Research and writing of a history of Toronto’s Baby Point neighbourhood, site of the reputed Old Mill Bridge.
Continue readingBaby Point Heritage Conservation District Study
When the wind picked up
Acrylic on canvas
LGBT hockey players open up about homophobia in youth sports
“MacPhail remembers the exact moment when he reconnected with the little boy who loved the feel of the wind on his face when he skated hard, the dash for the puck in the corner and the joy of scoring goals as the hard earned reward of teamwork.”
New book traces the growth of lesbian community in Canada
“In the 1960s women began to come out, create community and love openly”
The Body Politic, fortieth anniversary exhibition
A public history exhibition to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of The Body Politic.
Continue readingIndian Shaker Church
For The Canadian Encyclopedia, I give an overview of the Indian Shaker Church, a religious movement from the 19th century that blended Christianity and Indigenous spirituality to birth a new religion.
The memorial to communism in Ottawa is a poor example of public history
In The Georgia Straight I argued that the proposed memorial to communism in Ottawa was a poor example of public history.
First and Second World War Education Guides
Research and writing of two 25 page guides on Canada’s involvement in the First and Second World Wars.
Continue reading“Whatever your lot was, that was your lot”: Chinese-Canadian Women at Work in the Vancouver Area, 1880-1945.”
To launch an exhibition at Access Art Gallery, I wrote a short essay describing the experiences of Chinese-Canadian working women in the period 1880-1945 in Vancouver. Beginning with a meditation at the Chinese Canadian War Monument on nationhood and belonging, I spiral outwards geographically and metaphorically into the realm of the lesser known stories. Original archival research completed at the Vancouver Public Library Special Collections and Multicultural History Society of Ontario.
“And bold and adventurous amazons they were”: Colonial encounters with LGBT Indigenous people in the Pacific Northwest fur-trade
For Active History I profiled a number of encounters between fur traders and Indigenous people who in our current understanding of sexuality would be termed “LGBTQI+”. For this piece, I completed original archival research at the