Monthly Archives: January 2024

War graves, battlefield tours and Canadian Steve Douglas’ little shop of horrors

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An item from the Legion Magazine.
Front Lines
Front Lines

STEVE DOUGLAS COLLECTION/STEPHEN J. THORNE/LM

War graves, battlefield tours and Canadian Steve Douglas’s little shop of horrors

STORY BY STEPHEN J. THORNE

Two decades ago, a passion for the history of conflict brought Steve Douglas from London, Ont., to Ieper, Belgium, a mecca of First World War history where he has made a career running battlefield tours and a shop brimming with books and artifacts.

But at the heart of Douglas’ fervour is an epic endeavour he started long before he owned Salient Tours or the British Grenadier Bookshop in the medieval town once known as Ypres. It’s called the Maple Leaf Legacy Project, a 27-year-old effort to procure and post photographs of each and every Canadian war grave.

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Military Milestones
Military Milestones

CITIZEN SAILORS VIRTUAL CENOTAPH PROJECT

How Canadian volunteer sailors helped win the Battle of the Atlantic

STORY BY PAIGE JASMINE GILMAR

The Royal Canadian Navy Volunteer Reserve (RCNVR) was comprised of seafaring novices who not only helped to win the Battle of the Atlantic during the Second World War, but became a foundation for Canada’s present-day navy. Marking the 101th anniversary since its creation, the largely little-known history of the RCNVR is one of endurance and strength, which ultimately helped ensure western Europe’s survival during the war.

Rear-Admiral Walter Hose created the RCNVR on Jan. 31, 1923, a time when the Navy was dealing with drastic budget cuts. Hose, however, believed volunteers could be the force’s lifeblood, and established Naval Reserve Divisions in cities throughout Canada. The RCNVR’s utility was put to the test come September 1939.

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Tomorrow: Jewish identity in Quebec; URAP deadline extended

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An item from a fellow Canadian organization in the Bay Area.

Canadian Studies Announcements

In This Issue:

Program News

  • URAP deadline extended to noon tomorrow

Upcoming Events

  • Negotiating the “Double-Minded Vocabulaire”: Montreal’s Jewish Communities and Contemporary Quebec
  • Slavery and Self-Emancipation in Colonial Canada

External Events

  • Eco Ensemble: The Music of Cindy Cox
  • Homelessness in Canada: A Complex Policy and Governance Landscape

PROGRAM NEWS
URAP Application Deadline Extended

Extended Deadline: Tuesday, January 30, 12 pm

The deadline for Canadian Studies’ student assistant position has been extended to noon tomorrow. We’ll begin interviewing this week, so this is your last chance to help teach other Berkeley undergrads about Canada!

This position is organized through the Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program (URAP), and will give an undergraduate student the chance to work with our program director, Dr. Richard A. Rhodes, and program staff on preparing teaching materials in preparation for a future DeCal course on Canada. Students will be able to develop research and synthesis skills while learning how to construct a course of their own.

This position will work closely with faculty, graduate students, and program staff on a variety of tasks, including writing, researching, and assisting with Program events. The student’s interests will shape specific project outcomes. A living stipend may be offered depending on time commitment and specific work required.

Students will be expected to be available about 3-5 hours per week, and should have strong writing and research skills as well as a basic knowledge of Canada. Interested students should click here to learn more about anticipated tasks and qualifications.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Negotiating the “Double-Minded Vocabulaire”: Montreal’s Jewish Communities and Contemporary Quebec

Tues., January 30 | 12:30 pm | 223 Philosophy Hall | RSVP

Montreal’s 90,000-strong Jewish community presents unique features that differentiate it from the Jewish populations of other North American cities. Even those aspects that it shares – a large Ashkenazic immigration in the early 20th century, broad and successful upward mobility, and the development of strong educational, cultural, and service institutions – have been achieved in a city once divided by language, religion, and geography (the English-speaking, largely Protestant business west versus the French-speaking, overwhelmingly Catholic proletarian and lower middle-class east), now a secular, multicultural metropolis whose official language is French but with the highest rate of citizens who speak at least three languages of any North American city. The departure of many Ashkenazic Jews in the 1970s and 80s in the face of the Quebec independence movement has been partially offset by the arrival, since the 1950s, of Sephardic Jews, at first from North Africa, and more recently from Israel and France. At the same time, Montreal received one of the world’s largest populations of Holocaust survivors and has become a world center for Hasidic Judaism.

Today, Montreal Jewish institutions speak increasingly of the city’s Jewish communities, in recognition of this remarkable internal diversity. How do these developments challenge the vision and missions of Montreal’s historical Jewish institutions? How is the question of Jewish identity in Montreal shaped by the concern in Quebec for the flourishing of the French language and the codification into law of a concept of laïcité, or secularism, more in line with European views than with the prevailing notions of multiculturalism in North America? How do Montreal’s Jewish communities articulate their identities and sentiments of belonging in response to the range of ways, variously inclusive and exclusive, that Quebec identity is asserted in the linguistic, cultural, and political spheres?

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Dr. Robert Schwartzwald is a professor in the Département de littératures et de langues du monde at the Université de Montréal, where he directed the graduate certificate program in Jewish studies from 2016-2022. He received his M.A. in comparative literature from the University of Toronto, and a Ph.D. in Québécois literature from Université Laval. His publications explore interfaces between literary and national articulations of modernity with special attention to issues of sexual representation and intercultural relations. He is a former editor of the International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes and a recipient of the Governor-General’s International Award for Canadian Studies.

This event is cosponsored by the Center for Jewish Studies and Department of French.

Slavery and Self-Emancipation in Colonial Canada

Tues., Feb. 13 | 12:30 pm | 223 Philosophy Hall | RSVP

The US-Canada border played a central role in the history of slavery in North America. Yet, while Canada is remembered chiefly as a haven for those fleeing slavery in the United States via the Underground Railroad during the mid-nineteenth century, it is less well known that many people enslaved in colonial Canada during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries gained their freedom by crossing the border into the United States. Early Canadian and American anti-slavery laws did remarkably little to free people enslaved within their respective jurisdictions. But their enactment – and the proximity of a permeable border between rival regimes – afforded an unprecedented opportunity to enslaved men, women, and children. Laws on both sides of the Great Lakes inadvertently established free spaces, where fugitives from the opposite side could find sanctuary. By passing from one jurisdiction to another, enslaved individuals could exploit competing slavery laws and emancipate themselves simply by crossing the border, a development that destabilized and ultimately destroyed chattel slavery in the borderlands.

In this talk, Dr. Gregory Wigmore will provide a broad overview of slavery in early Canada, especially in the Great Lakes region. His talk will explain how both slaveholders and the enslaved, along with British and American authorities, responded to the emergence of the new Canadian-American border after the American Revolution. While slaveholders in Upper Canada (now Ontario) begged the colonial government to help them protect their valuable human property, their enslaved laborers were among the first people in North America to understand the political significance of the new international boundary, using it as a portal to freedom.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Dr. Gregory Wigmore is a lecturer in the Department of History at Santa Clara University. He received his B.A. in journalism and history from Carleton University, and his Ph.D. in history from UC Davis. His research and teaching focus on the intersection of social and political history and foreign relations, especially the role of frontiers and borders. His article, “Before the Railroad: From Slavery to Freedom in the Canadian-American Borderland”, received the Bernath Prize from the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations and the Ontario Historical Society’s Riddell Award. He is currently working on a book manuscript based on his dissertation, “The Limits of Empire: Allegiance, Opportunity, and Imperial Rivalry in the Canadian-American Borderland.”

EXTERNAL EVENTS

Eco Ensemble: The Music of Cindy Cox

Saturday, February 3 | 8:00 pm | Hertz Hall | Buy tickets

UC Berkeley’s acclaimed ensemble in residence pays tribute Music Department faculty member and eminent composer Cindy Cox, whose compositions are inspired by the invisible laws of nature. The program presents a kaleidoscopic portrait of Cox’s chamber music over several decades, including 2014’s Hishuk ish ts’ awalk (All Things are One), a piece for clarinet, strings, and piano, inspired by the rainforest and native inhabitants of Canada’s Pacific Rim National Park Reserve. “Her music…is always buoyant, puckish, rhythmically alive and crisply engaging” (San Francisco Chronicle). Tickets are available through Cal Performances.

Homelessness in Canada: A Complex Policy and Governance Landscape

Thursday, February 8 | 12:00 pm | Online | RSVP

Western Washington University’s Center for Canadian-American Studies invites you to the inaugural talk of their new series, “Populations Rendered ‘Surplus’ in Canada”. Anna Kopec, an assistant professor at the School of Public Policy and Administration at Carleton University, will discuss the challenges in addressing the homelessness crisis in Canada. Homelessness includes a complex policy landscape that requires integrated and cooperative policy approaches. Unfortunately, Canada’s current approach often includes fragmented and siloed responses that lead to a patchwork of services and policies. Using comparative findings from Melbourne, Australia, and Toronto, this interactive seminar will present the effects of Canada’s current policies and assert the need for integrated, collaborative responses.

This talk is sponsored by the WWU Center for Canadian-American Studies, The Ray Wolpow Institute, and the Foundation for WWU & Alumni.

Canadian Studies Program

213 Philosophy Hall #2308

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Canadian Studies Program | Univ. of California, Berkeley, 213 Philosophy Hall #2308, Berkeley, CA 94720

How Do You Live With Purpose?

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An item from the Wreaths Across America organization.

MMHeader

Dear Michael Barbour,

We’re excited to announce our 2024 theme, “Live with Purpose.” Over the course of the last year, and then especially on the escort to Arlington last December, I listened to people who had gone through great adversity.
WAA_MasterLogo_LiveWithPurpose_FINAL

They’d taken that adversity and turned it around as a call to action to spend the rest of their lives making sure that every day was meaningful and that they lived purposefully. For me, to live with purpose is a mindset. You can read more about our 2024 theme here, or listen to my interview on Wreaths Radio here.

 

With gratitude,

Karen Worcester
Sponsor Wreaths

Wreaths Across America Radio: Listen Live
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Since September 2022, Wreaths Across America Radio has added 39 new veteran-related partners to our lineup!

Read more about our programming below, or click here to listen to Wreaths Across America Radio.
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Available Now: Black History Month Lesson Plans

February is Black History Month, and Wreaths Across America has curriculum available for learners of all ages. From Rosa Parks and Ruby Bridges to the Buffalo Soldiers, there’s something for everyone!

 

View all of our educational resources here or download specific lesson plans below.
Black History Month Lesson Plan
Kindergarten
First Grade
Grades 2-3

Find the Mobile Education Exhibit in Your Community
Mobile Education Exhibit MEE

The Mobile Education Exhibit will be in North Carolina and South Carolina in February! This unique museum on wheels not only teaches the next generation about service and sacrifice, it also shares stories of patriotism and love of country.
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Wreaths Across America Honors “The Four Chaplains”

On Saturday, Feb. 3, 2024, Wreaths Across America will pay tribute to the indomitable spirit of American heroes, ‘The Four Chaplains,’ and commemorate the bravery displayed during the U.S.A.T. Dorchester incident. Join us for a special Facebook live event.
four chaplains
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Featured Merchandise
Calendar

The Wreaths Across America 2024 calendar features beautiful pictures and special dates each month.
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Sponsor Wreaths

Make sure to follow Wreaths Across America official channels on social media for the most up-to-the-minute news on the mission throughout the year:

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Wreaths Across America, PO Box 249, Columbia Falls, ME 04623, United States, 877-385-9504

Military history and remembrance learning resources for January 2024 / Histoire militaire et ressources d’apprentissage du Souvenir pour janvier 2024

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An item from Veterans Affairs Canada that may be of interest to members and their families.