Name changes can’t erase burden of history

For about a year and a half of my early career I worked in a large office in Ottawa’s Hector Langevin building. For years that building was part of several housing our External (Foreign) Affairs Department. Once the department moved into the Lester Pearson building, the Langevin block became home to the Office of the Prime Minister.

Recently, Langevin’s name was removed from the building. It was renamed — as it has been for several years — the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO). A Langevin bridge in Calgary also has been renamed. Langevin was a Father of Confederation.

Within the Langevin building I was fortunate to have an office facing Parliament Hill. During 1967, that was a remarkable location for viewing centennial celebrations on the Hill, including assorted royal visits.

The Langevin building was named after John A. Macdonald’s public works minister. Langevin, like many politicians in the 19th century, was a cultural product of his age — when there was corruption and racism, and only males voted.

Ironically, the consequence of corruption lived on long after Langevin’s demise. Because so much money assigned for construction of the building was siphoned away, when finally completed, the building had no toilets.

Added later, their placement resulted in washrooms being appended to the rear of the building hanging over the laneway. Within, a trip “to the loo” meant either climbing or descending several staircases.

Bats were regular blessed visitors to offices, dropping as they were able from abandoned fireplaces and chimney flues. The voice of an agitated office occupant heralded the arrival of another flying bat.

I am not a fan of naming buildings, bridges or roadways after former politicians or hockey players for two reasons: associations are easily forgotten; and, politically laden they are dubious in intent.

Recently, assorted activists complained that Langevin had a role in the sad history of residential schools. Complaints led our most pliant prime minister to ensure that the Langevin building was renamed. I do not agree with that decision.

Further, another boisterous group demanded that Ryerson University be cleansed also with a name change. Appreciating the contribution that Family Compact member Egerton Ryerson made to the development of public education in Ontario, I would urge vigorous opposition to any name change to Ryerson University or removal of memorial statutes.

In the frantic effort to bend over backwards in pursuit of obsessive political correctness, we are quickly losing our collective grasp of history, both how it evolves and how it offers instruction.

If Langevin was a late 19th century racist so, in all probability, was founding father John A. Macdonald whom Langevin served. Indeed, an elementary school teachers’ union now wants all schools bearing Sir John A’s name purged because he was a racist. Everybody was a racist in the 19th century and well into the 20th.

And these are school teachers responsible for education. Close your eyes and forget that history offers often brutal lessons. If they miss the lesson elementary teachers probably are doomed to relive the experience. Without John A. Macdonald there would not be a Canada.

This frenetic rush to change names to cleanse our collective historical record of cultural sins has potential to distort Canadian history and experience. After all, if we change names to reflect those without cultural sin then we not only deny actual history but we obscure the very basis upon which learning how to move beyond those archaic cultural norms takes place.

I cannot and will not be held responsible for attitudes and actions of my predecessors. I could be held accountable, however, were I to retain and promote racism, sexism and more if I do not both acknowledge history and acknowledge that lessons are being learned. Limited perceptions of our elders should not be perpetuated. Nor should they be condemned today for their cultural biases.

Simply symbolically changing names does little or nothing to mould changes in cultural attitudes and behaviours. That requires education. Because of Egerton Ryerson’s initiative, Ontario had an early educational system which our elementary teacher’s union appears to have forgotten.