Edwin Guillet – författare

Despite abundant hardships, pioneer life in Upper Canada was romantic and colourful, and Mr. Guillet brings vividly to life the early settlers and their experiences. He draws on contemporary letters, diaries, newspapers, and periodicals, supplementing these researches with interviews with persons who had personal contacts with early life in the province.This volume contains the chapters from Mr. Guillet's large volume, Early Life in Upper Canada, which describes the pioneer home, foods and cooking, milling, lumbering, maple sugar making, fishing, "bees", amusements in town and country, and pioneer sports. It is abundantly illustrated with authentic portraits, photographs, and drawings.

One of the most fascinating aspects of the history of Canada is the development of trave—from the canoe-routes and woodland trails first followed by the Indians, the fur-traders and explorers, and the pioneers, to the canals, locks, and highways of a later age, and the seaways, railroads, and air routes of today. Equally interesting is the story of the development of the means of transport—canoes, bateaux, sailing-ships, steamships, stage-coaches, railway cars.This volume contains the chapters from Mr. Guillet's large volume, Early Life in Upper Canada, describing early travel and transportation. He draws on contemporary letters, diaries, newspapers, and periodicals, in order to describe vividly the conditions of travel at various periods, and the book is abundantly illustrated with authentic portraits, photographs, and drawings.

Mr. Guillet is a familiar figure in the field of Canadian local and social history: his work has been acclaimed for its thorough and accurate research, its skilful use of source material, its wealth of authenticated anecdote, and its attention to detail. Written in an attractive and comfortable style, and illustrated with photographs often contemporary and previously unpublished, his books are a fund of information about areas which too frequently are neglected in Canadian historical writing.Pioneer Arts and Crafts, first published in 1940 and later expanded as a section of The Pioneer Farmer and Backwoodsman (University of Toronto Press), is typical of Mr. Guillet's fine work. In this book he describes all aspects of domestic manufactures and processes of pioneer days: he traces the development of wood-working in furniture and buildings, and of the tanning, spinning and weaving industries. He describes many farming activities which have long since disappeared, for example soap-making and lime-burning. There are several chapters on cooking and various food processes and recipes which include preparation of drugs and medicinal remedies, substitutes for tea and coffee, and the making of lard and sausages. Throughout this account there are quotations from contemporary journals, and anecdotes about various personalities in those early times, which bring our pioneering past to life again.Recommended for use in Ontario schools by the Minister of Education, this book is for all ages, for everyone interested in Canada's pioneering heritage.

The Lives and Times of the Patriots was first published in 1938, the centennial of the Upper Canadian Rebellion and the subsequent Patriot raids over the border from the United States. The Canadian part of the agitation for constitutional and social reform, long a subject of controversy and bitterness, is now generally considered to be, as Sir Wilfrid Laurier put it, a fight "for constitutional rights, not against the British Crown"; but very little in the American movement, allegedly in sympathy, can be justified, its aims and conduct being no better than—and often interior to—the Fenian Raids of some thirty years later. The story of the events and their consequences is unfolded from a wide coverage of source materials, and described from both Tory and Reform, Loyalist and Patriot point of view. Exciting trails and escapes from jails and forts follow one another in quick succession, and the lives and experiences of participants are traced around the world to the prison colony of Van Diemen's Land and home again, as diaries, letters, and narratives tell their story, supplemented and verified by official documents, contemporary newspapers, obituary notices, and tombstone inscriptions. Rare illustrations complement this careful account of what must be taken to be, with all its deficiencies, a notable episode in the history of human freedom.

The settlement of Upper Canada began in the Detroit river district where there were several hundred people living before the close of the French régime. Between 1785 and 1800 colonization continued with the arrival of Loyalists and other settlers, including a contingent of German mercenaries who fought for George III during the American Revolution. Pioneers continued to come in large numbers to the unsettled areas of the province for the next 75 years and these later settlers often suffered hardships greater than those experienced by the Loyalists. This is the story of these early settlements in Upper Canada.The author, a distinguished Canadian historian, has drawn on contemporary letters, diaries, newspapers, and periodicals; he has consulted all the existing histories, and has supplemented these researches with interviews with persons who had contacts with early life in the province. The numerous illustrations included accurately depict the era.This book was originally part of Early Life in Upper Canada, by far the finest social and economic history of the area yet compiled. It is being printed separately to make more widely available this important and engrossing description of the early settlement of Ontario.Informative, accurate and delightfully readable, this volume brings to life the pioneers of Ontario and vividly recreates their experiences.

In this lavishly illustrated new book, the author of Early Life in Upper Canada and other famous histories of pioneer days, relates the story of the Canadian farm and farmer from the primitive to the machine age. Farm life and farm processes are pictured in fascinating detail, and Mr. Guillet quotes generously from books, newspapers, letters and hitherto unpublished archives material, using the words of those who actually witnessed the life of other days–the pioneers themselves, or the more observant of the numerous travellers who visited Canada during the period. The 450 illustrations contained in the two volumes of this work include many never before reproduced. A detailed list of contents and a full index enable the reader to find readily any topic of pioneer life to which he wishes to refer.

From the portage trails snaking their way through the wilderness to superhighways carrying the raw materials and produce of an industrial nation, Canada's roads have had a romantic but long-neglected history. For the first time their development is described in this handsomely illustrated volume by a distinguished Canadian historian. Mr. Guillet has written a book which is often humorous and always human, to be enjoyed by readers of many ages. It contains nearly two hundred sketches, engravings, paintings, and photographs, most of them contemporary, gathered from archives and libraries across the country and well displayed in the specially chosen large format. Few are generally available elsewhere. For school and public libraries, as well as the general reader, this book documents a fascinating aspect of Canada's social history.

Here is a record of one of history's great migrations, the Atlantic Migration to the New World, especially from 1770 to 1890, when eleven million people came from the British Isles to North America. The slow crossing by sailing ship was unpleasant even in the best accommodation, but for the poor conditions were wretched in the extreme. Famine, unemployment, poverty drove many from the Old World, and their desperate circumstances made them vulnerable to exploitation at both ends of the journey. In the New World, the immigrant had to adjust to strange conditions as he ventured into the interior of the continent to enter upon the hardships of pioneering.Mr. Guillet has located records never before consulted, found contemporary descriptions not previously used, and presented excerpts from diaries, narratives, letters, and emigrant guidebooks formerly accessible only in museum and archives collections. The illustrations are all from contemporary sources and provide in themselves an authentic and comprehensive picture of the times.

Although there were abundant hardships, early life in Upper Canada was romantic and colourful in many ways. However, despite important contributions to the social and economic history of Canada, few good, comprehensive accounts have been generally available. Early Life in Upper Canada, originally published in 1933, is by far the finest history yet compiled, and it is now being reprinted in order to make available to a new generation an important and engrossing description of this area of Canadian history.The author, a distinguished Canadian historian, has drawn on contemporary letters, diaries, newspapers, and periodicals, as well as consulting all the existing histories, and he has supplemented these researches with interviews with persons who had personal contacts with early life in the Province. Mr. Guillet has compiled a thorough, accurate and delightfully readable history, that brings vividly to life the early settlers and their experiences. This is in accordance with the author's profound desire to make the study of Canadian history a delight rather than a chore. He has not concealed the unpleasant aspects of pioneer life, nor does he attempt to glamorize its difficulties.There is a tendency at times to forget that the founders of Upper Canada include hundreds of thousands of men and women of many nationalities, and fur traders, lumbermen, and voyageurs, as well as settlers. Their contributions, too, are acknowledged and recorded here.This book is profusely illustrated, with drawings made, in many cases, by army cartographers, who were skilled creative artists as well. Their paintings, fortunately, have been better preserved than were written accounts of the times, and are accurate depictions of pioneer life.The extensive bibliography and carefully prepared index will make this work invaluable for historians as well as for general readers.

In this lavishly illustrated new book, the author of Early Life in Upper Canada and other famous histories of pioneer days, relates the story of the Canadian farm and farmer from the primitive to the machine age. Farm life and farm processes are pictured in fascinating detail, and Mr. Guillet quotes generously from books, newspapers, letters and hitherto unpublished archives material, using the words of those who actually witnessed the life of other days–the pioneers themselves, or the more observant of the numerous travellers who visited Canada during the period. The 450 illustrations contained in the two volumes of this work include many never before reproduced. A detailed list of contents and a full index enable the reader to find readily any topic of pioneer life to which he wishes to refer.