Virgin Arm–Carter's Cove is a

local service district A local service district is a type of designated place in the Canadian province of New Brunswick. In the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, a local service district is a defined area led by an elected committee responsible for the deliv ...

and

designated place A designated place (DPL) is a type of community or settlement identified by Statistics Canada that does not meet the criteria used to define municipalities or population centres. DPLs are delineated every 5 years for the Canadian census as the sta ...

New World Island New World Island is an island in Notre Dame Bay, just off the coast of Newfoundland (island), Newfoundland in the Canada, Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. The island is connected to Newfoundland by a causeway. The prominent communit ...

in the

Canadian province Within the geographical areas of Canada, the ten provinces and three territories are sub-national administrative divisions under the jurisdiction of the Canadian Constitution. In the 1867 Canadian Confederation, three provinces of British North ...

Newfoundland and Labrador Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...

. Virgin Arm-Carter's Cove is located approximately 90 km Northwest of Gander in Subdivision H of Division No. 8.

History

The community of Virgin Arm is located at the head of Friday's Bay, on New World Island. Its name probably originated in the fact that the narrow arm was not settled until the 1870s, although it was used for winter woods work and

schooner A schooner () is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: fore-and-aft rigged on all of two or more masts and, in the case of a two-masted schooner, the foremast generally being shorter than the mainmast. A common variant, the topsail schoon ...

-building by

fishermen A fisher or fisherman is someone who captures fish and other animals from a body of water, or gathers shellfish. Worldwide, there are about 38 million commercial and subsistence fishers and fish farmers. Fishers may be professional or recreat ...

from Tizzard's Harbour and

Twillingate Twillingate is a town of 2,121 people located on the Twillingate Islands ("Toulinquet") in Notre Dame Bay, off the north eastern shore of the island of Newfoundland in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. The town is about north of ...

from the early 19th century. The first record of

settlement Settlement may refer to: *Human settlement, a community where people live *Settlement (structural), the distortion or disruption of parts of a building * Closing (real estate), the final step in executing a real estate transaction *Settlement (fin ...

at Virgin Arm is from Lovell's Newfoundland Directory (1871), which identifies fisherman John Smith as a resident and notes a population of 10 people. However, Smith appeared in the subsequent records, while Virgin Arm was not enumerated separately in the Census until 1901 (pop. 70). Locally, the first settler is said to have been a Curtis, of Snellings Cove, Twillingate.

William Curtis William Curtis (11 January 1746 – 7 July 1799) was an English botanist and entomologist, who was born at Alton, Hampshire, site of the Curtis Museum. Curtis began as an apothecary, before turning his attention to botany and other natural his ...

was resident by 1876, and by 1882 had been joined by

John Hicks Sir John Richards Hicks (8 April 1904 – 20 May 1989) was a British economist. He is considered one of the most important and influential economists of the twentieth century. The most familiar of his many contributions in the field of economic ...

and a family named Nicholas, also of Twillingate. At about the turn of the 20th century several other families settled: Burt's (from Tizzard's Harbour),Gleason's, Hann's, Ings' and Price's. As Virgin Arm was quite distant from the best headland fishing grounds, most

were involved in the fisheries on the

Labrador , nickname = "The Big Land" , etymology = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Canada , subdivision_type1 = Province , subdivision_name1 ...

and French Shore. The most lucrative small-boat fisheries in the area were for bait fishes and

lobster Lobsters are a family (biology), family (Nephropidae, Synonym (taxonomy), synonym Homaridae) of marine crustaceans. They have long bodies with muscular tails and live in crevices or burrows on the sea floor. Three of their five pairs of legs ...

, in both Friday's Bay and Dildo Run.

is only one kilometre wide at the bottom of Virgin Arm and early in the 20th century there was a tramway built between the two bodies of water for the transportation of fishing boats and lumber. Virgin Arm had a strong tradition of woods work and, after the decline of the

fisheries in the 1920s and 1930s, many people found employment in

pulpwood Pulpwood is timber with the principal use of making wood pulp for paper production. Applications * Trees raised specifically for pulp production account for 15% of world pulp production, old growth forests 9% and second- and third- and more gener ...

cutting or in supplying local sawmills. The population had grown to 225 by 1945.

Recent History

In the mid-1960s the completion of a network of roads and

causeways A causeway is a track, road or railway on the upper point of an embankment across "a low, or wet place, or piece of water". It can be constructed of earth, masonry, wood, or concrete. One of the earliest known wooden causeways is the Sweet Tr ...

connecting the various communities of New World Island with each other and with the mainland saw Virgin Arm South emerging as a service center of the area with such facilities as the New World Island Medical Clinic and a regional high school, Coaker Academy. In addition, several businesses serving New World Island have been located along the Road to the Isles leading towards Summerford.

Demographics

As a designated place in the 2021 Census of Population conducted by

Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; french: Statistique Canada), formed in 1971, is the agency of the Government of Canada commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and cultur ...

, Virgin Arm-Carter's Cove recorded a population of 442 living in 189 of its 224 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 615. With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2016.Statistics Canada. 2022. (table). Census Profile. 2021 Census. Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-316-X2021001. Ottawa. Released February 9, 2022. https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2021/dp-pd/prof/index.cfm?Lang=E (accessed April 14, 2022).

Government

Virgin Arm-Carter's Cove is a local service district (LSD) that is governed by a committee responsible for the provision of certain services to the community. The chair of the LSD committee is Trena Burge.

References

{{Coord, 49.53332, -54.78333, type:city_region:CA-NL, display=title Populated coastal places in Canada Designated places in Newfoundland and Labrador Local service districts in Newfoundland and Labrador

History

Recent History

Demographics

Government

See also

References