The British ordered the Acadians expelled from their lands in 1755 during the French and Indian

War, an event called the Expulsion of the Acadians or le Grand Dérangement. The "expulsion"
resulted in approximately 12,000 Acadians being shipped to destinations throughout Britain's
North America and to France, Quebec and the French Caribbean colony of Saint Domingue. 90
The first wave of the expulsion of the Acadians began with the Bay of Fundy Campaign (1755)
and the second wave began after the final Siege of Louisbourg (1758). Many of the Acadians
settled in southern Louisiana, creating the Cajun culture there. Some Acadians managed to hide
and others eventually returned to Nova Scotia, but they were far outnumbered by a new
migration of New England Planters who were settled on the former lands of the Acadians and
transformed Nova Scotia from a colony of occupation for the British to a settled colony with
stronger ties to New England. Britain eventually gained control of Quebec City and Montreal
after the Battle of the Plains of Abraham and Battle of Fort Niagara in 1759, and the Battle of the
Thousand Islands and Battle of Sainte-Foy in 1760.
Amongst notable Métis people are television actor Tom Jackson, Commissioner of the
Northwest Territories Tony Whitford, and Louis Riel who led two resistance movements: the
Red River Rebellion of 1869-1870 and the NorthWest Rebellion of 1885, which ended in his
trial.The languages inherently Métis are either Métis French or a mixed language called Michif.
Michif, Mechif or Métchif is a phonetic spelling of Métif, a variant of Métis. The Métis today
predominantly speak English, with French a strong second language, as well as numerous
Aboriginal tongues. A 19th-century community of the Métis people, the Anglo-Métis, were
referred to as Countryborn. They were children of Rupert's Land fur trade typically of Orcadian,
Scottish, or English paternal descent and Aboriginal maternal descent. Their first languages
would have been Aboriginal (Cree, Stulteaux, Assiniboine, etc.) and English. Their fathers spoke
Gaelic, thus leading to the development of an English dialect referred to as "Bungee". S.35 of the
Constitution Act, 1982 mentions the Métis yet there has long been debate over legally defining
the term Métis but on September 23, 2003, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that Métis are a
distinct people with significant rights (Powley ruling).
The Métis are people descended from marriages between Europeans (mainly French) and Cree,
Ojibway, Algonquin, Saulteaux, Menominee, Mi'kmaq, Maliseet, and other First Nations. Their
history dates to the mid-17th century. When Europeans first arrived to Canada they relied on
Aboriginal peoples for fur trading skills and survival. To ensure alliances, relationships between
European fur traders and Aboriginal women were often consolidated through marriage. The
Métis homeland consists of the Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan,
Manitoba, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Ontario, as well as the Northwest
Territories (NWT).
Warfare was common among Inuit groups with sufficient population density. Inuit, such as the
Nunatamiut (Uummarmiut) who inhabited the Mackenzie River delta area, often engaged in
common warfare. The Central Arctic Inuit lacked the population density to engage in warfare. In
the 13th century, the Thule culture began arriving in Greenland from what is now Canada. Norse
accounts are scant. Norse-made items from Inuit campsites in Greenland were obtained by either
trade or plunder. One account, ivar Bárdarson, speaks of "small people" with whom the
Norsemen fought. 14th-century accounts that a western settlement, one of the two Norse
settlements, was taken over by the Skraeling. After the disappearance of the Norse colonies in
Greenland, the Inuit had no contact with Europeans for at least a century. By the mid-16th
century, Basque fishers were already working the Labrador coast and had established whaling
stations on land, such as been excavated at Red Bay. The Inuit appear not to have interfered with
their operations, but they did raid the stations in winter for tools, and particularly worked iron,
which they adapted to native needs.
Inuit

The Inuit are the descendants of what anthropologists call the Thule culture, which emerged
from western Alaska around 1,000 CE and spread eastward across the Arctic, displacing the
Dorset culture (in Inuktitut, the Tuniit). Inuit historically referred to the Tunit as "giants", or
"dwarfs", who were taller and stronger than the Inuit. Researchers hypothesize that the Dorset
culture lacked dogs, larger weapons and other technologies used by the expanding Inuit society.
By 1300, the Inuit had settled in west Greenland, and finally moved into east Greenland over the
following century. The Inuit had trade routes with more southern cultures. Boundary disputes
were common and led to aggressive actions.
Many Aboriginal civilizations established characteristics and hallmarks that included permanent
urban settlements or cities, agriculture, civic and monumental architecture, and complex societal
hierarchies. These cultures had evolved and changed by the time of the first permanent European
arrivals (c. late 15th-early 16th centuries) and have been brought forward through archaeological
investigations. There are indications of contact made before Christopher Columbus between the
first peoples and those from other continents. Aboriginal people in Canada interacted with
Europeans around 1000 CE, but prolonged contact came after Europeans established permanent
settlements in the 17th and 18th centuries. European written accounts generally recorded
friendliness of the First Nations, who profited in trade with Europeans. Such trade generally
strengthened the more organized political entities such as the Iroquois Confederation.
Throughout the 16th century, European fleets made almost annual visits to the eastern shores of
Canada to cultivate the fishing opportunities. A sideline industry emerged in the un-organized
traffic of furs overseen by the Indian Department.
Chief George from the village of Senakw with his daughter in traditional regalia, c. 1906

First Nations peoples had settled and established trade routes across what is now Canada by 500
BCE-1,000 CE. Communities developed each with its own culture, customs, and character. In
the northwest were the Athapaskan, Slavey, Dogrib, Tutchone, and Tlingit. Along the Pacific
coast were the Tsimshian; Haida; Salish; Kwakiutl; Heiltsuk; Nootka; Nisga'a; Senakw and
Gitsan. In the plains were the Blackfoot; Kainawa; Sarcee and Peigan. In the northern woodlands
were the Cree and Chipewyan. Around the Great Lakes were the Anishinaabe; Algonquin;
Iroquois and Huron. Along the Atlantic coast were the Beothuk, Maliseet, Innu, Abenäki and
Mikmaq.
The Woodland cultural period dates from about 2,000 BCE-1,000 CE, and has locales in Ontario,
Quebec, and Maritime regions. The introduction of pottery distinguishes the Woodland culture
from the earlier Archaic stage inhabitants. Laurentian people of southern Ontario manufactured
the oldest pottery excavated to date in Canada. They created pointed-bottom beakers decorated
by a cord marking technique that involved impressing tooth implements into wet clay. Woodland
technology included items such as beaver incisor knives, bangles, and chisels. The population
practicing sedentary agricultural life ways continued to increase on a diet of squash, corn, and
bean crops. The Hopewell tradition is an Aboriginal culture that flourished along American
rivers from 300 BCE-500 CE. At its greatest extent, the Hopewell Exchange System networked
cultures and societies with the peoples on the Canadian shores of Lake Ontario. Canadian
expression of the Hopewellian peoples encompasses the Point Peninsula, Saugeen, and Laurel
complexes.
Thule site (Copper Inuit) near the waters of Cambridge Bay (Victoria Island)

The west coast of Canada by 7,000-5000 BCE (9,000-7,000 years ago) saw various cultures who
organized themselves around salmon fishing. The Nuu-chah-nulth of Vancouver Island began
whaling with advanced long spears at about this time. The Maritime Archaic is one group of
North America's Archaic culture of sea-mammal hunters in the subarctic. They prospered from
approximately 7,000 BCE-1,500 BCE (9,000-3,500 years ago) along the Atlantic Coast of North
America. Their settlements included longhouses and boat-topped temporary or seasonal houses.
They engaged in long-distance trade, using as currency white chert, a rock quarried from
northern Labrador to Maine. The Pre-Columbian culture, whose members were called Red Paint
People, is indigenous to the New England and Atlantic Canada regions of North America. The
culture flourished between 3,000 BCE-1,000 BE (5,000-3,000 years ago) and was named after
their burial ceremonies, which used large quantities of red ochre to cover bodies and grave goods.
The placement of artifacts and materials within an Archaic burial site indicated social
differentiation based upon status. There is a continuous record of occupation of S'ólh Téméxw by
Aboriginal people dating from the early Holocene period, 10,000-9,000 years ago.
Archaeological sites at Stave Lake, Coquitlam Lake, Fort Langley and region uncovered early
period artifacts. These early inhabitants were highly mobile hunter-gatherers, consisting of about
20 to 50 members of an extended family. The Na-Dene people occupied much of the land area of
northwest and central North America starting around 8,000 BCE. They were the earliest
ancestors of the Athabaskan-speaking peoples, including the Navajo and Apache. They had
villages with large multi-family dwellings, used seasonally during the summer, from which they
hunted, fished and gathered food supplies for the winter. The Wendat peoples settled into
Southern Ontario along the Eramosa River around 8,000-7,000 BC (10,000-9,000 years ago).
They were concentrated between Lake Simcoe and Georgian Bay. Wendat hunted caribou to
survive on the glacier-covered land. Many different First Nations cultures relied upon the buffalo
starting by 6,000-5,000 BE (8,000-7,000 years ago). They hunted buffalo by herding migrating
buffalo off cliffs. Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, near Lethbridge, Alberta, is a hunting
grounds that was in use for about 5,000 years.
The Arctic small tool tradition is a broad cultural entity that developed along the Alaska
Peninsula, around Bristol Bay, and on the eastern shores of the Bering Strait around 2,500 BCE
(4,500 years ago). These Paleo-Arctic peoples had a highly distinctive toolkit of small blades
(microblades) that were pointed at both ends and used as side- or end-barbs on arrows or spears
made of other materials, such as bone or antler. Scrapers, engraving tools and adze blades were
also included in their toolkits. The Arctic small tool tradition branches off into two cultural
variants, including the Pre-Dorset, and the Independence traditions. These two groups, ancestors
of Thule people, were displaced by the Inuit by 1000 Common Era (CE).
A northerly section focusing on the Saugeen, Laurel and Point Peninsula complexes of the map
showing south eastern United States and the Great Lakes area of Canada showing the Hopewell
Interaction Sphere and in different colours the various local expressions of the Hopewell cultures,
including the Laurel Complex, Saugeen Complex, Point Peninsula Complex, Marksville culture,
Copena culture, Kansas City Hopewell, Swift Creek Culture, Goodall Focus, Crab Orchard
culture and Havana Hopewell culture.

The Old Copper Complex societies dating from 3,000 BCE-500 BCE (5,000-2,500 years ago)
are a manifestation of the Woodland Culture, and are pre-pottery in nature. Evidence found in
the northern Great Lakes regions indicates that they extracted copper from local glacial deposits
and used it in its natural form to manufacture tools and implements.
The Plano cultures was a group of hunter-gatherer communities that occupied the Great Plains
area of North America between 12,000-10,000 years ago. The Paleo-Indians moved into new
territory as it emerged from under the glaciers. Big game flourished in this new environment.
The Plano culture are characterized by a range of projectile point tools collectively called Plano
points, which were used to hunt bison. Their diets also included pronghorn, elk, duer, raccoon
and coyote. At the beginning of the Archaic Era, they began to adopt a sedentary approach to
subsistence. Sites in and around Belmont, Nova Scotia have evidence of Plano-Indians,
indicating small seasonal hunting camps, perhaps re-visited over generations from around
11,000-10,000 years ago. Seasonal large and smaller game fish and fowl were food and raw
material sources. Adaptation to the harsh environment included tailored clothing and skin-
covered tents on wooden frames.
Archaic period

The North American climate stabilized by 8000 BCE (10,000 years ago); climatic conditions
were very similar to today's. This led to widespread migration, cultivation and later a dramatic
rise in population all over the Americas. Over the course of thousands of years, American
indigenous peoples domesticated, bred and cultivated a large array of plant species. These
species now constitute 50 - 60% of all crops in cultivation worldwide.
A Clovis point created using bi-facial percussion flaking (that is, each face is flaked on both
edges alternatively with a percussor)

Clovis sites dated at 13,500 years ago were discovered in western North America during the
1930s. Clovis peoples were regarded as the first widespread Paleo-Indian inhabitants of the New
World and ancestors to all indigenous peoples in the Americas. Archaeological discoveries in the
past thirty years have brought forward other distinctive knapping cultures who occupied the
Americas from the lower Great Plains to the shores of Chile.
Localized regional cultures developed from the time of the Younger Dryas cold climate period
from 12,900 to 11,500 years ago. The Folsom tradition are characterized by their use of Folsom
points as projectile tips at archaeological sites. These tools assisted activities at kill sites that
marked the slaughter and butchering of bison.

The land bridge existed until 13,000-11,000 years ago, long after the oldest proven human
settlements in the New World began. Lower Sea levels in the Queen Charlotte sound and Hecate
Strait produced great grass lands called archipelago of Haida Gwaii. (54] Hunter-gatherers of the
area left distinctive lithic technology tools and the remains of large butchered mammals,
occupying the area from 13,000-9,000 years ago. In July 1992, the Federal Government
officially designated Yá:tem (near Mission, British Columbia) as a National Historic Site, one of
the first Indigenous spiritual sites in Canada to be formally recognized in this manner.
The first inhabitants of North America arrived in Canada at least 15,000 years ago, though
increasing evidence suggests an even earlier arrival. 40 It is believed the inhabitants entered the
Americas pursuing Pleistocene mammals such as the giant beaver, steppe wisent, musk ox,
mastodons, woolly mammoths and ancient reindeer (early caribou). One route hypothesized is
that people walked south by way of an ice-free corridor on the east side of the Rocky Mountains,
and then fanned out across North America before continuing on to South America. The other
conjectured route is that they migrated, either on foot or using primitive boats, down the Pacific
Coast to the tip of South America, and then crossed the Rockies and Andes. Evidence of the
latter has been covered by a sea level rise of hundreds of metres following the last ice age.

The Old Crow Flats and basin was one of the areas in Canada untouched by glaciations during
the Pleistocene Ice ages, thus it served as a pathway and refuge for ice age plants and animals.
The area holds evidence of early human habitation in Canada dating from about 12,000. Fossils
from the area include some never accounted for in North America, such as hyenas and large
camels. Bluefish Caves is an archaeological site in Yukon, Canada from which a specimen of
apparently human-worked mammoth bone has been radiocarbon dated to 12,000 years ago.
Maps depicting each phase of a three-step early human migrations for the peopling of the
Americas

According to archaeological and genetic evidence, North and South America were the last
continents in the world with human habitation. During the Wisconsin glaciation, 50,000-17,000
years ago, falling sea levels allowed people to move across the Bering land bridge that joined
Siberia to north west North America (Alaska). Alaska was ice-free because of low snowfall,
allowing a small population to exist. The Laurentide ice sheet covered most of Canada, blocking
nomadic inhabitants and confining them to Alaska (East Beringia) for thousands of years.

Aboriginal genetic studies suggest that the first inhabitants of the Americas share a single
ancestral population, one that developed in isolation, conjectured to be Beringia. The isolation of
these peoples in Beringia might have lasted 10,000-20,000 years. Around 16,500 years ago, the
glaciers began melting, allowing people to move south and east into Canada and beyond.
An Aboriginal community in Northern Ontario

The term Eskimo has pejorative connotations in Canada and Greenland. Indigenous peoples in
those areas have replaced the term Eskimo with Inuit. The Yupik of Alaska and Siberia do not
consider themselves Inuit, and ethnographers agree they are a distinct people. They prefer the
terminology Yupik, Yupiit, or Eskimo. The Yupik languages are linguistically distinct from the
Inuit languages. Linguistic groups of Arctic people have no universal replacement term for
Eskimo, inclusive of all Inuit and Yupik people across the geographical area inhabited by the
Inuit and Yupik peoples.
Besides these ethnic descriptors, Aboriginal peoples are often divided into legal categories based
on their relationship with the Crown (i.e. the state). Section 91 (clause 24) of the Constitution
Act, 1867 gives the federal government (as opposed to the provinces) the sole responsibility for
"Indians, and Lands reserved for the Indians". The government inherited treaty obligations from
the British colonial authorities in Eastern Canada and signed treaties itself with First Nations in
Western Canada (the Numbered Treaties). It also passed the Indian Act in 1876 which governed
its interactions with all treaty and non-treaty peoples. Members of First Nations bands that are
subject to the Indian Act with the Crown are compiled on a list called the Indian Register, and
such people are called Status Indians. Many non-treaty First Nations and all Inuit and Métis
peoples are not subject to the Indian Act. However, two court cases have clarified that Inuit,
Métis, and non-status First Nations people, all are covered by the term "Indians" in the
Constitution Act, 1867. The first was Re Eskimos in 1939 covering the Inuit, the second being
Daniels v. Canada in 2013 which applies to Métis and non-Status First Nations.

Notwithstanding Canada's location within the Americas, the term "Native American" is not used
in Canada as it is typically used solely to describe the indigenous peoples within the boundaries
of the present-day United States.
The characteristics of Canadian Aboriginal culture included permanent settlements, agriculture,
civic and ceremonial architecture, complex societal hierarchies and trading networks. The Métis
culture of mixed blood originated in the mid-17th century when First Nation and Inuit people
married Europeans. The Inuit had more limited interaction with European settlers during that
early period. Various laws, treaties, and legislation have been enacted between European
immigrants and First Nations across Canada. Aboriginal Right to Self-Government provides
opportunity to manage historical, cultural, political, health care and economic control aspects
within first people's communities.

As of the 2011 census, Aboriginal peoples in Canada totaled 1,400,685 people, or 4.3% of the
national population, spread over 600 recognized First Nations governments or bands with
distinctive cultures, languages, art, and music. National Aboriginal Day recognizes the cultures
and contributions of Aboriginal peoples to the history of Canada. First Nations, Inuit and Métis
peoples of all backgrounds have become prominent figures and have served as role models in the
Aboriginal community and help to shape the Canadian cultural identity.
The terms First Peoples and First Nations are both used to refer to indigenous peoples of Canada.
The terms First Peoples or Aboriginal peoples in Canada are normally broader terms than First
Nations, as they include Inuit, Métis and First Nations. First Nations (most often used in the
plural) has come into general use for the indigenous peoples of North America in Canada, and
their descendants, who are neither Inuit nor Métis. On reserves, First Nations is being supplanted
by members of various nations referring to themselves by their group or ethnical identity. In
conversation this would be "I am Haida", or "we are Kwantlens", in recognition of their First
Nations ethnicities. In this Act, "Aboriginal peoples of Canada" includes the Indian, Inuit and
Métis peoples of Canada.

Indian remains in place as the legal term used in the Canadian Constitution. Its usage outside
such situations can be considered offensive. Aboriginal peoples is more commonly used to
describe all indigenous peoples of Canada. The term Aboriginal people is beginning to be
considered outdated and slowly being replaced by the term Indigenous people.
Indigenous peoples in Canada

Indigenous peoples in Canada, also known as Indigenous Canadians or Aboriginal Canadians,

are the indigenous peoples within the boundaries of present-day Canada. They comprise the First
Nations, Inuit and Métis. Although "Indian" is a term still commonly used in legal documents,
the descriptors "Indian" and "Eskimo" have somewhat fallen into disuse in Canada and some
consider them to be pejorative. Similarly, "Aboriginal" as a collective noun is a specific term of
art used in some legal documents, including the Constitution Act 1982, though in some circles
that word is also falling into disfavour.

Old Crow Flats and Bluefish Caves are some of the earliest known sites of human habitation in
Canada. The Paleo-Indian Clovis, Plano and Pre-Dorset cultures pre-date current indigenous
peoples of the Americas. Projectile point tools, spears, pottery, bangles, chisels and scrapers
mark archaeological sites, thus distinguishing cultural periods, traditions and lithic reduction
styles.
Under letters patent from King Henry VII of England, the Italian John Cabot became the first
European known to have landed in Canada after the time of the Vikings. Records indicate that on
24 June 1497 he sighted land at a northern location believed to be somewhere in the Atlantic
provinces. Official tradition deemed the first landing site to be at Cape Bonavista, Newfoundland,
although other locations are possible. After 1497 Cabot and his son Sebastian Cabot continued to
make other voyages to find the Northwest Passage, and other explorers continued to sail out of
England to the New World, although the details of these voyages are not well recorded.

Based on the Treaty of Tordesillas, the Spanish Crown claimed it had territorial rights in the area
visited by John Cabot in 1497 and 1498 CE. However, Portuguese explorers like João Fernandes
Lavrador would continue to visited the north Atlantic coast, which accounts for the appearance
of "Labrador" on topographical maps of the period. In 1501 and 1502 the Corte-Real brothers
explored Newfoundland (Terra Nova) and Labrador claiming these lands as part of the
Portuguese Empire. In 1506, King Manuel I of Portugal created taxes for the cod fisherles in
Newfoundland waters. João Álvares Fagundes and Pêro de Barcelos established fishing outposts
in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia around 1521 CE; however, these were later abandoned, with
the Portuguese colonizers focusing their efforts
L'Anse aux Meadows on the island of Newfoundland, site of a Norsemen colony about year
1000

There are reports of contact made before the 1492 voyages of Christopher Columbus and the age
of discovery between First Nations, Inuit and those from other continents. The Norse, who had
settled Greenland and Iceland, arrived around the year 1000 and built a small settlement at
L'Anse aux Meadows at the northernmost tip of Newfoundland (carbon dating estimate 990 -
1050 CE) L'Anse aux Meadows is also notable for its connection with the attempted colony of
Vinland established by Leif Erikson around the same period or, more broadly, with Norse
exploration of the Americas.
Pre-Columbian distribution of Na-Dene languages in North America

The Interior of British Columbia was home to the Salishan language groups such as the Shuswap
(Secwepemc), Okanagan and southern Athabaskan language groups, primarily the Dakelh
(Carrier) and the Tsilhgot'in. The inlets and valleys of the British Columbia Coast sheltered large,
distinctive populations, such as the Haida, Kwakwakawakw and Nuu-chah-nulth, sustained by
the region's abundant salmon and shellfish. These peoples developed complex cultures
dependent on the western red cedar that included wooden houses, seagoing whaling and war
canoes and elaborately carved potlatch items and totem poles.

In the Arctic archipelago, the distinctive Paleo-Eskimos known as Dorset peoples, whose culture
has been traced back to around 500 BCE, were replaced by the ancestors of today's Inuit by 1500
CE. This transition is supported by archaeological records and Inuit mythology that tells of
having driven off the Tuniit or 'first inhabitants'. Inuit traditional laws are anthropologically
different from Western law. Customary law was non-existent in Inuit society before the
introduction of the Canadian legal system.
Pre-Columbian distribution of Algonquian languages in North America.

Speakers of eastern Algonquian languages included the Milkmaq and Abenaki of the Maritime
region of Canada and likely the extinct Beothuk of Newfoundland. The Ojibwa and other
Anishinaabe speakers of the central Algonquian languages retain an oral tradition of having
moved to their lands around the western and central Great Lakes from the sea, likely the east
coast. According to oral tradition, the Ojibwa formed the Council of Three Fires in 796 CE with
the Odawa and the Potawatomi.

The Iroquois (Haudenosaune) were centred from at least 1000 CE in northern New York, but
their influence extended into what is now southern Ontario and the Montreal area of modern
Quebec. The Iroquois Confederacy, according to oral tradition, was formed in 1142 CE. On the
Great Plains the Cree or Nehilawe (who spoke a closely related Central Algonquian language,
the plains Cree language) depended on the vast herds of bison to supply food and many of their
other needs. To the northwest were the peoples of the Na-Dene languages, which include the
Athapaskan-speaking peoples and the Tlingit, who lived on the islands of southern Alaska and
northern British Columbia. The Na-Dene language group is believed to be linked to the
Yeniseian languages of Siberia. The Dene of the western Arctic may represent a distinct wave of
migration from Asia to North America.
The North American climate stabilized around 8000 BCE (10,000 years ago) Climatic conditions
were similar to modern patterns however, the receding glacial ice sheets still covered large
portions of the land creating lakes of meltwater. Most population during the Archaic periods
were still highly mobile hunter-gatherers. However, individual groups started to focus on
resources avail to them locally thus with the passage of time, there is a pattern of increasing
regional generalization (le. Paleo-Arctic, Plano Maritime Archaic traditions).

A northerly section focusing on the Saugeen, Laurel and Point Peninsula complexes of the map
showing south eastern United States and the Great Lakes area Canada showing the Hopewell
Interaction Sphere and in different colours the various local expressions of the Hopewell cultures,
including the Laurel Complex, Saugeen Complex, Point Peninsula Complex, Marksville culture,
Copena culture, Kansas City Hopewell, Swift Greek Culture, Goodall Focus, Crab Orchard
culture and Havana Hopewell culture.
The Great Lakes are estimated to have been formed at the end of the last glacial period (about
10,000 years ago), when the Laurentide ice sheet receded.

Archeological and Aboriginal genetic evidence indicate that North and South America were the
last continents into which humans migrated. During the Wisconsin glaciation, 50,000 - 17,000
years ago, falling sea levels allowed people to move across the Bering land bridge (Beringia),
from Siberia into northwest North America. At that point, they were blocked by the Laurentide
ice sheet that covered most of Canada, confining them to Alaska and the Yukon for thousands of
years. The exact dates and routes of the peopling of the Americas are the subject of an ongoing
debate. By 16,000 years ago the glacial melt allowed people to move by land south and east out
of Beringia, and into Canada. The Queen Charlotte Islands, Old Crow Flats, and Bluefish Caves
contain some of the earliest Paleo-Indian archaeological sites in Canada. Ice Age hunter-
gatherers of this period left lithic flake fluted stone tools and the remains of large butchered
mammals.
History of Canada

The history of Canada covers the period from the arrival of Paleo-Indians thousands of years ago
to the present day. Canada has been inhabited for millennia by distinctive groups of Aboriginal
peoples, with distinct trade networks, spiritual beliefs, and styles of social organization. Some of
these civilizations had long faded by the time of the first European arrivals and have been
discovered through archaeological investigations. Various treaties and laws have been enacted
between European settlers and the Aboriginal populations.

Beginning in the late 15th century, French and British expeditions explored, and later settled,
along the Atlantic Coast. France ceded nearly all of its colonies in North America to Britain in
1763 after the Seven Years' War. In 1867, with the union of three British North American
colonies through Confederation, Canada was formed as a federal dominion of four provinces.
This began an accretion of provinces and territories and a process of increasing autonomy from
the British Empire, which became official with the Statute of Westminster of 1931 and
completed in the Canada Act of 1982, which severed the vestiges of legal dependence on the
British parliament.
Great Depression

Canada was hard hit by the worldwide Great Depression that began in 1929. Between 1929 and
1933, the gross national product dropped 40% (compared to 37% in the US). Unemployment
reached 27% at the depth of the Depression in 1933. Many businesses closed, as corporate
profits of $396 million in 1929 turned into losses of $98 million in 1933. Canadian exports
shrank by 50% from 1929 to 1933. Construction all but stopped (down 82%, 1929-33), and
wholesale prices dropped 30%. Wheat prices plunged from 78c per bushel (1928 crop) to 29c in
1932.

Urban unemployment nationwide was 19%; Toronto's rate was 17%, according to the census of
1931. Farmers who stayed on their farms were not considered unemployed. By 1933, 30% of the
labour force was out of work, and one fifth of the population became dependent on government
assistance. Wages fell as did prices. Worst hit were areas dependent on primary industries such
as farming, mining and logging, as prices fell and there were few alternative jobs. Most families
had moderate losses and little hardship, though they too became pessimistic and their debts
become heavier as prices fell. Some families saw most or all of their assets disappear, and
suffered severely.
In 1930, in the first stage of the long depression, Prime Minister Mackenzie King believed that
the crisis was a temporary swing of the business cycle and that the economy would soon recover
without government intervention. He refused to provide unemployment relief or federal aid to
the provinces, saying that if Conservative provincial governments demanded federal dollars, he
would not give them "a five cent piece." His blunt wisecrack was used to defeat the Liberals in
the 1930 election. The main issue was the rapid deterioration in the economy and whether the
prime minister was out of touch with the hardships of ordinary people. The winner of the 1930
election was Richard Bedford Bennett and the Conservatives. Bennett had promised high tariffs
and large-scale spending, but as deficits increased, he became wary and cut back severely on
Federal spending. with falling support and the depression getting only worse, Bennett attempted
to introduce policies based on the New Deal of President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) in the
United States, but he got little passed. Bennett's government became a focus of popular
discontent. For example, auto owners saved on gasoline by using horses to pull their cars,
dubbing them Bennett Buggies. The Conservative failure to restore prosperity led to the return of
Mackenzie King's Liberals in the 1935 election.
In 1935, the Liberals used the slogan "King or Chaos" to win a landslide in the 1935 election.
Promising a much-desired trade treaty with the U.S., the Mackenzie King government passed the
1935 Reciprocal Trade Agreement. It marked the turning point in Canadian-American economic
relations, reversing the disastrous trade war of 1930-31, lowering tariffs, and yielding a dramatic
increase in trade.

The worst of the Depression had passed by 1935, as Ottawa launched relief programs such as the
National Housing Act and National Employment Commission. The Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation became a crown corporation in 1936. Trans-Canada Airlines (the precursor to Air
Canada) was formed in 1937, as was the National Film Board of Canada in 1939. In 1938,
Parliament transformed the Bank of Canada from a private entity to a crown corporation.

One political response was a highly restrictive immigration policy and a rise in nativism.

Times were especially hard in western Canada, where a full recovery did not occur until the
Second World War began in 1939. One response was the creation of new political parties such as
the Social Credit movement and the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation, as well as popular
protest in the form of the On-to-Ottawa Trek.
Second World War

Canada's involvement in the Second World War began when Canada declared war on Nazi
Germany on September 10, 1939, delaying it one week after Britain acted to symbolically
demonstrate independence. The war restored Canada's economic health and its self-confidence,
as it played a major role in the Atlantic and in Europe. During the war, Canada became more
closely linked to the U.S. The Americans took virtual control of Yukon in order to build the
Alaska Highway, and were a major presence in the British colony of Newfoundland with major
airbases.
Mackenzie King - and Canada - were largely ignored by Winston Churchill and the British
government despite Canada's major role in supplying food, raw materials, munitions and money
to the hard-pressed British economy, training airmen for the Commonwealth, guarding the
western half of the North Atlantic Ocean against German U-boats, and providing combat troops
for the invasions of Italy, France and Germany in 1943-45. The government successfully
mobilized the economy for war, with impressive results in industrial and agricultural output. The
depression ended, prosperity returneti, and Canada's economy expanded significantly. On the
political side, Mackenzie King rejected any notion of a government of national unity. The
Canadian federal election, 1940 was held as normally scheduled, producing another majority for
the Liberals.
Building up the Royal Canadian Air Force was a high priority; it was kept separate from Britain's
Royal Air Force. The British Commonwealth Air Training Plan Agreement, signed in December
1939, bound Canada, Britain, New Zealand, and Australia to a program that eventually trained
half the airmen from those four nations in the Second World War.

After the start of war with Japan in December 1941, the government, in cooperation with the
U.S., began the Japanese-Canadian internment, which sent 22,000 British Columbia residents of
Japanese descent to relocation camps far from the coast. The reason was intense public demand
for removal and fears of espionage or sabotage. The government ignored reports from the RCMP
and Canadian military that most of the Japanese were law-abiding and not a threat.
The Battle of the Atlantic began immediately, and from 1943 to 1945 was led by Leonard W.
Murray, from Nova Scotia. German U-boats operated in Canadian and Newfoundland waters
throughout the war, sinking many naval and merchant vessels, as Canada took charge of the
defenses of the western Atlantic. The Canadian army was involved in the failed defence of Hong
Kong, the unsuccessful Dieppe Raid in August 1942, the Allied invasion of Italy, and the highly
successful invasion of France and the Netherlands in 1944-45.

The Conscription Crisis of 1944 greatly affected unity between French and English-speaking
Canadians, though was not as politically intrusive as that of the First World War. Of a population
of approximately 11.5 million, 1.1 million Canadians served in the armed forces in the Second
World War. Many thousands more served with the Canadian Merchant Navy. In all, more than
45,000 died, and another 55,000 were wounded.
Post-war Era 1945-1960

Prosperity returned to Canada during the Second World War and continued in the proceeding
years, with the development of universal health care, old-age pensions, and veterans' pensions.
The financial crisis of the Great Depression had led the Dominion of Newfoundland to relinquish
responsible government in 1934 and become a crown colony ruled by a British governor. In 1948,
the British government gave voters three Newfoundland Referendum choices: remaining a crown
colony, returning to Dominion status (that is, independence), or joining Canada. Joining the
United States was not made an option. After bitter debate Newfoundlanders voted to join Canada
in 1949 as a province.
The foreign policy of Canada during the Cold War was closely tied to that of the United States.
Canada was a founding member of NATO (which Canada wanted to be a transatlantic economic
and political union as well). In 1950, Canada sent combat troops to Korea during the Korean War
as part of the United Nations forces. The federal government's desire to assert its territorial
claims in the Arctic during the Cold War manifested with the High Arctic relocation, in which
Inuit were moved from Nunavik (the northern third of Quebec) to barren Cornwallis Island; this
project was later the subject of a long investigation by the Royal Commission on Aboriginal
Peoples.
In 1956, the United Nations responded to the Suez Crisis by convening a United Nations
Emergency Force to supervise the withdrawal of invading forces. The peacekeeping force was
initially conceptualized by Secretary of External Affairs and future Prime Minister Lester B.
Pearson. Pearson was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1957 for his work in establishing the
peacekeeping operation. Throughout the mid-1950s, Louis St. Laurent (12th Prime Minister of
Canada) and his successor John Diefenbaker attempted to create a new, highly advanced jet
fighter, the Avro Arrow. The controversial aircraft was cancelled by Diefenbaker in 1959.
Diefenbaker instead purchased the BOMARC missile defense system and American aircraft. In
1958 Canada established (with the United States) the North American Aerospace Defense
Command (NORAD).
In 1604, a North American fur trade monopoly was granted to Pierre Du Gua, Sieur de Mons.
The fur trade became one of the main economic ventures in North America. Du Gua led his first
colonization expedition to an island located near the mouth of the St. Croix River. Among his
lieutenants was a geographer named Samuel de Champlain, who promptly carried out a major
exploration of the northeastern coastline of what is now the United States. In the spring of 1605,
under Samuel de Champlain, the new St. Croix settlement was moved to Port Royal (today's
Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia).

The Quebec Settlement: A. -The Warehouse. B. -Pigeon-loft. C. -Detached Buildings where we

keep our arms and for Lodging our Workmen. D. -Another Detached Building for the Workmen.
E.-Sun-dial. F.- Another Detached Building where is the Smithy and where the Workmen are
Lodged. G. -Galleries all around the Lodgings. H.- The Sieur de Champlain's Lodgings. I.- The
door of the Settlement with a Draw-bridge. L Promenade around the Settlement ten feet in width
to the edge of the Moat. M.-Moat the whole way around the Settlement. O.- The Sieur de
Champlain's Garden. P.- The Kitchen. Q.-Space in front of the Settlement on the Shore of the
River. R.- The great River St. Lawrence.
Music

The Aboriginal peoples of Canada encompass diverse ethnic groups with their individual musical
traditions. Music is usually social (public) or ceremonial (private). Public, social music may be
dance music accompanied by rattles and drums. Private, ceremonial music includes vocal songs
with accompaniment on percussion, used to mark occasions like Midewivin ceremonies and Sun
Dances.

Traditionally, Aboriginal peoples used the materials at hand to make their instruments for
centuries before Europeans immigrated to Canada. First Nations people made gourds and animal
horns into rattles, which were elaborately carved and brightly painted. In woodland areas, they
made horns of birch bark and drumsticks of carved antlers and wood. Traditional percussion
instruments such as drums were generally made of carved wood and animal hides. These musical
instruments provide the background for songs, and songs the background for dances. Traditional
First Nations people consider song and dance to be sacred. For years after Europeans came to
Canada, First Nations people were forbidden to practice their ceremonies.
Demographics and classification of Indigenous peoples

There are three (First Nations, Inuit, and Métis) distinctive groups of North America indigenous
peoples recognized in the Canadian Constitution Act, 1982, sections 25 and 35. Under the
Employment Equity Act, Aboriginal people are a designated group along with women, visible
minorities, and persons with disabilities. They are not a visible minority under the Employment
Equity Act and in the view of Statistics Canada.

The 2011 Canadian Census enumerated 1,400,685 Aboriginal people in Canada, 4.3% of the
country's total population. This total comprises 851,560 people of First Nations descent, 451,795
Métis, and 59,445 Inuit. National representative bodies of Aboriginal people in Canada include
the Assembly of First Nations, the Inuit Tapirit Kanatami, the Métis National Council, the Native
Women's Association of Canada, the National Association of Native Friendship Centres and the
Congress of Aboriginal Peoples.
Visual art

Indigenous peoples were producing art for thousands of years before the arrival of European
settler colonists and the eventual establishment of Canada as a nation state. Like the peoples who
produced them, indigenous art traditions spanned territories across North America. Indigenous
art traditions are organized by art historians according to cultural, linguistic or regional groups:
Northwest Coast, Plateau, Plains, Eastern Woodlands, Subarctic, and Arctic.

Art traditions vary enormously amongst and within these diverse groups. Indigenous art with a
focus on portability and the body is distinguished from European traditions and its focus on
architecture. Indigenous visual art may be used conjunction with other arts. Shamans masks and
rattles are used ceremoniously in dance, storytelling and music. Artworks preserved in museum
collections date from the period after European contact and show evidence of the creative
adoption and adaptation of European trade goods such as metal and glass beads. The distinct
Métis cultures that have arisen from inter-cultural relationships with Europeans contribute
culturally hybrid art forms. During the 19th and the first half of the 20th century the Canadian
government pursued an active policy of forced and cultural assimilation toward indigenous
peoples. The Indian Act banned manifestations of the Sun Dance, the Potlatch, and works of art
depicting them.

It was not until the 1950s and 1960s that indigenous artists such as Mungo Martin, Bill Reid and
Norval Morrisseau began to publicly renew and re-invent indigenous art traditions. Currently
there are indigenous artists practising in all media in Canada and two indigenous artists, Edward
Poitras and Rebecca Belmore, have represented Canada at the Venice Biennale in 1995 and 2005
respectively.
 Approximately 40,115 individuals of Aboriginal heritage could not be counted during the 2006
census. This is due to the fact that certain Aboriginal reserves and communities in Canada did
not participate in the 2006 census, since enumeration of those communities were not permitted.
In 2006, 22 Native communities were not completely enumerated unlike in the year 2001, when
30 First Nation communities were not enumerated and during 1996 when 77 Native communities
could not be completely enumerated. Hence, there were probably 1,212,905 individuals of
Aboriginal ancestry (North American Indian, Metis, and Inuit) residing in Canada during the
time when the 2006 census was conducted in Canada

Indigenous people assert that their sovereign rights are valid, and point to the Royal
Proclamation of 1763, which is mentioned in the Canadian Constitution Act, 1982, Section 25,
the British North America Acts and the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (to
which Canada is a signatory) in support of this claim.

Province/Territory Number % Indian Métis Inuit Multiple Other

(First
Nations)
British Columbia 232,290 5.4% 155,015 69,475 1,570 2,480 3,745
Alberta 220,695 6.2% 116,670 96,865 1,985 1,875 3,295
Saskatchewan 157,740 15.6% 103,205 52,450 290 670 1,120
Manitoba 199,940 17.0% 130,075 78,835 580 1,205 1,055
Ontario 301,430 2.4% 201,100 86,015 3,360 2,910 8,045
Quebec 141,915 1.8% 82,425 40,960 12,570 1,550 4,410
New Brunswick 22,620 3.1% 16,120 4,850 485 145 1,020
Nova Scotia 33,845 3.7% 21,895 10,050 695 225 980
Prince Edward Island 2,230 1.6% 1,520 410 55 0 235
Newfoundland and 35,800 7.1% 19,315 7,665 6,260 260 2,300
Labrador
Yukon 7,710 23.1% 6,585 845 175 30 70
Northwest Territories 21,160 51.9% 13,345 3,245 4,335 45 185
Nunavut 27,360 86.3% 130 135 27,070 15 15
Canada 1,400,685 4.3% 851,560 451,795 59,445 11,415 26,470
Languages

There are 13 Aboriginal language groups, 11 oral and 2 sign, in Canada, made up of more than
65 distinct dialects. Of these, only Cree, Inuktitut and Ojibway have a large enough population of
fluent speakers to be considered viable to survive in the long term. Two of Canada's territories
give official status to native languages. In Nunavut, Inuktitut and Inuinnagtun are official
languages alongside the national languages of English and French, and Inuktitut is a common
vehicular language in territorial government. In the NWT, the Official Languages Act declares
that there are eleven different languages: Chipewyan, Cree, English, French, Gwich'in,
Inuinnaqtun, Inuktitut, Inuvialuktun, North Slavey, South Slavey and Tlicho. Besides English
and French, these languages are not vehicular in government; official status entitles citizens to
receive services in them on request and to deal with the government in them.

Aboriginal language No. of speakers Mother tongue Home language

Cree 99,950 78,855 47,190
Inuktitut 35,690 32,010 25,290
Ojibway 32,460 11,115 11,115
Montagnais-Naskapi (Innu) 11,815 10,970 9,720
Dene 11,130 9,750 7,490
Oji-Cree (Anishinini) 12,605 8,480 8,480
Mikmaq 8,750 7,365 3,985
Siouan languages (Dakota/Sioux) 6,495 5,585 3,780
Atikamekw 5,645 5,245 4,745
Blackfoot 4,915 3,085 3,085
Aboriginal cultural areas depend upon their ancestors’ primary lifeway, or occupation, at the
time of European contact. These culture areas correspond closely with physical and ecological
regions of Canada. The indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast were centred around
ocean and river fishing, in the interior of British Columbia, hunter-gatherer and river fishing. In
both of these areas the salmon was of chief importance. For the people of the plains, bison
hunting was the primary activity. In the subarctic forest, other species such as the moose were
more important. For peoples near the Great Lakes and Sahit Lawrence River, shifting agriculture
was practised, including the raising of maize, beans, and squash. While for the Inuit, hunting was
the primary source of food with seals the primary component of their diet. The caribou, fish,
other marine mammals and to a lesser extent plants, berries and seaweed are part of the Inuit diet.
One of the most noticeable symbols of Inuit culture, the inukshuk is the emblem of the
Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics. Inuksuit are rock sculptures made by stacking stones; in the
shape of a human figure, they are called inunnguag.
Culture of Indigenous peoples

Through storytelling and other interactive learning styles, countless North American Indigenous
words, inventions and games have become an everyday part of Canadian language and use.
Thanks to groups such as the Aboriginal Language and Culture (ALC teachers of British
Columbia, these practices continue to be passed down to each generation. The canoe, snowshoes,
the toboggan, lacrosse, tug of war, maple syrup and tobacco are just a few of the products,
inventions and games. Some of the words include the barbecue, caribou, chipmunk, woodchuck,
hammock, skunk, and moose. Many places in Canada, both natural features and human
habitations, use indigenous names. The word "Canada" itself derives from the St. Lawrence
Iroquoian word meaning "village" or "settlement". The province of Saskatchewan derives its
name from the Saskatchewan River, which in the Cree language is called "Kisiskatchewani Sipi",
meaning "swift-flowing river. Canada's capital city Ottawa comes from the Algonquin language
term "adawe" meaning "to trade." Modern youth groups such as Scouts Canada and the Girl
Guides of Canada include programs based largely on Indigenous lore, arts and crafts, character
building and outdoor camp craft and living.
Indian reserves, established in Canadian law by treaties such as Treaty 7, are lands of First
Nations recognized by non-indigenous governments. Some reserves are within cities, such as the
Opawikoscikan Reserve in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, Wendake in Quebec City or Stony
Plain 135 in the Edmonton Capital Region. There are more reserves in Canada than there are
First Nations, which were ceded multiple reserves by treaty. Aboriginal people currently work in
a variety of occupations and may live outside their ancestral homes. The traditional cultures of
their ancestors, shaped by nature, still exert a strong influence on them, from spirituality to
political attitudes. National Aboriginal Day is a day of recognition of the cultures and
contributions of the First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples of Canada. The day was first
celebrated in 1996, after it was proclaimed that year, by then Governor General of Canada
Roméo LeBlanc, to be celebrated on June 21 annually. Most provincial jurisdictions do not
recognize it as a statutory holiday.
Royal Commission

The Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples was a Royal Commission undertaken by the
Government of Canada in 1991 to address issues of the Aboriginal peoples of Canada. It
assessed past government policies toward Aboriginal people, such as residential schools, and
provided policy recommendations to the government. The Commission issued its final report in
November 1996. The five-volume, 4,000-page report covered a vast range of issues; its 440
recommendations called for sweeping changes to the interaction between Aboriginal, non-
Aboriginal people and the governments in Canada. The report "set out a 20-year agenda for
change."
Political organization

First Nations and Inuit organizations ranged in size from band societies of a few people to multi-
nation confederacies like the Iroquois. First Nations leaders from across the country formed the
Assembly of First Nations, which began as the National Indian Brotherhood in 1968. The Métis
and the Inuit are represented nationally by the Métis National Council and Inuit Tapirit Kanatami
respectively.

Today's political organizations have resulted from interaction with European-style methods of
government through the Federal Interlocutor for Métis and Non-Status Indians. Aboriginal
political organizations throughout Canada vary in political standing, viewpoints, and reasons for
forming. First Nations, Métis and Inuit negotiate with the Canadian Government through Indian
and Northern Affairs Canada in all affairs concerning land, entitlement, and rights. The First
Nation groups that operate independently do not belong to these groups.
Health policy

In 1995, the federal government announced the Aboriginal Right to Self-Government Policy.
This policy recognizes that First Nations and Inuit have the constitutional right to shape their
own forms of government to suit their particular historical, cultural, political and economic
circumstances. The Indian Health Transfer Policy provided a framework for the assumption of
control of health services by Aboriginal peoples, and set forth a developmental approach to
transfer centred on self-determination in health. Through this process, the decision to enter
transfer discussions with Health Canada rests with each community. Once involved in transfer,
communities can take control of health programme responsibilities at a pace determined by their
individual circumstances and health management capabilities. The National Aboriginal Health
Organization (NAHO) incorporated in 2000, is an Aboriginal-designed and-controlled not-for-
profit body in Canada that works to influence and advance the health and well-being of
Aboriginal Peoples.
Those people accepted into band membership under band rules may not be status Indians. C-31
clarified that various sections of the Indian Act would apply to band members. The sections
under debate concern community life and land holdings. Sections pertaining to Indians (First
Nations peoples) as individuals (in this case, wills and taxation of personal property) were not
included.
Indian Act

The Indian Act is federal legislation that dates from 1876. There have been over 20 major
changes made to the original Act since then, the last time being in 1951; amended in 1985 with
Bill C-31. The Indian Act indicates how Reserves and Bands can operate and defines who is
recognized as an "Indian".

In 1985, the Canadian Parliament passed Bill C-31, "An Ack to Amend the Indian Act". Because
of a Constitutional requirement, the Bill took effect on April 17, 1985.

 It ends discriminatory provisions of the Indian Act, especially those that

discriminated against women.
 It changes the meaning of "status" and for the first time allows for limited
reinstatement of Indians who were denied or lost status and/or Band membership.
 It allows bands to define their own membership rules.
According to the First Nations- Federal Crown Political Accord "cooperation will be a
cornerstone for partnership between Canada and First Nations, wherein Canada is the short-form
reference to Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada. The Supreme Court argued that treaties
"served to reconcile preexisting Aboriginal sovereignty with assumed Crown sovereignty, and to
define Aboriginal rights". First Nations people interpreted agreements covered in treaty 8 to last
"as long as the sun shines, grass grows and rivers flow."
Politics, law and legislation

Treaties

The Canadian Crown and Aboriginal peoples began interactions during the European
colonialization period. Numbered treaties, the Indian Act, the Constitution Act of 1982 and case
laws were established. Aboriginal peoples construe these agreements as being between them and
the Crown of Canada through the districts Indian Agent, and not the Cabinet of Canada. The
Māori interprets the Treaty of Waitangi in New Zearand similarly. A series of eleven treaties
were signed between First Nations in Canada and the reigning Monarch of Canada from 1871 to
1921. The Government of Canada created the policy, commissioned the Treaty Commissioners
and ratified the agreements. These Treaties are agreements with the Government of Canada
administered by Canadian Aboriginal law and overseen by the Minister of Indian Affairs and
Northern Development.
Because of laws and policies that encouraged or required Indigenous peoples to assimilate into a
Eurocentric society, Canada violated the United Nations Genocide Convention that Canada
signed in 1949 and passed through Parliament in 1952. The residential school system that
removed Aboriginal children from their homes has led scholars to believe that Canada can be
tried in international court for genocide. A legal case resulted in settlement of 2 billion C$ in
2006 and the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission which confirmed the
injurious effect on children of this system and turmoil created between Aboriginal Canadians and
Canadian Society. In 2008 Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued an apology on behalf of the
Canadian government and its citizens for the residential school system.
The final government strategy of assimilation, made possible by the Indian Act was the Canadian
residential school system:

Of all the initiatives that were undertaken in the first century of Confederation, none was more
ambitious or central to the civilizing strategy of the Department, to its goal of assimilation, than
the residential school system... it was the residential school experience that would lead children
most effectively out of their "savage" communities into "higher civilization" and "full
citizenship."

Beginning in 1847 and lasting until 1996, the Canadian government, in partnership with the
Catholic Church, ran 130 residential boarding schools across Canada for Aboriginal children,
who were forcibly taken from their homes. While the schools were said to educate, they were
plagued by under-funding, disease, and abuse.
Forced assimilation

From the late 18th century, European Canadians (and the Canadian government) encouraged
assimilation of Aboriginal culture into what was referred to as "Canadian culture". These
attempts reached a climax in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with a series of initiatives that
aimed at complete assimilation and subjugation of the Aboriginal peoples. These policies, which
were made possible by legislation such as the Gradual Civilization Act and the Indian Act,
focused on European ideals of Christianity, sedentary living, agriculture, and education.

The attempt at Christianization of the Aboriginal people of Canada had been ongoing since the
first missionaries arrived in the 1600s, however it became more systematic with the Indian Act in
1876, which would bring new sanctions for those who did not convert to Christianity. For
example, the new laws would prevent non-Christian Aboriginal people from testifying or having
their cases heard in court and ban alcohol consumption. When the Indian Act was amended in
1884, traditional religious and social practices, such as the Potlatch, would be banned, and
further amendments in 1920 would prevent "status Indians" (as defined in the Act) from wearing
traditional dress or performing traditional dances in an attempt to stop all non-Christian practices.
Another focus of the Canadian government was to make the Aboriginal groups of Canada
sedentary, as they thought that this would make them easier to assimilate. In the 19th century, the
government began to support the creation of model farming villages, which were meant to
encourage non-sedentary Aboriginal groups to settle in an area and begin to cultivate agriculture.
When most of these model farming villages failed, the government turned instead to the creation
of Indian reserves with the Indian Act of 1876. With the creation of these reserves came many
restricting laws, such as further bans on all intoxicants, restrictions on eligibility to vote in band
elections, decreased hunting and fishing areas, and inability for status Indians to visit other
groups on their reservations.

Through the Gradual Civilization Act in 1857, the government would encourage Indians (i.e.,
First Nations) to enfranchise - to remove all legal distinctions between [Indians] and Her
Majesty's other Canadian Subjects. If an Aboriginal chose to enfranchise, it would strip them and
their family of Aboriginal title, with the idea that they would become "less savage" and "more
civilized", thus become assimilated into Canadian society. However, they were often still defined
as non-citizens by Europeans, and those few who did enfranchise were often met with
disappointment.
Canada under British rule (1763-1867)

With the end of the Seven Years War and the signing of the Treaty of Paris (1763), France ceded
almost all of its remaining territory in mainland North America, except for fishing rights off
Newfoundland and the two small islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon where its fishermen could
dry their fish. France had already secretly ceded its vast Louisiana territory to Spain under the
Treaty of Fontainebleau (1762) in which King Louis XV of France had given his cousin King
Charles Ill of Spain the entire area of the drainage basin of the Mississippi River from the Great
Lakes t Gulf of Mexico and from the Appalachian.
Canada under British rule (1763-1867)
Map showing British territorial gains following the "Seven Years' War". Treaty of Paris gains in pink, and Spanish
territorial gains after the Treaty Fontainebleau in yellow.
The new British rulers of Canada retained and protected most of the property, religious, political,
and social culture of the French-speaking habitants, guaranteeing the right of the Canadiens to
practice the Catholic faith and to the use of French civil law (now Quebec law) through the
Quebec Act of 1774. The Royal Proclamation of 1763 had been issued in October, by King
George III following Great Britain's acquisition of French territory. The proclamation organized
Great Britain's new North American empire and stabilized relations between the British Crown
and Aboriginal peoples through regulation of trade, settlement, and land purchases on the
western frontier.
With the end of the Seven Years' War and the signing of the Treaty of Paris (1763), France ceded
almost all of its remaining territory in mainland North America, except for fishing rights off
Newfoundland and the two small islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon where its fishermen could
dry their fish. France had already secretly ceded its vast Louisiana territory to Spain under the
Treaty of Fontainebleau (1762) in which King Louis XV of France had given his cousin King
Charles III of Spain the entire area of the drainage basin of the Mississippi River from the Great
Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico and from the Appalachian Mountains to the Rocky Mountains.
France and Spain kept the Treaty of Fontainebleau secret from other countries until 1764. In
return for acquiring Canada, Britain returned to France its most important sugar-producing
colony, Guadeloupe, which the French at the time considered more valuable than Canada.
(Guadeloupe produced more sugar than all the British islands combined, and Voltaire had
notoriously dismissed Canada as "Quelques arpents de neige", "A few acres of snow").
When the British evacuated New York City in 1783, they took many Loyalist refugees to Nova
Scotia, while other Loyalists went to southwestern Quebec. So many Loyalists arrived on the
shores of the St. John River that a separate colony New Brunswick-was created in 1784;
followed in 1791 by the division of Quebec into the largely French-speaking Lower Canada
(French Canada) along the St. Lawrence River and Gaspé Peninsula and an anglophone Loyalist
Upper Canada, with its capital settled by 1796 in York, in present-day Toronto. After 1790 most
of the new settlers were American farmers searching for new lands; although generally favorable
to republicanism, they were relatively non-political and stayed neutral in the War of 1812.
American Revolution and the Loyalists

During the American Revolution, there was some sympathy for the American cause among the
Acadians and the New Englanders in Nova Scotia. Neither party joined the rebels, although
several hundred individuals joined the revolutionary cause. An invasion of Quebec by the
Continental Army in 1775, with a goal to take Quebec from British control, was halted at the
Battle of Quebec by Guy Carleton, with the assistance of local militias. The defeat of the British
army during the Siege of Yorktown in October 1781 signaled the end of Britain's struggle to
suppress the American Revolution.
War of 1812

The War of 1812 was fought between the United States and the British, with the British North
American colonies being heavily involved. Greatly outgunned by the British Royal Navy, the
American war plans focused on an invasion of Canada (especially what is today eastern and
western Ontario). The American frontier states voted for war to suppress the First Nations raids
that frustrated settlement of the frontier. The war on the border with the United States was
characterized by a series of multiple failed invasions and fiascos on both sides. American forces
took control of Lake Erie in 1813, driving the British out of western Ontario, killing the Native
American leader Tecumseh, and breaking the military power of his confederacy. The war was
overseen by British army officers like Isaac Brock and Charles de Salaberry with the assistance
of First Nations and loyalist informants, most notably Laura Secord.
Lower emphasizes the positive benefits of the Revolution for Americans, making them an
energetic people, while for English Canada the results were negative:

[English Canada] inherited, not the benefits, but the bitterness of the Revolution. It got no
shining scriptures out of it. It got little release of energy and no new horizons of the spirit were
opened up. It had been a calamity, pure and simple. To take the place of the internal fire that was
urging Americans westward across the continent, there was only melancholy contemplation of
things as they might have been and dingy reflection of that ineffably glorious world across the
stormy Atlantic. English Canada started its life with as powerful a nostalgic shove backward into
the past as the Conquest had given to French Canada: two little peoples officially devoted to
counter-revolution, to lost causes, to the tawdry ideals of a society of men and masters, and not
to the self-reliant freedom alongside of them.
Rebellions and the Durham Report

The rebellions of 1837 against the British colonial government took place in both Upper and
Lower Canada. In Upper Canada, a band of Reformers under the leadership of William Lyon
Mackenzie took up arms in a disorganized and ultimately unsuccessful series of small-scale
skirmishes around Toronto, London, and Hamilton.

In Lower Canada, a more substantial rebellion occurred against British rule. Both English- and
French-Canadian rebels, sometimes using bases in the neutral United States, fought several
skirmishes against the authorities. The towns of Chartibly and Sorel were taken by the rebels,
and Quebec City was isolated from the rest of the colony. Montreal rebel leader Robert Nelson
read the "Declaration of Independence of Lower Canada" to a crowd assembled at the town of
Napierville in 1838. The rebellion of the Patriote movement was defeated after battles across
Quebec. Hundreds were arrested, and several villages were burnt in reprisal.
The signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783 formally ended the war. Britain made several
concessions to the Americans at the expense of the North American colonies. Notably, the
borders between Canada and the United States were officially demarcated; all land south of the
Great Lakes, which was formerly a part of the Province of Quebec and included modern day
Michigan, Illinois and Ohio, was ceded to the Americans. Fishing rights were also granted to the
United States in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and on the coast of Newfoundland and the Grand
Banks. The British ignored part of the treaty and maintained their military outposts in the Great
Lakes areas it had ceded to the U.S., and they continued to supply their native allies with
munitions. The British evacuated the outposts with the Jay Treaty of 1795, but the continued
supply of munitions irritated the Americans in the run-up to the War of 1812.
The War ended with no boundary changes thanks to the Treaty of Ghent of 1814, and the Rush-
Bagot Treaty of 1817. A demographic result was the shifting of the destination of American
migration from Upper Canada to Ohio, Indiana and Michigan, without fear of Indian attacks.
After the war, supporters of Britain tried to repress the republicanism that was common among
American immigrants to Canada. The troubling memory of the war and the American invasions
etched itself into the consciousness of Canadians as a distrust of the intentions of the United
States towards the British presence in North America.
British Government then sent Lord Durham to examine the situation; he stayed in Canada only
five months before returning to Britain and brought with him his Durham Report, which strongly
recommended responsible government. A less well-received recommendation was the
amalgamation of Upper and Lower Canada for the deliberate assimilation of the French-speaking
population. The Canadas were merged into a single colony, the United Province of Canada, by
the 1840 Act of Union, and responsible government was achieved in 1848, a few months after it
was accomplished in Nova Scotia. The parliament of United Canada in Montreal was set on fire
by a mob of Tories in 1849 after the passing of an indemnity bill for the people who suffered
losses during the rebellion in Lower Canada.

Between the Napoleonic Wars and 1850, some 800,000 immigrants came to the colonies of
British North America, mainly from the British Isles, as part of the great migration of Canada.
These included Gaelic-speaking Highland Scots displaced by the Highland Clearances to Nova
Scotia and Scottish and English settlers to the Canadas, particularly Upper Canada. The Irish
Famine of the 1840s significantly increased the pace of Irish Catholic immigration to British
North America, with over 35,000 distressed Irish landing in Toronto alone in 1847 and 1848.
Spanish explorers had taken the lead in the Pacific Northwest coast, with the voyages of Juan
José Pérez Hernández in 1774 and 1775. By the time the Spanish determined to build a fort on
Vancouver Island, the British navigator James Cook had visited Nootka Sound and charted the
coast as far as Alaska, while British and American maritime fur traders had begun a busy era of
commerce with the coastal peoples to satisfy the brisk market for sea otter pelts in China, thereby
launching what became known as the China Trade. In 1789 war threatened between Britain and
Spain on their respective rights; the Nootka Crisis was resolved peacefully largely in favor of
Britain, the much stronger naval power. In 1793 Alexander MacKenzie, a Canadian working for
the North West Company, crossed the continent and with his Aboriginal guides and French-
Canadian crew, reached the mouth of the Bella Coola River, completing the first continental
crossing north of Mexico, missing George Vancouver's charting expedition to the region by only
a few weeks. In 1821, the North West Company and Hudson's Bay Company merged, with a
combined trading territory that was extended by a licence to the North-Western Territory and the
Columbia and New Caledonia fur districts, which reached the Arctic Ocean on the north and the
Pacific Ocean on the west.
Confederation

The Seventy-Two Resolutions from the 1864 Quebec Conference and Charlottetown Conference
laid out the framework for uniting British colonies in North America into a federation. They had
been adopted by the majority of the provinces of Canada and became the basis for the London
Conference of 1866, which led to the formation of the Dominion of Canada on July 1, 1867. The
term dominion was chosen to indicate Canada's status as a self-governing colony of the British
Empire, the first time it was used about a country. With the coming into force of the British
North America Act (enacted by the British Parliament), the Province of Canada, New Brunswick,
and Nova Scotia became a federated kingdom in its own right.
The Colony of Vancouver Island was chartered in 1849, with the trading post at Fort Victoria as
the capital. This was followed by the Colony of the Queen Charlotte Islands in 1853, and by the
creation of the Colony of British Columbia in 1858 and the Stikine Territory in 1861, with the
latter three being founded expressly to keep those regions from being overrun and annexed by
American gold miners. The Colony of the Queen Charlotte Islands and most of the Stikine
Territory were merged into the Colony of British Columbia in 1863 (the remainder, north of the
60th Parallel, became part of the North-Western Territory).
Post-Confederation Canada 1867-1914

Expansion

Using the lure of the Canadian Pacific Railway, a transcontinental line that would unite the
nation, Ottawa attracted support in the Maritimes and in British Columbia. In 1866, the Colony
of British Columbia and the Colony of Vancouver Island merged into a single Colony of British
Columbia; it joined the Canadian Confederation in 1871. In 1873, Prince Edward Island joined.
Newfoundland-which had no use for a transcontinental railway-voted no in 1869 and did not join
Canada until 1949.
Federation emerged from multiple impulses: the British wanted Canada to defend itself; the
Maritimes needed railroad connections, which were promised in 1867; British-Canadian
nationalism sought to unite the lands into one country, dominated by the English language and
British culture; many French-Canadians saw an opportunity to exert political control within a
new largely French-speaking Quebec and fears of possible U.S. expansion northward. On a
political level, there was a desire for the expansion of responsible government and elimination of
the legislative deadlock between Upper and Lower Canada, and their replacement with
provincial legislatures in a federation. This was especially pushed by the liberal Reform
movement of Upper Canada and the French-Canadian Parti rouge in Lower Canada who favored
a decentralized union in comparison to the Upper Canadian Conservative party and to some
degree the French-Canadian Parti bleu, which favored a centralized union.
In 1905 when Saskatchewan and Alberta were admitted as provinces, they were growing rapidly
thanks to abundant wheat crops that attracted immigration to the plains by Ukrainians and
Northern and Central Europeans and by settlers from the United States, Britain and eastern
Canada.

The Alaska boundary dispute, simmering since the Alaska purchase of 1867, became critical
when gold was discovered in the Yukon during the late 1890s, with the U.S. controlling all the
possible ports of entry. Canada argued its boundary included the port of Skagway. The dispute
went to arbitration in 1903, but the British delegate sided with the Americans, angering
Canadians who felt the British had betrayed Canadian interests to curry favour with the U.S.
In the 1890s, legal experts codified a framework of criminal law, culminating in the Criminal
Code, 1892. This solidified the liberal ideal of 'equality before the law" in a way that made an
abstract principle into a tangible reality for every adult Canadian. Wilfrid Laurier who served
1896-1911 as the Seventh Prime Minister of Canada felt Canada was on the verge of becoming a
world power, and declared that the 20th century would "belong to Canada"

Laurier signed a reciprocity treaty with the U.S. that would lower tariffs in both directions.
Conservatives under Robert Borden denounced it, saying it would integrate Canada's economy
into that of the U.S. and loosen ties with Britain. The Conservative party won the Canadian
federal election, 1911.
In 1873 John A. Macdonald (First Prime Minister of Canada) created the North-West Mounted
Police (now the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to help police the Northwest Territories.
Specifically the Mounties were to assert Canadian sovereignty over possible American
encroachments into the sparsely populated land.

The Mounties' first large-scale mission was to suppress the second independence movement by
Manitoba's Métis, a mixed blood people of joint First Nations and European descent, who
originated in the mid-17th century. The desire for independence erupted in the Red River
Rebellion in 1869 and the later North-West Rebellion in 1885 led by Louis Riel. Suppressing the
Rebellion was Canada's first independent military action. It cost about $5 million and
demonstrated the need to complete the Canadian Pacific Railway. It guaranteed Anglophone
control of the Prairies, and demonstrated the national government was capable of decisive action.
However, it lost the Conservative Party most of their support in Quebec and led to permanent
distrust of the Anglophone community on the part of the Francophones.
Popular culture

In Canada, leisure in the country is related to the decline in work hours and is shaped by moral
values, and the ethnic-religious and gender communities. In a cold country with winter's long
nights, and summer's extended daylight, favorite leisure activities include horse racing, team
sports such as hockey, singalongs, Roller skating and board games. The churches tried to steer
leisure activities, by preaching against drinking and scheduling annual revivals and weekly club
activities. By 1930 radio played a major role in uniting Canadians behind their local or regional
hockey teams. Play-by-play sports coverage, especially of ice hockey, absorbed fans far more
intensely than newspaper accounts the next day. Rural areas were especially influenced by sports
coverage. Canadians in the 19th century came to believe themselves possessed of a unique
"northern character, due to the long, harsh winters that only those of hardy body and mind could
survive. This hardiness was claimed as a Canadian trait, and such sports as ice hockey and
snowshoeing that reflected this were asserted as characteristically Canadian. Outside the sports
arena Canadians express the national characteristics of being peaceful, orderly and polite. Inside
they scream their lungs out at ice hockey games, cheering the speed, ferocity, and violence,
making hockey an ambiguous symbol of Canada.
Popular culture

In Canada, leisure in the country is related to the decline in work hours and is shaped by moral
values, and the ethnic-religious and gender communities. In a cold country with winter's long
nights, and summer's extended daylight, favorite leisure activities include horse racing, team
sports such as hockey, singalongs, Roller skating and board games. The churches tried to steer
leisure activities, by preaching against drinking and scheduling annual revivals and weekly club
activities. By 1930 radio played a major role in uniting Canadians behind their local or regional
hockey teams. Play-by-play sports coverage, especially of ice hockey, absorbed fans far more
intensely than newspaper accounts the next day. Rural areas were especially influenced by sports
coverage. Canadians in the 19th century came to believe themselves possessed of a unique
"northern character, due to the long, harsh winters that only those of hardy body and mind could
survive. This hardiness was claimed as a Canadian trait, and such sports as ice hockey and
snowshoeing that reflected this were asserted as characteristically Canadian. Outside the sports
arena Canadians express the national characteristics of being peaceful, orderly and polite. Inside
they scream their lungs out at ice hockey games, cheering the speed, ferocity, and violence,
making hockey an ambiguous symbol of Canada.
Support for Great Britain during the First World War caused a major political crisis over
conscription, with Francophones, mainly from Quebec, rejecting national policies. During the
crisis, large numbers of enemy aliens (especially Ukrainians and Germans) were put under
government controls. The Liberal party was deeply split, with most of its Anglophone leaders
joining the unionist government headed by Prime Minister Robert Borden, the leader of the
Conservative party. The Liberals regained their influence after the war under the leadership of
William Lyon Mackenzie King, who served as prime minister with three separate terms between
1921 and 1949.
World wars and interwar years 1914-1945

First World War

The Canadian-Forces and civilian participation in the First World.War helped to foster a sense of
British-Canadian nationhood. The highpoints of Canadian military achievement, during the First
World War came during the Somme, Vimy Passchendaele battles and what later became known
as 'Canada's Hundred Days" The reputation Canadian troops earned, along with the success of
Canadian flying aces including William George Barker and Billy Bishop, helped to give the
nation a new sense of identity. The War Office in 1922 reported approximately 67 000 killed and
173,000 wounded during the war. This excludes civilian deaths in wartime incidents like the
Halifax Explosion.
Woman suffrage

Women's political status without the vote was vigorously promoted by the National Council of
Women of Canada from 1894 to 1918. It promoted a vision of "transcendent citizenship" for
women. The ballot was not needed, for citizenship was to be exercised through personal
influence and moral suasion, through the election of men with strong moral character, and
through raising public-spirited sons. The National Council position reflected its nation-building
program that sought to uphold Canada as a White settler nation. While the woman suffrage
movement was important for extending the political rights of White women, it was also
authorized through race-based arguments that linked White women's enfranchisement to the need
to protect the nation from "racial degeneration."

Women did have a local vote in some provinces, as in Canada West from 1850, where women
owning land could vote for school trustees. By 1900 other provinces adopted similar provisions,
and in 1916 Manitoba took the lead in extending full woman's suffrage. Simultaneously
suffragists gave strong support to the prohibition movement, especially in Ontario and the
Western provinces.
The Military Voters Act of 1917 gave the vote to British women who were war widows or had
sons or husbands serving overseas. Unionists Prime Minister Borden pledged himself during the
1917 campaign to equal suffrage for women. After his landslide victory, he introduced a bill in
1918 for extending the franchise to women. This passed without division but did not apply to
Quebec provincial and municipal elections. The women of Quebec gained full suffrage in 1940.
The first woman elected to Parliament was Agnes Macphail of Ontario in 1921.
On the world stage

As a result of its contribution to Allied victory in the First World War, Canada became more
assertive and less deferential to British authority. Convinced that Canada had proven itself on the
battlefields of Europe, Prime Minister Sir Robert Borden demanded that it have a separate seat at
the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. This was initially opposed not only by Britain but also by
the United States, which saw such a delegation as an extra British vote. Borden responded by
pointing out that since Canada had lost nearly 60,000 men, a far larger proportion of its men, its
right to equal status as a nation had been consecrated on the battlefield. British Prime Minister
David Lloyd George eventually relented and convinced the reluctant Americans to accept the
presence of delegations from Canada, India, Australia, Newfoundland, New Zealand, and South
Africa. These also received their own seats in the League of Nations. Canada asked for neither
reparations nor mandates. It played only a modest role at Paris, but just having a seat was a
matter of pride. It was cautiously optimistic about the new League of Nations, in which it played
an active and independent role.
In 1923 British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, appealed repeatedly for Canadian support
in the Chanak crisis, in which a war threatened between Britain and Turkey. Canada refused. The
Department of External Affairs, which had been founded in 1909, was expanded and promoted
Canadian autonomy as Canada reduced its reliance on British diplomats and used its own foreign
service. Thus began the careers of such important diplomats as Norman Robertson and Hume
Wrong, and future prime minister Lester Pearson.

In 1931 the British Parliament passed the Statute of Westminster which gave each dominion the
opportunity for almost complete legislative independence from London. While Newfoundland
never adopted the statute, for Canada the Statute of Westminster became its declaration of
independence.
America, New France and Colonization 1534-1763

French interest in the New World began with Francis I of France, who in 1524 sponsored
Giovanni da Verrazzano to navigate the region between Florida and Newfoundland in hopes of
finding a route to the Pacific Ocean. In 1534, Jacques Cartier planted a cross in the Gaspé
Peninsula and claimed the land in the name of Francis I. Earlier colonization attempts by Cartier
at Charlesbourg-Royal in 1541, at Sable Island in 1598 by Marquis de La Roche-Mesgouez, and
at Tadoussac, Quebec in 1600 by François Gravé Du Pont had failed. Despite these initial
failures, French fishing fleets began to sail to the Atlantic coast and into the St. Lawrence River,
trading and making alliances with First Nations.
In 1926 Prime Minister Mackenzie King advised the Governor General, Lord Byng, to dissolve
Parliament and call another election, but Byng refused, the only time that the Governor General
has exercised such a power. Instead Byng called upon Meighen, the Conservative Party leader, to
form a government. [167] Meighen attempted to do so but was unable to obtain a majority in the
Commons and he, too, advised dissolution, which this time was accepted. The episode, the King-
Byng Affair, marks a constitutional crisis that was resolved by a new tradition of complete non-
interference in Canadian political affairs on the part of the British government.
Domestic affairs

In 1921 to 1926, William Lyon Mackenzie King's Liberal government pursued a conservative
domestic policy with the object of lowering wartime taxes and, especially, cooling wartime
ethnic tensions, as well as defusing postwar labour conflicts. The Progressives refused to join the
government but did help the Liberals defeat non-confidence motions. King faced a delicate
balancing act of reducing tariffs enough to please the Prairie-based Progressives, but not too
much to alienate his vital support in industrial Ontario and Quebec, which needed tariffs to
compete with American imports. King and Conservative leader Arthur Meighen sparred
constantly and bitterly in Commons debates. The Progressives gradually weakened. Their
effective and passionate leader, Thomas Crerar, resigned to return to his grain business, and was
replaced by the more placid Robert Forke. The socialist reformer J.S. Woodsworth gradually
gained influence and power among the Progressives, and he reached an accommodation with
King on policy matters.
Champlain's Quebec City habitation c. 1608

In 1608 Champlain founded what is now Quebec City, one of the earliest permanent settlements,
which would become the capital of New France. He took personal administration over the city
and its affairs and sent out expeditions to explore the interior. Champlain himself discovered
Lake Champlain in 1609. By 1615, he had travelled by canoe up the Ottawa River through Lake
Nipissing and Georgian Bay to the centre of Huron country near Lake Simcoe. During these
voyages, Champlain aided the Wendat (aka 'Hurons’) in their battles against the Iroquois
Confederacy. As a result, the Iroquois would become enemies of the French and be involved in
multiple conflicts (known as the French and Iroquois Wars) until the signing of the Great Peace
of Montreal in 1701.
The English, led by Humphrey Gilbert, had claimed St. John's, Newfoundland, in 1583 as the
first North American English colony by royal prerogative of Queen Elizabeth I. In the reign of
King James I, the English established additional colonies in Cupids and Ferryland,
Newfoundland, and soon after established the first successful permanent settlements of Virginia
to the south. On September 29, 1621, a charter for the foundation of a New World Scottish
colony was granted by King James to Sir William Alexander. In 1622, the first settlers left
Scotland. They initially failed and permanent Nova Scotian settlements were not firmly
established until 1629 during the end of the Anglo-French War. These colonies did not last long:
in 1631, under Charles I of England, the Treaty of Suza was signed, ending the war and returning
Nova Scotia to the French. New France was not fully restored to French rule until the 1632
Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye. This led to new French immigrants and the founding of Trois-
Rivières in 1634.
In 1604, a North American fur trade monopoly was granted to Pierre Du Gua, Sieur de Mons.
The fur trade became one of the main economic ventures in North America. 50 Du Gua led his
first colonization expedition to an island located near the mouth of the St. Croix River. Among
his lieutenants was a geographer named Samuel de Champlain, who promptly carried out a major
exploration of the northeastern coastline of what is now the United States. In the spring of 1605,
under Samuel de Champlain, the new St. Croix settlement was moved to Port Royal (today's
Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia).

The Quebec Settlement: A. The Warehouse. B. Pigeon-loft. C. - Detached Buildings where we

keep our arms and for Lodging our Workmen. D. - Another Detached Building for the Workmen.
E. - Sun-dial. F. Another Detached Building where is the Smithy and where the Workmen are
Lodged. G. -Galleries all around the Lodgings. H. - The Sieur de Champlain's Lodgings. I.- The
door of the Settlement with a Draw-bridge. L Promenade around the Settlement ten feet in width
to the edge of the Moat. M. -Moat the whole way around the Settlement. O. -The Sieur de
Champlain's Garden. P. - The Kitchen. Q.- Space in front of the Settlement on the Shore of the
River. R. -The great River St. Lawrence.
Although immigration rates to New France remained very low under direct French control, most
of the new arrivals were farmers, and the rate of population growth among the settlers
themselves had been very high. The women had about 30 per cent more children than
comparable women who remained in France. Yves Landry says, "Canadians had an exceptional
diet for their time." This was due to the natural abundance of meat, fish, and pure water; the good
food conservation conditions during the winter; and an adequate wheat supply in most years. The
1666 census of New France was conducted by France's intendant, Jean Talon, in the winter of
1665-1666. The census showed a population count of 3,215 Acadians and habitants (French-
Canadian farmers) in the administrative districts of Acadia and Canada. The census also revealed
a great difference in the number of men at 2,034 versus 1,181 women.
During this period, in contrast to the higher density and slower moving agricultural settlement
development by the English inward from the east coast of the colonies, New France's interior
frontier would eventually cover an immense area with a thin network centred on fur trade,
conversion efforts by missionaries, establishing and claiming an empire, and military efforts to
protect and further those efforts. The largest of these canoe networks covered much of present-
day Canada and central present-day United States.

After Champlain's death in 1635, the Roman Catholic Church and the Jesuit establishment
became the most dominant force in New France and hoped to establish a utopian European and
Aboriginal Christian community. In 1642, the Sulpicians sponsored a group of settlers led by
Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve, who founded Ville-Marie, precursor to present-day Montreal.
In 1663 the French crown took direct control of the colonies from the Company of New France.
Map of North America in 1702 showing forts, towns and areas occupied by European
settlements. Britain (pink), France (blue), and Spain (orange)

By the early 1700s the New France settlers were well established along the shores of the Saint
Lawrence River and parts of Nova Scotia, with a population around 16,000. However new
arrivals stopped coming from France in the proceeding decades, resulting in the English and
Scottish settlers in Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and the southern Thirteen Colonies to vastly
outnumber the French population approximately ten to one by the 1750s. From 1670, through the
Hudson's Bay Company, the English also laid claim to Hudson Bay and its drainage basin known
as Rupert's Land establishing new trading posts and forts, while continuing to operate fishing
settlements in Newfoundland. French expansion along the Canadian canoe routes challenged the
Hudson's Bay Company claims, and in 1686, Pierre Troyes led an overland expedition from
Montreal to the shore of the bay, where they managed to capture a handful of outposts. La Salle's
explorations gave France a claim to the Mississippi River Valley, where fur trappers and a few
settlers set up scattered forts and settlements.
Louisbourg was intended to serve as a year-round military and naval base for France's remaining
North American empire and to protect the entrance to the St. Lawrence River. Father Rale's War
resulted in both the fall of New France influence in present-day Maine and the British
recognition of having to negotiate with the Mi'kmaq in Nova Scotia. During King George's War
(1744 to 1748), an army of New Englanders led by William Pepperrell mounted an expedition of
90 vessels and 4,000 men against Louisbourg in 1745. Within three months the fortress
surrendered. The return of Louisbourg to French control by the peace treaty prompted the British
to found Halifax in 1749 under Edward Cornwallis. Despite the official cessation of war between
the British and French empires with the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle; the conflict in Acadia and
Nova Scotia continued on as the Father Le Loutre's War.
There were four French and Indian Wars and two additional wars in Acadia and Nova Scotia
between the Thirteen American Colonies and New France from 1688 to 1763. During King
William's War (1688 to 1697), military conflicts in Acadia included: Battle of Port Royal (1690);
a naval battle in the Bay of Fundy (Action of July 14, 1696); and the Raid on Chignecto (1696)
The Treaty of Ryswick in 1697 ended the war between the two colonial powers of England and
France for a brief time. During Queen Anne's War (17012 to 1713), the British Conquest of
Acadia occurred in 1710, resulting in Nova Scotia, other than Cape Breton, being officially
ceded to the British by the Treaty of Utrecht including Rupert's Land, which France had
conquered in the late 17th century (Battle of Hudson's Bay) As an immediate result of this
setback, France founded the powerful Fortress of Louisbourg on Cape Breton Island.