The rocky coastline and marshy meadows of Nova Scotia's southwest shore offered a breathtaking backdrop for French navigator Samuel de Champlain, who thought it a fitting site for this country's first European settlement in 1604.
Champlain charted the peninsula and founded what would become known as Acadia.
Four hundred summers later, West Pubnico, a bountiful fishing village looking out over the Gulf of Maine, stands as the oldest Acadian community in the country. It's a place that, as much as any, can lay claim to being the birthplace of Canada and is now at the centre of celebrations to mark the Acadian World Congress, beginning July 31 across the Maritimes.
West Pubnico was founded in 1651 by French administrator Philippe Muis d'Entremont nearly half a century after Champlain settled in nearby Port Royal, though Acadians had been living in the area since shortly after Champlain's arrival. They forged a life sustained by fishing and farming, exploiting the fertile marshes as Britain and France battled over ownership of the region around them.
D'Entremont's family and descendants were among the last to leave during the great deportation that began in 1755 and the first to return a decade and a half later. They are the only Acadians to resettle in the same area they left behind, and begin anew.
Today, the name d'Entremont dominates the local telephone directory. Jean Bernard d'Entremont, 66, a retired math teacher and amateur genealogist, is organizing the reunion that will mark his sprawling family's participation in the Acadian World Congress. He is the 10th of 13 children and a ninth generation d'Entremont.
"Practically everyone in the community can claim that Philippe Muis d'Entremont was their ancestor," he said. "For a long time, there was a lot of intermarriage. It was a very closed community."
West Pubnico is home to a dozen generations of d'Entremonts, from the oldest, 98-year-old Philomene Amirault, to the youngest, baby Edyn Arcelle d'Entremont, born June 16 to Stephanie and Jody d'Entremont. The hundreds and possibly thousands in between will travel from Ontario and Quebec, Louisiana and California, France and Spain for the reunion.
But the majority of them will come from just down the road, where d'Entremonts make up more than half of the population of West Pubnico. [The d'Eon family is part of the same tree, descending from second-generation d'Entremonts and will be part of the reunion as well. Their numbers add hundreds more to the mix.]/p>
"Why are we doing this?" Jean Bernard said of the family's first-ever reunion. "It has to do with pride. Pride in our community and pride in our longevity. Pride that after a beginning marked by what would be seen today as intolerable hardship, we are still here. We want to celebrate that in a big way."
The words "still here" are a mantra when talking to anyone named d'Entremont.
"The hardship, it was unimaginable," said Bernice d'Entremont, curator of Le Musée Acadien in West Pubnico.
"What is special about the Acadians, special about the d'Entremonts in particular, was that they came back and continued their lives where they started them. We came back. And we are still here."
During the deportation, the Acadians were shipped throughout the Thirteen Colonies. Some were sent to France.
The d'Entremonts and d'Eons of Pubnico landed in Boston. They were supposed to go from there to North Carolina, but at the last minute the Massachusetts governor decided to let them stay in New England. When they finally returned to the area, it was as it was when they first arrived. They resettled around both sides of the harbour. And most of those who returned bore the same name: d'Entremont.
The Acadian World Congress will feature a grand parade in Point Clare, N.S., followed by an academic conference, arts and cultural showcases, a pilgrimage to the national historic site at Grand Pre, N.S., the centre of the deportation, and a concert on Citadel Hill in Halifax on Aug. 15.
But it is the grassroots events -- the family reunions -- that are at the heart of the celebrations, which have been going on throughout the province since May. Nearly 100 family reunions will be held, from Aucoin to Thibodeau.
"In West Pubnico there's a particular twist," said Neil Boucher, a historian and vice-president academic at the University of Moncton. "There is a long-standing attachment to the soil. Many people in Pubnico tend to stick together. It has been very inward looking. You've basically got just two families there."
Réal d'Entremont, a fisherman and local historian, is a ninth-generation descendant of Philippe d'Entremont. He hauled out the local telephone directory and showed off column after column of distant relatives.
"Pretty much everyone has d'Entremont blood," he said. "Somewhere along the line, most married someone from the family. Our whole family is here. We know where our roots are. The story goes so far back that it's sometimes hard not to get mixed up."
Such a close-knit community poses an interesting issue that only emerged as a dilemma over the past generation or two. Everyone here is related. Jean Bernard figures he and his wife, Anne d'Eon could easily be third cousins.
History has narrowly funnelled families and relationships in this Roman Catholic community. Until 40 or 50 years ago, few from the Pubnico region would think of marrying the Anglo-Saxon Protestants from nearby villages and towns.
"Fifty years ago we hardly spoke to them, never mind marry them. When I was 15 years old, had I come home with an Anglo-Saxon it wouldn't have been pretty. It was the same for them. They didn't want their children to come home with frogs.
"I hate to use the word, but there was a lot of inbreeding. Most of the people that I know married a relative, a distant relative, mind you. We don't think about it. But outsiders consider it. The last two or three generations decided that probably wasn't good, but there's still a lot of it. At least now it's acceptable to marry outside. There's much more tolerance for [other]religions and cultures."
There are roughly a quarter-million Acadians living in the Maritime provinces, although most -- as many as 90 per cent -- call New Brunswick home. According to Mr. Boucher, fewer than 4 per cent of Nova Scotia's population of just fewer than one million are of Acadian descent.
"It is almost a miracle the language in Nova Scotia has survived," Mr. Boucher said. "The government in Halifax was Anglican and English-speaking. There were discriminatory laws against Catholics. They could not vote or sit in the House of Assembly. When the school system came around in the late 1800s, English-speaking teachers were leading students who couldn't understand a word.
"It was out of determination and, in part, their inward-looking attitude that they managed to preserve their language and culture. The authorities wanted to ostracize them, but in doing that they helped preserve the characteristics that determined who they were."
The family names and place names ring loudly. The Pubnico region is made up of a handful of villages bearing the same name. Just off Highway 103, which hugs the south shore for more than 300 kilometres from Halifax to Yarmouth, is Pubnico, East Pubnico, Middle East Pubnico and Lower East Pubnico. Along the peninsula extending from the original village sits West Pubnico, Middle West Pubnico and Lower West Pubnico.
The heart of the region, however, is West Pubnico, with its historical village and storied Le Musée Acadien and Archives. Father Clarence d'Entremont, an archivist who spent most of his life tirelessly researching the family, produced 11 books, thousands of papers and photographs, all meticulously catalogued and stored.
"People come in to research in the archives and they are family," said Bernice d'Entremont, the museum curator. "I think of all of them as my family. It's so strong. It pulls people here to find their ancestors. And some people stumble across us by accident and that is incredible to see them discover their descendants. People are in tears. They want to touch the artifacts. They are moved."
It seems surprising that a family with such a rich, tragic history has never hosted a family reunion. Organizers are expecting more than 1,500 d'Entremonts the first weekend in August; hundreds more if one factors in the d'Eons.
"It wouldn't show up in the SkyDome, but for here that's a big deal," Jean Bernard d'Entremont said.
"There is a good community spirit here. Though some people do leave. You'll find some of us more recently have gone to Halifax."
His three adult children, all professionals, moved there to raise their families. But most of the people in Pubnico work in the fishing industry, mostly lobster and ground fish, and they do well by it.
As suggested by Haligonian Peter d'Entremont's 1997 film, Acadian Spirit: The Legacy of Philippe d'Entremont, the story of the d'Entremont family is the history of Acadia. As he discovers his relatives he remarked: "Suddenly, I feel part of an enormous family."
Acadia changed hands time and again -- nine times alone between Champlain's arrival in 1604 and 1710. Throughout, the Acadians, who were struggling to survive, also struggled to stay neutral. But when they refused to sign the oath of allegiance to the King of England, 10,000 men, women and children were deported.
Peter d'Entremont called the expulsion "an attempt at cultural genocide."
The village of Pubnico that Philippe d'Entremont knew and loved came to a fiery end on Sept. 23, 1758, when Major Roger Morris and his troops set it on fire, burning it to the ground.
Residents of the village, Father Clarence wrote, who took refuge in thick woods nearby, watched the carnage -- a century-and-a-half's work turned to ash and rubble. Shortly after they were sent into exile, where they would remain for nearly 12 years.
"Acadia occupied a strategic geographical position and served as a pawn in international politics," historians Sally Ross and Alphonse Deveau wrote in their 1992 book, The Acadians of Nova Scotia: Past and Prese nt.
"From a maritime point of view, Acadia was the key not only to the trade routes and the fishery of the North Atlantic, but also to the Gulf of St. Laurence and the fur trade. The key was tossed back and forth between the two superpowers for more than a century."
Today, French and English co-exist peacefully in Acadia. There is an easy bilingualism here that does not feel political or problematic or in-your-face.
"It's not something we think about," Jean Bernard d'Entremont said.
"I grew up not having a choice, but the language is just something that came naturally to this place and its people. Most people will speak French, but there's no issue with speaking English as well. A lot of youngsters will speak more English. But if I go for a coffee at the Red Cap in the morning everyone converses in French."
As the Congress and the reunion draw near, many residents have raised Acadian flags on their lawns as excitement catches on. In West Pubnico, 400 years can melt away in one conversation with a d'Entremont over a cup of coffee.
"I can't imagine," said Jean Bernard, speaking once more of what his ancestors endured. "It must be so extremely difficult. I mean, I remember living with no electricity, but I can't imagine what they went through. It took its toll. But to a large degree that helped make the community what it is today."