History Matters by Canadian Institute for Historical Education

In this episode, Allan talks with writer and media executive Richard Stursberg to explore the rise and decline of Canadian book publishing. The conversation breaks down how Canada once built a thriving literary culture, why English-Canadian publishing has lost ground, and what that means for national identity, history, and cultural sovereignty today, along with what can be done to rebuild it. Stursberg examines the dramatic decline of English Canadian publishing, tracing the rise of a vibrant national literary culture in the 1960s through the 1990s and the policy failures that allowed foreign multinationals to dominate the market. The discussion considers the relationship between publishing, national identity, cultural sovereignty, and historical literacy in Canada. Richard Stursberg’s leadership roles have included CBC English, language services, Telefilm Canada, the Canadian Television Fund, and PEN Canada.
Richard Stursberg

In this episode of History Matters, Allan speaks with veteran journalist Christina Blizzard about her fifty plus years in journalism, a career that began at the old Toronto Telegram in an era of linotype and “hot lead” printing, included being a “Day One” employee at the Toronto Sun in 1971, and continued into today’s era of social media, digital printing and the AI-driven newsroom. Blizzard discusses her years covering Ontario politics at Queen’s Park, including such key moments as Mike Harris’ “Common Sense Revolution” in 1995, offering insight into how political reporting has changed as the press gallery has shrunk and the pace of news has accelerated dramatically. The challenge journalists face when reporting on unfolding events that later take on new meaning with the benefit of hindsight, including the Walkerton water tragedy. Blizzard shares stories from covering royal events, including the funeral of the Queen Mother, and reflects on the enduring importance of historical literacy, museums, and public access to history, and how journalism both records and shapes the historical record.

In this episode of History Matters, journalist and author Madelaine Drohan joins the program to explore a question that feels contemporary, but is anything but new: how long have American Leaders imagined Canada as part of the United States? The conversation begins with today’s “51st state” rhetoric and Prime Minister Carney’s Davos warning that Canada is facing a rupture, not a transition. From there, it steps back to 1775–1776, when the Continental Army invaded Canada and Benjamin Franklin, already seventy years of age, traveled through the wilderness to Montréal for an attempt to persuade French Canadians to join the American Revolution. Drawing from her 2025 book He Did Not Conquer: Benjamin Franklin’s Failure to Annex Canada, Drohan explains why the invasion unraveled, why Franklin later downplayed the episode, and what this largely forgotten story reveals about how nations construct and revise their founding myths.
The episode concludes with a thoughtful discussion about whether Canada needs a more cohesive national story, and what it might be built around.
https://madelainedrohan.org/

In this special episode of History Matters Allan welcomes Gordon Henderson, a veteran television producer, documentary film maker, and historical novelist to introduce a live stage performance of the “The Trial of Egerton Ryerson,” a play commissioned by the CIHE, researched and written by Gilbert Reid and Gordon Henderson. Reid did the bulk of the original research which Henderson turned into a play set in a courtroom. Framed as an appeal hearing after Ryerson’s “conviction” in the court of public opinion, the play explores questions of presentism, historical context, responsibility, and legacy and how public institutions decide who is honored, criticized, or removed from commemoration. The play was performed before a live audience at the Arts and Letters Club in Toronto on Sunday, February 8th 2026, with Gordon Henderson in the lead role of Dr. Ryerson, Paul Duder in the role of the Judge, and Matthew Chapman in the role of the Journalism Student; the play was directed by Elizabeth Trott.
A longer video of the event, including an audience Q&A session after the performance with Henderson and Reid and facilitated by Professor Patrice Dutil, is available on the CIHE website, www.CIHE.ca.

DESCRIPTION EP15
Public monuments shape how Canadians encounter their past. Yet the process of representing historical figures in bronze raises important questions: how does one preserve humanity, complexity, and context in a permanent public form?
In this episode of History Matters, Allan Williams speaks with Ruth Abernethy, one of Canada’s most accomplished sculptors. Her public works include figures such as Glenn Gould, Oscar Peterson, Sir John A. Macdonald, and William Lyon Mackenzie King, among many others. The conversation traces her artistic development, from her early work building characters at the Stratford Festival to her first major public commission, Raising the Tent (1996), which marked the beginning of a distinguished career in public sculpture.
Abernethy explains how her theatrical background informs her approach to historical representation. Rather than presenting idealized figures, her sculptures seek to portray individuals in moments of action and narrative attentive to personality, context, and human complexity.
The discussion also examines lesser-known chapters of Canadian history reflected in her work, including Len Cullen’s influence on the gardens of Whitby, the legacy of Camp X and William Stephenson (“Intrepid”), and Nova Scotia figures such as Vernon Smith and Abraham Gesner, whose innovations connect whale oil, kerosene, and the early development of the modern energy industry. Throughout, Abernethy reflects on sculpture as a form of public storytelling shaped by placement, inscription, design, and historical interpretation.
Listeners interested in public memory, Canadian identity, and the ways societies choose to commemorate their past will find this episode a thoughtful exploration of history in the public square.
https://www.ruthabernethy.com/
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