-
Lester Giffin was a private with the 85th Battalion at the Battle of Vimy Ridge in 1917. In the years after that momentous battle, he felt its importance hadn’t been recognized by the general public, and in 1982, at the age of 89, he decided... -
After Confederation, the West was being transformed. A railway was being built, uniting the country but displacing both the bison and the First Nations. Soldiers and settlers were arriving. Louis Riel was trying to gather support for his rebellion. In 1879, Crowfoot, chief of the... -
On Dec. 5, 1952, Andrew Robert MacKenzie was flying over North Korea in his F-86 Sabre jet when he experienced hydraulic problems. He was at 42,000 feet, in a firefight with enemy MiG jets when he was hit. “Before I could take any evasive action,... -
I too was a commander who set out on what I thought was an exciting adventure,” Romeo Dallaire writes in Waiting for First Light: My Ongoing Battle with PTSD, “only to bear witness to the most terrible horrors on earth.” It is a familiar story, one first heard in... -
In 1864, John A. Macdonald, along with George Brown, D’Arcy McGee and Alexander Galt, sailed to Charlottetown to convince the maritime colonies to join Confederation. On board was $13,000 worth of champagne to smooth negotiations. “Whether as a result of our eloquence or the goodness... -
Canada was formed by a combination of hope and fear; hope that something great could be created in the wilderness, and fear of American imperialism and Fenian raiders. At 150, we are no longer young, but compared to our aging parents (England is 1,146 years...
O Canada: Moon legs
What was the first thing to touch the moon’s surface on July 20, 1969? Before Neil Armstrong stepped onto the lunar surface with the words, “That’s one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind,” the Canadian-made legs of the lunar landing module settled into the dust of the moon. The legs...
