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"Beggars cannot be choosers. We wanted just companies, we gave a damn who they were, we had no prejudice against them. We went to Germany because Europe was scared of Soviet Russia and saw a communist revolution coming. The German industrialists were particularly scared. In 1950 I was the first public visitor who came to Germany from any country. The leaders of the German companies all spoke excellent English. I was impressed.

During World War II St. John’s, Newfoundland played a critical role in the fight against Nazi Germany. Seamen from all over the world sailed to and from the old seaport, chosen for duty because it was closest to Europe and because its people knew both the peril and glory of the North Atlantic. In his introduction to this absorbing collection of stories, Bill Rompkey examines the city’s service to one of the most famous battles in military history and the effect it had on the people of St. John’s.

Barr’d Islands: From English Roots is a history of early English settlement in Notre Dame Bay, Newfoundland, with a focus on Barr’d Islands, a small fishing community on Fogo Island. Explore the day-to-day lives of a charitable, community-minded people whose hardships were many in a time when survival from year to year was uncertain: living under the iron fist of merchant firms, subsistence farming, poverty. Also, learn of these early settlers’ faith, richness of virtue, hard-work ethic, and games and amusements shared by all in the community.

In the early 1900s, Charles Noble Lewis and his family were prominent members of St. John’s high society. A chief engineer who worked for Bowring Brothers, Charles fraternized with many of the key players who shaped Newfoundland and Labrador history as we know it today. The living room of the Lewis house served as a meeting place for many of the principals of the Newfoundland sealing industry, including William Coaker, Captain Abram Kean and his sons, Joseph and Westbury Kean, John Munn, and crew members and sealers from many ships. In 1914, Charles’s daughter Jessie was eight years old.

A History of the Church Lads’ Brigade (CLB) The year 2017 marks 125 years of service in Newfoundland for the Church Lads’ Brigade. Today, it is the oldest and largest Anglican youth organization in Canada. The CLB is also one of the most recognizable civic organizations in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, known nationally for its regimental band. Since 1892 there have been more than 20,000 members in Newfoundland, with about 12,000 still living. Approximately 600 members in eighteen active companies are still listed on strength.

Inspired by True Events In 1934, North America lay stripped of its riches by a great depression. When the land refused to yield its bounty and the sea grew stingy, everyone in the Western World found it harder to survive, especially those in the isolated outports of Newfoundland. The Last Farewell tells the true story of a crew of logger-sailors who left their home port of Hare Bay aboard a two-masted schooner in early June of that year. Along her route to St. John’s, the crew of the Ethel Collett tell each other stories of life and death on the sea.

Rumrunners is a history of the smuggling trade between the French Island colonies of St. Pierre and Miquelon and the United States, the Bahamas, and Newfoundland. The distribution of contraband alcohol has always been an element of the culture of Newfoundland and Labrador. However, with the advent of the American Prohibition era (1919–1933), the French Islands’ illegal practice took on worldwide proportions.

From the “Newfie Bullet” to the SS Kyle to Amelia Earhart, Getting Around the Rock is a fascinating history of the transportation sector, largely in pre-Confederation Newfoundland and Labrador. These recollections were passed on to the author by his father, Raymond Lahey, and his uncle, Bill Lahey, who spent their working lives as telegraph operators in the changing times of transportation in the province.

The history of Bell Island, Newfoundland, is an amazing one of a strong and courageous people who overcame the challenge of creating a community exposed to the mighty North Atlantic Ocean. Bell Island: Dawn of First Light covers the first permanent European settlers who were attracted to the rich soil of the island and to the fish in the surrounding waters.

Although primarily associated with filling doctors' prescriptions and selling medicines and other items for self-care, historically drugstores have also been operated as general stores, selling an intriguing range of toiletries, perfumery, confectionery, seeds for the garden, and household items. For many years, the shopping experiences of customers owed a good deal to the distinctive drugstore aura created by a store's elegant wooden fixtures, rows of attractive glass containers, and a characteristic aroma arising from drugs and the preparations compounded on the premises.