Dec 7, 2015
Vancouver, BC -- Langara Anthropology instructor Rick Blacklaws recently co-published his fifth book, In the Footsteps of Alexander Mackenzie, with his wife Carol. As an archaeological field assistant, Carol worked mapping heritage sites and recording the oral histories of the regions. The book is written in a memoir style from her perspective recounting her adventures and the regional history of the Blackwater River. Rick contributed the photography for the book.
“Early in my archaeology career I saw the value photography offered as a tool to study and interpret culture. The camera replaced the trowel in my study of culture.”
The book contains essays, text, maps and colour tented black and white photographs. “This book was written to frame a particular place in time in Carol’s and my life, document the vanishing horse-based culture, and to bring attention to the Alexander Mackenzie Trail, definitely a neglected national treasure,” said Rick.
Rick has been an instructor at Langara for 25 years.
About the book
Trails, horses, people and adventure along the Nuxalk-Carrier Grease Trail. In the late 1970s an archaeological team was sent into a remote region of British Columbia to document the Nuxalk-Carrier Grease Trail - part of explorer Alexander Mackenzie’s 18th century crossing of North America. Mackenzie’s journey was the first documented crossing of the North American continent, predating Lewis and Clark’s expedition by 11 years. In the Footsteps of Alexander Mackenzie tells the fascinating story of the archaeological field assistants who walked, traveled by horse-drawn wagon and lived among the Lhoosk’uz Dene - a people whose origins in the area go back 4,000 years. This book is for everyone who has been drawn into the grandeur of vast landscapes and intrigued by the legends that lived there.
Learn more.
Mark Dawson
Manager, Communications and Marketing
Langara College
604.323.5702
mdawson@langara.ca
Photos: Rick Blacklaws