Overview

Canadians live beside three great oceans and ships have been part of Canadian history for centuries. Yet very little is known about the men and women who have worked in Canada' ocean fleets. This work allows the seafarers to tell their own stories. In their own words, they remember the good as well as the bad times, in peace and war, and during the depression. They reminisce about the dangers of seafaring, the loneliness aboard ship, and the difficulty of supporting families ashore, but they also recall rowdy adventures in port. They talk about the role that Canadian merchant ships played during the Second World War, they discuss the subsequent decline of the Canadain merchant navy and they comment on efforts to improve working conditions on Canadian ships. Eric Sager draws on interviews with master mariners, engineers, able seamen, cooks, stewards, and many others who worked in steamships between the 1920s and 1940s. Among them is Molly Kool, the first woman in Canada to earn a master's certificate. The seafarers for the most part speak for themselves, but Sager also provides brief comments for each section in order to put the recollections into the context of their time. A large number of illustrations of life on board and on shore add a visual dimension to the reminiscences. It provides details of life at sea during the age of steam. It should be of interest to anyone curious about this part of Canada's past as well as to scholars in history, sociology, folklore, and industrial relations.

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9780774804431

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Reviews

Here is a book that provides a fascinating, detailed and authoritative account of Canada's merchant marine, coupled with memorable years told by seafarers who served in these ships during the three decades from 1920 to 1950 when the Age of Steam witnessed the final demise of sail and the advent of diesel-driven merchant ships ... a worthy and genuine documentation of the oral history of a bygone era. -- Sean T. Cadigan Left History The design of this book will do much to attract a working-class readership as much as it will academics. Lavish use of illustrations and boldfaced type of quotes from the seafarers' own words set this book apart from the often monotonous presentations of more pedantic efforts. Ships and Memories may be brief in content, but it is not superficial in intent. The purpose of this book is not to give readers a dry study of workers in the shipping industry, but rather to set a new course by encouraging seafarers and other workers to value, and build on, the memories of their own experiences. -- R.F. Latimer The Northern Mariner Ships and Memories reads beautifully. Sager has deftly woven together these reminiscenses into a narrative that with human passion and energy documents the historic course of Canadian merchant shipping over a 40-year period. As one of the seafarers put it: readers shun dry fact, one fact after another (p. 8); history needs anecdotes, and interesting happenings to make it readable (p. 9). Ships and Memories does this admirably. -- Jeffery J. Stafford Pacific Northwest Quarterly

Ships and Memories reads beautifully. Sager has deftly woven together these reminiscenses into a narrative that with human passion and energy documents the historic course of Canadian merchant shipping over a 40-year period. As one of the seafarers put it: readers shun dry fact, one fact after another (p. 8); history needs anecdotes, and interesting happenings to make it readable (p. 9). Ships and Memories does this admirably. -- Jeffery J. Stafford Pacific Northwest Quarterly Here is a book that provides a fascinating, detailed and authoritative account of Canada's merchant marine, coupled with memorable years told by seafarers who served in these ships during the three decades from 1920 to 1950 when the Age of Steam witnessed the final demise of sail and the advent of diesel-driven merchant ships ... a worthy and genuine documentation of the oral history of a bygone era. -- Sean T. Cadigan Left History The design of this book will do much to attract a working-class readership as much as it will academics. Lavish use of illustrations and boldfaced type of quotes from the seafarers' own words set this book apart from the often monotonous presentations of more pedantic efforts. Ships and Memories may be brief in content, but it is not superficial in intent. The purpose of this book is not to give readers a dry study of workers in the shipping industry, but rather to set a new course by encouraging seafarers and other workers to value, and build on, the memories of their own experiences. -- R.F. Latimer The Northern Mariner

Author Information

Eric W. Sager is a professor of history at theUniversity of Victoria. He is the author of Seafaring Labour: TheMerchant Marine of Atlantic Canada and co-author of MaritimeCapital: The Shipping Industry in Atlantic Canada, 1820-1914.

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