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Willie Adams, Inuk, Liberal senator, businessman, electrician (born 22 June 1934 in Kuujjuaq [then Fort Chimo] in Nunavik, Quebec). As Canada’s first Inuit senator, Adams frequently sought greater federal government support for his people in education, health care, infrastructure, land claims, fishery allocations and affordable food, housing and fuel. He was actively involved in the creation of Nunavut and supported Inuit language rights, art and culture, and traditional hunting methods such as sealing.

James Ryan, railway machinist, labour leader (born 1840 in County Clare, Ireland; died 17 December 1896 in Hamilton, ON). James Ryan was a machinist and railway engineer for the Great Western Railway and later the Grand Trunk Railway. He was a powerful voice in the Canadian Nine Hour Movement, which fought for a shorter workday. Ryan also helped establish the Canadian Labor Protective and Mutual Improvement Association in 1872, the forerunner of the Canadian Labor Union.

Olive Patricia Dickason (née Williamson), CM, Métis journalist, historian, university professor, author (born 6 March 1920 in Winnipeg, MB; died 12 March 2011 in Ottawa, ON). Dickason was the first scholar in Canada to receive a PhD in Indigenous history. Her ground-breaking research and books about Indigenous and Métis history and culture transformed how Canadians perceive the origin of their country and Indigenous peoples. Dickason’s work inspired a new generation of scholars, helping to launch Indigenous studies as an area of scholarly research. She received an Order of Canada in recognition of her achievements.

Romeo Saganash, lawyer, politician, advocate for Indigenous rights (born 28 October 1962 in Waswanipi, a Cree community southeast of James Bay in central Quebec). Saganash is Quebec’s first Indigenous Member of Parliament and the province’s first Cree person to receive an undergraduate law degree. He is believed to be the first Indigenous leader in Canada to run for the leadership of a major political party. For the last 20 years, Saganash has represented the Cree at numerous national and international forums concerning Indigenous issues. He spent 23 years helping to negotiate the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples — a resolution that provides a framework to implement treaty rights between First Peoples and Canada and to fulfill other obligations in international agreements. He has spent his life furthering the economic, environmental, legal and constitutional rights of Indigenous peoples in Canada, particularly the Cree in the James Bay region.

The Cowichan sweater is a garment created in North America with a distinctly patterned design knitted out of bulky-weighted yarn. It originated during the late 19th century among the Cowichan, a Coast Salish people in British Columbia. Historically also called the Indian sweater or Siwash sweater (a derogatory Chinook word for Indigenous people), the Cowichan people reclaimed the name after the 1950s as a means of emphasizing their claim to the garment. The popularity of the sweater by the mid-1900s thrust Cowichan sweaters into the world of international fashion, where they have been appropriated by non-Indigenous designers. Nevertheless, several knitters from various Coast Salish communities around Vancouver Island and the mainland of British Columbia continue to create and sell authentic sweaters. In 2011, the Canadian government recognized Cowichan knitters and sweaters as nationally and historically significant.

Robin Blaser, CM, poet, academic, activist (born 18 May 1925 in Denver, Colorado; died 7 May 2009 in Vancouver, BC).

François Saillant, activist, community worker, politician, author (born 15 June 1951 in Quebec City, QC). Coordinator and spokesperson for the Front d’action populaire en réaménagement urbain (Popular Action Front for Urban Planning) from 1979 to 2016, he was also a candidate for Québec solidaire in three provincial elections. He is the author of three books on the right to housing.

John Geddie, Presbyterian missionary (b at Banff, Scot 19 Apr 1815; d at Geelong, Australia 14 Dec 1872). Geddie came with his family to Pictou, NS, in 1816 and after studying theology with Thomas MCCULLOCH became a minister in PEI.

Immigration to Canada by Southeast Asians is relatively recent; most arrived in Canada after 1974. Southeast Asia is located south of China and east of India. It consists of multiethnic nations with common histories, structures and social practices, as well as a cultural system that recognizes ethnic pluralism. Southeast Asia is comprised of 11 countries: Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar (Burma), the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, East Timor and Vietnam.

In the 2011 National Household Survey (NHS), more than one million Canadians indicated that they were of Southeast Asian origin. Filipino Canadians were the most numerous (662,600), followed by Vietnamese Canadians (220,425), Cambodians or Khmer (34,340), Laotians (22,090), Indonesians (18,125), Thais (15,080), Malaysians (14,165), Burmese (7,845) and Singaporeans (2,050). Southeast Asians of the Hmong people (an ethnic minority living in the mountains in the south of China, and the north of Vietnam and Laos) have also settled in Canada, as well as several hundred Chinese originally from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos who came to Canada following the “boat people” crisis.

 In recent years settlement, social and logistic factors have eliminated the nomadic lifestyle in favour of aggregation into permanent settlements which have concentrated around Repulse Bay, Mittimatalik [Pond Inlet], Hall Beach, Arctic Bay and Iglulik, which were formerly centres of trade.

Lois Miriam Wilson, née Freeman, United Church minister (b at Winnipeg 8 Apr 1927). Ordained after 15 years as a homemaker, Wilson shared team ministries with her husband, Roy, successively in Thunder Bay, Hamilton and Kingston, Ontario.

Glenna F. Hansen, Inuvialuit leader, businesswoman, health and education advocate, Commissioner of the Northwest Territories (b at Aklavik, 1956). Hansen was hired as an executive assistant by David Storr and Sons Contracting Ltd of Inuvik in 1990, and became general manager of the firm in 1996.

Jens Haven, founder of the Moravian mission in Labrador (b at Wust, Jutland, Denmark 23 June 1724; d at Herrnhut, Saxony [E Germany] 16 Apr 1796). After 10 years at the Moravian settlement at Herrnhut (1748-58), he was sent to the Inuit Mission in Greenland.

​Anne-Marie Huguenin (née Gleason, pen name “Madeleine”), writer, journalist and editor (born 5 October 1875 in Rimouski, Québec; died 21 October 1943 in Montréal).

Huguenots, a popular term used since 1560 to designate French Protestants, some of whom became involved in the Newfoundland fishery and Canadian fur trade, and in abortive colonization attempts in Canada (1541-42), Brazil (1555) and the Carolinas (1562-64).

Jean-Baptiste de La Brosse (born at Magnac, France 1724; died at Qué 1782). Jean-Baptiste de La Brosse was a Jesuit missionary in the Saguenay-St Lawrence Gulf region. La Brosse is also a hero of folklore, remembered for having predicted his own death on 11 April 1782.

Louis Lachance, priest, philosopher (b at St-Joachim de Montmorency, Qué 18 Feb 1899; d at Montréal 28 Oct 1963). His Nationalisme et religion (1936) provided the base for a nationalism based on reason - distinct from that advocated by Lionel GROULX which was based primarily on feeling.

Arthur Reginald Marsden Lower, historian (b at Barrie, Ont 12 Aug 1889; d at Kingston, Ont 7 Jan 1988).

Alikomiak (also spelled Alekámiaq) and Tatimagana, Inuit hunters from the central Arctic, were the first Inuit to be condemned and executed for murder under Canadian law on 1 February 1924. The trials of Alikomiak and Tatimagana have been described as demonstrations of federal authority over the Inuit as well as of Canadian sovereignty in the Arctic.

Basques were expert fishermen and sailors from the southeast corner of the Bay of Biscay. With the Portuguese, they were early arrivals to Newfoundland's Grand Banks.