Alequiers is the story of a one–hundred–year–old log house on the banks of the Highwood River in Southern Alberta, with particular emphasis on the time that author Mike Schintz and his family spent there. The book details what little is known about Alexander McQueen Weir, the original settler on the site and goes on to describe the changes in structure that took place under succeeding occupants, the Royle and Schintz families. The book is also a tribute to the author's talented parents, both of whom produced outstanding works of art while living and raising a family under conditions reminiscent of earlier, pioneer times.
Schintz imparts the flavour of the foothills with vivid and often humorous notes about neighbours, Bar U Riders, and the Stoney people, as well as describing the wildlife that has always contributed to the magic of Alequiers. A welcome addition to homesteading literature and social history, Alequiers will draw readers into the orbit of the daily life of a pioneering family who resided in one of Alberta's most prominent ranching districts with its whimsical and nostalgic journey into a recent, yet distant, past.
Mike Schintz is the co-author (with Robert J. Burns) of Guardians of the Wild: A History of the Warden Service of Canada's National Parks and was a National Park Warden for thirty-nine years.