Véronique St-Martin

February 2006

Véronique St-Martin of Montmagny, Quebec is currently researching local Franco-American history at the Franco-American Collection at USM’s Lewiston-Auburn College.

St. Martin was born in Montmagny, a town of 13 000 people, about one hour southeast of the Quebec’s city. In 2000, she began to study linguistics and writing at Laval University, in the city of Quebec. She obtained her diploma in 2004. This year, she joined the ranks of the CSECS (Coopérative de services aux écrivains de la Côte-du-Sud), a publishing enterprise, as a part-time copy editor.

Knowing her interest for history and wanting create a full-time job for Véronique, the president of the cooperative, Françoise De Montigny Pelletier, developed a project with the Canadian Museum Association for the publication of a heritage booklet for youth.

In addition to the administrative tasks at the cooperative, Véronique explored the market for youth publications and it’s financing. As part of her project, she had to complete a month long internship(outside of Canada) to explore the market for young readers. The president chose the Franco-American Collection at USM/L-A because of the region’s common history with Quebec.

At the Franco-American Collection, Véronique has researched Franco-American history, examined historical documents, and interviewed young and old residents of Lewiston- Auburn about this subject. She has also translated texts at the Collection and transcribed taped French interviews of Franco-Americans, including the reminiscences of Adélard Janelle.

The Franco-American Collection is the largest repository of Franco-American archival material in the State, with material on history, politics, religion, education, industry, business, theater and music. Located in a modern climate-controlled facility, the Collection includes a state-of-the-art archival storage unit designed to preserve the large collection of documents, news clippings, photographs, and artifacts about Franco-American history and culture. In addition, the Collection houses the Madeleine Giguere Reading Room, which includes a large selection of books concerning the French presence in North America.