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In a series of beautifully crafted letters, former Hudson's Bay Company "servant" Leonard Budgell describes life in the Canadian North from the 1920s to the 1980s, as could only be done by someone who lived and worked there.
Leonard Budgell saw the Canadian North like nobody else. He put his observations into words as few others ever could. As a "Servant of the Bay" Budgell ran Hudson’s Bay Company trading posts for decades in isolated communities up the Labrador coast and across the Arctic. Living among aboriginal Canadians he witnessed episodes and heard stories that would never again be repeated - except he wrote them down. His pen memorably portrays everything from dancing northern lights and hunting practices of birds to astonishing human adventures and predicaments. Northern ways intact for centuries changed with rifles and motorboats, radios and electric generators, new foods and different medicines. Mo...
Francis Pegahmagabow was a remarkable aboriginal leader who served his nation in time of war and his people in time of peace. In wartime he volunteered to be a warrior. In peacetime he had no option. His life reveals how uncaring Canada was about those to whom this land had always been home. A member of the Parry Island band (now Wasauksing First Nation) near Parry Sound, Ontario, Francis served with the Canadian Expeditionary Force in Belgium and France for almost the entire duration of the First World War, primarily as a scout and sniper. Through the horrific battles and inhumane conditions of trench warfare, his actions earned him three decorations for bravery — the most ever received b...
The fight to eliminate world poverty is being severely hampered by corrupt leaders in developing countries. According to the African Union, some $150 billion is lost every year to corruption in Africa. In China, it is estimated corruption diminishes the annual value of gross domestic product by 15%. The pattern repeats itself elsewhere. This bleak situation compounds the poverty problem even more because donor countries are justifiably reluctant to support jurisdictions whose leaders are known to be corrupt, ignoring their citizens’ needs while stealing and laundering public funds for private use. What development does occur in chronically corrupt nations is often poorly planned and enviro...
A root cause of terrorism in far-away countries, Canadians are told, is poor, desperate young people who turn their frustrations and anger on their "rich oppressors." Uprising brings this scenario home to Canada. When impoverished, disheartened, poorly educated, but well-armed aboriginal young people find a modern revolutionary leader in the tradition of 1880s rebellion leader Louis Riel, they rally with a battle cry "Take Back the Land!" Theirs is a fight to right the wrongs inflicted on them by "the white settlers." They know their minority force cannot take on all Canada. They don't need to. A surprise attack on the nation's most vulnerable assetsits abundant energy resourcessends the Can...
Dr Harry Paddon's memoir is an extensive account of life in Labrador prior to its entry into Confederation. As the Grenfell Mission's principal physician for over twenty-five years, Dr Paddon travelled extensively throughout Labrador by both dog team and boat. Through his journals he fashions a portrait of Labrador society in accord with the traditional rhythms of trapping and fishing, as it was before the onset of industrial development. He also chronicles the demands of northern medicine in response to pervasive threats such as tuberculosis and deficiency diseases, including a moving description of the Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918-19. Paddon's memoir gives the reader a sense of the resident Innu, Inuit, and settler communities, as well as the prevailing institutions of non-governmental authority: the Hudson's Bay Company, the Moravian Mission, and the International Grenfell Association. At a time when Labrador is undergoing further industrial development and social change, his writings, carefully edited and annotated by Ronald Rompkey, the biographer of Sir Wilfred Grenfell, capture the heart of the region and its people.
George Parkin, born on a New Brunswick farm, died a knight of the realm and most famous Canadian in the world. As orator and journalist he strengthened bonds between English-speaking peoples. As principal of Upper Canada College and a founder of the Rhodes Scholarships he put formation of character above training the intellect.
Explorer Jacques Cartier dismissed it as the land God gave to Cain, but generations of people from widely differing cultures living in dense wilderness conditions have forged the people of Labrador into a thriving, vital culture of their own. Here are their stories in their own voices, written by the expert hand of a person whose heart's home is Labrador.
A moving historical tale and remarkable literary achievement, City Wolves is the story of Canada’s first woman veterinarian, Meg Wilkinson. Born in 1870 on a farm near Halifax, Meg’s childhood experience with wolves makes her determined to be a veterinarian. Supported by the seemingly eccentric Randolph Oliphant and inspired by the ancient Inuit who first turned wolves into sled dogs, Meg surpasses the horse doctors at vet college and becomes the notorious ’dog doctor of Halifax’ in the 1890s. After her unusual marriage ends abruptly in Boston, Meg travels to Vancouver and up to the Yukon, seeking the legendary sled dogs. Arriving at the beginning of the Klondike gold rush, she makes...
A silent clapboard church on a barren Arctic landscape is more than just a place of worship: it is a symbol that can evoke fraught reactions to the history of Christian colonization. In the Inuit homeland of Northern Labrador, however, that church is more likely to resonate with the voices of a well-rehearsed choir accompanied by an accomplished string orchestra or spirited brass bands. The Inuit making this music are stewards of a tradition of complex sacred music introduced by Moravian missionaries in the late 1700s – a tradition that, over time, these musicians transformed into a cultural expression genuinely their own. Called Upstairs is the story of this Labrador Inuit music practice....