Who Has Seen the Wind Comes Home To Alberta

In November 2022, Calgary’s Freehand Books is launching a new edition of Mitchell’s classic novel commemorating its 75th anniversary.

Set in Saskatchewan, but written, edited, celebrated, and defended in Alberta. I loved revisiting W. O. Mitchell’s prairie classic and discovering its many connections to the province. Read my latest feature for Read Alberta here. And Eric Volmers’ article in the Calgary Herald here.

City of Romance: the Literary World of 1920s Calgary

The Calgary Atlas Project has released its newest map charting the city’s surprising history – this one exploring the exuberant and little-known literary world of 1920s Calgary.

I’m thrilled to have my research and text interpreted by Calgary artist Eveline Kolijn. The magical art deco-inspired bookcase Eveline has created is a visual feast complete with local literary treasures.

Thanks to Jim Ellis, director of the University of Calgary’s Institute for the Humanities, who shepherded the project, and Glenn Mielke for his graphic design.

If you’d like to purchase a copy of the map, check the Calgary Atlas Project website for a list of local distributors.

In the meantime, here’s a taste of the map to whet your appetite…

“A captivating and diverse cast of literary personalities called 1920s Calgary home, including a Chinese-Canadian novelist who made her name masquerading as Japanese, a mixed-race writer from North Carolina who fashioned a Blackfoot identity, and an Icelandic-Canadian bent on literary fame. Here lived a crusading feminist fiction writer, a car-crazy war correspondent, a policeman-novelist, and a posse of pioneering female journalists pursuing success. Many of these characters and other city writers were enjoying international acclaim.

In an era of city building after a world war and pandemic, the literary scene was booming. Writers and others saw Calgary as a “City of Romance” — a storied landscape rich with literary inspiration. Novelist Winnifred Reeve noted in 1923: “something more valuable than oil may spring from our wells.” In a small city of sixty-five thousand far from the country’s cultural centre, writers were making a literary world here. Their enterprise took effort, optimism and bravado. This map tells that forgotten story.”

— City of Romance: The Literary World of 1920s Calgary

Here’s one of Eveline’s sketches… Onoto Watanna aka Winnifred Eaton Reeve, a real-life literary character living in 1920s Calgary.

Towards an Elbow Park Reading List

Here are the books (and a couple of websites) I mentioned on my literary walk for Historic Calgary Week 2022 and Jane’s Walk 2023. Happy reading! You can find a map of a few of the sites on my Elbow Park walk below.

Elbow Park History

Max Foran, Calgary: Canada’s Frontier Metropolis: An Illustrated History (1982)

David Mittelstadt, A Social History of Elbow Park (2000)

Flos Jewell Williams

New Furrows (1926)

Fold Home (1950)

Carole Gerson et al, Hearing More Voices: English Canadian Women in Print and on the Air, 1914-1960 (2020)

Mary E. Waagen

The Wayside Cross (1924)

Laura Goodman Salverson

The Viking Heart (1923)

Confessions of an Immigrant’s Daughter (1939); (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2023)

P. K. Page

The Hidden Room, Volumes One & Two (1997)

Hand Luggage: A Memoir in Verse (2006)

Sandra Djwa, Journey with No Maps: A Life of P. K. Page (2012)

Chief Buffalo Child Long Lance (aka Sylvester Long)

Chief Buffalo Child Long Lance, Long Lance: The Autobiography of a Blackfoot Chief (1928)

Donald B. Smith, Chief Buffalo Child Long Lance: The Glorious Imposter (1999)

Karina Vernon, ed., The Black Prairie Archives: An Anthology (2020)

Charles W. Peterson

Fruits of the Earth: A Story of the Canadian Prairies (1928)

David C. Jones, “Ruminations of a Rustic: C. W. Peterson,” in Citymakers: Calgarians After the Frontier, Max Foran & Sheilagh Jameson, eds. (1987)

Winnifred Eaton Reeve (aka Onoto Watanna)

Cattle (1923), (Invisible Publishing, 2023); His Royal Nibs (1924)

Diana Birchall, Onoto Watanna: The Story of Winnifred Eaton (2001)

The Winnifred Eaton Archive, https://winnifredeatonarchive.org

 Check out the “Onoto Watanna’s Cattle at 100” conference being held in Calgary in July 2023 in conjunction with Historic Calgary Weeky.ca/historic-calgary-week.

Karen Gosbee

A Perfect Nightmare: My Glittering Marriage and How It Almost Cost Me My Life (Sutherland House, 2020)

We'll Meet Again – Historic Calgary Week 2022

I’m excited to be part of Calgary’s week-long local history celebration this summer, with an in-person literary walk in Elbow Park on July 27, 2022. I’m also happy to share my enthusiasm for Historic Calgary Week with LiveWire Calgary. You can find more details about Historic Calgary Week 2022 here.