Turning Left to the Ladies
- Publisher
- Palimpsest Press
- Initial publish date
- May 2009
- Category
- General
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9781926794297
- Publish Date
- May 2015
- List Price
- $18.95
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9780978491703
- Publish Date
- May 2009
- List Price
- $18.00
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Description
In 1977 Kate Braid got her first job in construction as a labourer on a small island off the coast of British Columbia. Never in her wildest dreams did she plan to be a construction worker, much less a carpenter, but she was desperate to stay on the island and had run out of money, along with all the options a woman usually has for work — secretary, waitress, receptionist. Turning Left to the Ladies is an autobiographical account of the fifteen years she worked as a labourer, apprentice and journey carpenter, building houses, high rises and bridges. She was the first female member of the Vancouver union local of the Carpenters and the first full-time woman teaching trades at the BC Institute of Technology. It is a wry, sometimes humorous, sometimes meditative look at one woman’s relationship to her craft, and the people she met along the way.
About the author
Kate Braid worked as a receptionist, secretary, teacher’s aide, lumber piler, construction labourer, apprentice and journey-carpenter before finally “settling down”? as a teacher. She has taught construction and creative writing, the latter in workshops and also at SFU, UBC and for ten years at Vancouver Island University (previously Malaspina University-College). She is the author of A Well-Mannered Storm: The Glenn Gould Poems, Covering Rough Ground, To This Cedar Fountain and Inward to the Bones: Georgia O’Keeffe’s Journey with Emily Carr. In 2005 she co-edited, with Sandy Shreve, In Fine Form: The Canadian Book of Form Poetry. Braid’s second book of poems about her carpentry experiences, Turning Left to the Ladies, was published by Palimpsest Press. She lives in Burnaby, BC, with her partner.
Other titles by
Hammer & Nail
Notes of a Journeywoman
Elemental
In Fine Form
The Canadian Book of Form Poetry
Covering Rough Ground
Canadian Artists Bundle
Emily Carr / Tom Thomson / James Wilson Morrice
Quest Biographies Bundle — Books 1–5
Emma Albani / Emily Carr / George Grant / Jacques Plante / John Diefenbaker
Journeywoman
Swinging a Hammer in a Man's World
To This Cedar Fountain
Inward to the Bones
Georgia O'Keeffe's Journey with Emily Carr
A Well-Mannered Storm
The Glenn Gould Poems
