It was on this date in 1939 that saw His Majesty King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (later known as the Queen Mother) arrive in Quebec City to start their cross-country tour of Canada. It marked the first time Canada’s reigning monarch had visited our country. Over the next month Their Majesties traveled to every Canadian province and also crossed over into the United States to visit President Franklin Roosevelt. In every Canadian town, village and city the King and Queen visited they were greeting by mass crowds. "It is now some 46 years since I first came to this country with the King, in those anxious days shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War,” the Queen Mother recalled decades later while on another trip to Canada. “I shall always look back upon that visit with feelings of affection and happiness. I think I lost my heart to Canada and Canadians, and my feelings have not changed with the passage of time." Upon arrival at Quebec City by ship, the King and Queen were met first on- board by Prime Minister Mackenzie King. “Welcome, Sir, to Your Majesty’s Realm of Canada,” our PM told the King. As the tour continued the Prime Minister wrote countless thousands of words in his famous diary, detailing the Royal visit to the last detail. On this date, before going to bed on the historic day Their Majesties arrived in Canada, Mackenzie King’s diary entry was more than 7,000 words long!