TODAY IN HISTORY

On this day in 1906

Parliament passed the “Lord’s Day Observance Act” to prohibit work, entertainment, sport and almost all commerce on Sundays. The law remained on the books until the Supreme Court of Canada struck it down in 1985. Also on this day: In 1535, Sir Thomas More was executed. More, once King Henry VIII’s chief minister and friend, had refused to take the oath of supremacy accepting the English monarch as head of the Roman Catholic church. He was beatified in 1886 and canonized in 1935.

In 1923, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was formed.

In 1950, in Nelson, B.C., 195 radical Doukhobors, the Sons of Freedom, were given prison sentences totalling 793 years on numerous charges, including burning schools and conspiracy. After much unrest in the 1950s and 1960s, the fanatical activism died down. Descendants of the original Doukhobors, a sect of Christian Russian dissenters, number about 30,000 across Canada.

In 1975, a hailstone weighing 249 grams fell near Wetaskiwin, Alta.

In 1989, Ottawa sold its remaining 57 per cent interest in Air Canada, completing privatization of the airline. Air Canada’s new issue of 41.1 million shares was an immediate sellout. Ottawa had begun its sale of the Crown corporation in October. The Tories had sold 12 Crown corporations since coming to power in 1984.

In 2013, a runaway train carrying crude oil derailed in Lac-Megantic, Que., igniting explosions and fires that incinerated the small town’s centre, killing 47 people and forcing the evacuation of nearly 2,000 others. Millions of litres of oil also leaked into the soil and nearby water bodies.