A recent study has shown — surprise — that young Canadians are weak on the history of their country. If you want to see how you stack up as a Canadian historian, try this test that I have drawn up. You should get at least half of the answers.

Questions:

1. Bliss Carman was: (a) a poet; (b) a porn star; or (c) a dessert made with maple syrup and grenadine.

2. Moose Factory is: (a) a small town; (b) a place where moose are manufactured; or (c) an all-star defensive lineman for the Calgary Stampeders in 1948.

3. Jacques Cartier was: (a) an early explorer; (b) the 14th round draft pick of the Montreal Canadiens in 1986; (c) a bridge; or (d) all of the above.

4. Which of these provincial premiers was not an onion farmer? (a) Maurice Duplessis; (b) Tommy Douglas; or (c) Mitch Hepburn.

5. In some Ontario lakes, there is a fish called a splake, which I believe is an engineered cross between a speckled trout and a lake trout. Experiments were done to crossbreed the following: carp and salmon; pickerel and ling; and sucker and perch. What names were made, but never used, for the fish that would have been produced by such crossbreeding?

6. The worst car ever imported into Canada was: (a) the Yugo; (b) the Austin Marina; (c) the Morris Oxford; or (d) the Fiat.

7. The Grand Trunk, the Great Northern and the TH&B are all names of: (a) rock bands; (b) railways; or (c) varieties of edible beans.

8. Red Deer is: (a) the name of Vladimir Lenin’s favourite pet; (b) a place in Alberta; (c) a beer turned out by a microbrewery with a poor proofreader.

9. Which of these is associated with a famous vanishing act? (a) The Toronto Maple Leafs at Stanley Cup time; (b) any campaign promise; or (c) Ambrose Small.

10. Lord Beaverbrook, the late newspaper proprietor of note, chose that name because: (a) he started amassing his fortune in Canada as a fur trader; (b) he looked like a beaver; or (c) all the good names were taken when he was raised to the peerage.

Answers:

1. Indeed, Bliss Carman was a poet and also a guy. But if you picked porn star, you might be able to make a good case.

2. A small town is right, although there certainly could have been a football player and several hockey players nicknamed “Moose.” But Factory is a rare last name.

3. The answer is (d), all of the above, although, sad to say, none ever made it to the National Hockey League.

4. Maurice Duplessis was no onion farmer, but he ran Quebec 70 years ago and was immortalized in a mammoth biography by Conrad Black. Nor was Tommy Douglas of Saskatchewan a farmer. Baptist minister was his trade. So, that leaves Mitch Hepburn, who was the controversial premier of Ontario 70 or so years ago. He has perhaps more notoriety than fame, but is the centrepiece of a rare bit of Canadian political humor. It seems that one day out in the country, he was speaking at a political meeting in a farmyard and he climbed up on a manure spreader so he could see over the crowd. “This is the first time I’ve ever spoken from a Tory platform,” said the Liberal premier. At which point, one of the farmers in the audience shouted out: “Throw her into high gear, Mitch. She’ll never carry a better load.”

5. The fish that never resulted would have been the “pickling,” the “pucker,” or the “serch”; and the cross of salmon with carp would have been the “carmon” — but not the poet.

6. All the vehicles can make the case for worst car, but having owned one, I’m partial to the Austin Marina, which let me down on a regular basis. The Morris Oxford, of course, was a shoe.

7. The answer is (b), railways, but beans and bands are worthy guesses. TH&B stands for Toronto, Hamilton and Buffalo, a train known years ago as the “Old To Hell and Back.”

8. I’m going with (b), a place in Alberta, but Lenin might have owned that deer; and proofreading in microbreweries can be suspect.

9. All are famous vanishing acts, so all the answers are right. My favourite is Ambrose Small, the Toronto millionaire theatre owner who disappeared in December 1919.

@page_break@10. If you’ve seen Lord Beaverbrook’s picture, you know that (b) has to be it. IE