Picture of forgotten WWI vet tells a thousand words for historian

Sporting a fashionable officer’s mustache and gazing serenely off-camera, this Canadian First World War soldier has the bearing of a man older than his 30-some years. An inscription on the wood frame of the black-and-white photograph identifies him as Major Alfred Frank Mantle and gives his date of death – Sept. 26, 1916.

Somehow, the image would end up in a biology department storage room at the University of Regina. In the winter of 2010, when staff were cleaning the place out, department head Mark Brigham dropped by and found the picture sitting in a trash heap. He rescued it, cleaned years of stains and watermarks from the glass and set about researching the man in hopes of tracking down his descendents.

“I was thinking, ‘Who is this and why is it here?’ ” he said. “I just knew the photo would mean something to someone.”

The age-old thirst for knowledge about family history prompts thousands of Canadians each year to trawl databases or travel to Europe to research their genealogy. Prof. Brigham’s motivation, however, is not familial connection or professional duty, but simply a burning curiosity. In addition to his career as a scientist, he’s had a fascination with military history that stretches back to his childhood. His own grandfather fought in the First World War, losing an eye during a battle to take Hill 60 on the Western Front....