In 1983 the city of Sudbury celebrated its 100th anniversary.What do you remember about that banner year? Share your memories at Sudbury.com
Happy New Year to all of Greater Sudbury. Dear city, congratulations on your 140th birthday.
Over the years, the area that is Sudbury has transformed from a Jesuit mission at a railroad construction camp along the Transcontinental Railroad to a crossroads in northeastern Ontario. In this month’s column, let’s take a look back at the 100th anniversary (no, we’re not talking about 1967). It’s his 100th anniversary in our city 40 years ago.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, I was a grade school student in Coniston (yes, I’m that young) and one day I found a 112-page book in the school library. Half English and half French: “To our city/Notreville”.
Having borrowed this book from the library many times, I poured in the details of what was planned for that special year. (following the “Coniston Tales” of my hometown which I devoured from start to finish) led to my lifelong fascination with history.
But enough about me… Let’s take a look at some of the many major events planned for the Centenary and listed across 12 pages (yes, 12!). With so many events planned for the day, an article appeared in The Sudbury Star in September 1982 entitled “100th Anniversary: A Weekend Full of Action”.
Our mining heritage is evident in the logo chosen to be used in all Centennial-related advertising, publications and memorabilia. The logo featured two of his miners in contrasting profiles. One miner’s headgear—a cloth hat with a candle—reminiscent of the simpler (and far more dangerous) times when mining operations began in our region. The second miner represents the present day (1983) with a plastic helmet and modern headlamps.
Although they represent different eras of mining at Sudbury, they are related because the mining families in the Nickel District were full of two, three and four generations of miners and smelters. There is a possibility.
In June 1983, the Laurentian University Museum and Arts Center honored its increasingly multicultural population with Strangers No More: a Sudbury Centennial Photographic Exhibition. This catalog and exhibition of 121 photographs and anecdotes, with a particular focus on the period from 1883 to his 1950, was launched to honor the people and events that contributed to the founding and development of Sudbury.
The exhibition, an accompaniment to an exhibition held in late 1982 and aptly named Towards Sudbury’s Centenary, features photographs and artefacts related to eight ethnic groups in Sudbury. featured. Important figures in Sudbury’s history such as Fabbro, Curlook, Young and Christakos can be seen in these two of his exhibits.
Sudbury’s multiculturalism was embodied in the man who captained the city on its 100th anniversary, Peter Wong, the first Chinese-Canadian mayor elected in any major Canadian city. Within his eight years of his centenary in us, and in Wong’s final year in office, Chatelaine magazine honored Sudbury by listing him one of the 10 best cities in Canada.
From 10am on a sunny Saturday in late June, thousands of residents lined the streets of Sudbury to watch the Centennial Parade meander through downtown. The parade began on Notre Dame Avenue, continued along Elm, Durham and Elgin Streets (the most historically significant streets in Sudbury’s history) and ended at Mint Street in Memorial Park. That afternoon, after the parade, citizens were entertained by musical performances by parade-goers and participated in organized games for all ages.
From March 6-13, Sudbury Arena hosted the Rabat Briar, Canada’s national men’s curling championship. It was his second time Sudbury hosted the event, the last time being in 1953, thirty years before him.
A total of 65,927 spectators came to watch each draw during the week, winning the Ontario Ring flown by Ed Werenich. The attendance was the fifth highest in the Briar’s 56-year history to that point.
Curling’s origins at Sudbury date back to 1891, during its first decade. At this time, James Orr, editor of the Sudbury Journal, encouraged the townspeople to form his curling team. The first curling match of the newly formed Sudbury Curling Club was between the club’s president, William Chalmers, and his vice-president, Dan Bakey (the original owner of Muirheads).
Even though the first curling/skating rink facility, the Palace Rink, opened on Durham Street, the curlers of the time still preferred to play on frozen lakes and ponds, and many of them were built around this future 330 lake city. multiplied.
What did they think when they heard that Sudbury would eventually host the U.S. Men’s Championship in a modern, spacious indoor facility?
Six months after Brier, the city hosted the 1983 Ontario Summer Games. It was the largest summer event to date, and over four days he brought more than 3,000 promising young athletes to the city. They participated in countless events including baseball, track and field and even waterskiing at 22 locations around the city.
This is the second time in several years that Sudbury has hosted a major summer track and field event. In 1980, the city hosted the Pan American Junior Track and Field Championships, bringing many future Olympic track and field athletes (including Carl Lewis of the United States and Charmaine Crook of Canada) to the city.
Of course, Sudbury was world class again five years later, as Vicki Gilhula wrote in two previous Memory Lane columns, when the 1988 World Junior Athletics Championships hosted 1,024 athletes from 123 countries. proved to be the city of
The Brier and Ontario Summer Games were the city’s most high-profile sporting events in 1983, but they weren’t the only sporting championships held that year.
The OCAA Men’s and Women’s Volleyball Tournaments at Cumbrian College, the Canadian Boxing Association Championship, the Eastern Canada Junior National Swim Championship and the Canadian Senior Men’s Baseball Championship were also held in turn.
These competitions, along with countless local tournaments across a wide variety of sports, made 1983 a sports enthusiast’s dream come true.
Now, if the previous paragraphs gave you the impression that Sudbury’s 100th anniversary celebrations were all about sports competition, think again. They were just the tip of the iceberg.
Beginning with the opening ceremony on New Year’s Day at the Sudbury Arena hosted by the Sudbury Centennial Foundation, a huge number of cultural events of all shapes and sizes will be held by various groups across the city to be part of the centenary celebrations. I was. .
Music performances and dance surged across the calendar that year. From the Ukraine Independence Day Banquet Concert in January hosted by the Ukrainian-Canadian Committee, to the Sudbury Symphony Orchestra’s Centennial Ball, to the Centennial Foundation’s “Open Air Dance” at Civic Square, to the 1983 New Year’s Eve Centennial Closing Ball, the year , says that Sudbury’s dance card was full.
On the concert scene, everyone’s favorite Bell Park Festival’s 12th has been temporarily renamed the ‘Northern Lights Sudbury Centennial Festival Boreal’. In the summer of 1983, the Bell Park Amphitheater hosted Sharon, Lois & Blum, The Nylons, CANO and more. That year the festival was expanded to his four days for the first time as a way to mark the centenary.
Of course, if theater is more your thing, the Sudbury Theater Center put on a play called “Image Above Patterns Below” to mark its 100th anniversary.
Even the federal government has taken steps to honor Sudbury’s 100th anniversary. In September 1982, the Canada Post announced that it would issue a stamp to commemorate the 1883 discovery of nickel at Sudbury. In a way, the stamp accompanied his centenary logo, and in a way, it was a stamp honoring the minerals that came to define the region. , and others celebrated the people who made it possible.
This stamp was officially released in August 1983 (where else?) at Big Nickel. The unveiling ceremony was attended by Canada Post Minister André Ouellet, Regional Chair Tom Davies, Sudbury Mayor Peter Wong and Nickelbelt MP Judy Elora.
The purpose of this new stamp is that on that day in August 1883, Thomas Flanagan, a Canadian Pacific blacksmith working with a gang that was cutting trees just northwest of the new village of Sudbury Junction, discovered a rocky outcrop. It was a reminder that , the color of rust that appears to contain copper.
Investigations revealed that Flanagan had not only discovered copper, but had also stumbled upon deposits of nickel. This deposit will turn out to be the world’s largest nickel deposit, and in just 100 years (and beyond) will transform that tiny crossroads of backwaters along the transcontinent into a world-class city.
Dear readers, now it’s your turn. Were you in the Brier or Summer Games crowd? Marched in the parade? Maybe you played at one of the many concerts? What do you remember most about that year’s celebration? And of course, can you share photos of these events with our readers? Tell me about your memories of
Jason Marcon is a Greater Sudbury writer and history buff. He runs his Coniston Historical Group and Sudbury Then and Now Facebook page. Memory Lane is made possible by the Community Leaders Program.
