This is the seventh week of a continuing series of articles celebrating the 50th anniversary of Stratford-Perth Archives and its treasures. This week we feature the Vera McNichol fonds; Vera was a well-known clairvoyant based in Millbank. A clairvoyant is a person who has an ability to perceive events in the future or beyond normal sensory contact.
The McNichol fonds is made up of material that was acquired by former Archivist James Anderson at an auction held in June 1988. When this auction occurred, Vera was living in a nursing home in Brunner. Some of the items that the Archives acquired were: a quilt, basket, playing cards, autograph book, correspondence and diaries. Pictured are some of these items from this fonds.
It is estimated that 250,000 people from all over Canada and the United States came to visit Vera in order to get a glimpse of their futures. Vera did not have a telephone and she did not make appointments. Her visitors stood in line for a turn to get a reading. The readings took place in her kitchen and were done using two sets of playing cards from her large collection. One of the decks would show their past and the second was used to predict their future.
In 1984, she changed locations for her readings to the back room of the Crystal Restaurant and Dining Lounge in Millbank. Even with the move, appointments were still not permitted. The move gave her husband, John, more privacy. According to an article, he could watch TV with the sound on and take a break from playing checkers with the waiting visitors.
Some thought she was a fraud. A Chicago newspaper even threatened to sue her. She proved them wrong when she helped solved a murder case in Mitchell in 1973. Her description of the location led to the discovery of the body by a group of hunters.
Vera was born in Peel Township, Wellington County, on April 30, 1910, the daughter of David Ernst (1878-1956) and Mary Donley (1876-1964). She also had two siblings, a brother Emerson (1903-1981) and a sister Audrey (1921-2012). On June 17, 1936, Vera married John Charles McNichol of Britton in the Zion Evangelical Church parsonage in Elmira. After they married they settled on a farm near Listowel.
Vera had also been a nurse at Listowel Memorial Hospital and was a prolific author. Over the course of 20 years she wrote around 20 books and was also named one of the top nine poets in the world. We are lucky that we have a number of her books at the Archives. In 1975 she was nominated by her fellow citizens as an outstanding woman in Ontario for International Women’s Year. Though she did not win, she treasured a letter from Premier Bill Davis letting her know that she had been nominated for the award.
John passed away in 1988. Vera died in the Brunner Nursing Home on May 10, 1995 at the age of 85. She was buried in Elma Centre Cemetery in North Perth with her husband.
In 1989, Vera and John’s former home in Millbank was purchased and moved directly across Mill Street onto a new basement foundation. The timber frame home, built around 1847, was to be restored to its original condition. This included the cedar shake roof, board and batten exterior and renovated interior.
Vera still fascinates people to this day. In 2005, the Millbank Summer Festival Theatre presented a play entitled Millbank’s Mystic, and in 2016 some of her belongings were featured in an exhibition at Western University called “Snake in my mouth: items and correspondences from Vera McNicol.”
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Stratford-Perth Archives is open for in-person research by appointment. Service by phone and email so you don’t need to come in is still an option. Please contact us to set up appointments to use the collections or to meet with the Archivist to discuss possible donations of archival material. We can be reached at 519-271-0531 ext. 259 or by emailing archives@perthcounty.ca.
