Gazetteer and Business Directory, Canada 1930

A wonderful book with a truly misleading original title. Of the almost 2000 pages in this book the gazetteer takes up 70 while the rest are devoted to a wonderfully complete directory of Canadian businesses and professional people and their advertising.
This is a great resource in a Country where early directories are so scarce.

Both the gazetteer and the Business Directory are indexed by Province but the Business Directory is also sub-indexed by trade or profession. So, if you are looking for someone who was a Grocer in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan you can go straight to the alphabetized list of 71 candidates, most of who were trading under their own name rather than under a company name.
In fact the vast majority of the businesses listed were named for the owner including, of course, the professional listings for Physicians, Veterinarians, Barristers, Insurance Agents, etc.

To help you Archive CD Books (Canada) have included the OCR'ed search layer behind the page images as usual.
You should note, however, that this book is so crammed with information, the very small, close packed, type used has meant that the recognition process was not up to the standard Archive CD Books (Canada) have come to expect.
Search success rates should still be in the high 90% range but a human search is strongly recommended if the computer search doesn't find your information right away.

A really good trade directory for the whole of Canada in 1930 with a bonus of a very detailed gazetteer for each Province in the Dominion and Newfoundland which would not be confederated until 1949. Notably missing are any listings for the North West territories, surprising in view of it's population of about 9,000 compared to the Yukon's population of about 4,000 which has generated a listing of over half a page.Another one for the must have list.

On Canada's Frontier - 1892

Sketches of History, Sport, Adventure, Indians, Missionaries, Fur-Traders and Newer Settlers in Western Canada.This book originated as a series of articles for Harper's Magazine designed to bring the frontier experience to the Eastern townsfolk of the US.
It records a number of adventures - over a three year period - and brings us a glimpse of backwoods life before it was changed forever by the advance of "civilization."
The author, Julian Ralph, records his experience of the people he encounters, both those of European and of First Nations origins, as well as that of their life and surroundings.
While the adventures are ostensibly about huntin', shootin' and fishin' trips the real value of the writing is in the authors impressions and reactions to what he encounters along the way. He describes the lives of the Indian's and their social organization as much as he does that of the woodsmen hunters and trappers, the voyageurs, the coureur du bois, the Hudson's Bay factors (agents) and, in the fledgling British Columbia, the "gang" workers on the railroads and those who followed the call of the gold strike.

Julian manages to work the essential details into his narrative as well, so this book also provides many facts, in particular on the history, growth and importance of the Hudson's Bay Company. He gives detailed descriptions of how the company traded with the hunters and trappers and it's reaction to the few rival organizations such as the Northwest Company.

The value of this book is greatly enhanced by the numerous (70) engraved illustrations supporting the narrative. Even better many of these illustrations are credited to Frederic Remington, the famous US artist who's powerful images of the "West" eventually bought him to worldwide popularity.
Remington worked for many years as an illustrator for Harper's Magazines and numerous other well know US periodicals. In later life he turned to sculpture and his bronzes have become immensely popular. As well as his illustrations he painted thousands of pictures in his life time. His fame stems partly from his accuracy and for his literal images which rendered his observations as good as photographic images.
On the other hand his work is unmistakable in that for all the realism he manages to bring a sense of drama and tension to his work which the camera can rarely capture.

The whole of the 325 page book has been formatted for text searches using the "Search" features of the freely available PDF interpreter programs such a Adobe Readerª.

The CD is useable with any computer with a CD drive and which can run a PDF interpreter application. We recommend Adobe Readerª V4 or later for maximum compatibility.

History of the 31st Canadian Infantry Battalion C.E.F., Nov. 1914 to June 1919.

Archive CD Books (Canada) are taking the publication date of 1938 for this wonderful military history from the date on the foreword.

The author or, as he styles himself, the Compiler and Assembler, Maj. H. C. Singer, ably assisted by Mr. A. A. Peebles, has left us a document which will at once satisfy both the military strategist and those looking to understand the personal experiences of this group of fighting Canadians.

This is the story of the the 31st. Battalion, otherwise known as the Alberta Regiment, which was raised in November 1914 as a component of the 6th Canadian Infantry Brigade, one third of the 2nd. Canadian Division of the Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF.)Starting from the assignment of Lieut.-Col. A. H. Bell as the commanding officer the narrative follows the recruitment in the main centers of Calgary and Edmonton as well as in many smaller towns across southern Alberta, the training both in Canada and in England and finally sees the Brigade landing in France and taking its place at the front. The list of battles in which the Battalion took an active part reads like a litany of the most famous and horrific of this Great War. Names like Flanders, Ypres and the Salient, the Somme, Vimy Ridge, Passchendaele, Amiens and Arras, still raise pictures of the horror of this war some 90 years after it took place.

Through the almost 450 pages of the narrative of this book Maj. Singer manages to give us a remarkable picture of both the strategic progress and a highly personal account of what it was like to be a soldier struggling to stay alive. in addition to the narrative there are numerous contemporary photographs showing the condition of the battlefield as well as in some of the trenches.

To enable the reader to better follow the progress of the battles from the narrative there are also 8 detailed maps showing the topography and troop dispositions.The book is completed with 68 pages of appendices containing lists of the Battalion's statistics, probably the most important of these being a nominal roll of the entire Battalion giving service numbers, names, casualty status and honors.It is hard to do justice to a book like this in such a short review but if you know of anyone who was a part of this Battalion you owe it to yourself to read this book so you know what they went through in the service of their country.

The complete book has been OCR'd so that its text can be searched by your computer. Altogether, 515 high quality scanned pages in our normal PDF format.

This great book has been loaned to Archive CD Books (Canada) by Marc Leroux. Marc has joined Chris Wight to undertake the mammoth task of making a biographical database of all the Canadians who took part in The Great War.
This work will be underway for a long time, but the current data base contents have been made available and can be found at: http://www.canadianGreatWarProject.com

Please visit their site so they know their work is being appreciated.

History of Saskatchewan and its People - Complete in 3 Volumes

Written by John Hawkes and first published in 1924, this work of over 2000 pages was originally bound as three volumes, but organized into two subject areas.

The whole of vol. 1 and a good part of vol. 2 contains the 'story' of Saskatchewan while the remainder of vol. 2 and the whole of vol. 3 is packed with the biographies of about 660 prominent Saskatchewans, and more than 50 photographic portraits.
The 'story' section is also illustrated with over 235 photographs of subjects such as early dwellings and settlements, people, natural history, and many fascinating early photographs of native people and their ceremonies.Here you can find the whole story of Saskatchewan. The early story of this province is inescapably intertwined with that of the other administration districts initially named the North-West Territories. This vast tract included all the lands between the Ontario border and the Province of British Columbia and up to the pole (except Alaska.)
While this book concentrates on Saskatchewan it contains much of the stories of the rest of the 'Territories.'The author says. "It should be understood that this book is in no proper sense of the word a 'history.' It is not intended for the student or the investigator but for the average man."

John went out of his way to find the stories of the early pioneers and settlers, including those of the native people already living on the prairies when the 'white man' arrived. Within this 'story' you will find many first hand accounts of early adventure - and misadventure, hardship and triumph.
Almost one and a half of these three volumes are filled with biographies submitted for publication by the subjects, or by friends.
This work is a rich treasure trove for genealogists and historians. Of special interest to anyone seeking the experience of early Saskatchewan are the recounted tales of the original settlers and pioneers which John has used as a part of the rich "story" section.

The whole of the book has been formatted for searches using Adobe Reader or similar application, and enhanced with FastFind technology so that search results can be presented almost instantaneously.

Presbyterian Pioneer Missionaries

Presbyterian Pioneer Missionaries in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. This book was authored (although edited might be a more accurate description) by the Rev. Hugh McKellar, D.D. in 1924.
In his introduction the Rev. Hugh makes it clear that he was motivated to make a permanent record of the pioneer missionaries who helped to carry the Presbyterian ministries into the developing prairie and western provinces of Canada.
The Rev. Hugh does not lay any claim to the completeness of his record but to judge from the listing of ministers and missionaries sent into the western provinces included in the rear of the book it would appear to be quite exhaustive.
The reason Archive CD Books (Canada) use the term "editor" rather than "author" is that many of the later biographies and reminiscences are attributed to other writers, either in answer to Rev. Hugh's inquiries, or in writing about the subjects for other purposes, i.e., church reports.

Many of the written reports are accompanied by photographs - or in a couple of instances - drawings - of the subjects, sometimes including their spouses and occasionally showing the buildings from which they conducted their ministry.Clearly the primary reason for inclusion in this book is work done in the provinces from Manitoba westward but so many of these individuals had previously established ministries in the east and so the book also includes much of the personal history of the Presbyterian church personnel in Ontario, Quebec and the Atlantic provinces.
While the book is primarily about the lives of the missionaries their stories are inextricably bound up with the story of the development of the Canadian west so that the reader will find this is also a history of the settlement of western Canada starting with the idealistic settlement along the Red River, championed by Lord Selkirk - the source of so much political wrangling and violence.
A valuable resource both for its personal histories and as a guide to the early history of the Canadian west.

Fully computer searchable with searches speeded up by the use of FastFind technology.