On-To-Ottawa Trek, 1935

(First of two parts)
I seem to recall having recently presented you with a case of history, sort of, repeating itself.

One could argue that the ongoing (as of time of writing) truckers’ protest in Ottawa is another case of deja vu. The precedent, for those of us who know even a smattering of Canadian history, is the 1935 On-to-Ottawa Trek of the unemployed in 1935. This was mid-Depression, the worst ever experienced by Canadians.

There, all similarity ends. Not only in protesters’ modes of transport and their stated aims, but particularly in the way the two protest movements have conducted themselves, and the responses by various levels of government.

We’re talking the difference between day and night.

In the 1960s, Ronald Liversledge who’d been one of the leading participants of this epochal event in Canadian history, was living in Lake Cowichan when he wrote Recollections of the On-To-Ottawa Trek, 1935.

Originally self published in a cheap and crude format “produced by volunteer labour,” it was reissued in standard paperback format in 1973. Despite the author’s pro-labour viewpoint and his personal participation, it’s considered to be one of the best accounts of the events leading up to and during the protest that ended in tragedy for some of the protesters and a policeman.

It’s easy to think that, because Ronald Liversledge was one of the ‘ringleaders” of this cross-country protest, his account is suspect. The fact is, it has a distinct aura of truthfulness and most historians, it seems, accept his version as being honest and incisive.

It should be required reading in Canadian schools.

When you read next week’s Chronicle, compare the circumstances described by Mr. Liversledge to news accounts of those which led up to the current debacle in Ottawa. If ever there was a time to really learn from history, this is it!
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PHOTO: Eighty-seven years ago, thousands of unemployed couldn’t protest with trucks—they had no gas. So they ‘rode the rails’ eastward from Vancouver, determined to present themselves directly to the R.B. Bennett government in Ottawa. They made it as far as Regina where they were met with mounted police and bullets. www.labourheritagecentre.ca