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Today's Canadian Headline... |
| 1670 | BAY DAY
London England – Charles II grants a Royal charter to his cousin Price Rupert and a group of investors called The Governor and Company of Adventurers of England trading into Hudson’s Bay: today’s Hudson’s Bay Company. Two French explorers and traders, Pierre-Esprit Radisson and Médard Chouart des Groseilliers, proposed the fur-trading company to the group, and mounted a successful season of trade a year earlier. The charter gives the company the exclusive monopoly of commerce in lands flowing into Hudson Bay, and charges them to find a route to the South Seas. |
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| 1660 |
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| 1797 |
And in Today's Canadian Birthdays... Abraham Gesner 1797-1864 Also William Buell Richards 1815-1889 Also John Galt 1779-1839
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| In Other Events… | |
| 1991 | Ottawa Ontario – Justice Bertha Wilson heads Canadian Bar Association task force to improve status of women in legal profession; she retired from the Supreme Court in November 1990 after 8 years. |
| 1991 | Ottawa Ontario – Supreme Court strikes down 190 year old law that let the Crown jail people found not guilty by reason of insanity, or commit them to a mental institution indefinitely. |
| 1988 | Ottawa Ontario – National Arts Centre sells 16,408 seats for the British musical CATS, the largest single-day sale of tickets for a musical in Canada. |
| 1988 | Halifax NS – Bruce Curtis transferred to Nova Scotia prison from New Jersey after a campaign by family and friends; was sentenced to 20 years for 1982 shooting death of classmate’s mother; maintained the gun went off accidentally. |
| 1986 | New York City – Nova Scotia singer Anne Murray’s Now and Forever (You and Me) reaches #1 on the Billboard pop chart. |
| 1986 | Ottawa Ontario – Dr. Wilbert Keon performs Canada’s first artificial heart transplant at the Ottawa Civic Hospital; fits patient Noella Leclair, 42, with a Jarvik 7- 70 until a human heart is found several days later. |
| 1986 | Vancouver BC – Prince Charles and Princess Diana officially open Expo ’86; Vancouver Exposition runs until October 13th. |
| 1975 | Point Lepreau NB – New Brunswick starts building of $900 million Point Lepreau nuclear power station; to provide 30% of New Brunswick’s electricity on completion in 1980. |
| 1970 | Amsterdam Netherlands – International Olympic Committee awards the 1976 Summer Olympics to Montreal; first time for a Canadian city. |
| 1969 | Ottawa Ontario – Federal government and Trans-Canada Telephone Systems form Telesat Canada, to develop communications satellites. |
| 1964 | Toronto Ontario – Toronto Maple Leafs beat Montreal Canadiens 4 games to 2 for the Stanley Cup. |
| 1964 | Louisville Kentucky – Windfield Farms owner Edward Plunkett (E. P.) Taylor 1901-1989 sees jockey Bill Hartack ride his stallion Northern Dancer to victory in the Kentucky Derby; first Canadian-bred horse to win; the same pair will go on to take the Preakness Stakes in Maryland. |
| 1962 | Ottawa Ontario – Canadian dollar officially pegged at US 92.5¢. |
| 1961 | Montreal Quebec – Ocean liner Empress of Canada arrives at Montreal on maiden voyage; new flagship of Canadian Pacific fleet. |
| 1939 | Ottawa Ontario – The National Film Act creates the National Film Board as a public production agency, headed by Scottish film maker John Grierson 1898-1972. |
| 1919 | Winnipeg Manitoba – Winnipeg metalworkers (the Central Metal Trades) go on strike for an eight hour day. |
| 1885 | Edmonton Alberta – Thomas Bland Strange 1831-1925 relieves Fort Edmonton during the North West Rebellion. |
| 1885 | Cut Knife Hill Saskatchewan – Colonel William Dillon Otter 1843-1929 forced to retreat with eight dead and 15 wounded, as Cree chief Poundmaker 1826-1886 holds off his attack at Cut Knife Hill. |
| 1881 | Portage La Prairie Manitoba – Canadian Pacific Railway starts building its prairie section of track; first sod turned for the CPR as a company line; first rail also laid at Fort William. |
| 1838 | Quebec Quebec – James Cuthbert 1769-1849 chairs the Special Council of Lower Canada, a 22 member body set up by Governor Colborne. |
| 1835 | Victoria BC – Hudson’s Bay Company launches The Beaver, the first steamship on the British Columbia coast. |
| 1835 | Quebec – William Colville, Lord Amherst Governor-in-Chief of Lower Canada; resigns in May. |
| 1610 | London England – John Guy (c1584- c1629), the Sheriff and later Lord Mayor of Bristol, is charged by the Company of Adventurers & Planters of London & Bristol (Newfoundland Company) to colonize the island; King James I had given the Company the grant of Newfoundland at the urging of Francis Bacon. |
| 1602 | Ratcliffe England – George Weymouth and expedition set sail on the ships Discovery and Godspeed to find the North West Passage to China; carries letters for the Khan; promised £500 prize by East India Company. |
Old Photos and Memories of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia 