Let’s Celebrate!
All kinds of things to love about Canada
Grain elevators 9
Nunavut has four official languages7: Inuktitut, Inuinnaqtun, French and English.
There is a 38-kilometre-wide crater on Mars8 named for Gander, NL. It’s a tribute to the town’s importance in the history of air travel and aerospace.
Quebec City is the only walled city10 in North America north of Mexico.
In 2007, the Royal Canadian Mint made the world’s first million-dollar coin11.
In 1859, William Hall15 became the first Black person, the first Nova Scotian and the first Canadian sailor to receive the Victoria Cross for his heroism.
Bonar Law12 of Kingston, N.B., was the first — and only — British prime minister to be born outside the United Kingdom.
Seacow Head and Seacow Pond on Prince Edward Island aren’t named for some made-up creature. Seacow14 is an old word for walrus.
Scientists at the University of Toronto built North America’s first electron microscope16 in 1938.
The Robertson17 screwdriver was invented by Canadian Peter Robertson in 1909.
Although she never intended to be a backcountry explorer, with the help of Cree guide George Elson18, Mina Benson Hubbard19 created the first maps of huge areas of Labrador after her husband died on an earlier expedition.
Maple Syrup 21
Born in Quebec, Margaret Newton20 studied rust, a disease affecting grain. Her work changed the lives of farmers in the West. They went from losing 30 million bushels of wheat because of rust, to almost none.
Louis Cyr 22 of Saint-Cyprien-de-Napierville, Que., is often called Percheron horse strongest on his man who ever lived. In 1881 he lifted a 1,000-kilogram Percheron horse the back.
The environmental group Greenpeace23 got its start in B.C. in 1971.
The first woman in the world to design airplanes was Vancouver’s Elsie MacGill24. She oversaw production of Hawker Hurricane planes during the Second World War.
Hudson’s Bay stripes 25
Canadians have won 18 Nobel prizes43* in physics, chemistry, medicine, literature and economics. Before he became Prime Minister, Lester Pearson won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1957. * 25+18=43
The delicious Yukon Gold45 potato was invented by scientists at the University of Guelph in 1966.
Since the 1930s, Canada and Denmark have “fought” over who owns Hans Island44 in the Arctic by leaving each other teasing notes and a bottle of alcohol.
Totem poles 46
Chocolate-lovers love chocolates made by Rogers Chocolates47 (since 1885, Victoria, B.C.), Laura Secord48 (1913, Toronto, Ont.) and Ganong Bros49. (1873, St. Stephen, N.B.). Ganong also invented chicken bones50, a crunchy, chocolate-filled cinnamon candy in 1885.
Two Sikh men, Lushman Gill and Sardara Singh Gill, started the India Field Hockey Club51 in Vancouver in 1932.
Métis beadwork 52
Wood Buffalo National Park53, which stretches across the Alberta-Northwest Territories border, is the largest national park in Canada. It is bigger than Switzerland.
Montreal is the largest French-speaking city54 outside France.
Nunavut and the Northwest Territories run their governments by consensus55. That means most of the elected members have to agree on something before it becomes official.
In 1942, Saskatchewan’s Mary Greyeyes Reid56 became the first Aboriginal woman in the Canadian Army.
Fergie Jenkins57 of Chatham, Ont., was the first Canadian in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. Named in 1991, the pitcher is still the only Canadian to receive the honour.
Drumheller, Alta., is home to the world’s largest dinosaur58. It’s four-and-a-half times bigger than a real T. rex, and 12 people can fit in its mouth at once. Also amazing: the nearby Royal Tyrrell Museum59, one of the best places anywhere to learn about dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures.
Throat singing 60
In 1911, a newspaper publisher in B.C.’s Bulkley Valley, Joseph Coyle, saw a delivery man arguing with a customer about damaged eggs, and came up with the idea for the egg carton61.
Many New Brunswick mountains62 are named for types of jobs: Geologists Range, Historians Range and the Naturalists Mountains.
Toboggans 63
Unique accents64 from Newfoundland to the Ottawa Valley, the Gaspé to Lac la Biche.
The CBC66
In 1857, McGill University professor Thomas Sterry Hunt65 invented the green ink used to print American money. It can’t be reproduced in photocopies or photographs.
Bannock 69
The 12.9 kilometre Confederation Bridge68 joining New Brunswick and P.E.I. is the longest bridge in the world over ice-covered water.
Flin Flon67, Man., is the world’s only town named after the main person in a science fiction novel: Professor Josiah Flintabbatey Flonatin.
Badlands 70
To show Algonkin chief Iroquet that he could be trusted, Samuel de Champlain shot the Lachine Rapids in his underwear72.
Ontario-born Leonora Howard King71 became the first Canadian doctor in China in 1877.
Many people know of David Thompson’s83 famous journeys to map the West, but they forget that his Saskatchewan-born wife Charlotte Small84, who spoke English and Cree, was with him at least 20,000 kilometres of the way. In 1962, a warm, dry wind known as a chinook86 (pronounced shih-NOOK), sent the temperature in Pincher Creek, Alta., from -19° to 22° in one hour. Canadian castles87 (actually hotels built by the Canadian Pacific Railway) For thousands of years, Inuit women have worn their babies on their backs in a special coat called an amauti85.