Book Description

A stunning book of portraits and biographies of the elders of the Salish Nation, complete with stories of the highlights of their lives. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Book was excellent, alot of good advice on wilderness living
I really enjoyed reading this book. There was quite a bit of good advice concerning wilderness living and survival. Also included interesting tales concerning Brad and Vena Angiers experiences living in the British Columbia wilderness. I found the style of writing to be quite easy to read and the explanations to be easily understandable. Would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in living in the wilderness or just enjoys reading about people who have done it. ... Read more

Book Description

When Woodsmen of the West first appeared in 1908, most readers could not relate to its rendering of the rough edges of logging-camp life. M. Allerdale Grainger refused to sentimentalize the West – he drew from life. While his dramatic and loosely structured tale is at heart a love story, it also tells of what happens when the novel’s British narrator encounters a small-time logging operator whose obsession with lumber is matched by his lust for power over other men.

Today the novel is recognized as marking a significant shift in fiction written in and about the Canadian West. The accuracy of its detail makes it one of the finest examples of local realism in Canadian writing. It is also a fascinating chronicle of conflicting personalities, and of the genius of British Columbia hand-loggers, the culture of camp life, and the intrigues and corruption of the lumber business at the turn of the century.

The New Canadian Library edition is an unabridged reprint of the original text, complete with the original photographs. ... Read more

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Presents the reader with a kind of "window in time"
Edmund Augustus Porcher was the captain of a Royal Navy vessel serving an Esquimalt-based tour of duty on Vancouver Island. Porcher was also a watercolor artist who made an impressive array of sensitive and skillfully executed paintings of what he saw. A Tour Of Duty In The Pacific Northwest: E. A. Porcher and H.M.S. Sparrowhawk, 1865-1868 is an impressive and uniquely informative work drawn from the ship's record and Captain Porcher's commentaries, enhanced with his superb paintings and illustrations presenting the reader with a kind of "window in time" to understand and feel what it was like in those times and places along Canada's Pacific coasts, as well as the complex and multifaceted roles and functions of a British war vessel. A Tour Of Duty In The Pacific Northwest is a unique and highly recommended contribution that will be greatly appreciated by students of maritime, and Canadian nineteenth century history. ... Read more

Book Description

Born into a comfortable middle-class German family, Paul Hertel left Germany in 1929 for a taste of adventure in the Canadian wilds before he was to settle down to run the family business. For the next five years he had the ultimate adventure. He rode the rails across Canada, homesteaded north of Burns Lake, picked fruit in the Okanagan and punched cattle in the Nicola Valley. Just after the Nazis won their first election, Paul returned to Germany.Urged by his bride-to-be, Grete, but over the protests of his family, Paul returned to BC with Grete, but as the World War II approached they faced rising anti-German sentiments. Feeling uncomfortable and unwanted in the south, they moved to the wilds of northern BC where they homesteaded in the Smithers area.Wilderness Beginnings is an amazing story - partly because it is a true one which shows how recent our frontier actually is-but also because it is a story of courage, of an individual who wouldn't say "enough already" and pack it in. Paul Hertel just picked himself up again and kept on. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

Learning about my own past
I truly loved this book. For once, because it's part of my own past, Paul Hertel was my mother's uncle. And second, I like Mrs. Falkenhagens style. It was great for me to learn about my ancestors. Now I understand much better my own urge to discover the world.

A German-Canadian Adventure
"Wilderness Beginnings" is truly an adventure story about two people facing seemingly insurmountable odds both in Pre-WWII Germany and in the wilderness of British Columbia during the 1930's. This true-life book is extremely well written and an easy read. The story draws you in from the start and holds your attention throughout the remarkable journey. There are times it is difficult to believe this is not fiction. I highly recommend this book to readers of all ages.

A personal wilderness adventure
A true life adventure of a young German immigrant who migrates to the wilderness of British Columbia during the mid 1930's. The adventures and brushes with death from the natural elements remind me of Jack London's "Call of the Wild".

Human interest story of a young man's wilderness adventures.
A wonderful true-life story of the adventures of a young German immigrant who becomes a 20th century pioneer in British Columbia. After falling in love with the BC landscape and learning to live in harmony with the forces of nature, he returns to his home in Germany to marry his sweetheart. They both return to BC to share the natural beauty of the country and indure the challenges of the Great Depression, which are intensified by the general distrust of Germans in Canada as Hitler invades Europe, and Canada and the United States are drawn into World War II. Inspite of these obstacles, Paul and Grete Hertel raise a family and eventually settle on a farm on Vancouver Island.

It was with a sense of sadness when I finished this story, knowing that I could no longer look forward to reading any further adventures of the Hertel family. I wish to thank the author for sharing this fasinating story of her father's early years in British Columbia. ... Read more

Book Description

For many years, the CPR offered free return passage each summer for the employees of its magnificent hotels. The "Dominion" and the "Canadian", Canada's famous trains travelled west to the Banff Springs Hotel and to Chateau Lake Louise in the Canadian Rockies. In 1957, captivated by stories of lofty mountain peaks and clear blue lakes, eighteen-year old Roger Patillo from Belle River, Ontario, signed up and set out to experience the West for himself. One summer turned into seven and changed his life.

The stories of his adventures while at the world famous Chateau are both humorous and poignant. He draws from many friendships, among which are the Feuz brothers, the legendary Swiss guides, John Lynn the much loved pianist who presented nightly concerts in the lobby, Beef Woodworth, the Park Warden and Lawrence Grassi, the "keeper of O'Hara". The book recounts the author's time skiing, flyfishing, mountaineering and canoeing down the Bow River. While these stories are entertaining enough, it is in the sharing of the sometimes hilarious pranks and misadventures of the staff that keeps us smiling throughout. The steak roasts, the dances, the parties at Gables (the Bellhop's residence) and his special friends all come alive again as Patillo recalls in tale after tale, a more gentle time when maybe Lake Louise really was the best. ... Read more

Book Description

Victoria: Where Dreams Come True is the fascinating and heartfelt memoir of Victoria-born entrepreneur Morris Kersey. Kersey, now in his late 80s, rose from near-poverty in a rural district outside of the city to becoming the owner of several successful businesses - from travel agencies to service stations to coffee shops to a peanut butter factory.

Along the way Morris Kersey has had the change to ride the Concorde, travel on the Orient Express and the QE2, and experience South Africa's Blue Train. ... Read more

Book Description

A spirit of adventure, a great sense of fun, an observant eye, and enthusiasm for everything new--that's the kind of woman Monica Hopkins was, and that's what led her to leave the comforts of her English family home in 1909 to homestead on the prairies.

Hopkins was a young bride who had finally married her childhood sweetheart, an Irish lad who'd wandered the world, then settled down to the life of a rancher in the foothills of Alberta. Through her eyes we get a unique view of the early days of Western Canada, that of an observant woman who took note of every detail of landscape and personality. Her letters sparkle with delights, enthusiasms, occasional troubles and tragedies.

In Letters from a Lady Rancher, Monica Hopkins brings to life the experiences of the women--and men--who settled the Canadian West.
... Read more

Reviews (1)

Historical - and hysterical!
A friend of a friend sent this book to a group of us living overseas, and while Monica Hopkins lived her adventures nearly 100years ago, we agree that she could be describing our daily life here. Writing to a friend on the other side of the globe, Hopkins details daily life in the "wilds" of Alberta at the turn of the last century, sharing personal anecdotes about her first year of marriage and interesting characters with whom she lives and works.

I highly recommend this title to anyone interested in Canadian history, particularly from a woman's point of view; to anyone living in a new and different culture/ lifestyle than the one to which they are accustomed; and to anyone interested in anecdotal, humorous history. The history of the West will never look the same! ... Read more

Book Description

The journal of James Colnett is the last unpublished account of the early maritime fur trade on the Northwest Coast. Between 1786 and 1789, Colnett’s expedition traversed the coast from Prince William Sound to the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Its members were the first Europeans to encounter the Tsimshian and the southern Heiltsuk, and the first to land on the southern Queen Charlotte Islands.

The journal is reproduced with full scholarly apparatus, as well as with extracts from a second journal by Andrew Bracey Taylor, 3rd mate on one of the ships in Colnett’s command. Focusing on the expedition’s remarkable encounters with the Native peoples of the Northwest Coast, Galois’ introductory essay also addresses the geopolitical context of the voyage and the intellectual background that shaped the writing of the journals.

This fascinating account gives us a new understanding of early European presence in the Northwest and of Native responses to these developments. It will interest historians, geographers, and ethnographers of the Northwest Coast and beyond. ... Read more

Book Description

In Crazy Man's Creek, author Jack Boudreau tells of the characters who have "caught the fever" in the rugged McGregor Mountain Range east of Prince George. Long recognized as some of the toughest bush in British Columbia, it was home to many who chose to lose themselves.Once there, life included confrontations with grizzly bears and raids by wolves. But if men were to snap, it was the long cold winters and the deafening silence that did them in. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Trials and Tribulations In Early Twentieth Century B.C.
Jack Boudreau grew up in the central BC lumber town of Penny, which is located along the Canadian National Railway line that runs through the Fraser valley in central B.C. He was regaled as a youth with stories of the guides, trappers, settlers, prospectors and others who tried to make this inhospitable wilderness their home during the beginning of the twentieth century. He decided that these stories were too valuable to let disappear with the passing of the original taletellers and began to record their stories. After several decades of collecting data from/about these individuals, Jack has done an excellent job of consolidating the best of their stories in this pleasurably readable collection. I highly recommend this book for anyone who is interested in outdoor adventures. The wondrous thing is that the stories are true and these robust individuals actually went through trials that the contemporary reader might find incredible.

I may be a biased reviewer in that, J. Boudreau is my mother's brother and I also grew up listening to a few of the tales depicted in this book. I can guarantee that once you pick it up, you won't want to put it down until it's finished. In my case, I read it several times. This book is worth every penny and will bring you much pleasure. ... Read more

Book Description

Frank Howard's mother was a prostitute; his father, purportedly her pimp. When he was six months old they placed him in the care of foster parents who never let him forget that he was the child of those "...no-good sons of bitches...".

At twelve he was committed by a judge to the care of the Childrens' Aid Society and taken to an orphanage in Vancouver. En route he was sexually molested by the policeman accompanying him. Dumped into the foster care circuit, he twice attempted suicide. He never finished grade ten. At eighteen he was sentenced to two years in the B.C. Penitentiary for armed robbery.

In From Prison to Parliament Howard describes those early years, his life in prison, and how, on finishing his sentence, he vowed never to return to crime. He never did.

He became a logger, then President of the Loggers' Local of the I.W.A. At twenty-eight he entered politics as a C.C.F. M.L.A. and went on to become the M.P. for the Northern B.C. riding of Skeena. He held that seat for seventeen years, longer than anyone else since its formation in 1914. During his twenty-seven years as a politician, he won ten elections.

Frank Howard was decidedly instrumental in getting Aboriginal people who lived on reserves the right to vote in federal elections. His three-year filibuster in the House of Commons produced reforms to Canada's divorce laws. His passion for prison reform led to the closure of Canada's barbaric Saint Vincent de Paul Penitentiary.

Blunt, tough, Frank Howard pulls no punches in describing some of his C.C.F./ N.D.P. fellow politicians. Reading From Prison to Parliament, it's easy to understand how his street smarts served his constituents, while at the same time infuriating other politicians. ... Read more

Book Description

What is the relationship between a city, its suburbs, and the rural landaround it?

In the 150 short pieces in Tom Thomson's Shack, Harold Rhenisch explores this questionin economic prose redolent with subtleties. From his native Okanagan to his home on theCariboo plateau, his musings are interwoven with a book tour to Toronto. On itsoutskirts, in Kleinburg, he discovers Group of Seven member Tom Thomson's studio,crucible of Canada -- to his surprise, as real as the valley a short distance from hishome that he knows as the Centre of the Universe.

Side trips to the stagnating mining town of Hedley, the totem poles of Kispiox, theretirement villas and golf courses of Kelowna, shape and refine the author's quest.Toronto, the inescapable electronic grid-city, ceaselessly colonizes the land with imagesof the land. In its wake, how can farming as Rhenisch's Okanagan forebears know it, afight to the death with God, prevail? Amazingly, the author's unsparing inquiry tunnelsthrough paradox to emerge beyond the city-country dichotomy, in the light of a newapprehension of ourselves as Canadians, whether city or country dwellers.

A rich and rigorous meditation on identity, language, work and life, Tom Thomson'sShack is a vital successor to the celebrated Out of the Interior. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Celebrates the works and life of Stanford Perrott
Maxwell Foran's Chalk & The Easel surveys and celebrates the works and life of Stanford Perrott, Alberta watercolorist. Black and white and color photos accompany text detailing his perspective and influences. ... Read more