Yes, we drag out a movie from my past, from the NFB, Impressions of Expo 67.
I am astounded at the clarity of this film, and thank heavens for the NFB, as I view Expo 67 as a “mile marker” in my life even though I was only six years old at the time.
I love the description from the NFB:
This short film served as an invitation to the World’s Fair held in Montreal in 1967. It was primarily considered to be the most successful World’s Fair of the 20th century, with over 50 million visitors. The film presents impressions of the event and Montreal at its liveliest and most exciting moment in history.
After Expo 67, the exhibition went on for a few more years as Man and His World, and my family went every year pretty much, and LaRonde, the amusement park, is still in operation. Undoubtedly a mile marker for Canada as well.
Impressions of Expo 67, William Brind, provided by the National Film Board of Canada
What people don’t remember is that Montreal was the largest city in Canada at the time. Toronto was a backwater and barely even an after thought. Montreal was the financial and cultural center of Canada and then along came the Péquistes and Canada changed. NHL head was in the SunLife Building. The Montreal Stock Exchange was the stock exchange in Canada. When deprtment store headoffices moved from Montreal to Toronto, people lamented that Canadian women were now going to be dressing like Torontonians. The joke was that the Canadian Armed Forces dropped 10,000 paratroopers over Toronto on a Sunday. They all died. Everyone knows that nothing opens in Toronto on a Sunday. Toronto the good ie Toronto the dull. For that summer Montreal was the place to be. The Big Owe, notwithstanding, that continued until 1976 and beyond and then the Péquistes and the party stopped, not just for anglophone but for economic development in Quebec. Infrastructure in Montreal was all built in the mid-60’s. A half century later, it’s being updated, replaced and repaired. Iwas only 12 during Expo, but 1976, the year the PQ was elected, was my second provincial election. How things changed.