Highlights of the day

  • 1896 Nova Scotia’s Charles Tupper becomes Canada’s 6th Prime Minister as Mackenzie Bowell resigns.
  • 1909 Ontario Goes Dry, as temperance movement wins prohibition of alcoholic beverages.
  • 1912 Dominion of Canada issues first $5 bill, replacing the $4 one.
  • 1935 Royal Canadian Mint circulates Canada’s first silver dollar, for the silver jubilee of George V.

List of Facts for May 1

  • 1660 Dollard des Ormeaux with 16 compatriots and 44 Huron allies, intending to ambush the Iroquois, instead meets a war party of 300 Onondagas, and has to retreat into an abandoned Algonquin fort by the Long Sault Rapids on the Ottawa River; some French panic and fire on the Iroquois, leading to the desertion of Huron chief Annaotaha. When a powder cask blows up, the Iroquois attack. (see May 2 for conclusion). Hawkesbury, Ontario
  • 1663 Augustin de Mezy appointed First Royal Governor of New France; serves from September 15, 1663 to May 5, 1665. Paris, France
  • 1682 Jacques de Meulles appointed Intendant of New France; serves from October 9, 1682, to September 23, 1686. Paris, France
  • 1682 Joseph de La Barre appointed Governor of New France to replace Count Frontenac, who is recalled from Québec; serves from October 9, 1682 to July 31, 1685. Paris, France
  • 1688 In Lower Town Québec, the cornerstone is laid for the Church of Notre-Dame-des-Victoires; two years later, the church is named to celebrate Count Frontenac’s 1690 victory over the English fleet led by William Phips; it is Canada’s oldest full-sized church. Québec, Québec
  • 1707 Creation of Great Britain with the union of the English and Scottish parliaments; both countries keep their own legal and school systems and national churches. London, England
  • 1763 Pontiac’s Rising - Pontiac and about 60 followers enter Fort Detroit on the pretext of wanting to “dance the Calumet” for the occupant; take advantage of their visit to observe the state of the garrison and locate the magazines. They would hide arms under their clothes and attack on Pontiac’s signal. See April 27 and May 7. Detroit Michigan
  • 1775 The Quebec Act comes into force, enlarging the boundaries of the province, creating a Governor and Council, and allowing the continued exercise of the French language and Roman Catholic religion. In Montréal, English vandals blacken the bust of King George III and place a ‘potato’ rosary around its neck. On the bust they write: ‘Behold, the Pope of Canada, or the English idiot.’ The expansion of the province into the Ohio and Mississippi valleys angered American settlers and was a leading cause of the American Revolution. The Quebec Act was repealed in 1791 with the passage of the Constitutional Act creating Upper and Lower Canada. Québec
  • 1776 American Revolutionary War - John Thomas relieves Benedict Arnold and Wooster and the American invading force at Quebec. Québec, Québec
  • 1822 Opening of the Montréal General Hospital with 80 patients. Montréal, Québec
  • 1831 Emily Stowe, doctor, born at South Norwich, Ontario; dies in Toronto, Ontario April 30, 1903. Stowe was the First Canadian woman admitted to practice medicine in Canada (1880); also First President of the Dominion Women’s Enfranchisement Association, founded in 1893 to get the vote for women. South Norwich, Ontario
  • 1839 Last trial of leaders of the Lower Canada Rebellion; since November 28, 1838, 108 Patriotes have been tried, 99 sentenced to death, 12 executed, and 58 exiled to Australia. Montreal, Quebec
  • 1843 New Brunswick puts new penny and halfpenny copper tokens into circulation; province’s First official coins; prices had been quoted in New Brunswick currency, even though Spanish, British, or American coins were used in commerce. New Brunswick
  • 1850 William Lyon Mackenzie brings his family home to Toronto after 12 year exile in the US. Toronto, Ontario
  • 1851 Queen Victoria opens the First Great Exhibition in the Crystal Palace in Hyde Park, London; many Canadian exhibits on display. London, England
  • 1856 Town of Woodstock incorporated. Woodstock, New Brunswick
  • 1868 Post Office Savings Bank established. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1876 St. Catharines incorporates as a city. St. Catharines, Ontario
  • 1885 Electric lighting used for the First time to illuminate city streets in Ottawa. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1888 Lord Stanley starts his term as Governor General of Canada; serves from June 11, 1888 to September 6, 1893; will later donate hockey’s Stanley Cup. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1888 Albert McCleary granted a 320 acre pre-emption at the end of the Fort Colville Trail on what is now the townsite of Castlegar, BC.
  • 1893 Joseph Tyrrell, of the Geological Survey of Canada, leaves Ottawa to map 5,150 km of Barren Lands from Hudson Bay to Lake Athabasca; with brother J. W. Tyrrell. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1893 J. Reith establishes Post Office at Waneta, BC.
  • 1896 Charles Tupper asked by the Governor General to serve as Canada’s 6th Prime Minister on resignation of Mackenzie Bowell; Tupper PM to July 8, 1896, when he is defeated in the election. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1896 Charles Tupper chooses Hugh John Macdonald to serve as Minister of the Interior and Superintendent General of Indian Affairs. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1896 Public Printing Bureau adopts eight hour work day. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1897 First settlers arrive on the Wardner, BC townsite.
  • 1901 CNP Coal begins selling residential building lots at Fernie, BC.
  • 1903 First residential lots put up for sale on the townsite of Morrissey, BC.
  • 1903 Sir Alexander C. MacKenzie, principal of the Royal Academy of Music, conducts the 150-voice Festival Chorus in the First major choral concert in Brandon; part of the Cycle of Musical Festivals of the Dominion of Canada, held in 15 Canadian cities. Brandon, Manitoba
  • 1904 Post office opened. Coleman, Alberta
  • 1906 Opening of the Carnegie Library at Ottawa; today’s Ottawa Public Library. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1907 Government of Saskatchewan confiscates 258,000 acres of land from the Doukhobors. Regina, Saskatchewan
  • 1909 Prohibition goes into effect in Ontario; the sale of liquor becomes unlawful, except for medicinal, scientific, sacramental, and mechanical purposes; victory for the temperance movement. Ontario
  • 1911 Philippe Ray appointed Canadian Commissioner to France. France
  • 1912 Canada issues First five-dollar bank note. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1912 Vancouver, Victoria & Eastern Railway open between Princeton, BC and Coalmont, BC.
  • 1913 North Battleford becomes a city. North Battleford, Saskatchewan
  • 1913 University of Saskatchewan officially opens. Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
  • 1917 D.C. Corbin retires from the directorship of the Spokane International Railway.
  • 1917 Schools in Saskatchewan given a holiday called Gopher Day, children from almost a thousand schools compete to destroy the greatest number of the farm pests aka groundhogs; over half a million gophers are killed, saving an estimated $385,000 in grain. Saskatchewan
  • 1917 Start of Prohibition in New Brunswick; the sale of liquor becomes unlawful, except for medicinal, scientific, sacramental, and mechanical purposes; law remains in effect for 10 years. New Brunswick
  • 1919 Labour - Building trades in Winnipeg strike over union recognition and collective bargaining; lack of action leads to Winnipeg General Strike two weeks later. Winnipeg, Manitoba
  • 1920 Labour - One Big Union (OBU) organizer Tommy Roberts calls a general strike in the Sandon area mines. Destroyed what little was left of the industry crippled by the post-war market collapse. Sandon, BC
  • 1921 Post Office opens in Oliver, BC.
  • 1921 Québec government takes control of the sale of liquor in the province; with near universal prohibition of alcoholic beverages in North America, Québec is the only ‘wet’ jurisdiction on the continent for a time. Québec, Québec
  • 1922 CJCA, the First radio station in Alberta, goes on the air at 8:00 pm in Edmonton. Edmonton, Alberta
  • 1923 Main gates raised allowing the Oldman River’s waters into the LNID’s main canal. Lethbridge, Alberta
  • 1932 RCMP absorbs provincial police force of Prince Edward Island. PEI
  • 1933 Department of National Defence begins administering make-work camps to ease the Depression; (to June 30, 1936).
  • 1935 Royal Canadian Mint circulates Canada’s First silver dollar, to commemorate the silver jubilee of the reign of King George V; will be coined every year, except for the war years 1939-44, until 1967. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1940 Second World War - Storage stocks of every commodity except cheese at 3 year high; due to ‘Phony War’ at the beginning of the Second Second World War.
  • 1943 Violinist Kathleen Parlow and her Parlow String Quartet make their debut at the Eaton Auditorium; will play for fifteen years of concerts. Toronto, Ontario
  • 1944 Second World War - London Conference of Dominion premiers meets until May 16, 1944. London, England
  • 1946 Espionage - British court sentences physicist Alan Nunn May to ten years hard labour under the Official Secrets Act for having passed information calculated to be directly or indirectly useful to an enemy, i.e. the Soviet Union. Nunn May had worked on atomic bomb research in Canada at Chalk River, and his spying was discovered in the revelations of Igor Gouzenko, who defected from the Soviet Embassy in Ottawa on September 5, 1945.
  • 1950 Start of $95 million inter-provincial pipeline to carry oil from Edmonton to Lake Superior. Edmonton, Alberta
  • 1951 25th Canadian Infantry Brigade Group sent to join United Nations forces in Korea. Korea
  • 1951 Canex completes purchase of the Emerald mine from the Canadian government. BC
  • 1951 Leonard Nicholson appointed tenth Commissioner of the RCMP (to March 31, 1959).
  • 1956 The Trades and Labor Congress of Canada merges with the Canadian Congress of Labour to form the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC). Toronto, Ontario
  • 1959 Streetcars in Ottawa replaced by buses. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1961 Habib Bourguiba, President of Tunisia, starts two-day visit to Canada. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1962 Manitoba Tartan is adopted. Winnipeg, Manitoba
  • 1963 Hydro-Québec expropriates the 11 remaining private power companies in Québec for $600 million, extending its operation province-wide; founded in 1944 after the Duplessis government took over Montréal Light, Heat and Power Consolidated and its subsidiary, Beauharnois Light, Heat and Power Co. Québec, Québec
  • 1963 Phillips Cable Company opens its Savanna, Alberta, facility.
  • 1965 Hockey - Montreal Canadiens beat Chicago Blackhawks 4 games to 3 for the Stanley Cup. Montreal, Quebec
  • 1965 Radicals bomb US Consulate in Montréal. Montréal, Québec
  • 1966 BBC transmitters relay first live CBC International (RCI) shortwave broadcast to Africa; via Sackville, New Brunswick. Daventry, England
  • 1967 Crestbrook Lumber Company becomes Crestbrook Forest Industries.
  • 1967 Jack Kimber appointed second outside President of the Toronto Stock Exchange; ex-chairman of the OSC and the Attorney General’s Committee on Securities Legislation. Toronto, Ontario
  • 1969 Rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix arrested at Toronto International Airport for possesion of narcotics; released on $10,000 bail. Toronto, Ontario
  • 1970 The Capitol Cinema, Ottawa’s only large movie palace, is closed and later demolished. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1971 Dominion Bureau of Statistics changes name to Statistics Canada. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1972 Supreme Court of Canada rules compulsory breath tests do not constitute a breach of the Canadian Bill of Rights. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1973 Bachman-Turner Overdrive, featuring former Guess Who guitarist Randy Bachman, releases its First album; a year later, the First single, Let it Ride, becomes a Billboard Top 25 hit. Winnipeg, Manitoba
  • 1973 Ontario awards $16 million to West German firm Krauss Maffei to build 4 km elevated transit system at CNE. Toronto, Ontario
  • 1975 Canada agrees to admit 3,000 South Vietnamese refugees. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1975 Canada to control own air space for the First time since NORAD agreement signed in 1958. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1979 Scotsman Kenneth Kerr leaves St. John’s attempting to row across the Atlantic; will have to be rescued halfway across when his boat capsizes. St. John’s, Newfoundland
  • 1981 Energy - Ottawa imposes special tax of $1.15 per barrel to pay for Petro-Canada’s purchase of Petrofina. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1984 Hockey - Edmonton Oilers 3, Minnesota North Stars 1; Oilers win Conference Finals 4 games to 0.
  • 1984 Ottawa starts Sport Select baseball pool; meets opposition of the provinces and major league baseball. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1986 Shirley Carr becomes the First female head of the Canadian Union of Public Employees Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1987 British Customs seizes Air Canada jet at Heathrow Airport after discovering a major hashish shipment from India; plane released after Air Canada pays substantial fine. London, England
  • 1990 Agriculture - Charlie Mayer announces price of No. 1 spring wheat to drop by 18%; from $165 to $135 a tonne; Grains and Oilseeds Minister. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1991 Baseball - Nolan Ryan of the Texas Rangers shuts out the visiting Toronto Blue Jays 3-0, throwing a record 7th no-hitter; Ryan is 44 years old. Houston, Texas
  • 1992 Westar Mining Limited suspends operations on Harmer Ridge open pit. BC
  • 1997 Red River Floodwaters finally crest on the worst flood since 1950 in southern Manitoba; the floodway and 6.5 million sand bags protect Winnipeg, but other communities are inundated. Manitoba
  • 1998 Parti Québécois advisor David Levine is named head of the newly amalgamated Ottawa Hospital, sparking great controversy. Ottawa, Ontario
  • 1999 Sponsorship scandal - Liberal government issues a $615,000 contract for a report from Groupaction into its own activities. Montréal, Québec
  • 2005 Canada imposes 15% surtax sanction on U.S. imports of cigarettes, oysters and live swine, after Byrd Amendment judged illegal by World Trade Organization. Ottawa, Ontario