Sir Alexander Mackenzie the Scottish Bulldog An article for the April 1999 Deep Cove Crier Sir Alexander Mackenzie ranks as one of the most remarkable persons of North American wilderness history and, indeed, as one of the greatest travelers of all time. His transcontinental crossing predated (and indeed inspired) the more famous Lewis and Clark American expedition by twelve years. Even Bernard De Voto, the well-known Utah-born historian said of Mackenzie, "In courage, in the faculty of command, in ability to meet the unforeseen with resources of craft and skill, in the will that cannot be overborne, he has had no superior in the history of American exploration." I remember singing around the YMCA Camp Elphinstone and Camp Howdy campfires: This Land is your Land, This Land is My Land, from the Arctic Circle to the Great Lake Waters,
from the Atlantic Ocean to Vancouver Island, this Land was made for you and me". In Mackenzie was realized the dream of a Canada stretching from sea to sea. Beneath the lion and the unicorn supporting the coat of arms of Canada are the Latin words: A MARI USQUE AD MARE, taken from a Biblical text, He shall have dominion also from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth. Without Alexander Mackenzie (and his NorWester friends Simon Fraser and David Thompson), Canada would have lost her entire Pacific Coast, being shut off from any access to the sea. In 1764, Alexander Mackenzie was born in Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis, a windswept, rugged island in the Outer Hebrides off the west coast of Scotland. When Alexander was ten, his mom died. Neighbours, knowing he had memorized long passages from the Bible, predicted that Alexander would become a clergyman. Through the local pastors library, he learned about astronomy and the use of telescopes. At age 13, Alexander tabulated all the animal and plant life in the Hebrides, and he and his pastor tried unsuccessfully to get it published in London. | |
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