Museums and the Past
Museums and the Past explores the central role of museums as memory keepers and makers. Using case studies from a Canadian context, the contributors to this collection reflect on the challenges in maintaining and developing museums as meaningful places of memory and learning. Discussions of museum practice and historical consciousness – how our u …
What We Learned
Stories of Indigenous children forced to attend residential schools have haunted Canadians in recent years. Yet most Indigenous children in Canada attended “Indian day schools,” and later public schools, near their home communities. Although church and government officials often kept detailed administrative records, we know little about the act …
Live Souls
Live Souls presents 210 of the numerous photos that Alec Wainman took in the midst of the Spanish Civil War, and his personal story of his time as a volunteer member of the British Medical Unit. Until the present only a small number of his photos have appeared in a few historical books, where they have been valued for their insight into the trouble …
Bent Props & Blow Pots
This print-on-demand title is available by request from most booksellers.
Crash landings were part of the job in the early 1930s, when Rex Terpening started out in arctic aviation. As an air engineer for Canadian Airways in the Northwest Territories, Terpening took the right-hand seat in the cockpit and flew "on operations" daily, warming the oil a …
Whistle Posts West
Everybody has a train story. Whether it comes from a distant relative who worked on the railways or from a family train trip that formed a lasting impression of the Canadian landscape, trains inspire a sense of wonder and nostalgia. They are embedded in the history of Canada as a whole and western Canada in particular, and for generations they were …
Of Myths and Sticks
A lively compendium of little-known hockey trivia from Kevin Gibson, TSN’s one-man Research, Stats and Information Department.
As engaging as the great game itself, the stories behind the National Hockey Leaugue are entertaining, fascinating and, at times, unbelievable. Faux facts emerge from urban legends, conspiracy theories and coincidences, le …
The School of Sophisticated Drinking
“A very entertaining book that deserves a leather armchair, a fine cigar, and a double measure of cognac. ” – Gaz Regan, author of The Joy of Mixology
An engrossing romp through the social, political, and scientific history of alcohol and art of cultured intoxication.
The School of Sophisticated Drinking traces the deep-seated lineage of dri …
School of Sophisticated Drinking
“A very entertaining book that deserves a leather armchair, a fine cigar, and a double measure of cognac. ” – Gaz Regan, author of The Joy of Mixology
A detailed and insightful look into the development and sometimes comical past of the world of cocktail recipes and their stories.” —Frankie Solarik, co-owner, Barchef Toronto and author of …
The Making of Modern Chinese Medicine, 1850-1960
Medical care in nineteenth-century China was spectacularly pluralistic: herbalists, shamans, bone-setters, midwives, priests, and a few medical missionaries from the West all competed for patients. This book examines the dichotomy between “Western” and “Chinese” medicine, showing how it has been greatly exaggerated. As missionaries went to …
The Man Who Invented Gender
A controversial figure, innovative scholar, and ardent advocate for sexual liberation, sexologist John Money opened a new field of research in sexual science and gave currency to medical ideas about human sexuality. This book offers, for the first time, a balanced and probing textual analysis of this pioneering scholar’s writing to assess Money …
A Road Taken
Nineteen years ago, David McLean was appointed by the prime minister of Canada to the board of directors of CN, after which he was elected chairman. McLean has been reelected each year and will retire in April 2014. In A Road Taken, the longest-serving chairman of the board in CN history explains complex business issues in very human terms. McLean' …
Olive Odyssey
When Julie Angus visits her relatives in Syria, where they continue a centuries-old tradition of making olive oil, she understands that the olive is at the very core of who they are. Her curiosity piqued, she begins to wonder about the origins and history of this fruit that has meant so much to them. Angus, her husband, and their ten-month-old son …
The Game of Our Lives
In this bestselling timeless classic, Peter Gzowski recounts the 1980-81 season he spent travelling around the NHL circuit with the Edmonton Oilers. These were the days when the young Oilers, led by a teenaged Wayne Gretzky, were poised on the edge of greatness, and about to blaze their way into the record books and the consciousness of a nation. W …
The Railway King of Canada
During the first two decades of this century, Sir William Mackenzie was one of Canada’s best known entrepreneurs. Spearheading some of the largest and most technologically advanced projects undertaken in Canada, he built a business empire that stretched from Montreal to British Columbia and to Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo in Brazil. It included g …
Quarantined
Vancouver Island in the late nineteenth century was a major port of entry for people from all walks of life. But for many, the sense of hope that had sustained them through rough sea voyages came to an abrupt halt as soon as they reached land. Quarantined is the heart-wrenching true story of the thousands of forgotten people who arrived on our shor …
Seize the Time
A photo portrait of Vancouver's extended "summer of love," Vladimir Keremidschieff's Seize the Time captures an era of profound change in Lotusland. Vlad's infatuation with photography began in 1967 when a friend introduced him to the craft and then left town, taking his 35mm Pentax camera with him — Vlad just had to get one of his own. His bloss …
Shattered Images
Fred A. Reed’s fifth book on the Middle East and “the wars of the Ottoman succession” traces the roots of Islamic fundamentalism, as currently enacted by Hezbollah and other Islamic fundamentalist organizations, to the iconoclasts of sixth- and seventh-century Damascus.
The emergence of Iconoclasm, as sudden and overwhelming as it was catalyti …
Intoxicating Manchuria
Intoxicating Manchuria reveals how the powerful alcohol and opium industries in Northeast China were altered by warlord rule, Japanese occupation, political conflict, and a vigorous anti-intoxicant movement. Through the lens of the Chinese media’s depictions of alcohol and opium, Norman Smith examines how intoxicants and addiction were understood …
Tales from the Back Bumper
Buckle up your seatbelt and prepare for a ride on the history highway! Christopher Garrish has collected hundreds of facts and photos (not to mention licence plates) in this astonishing assembly of motoring madness. Discover what the earliest motorists in the province used to build their own licence plates; why some licence plate numbers are worth …
A School in Every Village
In the early 1900s, the Qing dynasty implemented a nationwide school system to buttress its power. Although the Communists, contemporary observers, and more recent scholarship have all depicted rural society as feudal and these educational reforms a failure, Elizabeth VanderVen draws on untapped archival materials to show that villagers and local o …
Indian Education in Canada, Volume 2
The two volumes comprising Indian Education in Canada present the first full-length discussion of this important subject since the adoption in 1972 of a new federal policy moving toward Indian control of Indian education. Volume 1 analyzes the education of Indian children by whites since the arrival of the first Europeans in Canada. Volume 2 is con …
Escape to Gold Mountain
Winner, Chinese American Library Association Best Book Award winner (Fiction)
The history of Chinese immigration to Canada and the US over the past 100-plus years has been fraught with sadness and indignity; newcomers to North America encountered discrimination, subjugation, and separation from loved ones. As well, in Canada the Chinese head tax was …
Flying on Instinct
They were nicknamed Snow Eagle, Flying Knight, Bush Angel, Punch, Doc and Wop. They worked in open cockpits and flew through cold, snow and fog without the benefit of radios, maps or weather reports. They flew over the Barrens, frozen lakes, boreal forests and mountain ranges by dead reckoning and line of sight. They landed on makeshift runways, gl …
Sir John Franklin
After Royal Navy captain Sir John Franklin disappeared in the Arctic in 1846 while seeking the Northwest Passage, the search for his two ships, Erebus and Terror, and survivors of his expedition became one of the most exhaustive quests of the 19th century. Despite tantalizing clues, the ships were never found, and the fate of Franklin’s expeditio …
Trucking in British Columbia
Trucks are everywhere--crowding the highways, lining up for the ferries, roaring down dusty logging roads--and yet trucking is often left off the list when talk turns to British Columbia's major industries. It shouldn't be, as this gorgeous new illustrated history celebrating the BC Trucking Association's 100th anniversary shows. With annual revenu …
Backspin
Backspin is a comprehensive overview of everything golf-related in BC. Veteran sportswriter Arv Olson's work on the trailblazers and the growth of the game and the province's golf courses was "the preeminent resource" on golf history when he self-published Backspin in 1992. This first Heritage House edition has been completely updated and revamped …
The Uchuck Years
On the wild west coast of Vancouver Island, those days still exist, as this book reveals in vivid detail. Relating the trials and tribulations of what surely must be the last of Canada's historic coastal shipping lines, The Uchuck Years is a rare first-person account by an old salt who owned and captained his own vessels. Enduring for sixty-five ye …
The Battle of Batoche
The Battle of Batoche is the best-known confrontation between Métis and British soldiers in the Northwest Resistance of 1885. It remains one of Canada’s most emotion-laden memories, eloquently revisited in this revised and expanded edition.The strategies of both sides are thoroughly examined, and numerous maps and photographs offer detailed desc …
Code Name Habbakuk
In late 1942, Britain was desperate to win the ongoing Battle of the Atlantic. German U-boats had sunk hundreds of Allied ships containing millions of tons of cargo that was needed to continue the war effort. Prime Minister Churchill had to find a solution to the carnage or the Nazis would be victorious. With the support of Churchill and Lord Louis …
Fire Canoes
Anson Northup, the first steamboat on the Canadian prairies, arrived in Fort Garry in 1859. Belching hot sparks and growling in fury, it was called "fire canoe" by the local Cree. The first steam-powered passenger vessel in Canada had begun service on the St. Lawrence River in 1809, and for the next 150 years, steamboats carried passengers and frei …
Furrows in the Sky
Gerry Andrews (1903–2005) had many adventures in his 102 years. He was a rural school teacher, a forester, a soldier and a surveyor. His developments in aerial photography dramatically changed forestry in BC in the late 1930s and assisted the Allies in the D-Day landings. As BC's surveyor-general from 1951 to 1968, he supervised the mapping of th …
Keeping the Nation's House
The term home economics often conjures images of sterile classrooms where girls learn to cook dinner and swaddle dolls, far removed from the seats of power. Helen Schneider unsettles this assumption by revealing how Chinese women helped to build a nation, one family at a time. From the 1920s to the early 1950s, home economists transformed the most …
Xavier's Legacies
Japan has had three Catholic prime ministers, and its current empress was raised and educated in the faith. How did a non-Christian nation come to foster more Catholic leaders than the United States, particularly when Protestantism is said to define Christianity in Japan and Catholicism is believed to be but a fleeting element of Japan’s so-calle …
Stormy Years 1969-89
Who is the only player to win a home-run title when he was in retirement? Which all-star outfielder was also selected in the NBA, ABA, and NFL player drafts? Who swatted a record-setting six grand slams in one season? Baseball lovers will want to step up to the plate and see how they'll score on these entertaining games, quizzes, statistics, and an …
Bugaboo Dreams
Take the snowiest mountains in Canada, add two Austrian immigrants, an army of adrenaline-addicted skiers (kings, queens, billionaires, average people and everyday ski bums) and throw a helicopter into the mix for an unforgettable story of mountain adventure.
The tale begins when two childhood friends-Hans Gmoser and Leo Grillmair-leave postwar Aust …
New Possibilities for the Past
The place of history education in schools has sparked heated debate in Canada. Is history dead? Who killed it? Should history be put in the service of nation? Can any history be truly inclusive? This volume advances the debate by shifting the focus from what should be included in history education to how we should think about and teach the past. In …
Defence and Discovery
The Cold War space race between the United States and the Soviet Union is well documented, but few are aware of Canada’s early activities in this important arena of global power. Defence and Discovery represents the first comprehensive investigation into the origins, development, and impact of Canada’s space program from 1945 to 1974. Meticulou …