This is the gripping story of how one man’s half-century of service and devotion helped build and develop the Hastings & Prince Edward Regiment; and how that regiment played a vital role in Canada’s efforts during the Second World War. Angus Duffy was Regimental Sergeant-Major during the Second World War; commanding officer from 1958 to 1962, and Honorary Colonel from 1976 to 1981, an da man revered and respected for his tough but humane app ...
Mike Filey's «The Way We Were» column in the Toronto Sun continues to be one of the paper's most popular features. In Toronto Sketches Filey brings together some of the best of his columns. Each column looks at Toronto as it was, and contributes to our understanding of how Toronto became what it is. Illustrated with photographs of the city's people and places of the past, Toronto Sketches is a nostalgic journey for the long ...
James Fitzjames was a hero of the early nineteenth-century Royal Navy. A charismatic man with a wicked sense of humour, he pursued his naval career with wily determination. When he joined the Franklin Expedition at the age of 32 he thought he would make his name. But instead the expedition completely disappeared and he never returned. Its fate is one of history’s last great unsolved mysteries, as were the origins and background of James Fitzjame ...
An amusing collection of lives and stories from the eccentric side of Canada’s history. A joyous romp through the back pages of Canadian quirkiness, Canadian Folk provides a fresh look at the saints, sinners, oddballs, and outright nutbars who have populated the Canadian landscape. They were perpetually northbound or south; they were inveterate walkers, or world class runners, millionaires in ill-advised Citroen half-tracks. The restless char ...
2014 Dayton Literary Peace Prize – Nonfiction Runner Up The complex histories and memories of Jewish and Palestinian Israelis today frame Israel’s future possibilities for peace. 1948: As Jewish refugees, survivors of the Holocaust, struggle toward the new State of Israel, Arab refugees are fleeing, many under duress. Sixty years later, the memory of trauma has shaped both peoples’ collective understanding of who they are. After a war, the ...
A celebrated journalist finds himself reporting on the savage war in Vietnam while in combat with his own network. In September 1969, Michael Maclear, the first Western television journalist allowed inside North Vietnam, was in Hanoi for major Canadian and U.S. networks. He recounted in gripping detail how an entire population had been trained for generations in guerrilla combat. His reporting that the North was motivated more by nationalism tha ...
How emigrants were lured to Ontario’s Muskoka in the 1870s in a vain attempt to farm the Canadian Shield. When the Free Grants and Homestead Act was first introduced in 1868, fierce debates erupted in Ontario’s Legislature over whether land in the Muskoka region should be opened to settlement or reserved for the Aboriginal population. From the beginning, many people vented serious doubts about the free grant scheme, citing the district’s poor ag ...
From the jetliner and the snowmobile to the pacemaker and the BlackBerry, Canadians have long been at the forefront of innovation and invention. Canadians are behind a variety of cutting-edge products, life-saving medicines, innovative machines, and fascinating ideas. Although our inventions have typically been created with little fanfare, financing, or expectation of return, they have often gone on to play important roles in day-to-day life. Ou ...
A celebration in medals of Queen Elizabeth II’s 60 years as our monarch. On the occasion of the diamond jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II’s accession to the throne as Queen of Canada, Canada has followed a long tradition of recommending to Her Majesty the institution of a commemorative medal to mark this auspicious milestone. Commemorative Medals of The Queen’s Reign in Canada, 1952-2012 examines in detail this element of the Canadian honours syst ...
