Daniel Francis (born 19 April 1947) is a Canadian historian and writer. He has published thirty books, chiefly about Canadian, British Columbian and Vancouver history, on a broad range of subjects, from the Canadian fur trade and prohibition to the history of whaling, transportation and Indigenous peoples.
In 2017 he received the Governor General's History Award for Popular Media: the Pierre Berton Award, called Canada's top honour in the field of history and heritage. [1] In 2014 the City of Vancouver awarded him the Mayor's Arts Award for Literary Arts. [2] In 2010 Francis received an award of merit from the Vancouver Historical Society for his contributions to the history of the city and the province. [3]
His biography of L. D. Taylor, an early mayor of Vancouver, [4] won the 2004 City of Vancouver Book Award. [5] His book on the history of killer whales on the Pacific Coast, Operation Orca (Harbour), written with marine biologist Gil Hewlett, [6] won the Foreword Magazine prize for best nature book of 2007. [7]
The Encyclopedia of British Columbia (Harbour 2000), [8] which he edited and wrote the majority of, has been called “the most essential book for and about B.C.” In 2001 it won two awards at the annual British Columbia Book Prizes. [9]
Francis was born in Vancouver in 1947 and educated at Lord Byng High School. After graduating with a BA from the University of British Columbia in 1969, he became a newspaper reporter at the Medicine Hat New in Medicine Hat, AB and the Ottawa Journal in Ottawa, ON. He obtained a master's degree from the Institute of Canadian Studies at Ottawa's Carleton University in 1975 and began a career as a freelance historical researcher and writer. In 1984 he moved to Montreal to become editor of Horizon Canada, a bilingual, weekly magazine of Canadian history. [10] When that project concluded in 1987 he returned with his family to the West Coast where he has lived ever since. [11]
For several years he contributed a regular column on books to the literary quarterly Geist. [12] He continues to serve as editor of the online Encyclopedia of British Columbia. [13] In 2016 he wrote Where Mountains Meet the Sea: An Illustrated History of the District of North Vancouver (Harbour), which was published to commemorate the district's 125th anniversary. [14]
His Becoming Vancouver: A History (2021), is the first comprehensive history of Vancouver published in fifty years. It was short-listed for both the Basil Stuart-Stubbs Book Prize for outstanding scholarly book on British Columbia, and the George Ryga Award for Social Awareness in Literature.
Evelyn Lau is a Canadian poet and novelist.
Qualicum Beach is a town located on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. In the 2021 census, it had a population of 9,303. It is situated at the foot of Mount Arrowsmith, along the Strait of Georgia on Vancouver Island's northeastern coast.
Stephen Osborne is a Canadian writer and editor. He is the author of Ice & Fire: Dispatches from the New World, and since 1990 has been an editor of Geist magazine.
Terry Glavin is a Canadian author and journalist.
Kenneth Robert Lum, OC DFA is a dual citizen Canadian and American academic, painter, photographer, sculptor, and writer. Working in a number of media including painting, sculpture and photography, his art ranges from conceptual in orientation to representational in character and is generally concerned with issues of identity in relation to the categories of language, portraiture and spatial politics.
Western Front is an artist-run centre located in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It was founded in 1973 by eight artists who wanted to create a space for the exploration and creation of new art forms. After they purchased the former Knights of Pythias lodge hall located in Mount Pleasant, Vancouver, it quickly became a centre for poets, dancers, musicians and visual artists interested in exploration and interdisciplinary practices. Many of the Western Front's early works reflect this interdisciplinary ethos with early influences of Duchampian and Fluxus-based investigations into mail art, telecommunications art, live electronic music, video and performance art. Western Front also supported a number of political and activist projects - in one of their most famous performance pieces, founding member Vincent Trasov adopted the personality of Mr. Peanut, gave a number of performances and in 1974 ran for mayor of Vancouver. Mr. Peanut was so highly regarded that he was picked by The Vancouver Sun as one of the province's 100 most influential people as the end of the millennium approached in 1999. As a focal point of experimental art practice through the 1970s and 1980s, the Western Front, in connection with other centres like it, played a major role in the development of electronic and networked art forms in a national and international context.
William Herbert New is a Canadian poet and literary critic. Born in Vancouver, British Columbia, he was educated at John Oliver Secondary School, where he received one of the top matriculation exam scores in British Columbia in 1956, the University of British Columbia, and the University of Leeds. He taught English literature at the University of British Columbia from 1965 to 2003, where he was also the Assistant Dean of Graduate Studies from 1975–1977, and an acting head of the English Department. He also was an associate in 1971 at Cambridge University's Clare Hall. On October 5, 2006, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada and was invested October 26, 2007.
Deadman Island is a 3.8 ha island to the south of Stanley Park in Coal Harbour in Vancouver, British Columbia. The indigenous Squamish name is "skwtsa7s", meaning simply "island." Officially designated "Deadman Island" by the Geographical Names Board of Canada in 1937, it is commonly referred to as Deadman's Island. It has been a battle site, a native tree-burial cemetery, smallpox and squatter settlement in its long history. Today it is the site of Vancouver's Naval Reserve Division, HMCS Discovery.
Douglas Coupland is a Canadian novelist, designer, and visual artist. His first novel, the 1991 international bestseller Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, popularized the terms Generation X and McJob. He has published thirteen novels, two collections of short stories, seven non-fiction books, and a number of dramatic works and screenplays for film and television. He is a columnist for the Financial Times, as well as a frequent contributor to The New York Times, e-flux journal, DIS Magazine, and Vice. His art exhibits include Everywhere Is Anywhere Is Anything Is Everything, which was exhibited at the Vancouver Art Gallery, and the Royal Ontario Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, now the Museum of Contemporary Art Toronto Canada, and Bit Rot at Rotterdam's Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, as well as the Villa Stuck.
Cyril Edel Leonoff was a Canadian geotechnical engineer, historian, and author. He was the founding president of the Jewish Historical Society of British Columbia.
Silas White is a Canadian publisher, editor, author, musician, songwriter and politician.
Rachel Rose is a Canadian/American poet, essayist and short story writer. She has published three collections of poetry, Giving My Body to Science, Notes on Arrival and Departure, and Song and Spectacle. Her poems, essays and short stories have been published in literary magazines and anthologies in Canada and the United States.
Barry Morton Gough is a global maritime and naval historian.
Michael James Audain, is a Canadian home builder, philanthropist and art collector. He is the Chairman and major shareholder of the privately held Polygon Homes Ltd., one of the largest multi-family builders in British Columbia.
Gregory Betts is a Canadian scholar, poet, editor and professor.
Kate Craig was a Canadian video and performance artist. She was a founding member of the artist-run centre the Western Front, where she supported the video and performance works of many artists while producing her own body of work. She is known for her performances such as "Lady Brute," and for her video works.
Robert "Lucky" Budd is a Canadian author, oral historian, and radio host. He is known for his books based upon the stories of British Columbia pioneers, as well as his book collaborations with artist Roy Henry Vickers.
Gillian Jerome is a Canadian poet, essayist, editor and instructor. She won the City of Vancouver Book Award in 2009 and the ReLit Award for Poetry in 2010. Jerome is a co-founder of Canadian Women In Literary Arts (CWILA), and also serves as the poetry editor for Geist. She is a lecturer in literature at the University of British Columbia and also runs writing workshops at the Post 750 in downtown Vancouver.
Janet Anderson Craig Peterson is a Scottish-Canadian non-fiction writer, historian, artist, and journalist. She's best known for her books about Vancouver Island, including those about the cities of Nanaimo and Port Alberni. Peterson has been featured in the Times Colonist and Tofino-Ucluelet Westerly News.