A Township at War

In 1914, the southern Ontario township of East Flamborough was like a thousand other rural townships in Canada, broadly representative in its wartime experience. Author Jonathan Vance draws from rich narrative sources to reveal what rural people were like a century ago - how they saw the world, what they valued, and how they lived their lives. We see them coming to terms with global events that took their loved ones to distant battlefields, and dealing with the prosaic challenges of everyday life. Fall fairs, recruiting meetings, church services, school concerts - all are reimagined to understand how rural Canadians coped with war, modernism, and a world that was changing more quickly than they were.

This is a story of resilience and idealism, of violence and small-mindedness, of a world that has long disappeared and one that remains with us to this day.