|
NR
Discover what makes Canada unique and what Canada
was first to bring to the world...
- The population of BC is around 4.4 million, of which about 350,000
have their roots in Punjab.
- The Trans-Canada Highway is the longest national highway in
the world: from St. Johns, Newfoundland to Victoria, British
Columbia, it stretches 7821 kilometers (4860 miles).
- The worlds longest covered bridge is located in Hartland,
New Brunswick. It spans 390.8 meters (1282 feet).
- In 1879, Sanford Fleming, a Canadian, first originated the
idea of implementing an international Standard Time system.
- The telephone was conceived in Brantford (Ont.) in 1874 by
Alexander Graham Bell. He made the first long-distance call to
his uncle from Brantford to Paris, Ontario, on August 10th, 1876,
a total distance of 13 km.
- The first wireless voice message was transmitted December 23rd,
1900, by Quebec-born radio inventor Reginald Aubrey Ressenden.
- Canada also had the first batteryless radio and the first radio
station that was launched in April 1925, by inventor Edward Samuel
Rogers.
- Dr. Abraham Gesner discovered Kerosene and demonstrated it
for the first time on Prince Edward Island in 1846.
- In 1888, Ontario Hydro supplied a paper mill with energy, the
first plant to run on hydro-electricity in the world.
- In 1925, Swedish-born inventor Gideon Sundback came to Canada
and invented the zipper.
- Charles Fenerty of Halifax, N.S., discovered a process for
making paper from wood fibers in the early 1800s.
- The discovery of Insulin for diabetics was discovered by Frederick
Banting and his student Charles Best at the University of Toronto
in 1921. This was at a time when over 1 million North Americans
had the fatal disease. Banting won the Nobel Peace Prize for his
work.
- On April 12th, 1980, Terry Fox began his cross-country "Marathon
of Hope" to raise money for cancer research. He had lost
his leg to cancer in 1977, and succeeded in running a total of
5,373 km before the cancer spread to his lungs. A large portion
of money raised for cancer research continues to come from the
annual Terry Fox Runs held across the country.
- Pablum, the vitamin-enriched breakfast cereal for babies was
invented in the late 1920s by doctors T.G.H. Drake, Alan Brown
and Frederick F. Tisdall from Toronto.
- Canada has also been a leader in childrens care with
the world's first Hospital For Sick Children being opened in Toronto
in 1875 by a group of women.
- The active international environmental group Greenpeace was
formed in Vancouver in 1970.
- The widely-used Geographical Information Systems (GIS) computer-based
mapping program originated in Canada in the early 1960s.
- The first film to be titled a "Documentary" was produced
in Canada in 1920/1921. It was entitled Nanook of the North and
was used for many years in schools and educational facilities.
- Similarly, a Canadian produced the first commercial motion
picture. In 1897, James Freer made a film about the life of a
prairie farmer; this was used in Britain in 1898/1899 to promote
and encourage immigration to Canada.
- The National Film Board of Canada is now a world leader in
documentary films, and hosts Studio D, the only womens English
film studio in the world.
- Basketball was invented by a Canadian in 1892. Dr. James A.
Naismith developed the game and made it popular with a touring
womens team.
- The ever-popular Superman is another Canadian creation. The
comic was created in 1938 by a Canadian newspaper artist, Joe
Shuster, and Jerome Siegel, an American.
- Todays Hockey originated from Halifax in 1853.
- Kurt Browning performed the first Quadruple Jump in figure
skating in 1990.
- The game loved by all, Trivial Pursuit, was conceived and created
by Canadians Scott Abbott and Chris Haney in 1979. Today, more
than fifty million games have been sold throughout the world.
- From Ralph Naders Canada Firsts. Toronto: McClelland &
Stewart, 1992
|