World AIDS Day begins. HIV stands for human immunodeficiency virus. Every year, millions of people acquire HIV, and thousands die from it daily. In January of 1988, health ministers from 140 countries who were attending a world summit came up with the idea of designating a day to draw attention to HIV and AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome). They voted unanimously to do so. Later that year the UN and World Health Organization declared December 1, 1988 to be World AIDS Day. The day’s goal ...
Dec 01, 2017•2 min
Jackie Robinson charges New York Yankees with racism. U.S. baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis opposed integration of black and white players. But after his death in 1944, Brooklyn Dodgers president Branch Rickey decided to desegregate the major leagues. He wanted to sign more than one black player, but was concerned that would be moving too fast. So he signed Jackie Robinson from the Negro League into the minor leagues in 1946. On April 15, 1947, Robinson became the first African Amer...
Nov 30, 2017•2 min
UN creates the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People. On November 29, 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution that partitioned Palestine to create an independent Jewish and Arab state. Israel was born, however, before anyone had resolved “the Palestinian question”: Palestinian people’s hopes for an independent state of their own. So, responsibility for forging a solution amidst Jewish and Palestinian contention fell squarely on the UN’s shoulders. Finally, in 197...
Nov 29, 2017•2 min
November 28, 1909 Canadian humanitarian Dr. Lotta Hitschmanova is born. Many Canadians remember the voice of Lotta Hitschmanova on television commercials as she appealed for donations on behalf of the Canadian Unitarian Service Committee. The USC had taken on the task of feeding and supporting needy children worldwide. Hitschmanova was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia on November 28, 1909. The multilingual young woman studied political science and journalism throughout Europe. As the second world ...
Nov 28, 2017•2 min
Sheila Copps, Canada’s first female deputy prime minister, is born. Sheila Copps was born in Hamilton, Ontario on November 27, 1952. A year after her father completed 14 years as the city’s mayor, Copps ran for provincial office as a Liberal. She lost that election, but won on her next attempt in 1981. By 1984, she’d moved to federal politics just in time to see her Liberal Party take one of its worst beatings at the hand of Progressive Conservative Brian Mulroney. Even so, Copps made her mark a...
Nov 27, 2017•2 min
Britain improves race relations legislation. Up until the 1960s, Britain – like so many Western countries – was known for its practice of banning non-white people from public places. That changed in 1965 when the country passed its first race relations act. It made race discrimination in such public places as hotels and movie theatres an illegal offence. Three years later, on November 26, 1968, that ruling was superseded by the Race Relations Act, which made discrimination based on ethnicity ill...
Nov 26, 2017•2 min
UN declares International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. On November 25, 1960, Dominican Republic dictator Rafael Trujillo had three political activists brutally murdered. These three sisters, Patria, Maria and Antonia Mirabel, known as “The Butterflies” were part of a resistance movement to oppose the President’s rule. The outrage that followed their murder turned the spotlight on violence against women (and contributed to Trujillo’s assassination six months later). Accordin...
Nov 25, 2017•2 min
The Hollywood 10 jailed for contempt during the Red scare. As a U.S. Congress committee sought out “un-American activities” in the late 1940s and early 1950s, even Hollywood unions came under scrutiny for signs of a communist influence. A number of Hollywood screen writers and directors refused to answer questions this committee asked of them. This prompted officials to cite 10 of them (soon to be known as the “Hollywood 10”) for contempt on November 24, 1947. The next day, the Association of Mo...
Nov 24, 2017•2 min
“Father of rock and roll” fired in payola scandal while promoting black musicians. At a time when racial segregation was the norm in America, Alan Freed was promoting the music of black singers like Little Richard and Chuck Berry. Freed, born on December 15, 1921, called himself the “father of rock and roll.” After leaving one radio station in Akron, Freed moved to Cleveland, Ohio in 1949, where he worked as an afternoon TV movie host as well as started a late night radio show called “The Moondo...
Nov 23, 2017•3 min
President John F. Kennedy assassinated in Dallas, Texas. On November 22, 1963, United States President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. Texas Governor John Connally, riding in the same open car, was also struck by one of the bullets, but he survived. Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested for killing Kennedy, but two days later, on live television, Jack Ruby shot and killed Oswald. There have been many theories, conspiracy and otherwise, about the reason for Kennedy’s assassination. Ru...
Nov 22, 2017•2 min
Canada’s first openly gay MP, Svend Robinson, re-elected in B.C. Svend Robinson was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota on March 4, 1952, but grew up in Burnaby, B.C. before studying science and law at the University of British Columbia. A long-time social democrat concerned about human rights and social issues, Robinson joined the New Democratic Party in 1966. In 1979, at the age of 27, he was elected to the Canadian House of Commons as the Member of Parliament for Burnaby, a city bordering Vancouve...
Nov 21, 2017•3 min
UN proclaims Universal Children’s Day. In 1954, the United Nations General Assembly encouraged all countries to create a Universal Children’s Day to celebrate children and promote their welfare. On November 20, 1959, the General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, stating, “He may have a happy childhood and enjoy for his own good and for the good of society, the rights and freedoms herein set forth…” The 10 principles included protecting children from neglect, cruelty, d...
Nov 20, 2017•2 min
Egyptian President Anwar Sadat visits Israel. Anwar al-Sadat rose from humble beginnings to the presidency of his country, Egypt. When Egypt was locked in battle with Israel over Suez Canal rights, President Sadat risked much by telling the Egyptian Parliament that he would go to great lengths to negotiate peace with Israel. Israeli officials responded quickly by inviting Sadat to visit their country. So it was that on November 19, 1977, with the world watching, Sadat landed in Tel Aviv. The nex...
Nov 19, 2017•2 min
Preacher Sojourner Truth is born. Isabella Baumfree was born into slavery on November 18, 1797 in New York state, one of 13 children. She was first sold for $100 and subsequently sold other times before getting freedom about the time slavery was abolished in New York in 1827. One of her children had been illegally sold to an owner in Alabama and with the help of a Quaker activist, she successfully sued for his return. In 1843, she changed her name to Sojourner Truth, saying, “The Spirit calls me...
Nov 18, 2017•3 min
Defence Minister announces a public inquiry into Somalia Peacekeepers. The Canadian Airborne Regiment was modeled after the American Green Berets – an elite fighting force, ready for deployment during a time of war. In December 1992, Canada sent the Airborne Regiment and other soldiers to help the United States and United Nations keep the peace in Somalia after warlords ousted former President Mohamed Siad Barre from his East African country in 1991. However, in March of 1993, a 16-year-old Soma...
Nov 17, 2017•2 min
Authorities shut down Margaret Sanger’s birth control clinic permanently. As a midwife, Margaret Sanger witnessed too much mutilation and death amongst poor New York women trying to administer their own abortions. So in 1913, she became an activist set on promoting birth control for women. Birth control, she felt, would keep many from sinking into poverty, and keep them out of harm’s way. After several arrests and much media attention, Sanger and others opened a birth control clinic in New York....
Nov 16, 2017•2 min
Supreme Court of Canada upholds religious freedom. One Sunday afternoon in 1949, approximately 30 Jehovah’s Witnesses took part in a religious service at the house of Esymier Chaput in Chapeau, Quebec. Suddenly, three provincial police officers entered the house, broke up the service and confiscated a Bible, hymn books, a number of religious pamphlets and the collection box. The officers then dispersed the group and escorted the minister out of town. Chaput took the police to court, only to lose...
Nov 15, 2017•2 min
New Nuremberg laws set forth severe restrictions of the rights of Jews. At a Nazi Party convention in Nuremberg, Germany on September 15, 1935, participants adopted The Nuremberg Laws of Citizenship and Race. “A citizen of the Reich may be only one who is of German or kindred blood, and who, through his behaviour, shows that he is both desirous and personally fit to serve loyally the German people and the Reich.” The purpose was to set out who did not fit “citizenship.” On November 14, 1935, the...
Nov 14, 2017•3 min
U.S. Supreme Court declares segregation on buses unconstitutional. On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white man on a bus run by the Montgomery Bus Company in Alabama. Asked later how she had the nerve to take such a stand, she replied, “The only tired I was, was tired of giving in.” A few days later, a court found her guilty of disobeying the segregation laws. This so outraged blacks that on December 5th, the Montgomery Improvement Association urge...
Nov 13, 2017•2 min
UN suspends South Africa from General Assembly. After years of resolutions, restrictions and embargoes against South Africa and its state-sanctioned racist system of apartheid, the United Nations went one step further by suspending the country from the UN General Assembly on November 12, 1974. South Africa retaliated by retaining its overall membership without paying its dues. But this only racked up a $100 million US debt for the eventual post-apartheid government. Meanwhile, black South Africa...
Nov 12, 2017•2 min
Remembrance Day established the year after first world war’s end. On Monday, November 11, 1918 at 11:00 a.m., the fist world war came to an official end. The following year, the Commonwealth established Armistice Day, later to be known as Remembrance Day – a day for remembering the men and women who died during battles. During the first world war, of the 619,636 Canadian men and women who served, 66,655 died and another 172,950 were wounded. The second world war - with 1,081,865 Canadians in ser...
Nov 11, 2017•2 min
Nigeria hangs human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa. Kenule “Ken” Saro-Wiwa was born on October 10, 1941 in Bori, Nigeria, a member of the Ogoni ethnic minority. The homelands of the Ogoni are in the Niger Delta, where oil extraction has negatively impacted the environment. As an adult, Saro-Wiwa became a successful businessman who in time turned his attention to writing novels and producing television programs – both to high acclaim. However, his political and environmental involvement caught the...
Nov 10, 2017•3 min
When Mikhail Gorbachev took control of the Soviet Union in 1985, he brought about change well beyond his own borders. In East Germany, the Berlin Wall symbolized the divide between East and West, freedom and oppression. The East German government had put up barriers in 1961 to prevent the flow of millions of East Germans to the West. Once completed, the wall stood 12 feet high and 96 miles long. Thousands tried to make it across. Many made it, but 246 were killed trying. Even when the cold war o...
Nov 09, 2017•2 min
Ireland elects first woman president. Mary Robinson served as an Irish senator for 20 years, simultaneously working as a civil and human rights lawyer. She ran unsuccessfully for Parliament under the Labour Party twice, then made a run for president as an Independent a few years after leaving the Labour Party. On November 8, 1990, Robinson became Ireland’s first woman president. By Irish standards, she was considered a radical for her campaigns to liberalize divorce and abortion laws in the heav...
Nov 08, 2017•2 min
Supreme Court of Canada upholds decision to imprison a homosexual as a "dangerous sex offender." Everett George Klippert unwittingly woke Canadians up to injustices against homosexuals, and inspired Pierre Trudeau’s famous quote, “The state has no place in the bedrooms of the nation.” On the morning of August 16, 1965, when RCMP officers in Pine Point, Northwest Territories happened to speak to Klippert, he openly revealed his homosexuality, and mentioned he’d been sexually involved with a numbe...
Nov 07, 2017•3 min
Women’s group files discrimination complaint against CNR. On November 6, 1979, the Quebec group Action Travail des Femmes filed the first of 155 complaints against the Canadian National Railway (CNR), alleging systemic discrimination against women in its hiring and promotional practices. The case took years to wind its way through the human rights and court system, but eventually, the Supreme Court of Canada agreed with an earlier Canadian Human Rights Tribunal decision, and ordered CNR to hire ...
Nov 06, 2017•2 min
Quebec’s new lieutenant governor resigns for wearing swastika during student protest. On September 12, 1996, Prime Minister Jean Chretien appointed Jean-Louis Roux as lieutenant governor for Quebec. A strong federalist who had campaigned vigorously against separation during the 1995 referendum, Roux had a long and prominent career as a stage and television actor in the province. However, in an interview with L’Actualité magazine, Roux admitted that in 1942, when he was 19 years old, he’d worn a ...
Nov 05, 2017•2 min
Prime Minister Brian Mulroney apologizes to Italian Canadians for World War II internment. While Canada’s mistreatment of Japanese Canadians before, during and after World War II became well known, its mistreatment of Italian Canadians was less publicized. Of course, being at war with fascist Italy prompted suspicions about some Canadians of Italian descent as well. Although Canada detained hundreds of Italian Canadians in internment camps, few had their property seized as did Japanese Canadians...
Nov 04, 2017•2 min
Canadian court allows gay inmates family-visitation rights. Timothy Veysey, an inmate at the Warkworth Institution in Ontario, wanted his partner, Leslie Beau, to participate in the facility’s private family visiting program. The only drawback was, the program’s aim was to prepare inmates for a successful return to their community by supporting their family relationships – and Veysey’s and Beau’s gay relationship was not regarded as “family.” So Veysey went to court claiming that his rights had ...
Nov 03, 2017•2 min
Former Yukon MP Martha Black dies. Martha Munger, born in Chicago in 1866, left a life of privilege, as well as a husband, to join the Klondike gold rush in 1898. Her journey involved a rugged 92-kilometre hike through Chilkoot Pass in the Rocky Mountains, but her wealth made it easier than for most; she paid others to haul her mass of gear. In 1904 she married her second husband, George Black, who later became commissioner of the Yukon Territory and a member of Parliament. Martha’s career inclu...
Nov 02, 2017•2 min
