Share:

Resources: Investing in preservation

Encountering the Wild

Photo: Encountering the Wild

By

Ontario Heritage Trust

Tools for conservation

Published Date: May 31, 2011

Stanley Barracks: Toronto’s Military Legacy, by Aldona Sendzikas

Dundurn Press. Stanley Barracks begins with the construction in 1840-41 of the new facility that replaced the then decaying Fort York Barracks. The book recounts the background of the last facility operated by the British military in Toronto and how Canada’s own Permanent Force was developed.

During the course of the stories told in this history, we learn about Canadian participation in war, including the two world wars and the barracks’ use as an internment camp for “enemy aliens”; civil-military relations as Toronto’s expansion encroached on the lands and buildings of the barracks; the establishment and growth of Toronto’s Canadian National Exhibition; the struggles and discrimination faced by immigrants in Canada in wartime; the employment of the barracks as emergency housing during Toronto’s post-war housing shortage; and the origins of Canada’s famed Royal Canadian Mounted Police. In short, Stanley Barracks is the story of Toronto.

Encountering the Wild, by Carol Bennett McCuaig

Dundurn Press. Poison Acres, 250 acres of wilderness in Renfrew County, Ontario, long dedicated to the preservation of natural habitat, has been home to nature writer Carol Bennett McCuaig for many years. Her keen powers of observation, coupled with her insights into wildlife behaviour and her evocative writing style, have produced this captivating collection of stories.

Whether noting the courtship rituals of turkey vultures and red foxes or finding a black bear on her roof, an ermine in her bedroom, and a cougar on her lawn, Carol is always surrounded by the delights and challenges of living in a wilderness setting. Even night visitors bring joy, including flying squirrels at the bird feeder, a whippoorwill peering in a window, and a midnight standoff between a porcupine and a skunk.

Encountering the Wild is a delightful book that will appeal to country lovers in Canada and beyond.