Begun as a social experiment in 1937, Air Canada has evolved into one of the world’s greatest airlines.Air Canada: The History explores a modern miracle that has made commercial air travel in our country an everyday occurrence. The airline was born in 1937 as "Trans Canada Airlines," a ward of the Canadian National Railway. Renamed "Air Canada" in 1964 to reflect its status as a jet-age airline, it survived devastating air crashes, financial deficits, self-serving politici...

Why do planes disappear or fall out of the sky? Brace for Impact traces the evolution of accident investigation and explains why flying is the safest form of travel.The history of air accidents is a harrowing one. Yet today flying is the safest mode of transportation, thanks in no small part to the work of crash detectives. Whenever a plane falls from the sky, the investigators pick through the wreckage for the clues they need to decipher what happened to ...

The riveting history of how aircraft have transformed the fighting of wildfires.Throughout history, when threatened by wildfires our only defense was to pray for rain and run — until aircraft changed the way we fight fires. Beginning with the Canadian “H-Boats” in 1924, aircraft have become indispensable in detecting and extinguishing wildfires. Fire Eaters tells the incredible stories of the Ontario Provincial Air Service, the first government aerial fire...

Among the many technological advances of this century that have shrunk our country, few have had as great an impact as aviation. Technologies evolve and national priorities change, but the qualities necessary to design aircraft, fly them in war and peace, and manage airlines remain constant. In this, his second book about pioneers of Canadian aviation, Peter Pigott brings a richness and understanding of the individuals themselves to the reader.Flying Canucks II takes us in...

It has been said that Canada is a country with too much geography and too little history. Afghanistan has too much of both. As the war escalates in Afghanistan, more Canadians are asking what we are doing there. For a country that has specialized in peacekeeping, this war is a shock one that we have not yet comprehended. As the casualties mount, Canadians will want to know why we are there.Canada in Afghanistan introduces readers to Afghans and their culture, gives histori...

From the eccentric Fairey Battle to the lethal-looking CF-18, from modern airliners that have no defects (and no character) to the classic North Star (which had both), here is the ultimate line-up of the aircraft that have served Canadians in the last century. With over one hundred photographs of fifty historic planes, Wings Across Canada is a retrospective of Canada’s aeronautical technology. This book does not compare the planes, nor claim that all are "classics" in the traditio...

Under Canadian Pacific's red-and-white-checkered flag, the company's founders, George Stephen and William C. Van Horne, created a rail-sea service from Liverpool to Hong Kong. Boasting sternwheelers, Great Lakes bulk carriers, ferries, and luxurious ocean-going liner leviathans, the Canadian Pacific shipping line sailed around the globe. In both world wars the entire fleet served gallantly as Allied troop carriers. After the Second World War, the company staved off the realities of the jet...

Flying Canucks tells the fascinating story of aviation in Canada through this collection of 37 biographies of important aviators in our nation’s history.As early as 1908, having read the Wright brothers’ invention, Alberta farm boys and mechanics in Quebec villages were constructing large kites, attempting to fly them. Within a decade, Canadian air aces, like Bishop and Barker, swept the wartime skies over Frances, piloting deadly machines in mortal combat. Through the 20s...

Is the Canadian North a state of mind or simply the lands and waters above the 60th parallel? In searching for the ill-fated Franklin Expedition in the 19th century, Britain's Royal Navy mapped and charted most of the Arctic Archipelago. In 1874 Canadian Prime Minister Alexander Mackenzie agreed to take up sovereignty of all the Arctic, if only to keep the United States and Tsarist Russia out. But as the dominion expanded east and west, the North was forgotten. Besides a few industries, it...

The conveyance of royalty, whether to Balmoral or Buffalo, by Rolls Royce or Canadian Pacific train, has its own mysterious traditions and protocols. With dry humour and a keen sense of history, Peter Pigott describes how the British royal family has adapted to technological innovations. Organized thematically, the book is packed with well-researched details. We know all about the royal family’s lives, especially their romances and scandals, but do we know who was the first monarch to driv...

Be prepared to soar! Whether you are an aviation enthusiast, history buff, or air traveller, dont miss the third in a series of photo essays on aviation in Canada, covering almost 100 years of flight by Canadians. Dramatic visuals accompany each step of aviations advances, from Canadas first military aircraft to Billy Bishops Nieuport, from the earliest bush planes to the beginnings of passenger travel. This comprehensive history showcases 50 aircraft. Whether famous or forgotten, all were...

It is a cruel irony of history that as we celebrate the centenary of flight on December 17, 2003, aviation is in a tailspin and airlines are disappearing in Canada. Yet flight itself remains one of humanity’s most spectacular triumphs, and Canada especially has much to be proud of. Contained within these covers is a complex portrait of Canadian aviation, from the Silver Dart to the Cormorant. Packed with photographs as colourful as the details that accompany them, it bursts with unforgetta...