In celebration of Black History Month, Canada Post is doing their part by issuing new stamps which honours some ex-slaves, including a man from Alberta who is considered to be a pioneer of Alberta’s ranching industry, and a woman who fought discrimination and inequality by sitting in a whites-only area.
In 1845, John Ware was born into slavery in South Carolina, and after the American Civil Rights War, Ware decided to move to Texas where he learned how to be a rancher, and eventually became a cowboy.
After he was hired to bring a large herd of cattle up to the Bar U Ranch in what would become Alberta, Ware soon settled in the Calgary area in 1882. He set up his own ranch in Foothills in 1890, and would later move the ranch and his family to an area near Brooks, Alberta.
“John Ware was certainly one of those main builders of southern Alberta and the ranching community,” says Loraine Lounsberry, curator of Calgary's Glenbow Museum, CBC News reported.
As a fun fact, on the Canada Post website, it says that, “Skilled with the lariat, he pioneered steer-wrestling and won his first competition at the Calgary Summer Fair of 1893, setting a precedent for what would become a highlight of the Calgary Stampede.”
The other Black Canadian to grace the commemorative stamps is Viola Desmond, a woman whom was arrested after she sat in a whites-only area at the New Glasgow’s Roseland theatre in 1945.
According to the Canada Post, “After being dragged from the theatre, sitting up all night in jail still wearing her white gloves, Desmond was tried without counsel and convicted of defrauding the province of the additional one-cent tax for seats in the whites-only section, and fined $20. She paid the fine but went on to fight the charge in higher levels of court. Subsequent trials focused on tax-evasion, not that Ms. Desmond has been a victim of racism.”
However, regardless of her lengthy legal battle, her conviction was not overturned. But her lawyer graciously refunded all her fees so that she can fund the Nova Scotia Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NSAACP).
In 2011, the government of Nova Scotia formally apologized and granted Desmond a posthumous pardon, a first such pardon to occur in Canada.
“I used a collage of elements in the stamps to give dimension to the stories of both Desmond and Ware,” Lara Minja of Vancouver’s Lime Design, tells Canada Post. “Strong and flattering portraits of each figure provide a central focus, and silhouettes of significant places appear at the bottom. Both stamps are intended to have a historical look and feel, as well as a richness and human warmth.”
Canada Post says that the stamps will be available for sale on Wednesday, and they will be around all year long.
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