Nothing Happened Here

[00:00:02] Welcome to N.P. Traveler, that place where we talk about New Brunswick stuff.

[00:00:09] This morning I ran out of coffee beans so I went down to the city market and bought

[00:00:14] a bag of Foghorn by Java Moose and at the same time I stopped at Jeremiah's got

[00:00:22] me a breakfast sandwich and to my delight the hot chocolate chip cookies

[00:00:28] were just coming out of the oven. I enjoy living in St. John and today we're going

[00:00:36] to be talking with a co-host of a new podcast that's starting on the history

[00:00:43] of St. John. So sit back and here it comes. Today I have with me Greg Marquis.

[00:00:56] He is co-hosting with Mark Allen Green a new podcast called Nothing Happened Here

[00:01:03] and they're going to be launching this podcast on September 17th and I wanted

[00:01:09] to share this information with my listeners. Greg welcome to NB Traveler.

[00:01:17] Thanks for having me Mark. So to start with what's the story behind selecting

[00:01:22] the podcast name Nothing Happened Here? Well Mark and I were had a beer about a year

[00:01:30] and a half ago trying to decide if we wanted to do a podcast on St. John history

[00:01:34] and then we sort of went home thought about a potential name and we thought

[00:01:39] of something like maybe we'd catch listeners maybe a bit ironic be a

[00:01:44] bit different and I guess we're using a bit of understatement you know like

[00:01:47] we were surprised that there were quite a few topics I mean I already knew

[00:01:51] this as an historian that were quite interesting and that St. John is a like

[00:01:55] a fairly interesting past so we thought we would kind of use a bit of

[00:01:59] understatement or a bit of irony to draw listeners in maybe did not know much

[00:02:04] about St. John history. So why did you and Mark decide to collaborate on this

[00:02:09] project? Again we met he was in town promoting his book on the St. John

[00:02:13] fire I think you've interviewed him on that and from St. John originally

[00:02:17] had a bit of spare time we met for beer. I'd been interested in doing a

[00:02:20] podcast for a number of years I didn't quite know what the subject would be and

[00:02:25] during that conversation as so often happens we came up with this idea why not

[00:02:30] St. John. So how do you go about selecting the stories that you're going to cover?

[00:02:35] Well there's we started writing down potential topics and the sort of aim of

[00:02:40] our podcast project is kind of two-fold one is just sort of look at

[00:02:45] topics that have been written about in the past like sort of well known

[00:02:48] stories in St. John history like Benedict Arnold for example or the Orange

[00:02:54] Rye as in 1849 and maybe try to look at them with a fresh approach with some

[00:02:58] new questions. The second thing is to sort of uncover stories that maybe are

[00:03:04] not as well known that connect St. John to the wider world for example

[00:03:09] St. John's connection with the Titanic is something we're probably going

[00:03:13] to do right it's not a story that that's well known so yeah we just

[00:03:17] of course we both have different interests I've been working in St. John

[00:03:20] and New Brunswick history for years I have a number of stories you know up my

[00:03:24] sleeve so to speak and Mark has his own interest as well also as we meet people

[00:03:29] and tell them about the podcast they suggest topics for us and suggest

[00:03:33] people we might interview because some of our podcast episodes will be

[00:03:37] interviews with authors and people who are researching stories and topics

[00:03:41] So Coheucine has its advantages and disadvantages what strengths do each of

[00:03:48] you bring to this project? Well I think my strength is that I've been in this

[00:03:52] game for a long time Mark I've been I'm a veteran academic I've been

[00:03:57] researching St. John and Canadian New Brunswick history since the 80s which

[00:04:03] is kind of scary Mark is a slightly younger guy he's pretty good with

[00:04:07] the tech the editing the recording and things like that I think he is a

[00:04:12] natural because he's a lawyer I think he's good on his feet which is part of

[00:04:17] the game as well and I think that between the two of us you know we it's

[00:04:22] nice to Mark so you can appreciate this because you're a lone wolf operator

[00:04:25] we can split the work a little bit right so one guy can handle one thing

[00:04:30] the other guy can write the show notes and find the list of readings and

[00:04:34] that type of thing so it's nice to have you know a team even if it's two people

[00:04:38] to divide the work so what kind of challenges do you have in this

[00:04:43] collaboration and how have you addressed them well one of them is I of course

[00:04:50] technology can can bridge these gaps but I'm located in New Brunswick and he's

[00:04:55] located in Alberta so we have that time zone issue Mark has a young family

[00:05:02] that sort of complicates things a little bit if you have children at home I

[00:05:05] don't have that but we both have busy schedules so just trying to find a day

[00:05:10] where we can do some recording of course we can use email to send documents back

[00:05:16] and forth things like that is great but trying to find that time to a mutually

[00:05:20] mutually good time to do the work and then of course once we start

[00:05:23] interviewing other people trying to find a time where we can interview

[00:05:28] authors and guests in our show as well so far it's worked out so what do you hope

[00:05:34] that your listeners will take away from the podcast well we want people we want

[00:05:40] local people of course there's a lot of people working on the history and

[00:05:44] heritage of st. John there's lots of Facebook pages and blogs and and people

[00:05:49] are posting photos and things all the time but we're hoping to provide

[00:05:52] another outlet for that type of thing we hope that we want to sort of get

[00:05:56] people excited I mean there's already many people excited about this or st.

[00:06:00] John we want to try to get people excited and interested in st. John history

[00:06:04] we're trying to bridge gaps between the academic world and the non-academic

[00:06:10] world in terms of writers and researchers and things like that and I

[00:06:13] think the other goal we have is we want st. John to become better known

[00:06:17] outside the region by using stories about people and events that took place

[00:06:22] in st. John you know it's a fairly small city by Canadian standards it

[00:06:27] always doesn't always get a lot of attention within the maritime provinces

[00:06:31] right and so we're hoping to make st. John sort of give it a higher profile

[00:06:37] in the region through these historical stories what do you have strategies in

[00:06:42] place to promote the podcast and reach a wider audience yeah that's that's

[00:06:48] kind of Mark's idea like we will have we're on Apple podcast we'll have a

[00:06:54] Facebook page we'll have a web page I think once we get of course doing

[00:06:58] interviews like this is helpful I think word or mouth or like help it you know

[00:07:02] having things kind of spread organically will be useful you know

[00:07:07] asking our friends and family and contacts in the community to listen

[00:07:10] to the podcast to like it that type of thing and share those links I think

[00:07:14] as time goes on we will maybe do a bit more media after we get a few episodes

[00:07:20] released right and try to get some media coverage of it and other than that

[00:07:24] we're just hoping for the best we we we're just doing is doing this you

[00:07:29] know that this you know off the side of your desk you know which is kind of

[00:07:32] what you're doing as well right that we don't have a team someone asks us

[00:07:36] who's your sponsor and I thought sponsor what's a sponsor maybe someday

[00:07:41] right Mark you get somebody to buy a cup of coffee that there you go that's

[00:07:46] important that's the start right yeah so again we're we're kind of new to it but

[00:07:51] we understand if you get so many downloads and ratings on Apple podcast

[00:07:55] and things like that and other platforms it could increase your

[00:07:58] visibility so we're asking people if you do listen to the show and like it

[00:08:03] please try to acknowledge that so what probably would you say the most

[00:08:09] challenging part is to you of having this podcast I think it's just getting the

[00:08:16] rhythm of talking back and forth between the two of us and of course when we

[00:08:22] have a guest of course you can edit some of that out but we're trying to make

[00:08:25] our podcast sort of conversational sort of like what we're doing now Mark so

[00:08:29] we don't really have a script per se right we maybe have some bullet points

[00:08:35] and things like that and just trying to balance you know getting the story told

[00:08:42] on the one hand but also making it a bit sounding it like a conversation between

[00:08:47] two friends or two people who are maybe having a coffee or having a beer in

[00:08:52] the pub right so we want to sort of try to strike that balance and it means

[00:08:57] that sometimes you have to do more than one take and much like being an

[00:09:01] actor I guess and then but of course a lot of it is you know Mark can be

[00:09:05] handled through editing yeah that's true nothing's live so changes can be made

[00:09:11] and there's nothing that happens on here that we can't get rid of if we've said

[00:09:17] it wrong or done it wrong or we just leave it and let everybody laugh at

[00:09:21] it yeah pretty much can you give my listeners a little peek of what's

[00:09:26] coming in the next few weeks yeah well our first episode on the 17th of

[00:09:35] 1785 election riot that took place in St. John during the first

[00:09:40] provincial election and the riot took place on King Street in the heart of

[00:09:44] the new loyalist town so it's just we thought that we would start with a

[00:09:49] bang so to speak and it's all about the loyalists and the different

[00:09:51] problems that they faced a couple years after arriving from New York City

[00:09:56] and the riot shows that the loyalists were not divided or were not

[00:10:02] united and it shows a lot of the tensions within the community I think

[00:10:06] the second one will be the deadly cholera epidemic of 1854 which took

[00:10:13] hundreds of lives in St. John and what used to be called Portland which is

[00:10:17] down the North end of St. John so those would be the first two episodes I

[00:10:21] think we will also be looking at the in the fall the early fall the

[00:10:27] the York Point riot another riot which was a deadly riot that

[00:10:32] number of people have written about that took between 10 and 12 lives it was

[00:10:37] a riot amongst mainly amongst Irish immigrants and native born

[00:10:43] Irish Protestants single debt the single most deadly riot in

[00:10:47] New Brunswick history most people don't know about it or don't

[00:10:50] remember it and then we're going to try mark to do episodes that

[00:10:54] tie into certain anniversaries or things that are going on through the

[00:10:58] year so around Remembrance Day November 11th we will have around

[00:11:03] that time an episode on a topic about World War One in St. John

[00:11:08] will try to do something around Christmas time about Christmas

[00:11:11] past or Christmas is past and so on so some of our episodes we

[00:11:16] will try to link to seasons of the year or things that are going

[00:11:21] on or being commemorated at the time such you know in the spring

[00:11:23] obviously St. Patrick's Day would be a good example so I guess even

[00:11:28] though the loyalists left the states and they came up here an

[00:11:33] election riot here almost makes me think that maybe not all the

[00:11:40] loyalists left the United States.

[00:11:42] No most of them and they were divided you know much like

[00:11:45] much like their opponents I mean they didn't always agree on

[00:11:48] everything and you know so it's they were even before the left

[00:11:53] of York there were divisions and the divisions as listeners here

[00:11:56] were largely class based you know it's elite versus the popular

[00:12:01] elements right and so yeah and of course the use of the riot

[00:12:07] was an old phenomenon in both British society and colonial

[00:12:11] society as well so it wasn't like the loyalists invented

[00:12:15] rioting but it is interesting that during the first election

[00:12:17] there was a riot.

[00:12:18] Well I'm looking forward to hearing the very first episode of

[00:12:22] Nothing Happens Here when it airs on September 17th.

[00:12:28] It can be heard wherever you listen to podcasts and the

[00:12:32] contact information will be on the show notes.

[00:12:36] Thank you Greg.

[00:12:37] I appreciate you being here with me today and I trust that

[00:12:40] you and Mark have a great launch and that you keep this

[00:12:45] going at least for a few years.

[00:12:49] Thanks Mark we're going to try and do every two weeks and we

[00:12:51] appreciate your support and we also appreciate what you're

[00:12:54] doing with your podcast.

[00:12:56] I'll be listening and I'll be promoting thanks so much Greg.

[00:13:06] Thank you for taking the time to come and listen to this

[00:13:09] podcast today it's produced edited and hosted by me Mark

[00:13:16] Brewer and it's commercial free except for the fact you could

[00:13:21] go to my website and buy me a cup of coffee if you care to.

[00:13:25] For now have a good day.