Background to this
story
April 17, 2002
The story that sparked this was an article in the Tuesday, April 16 (yesterday) edition
of the Edmonton Journal in a story written by Rick Pedersen of their
staff. It quotes Rudyard Griffiths, Executive Director of the Toronto-based
Dominion Institute, as saying "Canadians are at times
a nation of amnesiacs." The Institute advocates a fresh approach
to teaching history in schools. The story says the Institute spent half-a-million
bucks on polls over the last five years, and a recent poll found that 60% of Canadians
failed a three-question quiz that asked them to identify three of Canada's best-known
prime ministers. Results of the poll found that only 49% of Canadians knew Trudeau
invoked the War Measures Act. Of 1000 polled by Ipsos Reid, 60% failed
the quiz, including one-third who got none right. Only 51% named John A. Macdonald
as our first prime minister. Only 19% could name our first francophone prime minister,
Sir Wilfred Laurier.
Editor's note: Edmonton Journal and other CanWest Global papers do not archive their material so if you don't see it that day its history. The one exception is the National Post which does have an archive.