Book Launch: Dan Black presents Oceans of Fate: Peace and Peril Aboard the Steamship Empress of Asia
Join author Daniel Robert Black in the MMBC gallery for this exciting launch!Cost:
FREE – $10.00 per personDuration:
1h 15minSchedule:
offered once this season at the MMBCAbout this experience
A riveting and highly researched naval history of a famous Canadian steamship, the Empress of Asia, and the personalities and world events intersecting its history--presented right here in Victoria at the Maritime Museum of BC!
Author Dan Black will launch Oceans of Fate: Peace and Peril Aboard the Steamship Empress of Asia (Dundurn Press) on March 14, 2025 in the MMBC gallery at 744 Douglas Street. This launch is included in admission, and free for MMBC members.
A Q&A and book signing will follow the presentation. Copies of Oceans of Fate will be available for purchase in the MMBC gift shop.
About the Book
The remarkable story of how one ship — doomed by war — intersected lives and crossed into history.
Completed in 1913 for Canadian Pacific, the Empress of Asia plied the oceans for nearly 30 years. Built for long-haul ocean travel during peace-time, she saw wartime service as an armed merchant cruiser and troopship before Japanese dive-bombers destroyed her in 1942.
Through the Roaring Twenties and the Great Depression, she brought continents and people together, delivering mail and multimillion-dollar consignments of silk. As a luxurious passenger liner, she was a “Greyhound of the Pacific,” braving epic storms and smashing transpacific speed records. From stokehold to bridge, steerage to first-class staterooms, she steamed with a kaleidoscope of lives, including courageous and recalcitrant crew, immigrants and refugees seeking a better life or relief from disaster, drug smugglers, weapons dealers, and the idle and not-so-idle rich.
This is the dramatic story of how that one ship and the lives of those on board intersected during a tumultuous period of world history, culminating in her sinking off Singapore in the Second World War.
About the Author
Dan Black is the former editor of Legion Magazine and author or co-author of three previous books, including Harry Livingstone’s Forgotten Men: Canadians and the Chinese Labour Corps in the First World War. He lives near Ottawa.
Your Host
The Maritime Museum of BC is on the territories of the Lekwungen Peoples who have respected these lands and waters for thousands of years. It is currently located downtown at 744 Douglas Street close to Victoria’s downtown Inner Harbour and the Empress Hotel. Here, you will find exhibits, a nautical-themed gift shop, and research space.