Shepard, Alberta in the 1930s and Early 1940s : Reminiscences by Stan Humenuk

If you enjoy reading simple human-interest stories and would like to learn things at the same time, you will enjoy reading the author's reminiscences in this book about growing up in Shepard, Alberta, a small hamlet near the City of Calgary in the 1930s and early 1940s. This book also will appeal to history buffs, cartographers, teachers and professors, students of social history, and anyone interested in family histories, particularly those from Shepard, past or present. You will learn how morality was instilled in children unobtrusively, and how their behavior was developed by innovating ways of playing and socializing. Importantly also, you will learn how people made a living in a small hamlet at a railway junction surrounded by an area of agricultural farmland.

After the start of World War II in 1939 a military airfield was built near Shepard that was used throughout the early 1940s. Along with airfields in Calgary and other airfields nearby in southern Alberta, the entire area provided land terrain suitable for emergency landings if necessary by training aircraft. Airplane pilots, navigators and radio operators were trained for the Royal Canadian Air Force and allied countries as well as airmen from Australia and New Zealand as part of the British Commonwealth Air Training Program. The author of this book has stories from this period about the aircraft seen flying frequently in this area, about certain aircraft related incidents, and how the airmen created ways to have a social life even while on duty.

The objective of the book is to provide historical primary source information in an entertaining way through human-interest stories.