Earlier this month I learned that for many years here in Prince Edward Island an annual local almanac, the Prince Edward Island Calendar, was published. As someone with a long-established interest in Almanacy things, I set out to learn more, and along the way found that the University of PEI library has a copy of the 1857 edition in its collection.

I asked my friendly collections librarian Don Moses if it could be added to the queue for scanning under the banner of Island Lives, and this afternoon came the news that it’s now available digitally (if you follow that link and click Download, you’ll get a high-resolution PDF file that’s full-text searchable – an amazing resource).

My favourite page so far is number three, a page absent of printed material and so left to the doodles of the owner, a man, one might surmise, named Robert Wade (there’s a Robert Wade mentioned as “Serjeant-at-Arms” of the Legislative Assembly on Page 31; no idea if this is the same person or not):