Remembering an Extraordinary Struggle for Sexual Equality in Ontario

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By Christine McLaughlin

Cliff Pilkey and Bev McCloskey, UAW Local 222 Executive Board, 1955.

Sometimes ordinary people can do extraordinary things. I had the pleasure of witnessing an example of this recently when I attended a tribute luncheon in honour of the 23rd annual Agnes Macphail Award winner, Beverly McCloskey.

Agnes Macphail was the first woman in Canada elected to the House of Commons and first woman sworn into the Legislative Assembly of Ontario where she played a leading role in passing Ontario’s first equal pay legislation in 1951.

Despite this first legislative step, it was still legal in Ontario to employ “girls” in segregated workspaces, enforce separate seniority lists for men and women, and to negotiate very unequal collective agreements on their behalf. For a group of seven women from UAW Local 222 in Oshawa who were capable of doing the same jobs as their male coworkers, this was grossly unfair. More importantly, they set out to change it. Continue reading →

Above and Below: Manipulating the Niagara Waterscape

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By Daniel Macfarlane

Niagara River Remedial Works.

Nik Wallenda’s impending and controversial tightrope walk across Niagara Falls, set for June 15, is just the most recent in a long line of such spectacles (e.g. actually going over the falls!) at the iconic cataract. Given the banality of the carnivalesque at the Niagara Falls – just think of circus-style attractions –  it has often interpreted as a touchstone of cultural and social history, ranging from the epitome of the North American natural sublime in past centuries, to the cradle of electricity since the late 19th century, honeymoon central since the mid-20th century, and then serving as a symbol of environmental degradation (Love Canal) in more recent decades.

But I would argue that what is going on underneath Niagara Falls, is much more intriguing, and culturally revealing, if not as made-for-TV dramatic as a tightrope walk. Ontario Power Generation, one of the successor organizations to Ontario Hydro, is set to finish a massive 10.4 km mega-tunnel in 2013 which will take water from above the cataract, funnel it underneath the community of Niagara Falls, Ontario to the Sir Adam Beck powerhouses downstream. But this tunnel is nothing new, as it joins similar diversion tunnels and conduits that were built throughout the 20th century  (Canadian Geographic recently featured this tunnel’s construction, including a map of the past and present tunnels, in its April 2012 issue). The soon-to-be-completed tunnel is part of a massive and historic hydro-electric production landscape in which water falling down the Niagara escarpment has been diverted on both sides of the border in order to generate power. Continue reading →

Power and the Questions We Ask about History Education

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By Thomas Peace

In one of her blog posts on THEN/HiER’s Teaching the Past, Samantha Cutrara asked a challenging question that gets to the fundamentals of history education.  Who, she asks, is history education for?  This question is more complex than it seems, because, depending on the answer, it has a variety of implications for historians and history educators.  Implicit in this question is a set of power relations that often remain undisclosed in discussions about history and how it is taught.  By probing the implications that develop from the question of ‘who history is for’, it becomes apparent that we must ask a more basic question that helps us better understand the uses and abuses of the past. What do we mean by history education? Continue reading →

Wednesday: “The War of 1812: Whose War Was It, Anyway?”

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This summer marks the two hundredth anniversary of the United States’ declaration of war on Great Britain and her colonies (including what eventually became Canada). The bicentennial of the War of 1812 this summer will be the starting point for a number of commemorations, restorations, re-enactments and monument building. The Government of Canada, under current Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, reiterated its commitment to supporting commemorations across Canada in its most recent Speech from the Throne. Numerous events planned across the country will serve to “perpetuate the identities of War of 1812 militia units,” as well as to demonstrate, in the words of Heritage Minister James Moore, that “This was the fight for Canada.” A public study conducted recently by the Department of Canadian Heritage, however, points out that many Canadians cannot name the three combatants in the war, and argues that it “may not be something that a lot of Canadians recognize or understand. Continue reading →

The Smokescreen of ‘Modernization’ at Library and Archives Canada

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Is this the new normal? Let's hope not.

By Ian Milligan

The government claims that Library and Archives Canada needs to be modernized so all Canadians can access archival services. Yet the state of Canada’s online collections are small and sorely lacking when compared to their expansive on-site collections. LAC does need to modernize, and the goal of expanding access beyond just Ottawa is actually a laudable one. But what they’re doing here, under the guise of ‘modernization’, is simply cutting services and diminishing our access to Canada’s past. In this post, I want to show you how small and insignificant LAC’s online collections are, why they haven’t taken them seriously, and that if we’re fighting for better on-site access, we might as well fight for better online access too! They are, after all, despite the rhetoric of LAC and the government, not incompatible in the slightest.

Continue reading →

Tuition, Protest and Bill 78: A View from Quebec

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Photo by Gerry Lauzon

At the end of last week, the Quebec government tabled Bill 78 in an effort to end the months of protest over planned hikes to university tuition. The bill sets restrictions on the freedom of assembly and expression, requiring those in protests over 50 people to ascertain that the protest has been officially sanctioned by police and government officials.  The bill also holds student associations, unions and their leaders accountable for the actions of their membership. The biggest problem with the law, like most draconian measures, is that it is vague in its definition of illegal activity and harsh on punishment.  Not surprisingly, countless groups – including some that disagree with the tuition-based protest – have voiced their opposition to it, culminating in a mass demonstration on Tuesday in Montreal.  Below is a translated version of an open letter, written by many of Quebec’s leading historians in reaction to the government’s bill.  It is followed by brief summaries of the posts related to this issue published by our francophone partner site, HistoireEngagee.ca. Continue reading →

Call for Nominations – CHA Active History Committee Coordinator(s)

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The CHA Active History Committee will be holding elections for one or more coordinators at its annual meeting at the Canadian Historical Association’s annual meeting, scheduled for noon on May 30, 2012 (see CHA programme for room location). Anyone interested in the position can contact the current co-coordinators at trepaj@yorku.ca  for more information. Continue reading →

Seizing Canada’s Past: Politics and the Reinvention of Canadian History

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Former National Archives building, Ottawa

By Sean Kheraj

The conversation has been ongoing among Canadian historians for the past few years, especially since the federal government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, altered the contents of the official citizenship guide for new Canadians to place greater emphasis on military history and the monarchy while ignoring or downplaying the country’s history of progressive social policy, multiculturalism, and social justice movements. Many Canadian historians have been concerned that the Conservative Party of Canada is attempting to reinvent the narrative of the country’s past for its own political purposes. Continue reading →

What’s Wrong With Celebrating the War of 1812?

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This is the third in a weekly series of posts leading up to the mini-conference The War of 1812: Whose War was it Anyway? being held at the University of Waterloo on May 30th.

By Ian McKay and Jamie Swift

Warmonger politicians customarily indulge in high rhetoric, attempting to rally the citizenry round the flag and boost the bloodletting. Or when invoking the glories of past wars. The War of 1812 was no exception.

Those who witness war’s gruesome reality often remember things differently, as do many historians. Continue reading →