July 12, 1999

View Full Issue Table of Contents

Life

The Long March West

Growing up in the small town of Hartney in the southwest corner of Manitoba, Grant Little believed that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police “hung the moon.” Intrigued by the romantic history of the force, he always wanted to be a Mountie, and after graduating from the University of Manitoba 20 years ago, he eagerly joined up. By Brian Bergman7 min

The Mail

I read “Canadas century: 25 events that shaped the country” (Cover, July 1) while on an airplane over central British Columbia. As I read about our soldiers’ great triumphs at Vimy Ridge and in Holland, I looked out the window and saw the mountains, lakes, farms and cities from where they came and for which they fought, and I nearly wept with pride.

Books

The timely wisdom of traditional tales

In the fall of 1900, John Swanton, a young American linguist and ethnographer, arrived on British Columbia’s Queen Charlotte Islands and found a great culture on the brink of extinction. On the shores of misty inlets, totem poles towered forlornly above abandoned cedar houses. By John Bemrose6 min

World

Digging up the horror

The object in Dr. Peter Markesteyn's rubber-gloved hand looks like a chunk of burned charcoal, the colour of wood ash, about the size and shape of a walnut. After rolling it around in his fingers for a moment, the Dutch-born pathologist, who has just retired as Manitoba’s chief medical examiner, finally issues a pronouncement. By Barry Came5 min

Opening Notes

The sky was gun-metal grey and the breeze off the harbour carried a salty tang. That much, at least, seemed familiar to the Second World War veterans, war brides, evacuees and long-ago refugees who made the pilgrimage to Halifax on Canada Day. By Tanya Davies5 min

July 51999