Today I received a message from Kerr’s spouse, Darlene that Kerr had passed away yesterday, peacefully.
Kerr in 2013 making measurements on an old tidal mill on the Apple River that had recently been exposed by erosion of the salt marsh that had grown over it. View
Tidal Mills on the Apple River, Nova Scotia (YouTube Video)
A flood of memories filled my consciousness, very graphic in nature, of walking salt marshes and beaches and forests with Kerr, of listening to his detailed recounting of historic times at the places we passed through en-route to our walks which were always explorations, we rarely went anywhere without making a measurement or two, sometimes many…
My friendship with Kerr began circa 2004, in our “older days”. I have to say that in those days, there has been no one I have been more comfortable with and enjoyed more then Kerr, and together with my spouse Nina, the get-togethers with both Kerr and his spouse Darlene. We had so many good times and laughs and discussions together and shared much more. Not the least of the benefits, Nina and I got to know and love that very special part of Nova Scotia and the World, the Parrsboro Shore all the way up to Apple River.
Kerr and I created this website as a way to
(i) archive and make accessible some of the many historical investigations into industrial technologies on the Parrsboro Shore that Kerr conducted out of personal interest as a sideline during his career as a faculty member teaching physics at Sir John Abbot College in Ste. Anne de Bellevue, Quebec; and that was pretty well a full time venture in his retirement years; and
(ii) celebrate the Parrsboro Shore.
This website will remain available under this domain (parrsboreshoredays.ca) as a tribute to Kerr for at least another 5 years; most or all the website should remain available on a permanent basis on the Web Archive.
I plan to make only one major addition, a section titled “A Tribute to Kerr” which will include photos from our ventures on the Parrsboro Shore, and annotated links to the various works and published papers by Kerr related to the Parrsboro Shore. As I go through those works, I may add some of them or portions of them to existing sections of this website, but with great care as I must now do so without Kerr’s critical eye… I am pretty sure I would have his approval. I will surely work hard but with much pleasure to keep it!
~ david p, Feb 14, 2026