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Queen opens St. Lawrence Seaway with U.S. President Eisenhower

On Feb. 6, 1952, Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor was proclaimed Queen of Canada. Her spectacular coronation in Westminster Abbey the following year was heard by millions on the radio and was the first ever to be televised. When she visited Canada in 1951, 1957, 1959 and 1964, Elizabeth left an indelible mark on Canadians coast to coast.

The highlight of the 1959 royal visit is on June 26, when Queen Elizabeth joins U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower in the formal opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway.
After addressing the crowd at the St. Lambert, Que. lock, Elizabeth and "Ike" board the Royal Yacht Britannia, which soon pulls away and enters the liftlocks, formally opening the seaway for business.

• The St. Lawrence Seaway connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes as far as Duluth, Minn. on Lake Superior - a distance of 3776 kilometres. It covers some 245,750 square kilometres of navigable waters.

• The first ship through the entire seaway was the icebreaker D'Iberville on April 25, 1959. Since then more than two billion tonnes of cargo have moved through the seaway.

• The Royal Yacht Britannia was launched in 1953 and served the Queen for 44 years. It carried the queen and her family on 968 official voyages, from the South Seas to Antarctica. Britannia was decommissioned on Dec. 11, 1997 and is now permanently moored in Edinburgh's historic port of Leith.

Medium: Television
Program: CBC Television News Special
Broadcast Date: June 26, 1959
Reporter: Ted Reynolds
Duration: 10:31

Last updated: March 28, 2012

Page consulted on March 26, 2013

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