Last modified: 2015-03-07 by rob raeside
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Reported on the national TV news (15 February 2000) was the "discovery" of the
first Canadian maple leaf flag. The flag was first flown on 15 February, 1965, but
no-one seemed to know what happened to the actual flag that was raised on that day.
It turns out that the the then-prime minister, Lester B. Pearson, took the flag
and put it up in the Liberal Party caucus board room, where it has been ever since.
A newspaper reporter started digging, and found it. The modern Liberals (again the
governing party) claim that they knew that was the original flag all along, and
have now donated it to a heritage museum. Of course the opposition parties all cried
foul, claiming the Liberals had deliberately hidden it.
Rob Raeside, 16 February 2000
The flag has been found since then and I believe I sent to the list information related to the finding. Anyway, the flag has returned to Canada, as explained on CBC news, 15 February 2006:
[…]
Prime Minister Stephen Harper was on hand for a special ceremony in Ottawa on Wednesday celebrating the flag's return. The flag was first raised over the Peace Tower in the capital during a ceremony on Feb. 15, 1965.
Glenn Wright was the federal archivist who was responsible for finding out what happened.
Lowering that first banner "was a bit of a letdown," he said. "It just slipped their mind."
Not knowing what else to do, Parliament Hill staff gave the flag to Lucien Lamoureux, then deputy Speaker of the House. He later became Canada's ambassador to Belgium.
In 1998, still in Belgium, a terminally ill Lamoureux asked soldier Jack Stevenson to drape his coffin with the flag, then return it to Canada. But in the distress surrounding the funeral, Lamoureux's widow, Elisabeth Hoffmann-Lamoureux, couldn't find the flag.
"I promised him at the time that I would look after that request," said Stevenson. "Unfortunately, that never happened."
But Stevenson never forgot his promise, and when he heard Ottawa had lost track of that first flag, he got in touch. After a series of delays and setbacks – Hoffmann-Lamoureux was in a pension dispute with the government – the flag was finally returned in time for Canada Day last year.
[…]
The flag will be on display for the next month in the Hall of Honour in the Parliament Buildings."
Ivan Sache, 24 February 2006
The pictures of the original 15 February 1965 ceremony show a flag approx. 3x6 ft (1x2m) being raised in front of the Parliament Buildings.(1)
The story seems to talk about the first flag raised atop the peace tower. The peace tower flag is a much larger flag (7 feet x 15feet / 2.5 x 5m). It is possible that there are at least two "first flags".?
(1) Archbold [abd02] pp 109-110
Dean McGee, 26 February 2006
When most Canadians contemplate their national flag, their thoughts might
naturally turn to Canada Day, July 1. Historians and others may think
about Feb. 15, the day in 1965 when the modern George Stanley-designed
Canadian flag - bearing its familiar hallmark symbol, the Maple Leaf - was
first raised on Parliament Hill. For Joan O'Malley, Nov. 6, 1964, will
forever be the birthday of Canada's iconic red-and-white banner, the day her
father, Ken Donovan, an assistant purchasing director with the Canadian
Government Exhibition Commission, asked her to do an impromptu sewing job
that she will never forget.
"For me, it's my 50th anniversary,"
O'Malley told a small gathering of friends, family and political dignitaries
Friday on Parliament Hill, where she was presented with the flag that flew
from the Peace Tower on Nov. 6 this year. With her original Singer sewing
machine on display, O'Malley described the night her father approached her to
ask whether she could sew the three prototypes that had been chosen as the
finalists to become Canada's new emblem. A November snowstorm had fallen
over the nation's capital and O'Malley was just home from work with her
husband Brian and expecting to spend the evening indoors. But
O'Malley's father Ken Donovan, an assistant purchasing director with the
Canadian Government Exhibition Commission, called his then-20-year-old
daughter with an urgent request.
That afternoon, Lester B. Pearson had
asked that the three flag prototypes that were under consideration be
delivered to 24 Sussex Drive so he could see them hoisted on poles at the
prime minister's Harrington Lake retreat the next day. Pearson had come to
office with a minority government under a promise made in 1963 that under his
leadership, Canada would have a new flag. The final three designs had been
picked from a list of entries that totalled more than 3,500. Pearson's
preference was a flag with three red maple leaves on a white background and
blue on either side, a design that became known as the Pearson Pennant.
But O'Malley said she knew her favourite right away as she saw the
prototypes sprawled across a makeshift table of plywood on top of two saw
horses. "I remember when they first put our flag on my sewing table, I said,
That's the one that would get my vote," she said. "It was nice, clean
looking." The flag she liked most was, in fact, one designed by historian
George Stanley and submitted at the last minute.
The debate over which
emblem to choose was a raucous one, pitting Pearson and his design against
the Conservatives. In the end, Pearson's Liberals voted unanimously with
the Conservatives in favour of Stanley's now-familiar red-and-white
design. At the time, O'Malley didn't give much thought to the
significance of what she was sewing. "I didn't think it was history in
the making at all," she said. "I just knew that they had to have it done and
I needed to help my dad out."
Democratic Reform Minister Pierre
Poilievre said he's not yet sure where O'Malley's now famous sewing machine
will be put on display, but promised that it would be retained by the federal
government as a historical artifact. "It will be preserved as a national
treasure," Poilievre said before presenting O'Malley with the Peace Tower
flag.
Unlike Betsy Ross, who was paid to produce flags and, as legend has
it, sewed the first American Stars and Stripes banner, O'Malley didn't
receive a cent for putting the finishing touches on Canada's original flag. Receiving recognition for her efforts, 50 years later, was thanks enough,
she said. "Now I think I'm paid in full," O'Malley said tearfully as she
received a standing ovation.
Source:
http://thechronicleherald.ca/canada/1251182-woman-who-sewed-first-flag-marks-milestone
Rob Raeside, 14 November 2014
