ESSAY: Remembering John Foster Paton Nash by Michael Sasges For Remembrance Day 2020, Michael Sasges presents the life of Nicola Valley rancher John Foster Paton Nash (1866-1916). John Nash’s name is on three Great War memorials. The first is at his school in England, King William’s College on the Isle of Man; the second is…
Read more #961 From Quilchena to Flanders
Valleys of Wine: A Taste of British Columbia’s Wine History by Luke Whittall Vancouver: Whitecap Books, 2019 $29.95 / 9781770503168 Reviewed by Bill Engleson * I cook with wine. Sometimes I even add it to the food. — W.C Fields What wine goes with Captain Crunch? — George Carlin I like the wine and not…
Read more #951 New wine in new bottles
The Larder of the Wise: The Story of Vancouver’s James Inglis Reid Limited by M. Anne Wyness, with a foreword by Michael Kluckner Vancouver: Figure 1 Publishing, 2019 $32.99 / 9781773271187 Reviewed by Mary Leah de Zwart * In The Larder of the Wise: The Story of James Inglis Reid Limited, M. Anne Wyness promises…
Read more #949 Haggis and Scotch pies
Masters and Servants: The Hudson’s Bay Company and its North American Workforce, 1668-1786 by Scott P. Stephen Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 2019 $44.99 / 9781772123371 Reviewed by Ron Verzuh * Radishes and Gooseberries: Meet some of the people who are missing from your high school history textbook… “Radishes and Gooseberries!” Our high school social…
Read more #937 Radishes and Gooseberries
Farm the City: A Toolkit for Setting up a Successful Urban Farm by Michael Ableman Gabriola: New Society, 2020 $19.95 / 9780865719392 Reviewed by Rose Morrison * While Michael Ableman’s Farm the City: A Toolkit for Setting up a Successful Urban Farm is written as a primer for those wishing to start an in-town farm,…
Read more #932 Ableman’s urban agriculture
Arrivals and Departures by Christine Hayvice Toronto: Unifor Local 2002, 2020 $35.00 / 9780968150511. Contact address: airlineworker1990@gmail.com Reviewed by Ron Verzuh * Flying Union High: An insider’s look at the history of union bargaining at Canada’s airlines I love flying and I’ve done my share of it. Now I’m grounded like most of the world, thanks…
Read more #914 Flying union high
Disappearing Minglewood Blues by M.C. Warrior Salt Spring Island: Mother Tongue Publishing, 2020 $19.95 / 9781896949796 Reviewed by Colin Sanders * In Disappearing Minglewood Blues, a collection of poems written over several decades, M.C. Warrior gives voice to the mostly voiceless, often nameless, persons who toiled and laboured, navigating and negotiating, or falling victim to,…
Read more #908 Hooktenders & wildcat strikes
Journeys of Hope: Challenging Discrimination & Building on Vancouver Chinatown’s Legacies, by Henry Yu; edited by Sarah Ling, Szu Shen, and Baldwin Wong; translated into Chinese by Szu Shen Vancouver: UBC Initiative for Student Teaching and Research in Chinese Canadian Studies, 2018. Distributed by the Chinese Canadian Historical Society of British Columbia $50.00 / 9780993659317…
Read more #899 Vancouver apologizes
Cataline: Uncovering the Life of BC’s Legendary Packer by Susan Smith-Josephy and Irene Bjerky Halfmoon Bay: Caitlin Press, 2020 $22.95 / 9781773860244 Reviewed by Harold Rhenisch * This is a book about the making of British Columbia by the simple hard work of carrying industrial material, strapped to the backs of horses and mules, across…
Read more #887 A legend of British Columbia
Chainsaws: A History by David Lee, in conjunction with Mike Acres Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2020 (updated 2nd edition; first published 2006) $34.95 / 9781550179118 Reviewed by Robert Allen * This book captured my interest right from the beginning with its retro cover showing a 1951 IEL Super Pioneer “one-man power chainsaw,” a 1950s style…
Read more #858 Enter the one-man power saw
Vanishing Fish: Shifting Baselines and the Future of Global Fisheries by Daniel Pauly, with a foreword by Jennifer Jacquet Vancouver: Greystone, 2019 $34.95 / 9781771643986 Reviewed by Loys Maingon * …fish are in dire peril, and, if they are, then so are we. — Daniel Pauly (p. 24) In a remarkable collection of essays drawn…
Read more #857 Oceans as sustainable commons
Ginger: The Life and Death of Albert Goodwin by Susan Mayse Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2020; first published by Harbour, 1990 $28.95 / 9781550170184 Reviewed by Dan Hinman-Smith * We’re all working men here, And we drink Lucky Beer, Do we hold a grudge? You bet. — Gordon Carter, “The Day They Shot Ginger Down”…
Read more #848 The ballad of Ginger Goodwin
Stagecoach North: A History of Barnard’s Express by Ken Mather Victoria: Heritage House, 2020 $22.95 / 9781772033090 Reviewed by Matthew Downey * Ken Mather’s chronicle of Barnard’s Express, the company that carried freight and passengers between coastal and interior British Columbia during the gold rush years of the mid to late 19th century, connects the…
Read more #841 Frank Barnard’s coach & mail
Tom’s Gray Creek: A Kootenay Lake Memoir. Part I: Early Years to 1945 by Tom Lymbery Gray Creek: Gray Creek Publishing, 2013 $29.95 / 9780992152109 * Tom’s Gray Creek: A Kootenay Lake Memoir. Part II: Years of Change, 1946 to 1980 by Tom Lymbery with Frances Roback Gray Creek: Gray Creek Publishing, 2016 $29.95 /…
Read more #840 Tom’s Kootenay Lake memories
Civilian Internment in Canada: Histories & Legacies by Rhonda L. Hinther and Jim Mochoruk (editors) Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 2020 $31.95 / 9780887558450 * The Stories Were Not Told: Canada’s First World War Internment Camps by Sandra Semchuk Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 2019 $34.99 / 9781772123784 * Harry Livingstone’s Forgotten Men: Canadians and…
Read more #823 Canadian internment legacies
Rainy Lake House: Twilight of Empire on the Northern Frontier by Theodore Catton Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2017 $32.95 (U.S.) / 9781421422923 Reviewed by Sarah Carter * The pandemic crisis descends as I write this review and my first thought is that this book will be a welcome diversion from the anxieties and upheavals…
Read more #796 John McLoughlin of Rainy Lake
The Klondike Gold Rush Steamers: A History of Yukon River Steam Navigation by Robert D. Turner Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2019 (first published by Sono Nis Press, 2015) $49.95 / 9781550178876 Reviewed by Ken Coates * The last 50 years have not been good for the preservation of the river boat heritage of the Upper…
Read more #794 Sternwheelers of the Yukon
Cures for Hunger: A Memoir by Deni Ellis Béchard Fredericton: Goose Lane Editions, 2019 (first published by Milkweed Editions, 2012) 22.95 / 9781773101453 Reviewed by Luanne Armstrong * When I was a girl, growing up on a backwoods farm in southeastern BC, I loved to listen to men talk. They were so sure of themselves….
Read more #782 You work or you starve
Chicanery, Civility & Celebrations: Tales of Early Rossland by Ron Shearer Rossland: Rossland Heritage Commission, 2019 $24.95 / 9780228502852 Reviewed by Ron Verzuh * Golden City Yarns: A Tireless Researcher Digs Out a B.C. Mining Mecca’s Raucous Past, by Ron Verzuh Kootenay history buffs have long savoured the storytelling talents of Ron Shearer, a retired…
Read more #774 Golden City yarns
The Hot Springs Cove Story: The Beginnings of Maquinna Marine Provincial Park by Michael Kaehn Madeira Park: Harbour Publishing, 2019 $24.95 / 9781550178609 Reviewed by Mike Starr * Ivan Clarke and his wife Mabel donated the land beside Hot Springs Cove to the Province of British Columbia to create Maquinna Provincial Park. This book, which…
Read more #764 Refuge at Hot Springs Cove