From The Ground Up

"I always believed that women could do anything men could, if they were just
prepared to put their minds to it and get down to work." She was the first
successful woman miner in Canada, probably in the world. She transformed the
Prospectors and Developers Association from a ragtag crew of rock enthusiasts
into a nationwide organization of geologists, engineers, and other mining
professionals. She rose from her humble beginnings near Bracebridge, Ontario,
to become one of the country's wealthiest female entrepreneurs and a member of
the Order of Canada. And she was a key player in the Windfall scandal of the
1960s and suffered its side effects behind bars. Viola MacMillan was a mining
dynamo, a legend in the testosterone-driven, wheeling-dealing venture that is
Canadian mining. In this rags-to-riches autobiography, MacMillan offers a
passionate account of her life in the bush, her rise to fame, and the setbacks
she endured along the way. To put the story in context, Virginia Heffernan
provides a snapshot of the Canadian mining industry during MacMillan's heyday,
including the events that led to her jail sentence and eventual pardon.
Through extensive interviews and research, Heffernan pieces together the
backdrop to Macmillan's entertaining life story.