Lasting Legacy: The history of the warships of Point Frederick

Witness to Yesterday (The Champlain Society Podcast on Canadian History)

In this podcast episode, Larry Ostola talks to Robert D. Banks about his book, Warriors and Warships: Conflict on the Great Lakes and the Legacy of Point Frederick, published by Dundurn Press in 2023. In his book, Banks provides a detailed history of the shipbuilding at Point Frederick on Lake Ontario and its lasting legacy. Warriors and Warships illustrates this history by including colour archival maps, aerial views, photographs, and 3D reconstructions. Banks highlights this part of Canada’s military history by describing the warships, and the people who built them in Point Frederick, from the late eighteenth to mid-nineteenth centuries. He further recounts the conflicts on Lake Ontario where these vessels played a role, including the War of 1812. Banks also draws attention to the influential figures of Upper Canada of the period, in addition to recounting the everyday lives of the warriors behind the warships. Robert Banks is a graduate of the Royal Military College of Canada and the University of Toronto. A former pilot, he served as a flight surgeon with the Snowbirds and specialized in aerospace medicine, a field where he's known for his research and his role as an investigator of the space Shuttle Columbia crash. A prolific author, he's published over 30 scientific papers and book chapters and has a long-standing interest in the history of Ontario and Canada. Image Credit: Library and Archives Canada, Acc. No. 1936-39-1