Queen of the Hurricanes awarded 2015 OHS Alison Prentice Award!!

I am happy to announce that Queen of the Hurricanes was awarded this year's Ontario Historical Society's Alison Prentice Award for Best Book in Women's History!  It is a wonderful honour which is very humbling knowing the great work of the OHS and Dr. Alison Prentice.

As many of you know the production of a book is a labour of love, and this has definitely been the case with Queen of the Hurricanes.  The passion and determination with which Elsie MacGill lived her life, and her desire to effect positive social change in the world inspired my work towards this book.  This award will help me my colleagues at the Feminist History Society and Second Story Press to continue contributing to the Ontario Historical Society's mission of 'preserving, promoting, and protecting Ontario's history'. 

The journey towards this book's completion could not have been achieved without the incredible help and support of many people including Constance Backhouse, Ruby Heap, Diana Majury, Jennifer Penny and the incredible women within The Feminist History Society, and the dynamic team at Second Story Press.  I owe a debt of gratitude as well to all of my professors and colleagues at Lakehead University and the University of Ottawa who made history come alive for me and encouraged my work over the years.  I am also indebted to the incredible support of my husband Teva Vidal who believed in this book every step of the way.   

Thank you very much,

Crystal Sissons   

An engaging time at the CAHS!

Last weekend I attended the Canadian Aviation Historical Society annual conference.  It was a very engaging event with high quality presentations on so many topics.  There were a wide range of exciting papers from the  re-interpretation of a primary source on Canadian aviation heroes from the First World War to a presentation on the considerations between replicating, refurburshing and re-creating a vintage aircraft.

I learned a lot, and I was able to share Elsie's story with the CAHS members.  

On Sunday, we had a chance to visit the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum.  It was incredible to see so many of the planes and learn about them from the experts working to either restore them or to maintain them - in some cases to flight worthy status.  I had the chance to visit and explore the interior of the only public;y accessible and flight worthy Lancaster (Elsie worked on Lancasters during her post-war career).  It was incredible.  The Lancaster was so much larger than I anticipated!  Someday, I hope to go up for a spin!

While I didn't go up that day, I did get a chance to imagine flying in a CF-100 fighter jet!

 It was a great day and conference overall!  

To all CAHS members - may your flights be safe and enriching until we meet again!  

Crystal
 

 

Queen of the Hurricanes Sited at Congress 2015

Each year during the Congress for the Social Sciences and Humanities an impressive book fair is included.  Last year, pre-publication notices were available for Queen of the Hurricanes, this year it was amazing to see it on the shelves!