Our 38th annual meeting was held at the Huron Village of Wendake, in L’Ancienne-Lorette, on September 15, 2024; it attracted more than fifty participants. Our 39th will take place at the Manoir Montmorency, in Quebec City, on September 10, 2025. This will actually be an anniversary, that of our first official general meeting held 40 years ago, in 1985. We no longer talk about large gatherings like those of the past, but it’s still very pleasant for many Bérubés to meet in this way.
Last summer, I had prepared myself to give a presentation explaining who the people named Berruby/Berube were in the Middle Ages and how they moved from the British Isles to the European continent in the 15th century. I was suffering at the same time from a lung virus that I hoped would be somewhat curtailed before our meeting. Unfortunately, this was not the case, and my presentation had to be cut short due to repeated coughing fits. The virus continued to rage, and I lost 35 pounds before I could eat normally again. We finally recorded the presentation in March ‘25 to put it on YouTube even though I was not completely cured. It’s in French, but many details are readable in both languages. You can find at the end of the text.
I hope it will help you realize once again the value of keeping our association alive more than forty years after its foundation. It remains possible to find answers to questions that have sometimes been raised for a long time. We will be able to share our findings with you in future issues of our magazine Le Monde Berrubey (LMB). For example, we obtained during last summer from the United Kingdom National Archives the will of John Berby, which dates from 1464. There is enough information in it to confirm that this London merchant, already active in Antwerp in the 1430s, is indeed a Beruby, a good subject for the LMB to explore further.
If you would like to follow and support our association, you will find on this site a membership form that some prefer to consider as their subscription to the magazine Le Monde Berrubey, published four times a year. For many of our readers, this is worth it in itself.
Michel Bérubé , #0338, President
Updated: March 18, 2025
