Maureen Jennings was recently honoured with the 2024 Grandmaster Lifetime Achievement Award from Crime Writers of Canada and was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada by the Governor General. The Murdoch Mysteries series airs in over 120 territories worldwide and has been renewed for its 19th season on CBC television.

Special venue for this event:
The Scottish Rite Club
4 Queen Street South (at King Street West), Hamilton

Doors open at 1:30 pm; Presentation at 2:30 pm
(Tours of the building will be available after the talk)

Wheelchair accessible   *   Light refreshments   *   Admission: $10 for this event; HOTL Members: Free

A fascinating journey into life and law in late nineteenth-century Canada. Deadly Swindle tells the story of one of the country’s most sensational murder cases: in February 1890 two woodsmen found the frozen body of a well-dressed young stranger in a remote swamp. Reginald Birchall, a charming young gentleman from London, was accused of the cold-blooded murder while simultaneously drawing intense press attention from Canada, the United States, and Britain.

The book paints a vivid picture of social life in late nineteenth-century Canada and provides a learned portrait of the criminal justice system of the day. Based on extensive research in Victorian newspapers and press history, Deadly Swindle is a lively and thoroughly researched narrative.

Ian Radforth is a Canadian social historian and the author of Bushworkers and Bosses: Logging in Northern Ontario, 1900–1980 and Royal Spectacle: The 1860 Visit of the Prince of Wales to Canada and the United States.

Even after more than a century, treasures from the Great War are still coming to light. Dr. Vance will literally unbox the archive of a family of Hamilton lawyers (the Robinsons of Wellington Street South) to explore what the material reveals about the family, the city, and the war.

Professor Vance teaches military history, Canadian history, and social memory. His research focuses on the First World War, Canadian culture, and prisoners of war. In 2019 he was awarded the Floyd S. Chalmers Award for Ontario History for A Township at War. His recent book is The True Story of the Great Escape: Stalag Luft III, March 1944.