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Today in Canada's Political History: October 21, 1957, Eleanor Roosevelt celebrates Lester Pearson’s winning the Nobel Peace Prize

  • Arthur Milnes

  • National Newswatch

  • October 21, 2026

Arthur Milnes, creator of Art's History on National Newswatch, is an accomplished public historian, award-winning journalist, and in-house historian at the Frontenac Club Hotel who brings Canada's political history to life through engaging stories, historical insights, and personal anecdotes drawn from his encounters with many of the country's leading figures.

Canadians were not the only ones happy at the fact Lester B. Pearson was announced as the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1957 for his work diffusing the Suez Crisis. Former American First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt also joined in the praise. She did so when writing in her famous syndicated column, My Day, on October 21, 1957.

“I was glad to see that the Nobel Peace Prize for 1957 was awarded to Lester B. Pearson, Canada's Minister of State for External Affairs,” she wrote. “His leadership in the U.N. has been so outstanding that I think we must all rejoice in its recognition. Leadership in the U.N. is of great importance to the world, and it does largely depend upon the individual character of the person concerned.”

High praise indeed.



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.