Storytelling and star-gazing
Locals named to Order of Canada
From a civil servant who spent decades launching Canadian astronauts and technology into the mystery of space to a storyteller who creates her own worlds for audiences, a string of local people were among Friday’s appointees to the Order of Canada.
Gov. Gen. David Johnston said the coming year marks a milestone because 2017 is not only Canada’s 150th birthday but the 50th anniversary of the Order of Canada.
“So let’s be inspired by the examples set by these remarkable Canadians and use this occasion to build a smarter and more caring country in which every individual can succeed to the greatest extent possible,” Johnston said.
The new companions, officers or members of the Order of Canada will accept their insignias at a ceremony at a later date.
Almost 7,000 people from every walk of life have been invested in the order, whose motto translates as “they desire a better country.” Ottawa’s William MacDonald Evans, known as Mac, was a public servant for three decades and the “key architect” of the Canadian Space Program, which he helped create, then served as president from 1994 to 2001. Evans spearheaded the Canadian astronaut and RADARSAT programs, and negotiated Canada’s role in the International Space Station.
Jan Andrews of Lanark, meanwhile, is being honoured as the author of children’s books, including Rude Stories, which was hailed by a reviewer as “wonderfully inventive and delightfully told.” Andrews was called a storytelling “pioneer” who finds tales from around the world and tells them across Canada and as far away as Australia.
Other names on the latest list of 100 Canadians to be appointed to the order were Nunavut-based throat singer Tanya Tagaq Gillis, former Supreme Court of Canada Justice Morris Fish, former federal Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff and former Ontario LieutenantGovernor David Onley. With files from the Canadian Press