"The Canadian Year"

THE Dartmouth community will have its attention turned north to that great nation only 90 miles from campus as the College joins Canada in celebrating its centennial with a year-long program emphasizing all thing Canadian.

Seminars, conferences, lectures, and cultural events during the upcoming academic year will involve both Canadian and American participants, including political leaders, scholars, writers, artists, and other experts. Now being planned is a series of discussions and lectures on Canadian culture, history, and the Dominion's relationship to the United States, the British Commonwealth, and the world.

The Hopkins Center will again have a major role, and programs similar to those presented in the previous all-year concentrations on Japan, Religion and Art, and the World of William Shakespeare are being planned on Canada. Art exhibits by Canadian artists, concerts by Canadian musicians, plays by Canadian dramatists, Canadian movies, and photographic exhibits are all being arranged now for later presentation.

Although not formally part of "The Canadian Year" program, an exhibit of a young Canadian's paintings in the Beaumont-May Gallery gave the year an auspicious start. The striking artistry of 31-year-old Thomas Forrestall of Fredericton, New Brunswick, was on view in early September. Most of his Grant Wood-like canvasses not already in collections on arrival were added to Hanover area collections before the showing closed.

The Comparative Studies Center and its co-directors, Professors Lawrence I. Radway and Francis W. Gramlich, are responsible for over-all planning of "The Canadian Year." Collaborating with them is Marselis C. Parsons Jr., a retired Foreign Service Officer now living in Lyme, who has been named Special Assistant for the campus-wide program.

Dartmouth chose this year to salute Canada, according to Professors Gramlich and Radway, because 1967 is the centennial of the British North American Act which set up the Canadian Constitution and gave Canada its independent status. In addition, it will be the year of EXPO '67, Montreal's World's Fair. With two such major events to the north, it will be a propitious time to focus Dartmouth's attention on Canada, its people, history, and culture.

Dartmouth has had a long and special interest in Canada, because of both geographic proximity and historic associations. Canada has more students now enrolled at the College than any other foreign nation, and the College and many of its faculty members have special research interests in the Canadian government, geology, history, geography, and prehistoric cultures.

In the past the College has also sponsored many special events designed to increase understanding between the countries. Prime Minister Lester Pearson, former Prime Minister John Diefenbaker, and the Prime Minister of Quebec, Jean Lesage, have all delivered major addresses on campus. Mr. Diefenbaker made his first post-election appearance in the United States in 1957 as the featured speaker at the Dartmouth Convocation on Great Issues in the Anglo-Canadian-American Community.

President Dickey, who envisaged the program now developing as "The Canadian Year," has been a strong advocate of a more lively appreciation of Canadian achievements and problems, including an acknowledgement of Canada's role in world affairs. He complied and edited The United States and Canada, a book published by The American Assembly in connection with its 1964 conference on the Canadian-American relationship.