MetaFilter posts tagged with canada and history

A new battle for the Plains of Abraham?

zadcat — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 18:54:23 -0800

Two hundred and fifty years ago the Battle of the Plains of Abraham* took place in Quebec City. In a fight that lasted less than an hour (following a three-month siege throughout the summer of 1759), both generals died and the British won Quebec, soon becoming masters of most of North America. This summer has seen plans for a re-enactment of the battle cancelled and now a controversy over an event to be staged next week, the Moulin à paroles (Mill of Words)**. Plans include a reading of the manifesto of the Front de libération du Québec, a group which carried out bombings and kidnappings throughout the 1960s, culminating in 1970's October Crisis, which is a hot potato that may provoke new trouble on the Plains next week. *Despite the resoundingly Biblical-sounding name, the Plains of Abraham were merely some fields belonging to a local man named Abraham Martin. They are now part of the Battlefields Park in Quebec City. **Presumably so named after the successful multimedia show Le Moulin à images mounted last summer for Quebec City's 400th anniversary.

Fading towns of coastal British Columbia

Rumple — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 13:48:29 -0800

Land's End: Photographer and writer Christopher Grabowski documents the fading industrial towns of the British Columbia coast. Interview, and some of his other Photo Essays at Geist Magazine.

Canadian War Posters

flibbertigibbet — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 03:29:12 -0800

Canadian War Poster Collection at McGill University. And if that doesn't strike your fancy, the list of digital collections include such time-honoured favourites as Expo '67, and the award-winner for unexpected collection, Gynaecology in Traditional Chinese Medicine. (previously)

Hark, A Vagrant!

flatluigi — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 08:40:06 -0800

Kate Beaton, Historical Cartoonist

History of War and Peace Collection

Rumple — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 12:03:01 -0800

Peace and War in the 20th Century is an ambitious, in progress, massive assemblage of posters, photographs, propaganda, ephemera, letters, diaries, paintings, sketches, stories, letters, music and related items, from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. The collection is international in scope. Some of the nodes lack content, and the navigation is a little confusing, so the jump I list some of my favourite case studies from their site. Note: Many of the images are reasonable resolution if you right click and open in a new tab rather than only view in the pop-forward window. Also scroll down for thumbnails of additional material. The advanced search option is very useful as it includes a detailed site map. Representing War: Posters, Art and Music. Many of the posters are unusual and new to me, such as 'Save Waste Bones - They Make Glue for Aircraft', 'Boys, Come Along, You're Wanted', and this beautiful poster of the Earth and Doves. Concentration Camp correspondence Sir Norman Angell: a lifelong proponent of peace (many images of his pamphlets and posters) The Spanish Civil War: Foreign Intervention, American Reaction. Includes evocative pamphlets, leaflets, and posters. Waging War London prepares for World War II: a great selection of instructional and civil defence materials such as posters and memos. Britain prepares for World War I: some diary pages of Adrian Duff. William Frank Kenwood, Canadian Pilot and Prisoner of War, including newspaper clippings, a letter from the Red Cross, telegrams, etc. Vera Brittain's diaries and pamphlets Canadian Women's Roles in World War I: anything new in war work? Mapping and Photographing World War I: interesting instructional materials, etc. The Nuclear Disarmament Movement, which includes a great collection of very striking posters and leaflets. Evolving Technology in World War I, which includes numerous artistic visions of machine guns, tanks, etc. War Resisters, including pamphlets. World War 1 in the Middle East I like this typed report of a raid. I also like this leaflet against War Toys. As I noted, there is a huge amount of great stuff at this site, interspersed with some dead ends as one would expect from a work in progress.

A Forest of Guitars

boost ventilator — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 19:24:50 -0800

Dick Stacey's Country Jamboree is now available on DVD/CD after years of slowly fading into obscurity. "I was wrong in thinking the Jamboree was a thing of the past," said Dick Stacey, a man whose three gas stations and motel took over sponsoring this uniquely Maine talent showcase on a whim in 1973—and ended up lasting just over a decade. The original show (Frankenstein's Country Jamboree) was started by Bob Whitten in Milbridge, Maine during the late 1950s. "There were no rehearsals, and auditions were unheard of. The only thing you had to be to be on Stacey’s Country Jamboree was to be sincere and sober," said 30-year-host Charlie Tenan. "Saturday Night Live was trying to invent characters like this...these were real people, but they were characters who couldn't be manufactured," said Nova Scotia resident and fan Brian White to The Halifax Daily News in 2001. For a sample, check out Bucksport's own Jennie Shontell sing "Wings of a Dove." The longevity and regional success of this program (yet current lack of YouTube presence) was partly due to the bizarre "Bangor/Atlantic Canada cable connection," which also bolstered the career of the late Great Money Movie host Eddie "We'll put 'em on for ya" Driscoll, until being destroyed by a decision by Atlantic Canadian cable providers to opt for Detroit feeds instead of ones from Bangor.

Canada's Russian Revolution

amyms — Tue, 13 May 2008 23:25:51 -0800

It stands as one of the more unusual turning points of the Cold War, thanks mostly to the surprise appearance of several naked middle-aged women. Taking The Cure: How a group of British Columbian anarchists inspired democracy in Russia. More information on the Doukhobors at the Doukhobor Discovery Centre and the Doukhobor Genealogy Website. Alexander Yakovlev died in 2005. Here's his obituary as presented by the BBC. For more information about his place in history, see Alexander Yakovlev and the Roots of Soviet Reforms, a collection of documents housed at the National Security Archive at George Washington University. And for those who can read Russian, The Alexander Yakovlev Foundation.

Mapping Canada

St Urbain's Horseman — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 21:22:05 -0800

Canada at scale: Exploration, colonization and development. And a pop-up menu. Go, eh!

Framing Canada - Early Canadian Photography

Urban Hermit — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 13:59:15 -0800

Framing Canada is an online exhibit of early Canadian photography. Some images are quintessentially Canadian; others range from the sublime to the ridiculous. One picture just might settle a contentious debate once and for all. Most of the collection is organized into topical photo essays. [More inside]

DeLorean out of gas? Try the Toronto Archives....

orange swan — Tue, 04 Jul 2006 07:57:39 -0800

From Muddy York to the Toronto of today.... My search to discover the exact age of the house I recently bought led me to the fabulous Toronto Archives. Even if you don't have the good fortune to live in Toronto and so have the ability to visit the Archives to take a free tour and check out their massive holdings, they have a whack of stuff on line. Of their million photographs dating back to 1856, over 21,000 are online. Check out some of their virtual exhibits. I couldn't begin to give you an overview of the site or even the best of its many gems, but check out Chinatown's VE day victory parade, Bay and Wellington as it was after a huge fire in 1904, old advertisements, letters and postcards (including some from the disenchanted), snapshots of a, er, less politically sensitive time (thanks, Capn!), and — inevitably! — hockey artifacts. A friend of mine makes a hobby of Toronto's history, and after this search of mine, I better understand her interest. It’s fascinating to see what lies beneath the layers of time on a surface so familiar and loved.

Stuff About Dead People: or, History

marxchivist — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 17:29:12 -0800

The Public Archives of Nova Scotia has some cool online exhibits. The original list of dead bodies recovered from the Titanic sinking caught my eye, they also have original log book pages from privateers, lighthouses, slavery and abolition, boats, boats, and more boats. [via]

Gimli Glider: How to glide a 767

five fresh fish — Tue, 21 Feb 2006 19:27:03 -0800

The impressive Gimli Glider. Yes, seriously: it can be a glider. An amazing story of a commercial pilot with mad emergency landing skillz.

oook, indeed

mmahaffie — Thu, 12 Jan 2006 17:16:20 -0800

The past can be a fascinating place. An Anthropologist by training and finder of interesting things by avocation, Hugh Blackmer, began rescuing old photos from antique shops on Nova Scotia (the former Acadia) several decades ago. He's now posting them on-line for his Nova Scotia Faces project. He's using Flickr and experimenting with a wiki. He's finding some wonderful old moments.

What do people eat with maple syrup?

livii — Mon, 25 Apr 2005 13:30:29 -0800

Learning English with the CBC. Learn about Canadian history and improve your English skills with a series of audio and video clips, as well as quizzes and exercises. Topics include Terry Fox: A Marathon of Hope, Arctic Winter Games: The Olympics of the North, and Maple Syrup: A Taste of Canada, among others.

in all thy sons command? What about the babes?

arse_hat — Sat, 29 Jan 2005 23:08:23 -0800

Laura Secord ,Elizabeth Barnett and the Five Nations Mohawks, arguably, made Canada possible.

Doot-doot-doodle-oodle-doot-doo-doo-doot

painquale — Sun, 23 Jan 2005 05:25:00 -0800

It's Carnival Time! In 2002, Silflay Hraka launched the internet's first carnival: The Carnival of the Vanities. Carnivals are showcases of the best that blogs have to offer; bloggers send in posts they have made that they are especially pleased with, and a rotating editor collates them into a weekly edition with editorial comments. Think of carnivals as best-of-the-blogosphere magazines. The Carnival of the Vanities (current edition here) doesn't have any particular focus, but a number of offshoots dedicated to specific fields have popped up. Stay up to date on blog postings about philosophy, science, history, the early modern period, sex, Canada, and (if desperately bored) cats. A new carnival about atheism, The Carnival of the Godless, will be coming out at the end of the month.

Virtual Museums of Canada: Cultural Cornucopia

Rumple — Thu, 25 Nov 2004 20:30:28 -0800

The Virtual Museum of Canada has funded or collaborated on almost 150 virtual exhibits, mostly relating to Canadian History and Culture. There is great diversity, among my favourites are Nk'Mip Nation Aboriginal Childrens' Art from the Inkameep day school (a welcome counterpoint to the residential schools tragedy), the historic re-photography and soundscapes of Montreal, Haida Culture documented , and also compared to Inuit Culture, Inuit (Eskimo) games and 3-dimensional (VR) sculpture, a history of the Canadian Trucking Industry, a splendid overview of Canadian documentary film making, Canadian design in the late 20th century, and the Shipwrecks of Vancouver Island. There is also a searchable image gallery. The only thing missing is a historical whodunnit or two (or three). All sites available in both French and English, and some in other languages too.

History Minutes

jb — Sun, 11 Apr 2004 22:49:31 -0800

History comes to the life, and to television. If people will not come to history, then let history come to them. [more inside]

mammoth confrence

stbalbach — Fri, 08 Aug 2003 07:19:53 -0800

Mammoths (Mammuthus) have been discussed here before and for those modern explorers who hunt the long extinct tusker in the field there is the 3rd International Mammoth conference where you can learn about things such as Mammoth Hunters and Ice Age Dogs.

tdecius — Mon, 11 Oct 1999 09:28:26 -0800

The world's oldest corporation, the Hudson's Bay Company, has a great introduction to its three-hundred seventy years of history on the site. Once hailed as the largest colonial power other than Russia, England, and the U.S., the Bay has generally left furs and is now the Sears of Canada.