Sam Steele Project

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Starting on Sam Steele Project, ihr. documentary, book, gigapixel imaging & educational resources.

The Quest for the Holy Grail of Canadian History

A multi-platform project including documentary film on Sir Sam Steele, the Canadian hero who played a pivotal role in the seminal events that shaped Canada as it became a nation in the late nineteenth century and came of age in the early twentieth century. Apart from broadcast, the documentary will be bundled with a book as a limited edition multi-media edition and will also be made available in digital media for all mobile applications. In conjunction with making the project available to Canadian the high school social studies curriculum, a video history game will be developed. Project to be developed in cooperation with award-winning author and historian Norman Leach and veteran publisher Dennis Johnson.

Set in Ontario, the West and the North, Sam Steele: Canadian Hero interweaves contemporary historians’ search for the truth of the man and his legacy with extensive archival photography, early twentieth century film footage and reenactments.

BACKGROUND

In June 2008, the Province of Alberta purchased for $1.8 million the Sam Steele Collection—a treasure consisting of over 84 cartons of previously unknown official documents, personal letters, diaries, photographs and personal memorabilia that Sir Sam Steele accumulated throughout his long and storied career in police and military service on three continents. Commentators have called the Collection the Holly Grail of Canadian History.

SAM STEELE BRIEF BIOGRAPHY

Sam Steele’s life story provides a compelling window on events that shaped Canadian history in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

It has been rightly observed that if Sam Steele had not been an actual historical figure it would have taken Hollywood to invent him. He was born into the social stability of the Victorian era and Pax Britannica and died amidst the post-war turmoil of the Lost Generation. His unconventional and, at times, controversial career touched upon many compelling moments in Canada’s settlement and early development: the Fenian raids, the formation of the North West Mounted Police, Sitting Bull’s exile in Canada, the construction of the national railroad, the Northwest (Riel) Rebellion, the opening of the North during the Klondike Gold Rush, Canada’s role within the British Empire during the Boer War and the nation’s coming of age in the world during the First World War.

More Information

Michael Witwicki Executive Producer

403 710 2999 m.witwicki at shaw.ca