This week the Winnipeg Free Press showcased creative communications student, Michael Wilms book, In the Grain Fields.

The story follows Wilms as he spent 10 years chronicling the experiences of his grandfather — Harry John Giesbrecht — during the Second World War. Giesbrecht was born in Ukraine in 1928 and joined the SS in 1944. He fought for the Germans in Bastogne and the former Czechoslovakia. Giesbrecht later settled in Winnipeg, started a construction company and, during the 1980s, became the first North American entrepreneur to work in the former Soviet Union. He met with Mikhail Gorbachev on numerous occasions and even had Vladimir Putin over to his Winnipeg home for a barbecue.

Read the full story here.