Townships Trivia: Famous "Firsts" (Answers)

Author:
Matthew Farfan

1. c) William Francis (Billy) Connor was the first to swim Lake Memphremagog (or at least the 40 km stretch from Newport, Vermont to Magog, Quebec). He accomplished this feat in August of 1955 in 18.5 hours. Many people are familiar with the more recent "Traversée internationale du lac Memphrémagog," which has taken place every summer since 1979 between Newport and Magog.

2. c) George Foote Foss, of Sherbrooke, in 1897.

3. a) Reginald Fessenden, in 1900. (Guglielmo Marconi had sent the first wireless messages by Morse Code).

4. b) Louis St-Laurent, born in Compton in 1882.

5. c) The St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railway was chartered to link Montreal with an ice-free port in the United States (Portland, Maine). The world's first international railway, the StL&A was completed in 1853 and sold immediately to the new (and more financially secure) Grand Trunk Railway.

6. b) Townshipper Henry Seth Taylor's steam buggy or horseless carriage, the first of its kind in Canada, was unveiled at the Stanstead County Fair in 1867.

7. b) The first Caisse populaire in North America.

8. b) The British Colonist and Saint Francis Gazette, published from 1823 to 1834 by Silas Horton Dickerson.

9. b) The equestrian events were held in Bromont.

10. a) Mack Sennett, born Mikall Sinnott in Danville in 1880, was nicknamed "The King of Comedy." Sennett's Academy Award read, in part " For his lasting contribution to the comedy technique of the screen, the Academy presents a Special Award to that master of fun, discoverer of stars... [that] sympathetic, kindly, understanding, genius: Mack Sennett."