One lasting value of any shipwreck is the marvelous stories that come out of those terrible events. Ronald Caplan has collected a terrific batch of stories ranging from the gut-wrenching 1761 winter trek of survivors of the Auguste to John Angus Fraser's hilarious 1955 adventures aboard the abandoned Kismet II. Walter Boudreau delivers his harrowing account adrift in a lifeboat while his companions died around him, and survivors of the Marine Atlantic Caribou ferry tell of being torpedoed by a Nazi submarine between Cape Breton and Newfoundland.

Filled with courage and humanity--stories of people determined to live, told by people determined to keep these stories alive.

Ronald Caplan has served as interviewer and photographer for Cape Breton's Magazine for twenty-five years. He has received the Barbeau Award of the Folklore Studies Association of Canada, Nova Scotia's Cultural Life Award, the Canadian Historical Association's Award for exemplary contribution to the Oral History of Cape Breton and an honorary doctorate from Cape Breton University. His work is best known for keeping the Cape Breton story alive through oral testimony and images. Living at Wreck Cove on the Cabot Trail, Caplan is the author of several books and the publisher of Breton Books.

Ronald Caplan's profile page