Next week, the city of Kingston will be asking residents and visitors to share their thoughts about Sir John A. Macdonald, Canada’s first prime minister.
On Sept. 6, the city will open what they’re calling an “engagement opportunity” where residents can express their view about Macdonald’s legacy. The survey can be completed at City Hall in the Sir John A. Macdonald room or online when it opens.
Jennifer Campbell, the city’s manager of cultural heritage, said the city is interested in hearing about how people feel about the story the Kingston is telling about its past, and whether residents feel it may be too centred on colonialism.
“This is an opportunity to think about the kinds of histories and stories we need to be telling as part of our inclusive history. So it starts with Sir John A. Macdonald, but it certainly isn’t intended to end there,” Campbell said.
Campbell called the project an “exercise in engagement,” one which will continue until the end of 2019.
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This request for feedback comes off the heels of a controversy in Victoria B.C., where a statue of Macdonald was recently removed from Victoria’s City Hall.
WATCH: Victoria mayor apologizes over Sir John A. Macdonald statue controversy
Some in Canada take issue with the first prime minister’s involvement in the creation of residential schools, institutions that have a long and troubled history of abusing Indigenous children. According to Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps’ campaign blog, the decision to remove the statue was done as an act of reconciliation.
Controversy also boiled over in Kingston in 2017, when the downtown restaurant Sir John’s Public House changed its name, removing the reference to Macdonald and calling it The Public House. The change was also done in the name of reconciliation after protests popped up outside the restaurant.
Campbell notes that because Macdonald grew up in Kingston, the city has a lot of Macdonald memorabilia, like the Bellevue House, his one-time home, the city’s civic collection, which includes pieces like the statue of Sir John A. Macdonald in City Park, Engine 1095 in Confederation Park, named “The spirit of Sir John A.,” artifacts in city hall and items in the Sir John A. Macdonald room where the feedback will be given on Sept. 6.
All in all, Campbell made it clear there was no designed endpoint to the exercise, and that city officials are not looking to erase the first prime minister’s name from Kingston.
“This isn’t us trying to rewrite history, this is about listening to what the community wants to say.”
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