By Will Knight In 2007, Stephen Bocking, professor of environmental studies at Trent University, asked me to conduct some research on British Columbia’s aquaculture industry. The plan included a visit to British Columbia to consult the collection at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) library at the Pacific Biological Station in Nanaimo on Vancouver Island. As a budding historian… Read more »
By Dagomar Degroot In Toronto, 2013 was a year of storms. The media storm kindled by the mayor’s chicanery was twice interrupted by meteorological storms that threatened lives and property on an unprecedented scale. On July 8th more than 100 mm of rain inundated the city in a matter of hours, triggering flash floods that caused more than $1 billion… Read more »
Many Canadians view Pierre Elliott Trudeau as a Canadian hero, perhaps the most charismatic Prime Minister the nation has ever seen. Yet others are far more critical of Trudeau’s leadership and legacies. This ambivalence has led to popular opinion polls naming Pierre one of the greatest and worst Canadian of all time. Justin, Pierre’s 41-year-old son and current leader of… Read more »
By Lachlan MacKinnon On Labour Day Weekend, Sydney, Nova Scotia celebrated the opening of the Open Hearth Park on the remediated site of the former steel plant with a series of musical performances, a gourmet street fair, and a procession of former steelworkers through the park. The celebration, titled “Stronger than Steel,” revealed some of the ways that the experiences of… Read more »
By Josh MacFadyen The following piece was recently originally posted on The Otter ~ La Loutre Many Canadians had a brush with homelessness, or at least heat-lessness, over the holidays. Over half a million customers across Ontario, Quebec, and New Brunswick spent Christmas in the cold and dark, and ten days after the 2013 ice storm homes were still coming… Read more »
By Kaitlin Wainwright In 2001, the federal government officially declared January 11th to be Sir John A. Macdonald Day, in honour of Canada’s first prime minister and a Father of Confederation. While it’s not an official holiday (shame, we could all use one of those in the cold winter months), it is a “heritage day” along with National Flag of… Read more »
By Andrew Watson, Stacy Nation-Knapper, and Sean Kheraj Last year, Nature’s Past, the Canadian environmental history podcast, published a special series called, “Histories of Canadian Environmental Issues”. Each episode focused on a different contemporary environmental issue and featured interviews and discussions with historians whose research explains the context and background. Following up on that project, we are publishing six articles… Read more »
https://activehistory.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/McKay-War-Memory-and-Reaction-Reshaping-History-in-Harpers-Canada.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadActiveHistory.ca is happy to present a recording of Ian McKay’s talk, “War, Memory and Reaction: Reshaping History in Harper’s Canada.” McKay delivered the talk to the First Unitarian Congregation in Ottawa as the 2013 Holtom Lecture.
By Jay Young I put up my family’s Christmas tree yesterday. Although some have described me as a bit of a scrooge, the truth is, I really do enjoy many holiday traditions, especially as I get older. And as a historian, I realize that these traditions have a past, both within wider society and within my own life. Take that… Read more »
By Peter Seixas For the Historical Thinking Project, 2013-14 was the best of times and the worst of times. It was the best of times because two of Canada’s largest provinces made the most concrete and comprehensive headway in adapting the ideas of the Project for their curricula. Ontario implemented a new K-12 curriculum that embedded the historical thinking concepts… Read more »
