The following teaser is from an article posted in the May 17, 2013 edition of Canada.com:
A time-yellowed, 439-year-old baptismal registry from 16th century France, recently found to contain long-sought clues about the birth and family history of the famed New World explorer Samuel de Champlain, has arrived in Canada to help mark a major milestone in this country’s own birth.
The document that appears to solve a centuries-old mystery about when the founder of New France was born — and whether he was, as generations of scholars have suspected, from a Protestant family — is to be publicly displayed for the first time later this month at the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Gatineau, Que., directly across the Ottawa River from Parliament Hill.
The exhibit, open from May 29 to Aug. 5, celebrates the 400th anniversary of Champlain’s landmark 1613 voyage up the river that runs past Canada’s national history museum. Its curators have been loaned the fragile parish registry by the district archive in France where local genealogist and Champlain enthusiast Jean-Marie Germe unearthed the telltale reference last year.
