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Article

Nova Scotia and Confederation

Nova Scotia was one of the four founding provinces of Canada. It joined New BrunswickOntario and Quebec in Confederation on 1 July 1867. However, this was mainly because Confederation delivered the Intercolonial Railway to the Maritimes, and because of the efforts of Sir Charles Tupper. His government passed approval for Confederation in the colonial legislature despite popular opposition. (See Confederation’s Opponents.) Confederation was met with mass protests in the colony. Joseph Howe led a two-year effort to repeal the union. (See Repeal Movement.) But Howe finally decided he could do more to help his province by working inside the federal government. He joined the federal Cabinet in 1869.

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Château Ramezay

Château Ramezay, in Old Montréal, was the first building to be designated a historic monument by the government of Québec, in 1929. Recognized as a National Historic Site of Canada in 1949, it is now a museum with permanent collections and temporary exhibits where visitors can learn about over 500 years of Montréal’s history.

Article

British Columbia

British Columbia is Canada's most westerly province, and is a mountainous area whose population is mainly clustered in its southwestern corner. BC is Canada’s third-largest province after Québec and Ontario, making up 10 per cent of Canada’s land surface. British Columbia is a land of diversity and contrast within small areas. Coastal landscapes, characterized by high, snow-covered mountains rising above narrow fjords and inlets, contrast with the broad forested upland of the central interior and the plains of the northeast. The intense "Britishness" of earlier times is referred to in the province's name, which originated with Queen Victoria and was officially proclaimed in 1858.

Article

Africville

Africville was an African-Canadian village located just north of Halifax and founded around the mid-19th century. The City of Halifax demolished the once-prosperous seaside community in the 1960s in what many said was an act of racism. The mayor of the Halifax Regional Municipality apologized for the action in 2010. For many people, Africville represents the oppression faced by Black Canadians, and the efforts to right historic wrongs.

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Intercolonial Railway

The Intercolonial Railway was a rail line that operated from 1872 to 1918, connecting Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Québec and Ontario. The line was Canada’s first national infrastructure project. Plans for its construction date to the 1830s, but the project only gained momentum during the Confederation conferences of 1864 in Charlottetown and Québec City, where construction of the Intercolonial Railway was negotiated for the Maritime colonies’ entry to British North American union. Construction began shortly after Canada became a country in 1867, with most lines completed by the mid-1870s.

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East Gwillimbury

East Gwillimbury, Ontario, incorporated as a town in 1971, population 34,637 (2021 census), 23,991 (2016 census). Located in York Region, East Gwillimbury’s northern border is less than a kilometre from Lake Simcoe. Historic communities within East Gwillimbury include Sharon, Holland Landing, Queensville and Mount Albert. As of 2021, the town was Canada’s fastest growing municipality of over 5,000 people, with a population increase of over 44 per cent between 2016 and 2021.

Throughout history, the East Gwillimbury area has been home to different Indigenous groups, namely the Wendat (Huron), Tionontati (Petun), Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabeg, including the Chippewas of Georgina Island First Nation. The land is part of the Williams Treaties (1923).

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Red Deer

Red Deer, Alberta, incorporated as a city in 1913, population 100,844 (2021 census), 100,418 (2016 census). The city of Red Deer is located on the Red Deer River, 150 km south of Edmonton. The Cree applied the name “Elk” to the river, but Scottish fur traders appear to have confused elk with the red deer of their homeland.

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Nunavut

Nunavut, or “Our Land” in Inuktitut, encompasses over 2 million km2 and has a population of 36,858 residents (2021 census), 30,865 of whom are Inuit. Covering roughly the part of the Canadian mainland and Arctic Archipelago that lies to the north and northeast of the treeline, Nunavut is the largest and northernmost territory of Canada and the fifth largest administrative division in the world. Nunavummiut live in 25 communities spread across this vast territory, with the largest number, 7,429 (2021 census), in the capital, Iqaluit. The creation of Nunavut in 1999 (the region was previously part of the Northwest Territories) represented the first major change to the political map of Canada since the incorporation of Newfoundland into Confederation in 1949. Beyond changing the internal political boundaries of Canada, Nunavut’s formation represented a moment of great political significance; through political activism and long-term negotiations, a small, marginalized Indigenous group overcame many obstacles to peacefully establish a government that they controlled within the Canadian state, thereby gaining control of their land, their resources and their future. As such, the creation of Nunavut represents a landmark moment in the evolution of Canada and a significant development in the history of the world’s Indigenous peoples.

Article

Fur Trade Route Networks

Throughout the period of the historical fur trade (early 17th to the mid-19th century), water routes were the natural “highways” of First Nations trappers and European fur traders. Water trading networks connected Indigenous societies from the Atlantic Ocean, along the St. Lawrence River to the Great Lakes, and then on towards the Hudson Bay watershed. North America’s waterborne geography facilitated intracontinental travel, enabled European expansion and settlement into Indigenous North America, and shaped the contours of Euro-Indigenous relations in the context of the fur trade. These extensive and interconnected systems of rivers, lakes and overland trails criss-crossed Indigenous territories and had been used for generations. At the height of the fur trade, the principal canoe route extended westward from the Island of Montreal through the Great Lakes, and from the northwestern shore of Lake Superior over the height of land into the Hudson Bay watershed. From the Lake Winnipeg basin, Indigenous trappers and European traders fanned out towards the Western Prairies via the Assiniboine, Qu’Appelle and Souris rivers, towards the foothills of the Rocky Mountains via the North and South branches of the Saskatchewan River, and finally towards the Athabasca Country via the Sturgeon-weir River and the Methye Portage.

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Parliament

The term Parliament refers to the Crown, the House of Commons and the Senate. Together, these institutions create Canadian laws. Parliament has two branches: the executive (the Crown, prime minister and cabinet) and the legislative (the House of Commons and the Senate). This system is a blend of parliamentary democracy and constitutional monarchy. It is based on the Westminster tradition in Britain. Each of the Crown, Senate and Commons must agree with (assent to) a law before it is enacted. The government of the day derives its authority from the people who elected it. It is therefore a representative government, even though it acts in the name of the Crown — a largely symbolic institution. In formal terms, Parliament includes all three bodies. But in common usage, the legislative branch is often equated with Parliament.

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Geography of British Columbia

British Columbia is divided by two of Canada’s seven physiographic regions. These regions are the Cordillera and the Interior Plains. The vast majority of the province is in the Cordillera region, while the northeast corner is part of the Interior Plains. Within the Cordillera region there are many mountain ranges, including the Rocky Mountains and the Coast Mountains. British Columbia’s wet, coastal climate is also home to some of the tallest coniferous trees in Canada, such as the Douglas fir.

Memory Project

William Roy Hindle (Primary Source)

William Roy Hindle  served in the Royal Canadian Air Force during the Second World War. Towards the end of the war he joined the Royal Naval Canadian Volunteer Reserve.

Please be advised that Memory Project primary sources may deal with personal testimony that reflect the speaker’s recollections and interpretations of events. Individual testimony does not necessarily reflect the views of the Memory Project and Historica Canada.

Memory Project

Tadeusz "Tad Szablewski" (Primary Source)

Tad Szablewski was a member of the Polish Air Force during the Second World War.

Please be advised that Memory Project primary sources may deal with personal testimony that reflect the speaker’s recollections and interpretations of events. Individual testimony does not necessarily reflect the views of the Memory Project and Historica Canada.

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