Printed in Issue #11 of UPPERCASE Magazine , a written profile of Clarence Riggs.
“Clarence Riggs (“Clar” to his friends and “Sir” to me) has had a place up on the Terra Nova River since 1960. Born in Burin, Newfoundland, he moved to Glovertown, jtmarust north of Terra Nova National Park, some years before confederation, before there was a “national” anything in Newfoundland.
The original cabin, a field office bought from a completed government building project, burned down in the late 80s. The cabin we visited one grey Saturday in June was the new one. It’s just a kitchen, split bunk rooms and a porch with “Fish ’n’ Fur” written on a sign hung upside down. But you can tell that it has been home to weeks and weeks of good summer, year after year.
The walls are lined with plaques poking fun at fishermen—the kind they sell in rural gas stations. “Old fishermen never die,” said one, “they just can’t raise their fishing pole!” On another, with what looked very much like a sketch of the cabin: “There is no place anything like this place, anywhere near this place, so this must be the place.”