At the midpoint of the twentieth century, the First Nations people of Ontario’s underdeveloped hinterland lived primarily from the land. They congregated in summer in defined communities but in early autumn dispersed to winter camps to hunt, fish, and trap. Increasingly, however, they found they had to adapt to a different way of life, one closer to the Canadian mainstream. While lifestyles and expectations were clearly changing, the native peop ...
Short-listed for the 2002 Saskatchewan Book Awards for Best Non-Fiction and Best Book The stories in Coming Home are as surprising as the landscape of Saskatchewan itself and as varied as its weather. Through the author’s reminiscences, we experience prairie life as it was more than sixty years ago, and as it is today. A rich cast of characters appears – neighbours, drunks, misfits – all with a place in the story. These are the tales of a ...
Memories of farming in the 1940s conjure up images of horse-drawn farm machinery, grain stooks in fields, hay meadows, free-range chickens and cords of wood strategically placed for fuelling the kitchen range – all before farming became the highly technical, big-time operation it is now. Author Victor Carl Friesen was born and raised on a quarter section farm in Saskatchewan and still owns the «home place.» It is there he still goes to renew hi ...
Short-listed for the 1999 CLA Book of the Year for Children Award Award-winning poet and playwright Barbara Nickel returns to her Prairie roots in a beautiful collection of seasonal poems that chart, with a bird's-eye view of the western landscape, nature's glorious playground. Nickel's experimental verses are perfectly complimented by Kathy Thiessen's black-and-white etchings, making this ideal for any young Canadian – P ...
"Pike’s Portage plays a very special role in the landscape of Canada’s Far North and its human history. It is both an ancient gateway and the funnel for early travel from the boreal forest of the Mackenzie River watershed to the vast open spaces of the subarctic taiga, better known as the «Barren Lands» of Canada. "This book is a rich and wonderful comopendium of stories about this area and the early white explorers, the Dene guides, ...
The Lake Erie shoreline has born witness to some of Ontario's earliest history, yet remains largely unspoiled. Much of the area's natural features – the wetlands, the Carolinian forests – and its built heritage – fishing ports and military ramparts – provide much of interest for vistors to the region. Ron Brown has traversed this most southern coast line in Ontario, fleshing out forgotten stories of the past, from accounts of the worl ...
In the early 20th century the Canadian North was a mystery, but the Canadian military stepped in, and this book explores its historic activities in Canada’s Arctic. Is the Canadian North a state of mind or simply the lands and waters above the 60th parallel? In searching for the ill-fated Franklin Expedition in the 19th century, Britain’s Royal Navy mapped and charted most of the Arctic Archipelago. In 1874 Canadian Prime Minister Alexander Mack ...
In an age when «survival» shows permeate the media, noted northern traveller Hap Wilson shares accounts of his lifelong involvement with wilderness living within the Canadian Shield. Wilson knows better than most how to live in the woods. As park ranger, canoe guide, outfitter, trail builder, and environmental activist, he learned from firsthand experience that nature can neither be beaten or tamed. Trails and Tribulations takes the reader on ...
The discipline of Occult Herbalism encompasses the knowledge and use of the magical, spiritual, and folkloric dimensions of plants. This perennial wisdom animates many global spiritual traditions, especially those which have maintained their integrity of transmission even in the face of industrial development and cultural destruction. Often concealed within the deepest strata of the Western Esoteric Traditions, this green strand of wisdom is a p ...
