Medicare
1966 In December 1966, Parliament passed the Medical Care Act, creating a national program of health insurance that guarantees...
Tom Thomson drowns
1917 In July 1917, Canadian landscape painter Tom Thomson drowned in Canoe Lake, Ontario. Thomson’s vibrant and distinctive...
Cod fishery moratorium begins
1992 For nearly 500 years, cod fishing in the waters off the coast of Newfoundland and in the Grand Banks had been an integral...
The Canadian Citizenship Act is passed
June 27, 1946 On June 27, 1946, the Canadian government passed the Canadian Citizenship Act, which defined the terms of Canadian...
Oka Crisis
1990 On July 11, 1990, a 78-day standoff between security forces and members of the Mohawk community of Kanesatake, Quebec, began...
Kim Campbell becomes Canada’s first female Prime Minister
1993 Lawyer Avril Phaedra Douglas “Kim” Campbell had served in Brian Mulroney’s Progressive Conservative government as the...
The Rupert’s Land Act
1868 For 200 years, the Hudson’s Bay Company had “owned” the vast expanse of North America that drains into Hudson Bay. In...
Construction of Manic-5
1959 to 1968 In 1959, Hydro-Québec began construction on the Manicouagan-Outardes project, a multi-dam hydroelectric complex...
King−Byng affair
1926 Facing a non-confidence motion in Parliament in 1926, Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King asked Governor General Lord...
Bertha Wilson becomes the first woman appointed to the Supreme Court o...
1982 In March 1982, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau appointed Bertha Wilson to the Supreme Court of Canada, making her the first...
High Arctic resettlement experiment
1953 In August 1953, the Canadian government initiated a relocation program that transferred Inuit from communities in Arctic...
The battle at Seven Oaks
June 19, 1816 In 1811, the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) began efforts to settle displaced Scottish farmers in the Red River...
Bryce Report
1907 After spending several months visiting dozens of residential schools in western Canada in 1907, Indian Affairs Chief Medical...
Meech Lake Accord fails
1990 After Quebec refused to ratify the Constitution Act of 1982, the June 1987 Meech Lake Accord, agreed between the federal...
Death of Kateri Tekakwitha
1680 In 1680, Kateri Tekakwitha, the daughter of a Christian Anishnabee woman and a Mohawk man, died. She was baptized a...
Co-operative Commonwealth Federation adopts the Regina Manifesto
1933 At its first national convention, in Regina, Saskatchewan, in 1933, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) adopted a...
Auto Pact
1965 The Liberal government of Lester B. Pearson, in an attempt to increase exports to the United States, negotiated and signed...
October Crisis
1970 In October 1970, the Front de libération du Québec (FLQ) kidnapped British Trade Commissioner James Cross and Quebec...
The Inuit migrate
1200 Ancestral Inuit moved into the central and eastern Arctic from their homeland along the northwest coast of Alaska. They had...
Moratorium on capital punishment
1967 In November 1967, legislation was passed in the House of Commons to put a moratorium on the use of the death penalty in...