Halifax Explosion 100th Anniversary Commemorative Markers is one of many public artworks installed across the Halifax Regional Municipality.
Rayleen Hill Architecture and Design, 2018
Corten and stainless-steel
12 significantly relevant locations
About the artwork
Installed in select locations throughout the city in 2018, a series of iconic sculptural markers commemorate the events of the Halifax Explosion. Designed by RHA+D, these bent perforated vertical forms reference the landscape of exploded trees that remained standing in the devastated area after the blast. A conversation between two forms, the markers represent a traumatic past and our reflective present, the interplay of two ships in their fateful approach toward one another, and the tension of the harbour Narrows in-between.
Each marker provides additional context through quotes and archival information. Markers sites have been established in Halifax’s Fort Needham Memorial Park and in special locations on both sides of the harbor where strong connections to the Explosion remain imprinted on the landscape.
MARKER 1: DEVONSHIRE AND VINCENT
“Richmond with land to spare knew no over-crowding and was spared the greater city’s greater problems. She could not boast of wealth nor complain of poverty. Here dwelt the artisan, the railroad man, the independent man of moderate means, the home-maker, the man of enterprise building the city’s newer part.” - Reverend C.J. Crowdis, 1920
Every corner of Halifax felt the impact of the explosion, but none as great as Richmond in the city’s north end. On that December morning, the working-class neighbourhood was just waking up: mothers filled furnaces and stoked woodstoves, children dressed for school, and horse-drawn delivery wagons began their daily rounds. The waterfront below bustled with merchant ships, freight cars, and factories changing shift. Windows everywhere filled with faces watching a flaming ship drifting toward the shore. In an instant Richmond was blown apart.
MARKER 2: DEWOLFE PARK, BEDFORD
“There are no ships in for examination. During the afternoon 10 transports steam up to the basin. . .with convoys of soldiers for France. They anchor in the basin, where they will await the departure of the battleship to escort them across the Atlantic.” - Frank Baker, Sailor, 1917
By 1917 Halifax had become one of the busiest military ports in the British empire. Ships from all over the world, including the Mont Blanc and Imo, jostled in the harbour moving people and supplies. Soldiers filled every fort and crowded the streets, ready to embark for Europe or defend the city. Workers laboured day and night to keep industries running at full speed. The world was at war and Halifax prospered, but on December 6 the battlefield would shift much closer to home.
MARKER 3: DARTMOUTH COMMONS
“On the other side of the bay, the little town of Dartmouth was also in flames, on sea and land nothing but misery, death, and destruction. Looking out on the flaming city from our ship, I cannot help but marvel that we escaped sharing the fate of thousands of souls in this terrible catastrophe.” - Frank Baker, Sailor, 1917
Dartmouth did not escape the disaster unscathed: anyone living or working along this shore of the Narrows—especially at Turtle Grove—felt the full force of the blast when the Mont Blanc exploded. Buildings toppled, and not a single window remained in tact. The tsunami that followed crashed over people and homes, carrying all manner of debris inland. Through it all, the Dartmouth ferries continued to operate: helping survivors search for loved ones, transporting patients to hospitals, and carrying supplies where they were needed most.
MARKER 4: RICHMOND COURTHOUSE, DEVONSHIRE AND KENNY
“Men were crying for their families and women crying for their children still trapped in burning homes. Some were kneeling in the streets praying to God for help. It was a terrible sight.” - Annie Chapman, Survivor
The Halifax Explosion tore apart families as ruthlessly as it razed homes and schools, leaving a trail of chaos and profound loss in its wake. In a matter of seconds, mothers and fathers lost track of children and children became orphans, while others grew up entirely too fast as their parents recovered in hospital. Even families that remained together were forever changed, left to rebuild with what few pieces of their lives could be salvaged from the wreckage.
MARKER 5: BAYERS RD. BARNSTEAD LANE (GRAVEYARD)
“In the midst of life we are in death.” - The Archbishop of Nova Scotia, Book of Common Prayer, 1917
On the morning of December 6, 1917 death’s arrival was immediate and swift. More than 2000 people perished in the explosion—roughly one in every 25 souls in a city of 50,000. Some, trapped beneath the rubble, died of exposure in the blizzard that unmercifully arrived that same day. In the days and weeks that followed, soldiers searched for survivors, survivors searched for loved ones, and loved ones known and unknown were tragically laid to rest.
MARKER 6: DARTMOUTH FERRY TERMINAL PARK
“Smoke was already rising from many places and the fire was spreading. It was a novel and dreamlike experience—death, destruction, and fire all around. As the ferry docked, we saw men and women pressed against the ferry gates intently watching for the return of their children and menfolk.” - Ian Forsyth, Student
Concerned citizens gathered at the Dartmouth Ferry Terminal the morning of the blast, forming an ad hoc relief committee to ease the plight of those affected. Shelter, food, and clothing for the homeless were top priorities, as was medical care for the injured and funeral arrangements for the dead. Those most in need resided in the town’s north end where wooden houses, scattered across mostly unpaved roads, had collapsed or caught fire.
MARKER 7: UNIVERSITY AVENUE
“Notwithstanding the crowding together of the wounded they gave little evidence of the suffering they endured. . . . There were pale faces enough but their eyes were dry. There were no tears. Tears were not yet brewed.” - G.H. Murphy, Doctor, 1917
In the wake of the blast, Halifax faced the arduous and nearly impossible task of caring for thousands of injured men, women, and children. Without an emergency response strategy, hospitals already burdened with wounded Canadian soldiers were quickly taxed beyond capacity. Temporary hospitals opened in churches, schools, and halls to ease the strain, as relief efforts threw together strangers trained and untrained who laboured without rest until relief arrived.
MARKER 8: HALIFAX ARMOURY
“I have lain among the dying in Flanders, I have gone over the top, crossed No-Man’s Land, treading underfoot my own comrades still trembling with their death wounds . . . but I have seen nothing worse than this.” - Unknown Soldier, 1917
In a city laid to waste, the military in Halifax responded with unflinching resolve. Thousands of soldiers and sailors sprung into action to search for survivors, assist the injured, and recover the dead. In the midst of war, the city was teeming with well-disciplined troops en route to Europe and its garrison was fully staffed to defend the harbour. These men in uniform mobilized immediately to assist with relief of all kinds, gaining complete emergency powers after only three hours on the ground.
MARKER 9: BELL and AHERN
“Tonight it is a city of death, of nameless graves, ghostly phantoms, but from the blackness of the shadows there emerges something bright and holy, the faith and the heroism and the human brotherhood of man.” - Grattan O’Leary, Journalist, 1917
Help poured in from near and far as word of the disaster in Halifax spread. Within hours, relief trains carrying supplies and skilled workers rolled into the city with astounding speed. Emergency shelters gave way to temporary housing complete with electricity, sewage, and running water, transforming sites like the Garrison Grounds into unlikely communities. Together, allied nations and ordinary citizens the world over responded with more than $20 million in relief and reconstruction donations by 1918.
MARKER 10: UNION ST. ENTRANCE, FORT NEEDHAM PARK
“But we must live in hopes of a brighter future. Somewhere the sun is shining. The dark cloud will eventually break, revealing its silvery lining. We can only add, ‘Lead kindly light, amid the encircling gloom, lead thou us on.’” - Joseph Sheldon, Journalist, 1917
December 6, 2017 marks 100 years since the day an explosion shattered Halifax and the lives of thousands in it.
Today, few physical reminders of the disaster remain—but the city is forever changed. We look back to remember that devastating day and each life lost, but we also look ahead: each passing year a testament to the resilience of those who survived, persevered, and came together to rebuild.
MARKER 11: NOVALEA ENTRANCE, FORT NEEDHAM PARK
“Men say the day of miracles is passed; but there is a vision of regeneration here that fringes the miraculous. As though over night, the North End has shaken off its incubus of holocaust. Ruin and desolation have given place to the new order. A new city has risen out of the ashes of the old. We rub our eyes and look again—but the vision does not fade.” - North End Redevelopment Poster, 1919
Appointed by the federal government in 1918, the Halifax Relief Commission assumed the relief work of all voluntary committees that had formed in the hours following the explosion. Its commissioners distributed relief funds and rebuilt the areas affected by the blast, including permanent housing for survivors in the city’s demolished north end.
MARKER 12: NEEDHAM ST. ENTRANCE, FORT NEEDHAM PARK
“The tower will be an emblazoned symbol of hope with its striking appearance growing from Fort Needham, with its bells ringing out across the city tolling for the first time visibly and audibly to its residents below and in Dartmouth, a reminder of the paths we have travelled since that awful day, and how we have got to where we are now.” - Keith Graham, Architect, 1984
The Memorial Bell Tower overlooks the harbour and the site of Pier 6, where the Mont Blanc exploded that fateful winter morning in 1917. Its carillon bells ring daily in memory of all those who suffered because of the blast—the thousands who lost life or limb, loved ones, homes and possessions, and those who survived and rebuilt in the years that followed.
MARKER 13: AFRICVILLE PARK
after the thunderclap of devastation-
after the slaughter of the city,
four unknown women-
black women from the flattened shantytown-
no, village-
Africville-
“for coloureds only,”
stranded behind tracks,
donned winter clothes and shoes and huge black overcoats
and went out into the snuffing-out snow,
looking over their losses-
ten of us,
the Seaview African Baptist Church-
and kept on stepping, unbent,
strong-willed,
to rebuild.
Excerpted from a transcription of poem Four Unknown Women from RED, George Elliott Clarke
About the artist
RHAD is an award-winning architecture firm that designs modern spaces for living. Whether a public or residential project, we work together to curate elevated experiences that extend beyond the build—for now and years to come.