Exhibit at East Gwillimbury's Sharon Temple features wreaths made from hair of the dead

Scarin' Temple exhibit: Death and mourning in the Victorian Era on now until March.

Yorkregion.com
November 30, 2018
Amanda Persico

One of the first questions someone asks about a museum, especially one set in a historical building, is if the building is haunted.

“We always get that question. Sometimes you joke and tell a story,” said Elizabeth Evans, collections manager at the Sharon Temple National Historic Site and Museum, in East Gwillimbury.

“But sometimes it’s not the building at all, but the objects people find creepy.”

Housed in a glass case in the museum is a collection of Victorian-era dolls: one porcelain doll in particular has glass eyes that move, another has elbow joints at the wrong angle, and a third is made of wood, with small nails used as joints.

Maybe it’s the disproportionate torso, the unblinking eyes or the arms that bend the wrong way, but something is off.

“The dolls were made to look human,” Evans said. “We know they’re not. So, they’re lifeless humans. That’s what makes them creepy. People hate these dolls. But what we see as scary was normal back then.”

The collection of dolls is part of the Scarin’ Temple exhibit, where visitors can get an up-close look at creepy items from the Victorian era.

Along with all things creepy, the exhibit also looks at the act of mourning during the Victorian era.

“Death was so common back then,” Evans said.

It was during the Victorian era when the mourning period became more defined.

The exhibit features a number of hair wreaths, made from hair collected from a deceased family member; a mourning dress worn by a wealthy local woman; scuffed mirrors; a wooden bier used to carry small coffins; era clocks; and a collection of post-mortem family portraits.

Mirrors were scuffed or covered immediately after a death. The fear was the spirit would be trapped in the mirror if it saw its reflection prior to passing on, Evans said.

The hair wreaths were usually made with collected hair, twisted and woven in a U-shape, open to the heavens, Evans said.

“Usually, those are the first things families get rid of,” she said of the museum’s donated hair-wreath collection. About 20 wreaths are part of the temple's collection; about half were made from hair, while the rest were made with either seeds, leather or wool.

Clocks were stopped at the time of death and restarted again when the person was buried, Evans said.

“The idea was you can mourn as long as you wanted,” she said. “Back then, you didn’t have to worry about things happening. Stopping time was a way to experience and feel the sadness before getting back to life.”

Taking cues from the monarch of the day, Queen Victoria, women of the time wore all black during their mourning period, which could be up to two years for a loved one.

Queen Victoria dressed in black from the day Prince Albert died in 1861 to her own death 1901.

This became the social custom across all wealth classes.

“If a woman could not afford a separate mourning dress, she often died her nicest dress black,” Evans said. “In this farming community, she might have only had one dress and she would be in mourning the rest of her life.”

The stage of mourning dictated the amount of black a woman was to wear.

It wasn’t until a woman was in the second stage of mourning, usually after a year, could she introduce greys and lace to her dresses, Evans said.