Caught in the moment

Took this shot today over my lunch break. I know it's a little nationalistic, but the storm cloud background just took my breath away. I took about thirty shots of this, using the drive setting on my camera... this is the final shot. Nice how that worked out. :)

A look at home

I had today off, so around noon I took the subway downtown to meet my friend Paul who works at the Archives of Ontario. I got to see some incredible things. One of the most powerful for me was a book, printed over 200 years ago, recording the very first acts passed into law by the legislature of the newly-created Province of Upper Canada, which was renamed Ontario in 1867. Here is a photo of the very first law every passed here.



Ontario was essentially founded by Americans leaving the United States after the Revolution. There has never been a time in our history when that dichotomy has not been a factor in who we are and what we fear to become. So, relatedly, I also found another remarkable record, completely by accident. Paul was showing me the pamphlets on record, and pulled down one from the 1860s, prior to Canada becoming a nation in 1867. In it was a speech by Thomas D'Arcy McGee, an Irish immigrant who was one of the Fathers of Confederation. McGee was always enthusiastic about creating a union of the British North American colonies, and he did live just long enough to see it happen, before he was assassinated in April, 1868, less than a year after Confederation. On the back page of the pamphlet, someone had pasted an article from a newspaper recording one of his speeches, this one delivered before an audience in Quebec, about Canada's destiny in the face of the American Civil War. As Paul read it out loud, I literally got goosebumps. The things McGee was saying then still ring true today, 140 years later...

"That shot fired at Fort Sumter, on the 12th of April, 1861, had a message for the North as well as for the South, and here in Quebec, if anywhere, by the light which history lends us, we should find those who can rightly read that eventual message. Here, from this rock, for which the immortals have contended, — here from this rock, over which Richelieu's wisdom and Chatham's genius, and the memory of heroic men, the glory of three great nations has hung its halo, we should look forth upon a continent convulsed, and ask of our rulers, 'Watchman, what of the night?' That shot fired at Fort Sumter was the signal gun of a new epoch for North America, which told the people of Canada, more plainly than human speech can ever express it, to sleep no more, except on their arms — unless in their sleep they desire to be overtaken and subjugated. (Cheers.) For one, Mr. President, I can safely say that I know myself I have not a particle of prejudice against the United States; on the contrary, I am bound to declare that many things in the constitution and people I sincerely esteem and admire. What I contend for with myself, and what I would impress upon others is, that the lessons of the last eighty years, more especially of the last few years, furnished by America to the world, should not be thrown away upon the inhabitants of Canada. I do not believe that it is our destiny to be engulphed into a Republican union, renovated and inflamed with the wine of victory, of which she now drinks so freely — it seems to me we have another and a worthier part; we can never join the Americans on our own terms, and we never ought to join them on theirs. — (Cheers.) A Canadian nationality — not French-Canadian, nor British-Canadian, nor Irish-Canadian — partiotism rejects the prefix — is in my opinion, what we should look forward to, — that is what we ought to labor for, that is what we ought to be prepared to defend to the death. (Cheers.) Heirs of one-seventh of the continent — inheritors of a long ancestral story, — and no part of it dearer to us than the glorious tale of this last century, — warned not by cold chronicles only, but by living scenes, passing before our eyes, of the dangers of an unbalanced Democracy, — we are here to vindicate our capacity, by the test of a new political creation. (Cheers.)"

Thoughts on the Maple Leaf

Like I said (below... I hate how blogs arrange things), it's Canada Day. Canada, as a federal union, is 138 years old today. We have had our own flag for just over 40 years now, as of February 15, 1965. Of course, everyone is familiar with the current flag...

But how many people these days are aware that we had a rather different flag before 1965? I think this is lost on many people just a little younger than me. This was never my flag; I was born under the Maple Leaf. But when I was younger, I had a special affinity for the old Red Ensign. It was the flag of a Twilight Zone Canada I never knew.

This was nearly our flag. When Prime Minister Lester Pearson set out in 1964 to give us our own flag in time for the Centennial (1967), this was the design he favoured. The sprig of three maple leaves is traditional, particularly to Quebec and Ontario (it still appears on Ontario's flag). You can also see it in the Red Ensign above, which features Canada's coat of arms.

While this, too, is not my flag, and the design of the leaves is hideous, I do sometimes find myself wishing the blue had made it onto the flag we have today... either one or both bars in blue. Many of the flags of free countries are red, white, and blue, and we would not have been out of place among them. But then I reflect on how beautiful our flag is in the wind... how alive it looks in red... how much it looks like flame. And then I can really only regret instead that blue, no matter how lovely, could never give me the same catch in the throat of that rippling, living flame.

Here's a revision to the Canadian flag, proposed in 1995, that incorporates blue in the design. It's not bad. But I guess it's too late in history; that ship has sailed. I'm not one to change our flag every generation or two.

I have a book about the history of the Flag Debate, and it features a number of the designs Canadians proposed over the years. Some are a testament to bland mediocrity, all character stripped away in an attempt to offend no one. Others are crammed with references to every ethnic group that ever found its way to these shores. Religious symbols. Animals. Union Jacks, fleurs-de-lys. Stripes, stars, mountains, lakes, Natives, and the ubiquitous maple leaf itself. When I look at them and see what we might have been stuck with, I'm deeply thankful we found the wisdom to adopt the flag we did. It gave us a symbol, the stylized leaf, that's unique, instantly recognizable, and infinitely utilitarian as a graphic element. I believe Canada is better known in the world simply by dint of having such a singularly striking flag. But if you're interested in seeing some of the bullets we dodged, click here.

If you would like to know a little bit about the stormy labour that gave birth to the flag, the CBC has a wonderful retrospective site about just how difficult it actually was.

The first flag (again?)

It's Canada Day, and as I write this, Prime Minister Martin is addressing the nation on Parliament Hill. He's talking about the gift we just received back from Europe -- the first Canadian flag (the current one, I mean) that ever flew atop the Peace Tower over the Centre Block of the Parliament Buildings, back on Feb. 15, 1965. It's been lost for 40 years.

A few years ago, the Liberal Party donated to Canada "the first flag", but it turned out not to have been. Don't ask me how you confirm something like this. I confess, I'm dubious about this one too. There must have been a lot of new Canadian flags floating around in 1965. How can we possibly know for sure this is the one? I guess we just have to accept it on faith. You can believe and be proud, or disbelieve and rob yourself of something small and valuable about the country. So... okay, we have our first flag back.

Happy Canada Day. :)