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Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day
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Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day
Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day (French: Fête de la Saint-Jean-Baptiste, la Saint-Jean, Fête nationale du Québec), also known in English as St John the Baptist Day, is a holiday celebrated on June 24 in the Canadian province of Quebec. It was brought to Canada by French settlers celebrating the traditional feast day of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist. It was declared a public holiday in Quebec in 1925, with publicly financed events organized province-wide by a Comité organisateur de la fête nationale du Québec.
The feast day of Saint John the Baptist or Midsummer was a very popular event in the Ancien Régime of France, and it is still celebrated as a religious feast day in several countries, including Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Spain, Latvia, Ireland and Lithuania.[citation needed]
The tradition landed in Canada with the first French colonists. The first mention of celebrations of Saint John the Baptist in North America dates back to 1606, when settlers en route to the future Acadia rested on the coast of Newfoundland, June 23. The second mention of celebrations, according to The Jesuit Relations, occurred on the banks of the Saint Lawrence River on the evening of June 23, 1636, with a bonfire and five cannon shots.
In Lower Canada, the celebration of the nativity of St. John the Baptist took a patriotic tone in 1834 on the initiative of one of the founders of the newspaper La Minerve, Ludger Duvernay, who later became the first president of the Saint-Jean-Baptiste Society. In the spring of 1834, Duvernay and other patriotes attended the celebrations of the first St. Patrick's Day, the celebration of the Irish diaspora, in Montreal. This gave him and others the idea of organizing something similar for the Canadiens and their friends.
On that June 24, George-Étienne Cartier's "Ô Canada! mon pays, mes amours" was first sung during a grand patriotic banquet gathering about sixty francophones and anglophones of Montreal, in the gardens of lawyer John McDonnell, near the old Windsor Station. The Canada in the song refers to Lower Canada, today's southern Quebec. Rounds of toasts went to the Parti patriote, the United States, Ireland, and the Ninety-Two Resolutions.
Two days later, La Minerve concluded: "This holiday, whose goal is to solidify the union of the Canadiens, will not go without bearing fruit. It will be celebrated annually as a national holiday and will not miss producing the happiest results." The celebration recurred in 1835, 1836, 1837.
Following the defeat of the insurrectional movement during the Lower Canada Rebellion and the military repressions which followed, the day was not celebrated for several years.
In 1834, Duvernay established the charitable Association Saint-Jean Baptiste in order to have the Saint-Jean-Baptiste celebrated that year. The association was chartered in 1849 with the mission of promoting social and moral progress. (See Saint-Jean-Baptiste Society.)
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Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day
Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day (French: Fête de la Saint-Jean-Baptiste, la Saint-Jean, Fête nationale du Québec), also known in English as St John the Baptist Day, is a holiday celebrated on June 24 in the Canadian province of Quebec. It was brought to Canada by French settlers celebrating the traditional feast day of the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist. It was declared a public holiday in Quebec in 1925, with publicly financed events organized province-wide by a Comité organisateur de la fête nationale du Québec.
The feast day of Saint John the Baptist or Midsummer was a very popular event in the Ancien Régime of France, and it is still celebrated as a religious feast day in several countries, including Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Spain, Latvia, Ireland and Lithuania.[citation needed]
The tradition landed in Canada with the first French colonists. The first mention of celebrations of Saint John the Baptist in North America dates back to 1606, when settlers en route to the future Acadia rested on the coast of Newfoundland, June 23. The second mention of celebrations, according to The Jesuit Relations, occurred on the banks of the Saint Lawrence River on the evening of June 23, 1636, with a bonfire and five cannon shots.
In Lower Canada, the celebration of the nativity of St. John the Baptist took a patriotic tone in 1834 on the initiative of one of the founders of the newspaper La Minerve, Ludger Duvernay, who later became the first president of the Saint-Jean-Baptiste Society. In the spring of 1834, Duvernay and other patriotes attended the celebrations of the first St. Patrick's Day, the celebration of the Irish diaspora, in Montreal. This gave him and others the idea of organizing something similar for the Canadiens and their friends.
On that June 24, George-Étienne Cartier's "Ô Canada! mon pays, mes amours" was first sung during a grand patriotic banquet gathering about sixty francophones and anglophones of Montreal, in the gardens of lawyer John McDonnell, near the old Windsor Station. The Canada in the song refers to Lower Canada, today's southern Quebec. Rounds of toasts went to the Parti patriote, the United States, Ireland, and the Ninety-Two Resolutions.
Two days later, La Minerve concluded: "This holiday, whose goal is to solidify the union of the Canadiens, will not go without bearing fruit. It will be celebrated annually as a national holiday and will not miss producing the happiest results." The celebration recurred in 1835, 1836, 1837.
Following the defeat of the insurrectional movement during the Lower Canada Rebellion and the military repressions which followed, the day was not celebrated for several years.
In 1834, Duvernay established the charitable Association Saint-Jean Baptiste in order to have the Saint-Jean-Baptiste celebrated that year. The association was chartered in 1849 with the mission of promoting social and moral progress. (See Saint-Jean-Baptiste Society.)
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