Lady Franklin Visits Sitka, Alaska, 1870

Lady Franklin Visits Sitka, Alaska, 1870

Author: Sophia Cracroft

Publisher: Anchorage, Alaska : Alaska Historical Society

Published: 1981

Total Pages: 174

ISBN-13:

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Detailed account with sketches of Sophie Cracroft's journal kept from May 12 to June 14, 1870. Includes map and census of Sitka with biographical information on residents. From original manuscript held by Scott Polar Research Institute.


Framing the West

Framing the West

Author: Carol Williams

Publisher: New York : Oxford University Press

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 233

ISBN-13: 0195146522

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Framing the West argues that photography was intrinsic to British territorial expansion and settlement on the northwest coast. Williams shows how male and female settlers used photography to establish control over the territory and its indigenous inhabitants, as well as how native peoples eventually turned the technology to their own purposes. Photographs of the region were used to stimulate British immigration and entrepreneuralism, and imagies of babies and children were designed to advertise the population growth of the settlers. Although Indians were taken by Anglos to document their "disappearing" traditions and to show the success of missionary activities, many Indians proved receptive to photography and turned posing for the white man's camera to their own advantage. This book will appeal to those interested in the history of the West, imperialism, gender, photography, and First Nations/Native America. Framing the West was the winner of the Norris and Carol Hundley Prize of the Pacific Coast Branch of the American Historical Association.


Old Square-Toes and His Lady

Old Square-Toes and His Lady

Author: John David Adams

Publisher: TouchWood Editions

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 258

ISBN-13: 192697171X

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August 12, 2003, marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Sir James Douglas. Although he played an integral role in British Columbia's history, in many ways Douglas remains misunderstood and an enigma. He is known for his contradictory qualities -- he was self-serving, racist, a military hawk, sometimes violent and arrogant. Yet he was also extremely community oriented, a humanitarian, brave and a devoted family member. John Adam's bestseller Old Square-Toes and His Lady: The Life of James and Amelia Douglas serves as an important source of information regarding Douglas's public and private lives. As Adams writes, [the term] old square-toes characterizes him as an unbending, stodgy, boring individual, but nothing could be further from the truth. At the pinnacle of his career, Douglas was knighted by order of Queen Victoria. Considering his modest, mixed-race beginnings in South America, his lofty status is, indeed, remarkable. Equally so is the life of his wife, Amelia. She was also of mixed blood, her mother being Cree and her father Irish. But unlike Douglas, who was educated in Scotland, she never left the northern forests until they married. Their ending up as a knight and lady of the British Empire was an unusual achievement. Old Square-Toes discusses the Douglases' diverse experiences of astonishing contrasts, from crossing North America by canoe to touring Europe by train, from Native uprisings to the frantic gold rush. Besides finding glory, they also faced grief in losing seven of their beloved children. This is a story of the adventure, heartbreak, and devotion that lies at the roots of western Canada.


Between Heaven and Balmoral

Between Heaven and Balmoral

Author: Robert Ratcliffe Taylor

Publisher: FriesenPress

Published: 2024-07-18

Total Pages: 181

ISBN-13: 1039184537

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In 1860, Cary Castle was built by George Hunter Cary in Victoria, the bustling Gold Rush capital of Vancouver Island. Cary was the brilliant “Boy Attorney-General,” unethical, unpopular and mentally disturbed—one of the colony’s vivid early characters. In 1865 Governor Arthur Kennedy forced the parsimonious Legislative Assembly to purchase the mansion as Vancouver Island’s Government House. After 1871, it became the vice-regal residence of the new province of British Columbia which it remained until it burned down in 1899. Defectively built and uncomfortable to live in, prone to drafts, fires and water leakage, it nevertheless reflected the character and heritage of Victoria and played an important role in the history of the province and Canada. The venue of elegant social events, as well as personal dramas, the mansion hosted British royalty, governors general, naval officers and local political leaders, and could have become a Canadian historic site. Cary Castle was also a family home for vice-regal couples where babies were born, boys slid down the bannister in the main hall, nasty diseases were endured and the Chinese “help’ was indispensable. Based on personal memoirs and letters, government documents, newspaper articles, photographs and plans, this book recreates how that idiosyncratic mansion looked and even smelled. Professor Martin Segger described Dr. Taylor’s earlier study, The Birdcages. British Columbia’s First Legislative Buildings (Friesen, 2020), as “a significant contribution, [with] fascinating detail, [and] a highly readable writing style.” (Ormsby Review, April 22, 2020) Between Heaven and Balmoral expands the picture of colonial Victoria developed in The Birdcages and will appeal to readers interested in Victoria’s history, especially its early social and architectural development.


Go Do Some Great Thing

Go Do Some Great Thing

Author: Kilian Crawford

Publisher: Harbour Publishing

Published: 2020-10-10

Total Pages: 309

ISBN-13: 1550179497

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Living in pre-Civil War Philadelphia, young Black activist Mifflin Gibbs was feeling disheartened from fighting the overwhelming tide of White America’s legalized racism when abolitionist Julia Griffith encouraged him to “go do some great thing.” These words helped inspire him to become a successful merchant in San Francisco, and then to seek a more just society in the new colony of Vancouver Island, where he was to become a prominent citizen and elected official. Gibbs joined a movement of Black American emigrants fleeing the increasingly oppressive and anti-Black Californian legal system in 1858. They hoped to establish themselves in a new country where they would have full access to the rights of citizenship and would be free to seek success and stability. Some six hundred Black Californians made the trip to Victoria in the midst of the Fraser River Gold Rush, but their hopes of finding a welcoming new home were ultimately disappointed. They were to encounter social segregation, disenfranchisement, limited employment opportunities and rampant discrimination. But in spite of the opposition and racism they faced, these pioneers played a pivotal role in the emerging province, establishing an all-Black militia unit to protect against American invasion, casting deciding votes in the 1860 election and helping to build the province as teachers, miners, artisans, entrepreneurs and merchants. Crawford Kilian brings this vibrant period of British Columbia’s history to life, evoking the chaos and opportunity of Victoria’s gold rush boom and describing the fascinating lives of prominent Black pioneers and trailblazers, from Sylvia Stark and Saltspring Island’s notable Stark family to lifeguard and special constable Joe Fortes, who taught a generation of Vancouverites to swim. Since its original publication in 1978, Go Do Some Great Thing has remained foundational reading on the history of Black pioneers in BC. Updated and with a new foreword by Adam Rudder, the third edition of this under-told story describes the hardships and triumphs of BC’s first Black citizens and their legacy in the province today. Partial proceeds from each copy sold will be donated to the Hogan's Alley Society.


The West Beyond the West

The West Beyond the West

Author: Jean Barman

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Published: 2017-06-22

Total Pages: 647

ISBN-13: 1487516738

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British Columbia is regularly described in superlatives both positive and negative - most spectacular scenery, strangest politics, greatest environmental sensitivity, richest Aboriginal cultures, most aggressive resource exploitation, closest ties to Asia. Jean Barman's The West beyond the West presents the history of the province in all its diversity and apparent contradictions. This critically acclaimed work is the premiere book on British Columbian history, with a narrative beginning at the point of contact between Native peoples and Europeans and continuing into the twenty-first century. Barman tells the story by focusing not only on the history made by leaders in government but also on the roles of women, immigrants, and Aboriginal peoples in the development of the province. She incorporates new perspectives and expands discussions on important topics such as the province's relationship to Canada as a nation, its involvement in the two world wars, the perspectives of non-mainstream British Columbians, and its participation in recreation and sports including Olympics. First published in 1991 and revised in 1996, this third edition of The West beyond the West has been supplemented by statistical tables incorporating the 2001 census, two more extensive illustration sections portraying British Columbia's history in images, and other new material bringing the book up to date. Barman's deft scholarship is readily apparent and the book demands to be on the shelf of anyone with an interest in British Columbian or Canadian history.


Performance Studies in Canada

Performance Studies in Canada

Author: Laura Levin

Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP

Published: 2017-06-01

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 0773549862

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Since its inception as an institutionalized discipline in the United States during the 1980s, performance studies has focused on the interdisciplinary analysis of a broad spectrum of cultural behaviours including theatre, dance, folklore, popular entertainments, performance art, protests, cultural rituals, and the performance of self in everyday life. Performance Studies in Canada brings together a diverse group of scholars to explore the national emergence of performance studies as a field in Canada. To date, no systematic attempts has been made to consider how this methodology is being taught, applied, and rethought in Canadian contexts, and Canadian performance studies scholarship remains largely unacknowledged within international discussions about the discipline. This collection fills this gap by identifying multiple origins of performance studies scholarship in the country and highlighting significant works of performance theory and history that are rooted in Canadian culture. Essays illustrate how specific institutional conditions and cultural investments – Indigenous, francophone, multicultural, and more – produce alternative articulations of “performance” and reveal national identity as a performative construct. A state-of-the-art work on the state of the field, Performance Studies in Canada foregrounds national and global performance knowledge to invigorate the discipline around the world.


A History of Canadian Literature

A History of Canadian Literature

Author: William H. New

Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 496

ISBN-13: 9780773525979

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"New offers an unconventionally structured overview of Canadian literature, from Native American mythologies to contemporary texts." Publishers Weekly A History of Canadian Literature looks at the work of writers and the social and cultural contexts that helped shape their preoccupations and direct their choice of literary form. W.H. New explains how – from early records of oral tales to the writing strategies of the early twenty-first century – writer, reader, literature, and society are interrelated. New discusses both Aboriginal and European mythologies, looking at pre-Contact narratives and also at the way Contact experience altered hierarchies of literary value. He then considers representations of the "real," whether in documentary, fantasy, or satire; historical romance and the social construction of Nature and State; and ironic subversions of power, the politics of cultural form, and the relevance of the media to a representation of community standard and individual voice. New suggests some ways in which writers of the later twentieth century codified such issues as history, gender, ethnicity, and literary technique itself. In this second edition, he adds a lengthy chapter that considers how writers at the turn of the twenty-first century have reimagined their society and their roles within it, and an expanded chronology and bibliography. Some of these writers have spoken from and about various social margins (dealing with issues of race, status, ethnicity, and sexuality), some have sought emotional understanding through strategies of history and memory, some have addressed environmental concerns, and some have reconstructed the world by writing across genres and across different media. All genres are represented, with examples chosen primarily, but not exclusively, from anglophone and francophone texts. A chronology, plates, and a series of tables supplement the commentary.


In the Days of Our Grandmothers

In the Days of Our Grandmothers

Author: Mary-Ellen Kelm

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Published: 2006-01-01

Total Pages: 449

ISBN-13: 0802079601

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From Ellen Gabriel to Tantoo Cardinal, many of the faces of Aboriginal people in the media today are women. In the Days of Our Grandmothers is a collection of essays detailing how Aboriginal women have found their voice in Canadian society over the past three centuries. Collected in one volume for the first time, these essays critically situate Aboriginal women in the fur trade, missions, labour and the economy, the law, sexuality, and the politics of representation. Leading scholars in their fields demonstrate important methodologies and interpretations that have advanced the fields of Aboriginal history, women's history, and Canadian history. A scholarly introduction lays the groundwork for understanding how Aboriginal women's history has been researched and written and a comprehensive bibliography leads readers in new directions. In the Days of our Grandmothers is essential reading for students and anyone interested in Aboriginal history in Canada.