Growing up as the son of a gypo logger on Nelson Island, publisher Howard White never dreamed he'd be competing with the Beatles. But these days his line-up of Terry (Fox), Pauline (Johnson), James (Douglas) and Wacky (Bennett) is proving almost as popular as John, Paul, George and Ringo. White's 850-page, million-word Encyclopedia of British Columbia (Harbour $99), edited by Daniel Francis, is in a two-horse race for top sales with the 368-page Beatles Anthology (Raincoast $92). The full-colour B.C. Encyclopedia, with a CD-ROM included, was reprinted less than a month after it was released.

"Somebody told me after reading the EBC,"; says White, "that they hadn't felt as good about B.C. since Expo '86. It made me realize that's the sort of feeling we were aiming for. We wanted to give B.C. people a millennium present that would get them feeling good about themselves again, and it seems to be working.";

The risky publishing venture is the third of its kind in Canada. Hurtig Publishers of Alberta were ruined by a national encyclopedia project in 1990 (now managed by M&S) and there is an encyclopedia for Newfoundland.

[BCBW WINTER 2000]