The legend of the lost Fred Ross war memorial mural was a staple of Fredericton lore for decades. The multi-faceted sentiments of loss were a combination of cultural and social remorse in the absence of a once prominent and defining icon of the city's civic culture. From the day of its unveiling on Empire Day in 1948, Ross's mural The Destruction of War & Rebuilding the World Through Education has held a special place in the civic consciousness of New Brunswick citizens. Originally commissioned as a memorial to the sixty-three Fredericton High School students whose lives were lost in the Second World War, the mural was later dismantled during building renovations and placed in storage. Its circuitous demise and eventual mysterious disappearance left what would be a palpable and growing sense of cultural absence in the social fabric of New Brunswick. In the 1990s a chance discovery of the full-scale mural drawings, now housed at the National Gallery of Canada, provided what would eventually offer a treasure map-like route to the mural's restoration under the guidance of the original artist. With what grew to be nationwide support, Fred Ross, with the help of three studio assistants guided by his drawings created sixty-three years earlier, retraced the developmental process in what would prove to be the most ambitious reanimation of a cultural treasure in Canadian art history. This is the unprecedented story of the mural's history, its creation, loss, and eventual restoration and return to public prominence.

Featured in this book are five essays exploring different aspects of one of the most unique art restoration projects in Canadian art history. The contributors include artist and writer Virgil Hammock, art critic and professor emeritus at Mount Allison University; Charles Hill, curator of Canadian art at the National Gallery of Canada; John Leroux, architect and art historian; Tom Smart, curator, gallery director, and writer; and William Forrestall. The renowned photographer James Wilson, a long-standing friend of Fred Ross, documented the restoration process from its earliest stages, bringing to the reader an immediate sense of presence through his revealing photographic essay. Fred Ross offers his first-hand recollections in an interview covering the development of the project from its inception in 1946 to its reanimation and final unveiling in 2011.