Montreal’s first Canada Day parade met with laughter, founder recalls
MONTREAL — Among the tens of thousands of flag-waving revellers expected to line the streets for Montreal’s Canada Day parade, there will be one man who remembers the year he almost marched alone.
Roopnarine Singh, a Trinidad-born Montreal doctor, organized the first Canada Day parade in 1978 after being horrified there was no celebration to mark his adopted country’s birthday.
The province had elected its first sovereigntist premier in Rene Levesque, and few seemed enthusiastic to join an overt display of Canadian patriotism.
So when rain clouds loomed, Singh said the few friends who had agreed to join him almost backed out.