Peter Coffinman

Today, #CanadaDay 2026, is Day 1 of my retirement! That should free up more time to do what I love most: visiting, photographing, and celebrating this country’s architecture. 🇨🇦 No need to critique, deconstruct, or scrutinize – I can just enjoy it. 😍 #VacationInCanada

Every surviving prairie grain elevator #OughtToBeHaunted. Once a dominant feature of the built landscape in western Canada, the few that are left rise like huge wooden tombstones to the past. 👇 Gravelbourg, SK. 🎃👻

If a house is so isolated that there's no one around to hear the footless footsteps and see the doors opening and closing on their own, is it still haunted? Every NL outport has at least one house that #OughtToBeHaunted; a house that shows no signs of life, but betrays hints of an afterlife. 🎃👻😱

Follow that hashtag, #OughtToBeHaunted! Even better, add a story/picture of your own! This offer will expire in six days.... 🎃👻😱

If you're part of that (possibilty small?) community that loves real life ghost stories, Canadian historical architecture, and high quality black and white photography, you will understand why I am reposting all of Peter Coffman's skeets these days

The mediocre plan for a #BetterByWard was developed pre-pandemic; was approved in 2021 (b4 elected) and languished until an election year and is under-funded; a lack of vision + lack of funding ensures a mediocre result.

The figure walks silently along the path between the residence and Military Road. He never speaks, and when spoken to, he simply disappears. But you're not surprised, because you know that Government House, in St. John's NL, #OughtToBeHaunted.

Does industrialist William Cornelius van Horne haunt his summer home at Minister's Island, New Brunswick? Surely he must – I mean, I would if I'd built it. #OughtToBeHaunted 🎃👻

It hardly needs saying that the Banff Springs Hotel #OughtToBeHaunted. And plenty will tell you it is – by guests who came to an unhappy end, by staff who loved their jobs so much they couldn't bear to leave. If there's a real Overlook Hotel, this must be it. 😱🎃

How many of those parks/community centres are under-maintained bc of 2.5% taxes? How many are slated to close bc $419m went to Landsdowne? How many parks have functioning, accessible, public washrooms to promote equity and accessibility? How many paths are winter maintained?

Dredge mining around Dawson City was an act of extreme violence that chewed up the landscape, extracted the gold, and spat out the rest. Dredge #4 #OughtToBeHaunted, perhaps by the ghosts of the operators who went deaf in the din, and consequently did not hear the news that they'd died. 🎃👻

I think pretty much every building in Dawson City, Yukon, #OughtToBeHaunted. By the ghosts of the thousands who hoped to strike it rich but only struck out. By the ghosts of the dreams that died with them. 🎃👻😱

Under Mark (and predecessor) our social infra has been under funded, under maintained. Where Mark promises more low taxes, more pools, rec centres, libraries will close. 100 are threatened. Want #OurBestOttawa? Vote for @jleiper.bsky.social ! 1/

Today's #BirdOfTheDay theme is #Juveniles, so here's a wee baby bald eagle trying out its wings – and finding them, for the time being, wanting.

Ruin a song by adding “in my pants” to the title. Blowin’ in the Wind in my Pants

AOC: "As AI begins to encroach in our society, their goal is to take your cognition away from you. AI's goal is to take your thoughts away from you, your ability to think away from you, so that you become dependent on a machine ... reading books is active resistance"

I'm no wildlife photographer, much less a bird photographer. So it surprises me how often the #BirdOfTheDay theme (or alt theme) matches something I've done recently. Today's alt theme is #Corvids, so here's another shot of the raven I met while on a walk at this time yesterday.

Threats to a strong Canada? Universities are also a national emergency

Quoth the raven....

I love the message behind our latest student blog: when traveling, don't just stick to what you already know about. carleton.ca/aah/2026/dan...

Indeed. A gift 🎁 youtu.be/tKQSlH-LLTQ?...

An odd headline. No one ever has, and no one ever will, 'own' the incomparable and indomitable Joni Mitchell. www.theglobeandmail.com/culture/musi...

A new documentary on the archaeology of Great Zimbabwe airs tonight on PBS. I interviewed the lead archaeologist, Shadreck Chirikure, and if you click through, you can watch an exclusive clip showing the team's discovery of Longquan celadon from eastern China. 🧪🏺

Ottawa's Château Laurier, built in 1912 for the Grand Trunk Railway, #OughtToBeHaunted. A prime candidate is Charles Melville Hays, President of the GTR, who went down with the Titanic en route to the hotel's grand opening in 1912. Some say that although he arrived late, he never left. 😱🎃👻

A bang-up job of translating my research into sharp, clear, accessible writing. Kudos to Vern Ramesar at CBC Halifax share.google/kqt8OfOxNuHv...

The Uniacke house in Mount Uniacke, Nova Scotia, was built for Richard John Uniacke – lawyer, politician, abolitionist, and proto-champion of confederation. RJW lived here and, in 1830, he died here. But many will tell you he never left. #OughtToBeHaunted

Speaking of haunted lighthouses (and who isn't?), the one at Cape d'Or, Nova Scotia, #OughtToBeHaunted. It broods on its remote site, keeping watch over turbulent waters since 1922. Best of all, you can spend a night (or more) in one of the adjacent buildings! Yes, I have. 🎃👻

Chebucto School in Halifax #OughtToBeHaunted. Not by its former students, but by the shades of the hundreds of dead brought here when its basement served as a temporary morgue after the Halifax explosion in 1917. 🎃👻😱

I had a great time talking to Jessica Wong for this piece on igniting students’ interest in history! www.cbc.ca/news/canada/... @thinkhist.bsky.social @sshrc-crsh.canada.ca

On this day in 1929, Raymond Moriyama was born in Vancouver. One of Canada's most acclaimed architects, his buildings include the Canadian Embassy in Tokyo, the Ontario Science Centre, the Bata Shoe Museum, and the Canadian War Museum. 📸 Moriyama & Teshima Architect

What's left of the Prince's Lodge, Halifax, #OughtToBeHaunted. Perhaps by its builder Prince Edward, returning in search of his true love, Julie, whom he could never marry. Perhaps by the two soldiers said to have died in a dual there in 1798. 🎃👻💔

On Feb. 11, 1869, Patrick J. Whelan was dropped at the end of a rope through this trap door. Whelan was convicted (but not necessarily guilty) of the murder of Thomas D'Arcy McGee. 5000 spectators watched him die. This place, and those who would gather at such events, #OughtToBeHaunted.

A lot Haligonians think that the Five Fishermen restaurant #OughtToBeHaunted. The rest already know that it is. Formerly a mortuary, the building has cared for victims of the Titanic, and the Halifax Explosion. Go for the food, which is excellent. Stay for the ghosts. 🎃👻😱

I reckon every lighthouse #OughtToBeHaunted. They watch in silence, across generations, sometimes bearing witness to the very kinds of tragedy they are intended to prevent. And don't get me started on lighthouse keepers.... 👇 Presqu'île Point Lighthouse, Lake Ontario, built 1840. 😱👻🎃

Cat + heating pad = pure happiness. May you all have a weekend like this!

I used to tell students about public executions at places like the Carleton County Gaol in Ottawa, and they'd be aghast at the barbarity of our ancestors. And now, this. 'Depraved' is one of the few words that does it justice. www.cbc.ca/news/world/u...

BREAKING NEWS The 2026 #NobelPrize in Literature is awarded to the Canadian author Anne Carson, “for her bold and inventive oeuvre that, in playful dialogue with the classical tradition, has created new forms for contemporary literature.”

I was chuffed to see last weekend that my favourite Hintonburg local, the Happy Goat, now has a café in Kingston! It's in this beautiful row of heritage buildings surrounding Market Square (on the right).