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Fact of the Day


DarkRavie

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Fact of the Day - QUEBEC CITY

 

Did you know... that There are 85 Roman Catholic parishes in the Quebec City area?  The Notre-Dame de Québec Cathedral near the Chateau Frontenac is the mother church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Quebec. Other churches you’ll find in Quebec City are one for each of these religions – Anglican, Baptist, Presbyterian, Reformed, United, Greek Orthodox, Jewish, Muslim, Jehovah’s Witness and Buddhist. Another fun fact is that Quebec City is home to a Chocolate Museum. Other museums worth visiting include Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec – an art museum, Musée de la Civilisation, La Citadelle de Québec – North America’s largest British fortress and Musée de l’Amérique Francaise – Canada’s oldest museum.

 

Translations

Musée = Museum

Citadelle = Citadel

Beaux-Arts = Fine Arts

Amérique Francaise = French America

Edited by DarkRavie
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Did you know... that on July 3 1608 , Samuel de Champlain founded Quebec City and by 1665 , there were over 500 people living there ? In 1759 , Quebec City was taken over by the British who controlled it until 1760 when France was able to get back control . In 1763 however , France ceded New France , which included Quebec City , to Great Britain .
 

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The Plains of Abraham is the site of the 1759 battle between General Wolfe and Montcalm. This is where Quebec’s biggest holiday – St. Jean Baptiste Day gets celebrated every year. It’s also a 103 hectare park used by tourists and locals alike on a year round basis. It’s got a great skating rink in winter.

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Fact of the Day - THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD

 

Did you know... that The Underground Railroad (UR) was not underground nor was it a railroad?  It was called “underground” because of its secretive nature and “railroad” because it was an emerging form of transportation.  The history of the UR goes back to the 1780s and became known as such in the 1830s. It reached its height in the 1850s and ended in 1863 when President Lincoln announced the Emancipation Proclamation.  Levi Coffin was known as the “President of the Underground Railroad” and his home as the “Grand Station of the Underground Railroad”.  One of the most famous members of the Underground Railroad was Harriet Tubman, an escaped slave. She helped to free more than 300 slaves. Quakers in the North, who believed that slavery was wrong, also helped escaping slaves to freedom. Most travel from one safe house to the next was done at night and on foot.

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Fact of the Day - THE THREE-PENCE BEAVER

 

Did you know... that The Three-Pence Beaver is Canada’s first postage stamp, designed by Sir Sandford Fleming and issued on April 23, 1851?   In 1851, the British Crown transferred authority to the Province of Canada for the management of its own postal system, whereupon Canada hastened to issue postage stamps so as to give tangible form to its new authority. Only two days after being instructed to reorganize the Post Office from top to bottom, James Morris met with Sandford Fleming in Toronto, on 24 February 1851, to discuss certain details concerning postage stamp illustration.

During this meeting, Fleming suggested the idea of using the beaver to illustrate the first Canadian postage stamp.  The proposal was audacious, to say the least, for it broke with the tradition hitherto observed in the British Empire of using the effigy of the monarch to illustrate postage stamps.  Sandford Fleming felt that the beaver was totally appropriate, since this characteristic specimen of Canadian wildlife, known for its industriousness, its building skills and its tenacity, was the perfect representative of a young nation occupied with building its future in a land that was still virtually undeveloped.  The beaver was also evocative of the colony’s beginnings, since beaver pelts were one of the first articles of trade between Amerindians and the French who disembarked in New France.

 

Sandford Fleming succeeded in convincing James Morris, and, on 23 April 1851, a three-pence postage stamp for domestic mail was issued.  Its central motif is of course a beaver, which appears in profile in its natural habitat, at work building a dam near a waterfall; on the same plane, to the right, is a field of trilliums.  The stamp is not devoid of symbols of the monarchy, for it also features the royal crown of England on a cushion of heraldic flowers: the English rose, the Scottish thistle and the Irish shamrock.  The VR monogram of Queen Victoria also overhangs the representation of the beaver.

Sandford Fleming created two other postage stamps in 1851, this time for international mail.  These were a six-pence stamp with the effigy of Prince Albert and a twelve-pence bearing the portrait of the Queen.

The beaver we now see on the back of our five-cent nickels became the official emblematic animal of Canada on 24 March 1975.

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On March 24, 1975, the beaver received the highest honour ever bestowed on a rodent. On that day it became an official emblem of Canada when an "act to provide for the recognition of the beaver (castor canadensis) as a symbol of the sovereignty of Canada" received Royal assent. Today, thanks to conservation and silk hats, the beaver - the largest rodent in Canada - is alive and well all over this great country.

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Fact of the Day - CREEPERS (plants)

 

Did you know.... that Creeping plants or "creepers" are generally considered to be small, viny plants that grow close to the ground?  They are also referred to as procumbent plants.  In cases where their vines are long enough and you wish to have them climb a structure, you need to guide them (train them) and secure them to a support if they are to achieve much height at all. In this sense, they differ from "climbers," which are another class of vine. For example, you could tie the vines to the structure loosely with twine. Even some plants that tend naturally to grow more upright often need such help.

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Did you know... that most of the creepers plants have various benefits ? 3 examples are : Devil’s Ivy ( Money Plant ) remove pollutants and induce calmness , Wisteria improves soil quality as it has nitrogen-fixing properties , Trumpet Vine attracts hummingbirds and requires little watering . 

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Creeping phlox is a familiar spring-blooming creeping plant that is frequently seen in rock gardens, growing from crevices in stone walls, or planted as a ground cover to blanket areas of the ground. Surely the best feature of creeping phlox is its flower production. Not only are the individual blooms pretty, but there are also so many of them that the display is truly something special to behold.

The flowers are so densely packed that it can be hard to make out the plants’ foliage from a distance; once blooming is completed, the tiny leaves remain green for much of the year.

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Fact of the Day - PHARAOHS

 

Did you know... that in Ancient Egypt, all rulers were called king regardless of their gender since there was no Egyptian word for queen.?  The word pharaoh is not actually an Egyptian word. It is a Greek or Hebrew pronunciation of the Egyptian word pero or per-aa and means “great house.”  It originally referred to the King’s palace and didn’t become a term for the ruler until about 1450 BC.  A person didn’t just get to wake up and become pharaoh. Training was a long and difficult period that began when the heir to the throne was extremely young.  Lessons were focused on building strength and endurance, and he had to learn to hunt and fish and ride and break horses. If they were successful in their lessons, the pharaoh would take them on as co-regent, and upon the pharaoh’s death, they would assume full control.  A pharaoh’s ascension to the throne was one of the most important rituals in Ancient Egypt, and the event was celebrated with feasts, rites, and ceremonies that were all part of the coronation feast.  The feast could last for as long as a year and is described by modern Egyptologists as the “year of the coronation.”

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Long And Hard Training Was Required To Become A Pharaoh.

 

To become a pharaoh was by no means an easy task. It required a long period of hard training that started were very early in a prince’s life. Young children went through a series of lessons. Many of these lessons focused on building physical strength because the pharaoh often fought at the head of his army. Princes went to the royal stables where they learned how to ride and break wild horses. They also ran long foot races to build endurance and went on hunting and fishing expeditions. In time, a prince hoped to persuade a pharaoh to take him on as his ‘co-regent’. When a pharaoh died, control went to his co-regent.

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Did you know... that only a pharaoh was allowed to make offerings to the gods ? The pharaohs were also the high priests and made daily offerings to the gods . Only the kings and priests were allowed to enter the temples which were believed to house the gods , whose spirits resided in their statues . It was believed that pharaohs were the only people who were allowed to approach and touch the gods . Pharaohs are the only people shown making offerings to the gods in temple wall paintings .

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Fact of the Day - PROHIBITION

 

Did you know... that he prohibition of alcohol in Canada arose in various stages, from local municipal bans in the late 19th century, to provincial bans in the early 20th century, and national prohibition (a temporary wartime measure) from 1918 to 1920?  The relatively large and powerful beer and alcohol manufacturing sector, and the huge working class that purchased their products, failed to convince any of the governments to reverse their stance on prohibition.  Most provinces repealed their bans in the 1920s, though alcohol was illegal in Prince Edward Island from 1901 to 1948. By comparison the temperance act in Ontario ran from 1916 to 1927.  

 

Despite having prohibition from 1916 until 1927 in Ontario, the government allowed for numerous exceptions.  Wineries were exempted from closure, and various breweries and distilleries remained open for the export market.[26] In Hamilton, Ontario, Rocco Perri specialized in exporting liquor from old Canadian distilleries, such as Seagram and Gooderham and Worts to the United States, and helped these companies obtain a large share of the American market.  In London, Ontario, Harry Low and his group of rum-runners bought the Carling Brewery, while the Labatt family left the operations to the manager Edmund Burke. The fact that the "export" might be by small boat from Windsor across the river to Detroit only helped the province's economy.  Rum-running occurred in other provinces as well.

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Did you know... that prohibition had been tried before ? In the early 19th century , religious revivalists and early teetotaler groups like the American Temperance Society campaigned relentlessly against what they viewed as a nationwide scourge of drunkenness . The activists scored a major victory in 1851 , when the Maine legislature passed a statewide prohibition on selling alcohol . A dozen other states soon instituted “Maine Laws” of their own , only to repeal them a few years later after widespread opposition and riots from grog-loving citizens ( Kansas later instituted a separate ban in 1881 ) . Calls for a “dry” America continued into the 1910s , when deep-pocketed and politically connected groups such as the Anti-Saloon League and the Women’s Christian Temperance Union gained widespread support for anti-alcohol legislation on Capitol Hill .
 

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