Which Canadian? Trivia Quiz

Answer: Mary Pickford

Silent movie star Mary Pickford (1892-1979), was born Gladys Smith in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and was on stage as part of a family act by the age of seven. Her movie acting career spanned the years 1909-1933, and in 1919 she was one of the co-founders of United Artists.

She won the Best Actress Oscar for "Coquette" (1929), and in 1976 the Academy gave her an honourary award to recognise her "unique contributions to the film industry". At the time of her death she resided in Santa Monica, California.

Answer: Lucy Maud Montgomery

Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874-1942) was born in Clifton, Prince Edward Island, Canada and died aged 67 in Toronto, Ontario. She set her tales of the red-headed Anne Shirley largely in her home province of PEI, and was not pleased when one movie version made Anne an American! The Green Gables museum in Cavendish, PEI, became a tourist draw for the province, as Montgomery's novels and her heroine achieved world-wide fame.

Answer: James Campbell Clouston

When Christopher Nolan's blockbuster "Dunkirk" was released in 2017, there was much indignation in the Canadian media that Commander Clouston, from Montreal, was not in any way acknowledged for his part in the evacuation. The role that approximated his was given to Belfast-born Kenneth Branagh. Though serving in the Royal Navy, which he had joined in 1918, Clouston was indeed Canadian, and was tasked with organising the embarkation of troops via ships brought alongside the mole (pier) which he did with great success over several days. Having been called to Dover for a conference, he was killed whilst returning to Dunkirk to continue the evacuation.

He was 39 years old.

Answer: Julie Payette

Born in 1963 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, Payette was educated at McGill University and the University of Toronto. She became the 29th Governor-General (representative of the Queen) of Canada in 2017, and the fourth woman to hold the post. Prior to this appointment, she was selected in 1992 by the Canadian Space Agency as an astronaut, and spent a total of just under 26 days in space over two missions in 1999 and 2009.

Answer: Hayley Wickenheiser

Hayley Wickenheiser was born in Shaunavon, Saskatchewan, Canada in 1978, and began playing hockey as a small child, playing on boys' teams until she became a teenager. Her first Olympics with Team Canada (Nagano 1998) resulted in a silver medal, but the next four (2002 Salt Lake City, 2006 Turin, 2010 Vancouver and 2014 Sochi) were all golden.

She retired in 2017 having scored 18 goals and 51 points in Olympic play, a record at that time.

Answer: Frederick Banting

Frederick Grant Banting was born in Alliston, near Barrie, Ontario, Canada in 1891 and studied medicine at the University of Toronto. After service in the Canadian Army Medical Corps in World War I, during which he was decorated with the Military Cross (MC) for heroism, he returned to Canada to practice medicine. Having become interested in the study of diabetes, he developed a theory regarding secretions of the pancreas, which led eventually to the discovery of insulin.

He was joined in this work at the University of Toronto by a professor of physiology, J.J.R. Macleod and then-medical student Charles Best. For their discovery Banting and Macleod shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for 1923. Banting was knighted in 1934, and when World War II broke out he rejoined the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps. Major Banting KBE, MC, RCAMC was killed in an airplane crash in Newfoundland whilst on active duty, in February 1941.

Answer: Chris Hadfield

Chris Austin Hadfield was born in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada in 1959, and educated at the Royal Military College, Kingston, Ontario, the University of Waterloo, Ontario and the University of Tennessee. He received a Master of Science in aviation studies from the latter.

After serving in the Canadian Armed Forces as a pilot for a number of years he was selected for astronaut training in 1992, and subsequently spent 166 days in space, spread over a number of missions. It was during the last of these missions in 2012-13 that he became the first Canadian commander of the International Space Station.

He announced his retirement as an astronaut shortly after his return from that mission.

Answer: Terry Fox

Terrance Stanley "Terry" Fox was an athletic young man, born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada in 1958. After losing his right leg to cancer in 1977 he took up wheelchair basketball, and played golf with the help of a prosthetic leg. What he called the Marathon of Hope began in April 1980.

His idea was to run across Canada, at the rate of a marathon a day, to raise money and awareness for cancer research. Starting in Newfoundland by dipping his artificial leg in the Atlantic Ocean, he ran for 143 days and 5,373 kilometres (3,339 mi) before the cancer returned and forced him to stop, near Thunder Bay, Ontario.

He died aged 22 in June 1981, but his name lives on in annual Terry Fox Runs for cancer research.

Answer: Raymond Massey

Raymond Hart Massey (1896-1983) was born into the wealthy Massey family of farm implement fame (think Massey-Harris or Massey-Ferguson) in Toronto and studied at the University of Toronto and Balliol College, Oxford. He was wounded during WWI while serving with the Canadian Field Artillery, and took up acting after the war.

His elder brother, Vincent, went on to become the first Canadian-born Governor General of Canada (1952-9), while Raymond ended up in Hollywood. He portrayed Abraham Lincoln several times, starting with the movie "Abe Lincoln in Illinois" (1940), for which he received his only Oscar nomination.

Answer: Alexander Dunn

Alexander Roberts Dunn was born in York, Upper Canada (now Toronto, Ontario) in 1833 and educated at Upper Canada College, in that city, and Harrow, in England. He was commissioned a lieutenant in the 11th Hussars of the British Army in 1853, and a year later participated with his unit in the Charge of the Light Brigade at Balaclava in the Crimea. During the action he saved the lives of a sergeant and a private of his regiment, for which action he was subsequently awarded the Victoria Cross, which was created specially to reward acts of heroism during the Crimean War.

He died in a hunting accident in Abyssinia (now Eritrea) in 1868.