By Michael Peake
The story behind route one and traveling is precisely what Bob Henderson talks about in great detail in Every Trail has a Story. In fact, what Professor Henderson has done here is rip open that bibliography that lies largely unread at the end of many a great book. Then, there are the seeds of discovery that sprout into a memorable trip.
Bob Henderson teaches this stuff at McMaster University in Hamilton—and clearly lives it. His bright and breezy writing style serves him well in clambering over an impressive number of often little known northern travelers and sources. The book has a foreword by fellow outdoor-educator turned author James Raffan and is dedicated to the late C. S. (Stuart) Mackinnon, who has done so much to bring our past stories to life with books like Arctic Artist and others. A great mentor to be sure, and Bob has done him proud with insatiable curiosity and peripatetic ways.
This is not a canoeing book per se, though it plays a large part for sure. Bob skis, hikes, snowshoes, dogsleds and horsebacks his way along many great trails and writes their stories. The book is divided into three sections—Places, Practices and Peoples. He was also inspired by two canoeing greats—Eric Morse and Sigurd Olson and he is not alone there! Henderson is able to cast a wide net of resources from 14th century Japanese texts to Ian Tamblyn, modern songwriter. He is immersed in the academic world of the outdoors and shares generously.
Henderson tackles the tricky and ethereal nature of humankind’s relationship to the wild. The very subject is like trying to remember a dream. You recall certain hints of it, a flavor but like biting a tomato seed—it’s elusive.
This is a solid book with many, many references and it is not light reading in that sense. Some of the areas covered include, The Labrador, Algonquin Park, Notakwanon River, Nueltin Lake, Milk Rier, Teslin River and the Churchill River among many others.
Bob examines the routes and the people who lived there, those who traveled there and the many traces left behind.
To me, one of the most interesting exchanges in the book is a meeting with legendary northern Manitoba trapper Ragner Jonsson who lived in the bush for more than 60 years until he was 84. He was famous for his solitude, known for journeying200 miles by dogsled to Churchill for food and leaving within the hour. Surely, such people are the overlaps of history, clinging to a classic traditional existence in a modern world, a great romantic figure. So it was with some delusion that Bob and his companion were greeted by Ragnar when they paddled into his odiferous, disheveled camp with “Ahh tourists.” I think it would be hard for such a character to insult Bob for such is his generous nature and intellect. He would find a way to make some understanding of it. But it seemed to me, he truly fulfilled the book’s later quotation of Canadian historian Michael Bliss who said, “We have to find a way to make history smell again.”
The book is a trade six by nine inch paperback with many grayish illustrations of some very fine photos that would have cried out for better reproduction. The numerous maps are clean and informative. One picky point that appeared and also showed up in Raffan’s books is why do they always display the distances in both metric and Imperial? Pick one and stick with it, I think we can all figure it out by now.
One of my all time favorite northern books is Exploration of Northern Canada which is simply a listing of every modern northern canoe trip in Canada up until 1920. This seminal work contains no prose, just people, dates and locations. Every Trail seems to be halfway to that and a traditional northern book. There are so many directions you can take off into, thanks to Bob’s generous directions.
Like a fine malt whisky, this book should be sipped slowly, give time for the taste of the heather to spread and finish. It’s one of the many trips worth taking.
Originally published in Che-Mun, The Journal of Canadian Wilderness Canoeing. Summer 2005, Outfit 121.
Every Trail Has a Story
Heritage Travel in Canada
By Bob Henderson
312 pp 83 photos 17 maps
Natural Heritage Books
Toronto 2005
ISBN: 1-896219-97-7
