Much work of preserving our Maritimes history was done by Dr. J. C. Webster. He was a founder of and donor to numerous archives, museums, and collections throughout the Maritimes. Yet that was merely the second act to his impressive life.
CBC’s Maritime Comment radio show described him as “distinguished, aristocratic, and famous locally for his shapeless khaki trousers and old corduroy jackets. A slender man, with fine fine features and an imperious flashing glance, he gave the impression of tremendous vitality out of all proportion with his actual physical size and strength.”
The Websters were wealthy social elites of the small town of Shediac, then home to 2000 people. Perhaps somewhat more impressively, they had also been wealthy social elites in Chicago.
John Clarence Webster had been born in Shediac on October 21st 1863 into a distinctly less-than-privileged family. He’d attended the Westmorland County School where he excelled, encouraged by a teacher named D. B. White. He began university at Mount Allison at the tender age of 15.
In his twilight years he privately published an autobiography for his children called Those Crowded Years. In it his only comment about his time at Mt. A was that he considered the Latin and Greek they taught to be a complete waste of his time.
After graduating, he followed in the advice of that schoolteacher he’d admired and went to study medicine at the world renowned University of Edinburgh. He received his Doctor of Medicine in 1890, awarded the gold prize for original work.
For the next decade he largely lived in Montreal, teaching at McGill and practicing at Victoria Hospital. Sickly at the best of times, he contracted a disease from a patient while operating, and subsequently introduced what at the time was a new development in medicine: wearing rubber gloves while operating. This was apparently quite controversial.
In Montreal he met Alice Lusk, from New York City, who was on her own merits a highly respected force in the art world. They married and shortly afterwards moved to Chicago.
After Webster passed away in 1950, Dr. Fred Priest gave a lengthy speech commemorating his achievements to the Canadian Gynecological Society. He said that in Chicago Webster “was given free reigns in the development of his own department. This he conducted with an iron hand. His keen intellect, unlimited energy, advanced surgical principles and deft technique brought him prompt recognition and a large and remunerative surgical practice. He spared himself no pains and accepted no excuses from others.”
He conducted research and published prodigiously while in Chicago, churning out an
astonishing 12 books and 96 papers on midwifery and gynecology.
His publications brought him renown all over the world. He was known for his beautifully illustrated articles, which Alice created.
While he was evidently reasonably easy going outside of the operating room, according to Dr Priest, he could be rather insufferable and eccentric inside of it: “He enjoyed the distinction of having more interns quit his service, or threaten to do so, than any other head of a department. … He had a great fear of upper respiratory infections, and always tried to avoid being chilled. In the operating theater he was quite unpopular. Besides the warmth of the surgical attire and the room, he could easily increase his temperature by the smallest irritations. … On [one] occasion an intern who was giving anesthesia for Webster, became somewhat irritated with his continual nagging and said: “Dr. Webster, if you’ll attend to your end of the patient I’ll attend to mine.”
He developed a deep respect for that intern who snapped back at him, and when Webster retired he referred his patients to him.
Although immensely prolific and profitable in Chicago, it seems that Clarance –as friends called him– and Alice didn’t much care for the city. They generally avoided the social scene as best they could.
Alice spent her time in Chicago collecting art, mostly from Chinese and Japanese sources. She was also a highly sought after expert on oriental art, and a prolific giver of speeches on the matter. She would later donate this collection to the New Brunswick Museum.
When the First World War broke out in 1914, the then 51 year old Dr. Webster attempted to enlist in the Canadian Army as a battlefield doctor. Being vastly too old to be a battlefield doctor, he was rejected.
When the Americans finally joined that war three years later, Dr. Webster again tried to enlist. The Americans not only rejected him, but even mocked his gynecological medical expertise, saying: “When the time comes to deliver Belgium and confine German, I will send for you, gladly.”
During the war he became sickly from being overworked. After so many younger doctors went overseas it fell to older doctors like him to pick up the slack. He abruptly retired shortly after the war ended.
At the age of 57 he returned to Shediac where he threw himself deep into a new career for the next three decades: history.
He became a remarkably prolific historian, producing dozens of astonishingly in depth books
about Canadiana and the Maritimes in particular. He was a founder of both the Nova Scotia Public Archives and the New Brunswick Museum, and helped to build up the collections of countless smaller Maritimes museums as well.
Dr. Priest said “he has, I believe, done more for the preservation of historic sites of the Maritimes than any other man.”
While it was often said that most of the collecting he did was on behalf of various small Maritimes museums and not for himself, when he died in 1950 he had amassed a personal collection of Canadian artifacts worth over $1 million – that’s $12 million in today’s money! He donated this entire collection to the New Brunswick Museum.
He once wrote in a letter to his daughter Janet: “When I can no longer work I have no wish to live.” He got his wish, dying at his desk while working away on the history of his beloved Maritimes.
