows, and pays with the worst whipping of his life. That night his little sister Amy sneaks in with part of her own supper and her tears.
He also sees most of the redwood city burn twice, and he runs to every blaze. Then a ship his father part-owns is wrecked, and with no insurance the family is ruined. They sail for Victoria. History is something a child can stand inside, and loss can be the doorway to a new home.
That’s 1 of 8 key points.
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About 5 h 20 min to read.Questions about Alcuni ricordi della vecchia Victoria
What is Some Reminiscences of Old Victoria about?
It is a collection of Edgar Fawcett's memories and articles about growing up in San Francisco and Victoria, British Columbia, in the 1850s and 1860s, covering streets, shops, schools, churches, fires, the navy and the pioneers he knew.
Who was Edgar Fawcett?
Fawcett was a pioneer of Victoria who arrived in 1859 as a boy, worked as an upholsterer and then in the customs service, and wrote newspaper reminiscences. He was secretary of the first meeting of the Pioneer Society in 1871.
Is Some Reminiscences of Old Victoria a true story?
Yes, it is a factual memoir. Fawcett wrote from memory and from old newspapers, directories and letters from friends, and he says when he is unsure of a date or detail. He published the book in 1912.
What was the View Street dispute in the book?
Fawcett argued that View Street once ran through from Cook Street to Wharf Street and was closed with fences in 1858. He cites the Victoria Gazette, advertisements and an editorial to answer a friend who disagreed.
Is it easy to read Some Reminiscences of Old Victoria?
It is approachable because the chapters are short and independent. Fawcett writes in a friendly, conversational voice, with humor, anecdotes and quick sketches of people, so you can open almost any chapter and enjoy it.
Cite this edition
Fawcett, Edgar. Some Reminiscences of Old Victoria. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/some-reminiscences-of-old-victoria.
Fawcett, E. (2026). Some reminiscences of old Victoria. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/some-reminiscences-of-old-victoria (Original work published 1912)
Fawcett, Edgar. Some Reminiscences of Old Victoria. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/some-reminiscences-of-old-victoria.
@book{fawcett2026some,
author = {Fawcett, Edgar},
title = {Some Reminiscences of Old Victoria},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/some-reminiscences-of-old-victoria},
note = {First published 1912}
}
