1897 in Canada
Events from the year 1897 in Canada.Incumbents
Crown
Lieutenant governors
Commissioners
- Commissioner of Yukon – James Morrow Walsh
Lieutenant governors
- Lieutenant Governor of Keewatin – James Colebrooke Patterson
- Lieutenant Governor of the North-West Territories – Charles Herbert Mackintosh
Premiers
- Chairman of the Executive Committee of the North-West Territories then Premier of North-West Territories – Frederick Haultain
Events
- January 29 – The Victorian Order of Nurses is founded in Ottawa
- February 2 – Clara Brett Martin becomes the first woman to practise law in Ontario
- February 19 – World's first Women's Institute founded in Stoney Creek, Ontario
- May 24 – Félix-Gabriel Marchand becomes premier of Quebec, replacing Edmund Flynn
- May 24 – Lion of Belfort unveiled
- September 6 – The federal government gives the CPR a grant to allow it to reduce freight rates through Crowsnest Pass
- October – A.B. Warburton becomes Premier of Prince Edward Island
- October 7 – Responsible government is introduced in the North-West Territories: Frederick Haultain becomes the first premier
- October 29 – Henry Emmerson becomes premier of New Brunswick, replacing James Mitchell
Full date unknown
- Klondike Gold Rush rages in the Yukon
- Lord Grey proposes that Canada create a navy to protect its west coast; Prime Minister Laurier does not act on the recommendation
- 1897–1912 – 961,000 people enter Canada from the British Isles, 594,000 from Europe and 784,000 from the United States.
- The first Canadian movie, Ten Years in Manitoba
Births
- January 23 – William Stephenson, soldier, airman, businessperson, inventor and spymaster
- January 27 – Charles Stephen Booth, politician and barrister
- March 9 – Sidney Earle Smith, academic and 7th President of the University of Toronto
- April 23 – Lester B. Pearson, politician, 14th Prime Minister of Canada, diplomat and 1957 Nobel Peace Prize recipient
- September 23 – Walter Pidgeon, actor
- September 29 – Graham Towers, first Governor of the Bank of Canada
- November 30 – William Murdoch Buchanan, politician
- December 7 – Gordon Graydon, politician
Deaths
- January 2 – Thomas McGreevy, politician and contractor
- February 27 – James Austin, businessman
- July 4 – Amor De Cosmos, journalist, politician and 2nd Premier of British Columbia
- September 19 – Frederick Cope, 3rd Mayor of Vancouver
- October 21 – Philip Francis Little, 1st Premier of Newfoundland of the colonial
- December 14 – Robert Simpson, businessman and founder of Simpsons
- December 15 – James Mitchell, politician and 7th Premier of New Brunswick
- December 31 – David Oppenheimer, entrepreneur and 2nd Mayor of Vancouver
Historical Documents
Cree leader Almighty Voice pursued and killed by North-West Mounted Police in Saskatchewan
Annual report of Indian agent for Kootenay Agency in British Columbia
Anglican missionary conducts church services on his dogsled trip around northwest Alberta
Editorial praises founding of Victorian Order of Nurses
Lack of food and other boomtown problems discourage some Dawson City residents
British railway labourers in western Canada treated as slaves before escaping
