In 1969, the federal and New Brunswick governments created Kouchibouguac National Park on the province’s east coast. The park’s creation required the relocation of more than 1200 people who lived within its boundaries. Government officials claimed the mass eviction was necessary both to allow visitors to view “nature” without the intrusion of a human presence and to improve the lives of the former inhabitants. But unprecedented resistance by the mostly Acadian residents, many of whom described their expulsion from the park as a “second deportation,” led Parks Canada to end its practice of forcible removal. One resister, Jackie Vautour, remains a squatter on his land to this day.

In Kouchibouguac, Ronald Rudin draws on extensive archival research, interviews with more than thirty of the displaced families, and a wide range of Acadian cultural creations to tell the story of the park’s establishment, the resistance of its residents, and the memory of that experience.

Ronald Rudin is a professor in the Department of History and co-director of the Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling at Concordia University. His most recent book, Remembering and Forgetting in Acadie, received both the US National Council on Public History Book Award and the Public History Prize of the Canadian Historical Association.

Ronald Rudin's profile page

• Commended, 2018 National Council on Public History Book Award
• Winner, Clio Atlantic Region Prize awarded by the Canadian Historical Association
• Winner, Prix de l’Assemblée nationale of the Institut d’histoire de l’Amérique française
• Short-listed, Sir John A. Macdonald Prize awarded by the Canadian Historical Association
• Winner, Canadian Oral History Association Prize awarded by the Canadian Historical Association

‘Historians, civil servants, students, and general public will find it a stimulating and valuable interpretation of the time and events.’

Canadian Historical Review vol 97:04:2016

‘This is an important book that tells a story, we think we know, in a new and different way… A significant contribution to the regional and national history of Canada.’

Acadiensis September 2016

“Kouchibouguac is an excellent book, not only as a resource, but as enlightening reading for anyone with a social conscience. Ronald Rudin is to be applauded for his intensive and extensive research and his obvious concern for getting the Kouchibouguac story told properly and lucidly.”

The Miramichi Reader, August 24, 2016