Archive for November, 2010

November 11th is Remembrance Day, a day to honour our veterans and to remember  the 61,000 Canadians who died in the First World War, and the 42,000 Canadians who died in the Second World War. According to the Veterans Affairs Site

“By remembering their service and their sacrifice, we recognize the tradition of freedom these men and women fought to preserve. They believed that their actions in the present would make a significant difference for the future, but it is up to us to ensure that their dream of peace is realized. On Remembrance Day, we acknowledge the courage and sacrifice of those who served their country and acknowledge our responsibility to work for the peace they fought hard to achieve.”

One way that many people like to pay tribute to the soldiers is by visiting the battlefields.  WLU Press distributes a number of battlefield guides published by the Laurier Centre for Military Strategic and Disarmament Studies. Written by military historians and supplemented with full colour maps and photos, these guides focus on battles in Normandy, Italy, Northern France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany.

Other titles in military history and engagement include Germany’s Western Front,  Vimy Ridge: A Canadian Reassessment, Afghanistan: Transition under Threat, A Nation at War, 1939-1945, and A Duffle Bag, Close Friends, and Lots of Memories.

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The topic at the next Waterloo Region Social Media Breakfast (Nov. 23 at the Kitchener Market) is community. The panelists are all local community builders and each brings a unique perspective to the idea. This is the third breakfast I will attend, and although I enjoyed the first two, I haven’t yet met as many people as I’d like to. After the presentation I think I need to be forced into a personal meet and greet (perhaps some small-group mingling) or I may forever flee to the safety of my computer. So that’s something for the organizers to think about: enforced community.

All this talk about community got me thinking about Edna Staebler, the author and subject of a few of our books. A well-known writer from Kitchener-Waterloo, Edna certainly understood about community. Everyone who ever met her became her friend and many became regular visitors at her (later) home on Sunfish lake. When she was preparing to write the famous Food That Really Schmecks cookbook, she moved in with a Mennonite family so that she could absorb their culture and become part of the community. Those relationships endured for the rest of her life. The cookbook is filled with stories of family and friends and almost every recipe talks about how she first experienced the food, and who she was with.

A few years ago, when WLU Press was publishing Edna’s diaries, she granted us the rights to the first cookbook, which had long been out of print, with the stipulation that it would always be “in print.” Although it sold thousands and thousands the first time around in the late 1960s and ’70s, we’ve had great success with this edition, mainly because the next generation wants their own copy, not having been able to pry it away from their mothers’ kitchens.

I can’t help thinking that if Edna was alive today she’d have over a thousand friends on Facebook and as many followers on Twitter, and she’d faithfully follow back. In that spirit, WLU Press will donate two copies of Food That Really Schmecks at the next Social Media Breakfast for the door prizes. If you’re in Waterloo Region and you haven’t already registered, perhaps you should.

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