Americans don’t have deep historical roots, their approach to history mirrors that of Catholic relics. They encase fragments of flags that flew during major battles in a glass case and show off Lincoln’s paperweights. None of those items have any historical significance apart from being associated with an event or Read more…
Washington, D.C.’s main monoliths of power, culture, and history all lie in an inverse T-shaped park stretching two miles from end to end. From the Lincoln Memorial in the west to the Capitol in the east to the White House in the north, this half-kilometre wide grassy avenue was the Read more…
If I had a tail I’d wag, and it’s a shame their shop isn’t called swag. The museum in Winnipeg has over 24,000 works of indigenous art and the largest collection of Inuit art in the world. It has space for educational activities and docents that explain the works to Read more…
The Forks was an ancient meeting place for indigenous peoples for over 6,000 years where different groups made alliances and traded. It was here that Louis Riel defended the rights of Métis people. His house and grave are historic sites in Winnipeg. It was also the site of the first Read more…
The fish ladder at the dam in Grand Rapids lets fish lie trout and salmon move upstream and bypass the dam. There are additional fish ladders in upstream dams so fish can spawn as they did thousands of years ago. The fish ladder was designed to allow fish through while Read more…
Grand Rapids was my bonus level in Michigan. I had only planned to visit Flint, Ann Arbor, Detroit, and Lansing on the trip, but efficiency won the day. Former president Gerald Ford was born and grew up in Grand Rapids, his presidential library and grave site has price space on Read more…
University of King’s College is the oldest university in the British Empire outside of the British Isles. It was originally established in 1789 in Windsor before being moved to Halifax in 1923, occupying the northwestern corner of Dalhousie University’s main campus. Dalhousie College, now a university, was built with customs Read more…
The landscape of Grand Pré was created by 17th century Acadians who built dykes, drained the seawater, and let the rain wash the salt away to create fertile farmland. Although the infrastructure holding the sea back has been replaced, visitors are still standing on the same tract of land cleared Read more…
Pier 21 in Halifax is what Staten Island was to New York—the first port of entry for many migrants in the 19th and early 20th century. The special exhibition on German-Canadian relations was told through a series of photographs depicting German immigrants to eastern Canada and Canadians occupying West Germany Read more…
Human ingenuity led to the industrial revolution but it was powered by coal. Long hours and low pay, coal miners fed the machines in Detroit that built Ford Model T’s on a production line, the locomotives that shipped them all over the world, and cooked the food of the people Read more…