'Green spaces amidst the smokestacks': Halifax's Waegwoltic Club and the boom of leisure and open-air recreation in Nova Scotia, 1908--1914 [electronic resource]
Thesis (M.A.)--Dalhousie University (Canada), 2005
This thesis uses Halifax's Waegwoltic Club as a case study of the rise of social-recreation clubs at the turn of the twentieth century. Founded in 1908, the Waegwoltic Club has served as a social and recreational retreat for five generations of Haligonians
An expanding, healthy economy led to an expansion of the middle class---a group separated from the lower orders in terms of wealth, yet also separate from the upper crust of society on the basis of prestige and family background. Many of these members of the middle class become reformers within the progressive movement. This middle class group of business people and professionals created the Waegwoltic Club
The formation of the Waegwoltic was inspired by many aspects of the progressive movement: firstly, it was one of many clubs that developed to quench the social and recreational desires of progressives of the Edwardian age; secondly, the activities offered at the Waegwoltic---lawn tennis, quoits, swimming and boating---were a reflection of the rise of athletics and healthful pursuits at this time; thirdly, the location of the club----on the Northwest Arm---was a sure connection to progressives' view that citizens had to escape the bustle of the city and return to nature; and finally, the club was seen as a means of attracting tourism to Halifax, and thus expanding the Halifax economy. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
