Like many Canadians, I love our anthem and, despite not having the best singing voice, since childhood I have proudly belted our anthem out whenever I’m asked and these lines have always been my favourite:
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free.
From far and wide,
O Canada,
we stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free.
The True North part, as Holden Caulfield said in Catcher in the Rye, really slays me.
For those who haven’t been following (but really, who would that be?) Canada’s sovereignty has become a heated issue and, for some reason, we are now the punching bag for a certain gentleman’s constant late night rants.
My recent research into the issue of Arctic sovereignty on Ellesmere Island in the early 1900s was a refreshing change and really made me sigh and think, that was a gentler time. And a funnier time.
Let me set the stage: in the early 1900s, people communicated through mail, the telegraph, newspapers and a few landline telephones in urban areas. So, how were threats perceived handled when no one was typing into their phone to reach wide swaths of the population through the internet? They read newspapers and, if throughly inflamed by what they read, they could rapidly write a letter in long hand and fire it off into the mailbox to arrive in days or weeks. All this tends to slow down the rage baiting from an incessant drum beat to, at most, a nightly article in a newspaper.
Ellesmere Island is our northernmost island – it’s almost abutting Greenland.
There is archeological evidence that Ellesmere island was occupied some 4,000 years ago and the Dorset people lived along the eastern Arctic coast for about 2,000 years until they disappeared around 1400CE. Ancestors of the Inuit, the Thule peoples lived there around the 12th century and numerous Norse artifacts, including knife blades and a shipwreck have been found.
In the 16th century, Britain claimed the far north, but in 1880 Britain gave to Canada her title and claims in the Arctic.
There were, of course, concerns about Arctic sovereignty even then and there are many interesting historical details all of which I’d like to ignore and pare it down to the parts worth talking about, the absurd parts.
To counter early American and European activities in the north, Canada affirmed its title in… wait for it… an 1895 Order-in-Council. That really should have done it, because what can be clearer than an Order-in-Council? Surprisingly though, in the early 1900s, things got heated.
“American sponsored explorations were apparently in the offing and it was reported that a recently published American atlas showed Ellesmere in the same colour as Alaska—an ominous sign to concerned Canadians.” This is the 1900 equivalent of the inflammatory maps we are now seeing posted online. Canadians were upset, naturally, and their retaliation was swift (or swiftish, because it’s the 1900s). The Department of the Interior formed a small group of senior civil servants into the Advisory Technical Board in 1919."
Take that you brutes.
In 1920, the Danes started to view Ellesmere Island as a no man’s land and began hunting. Canada took this threat to its sovereignty seriously as well and retaliated by forming a committee.
That was resolved, of course.
It’s obvious that Canada doesn’t play around with our true north, has dealt with all threats fiercely and the threats settled down. Until now when we find ourselves in 2026, with a foghorn blasting in our ear.
Should we retaliate with a committee or take away everyone’s phone?
