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for future generations.
HSO 2026 Bytown200 Bicentennial Storytelling Challenge
The Historical Society of Ottawa is proud to share stories about Bytown and the Rideau Canal to highlight the 200th anniversary of both in 2026.
Have a story to share as part of our Bytown200 Challenge? Follow this link to learn more: https://www.historicalsocietyottawa.ca/hso-news/the-hso-2026-bytown200-bicentennial-storytelling-challenge
Chloe Dennis – Luxury Passenger Steamboats of the Rideau Canal
16 September 2025
Chloe Dennis
Chloe Dennis is Exhibitions and Collections Manager for the Bytown Museum. After the completion of the Rideau Canal, it was actively used by transport steamers until the 1870s when a…
Allison Margot Smith – The Rideau Canal (Films)
18 August 2025
HSO
Historian and documentary filmmaker Allison Margot Smith, winner of the Ontario Historical Society’s President’s Awards for her fascinating documentary films, shares four of her short films reflecting back on the…
Jean-Luc Pilon – Paddling through the Past
18 August 2025
HSO
What vast history existed here in the Ottawa area, long before the establishment of Bytown and the Rideau Canal? Renowned archaeologist/anthropologist Dr. Jean-Luc Pilon helps us reveal our area’s past.…
Michael McBane – Bytown 1847
15 August 2025
HSO
Historian Michael McBane, author of Bytown 1847: Élisabeth Bruyère & the Irish Famine Refugees, re-tells this important story for the "Time Travelling with the Historical Society of Ottawa" HSO/Rogers TV…
Jim Stone – Chief Pinesi
15 August 2025
HSO
Much of our nation’s capital today sits specifically on the (unceded) traditional land of Grand Chief Pierre Louis Pinesi and his family. Jim Stone, a non-Indigenous historian, researched the story…
Rick Henderson – The Capital Builders
11 August 2025
HSO
Rick Henderson is the great-great-great-great-grandson of Philemon Wright & Abigail Wyman and author of "Capital Chronicles". Rick recounts the history of the region in four parts: The Curious Cast that Created Canada's…
Ken Watson – History of the Rideau Canal
11 August 2025
HSO
![This 1688 map [1910 copy] is one of the first to name the Rideau River. "Kataracoux" is today's Kingston and "Tonniata" is Brockville.](/media/k2/items/cache/3119c7be2ab58173062c39c6b8c72ed7_S.jpg?t=20250818_135537)
Ken Watson, a member of the Board of “Friends of the Rideau” since 1997, is a geologist with a deep interest in Rideau heritage and the environment. Ken recounts the…
Alastair Sweeny – “Ice Shintie” in Bytown
10 August 2025
HSO
Alastair Sweeny, PhD, has written extensively about Thomas Mackay, including his 2022 book “Thomas Mackay: The Laird of Rideau Hall and the Founding of Ottawa”. Other books authored by Alastair…
James Powell – Today in Ottawa's History
9 August 2025
HSO
James Powell is the author of the blog Today in Ottawa's History giving a day-by-day account of local history. The AnishinabekFor thousands of years before the Rideau Canal and Bytown, the Ottawa Valley was…
Paul Weber – Stories in Song
8 August 2025
HSO
Paul Weber is a bilingual singer-songwriter, guitarist, storyteller and videographer who likes to share Ottawa history in song. In this 3½ minute video, Paul performs an ode to the workers who…
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