CHAPEL'S COVE

This Conception Bay Central community that's part of the Municipality of Harbour Main-Chapel's Cove-Lakeview is one of the many eye-pleasing places to be found along the old Conception Bay Highway, about 60 kilometres from St. John's just before Harbour Main. Former councillor and historian Eddie Fahey believes Chapel's Cove was named for an English fishing captain named Chapel, who used the fine beach there for drying cod in the early 1700s. The first permanent settlers in Chapel's Cove were from County Waterford in Ireland, at least as far back as 1779 - families such as the Faheys, Duggans, Walshs, Fewers, Corbetts and Hawcos. Mr. Fahey said these pioneers were great farmers and cleared enormous tracts of land all around Chapel's Cove where the soil is rich.  Mr. Fahey said a census done in 1901 showed a crop of more than 4,000 barrels of potatoes, each weighing 180 pounds, and more than 100,000 cabbages. Chapel's Cove now has a population of about 250 and although not too much farming is done there these days, there are still a dozen or so inshore fishermen who sell their catches at the Gorman Fisheries plant in Harbour Main, which is just around the corner. Chapel's Cove became part of the expanded Harbour Main Municipality in 1974 and two of its residents, Deputy Mayor Vince Myers and Helena Fewer are members of the council headed by Clare Wall of Harbour Main.

Article originally written by Bill Power, The Evening Telegram