| Jun 14, 2017


Those of us who are over 55, have some memory of  Canada's Centennial year. I happened to be a kid living in Montreal in 1967, and as part of their efforts to make the World's Fair, Expo '67, a crowd pleasing success and to make it accessible to Montrealers, there was a family pass available for the entire run of Expo.

I looked it up, and even accounting for 50 years of inflation, the price was indeed pretty reasonable. $35 for adults and $17.50 for children for a seasons pass. For our family the total would have been $122.50 for the season. Allowing for inflation, it would have cost about $850 in 2017 dollars, still a pretty good price for a 180 day festival. We packed a lunch and went just about every day. We wandered about the site, got lost and found, ate soft ice cream, and saw every pavilion, including the Czech and US pavilions which were the best ones, the Czech for artistry and the US for the awe factor, a Geodesic dome with the longest escalator running way, way up into the centre of an open space.

Expo was controversial when it was conceived and throughout its construction, but it was a monumental success for both the City of Montreal and for the country, and between it and the thousands of Centennial arena's and parks that were built that year, the Centennial year was a huge coming out party for the country that had a lasting legacy.

When Canada 150, a prosaic name if there ever was one, came along, I was expecting something to happen, nothing on the scale of the Centennial year, but something to mark the moment in our nation’s history. Federal governments have become pretty good at waving the flag over the last 20 years, calling us the best country in the world whenever they get a chance. They have turned the Olympics, for example, into a patriotic event so much so that Canadian coverage rivals US coverage in its fixation with medal counts by Canadian athletes. But as our 150th anniversary approached, there has been nothing, it was met only with the announcement of a Canada 150 infrastructure program that is indistinguishable from any other infrastructure program that the government undertakes. There is no symbol of Canada 150 other than a stylized maple leaf, no song, no signature event, nothing beyond a bigger show in Ottawa on Canada Day and maybe a few more fireworks.

The shame is that, given the efforts locally to create memorable events this summer in communities around Eastern Ontario and across the country as well, it is clear that there is a desire among the population to mark the occasion.

Certainly in Frontenac County there is such a desire, as the list of Canada Day and Canada 150 events grows and grows.

Perhaps this is a marker of how Canada has developed as a nation of communities that are self reliant, with a federal government that exists in its own remote world, no matter which of the two old line parties is in power.

As we get ready to celebrate Canada Day over the next few weeks, we can look clearly at our successes and failures as a country. The country was built by bringing new people in throughout our history and that is our strength. At the same time we are finally starting to face, for the first time, the cost and continuing fallout from the fact  this country was built upon stolen land, that land remains stolen no matter how much time passes. Reconciliation with the Indigenous, First Nations, peoples in this country is not a tap that can be turned off and on when it is politically convenient, but an extensive, long term project.

If it can be accomplished, it will be a bicentennial project, requiring 50 years of unrelenting effort to achieve.

If that happens, the 200th anniversary will certainly outflank Canada 150 as a year to celebrate, and even the centennial as well.

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