Valerie Knowles - Canadian Author

The book tracks Van Horne's epic career from the age of eleven...
- Deborah Morrison, Publisher, President and CEO of Canada's History Society and of Canada's History Magazine
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Capital Lives Vol. II:
Profiles of 32 Leading Ottawa Personalities

Valerie Knowles' competent survey of the life and times of William Van Horne is the latest volume in the highly accessible Quest series of biographies of significant Canadians.

William C. Van Horne:
Railway Titan

his follow-up to Valerie Knowles' first edition of Capital Lives is a welcome addition to the growing literature concerning Ottawa's more interesting inhabitants. In short, lively sketches feature well-known early settlers, such as Braddish Billings (1783-1864), to more modern, but little-known personalities like Isabel Percival (1903-1998)...
- Dave Mulligan, author of: Charlotte: The Last Suffragette, a biography of former Ottawa mayor Charlotte Whitton
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Capital Lives:
Profiles of 32 Leading Ottawa Personalities

These brief vignettes make compelling reading. Here are people who have played a part, large and small, in building the community and the nation. Taken together they provide a portrait of Ottawa that all of us who love this city will treasure.
- Barbara McInnes, President and CEO, Community Foundation of Ottawa
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Strangers At Our Gates:
Canadian Immigration and Immigration Policy, 1540-2006

First Person: A Biography of Cairine Wilson
Canada's First Woman Senator

From Telegrapher to Titan:
The Life of William C. Van Horne

This work by Valerie Knowles, an Ottawa scholar who wrote a useful biography of Senator Cairine Wilson, examines the evolution of immigration policies from the days of New France until very recent times. It is a sound and clear overview and the best general work available on this interesting subject.
- Gerald Tulchinsky, Labour/ Le Travail, Spring, 1995
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Valerie Knowles has written an absorbing biography of Wilson and the times in which she lived. The study is thorough but not pedantic, and rich in detail and interpretation.
- Lorna Marsden, The Globe and Mail, October 29, 1988
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Valerie Knowles's From Telegrapher to Titan is a well-researched and intelligently written biography about the man primarily responsible for tying Canada together with a ribbon of steel. It is an important book. But it is also hugely entertaining, providing a wealth of detail about the transplanted American who grew to love Canada.
- Jury Statement, Ottawa Book Award 2005
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