HAPPY CANADA DAY! (July 1st)

[totalmotorcycle]

As Canada turns 142 years old today.





Happy Birthday Canada!


Mike

P.S. I'll do the same for Independance Day (July 4th) for the US as well as any other countries requested for their Birthday.

History thank to Wikipedia.

[totalmotorcycle]

And for a little history you might not know...

Coat of arms of Canada


Don't mess with Canada. We have firebreathing Unicorns, lions, armor and a levitating magical crown!

A Mari Usque Ad Mare (Latin)
"From Sea to Sea"

Symbolism

Crown
The coat of arms are surmounted by a rendition of St. Edward's Crown, which has been used in the coronations of Canada's monarchs. This element represents Canada's status as a constitutional monarchy headed by a sovereign king or queen. This style of crown is that preferred by Queen Elizabeth II, and was modernised in 1957 from the 1921 design, which used the Tudor crown.


Crest
The crest is based on the Royal Crest of the United Kingdom but differenced by the addition of a maple leaf, and symbolises the sovereignty of Canada. It appears on the flag of the Governor-General, symbolising that the Governor General is a representative of the Sovereign. The crest consists of a crowned gold lion standing on a twisted wreath of red and white silk and holding a maple leaf in its right paw.


Helm
The arms show a royal helmet, which is a barred helm of gold looking outward, with mantling of white and red, stylised in the official version to look like maple leaves.


Shield
The shield is divided into five sections. The first division at the viewer's top left contains the three golden lions that have been a symbol of England since at least the reign of King Richard I. The second quarter bears the red lion rampant of Scotland in a double tressure border with fleurs-de-lis, used as a symbol of Scotland since at least the reign of William I. The third quarter shows the Irish harp of Tara. The gold fleurs-de-lis of royal France, the first post-medieval European emblem raised in Canada by Jacques Cartier, during his landing at Gaspé, fill the fourth quarter.

The fifth charge, a sprig of red maple leaves at the bottom, is a distinctly Canadian symbol that became gradually identified with the country throughout the 19th century. They were first proposed as a symbol in 1834, were established in 1868 on the arms of Quebec and Ontario and officially became the national emblem in 1965, with the proclamation of the Flag of Canada. Initially, the leaves were depicted as coloured green on the coat of arms because it was thought to represent youth, as opposed to the red colour of dying leaves in autumn. However, they are blazoned as "proper," so could be shown as either red or green, and it is the blazon, rather than any depiction, which is regarded as authoritative. The leaves were later redrawn in official depictions in 1957 with the current colour to be in line with the official colours of Canada. The shield forms the basis of the royal standard of Canada.

Ribbon
The ribbon is marked desiderantes meliorem patriam, meaning "desiring a better country," which is the motto of the Order of Canada. This component was added by the Queen in 1987 on the advice of her Prime Minister. With the patriation of oversight of arms to Canada through the Canadian Heraldic Authority the following year, the constitution of the Order of Canada was amended to include entitlement by all recipients to encircle their own arms with the ribbon, if arms are granted to them. Since 1994 the arms used by government ministers and institutions have slowly changed to reflect the new version with the ribbon.

Motto
The motto of Canada is in Latin a mari usque ad mare (From sea to sea), a part of Psalm 72:8. This phrase was suggested by Joseph Pope, then-Under Secretary of State, when the Arms were redesigned in 1921. The motto was originally used in 1906 on the head of the mace of the Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan.

In March 2006, the premiers of Canada's three territories called for the amendment of the motto to better reflect the vast geographic nature of Canada's territory, as Canada has coastlines on the Arctic, Atlantic, and Pacific Oceans. Two suggestions for a new motto are A mari ad mare ad mare (from sea to sea to sea) and A mari usque ad maria (from the sea to the other seas).


Supporters
Supporting the shield on either side are the English lion and Scottish unicorn, which are also the supporters of the UK coat of arms. The English lion stands on the viewer's left and holds a gold-pointed silver lance flying the Union Flag. The Scottish unicorn has a gold horn, a gold mane, gold hooves, and around its neck a gold, chained coronet of crosses and fleurs-de-lis; it holds a lance flying the three gold fleurs-de-lis of royal France on a blue background. Unlike the British version, the lion is not crowned, nor is it facing the viewer. The broken chain on the unicorn symbolises the unicorn's resistance to oppression.

Compartment
The entire coat of arms rests on the compartment, which is made up of the floral emblems of the founding countries whose royal arms were incorporated into the design of the shield. The Tudor rose is the floral badge of England (and Wales), combining the White Rose of York and the Red Rose of Lancaster. The thistle and shamrock are the symbols of Scotland and Ireland, respectively, while the fleur-de-lis has been the royal symbol of France since the 12th century.

[totalmotorcycle]

The Canadian Flag



The National Flag of Canada, also known as the Maple Leaf, and l'Unifolié (French for "the one-leafed"), is a red flag with a white square in its centre, featuring a stylized 11-pointed red maple leaf. Its adoption in 1965 marked the first time a national flag had been officially adopted in Canada to replace the Union Flag. The Canadian Red Ensign had been unofficially used since the 1890s and was approved by a 1945 Order-in-Council for use "wherever place or occasion may make it desirable to fly a distinctive Canadian flag". In 1964, Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson appointed a committee to resolve the issue, sparking a serious debate about a flag change. Out of three choices, the maple leaf design by George F. G. Stanley and John Matheson based on the flag of the Royal Military College of Canada was selected. The flag made its first appearance on February 15, 1965; the date is now celebrated annually as National Flag of Canada Day.

The length of the Maple Leaf flag is twice the width. The white field is a Canadian pale (a square central band in a vertical triband flag, named after this flag), and each bordering red field is exactly half its size. In the centre of the white field is a red maple leaf. In heraldry, the flag has been blazoned as "Gules on a Canadian pale argent a maple leaf of the first."

The maple leaf has served as a symbol celebrating the nature and environment of what is now Canada since the 1700s. The number of points on the leaf has no significance on the flag; they do not, for instance, represent the ten provinces plus one point for the territories, such as the Australian Commonwealth Star denotes. The number and arrangement of the points of the maple leaf were chosen after wind tunnel tests showed the current design to be the least blurry of the various designs when tested under high wind conditions. The image of the maple leaf used on the flag was designed by Jacques Saint-Cyr. In 1921, King George V proclaimed the official colours of Canada as red, from Saint George's Cross, and white, from the French royal emblem since King Charles VII.


History:

The first flag known to have flown in Canada was the St George's Cross carried by John Cabot when he reached the east coast of Canada in 1497. In 1534, Jacques Cartier planted a cross in Gaspé bearing the French royal coat of arms with the fleurs-de-lis. His ship flew a red flag with a white cross, the national flag of France at the time. New France continued to fly the evolving French military flags of that period.

The Royal Union Flag has been used in Canada since the 1621 British settlement in Nova Scotia. Since the surrender of New France to the United Kingdom in the early 1760s, the Royal Union Flag, called the Union Jack (or, less commonly, Union Flag) in the United Kingdom, was used as the de jure national flag, as in the United Kingdom, until the adoption of the current flag in 1965.

Shortly after Canadian Confederation in 1867, the need for distinctive Canadian flags emerged. The first Canadian flag was the Flag of the Governor General of Canada, a Royal Union Flag with a shield in the centre bearing the quartered arms of Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick surrounded by a wreath of maple leaves. In 1870 the Red Ensign, with the addition of the Canadian composite shield in the fly, began to be used unofficially on land and sea, and was known as the Canadian Red Ensign. As new provinces joined the Confederation, their arms were added to the shield. In 1892, the British admiralty approved the use of the Red Ensign for Canadian use at sea. The composite shield was replaced with the Coat of arms of Canada upon its grant in 1921 and, in 1924, an Order-in-Council approved its use for Canadian government buildings abroad. In 1925, Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King established a committee to design a flag to be used at home, but was dissolved before the final report could be delivered. Despite the failure of the committee to solve the issue, public sentiment in the 1920s was in favour of fixing the flag problem for Canada.


The 1946 special joint committee's recommended national flagDuring the Second World War, the Red Ensign was the national flag Canadian troops carried into battle. The Canadian Red Ensign within and outside of Canada was the Canadian flag. A joint committee of the Senate and House of Commons was appointed on November 8, 1945, to recommend a national flag to officially adopt. By May 9, 1946, 2,695 designs were submitted and the committee reported back with a recommendation "that the national flag of Canada should be the Canadian red ensign with a maple leaf in autumn golden colours in a bordered background of white". The Legislative Assembly of Quebec, however, had urged the committee to not include any "foreign symbols", including the Royal Union Flag, and Prime Minister Mackenzie King declined to act on the report, leaving the order to fly the Canadian Red Ensign in place.

By the 1960s, however, debate for an official Canadian flag intensified and became a subject of controversy, culminating in the Great Flag Debate of 1964. In 1963, the minority Liberal government of Lester B. Pearson gained power, and decided to adopt an official Canadian flag through parliamentary debate. The principal political proponent of the change was Prime Minister Lester Pearson. He had been a significant broker during the Suez Crisis of 1956, for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. During the crisis, Pearson was disturbed when the Egyptian government objected to Canadian peacekeeping forces, on the grounds that the Canadian flag (the Red Ensign) contained the same symbol (the Royal Union Flag) also used as a flag by the United Kingdom, one of the belligerents. Pearson's goal was for the Canadian flag to be distinctive and unmistakably Canadian. The main opponent to changing the flag was the leader of the opposition and former prime minister, John Diefenbaker, who eventually made the subject a personal crusade.

Pearson was leader of a minority Government and risked losing power over the issue; however, he knew the Red Ensign with the Union Jack was unpopular in Quebec, a Liberal base of support. The Red Ensign was strongly favoured by English Canada. On May 27, 1964, Pearson's minority Liberal government introduced a motion to Parliament for adoption of his favourite design of a "sea to sea" (Canada's motto) flag with blue borders and three conjoined red maple leaves on a white field. This motion led to weeks of acrimonious debate in Parliament, and the design came to be known as the "Pearson Pennant". Diefenbaker demanded a referendum be held on the flag issue, but Pearson instead formed a 15-member multi-party parliamentary committee to select a new design. Through a period of study with political manoeuvring, the committee chose the current design, which was created by George F.G. Stanley and inspired by the flag of the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario. The design was approved unanimously by the committee on October 29, 1964, and later passed by a majority vote in the House of Commons on December 15, 1964. The Senate added its approval two days later.

Queen Elizabeth II proclaimed the new flag on January 28, 1965. It was inaugurated on February 15, 1965, at an official ceremony held on Parliament Hill in Ottawa in the presence of Governor General Major-General Georges P. Vanier, the prime minister, the members of the Cabinet, and Canadian parliamentarians. The Canadian Red Ensign and the shield of the royal arms of Canada, was lowered at the stroke of noon, and the new Maple Leaf flag was raised. The crowd sang the national anthem, "O Canada", followed by the royal anthem, "God Save the Queen". Maurice Bourget, Speaker of the Senate, said, "The flag is the symbol of the nation's unity, for it, beyond any doubt, represents all the citizens of Canada without distinction of race, language, belief, or opinion." For the nation's centennial celebrations in 1967, the Canadian government used the Canadian coat of arms (whose shield was used on the red ensign) on a red flag

Canadian Flags through the years.


Flag used (1868–1921)


Flag used (1921–1957)


1957 version of the Canadian Red Ensign that had evolved as the de facto national flag until 1965


First Flag Proposal to Parliament, the Pearson Pennant


Flag of the Royal Military College of Canada; used as inspiration by George F.G. Stanley


Earlier (1964) version of the proposal that was adopted


Current flag, 1965 to date

[Gummiente]

Happy Canada Day to Canucks around the world!

[king robb]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYSYipouABI

[PacificShot327]

Hahaha....


Happy Canada Day to all of my Canadian family here!

[Wrider]

Happy Canuckistan day to all you Northerners!

[blues2cruise]

Happy Canada Day.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWDXE9Pbjic