From their perch high above Canada in the great House of Commons in the sky, Sir John A. Macdonald and Sir Wilfrid Laurier were both smiling on this date in 1937. Both these late-great PMs had reason to be happy as the government of Mackenzie King announced projects aimed at honouring the lives and legacies of both men. Laurier’s Quebec home at St. Lin was purchased to be made into a museum while at the same time the federal government also announced it would be creating a fund to help care for the Father of Confederation’s grave in perpetuity.
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.