SaskBooks Reviews

Pulpits of the Past: A Record of Closed Lutheran Churches in Saskatchewan – up to 2003 by Lois Knudson Munholland Published by Three West Two South Books Review by Keith Foster $30.00 ISBN 0-9735234-0-9 In Pulpits of the Past, Lois Knudson Munholland shares the joys, sorrows, and hardships of everyday church life in rural Saskatchewan. She covers the full spectrum of births, baptisms, weddings, social events, and deaths as told through the histories of the province’s Lutheran churches that no longer exist. Compiling and documenting the material for this book was a massive undertaking for Knudson Munholland, one that almost became a lifelong project. She notes that, for most of their young lives, her children couldn’t even remember a time when she wasn’t working on this book. All the former churches cited in Pulpits of the Past are located in what is now the province of Saskatchewan. Not only have these churches closed, some of the communities are now ghost towns. Garden Valley Lutheran Church at Instow is just one of many examples. Sometimes services were held in homes until a church could be constructed. Services at Attica were conducted in the school, but only about twice a month. Two…

Thugs, Thieves & Outlaws: Alberta Crime Stories by Ryan Cormier Published by University of Regina Press Review by Keith Foster $19.95 ISBN 978-0-88977-300-4 In the decades before Canada abolished capital punishment, hanging was a popular mode of execution. It was not an efficient method. An executioner mistakenly cut down one man while he was still alive, with his neck grotesquely dislocated. As the young man struggled for breath in front of witnesses for another 12 minutes, prison officials discussed hanging him a second time. In the 40 chapters of Thugs, Thieves & Outlaws: Alberta Crime Stories, author Ryan Cormier describes many grisly crimes and their punishments. He explains that “good people can be fascinated by gruesome things.” A reporter for the Edmonton Journal, Cormier relies heavily on court transcripts, newspaper accounts, and his own notes. While acknowledging that “every crime has at least two sides,” he uses only the official version, the one sanctioned by the courts. Cormier’s book covers crimes in Alberta from 1870 to 2008. Many of the stories are ripped straight from the headlines, such as the murder of four RCMP officers at Mayerthorpe in 2005. Some stories seem beyond belief, like the banker who embezzled millions…

Potash: An Inside Account of Saskatchewan’s Pink Gold by John Burton Published by University of Regina Press Review by Keith Foster $34.95 ISBN 978-0-88977-314-1 When Rita MacNeil sang “Working Man” about “Men of the Deep,” she wasn’t referring to Saskatchewan’s potash miners, but she might just as well have been. Some of these mines are more than 3,000 feet underground, and at that depth, danger lurks. Rather than dealing with the dangers below, John Burton focuses on the threat above ground. He fears that Saskatchewan may lose this precious resource to privatization. The value of potash is reflected in his tantalizing subtitle, Pink Gold. Burton explores the history of potash production in Saskatchewan from its beginning in 1942 to the present. He knows what he’s talking about. As a close associate of NDP Premier Allan Blakeney and a former board member of the Crown-owned Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan, he’s in a position to provide the inside scoop. Burton claims that the aggressive potash development policy of Ross Thatcher’s Liberal government brought about a “crisis that almost brought the industry to its knees.” He notes, “There were even suggestions that some ministers and officials would be arrested if they entered the…

One Family’s War: The Wartime Letters of Clarence Bourassa, 1940-1944 (Second Edition) Edited by Rollie Bourassa Published by University of Regina Press Review by Keith Foster $34.95 ISBN 978-0-88977-320-2 One Family’s War: The Wartime Letters of Clarence Bourassa is a book that had to be written, a story that had to be told – and a story important enough to be retold. That’s why the University of Regina Press printed this second edition. The first edition sold out, and no one should be deprived of reading this fascinating first-hand account of a Saskatchewan hero in World War II. The story is told through the wartime letters of Clarence Bourassa, a lad from Lafleche, SK, who enlisted in the South Saskatchewan Regiment, leaving his wife Hazel and two young sons at home. He kept in touch by writing, almost daily, letters home. Clarence recounts both the drudgery and routine of army life, and the horror of combat. He also expresses the loneliness he felt being separated from his family. This 603-page book is supplemented with two dozen black and white photos of Clarence’s family and army life. A highlight of the book is Clarence’s firsthand account of his participation in the…

Settling Saskatchewan by Alan B. Anderson Published by University of Regina Press Review by Keith Foster $39.95 ISBN 978-0-88977-284-7 Who says you can’t judge a book by its cover? The evocative cover of Settling Saskatchewan – a photo of newly arrived immigrants crowding together on a railway siding – effectively conveys the theme of this book. Author Alan Anderson covers the full gamut of ethnic settlement – starting with First Nations people and Métis, to English, French, German, Scandinavian, Polish, Ukrainian, and Asian – from early days to the present. Some immigrant communities are well known, such as the English settlers of Cannington Manor and the Barr Colonists. Others, like the Patagonian Welsh from Argentina, are either unknown or forgotten. Pity. Their stories are worth telling. Many ethnic minorities, such as the Scottish crofters at Saltcoats, Oklahoma Blacks near Maidstone, and Old Colony Mennonites, settled in blocs for security or ethnic cohesiveness. These pockets formed a patchwork pattern throughout the province. Drawing on his research spanning four decades, Anderson packs a lot of very detailed data into his 485-page book. In addition to a list of sources at the end of each chapter, Settling Saskatchewan has endnotes, a bibliography, and…

Métis Soldiers of Saskatchewan: 1914-1953 by Cathy Littlejohn Published by Gabriel Dumont Institute Review by Keith Foster $25.00 ISBN 978-1-926795-10-2 They were there – at Vimy Ridge, Dieppe, Ortona in Italy, and Juno Beach on D-Day. In every major campaign of the First and Second World Wars and in a hundred skirmishes in Korea, Saskatchewan Métis soldiers were there, fighting for Canada. Their exploits are chronicled in Cathy Littlejohn’s Métis Soldiers of Saskatchewan: 1914-1953. Métis were readily accepted into the military because they already knew how to handle firearms and often brought certain skills useful in warfare. Littlejohn tells many of the stories in the soldiers’ own words, gleaned from transcripts in the Gabriel Dumont Institute. “My officer asked where I got the jug,” one Métis said, after crawling across no man’s land in the First World War. “I told him that I got it off the Germans in the frontline. He said that I had risked my life and they gave me a medal.” During the Second World War, Métis troops were among those captured when Hong Kong surrendered to the Japanese on Christmas Day, 1941. As prisoners of war, they endured near-starvation. One soldier was so hungry he…

Herstory 2014: The Canadian Women’s Calendar by The Saskatoon Women’s Calendar Collective Published by Coteau Books Reviewed by Jackie Blakely $15.95 ISBN 9781550505566 Herstory 2014: The Canadian Women’s Calendar offers a wonderful collection of stories highlighting the achievements of Canadian women throughout Canadian history. Each vignette in the calendar is crafted to bring to life each woman’s experience and influence, through thoughtful reflections on each of its subjects. From writers to artists and athletes, this compilation of women’s history is proof of the strength of Canadian women and their involvement in creating a great nation. This book is so much more than a functional calendar. It is a documentary of women’s stories that might otherwise be lost over time. Stories such as that of Annie Hanley, the first female council member in Nelson, British Columbia, a nurse, a teacher, a writer and a scholar, populate the pages and bring to life a Canadian history rich in feminine energy. The women profiled in the calendar come from all walks of life and various nationalities and backgrounds. Their impacts are felt from Canada’s historical inception to present day, and their stories are told to highlight their contributions. Stories are accompanied by photos…

Architecture of Saskatchewan: A Visual Journey, 1930-2011 by Bernard Flaman Published by University of Regina Press Review by Keith Foster $49.95 ISBN 978-0-88977-250-2 Saskatchewan is more than a land of living skies and gorgeous sunsets; it also comprises the buildings that dot our prairie landscape and adorn our cityscapes. Architecture of Saskatchewan: A Visual Journey covers the period from the 1930s to the new millennium as a companion volume to Historic Architecture of Saskatchewan, published in 1986, which focused on Saskatchewan’s early heritage buildings. An architect in the field of heritage conservation, Bernard Flaman wrote the introduction to each chapter and the text accompanying the photos. A man of few words, he introduces the chapters, then lets the photos speak for themselves. Flaman uses both black and white and colour images. He took many of the photos himself, supplemented by archival sources and other photographers. This 179-page hardcover coffee table book often shows multiple images of the same structures, displaying the changes or additions that have taken place over the years, or simply showing the buildings in different seasons or at different times of day. The photos create some strange images, especially if one adds a little imagination. The Saints…

Our Lamps Were Heavy by Eleanor A. Sinclair Published by DriverWorks Ink Review by Keith Foster $14.95 ISBN 978-0-9879643-3-5 A diary is a good thing to keep; you never know when it might come in handy. Eleanor Sinclair uses extracts from a diary she kept as a nurse in training as the basis for her book, Our Lamps Were Heavy. A retired registered nurse, Sinclair relates the sharp learning curve she experienced as a teen in the 1950s while in training at the Holy Family Hospital and School of Nursing in Prince Albert. She soon learned there was more to nursing than wearing a white uniform. This book is not for the squeamish. While assisting in a delivery, Sinclair witnessed both mother and baby die in childbirth. Then she had to carry the stillborn child to the morgue and clean it for burial. Her narrative slows somewhat when she uses medical terms, but is most lively when she quotes from her diary: “I copied doctor’s orders wrong today and had a baby girl to be circumcised tomorrow. Did I ever get teased.” Sinclair supplements her text with three dozen black and white photos taken while she was training. All the…

One Family’s War: The Wartime Letters of Clarence Bourassa, 1940-1944 Edited by Rollie Bourassa Published by Canadian Plains Research Center Review by Keith Foster $29.95 ISBN 978-0-88977-221-2 For the average soldier, war is mostly long periods of endless monotony, occasionally interrupted by spasms of sheer terror. This maxim is nowhere more clearly borne out than in One Family’s War: The Wartime Letters of Clarence Bourassa. As the title suggests, this really was a family war because it affected the entire family. By enlisting in the South Saskatchewan Regiment and being shipped overseas in 1940, Clarence had to leave his wife Hazel and two young sons, Rollie and Murray, back home at Lafleche, SK. Edited by his son Rollie, with an introduction by Regina Leader-Post reporter Will Chabun, these letters express Clarence’s abiding love for his wife and children, often with sentimental terms of endearment. Many of the letters are deeply personal. Right from the first, the reader can feel Clarence’s deep pangs of loneliness. And the further he got from his wife, the worse he felt: “I’m all alone in my tent with a great big lump in my throat, and I sure feel like crying.” Aside from letters, the…