Our Canada Magazine a Division of Readers Digest - Our Canada Our Country Our Stories

Our Canada, Our Country, Our Stories

Inspirational Tales From the Heart and Soul of This Great Land

From the Editors and Contributors of Our Canada

Foreword by Gary George

Copyright 2018 The Readers Digest Association (Canada) ULC

All rights reserved. Unauthorized reproduction, in any manner, is prohibited.

Readers Digest is a registered trademark of Trusted Media Brands, Inc.

ISBN 978-1-62145-409-0

E-Pub 978-1-62145-411-3

TRUSTED MEDIA BRANDS

President and Chief Executive Officer Bonnie Kintzer

Editor-in-Chief, International Magazines Raimo Moysa

OUR CANADA MAGAZINE

Chairman of the Board Christopher Dornan

Editor-in-Chief, Readers Digest Canada Dominique Ritter

Advertising, Head of Sales and Sales Strategy Ashley Leon

Our Canada Editor-in-Chief Gary George

Senior Editor Maryanne Gallagher

Art Director Robert Bigras

Graphic Designers Pierre Loranger, Michel Pelletier

Web Editor Brett Walther

Assistant Web Editor Robert Liwanag

Content Operations Manager Lisa Pigeon

Circulation Director Edward Birkett

OUR CANADA, OUR COUNTRY, OUR STORIES

Book Project Staff

Project Editor Pamela Johnson

Proofreader Joan Page McKenna

Graphic Designer Olena Lytvyn

Our Canada and More of Our Canada are reader-written publications of The Readers Digest Magazines Canada Limited, Montreal, QC. We are interested in receiving your comments on the content of this book.

Submit your comments at ourcanada.ca or write to:

Our Canada c/o Readers Digest

5101 Rue Buchan, Suite 300

Montreal, QC H4P 1S4

Jana ONeil, Tantallon, Nova Scotia

Originally from Moncton, New Brunswick, Jana moved to Nova Scotia more than two decades ago. She discovered her zest for photography in her early 30s while out and about enjoying nature. Jana gravitates towards capturing the everyday beauty that surrounds us, from dandelions and forest beds of wildflowers to stunning sunrises and sunsets. She feels very lucky to live in a country where we experience four majestic seasonsyes, even snowy winters! Janas other passions include kayaking, hiking, camping and exploring new places with family, friends and her fur babies. She has a wonderful son who shares in her love of photography. She is a firm believer in living life to its fullest and is always up for an adventure.

Jana snapped this photo at Graves Island Provincial Park, Nova Scotia, on a magnificent, chilly fall day.

Bill L. Knibbs , Medicine Hat, Alberta

Bill shares this great picture of his brothers, the Knibbs Leafs hockey team, at the rink back in 1937.

Andrea Hamilton , Pointe Claire, Quebec

Andrea sent along this heartwarming photo of her son Ryan and his beloved dog Blu taken at Boom Lake in Banff National Park, Alberta.

Catherine MacKenzie , Fall Lake, Nova Scotia

Catherine shares a great shot of her grandfather Harry Thompson MacKenzie leading the troops as a member of the Canadian Armed Forces Reserves.

Liz Youngman , Ottawa, Ontario

Liz shares this peaceful image snapped by her partner Barb Gray, by the lake in Bowman, Quebec.

Tyler Dixon , Calgary, Alberta

Tyler enjoying the beautiful view at Sunshine Village Ski Resort in Banff, Alberta.

Leanne Smith , Calgary, Alberta

Leanne snapped this awesome picture of the Indian Village while attending the Calgary Stampede several years ago.

Timothy Mohan, Elliot Lake, Ontario

Tim shares one of his incredible pieces of art called Two of Us.

H i there! Im the lead editor of Our Canada magazine and Im absolutely thrilled that youre holding our new book in your hands. If youre an avid reader with a passion for this great land we so proudly call home, I think youre in for a treat. Ive been editing Our Canada since 2006 and, prior to that, I spent two years writing promotional material in support of the then newly minted reader-written magazine published by Readers Digest Magazines Canada.

If theres one thing Ive come to appreciate over the years, its that the old saying is trueeveryone does indeed have at least one great story to tell. Youll see what I mean as soon as you dive into the 120-plus story selections that follow, all of which were originally published in Our Canada or its companion magazine, More of Our Canada, during the past five years.

But before you do, Id like to share Our Canada s story with youwell, the condensed version at least.

Our Canada was launched as a bimonthly publication in January 2004, following an overwhelmingly successful Show Us Your Canada contest held in Readers Digest magazine the previous year. The Readers Digest editorial team at the time waded through all of the contest entries, and then selected and fleshed out the content that appeared in Our Canada s highly successful premier issue. With that original blueprint in place, a small editorial team dedicated to Our Canada was created and the magazine was off to the races in earnest. By September 2005, Our Canada had grown from zero subscriptions to 250,000, becoming in the process one of the most successful Canadian magazine launches of that era. In a nutshell, the new magazine written by Canadians, for Canadians went viral in print, long before going viral became a phenomenon on the Internet.

In September 2008, responding to a growing number of subscribers who wished to receive Our Canada 12 times a year instead of the usual six, we introduced More of Our Canada, a subscriber-only publication scheduled for delivery during the in-between months of Our Canada s bimonthly publication calendar.

Moving forward from that point, we solidified our online presence on www.ourcanada.ca, where most of the incoming submissions are accepted and categorized, and jumped onto the growing social-media bandwagon, primarily via our Facebook page. While generating ongoing momentum for our two magazine publications, and engaging with a highly active and loyal social media following, we also produced two hardcover books of photography and collaborated on a third one about travel in Canada. In 2014, we started up our iPad edition and more recently weve been accepted onto popular digital magazine platforms such as Texture, Google Play, PressReader and Zinio.

Fuelling the magazines ongoing popularity to this very day is a steady flow of reader-written stories and photo submissions sent in to us by everyday Canadians from across the country, representing a wide range of age groups, walks of life, cultural backgrounds, interests and pursuits. From rural hamlets to major urban centres, remote northern outposts to southern border towns, fishing villages in the Maritimes and Newfoundland and Labrador to the First Nations cultural sanctuary of Haida Gwaii, B.C.and everywhere in between Our Canada is above all a gathering place for all Canadians. We strive to be a venue where everyone is welcome and invited to share their memories and experiences, hopes and aspirations, and love for this wonderful country of ours.

Being reader-written, we do not engage the services of professional writers but rather select and polish written submissions sent in to us by the everyday people of Canada, regular folks just like you and me. And therein lie two of my favourite aspects of the job that my colleague, Senior Editor Maryanne Gallagher, and I are privileged to perform: firstly, reading through all of the amazing stories sent our way, which number in the thousands, and, secondly, reaching out to those individuals whose submissions are selected to appear in an upcoming issue and working with them to make their story the best it can possibly be. Editorially, our aim here is to point out and see that any gaps in a submission are filled; make sure the facts being presented are accurate; and edit for length as well as consistency of writing style and grammarall the while maintaining the contributors natural tone of voice and turn of phrase.