Cyrus Stephens Eaton -- Bio by Cathy Eaton (August 15, 2017)
 
Cyrus Eaton was born on December 27, 1883, not far from here in Pugwash River, Nova Scotia.  He was my grandfather.
 
He became a wealthy industrialist, a generous philanthropist, and a passionate advocate for peace between communist and capitalist countries.  In the 1950s and 1960s, he hosted and funded the early Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs in his hometown of Pugwash, Nova Scotia and in other locations. In 1995, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded jointly to the Pugwash conferences and Joseph Rotblat.
 
Joseph Howe Eaton, Cyrus’s father, eventually owned three farms, a general store, and ran the local post office as well as a lumber business. However, in the early years, the family owned one farm and barely had the funds to pay one hired man.  Cyrus’s mother, Mary Adelia MacPherson, was a devout Baptist who encouraged her son to study for the ministry and to read widely in literature, history, religion and philosophy. Before Cyrus was born, the couple lost four children to diphtheria. Three sisters and a younger brother were born after him.
 
As a four-year-old, his father trusted Cyrus, the oldest surviving child, to drive a horse and wagon to Conns Mills in order to have the flour ground for his mother to bake bread. Cyrus, who weighed out flour, sugar and raisins, and counted change carefully, often waited upon customers in Joseph Eaton’s general store.  His father used to boast, “When Cyrus was six, I could leave him in the store for hours alone and he never failed my confidence.  His qualifications for big business are brains and absolute trustworthiness.” The family moved to Pugwash Junction.
 
His father also inadvertently provided his son with international reading material since one of his jobs at the post office was to sort newspapers from Boston, Providence and Halifax. Cyrus recalled, “By the time I was ten, I was pretty well experienced in business and world affairs – my father was postmaster and I used to read all the newspapers that came in to subscribers.”11
 
Cyrus, following in the path of his Uncle Charles Eaton just fifteen years older, attended a one-room schoolhouse under the instruction of Margaret King in Pugwash Junction, before studying at Amherst Academy in Amherst. For being top of his class in science, Cyrus was presented at graduation with complete works of Charles Darwin and Thomas Huxley, along with framed photographs of the authors, which now hang in the Cyrus Eaton room at Thinkers Lodge.  The evolutionist and the biologist undoubtedly sparked his interest in science and his desire to nurture the environment and prevent it from being irrevocably destroyed by atomic weapons.
 

Joseph Rotblat, the Pugwash Conferences, & Nuclear Weapons –by Cathy Eaton
 
Joseph Rotblat, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, was born on November 4, 1904, in Warsaw (then part of the Soviet Union) to an Orthodox Jewish family. During World War I, he and his family fearing for their lives lived in a basement and subsisted on potatoes as a mainstay of their diet. His family spiraled from affluence to extreme poverty.  
 
Joseph Rotblat played a pivotal role in the Pugwash Conferences and was a significant participant in the 1957 conference held here in Pugwash. He returned to Thinkers Lodge numerous times.
 
By 1916, there was no money so his family wanted him to do practical studies that would quickly provide him with a career. He studied electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, and basic arithmetic. At 14 he became an apprentice to an electrician, a job that he hated. However, he was grateful he could help support his parents. Then he enrolled in the Free University of Warsaw, which was one of the few that admitted Jewish students.
 
Since he was a Jew, he could not be officially admitted to Warsaw University, but he earned his degree there unofficially. At 30, he studied in Liverpool with James Chadwick, a Nobel Prize recipient in Physics. Chadwick proved the existence of neutrons. Rotblat returned to Poland to bring back his wife, who sadly due to appendicitis surgery was unable to leave with him.  Rotblat escaped Poland two days before Hitler invaded his country, and tragically his wife was a victim of their reign of terror, one of over six million Jews murdered.
 
In 1939 nuclear fission in uranium was discovered.  Rotblat worked on fission first in Warsaw and next in Liverpool. In 1944 he moved to the United States and became a key scientist in Los Alamos working on the Atomic Bomb.  Although concerned about the morality of the weapon, he agreed to help develop the bomb believing that the Germans were close to building one that they could unleash on Europe. He learned that the Germans did not have the scientific knowledge to build the bomb. Then he discovered that the United Stated intended to continue its work on the bomb believing that having this deadly technology would subdue the Soviet Union and be a deterrent to the Soviet Union’s future position as a world leader.  At the time the Soviet Union and the United States were allies. Rotblat quit the Manhattan project and was accused of being a traitor.  When he departed, all his luggage disappeared, which contained photos and mementoes of his beloved wife.
 
After the war, he became a British citizen.  In 1955, he was one of eleven scientists who signed the Russell-Einstein Manifesto. Ten them were awarded Nobel Prizes in a variety of disciplines. Joseph Rotblat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize jointly with the Pugwash Conferences in 1995.  His medal is proudly displayed at Thinkers Lodge in Pugwash, Nova Scotia.
 
Rotblat made significant contributions through the Pugwash Conference on Science and World Affairs, some of which were hosted and funded by the Pugwash born industrialist, Cyrus Eaton. The first one was held in 1957 at Pugwash, a safe and neutral spot where individuals could speak their beliefs and write declarations without fearing retribution from their countries.

Levy Eaton and his Briganteen The George Henderson: 1860 -- by Cathy Eaton
 
Pugwash was a bustling harbour and its abundant lumber enabled many shipbuilders to prosper.  Cyrus Eaton had two well-known ancestors that were shipbuilders. Levy Eaton’s brother, Stephen Eaton, was Cyrus Eaton’s grandfather, so Levy was Cyrus’ great uncle of his father’s side.  Another ship builder, Donald McKay, was great uncle to Cyrus on his mother’s side. Levy was born in Nova Scotia and migrated to New Zealand while Donald McKay was born in Shelburne and migrated to Boston.
 
The "George Henderson"was built in Pugwash by Levi Woodworth Eaton who was a shipbuilder and merchant in the town.  This 171-ton Briganteen was the last ship he built in Nova Scotia. Because he believed the best days of shipbuilding were coming to an end, he decided to journey to New Zealand with his family. There is no passenger or crew list of those who set sail. John James was the ship captain, and George Eaton, Levi’s son, was the chief mate. John James married Levy’s daughter.
 
Levi W. Eaton was a landowner in Pugwash. He bought Lot #36 in 1847 for 60 pounds. and in 1849 bought lot # 114 on the corner of Durham and Russell Streets for 30 pounds. This lot was referred to at the “Baptist Meeting House Lot” but was not officially turned over to the church until 1853. Levi Eaton was a trustee of the church. In 1978 lot #114 was still the site of the Pugwash Baptist Church.  In addition to being a shipbuilder, he was a surveyor of lumber, a highway surveyor, a poundkeeper, and owned a lumber business that benefited from the overseas demand for lumber. Levi built a home near the Pugwash Lighthouse point.  In 1849 Levi built a brigantine, and in 1850, he built a barque. In 1851, it was recorded that Levi Eaton’s firm built six of twelve ships that were sold in Pugwash Harbour.  He built three barques, a brig, a briganteen, and a schooner, which he kept.  The names of these ships are noted in James Smith’s The History of Pugwash.  In 1858 he built a schooner.
 
The journey Levy Eaton and his family embarked on took over four months. Imagine the close quarters, the stormy seas, and the basic foods. The ship set sail from Pugwash on December 4, 1859.  For the next nine days they suffered storms as they headed south.
           
Malcomb McLean, a passenger, wrote a letter to his brother Peter of the Gulf Shore.  “We had fine weather until four in the evening. The wind set in from the northeast, that with sleat of snow, blowing very heavy the bridge begun to pitch and roll.  We soon had a guise sean below children crying mothers moaning passenger seciking and heaving pots and pans rolling and kicking.  There was a crow bar left in the hold commenced its pranks, broke the leg of my chair, and nearly killed one of my young ones.”
 

 
 

​Charles Aubrey Eaton (1868-1953) by Cathy Eaton
​See additional articles and photographs on Thinkerslodgehistories.org
 
Charles Aubrey Eaton was Cyrus Eaton’s uncle.  Just fifteen years older than Cyrus, Charles was more of a brother than an uncle. The youngest of ten children, he was born in 1868 and moved to Pugwash Junction after the family’s farm burned down. His brother, Joseph Howe, was Cyrus’s father.  Sadly, three of their siblings died in infancy due to diphtheria.  Cyrus’s four older siblings also died of the dreadful, contagious disease. Both Cyrus and Charles grew up in rural Pugwash with strong Baptist roots. Daily life for both boys involved strenuous farm chores.
 
Charles recalled, “I cannot recall an unhappy day in all those golden years of childhood. In those primitive days it was taken for granted that everyone would pull its own weight, and in our family at least everyone did. I do not remember when or how I learned to milk a cow, or harness a horse, or yoke and drive a pair of oxen, or swing a scythe or axe, or tow and sail a boat, or plant, cultivate, and harvest the various farm crops.”
 
Charles attended school in Truro but returned to help on the farm after his father’s shipbuilding business failed.  His father departed for Colorado for two years to work in the mines and help the family’s finances. Upon his return, he suffered a massive stroke, and Charles became head of the household since his older siblings had farms and jobs of their own. Charles also worked on the railroad to supplement his income.  While attending Amherst Academy, he worked in a shoe store and as a store clerk.
He took one small trunk with him.  Charles recalled, “It was not an impressive and elaborate inventory. My school books, the New Testament, a clean shirt or two, a pair of overalls. After paying my fare from Thompsons Station at Amherst, I had a $.25 piece left as my entire monetary capital. Measured by modern standards, I was traveling light” (Miller 17).  
 
Charles found his calling for the ministry at Acadia University in Wolfville. He landed a job preaching for $1.20 at a small local church,  but his first preaching job was short lived due to lack of ideas for sermons. He co-edited the college newspaper, which prepared him for his work later as a newspaper editor. He moved his mother close so he could provide for her.
 

​ 
The History of the Thinkers Lodge Building
Pugwash, Nova Scotia
By Cathy Eaton
 
Thinkers Lodge is located on the northern end of Water Street facing the Northumberland Strait at the mouth of the Pugwash River Estuary. It was declared a National Historic Site in 2008.
 
Originally, it was a 26-foot by 34-foot rectangular central hallway built by the Pineo Family and constructed in the early decades of the nineteenth century probably between 1818 and 1840. David Pineo purchased the property in 1818.
 
Henry Gesner Pineo (1798-1874), a successful merchant, shipbuilder and member of the Legislative Council of Nova Scotia, built the house for his daughter Mary who was married to Doctor Clay.  It had a central doorway with a gabled dormer, flanked by bay windows on each side.  The original rooms are now the current gift shop, Joseph Rotblat’s room, the staircase you see upon entering the front of the house and the two bedrooms at the top of the stairs.
 
Around 1860 the first addition was built on the east side of the house.  This one and one-half storey produced an L-shaped structure. It is possible that the kitchen was a tiny house that was moved here. The other rooms included Anne Eaton’s room, the staircase and the bedroom at the top of the stairs. Around 1880 another one-and-one-half storey on the west side of the main house was built, which is now Cyrus Eaton’s room, the staircase next to it, and the bedroom above it.
 
In 1918, the Clay Family sold the property to Fred Dakin who ran the house as a lodge known as the Pineo Lodge.  Around 1921, Frank Allan built the lobster-canning factory adjacent to Pineo Lodge. He lived across the way on Water Street in a house that burned.  Eventually, Eva Webb (Cyrus’s sister) built her home on that property.
 
When the devastating fires of 1928 and 1929 consumed much of Pugwash, Cyrus Eaton returned to help rebuild the village of his youth.  He hired local residents in need of work to remove the debris of the burnt Empress Hotel, wharves, and shops on Water Street.  Then they carted in soil and landscaped the land to create Eaton Park for the residents to enjoy all year and to host the Canada Day celebrations on the stage.  “Local people contributed what they could – cash and labour of course, one offer of 3 days of trucking and, perhaps more interesting 21 different residents volunteered a “team and driver” for a total of 124 days!”
 
In 1929 Cyrus donated the park and deeded what was formerly the Pineo property to a Nova Scotia non-profit called The Pugwash Park Commission incorporated by an act of the Legislature introduced by Raymond Bourque.


Cyrus acquired Pineo Lodge and commissioned Andrew Cobb, the renowned Halifax architect, to expand and renovate Pineo Lodge to give it seven bedrooms and bathrooms, two new public spaces, and a veranda. Cobb added the great room, the verandah, a living room and a library, which now contains the Nobel Peace Prize and the Lenin Peace Prize.  Due to the skill of Cobb, the many additions were tied together to produce a coherent whole and maintain the simple elegance of the original colonial house.
 

 
 

Lobster Factory Tour by Cathy Eaton 
 
Welcome to the Lobster Factory.
 
If you listen carefully, you might hear the far distant chatter of lobster meat packers or the most recent lecture on climate change or perhaps the vows of a bride and groom.  Or you might hear the distinctive squawk of a soaring gull, the wind rattling the masts of a tall ship, or Einstein reminding you to remember your humanity.
 
Look outside and cast your eyes out the strait as far as you can see.  Perhaps you can see Prince Edward Island in the distance. Imagine the sky is dark, the sea is rough, the chill wind is blasting through your oilskin slicker, and you are soaked from relentless stinging rain.  Your arms ache and your body is weary because you have hauled in hundreds of sixty pound traps.  You have a family to feed.  Perhaps your sons or brothers or neighbors are in other small crafts that you catch a glimpse of as you take a brief break to eat breakfast that your wife fixed hours earlier. Another day, the sea might be calm, and the puffy clouds might float across a vivid blue sky. Perhaps, you are chatting to your shipmate or pointing out a sailing vessel fully rigged.  Hours later, exhausted, you have returned to port to begin the arduous process of unloading your catch.
 
This building was built in 1921 as a Lobster Canning Factory, then transformed into the Pagweak Tea Room adjacent to the Pineo Lodge in 1930 and a Dining Hall in 1955. It is now called the Lobster Factory.
 
Originally, the point of land it resides on would have jutted out more into the Northumberland Strait.
 
In the late 1800s and early 1900s thousands of lobstermen often in hazardous weather ventured out to sea in small boats from the villages of Wallace, Port Howe, Malagash, Northport, and of course, Pugwash. The catch was unloaded o n docks and carried inside the canning factories that dotted the shorelines.  Then the young women, many Acadians from New Brunswick, picked the meat from the shells, washed it, and packed it into cans.  Next, the cans were heated in boiling water; a tiny hole in each can, later plugged, released the steam. By the early 30s, most of the small canning factories closed, and the “lobster processing industry was consolidated in Pictou.”
 
The entire lobster industry changed, when a demand for live lobsters controlled the market. Did you know that at one time lobster was considered poor men’s fare?
 
This land probably belonged to the Pineo Family who purchased land here in 1816.  The family built the adjacent house now known as Thinkers Lodge around 1830.
 
Frank Allan was the second youngest of sixteen children all born in the twenty years between 1865 and 1885. Frank Allan built this Lobster Factory on Water Street around 1921 as well as several others along Crescent Beach and on the Northumberland Shore. He hired additional lobstermen who owned their own boats to bring in their catch. Two of his sons worked with him.  In the early years, men rowed dories out to the traps. Later, lobstermen used sailboats and then lobster boats similar to what you see motoring out the channel towards Prince Edward Island early in the morning.
 
Cyrus Eaton bought the Lobster Factory from Frank Allan in 1928.