1891 in Canada

February 21 – The first Springhill Mining Disaster occurs killing 125.
March 5 – Federal election: Sir John A. Macdonald's Conservatives win a fourth consecutive majority
April 27 – Frederick Peters becomes premier of Prince Edward Island, replacing Neil McLeod
June 6 – Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald dies in office
June 8 – Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald lies in state in the Senate Chamber
June 16 – Sir John Abbott becomes prime minister following the death of Sir John A. Macdonald
September 29 – Thomas McGreevy is expelled from the House of Commons due to corruption.
November 7 – The election of the 2nd North-West Legislative Assembly
December 10 – The Calgary and Edmonton Railway opens, connecting Edmonton to the national railway network for the first time.
December 21 – Sir Charles-Eugène de Boucherville becomes premier of Quebec for the second time, replacing Honoré Mercier
The Legislative Council of New Brunswick is abolished

SportEdit

The Canadian Rugby Football Union is renamed the Canadian Rugby Union

BirthsEdit

January to JuneEdit

January 6 – Tim Buck, politician and long-time leader of the Communist Party of Canada (d.1973)
January 26 – Wilder Penfield, neurosurgeon (d.1976)
April 1 – Harry Nixon, politician and 13th Premier of Ontario (d.1961)
May 3 – Thomas John Bentley, politician (d.1983)
June 13 – Hervé-Edgar Brunelle, politician and lawyer (d.1950)

July to DecemberEdit

July 12 – Adhémar Raynault, politician and Mayor of Montreal (d.1984)
August 30 – Elmer Jamieson, educator
September 16 – Julie Winnefred Bertrand, supercentenarian, oldest living Canadian and oldest verified living recognized woman at the time of her death (d.2007)
October 30 – Ada Mackenzie, golfer
November 14 – Frederick Banting, medical scientist, doctor and Nobel laureate (d.1941)
December 10 – Harold Alexander, 1st Earl Alexander of Tunis, military commander and Governor General of Canada (d.1969)
December 25 – William Ross Macdonald, politician, Speaker of the House of Commons of Canada and 21st Lieutenant Governor of Ontario (d.1976)

File:JaMAC.jpg

John A. Macdonald

DeathsEdit

January 4 – Antoine Labelle, priest and settler (b.1833)
January 21 – Calixa Lavallée, musician and composer (b.1842)
May 31 – Antoine-Aimé Dorion, politician and jurist (b.1818)
June 6 – John A. Macdonald, politician and 1st Prime Minister of Canada (b.1815)

Historical documentsEdit

Residential school principal says teaching Gospel and how to live better compensates for robbing and half-starving Indigenous people<ref>Miss Walker, "Work Among the Indians of Portage la Prairie," Monthly Letter Leaflet, Vol. 8, No. 8 (December 1891), in Denise Hildebrand, Staff Perspectives of the Aboriginal Residential School Experience: A Study of Four Presbyterian Schools, 1888-1923 pg. 89. Accessed 10 June 2021</ref>

Poster: Conservatives campaign against reciprocity with United States as destructive of industry nurtured by Canada's National Policy<ref>"Election Poster - Conservative Campaign against reciprocity" (ca. 1891). Accessed 2 May 2021 https://www.picturingpolitics.com/friends-or-foe/ (scroll down to "What do sand")</ref>

Prime Minister John A. Macdonald dies<ref>"He Is Gone; Death of Rt. Hon. Sir John Alexander Macdonald;...Canada Mourns the Loss of Her Greatest Statesman...." The (Victoria) Daily Colonist (June 7, 1891), pg. 1. Accessed 20 December 2019</ref>

Death of Prime Minister Macdonald, Conservative Party's "tyrannical master," leaves power vacuum<ref>"The Tory Position," The (Toronto) Globe (June 16, 1891), pg. 4. Accessed 7 December 2019 via ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Globe and Mail (on-line through many Canadian public and academic libraries)</ref>

Imprisonment of ejected MP Thomas McGreevy strikes at pernicious level of corruption in public contracts<ref>Editorial The Canadian Architect and Builder, Vol. VI, No. XII (December 1893), pg. 122. Accessed 23 December 2019</ref><ref>"Charges against the Honourable Thomas McGreevy" Reports of the Select Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections Relative to[...]Tenders and Contracts[;] Also Relative to the Resignation of Honourable Thomas McGreevy, pgs. ivb-ivy. Accessed 9 October 2020</ref>

Heroism of rescuers at Springhill, Nova Scotia mining disaster <ref>R.A.H. Morrow, "Chapter IV; Searching for the Dead and Injured" Story of the Springhill Disaster (1891) Accessed 3 December 2019</ref>

Bilingual English and Chinook periodical is published to improve Indigenous people's literacy<ref>J.M.R. LeJeune, "This paper is named Kamloops Wawa" Kamloops (B.C.) Wawa, No. 1 (May 2, 1891). Accessed 25 July 2020</ref>

Federal bill aligns Canada with international time system based on global time zones and Greenwich, England time<ref>"An Act respecting the Reckoning of Time" (1891), Senate and House of Commons Bills, 7th Parliament, 1st Session: A-U, 2-175, images 1189-92. Accessed 30 May 2021</ref>

Calm messenger pigeons by replacing trap-door entrance (which scares birds) and long roosting rail (on which they fight) in their loft<ref>"Report of Major General D.R. Cameron on Messenger Pigeons of the Department, at Halifax" (September 2, 1891), Appendix No. 36, Sessional Papers; Volume 8; Second Session of the Seventh Parliament of the Dominion of Canada; Session 1892, pg. 246. Accessed 22 August 2021</ref>

ReferencesEdit

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