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Inuit Songs of the Hudson Bay (1903-1912)
1- Iglulirmiut (Iglulic). One of Captain Parry natives songs when seeing ships. ‘Quill ale e tuck’, sung by Pikey and Puty. (388-22)
2- Iglulirmiut (Iglulic). Songs describing their thoughts when ships were first seen, sung by Pikey. (388-26)
3- Aivinlingmiut (Iwilic). This song refers to a time when natives did not (sing?), sung by Pokey and Shoofly. (389-14)
4- Saquaaturmiut (Shuck vouc tow). Deer hunting song. (389-22)
Courtesy of Indiana University and the Museum of Natural History of New York
On his 1903 whaling voyage to the Hudson Bay, Captain George Comer took on board of the Era an Edison Standard Phonograph with fifty wax cylinders. He recorded songs and stories of Inuit visiting the Era during the long winter months. These recordings were the first ever made in the Canadian Eastern Arctic. With the granted permission of the New York Museum of Natural History and Indiana University, a few of the pieces recorded by Comer are made available to the World Wide Web on our web site.
Capitaine George Comer
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Whaling Schooner ERA at Cape Fullerton, Hudson Bay, Nunavut, 1897-1905
George Comer, a navigator's son, was born in Quebec City in 1858. He was only 10 when his father died and young George moved with his mother to Hartford, Connecticut. He was then placed with an East Haddam family. At 17, aboard the Nile, which was then commanded by Captain John O. Spicer, George Comer embarked on his first northern expedition. Comer then sailed on the Era (1889-1892) and the Canton (1893-1894). In 1895, when he was 37, he was named captain of the Era and held that position until the vessel was shipwrecked in 1906 off the Miquelon coast. Comer was also captain of the A.T. Gifford from 1907 to 1912. After 1912, Captain Comer gradually decreased whale hunting, but he continued his northern expeditions. Between 1875 and 1919, George Comer spent only two years on dry land. He survived two shipwrecks: of the Era in 1906 and then of the Finback in 1919. The latter wreck marked the end of his eastern Canadian Arctic voyages.
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Captain George Comer standing in rigging of ship
George Comer was not only recognized for his sea career but also for his photographic production and his strong interest in Inuit ethnology. Captain Comer took hundreds of photographs of his Inuit companions on the Era and on the A.T. Gifford and of their daily lives near Cape Fullerton. Eber also mentions that his photographs earned Comer the name of Angakkuq among the Inuit: "Inuit called [Comer] angakkuqthe shamanbecause he took photographs and was able to perform wonders" (Eber 1989: xv-xvi). Today a large part of his photographic archives can be viewed at the Mystic Seaport museum (http://www.mysticseaport.org) in Mystic, Connecticut.
Captain Comer's contribution to Canadian Arctic mapping is considerable. Thanks to him, the mapping of Southampton Island began in 1910. Furthermore, he published an article on the mapping, geography and population of that island in the prestigious journal of the American Geographical Society (Comer 1910).
Under the instruction of anthropologist Franz Boas, Captain Comer could also contribute in a remarkable manner to Inuit anthropology (Ross 1984). As opposed to other whalers, Captain Comer spoke Inuktitut, which enabled him to maintain close relationships with the Inuit. Furthermore, along with photographs of their daily lives, he took important collections of objects, clothing and archaeological artefacts to the United States. He was also one of the first to make sound recordings of traditional songs and legends. Upon Franz Boas' request, Comer also produced a series of plaster masks of several Inuit who agreed to the experiment. Here are the words of Fred Calabretta on Captain Comer's contribution:
His efforts resulted in important contributions in the fields of anthropology, natural history, cartography and exploration. In addition to extensive and carefully written records, Comer employed photography, archaeology and even sound recording in his studies of the Arctic and its native people. Certainly most apparent, as reflected in several major museum collections, are the results of his studies of the Eskimos of the Hudson Bay region. Photography was one of the major tools employed by Comer in this work. (Calabretta 1984: 118)