TODAY IN HISTORY: First phone call is made

On this date in 1527, Captain John Rut wrote the first recorded letter from the New World to the old.

In 1583, the first English settlement in North America was founded at St. John’s, after Sir Humphrey Gilbert proclaimed England’s authority over Newfoundland.

In 1751, the first printing press in Canada was set up in Halifax by Bartholomew Green.

In 1811, Elisha Graves Otis, who invented the elevator brake, was born near Halifax, Vt.

In 1847, Quebec City, Montreal, Toronto and Buffalo were connected by telegraph.

In 1860, Joseph Howe was elected premier of Nova Scotia.

In 1876, the first telephone call from one building to another took place in Mount Pleasant, Ont. Alexander Graham Bell called his uncle in Brantford, Ont.

In 1914, Germany declared war on France and Belgium beginning the First World War.

In 1961, Saskatchewan Premier Tommy Douglas was elected national leader of the newly formed New Democratic Party.

In 1977, the Canadian government rejected aboriginal demands for their own political territory in the Northwest Territories.

In 1996, Donovan Bailey anchored Canada’s victory in the mens 400-metre relay final at the Atlanta Olympics.

In 1999, the Toronto Dominion Bank announced it would take over Canada Trust in an $8 billion deal.

In 2005, Second World War veteran Ernest "Smoky" Smith, the last Canadian to be awarded the Victoria Cross, died at age 91.

In 2005, over 40 cars of a CN Rail train derailed, spilling thousands of litres of oil and a toxic pole-treating chemical in Lake Wabamun, Alta.

In 2006, four Canadian soldiers from Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry were killed and 10 others injured in Taliban ambush in Pashmul, Afghanistan.

In 2011, according to a study by the Interactive Advertising Bureau of Canada, online advertising revenues pushed the Internet past daily newspapers as the second largest ad revenue source in Canada, after TV.

In 2018, a 77-year-old man was killed when a powerful tornado touched down west of Lake Manitoba, lifting several homes off their foundations and sweeping one vehicle into the lake.

In 2018, the federal government delivered $11 million to help the City of Toronto defray some of the costs associated with an influx of asylum seekers.

In 2021, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was cleared by the federal ethics watchdog over Liberal MPs using their office budgets to hire the services of a company run by one of his lifelong friends.