1876 in Canada

Events from the year 1876 in Canada.

Incumbents

Crown

• Monarch – Victoria<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Federal government

• Governor General – Frederick Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood
• Prime Minister – Alexander Mackenzie
• Chief Justice – William Buell Richards (Ontario)
• Parliament – 3rd

Provincial governments

Lieutenant governors

• Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia – Joseph Trutch (until June 27) then Albert Norton Richards
• Lieutenant Governor of Manitoba – Alexander Morris
• Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick – Samuel Leonard Tilley
• Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Territories – David Laird (from October 7)
• Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia – Adams George Archibald
• Lieutenant Governor of Ontario – Donald Alexander Macdonald
• Lieutenant Governor of Prince Edward Island – Robert Hodgson
• Lieutenant Governor of Quebec – René-Édouard Caron (until December 13) then Luc Letellier de St-Just (from December 15)

Premiers

• Premier of British Columbia – George Anthony Walkem (until February 1) then Andrew Charles Elliott
• Premier of Manitoba – Robert Atkinson Davis
• Premier of New Brunswick – George Edwin King
• Premier of Nova Scotia – Philip Carteret Hill
• Premier of Ontario – Oliver Mowat
• Premier of Prince Edward Island – Lemuel Cambridge Owen (until August 1) then Louis Henry Davies
• Premier of Quebec – Charles Boucher de Boucherville

Territorial governments

Lieutenant governors

• Lieutenant Governor of Keewatin – Alexander Morris (from October 7)
• Lieutenant Governor of the Northwest Territories – Alexander Morris then David Laird

Events

• January 1 – The building of Fredericton City Hall is completed
• February 1 – Andrew Elliott becomes premier of British Columbia, replacing George Walkem
• April 12 - The Indian Act is passed. Consolidating and expanding on existing Canadian laws, it defines the special status and land regulations of Aboriginal peoples in Canada who live on reserves; status Indians have no vote in Canadian elections and are exempt from taxes
• July 1 – The Intercolonial Railway connecting central Canada to the Maritimes is completed
• August – Sir Louis Henry Davies becomes Premier of Prince Edward Island, replacing Lemuel Cambridge Owen
• August 10 – The world's first long-distance phone call connects the Bell residence with a shoe and boot store in nearby Paris, Ontario.
• August 23 – The first signings of Treaty 6. Further signings will be on August 28 and September 9.
• October 7 – The District of Keewatin (incorporating the disputed area between Ontario and Manitoba) is separated from the North-West Territories.
• October 10 – 1876 Prince Edward Island election: Lemuel Cambridge Owen's Conservatives win a second consecutive majority

Full date unknown

• The Toronto Women's Literary Club is founded as a front for the suffrage movement.
• The Legislative Council of Manitoba is abolished, and the legislature becomes unicameral.

Sport

• September 20 – The Ottawa Football Club (Ottawa Rough Riders) is established.

Births

January to June

• January 8 – Matthew Robert Blake, politician (died 1937)
• January 21 – James Charles Brady, politician (died 1962)
• January 27 – Frank S. Cahill, politician (died 1934)
• April 3 – Margaret Anglin, actress, director and producer (died 1958)
• April 21 – William Henry Wright, prospector and newspaper owner (died 1951)
• June 17 – Thomas Crerar, politician and Minister (died 1975)

July to December

• August 23 – William Melville Martin, politician and Premier of Saskatchewan (died 1970)
• September 6 – John Macleod, physician, physiologist and Nobel laureate (died 1935)
• October 6 – Ernest Lapointe, politician (died 1941)
• November 18 – Walter Seymour Allward, sculptor (died 1955)
• December 9 – Berton Churchill, actor (died 1940)

Deaths

• February 4 – Charles-Séraphin Rodier, mayor of Montreal (born 1797)
• February 5 – George Ryan, politician (born 1806)
• April 5 – Élisabeth Bruyère, nun (born 1818)
• June 1 – Malcolm Cameron, businessman and politician (born 1808)
• July 3 – Aldis Bernard, mayor of Montreal (born 1810)
• July 27 – Thomas-Louis Connolly, Archbishop of Halifax (born 1814)
• October 2 – Louis-Ovide Brunet, priest and botanist (born 1826)
• October 6 – John Young, 1st Baron Lisgar, Governor General (born 1807)
• December 13 – René-Édouard Caron, 2 Mayor of Quebec City and 2nd Lieutenant-Governor of Quebec (born 1800)

Full date unknown

• Edward Feild, Church of England clergyman, inspector of schools, bishop of Newfoundland (born 1801)
• Wilson Ruffin Abbott, businessman and landowner (born 1801)

Historical documents

Bell's Ontario experiments lead to the first long-distance telephone conversation<ref>Alexander Graham Bell, "First Transmission of Speech over a Telegraph Line in Brantford, August 1876" The Pre-Commercial Period of the Telephone (1911), pgs. 14-16. Accessed 16 September 2018</ref>

Treaty 6 annexes land of Cree and other nations in exchange for reserves subject to sale or development, plus money and supplies<ref>"The Treaty at Forts Carlton and Pitt, Number Six" (September 9, 1876), Voices of the Plains Cree (1973, 1995), pgs. 124-9. Accessed 23 June 2021</ref>

Matron reports illness and death of girl at Wawanosh Indian residential school as local physician says her disorder is hysteria<ref>"Shingwauk Home; The following is the Matron's letter[....]" (February 1, 1876), Dominion Churchman (April 20, 1876), pg. 187 Accessed 29 November 2024</ref>

Mark Twain's anger at a Canadian firm publishing The Adventures of Tom Sawyer without permission<ref>Samuel Langhorne Clemens, "To Moncure D. Conway, 2 November 1876, Hartford, Conn." Mark Twain Project. Accessed 16 September 2018</ref>

Emigrant's guide written especially for "people of small fortune"<ref>John J. Rowan, The Emigrant and Sportsman in Canada; Some Experiences of an Old Country Settler (1876). Accessed 23 April 2020</ref>

References

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