Our young Dominion greatly expanded on this date in 1870. First off, Manitoba officially became part of Canada, entering Confederation as our fifth province. Métis leader, the legendary Louis Riel, had played an oversized role in the new province’s establishment. And on the same day, Rupert’s Land, which was made up of what is now Manitoba, most of Saskatchewan, southern Alberta, southern Nunavut, and northern parts of Ontario and Québec, was transferred to Canadian hands by the British. These moves demonstrated the confidence and vision of Sir John A. Macdonald, Riel and other leaders and Canada’s dreams of linking East to West through a band of steel could now begin in earnest.
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.