'Scaring' children to learn about history

Joel Sutherland, while being a pleasant, not-so-scary man, loves to tell scary stories to children.

The librarian and author read excerpts from his award-winning book "Haunted Canada 5" at the Sault's Centennial Library to a group of 30 children and adults Saturday.

The book is a compilation of stories about eerie people, places and events, each centred in Canada.  

"It's non-fiction (the book relays stories which some people insist are true)," Sutherland told SooToday.

"Some kids just love to be scared (through scary stories)," Sutherland said.

"I'll tell parents and teachers this, that the ghost stories are really history books in disguise as ghost books, because the covers are scary and that's how the books are sold, but the ghost stories are a hook to interest kids in Canadian history."

"Really, the bulk of each story discusses the history of places or famous people…one story is about Emily Carr's (alleged) ghost, the location where she died in B.C., so it was an opportunity for me to write and teach about Emily Carr, her paintings and her life, so the kids will be learning about her," Sutherland said.

"Whether or not you believe in ghosts, when I interview people I get the facts straight, exactly what they've seen or heard and reported."

"Then I always do a lot of research to get the history of the location that's haunted, and my editor as well does a lot of work to make sure everything's as accurate as possible," Sutherland said.

"In the beginning it was mostly through my own research, that's how I was finding stories, starting online and reading old books, newspapers, magazine articles, anything I could find."

"Now that a couple of books are out, people know that I write the series and people come to me with their own personal stories, which is really fun," Sutherland said.

"I've got a good mix of famous landmarks and buildings and private residences that are totally original to my books."

There are about 75 short stories contained within the fourth, fifth and sixth Haunted Canada books, written by Sutherland.

The first three books in the Haunted Canada book series were written by Pat Hancock before Sutherland continued the series with the fourth and fifth books.

Haunted Canada 5 was released in 2015, with the sixth in the series due for release August 30.  

"My publisher, Scholastic, asked if I would like to take over the series because they knew I loved ghost stories and scary movies," Sutherland said.

While his books are aimed at a young audience, Sutherland said some adults enjoy them too, partly because they are collections of short stories.

"You can read a couple of the stories on your coffee break."

Sutherland said there have been reports of ghost sightings inside the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, details of which were written by Sutherland in his first Haunted Canada book.

"You don't get much more of a Canadian ghost story than one about the Hockey Hall of Fame," Sutherland said.

There are ghost stories all over Canada, with most of them, it seems, situated in Quebec and the Maritimes, Sutherland said.

"It's probably because of the superstitions that early settlers brought that are still really strong in those provinces."

"I could write a whole book on the folk tales in Newfoundland that come from Ireland…a lot of people still believe leprechauns and fairies inhabit Newfoundland," Sutherland said, adding many other stories originate from First Nations communities.

Sutherland currently resides in Courtice, near Oshawa, and is the children and youth services librarian at Georgina Public Library, north of Toronto, and writes in his free time.

His first childrens' book was entitled "Be a Writing Superstar," published in 2010, encouraging children to try their hand at writing, based on childrens' writing classes he has held as a children's librarian.

Sutherland was in the Sault not only for Saturday's public library event, but also for Friday's Ontario Library Association's Festival of Trees event held at Essar Centre.

1,500 children attended to take in the work of Sutherland and other authors in town for the event.

The OLA's Festival of Trees is a national literary gathering held for young people every year.

Friday marked the first time the event was held in Sault Ste. Marie.