It is a historic day here at Art’s History as I officially welcome the Right Honourable Mark Carney to the Prime Minister’s Club on this, his special day. Yes indeed, it was on this date in 1965, in the Northwest Territories, that our 24th Prime Minister came into the world. Born at Fort Smith, and then raised in Edmonton, the future Prime Minister then embarked upon his personal and professional journey that culminated in his swearing-in as PM last Friday. So, it is a great personal and professional pleasure to send out congratulations to Mr. Carney and his family at this special time.
And all these nice words bring me to something – that as seven of our Prime Ministers before him can attest to – that should now be at the top of the new PM’s agenda. I submit that this matter involving a trip to visit Kingston is even more important than staffing up the PMO, or readying the campaign team for the soon-to-be-called election.
As readers of Art’s History know, one cannot be a true Prime Minister in the fullest sense of the word until he or she has visited my wife and I in our now famous garden in Kingston to perform his expected tree-planting. He has been preceded as a planter by – in order of their visits to us – John Turner, Paul Martin, Joe Clark, Jean Chrétien, Stephen J. Harper, Brian Mulroney and Kim Campbell. You can see some of the pictures of these tree-plantings placed as part of this column today.
Sadly, our immediate past Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, and despite his personal promises to me that he’d visit us, never made it to Kingston to perform his tree-planting. I would suggest, in all frankness, that his lack of doing so might have contributed to his dismal polling numbers in the last couple of years of his Premiership.It was also surprising as his parents' friends, Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter, came to see us in Kingston with each performing a tree-planting.
But, to go back to Mr. Trudeau for a moment: I wrote him a letter before he left office, thanking him and his family for their public service to all Canadians, regardless of party, and mentioning that he is still very much welcome to drop by Kingston and (finally) plant his tree.
Back, however, to the present.
So, Prime Minister Carney, your time has come. Over to you and we hope to see you in our garden in the coming days. Remember, you will not fully be Prime Minister until you wield our special shovel here in Kingston.
And again, from Art’s History, congratulations on becoming Prime Minister, and happy birthday. I know that all Canadians, regardless of party, join me in sending along our non-partisan wishes as you get down to work on all of our behalf.
Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.