National Network for Equitable Library Service

Loyalist Mosaic highlights the ethnic diversity among the Loyalist settlers to Canada by exploring the experiences of 11 extraordinary individuals.

French Canadians have a long, proud history of serving their nation. From the earliest beginnings, French Canadians assisted in carving out and defending the nascent country. They were critical as defenders and as allies against hostile Natives and competing European powers. In the aftermath of the conquest, they continued, albeit under a different flag, to defend Canada.

The Empress of Ireland’s last voyage ended on May 29, 1914, when she was rammed by a Norwegian coal-carrier in a fog patch on the St. Lawrence River near Rimouski. For David Creighton, her voyage still continues. In Losing the Empress, Creighton delves into the lives of his grandparents - Salvation Army officers who were lost on the Empress - and the lives of their five orphaned children who would soon be plunged into World War I. His discoveries reveal amazing details about the Empress, which sank in fourteen minutes with a greater loss of life than the Titanic disaster.

Donald Smith, known to most Canadians as Lord Strathcona, was an adventurer who made his fortune building railroads. He joined the Hudson’s Bay Company at age eighteen and went on to build the first railway to open the Canadian Northwest to settlement. As his crowning achievement, he drove the last spike for the nation-building Canadian Pacific Railway. In 1896, Smith became Canada’s High Commissioner in London and was soon elevated to the peerage. He became a generous benefactor to Canadian institutions.

The Little Immigrants is a tale of compassion and courage and a vivid account of a deep and moving part of Canadian heritage. In the early years after Confederation, the rising nation needed workers that could take advantage of the abundant resources. Until the time of the Depression, 100,000 impoverished children from the British Isles were sent overseas by well-meaning philanthropists to solve the colony’s farm-labour shortage. They were known as the "home children," and they were lonely and frightened youngsters to whom a new life in Canada meant only hardship and abuse.

Lightkeeping on the St. Lawrence outlines the history of lightkeeping in the St. Lawrence River and Gulf from its emergence in 1803 until automation replaced the last lightkeeper in 1988. Fog, hidden reefs, rocks, and sandbars have made the waters of the river and gulf among the most treacherous in the world. In the earliest days of lightkeeping in this region, the safety of the mariners had to be weighed against the problem of giving aid to enemy ships.

By the time Amelia Hall died suddenly in December 1984 she had become one of Canada's most respected and well-loved actresses. In this book she has left an incomparable record of her early years in the professional theatre in Canada. In particular, these memoirs chronicle the history of the Canadian Repertory Theatre of Ottawa, one of the first professional repertory theatres in Canada.

B.C. journalist Stephen Hume has said that fur trader and explorer Simon Fraser should be celebrated as the founder of British Columbia. Certainly, the achievements of the Scottish-descended United Empire Loyalist adventurer were impressive. During three extraordinary years, 1805-1808, Fraser undertook the third major expedition (after Alexander Mackenzie’s and Lewis and Clark’s) across North America, culminating in his famous journey down the river in British Columbia that now bears his name.

Le leadership militaire possède deux dimensions : une dimension officielle et une dimension non officielle. Dans toute organisation, le leadership officiel doit sans cesse veiller à limiter l’écart entre les buts institutionnels et les actes des leaders non officiels. Si l’écart se creuse, on assiste parfois à une MUTINERIE! L’insubordination et la non conformité constituent une forme de dialogue entre les militaires et leurs leaders.

Le commandement et le leadership sont des caractéristiques très personnelles. La façon dont un militaire commande et fait preuve de leadership révèle son caractère et sa personnalité plutot que de jeter la lumière sur les concepts de commandement et de leadership. Le volume des Guerriers intrépides : Perspectives sur les chefs militaires canadiens étudie attentivement certains des meilleurs commandants et leaders militaires du Canada pendant la guerre.