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Create AccountMina Benson's background did not suggest she would one day perform a feat of wilderness exploration that no other woman has ever approached. Her husband, writer Leonidas Hubbard Jr, was her connection with wilderness exploration, but in a way that neither could have foreseen, nor wished.
On March 19, 1687, somewhere in the trackless wilderness of southern Texas, the French explorer Cavalier de La Salle approached the camp of a party he had sent ahead to find food. La Salle sensed that something was wrong and shouted "Where is my nephew?" "Gone to the dogs," was the reply.
Radiant sunshine bathed the Island of Montreal on the morning of May 18th, 1642. The hawthorns and wild cherry trees were in blossom and the meadow, where a group of French colonists had set up an altar, was dotted with trilliums and violets. Father Vimont celebrated mass, and declared that the new settlement, which they called Ville-Marie, was "only a grain of mustard seed... I have no doubt that this small seed will produce a tall tree that will bring forth wonders some day."
“Freedom and a Farm.” The promise was exciting to the thousands of African Americans, most seeking to escape enslavement, who fought in British regiments during the American Revolutionary War (1775–83). Following the war, they joined tens of thousands of Loyalists — American refugees who had sided with the British. Between 80,000 and 100,000 Loyalists eventually fled the United States. About half came to British North America. The main waves arrived in 1783 and 1784. The territory that now includes the Maritime provinces became home to more than 30,000 Loyalists. Most of coastal Nova Scotia received Loyalist settlers, as did Cape Breton and Prince Edward Island (then called St. John’s Island).
"Five!? There are five? My God! What am I going to do with five babies?" exclaimed Oliva Dionne on May 28, 1934, when his wife Elzire delivered quintuplets. Elzire managed only to gasp "Holy Mary!" as she realized that their family had increased from seven to 12.
At 8:00 p.m. on Monday, 4 December 1837, William Lyon Mackenzie set out by horse down Yonge Street to scout the route for his attack on Toronto. At the top of Gallows Hill (below St. Clair Ave.) he met Tory alderman John Powell, himself on patrol from the city. Mackenzie and his men took Powell prisoner. “Do you have a gun?” Mackenzie asked Powell. “No,” Powell replied. Mackenzie took his word as a gentleman and sent him back toward the rebel headquarters at Montgomery’s Tavern.
Born in Toronto in 1867 and raised in Woodstock, Ont., Joe Boyle was an extraordinarily restless young man. At age 17 he went to New York with his father and hopped an outbound ship, spending three years at sea.
The English race gets continually into the most unheard of scrapes all over the world by reason of its insular prejudices and superiority to advice; but somehow they muddle through and when they do they are on the ground to hold it. Manitoba Free Press, December 1903
This entry presents an overview of Québec cinema, from the burgeoning of a distinctly Québec cinema in the 1970s, to the production explosion that followed Denys Arcand’s Le déclin de l’empire américain (1986). It highlights the most important films, whether in terms of box office success or international acclaim, and covers both narrative features and documentaries. It also draws attention to an aspect of filmmaking that still has difficulty finding its place: women's cinema.
Between 1942 and 1947, the Canadian government brought 47,783 "war brides” and their 21,950 children to Canada. Most of these women were from Great Britain, where Canadian forces had been based during the Second World War. Although the voyage and transition were difficult for many war brides, most persevered and grew to love their adopted homeland.
Born in London of Welsh parents, David Thompson was an outsider, struggling to find a foothold in the empire that had consumed his country. He described himself as a solitary traveler, unknown to the world.
Canada is a hard country to govern, observed John A. Macdonald, Canadas first Prime Minister. Its also a hard country in which to get elected.
On 24 July 1967, during a state visit to Expo '67, General Charles de Gaulle, president of France and a hero of the 20th century, proclaimed from the balcony of Montréal's City Hall a sentence that would change the history of Canada: “Vive le Québec libre.”
Shawnadithit grew anxious waiting for her uncle, Longnon, to return to camp at the junction of Badger Brook and the Exploits River, deep in the wilds of Newfoundland.
The story of the CCF began during the Great Depression. The stock market crash of 1929 and a lengthy drought devastated the economy. Neither Prime Minister Mackenzie King and his Liberals nor R.B. Bennett and the Conservative Opposition were inclined to do anything, believing that the economic crisis required no extraordinary measures.
Laurier led the country for 15 years — the longest uninterrupted term for a Canadian prime minister — with a policy of systematic compromise.
On 5 August 1583 Sir Humphrey Gilbert assembled the reluctant fishermen of St. John's harbour in front of his tent. In a brief ceremony he proclaimed that the land thereabouts now belonged to England, and that he would be its governor.
On October 22, 1854, after a treacherous Atlantic crossing during which his ship, the Prince Rupert, narrowly survived pack ice and a vicious storm that ripped apart four of its sails, Arctic explorer Dr. John Rae arrived in England.
Lord Cardigan took up his position at the front of the Light Brigade. He sat tall in the saddle, his eyes flashing sapphire blue, his bearing proud. This would be his day for, although all who met him found him unusually stupid, no-one doubted his dauntless courage.
