 |
| Victoria Day fireworks |
2,408 miles
May 23 – I'm visiting Stinson today, but I’m celebrating Victoria Day (French: Fête de la Reine) with people all across
Canada! It’s a federal Canadian public
holiday celebrated on the last Monday preceding May 25, in honor of Queen
Victoria's birthday, and thus is always the penultimate Monday of May. (I just had to take this opportunity to use
the word “penultimate”.)
 |
| unofficial "Maplejack"flag |
On Victoria
Day, all government buildings must fly both the Canadian national flag (the
maple leaf) & the Union Jack, if they have enough flagpole space. It is also the day on which the birthday of
the current British monarch is officially celebrated, to avoid too many
shenanigans with the calendar.
 |
| summer bug jacket |
Across the
country, no matter the actual weather, the long Victoria Day weekend is the
unofficial marker of the end of the winter social season, and the beginning of
the summer social calendar. It’s time to
put away the warm flannels & wear lighter-colored summer clothing (such as
bug jacket?). In Alberta, Banff Sunshine
Village ends its lengthy ski season on Victoria Day and many summer
businesses—such as parks, outdoor restaurants, & bike rentals—open. Victoria Day also begins the summer “cottage
season”, when cottage owners reverse the winterization of their property and
prepare for summer fun. Gardeners can –
finally – be fairly certain that frost will not return until the next autumn.
 |
| Stinson houses by the highway |
Stinson, a cluster
of houses by the roadside of Highway 17, is another example of Ontario’s
administrative consolidation of former railroad-logging-mining camps that are
no longer viable as towns. This railway
stop was named for the Stinson Lumber Company.
Stinson is a part of Markstay-Warren (itself a conglomeration), which
lies within Sudbury East, which is part of the Sudbury District (like a county,
but outside of the city of Greater Sudbury).
Most early settlers
of this area were French-Canadian Roman Catholics who came by rail from the
province of Quebec.
 |
| Ontario Hydro dam at Stinson |
Because of
its proximity to Sudbury, many area residents were employed in the mines of the
Sudbury area. In 1925, a dam &
hydroelectric power station was built nearby on the Wahnapitae River. Ontario Hydro & the Ontario Provincial
Police became major employers. Since the
1990s, economic recessions, corporate restructuring, & downsizing at
Ontario Hydro & O.P.P. have reduced employment opportunities, and many
residents moved to Sudbury or North Bay.
 |
| Stinson postal delivery boxes |
No comments:
Post a Comment