What kind of historical figures will we celebrate after 150 years of Confederation?
The question got some traction last week after a Canadian Press story about answers to that query.
A government-sponsored consultation asked Canadians to consider the question: “Which Canadians have inspired you the most over the last 150 years?” The result was a predictable list of characters — David Suzuki, Pierre Trudeau, Terry Fox — most of whom made their mark in Canada since the centennial in 1967.
But there is so much more to Canada than just the past 50 years. The 150th anniversary of Confederation in 2017 is an opportunity to explore our past, far beyond our own lifetimes. This will be a time to shine a light on Canadians who have made an important contribution to the country, despite the fact they may have receded from memory.
From Fathers of Confederation to sports heroes of bygone decades, there is no shortage of Canadians who have inspired us. Thomas D’Arcy McGee and George-Étienne Cartier, for example, are two great Canadians from the early days of Confederation who merit our attention.
McGee, the passionate Irish immigrant and fervent supporter of Canada, spoke of a country “bound by the blue rim of ocean.” Cartier was the refined blue from Montreal whose partnership with John A. Macdonald was essential to making Canada possible. Both men’s legacies are already etched in stone, but they deserve new life as we approach 2017.
The same could be said of some of our greatest sports heroes. Long before Wayne Gretzky or Clara Hughes (Canada’s most-decorated Olympian) came Bobbie Rosenfeld and Lionel Conacher.
At the 1928 Olympics in Amsterdam, the first in which women were able to compete in track and field, Rosenfeld won a gold medal in the 4x100 relay as well as a silver in the 100-yard dash.
Conacher, known as “The Big Train,” played professional football and hockey while also excelling at baseball, lacrosse and boxing. He later served as an MP. Both Rosenfeld and Conacher were named Canada’s athletes of the half-century in 1950.
We’re just scratching the surface here, and many Canadians will have ideas of their own. However, when asked, the public seems challenged to come up with names from beyond their own times. (What’s that line about the past being a “foreign country”?)
Ironically, publishing lists of great Canadians from the past is not new.
In 1997, historians H. Graham Rawlinson and J. L. Granatstein published The Canadian 100 and captured attention for anointing Charles Saunders — the creator of the hardy Marquis wheat — the most influential Canadian of the 20th century. (In a stroke of genius, they further provoked Canadians by naming Brian Mulroney second.)
In 1998, as millennium fever continued across the Dominion, Maclean’s magazine published its special issue of the 100 Most Important Canadians in History. Choices were distributed across various categories, which allowed for an eclectic final list, topped by First World War hero and former governor-general Georges Vanier.
Tommy Douglas, the father of medicare, was voted “the greatest Canadian” in 2004 by viewers watching the CBC show of the same name.
All of this is to say that there are some resources for Canadians to draw upon when they consider who should receive special attention in 2017. Tom Longboat? Nellie McClung? Big Bear?
It will be a lot of fun to consider Canadians who have made a difference to the country in various walks of life and make them a part of our celebration in some way.
But when we’re doing so, let’s remember that Canadian history reaches back beyond the Pierre Trudeau years.
J.D.M. Stewart teaches Canadian history at Bishop Strachan School in Toronto.