About the Club

Logo: City of Kingston, Ontario, Canada

Canadian Club of Kingston

Updated: 02 September 2010 Please note the change in day from Thursday for monthly luncheons October to May at noon, to second Wednesday each month.

Next Speaker: Wednesday 13 October 2010

Dr. Alec Douglas, Ex-Director of History, Department of National Defence

Topic: "Old wine into new wineskins: Canada's Navy at the century mark"

Membership Reminder - Former and potential new members, please consider joining for 2010-11.

Membership Fee: $40 for an individual, and $70 for a couple.

CONTENTS

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About the Club

Membership Matters

2010-11 Program

Next Speaker

2010-11 Menus - Minos

Past Programs

Membership Application

Canadian Club of Kingston Sponsors

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Our Objectives
The Canadian Club of Kingston exists today, as it has since 1980, to promote Canadian identity and foster Canadian unity. It encourages knowledge of Canada’s own history, honours native talent in the arts, sciences, business and public affairs, and ‘fosters patriotic sentiment.’ The Club is a product of its time and of its place. At the outset, it was about nation-building. As Vincent Massey, one of the country’s great Governors-General, put it in 1952, “Canadian Clubs… are made possible by our national character; they are made necessary by our national need. Theirs is a great honour and a heavy responsibility.” Still today, it is about nurturing a sense of nationhood in a highly diverse population.

Our Programs and Themes
In the decades since its founding, the ways and means the Club has used to pursue its goals have evolved but its purpose has remained the same: to foster fellowship among people proud to celebrate their Canadian identity and to educate, inform, and stimulate thought about issues of national significance. Different from service clubs or groups raising funds for specific causes, the Club’s not-for-profit work focuses mainly on organizing events at which invited speakers share their knowledge and insights with Club members and guests. Some unique characteristics of the Canadian Club of Kingston include:
• Its strong association with students and educational institutions at secondary and tertiary levels. An ‘attitude of helpful friendliness’ in the Club’s early days towards Queen's University, the Royal Military College, and St. Lawrence College has grown into today’s active seeking of secondary-school students’ attendance at Club functions.
• Its focus on a balanced set of topics between those of historical interest and contemporary events and activities.

Our History
The Canadian Club of Kingston held its first meeting in 1910, but at some point in its history it ceased to meet. It was reborn in 1983 and has been active in the life of Kingston since then. From this high-level start, the Club continued to attract illustrious speakers to its podium.

In recent years, the Club has been pleased to host speakers such as:

the Honourable Bob Rae ,
General (Retired) John de Chastelain,
Jan Wong, author and journalist,
Brian Osborne, Past President Ontario Historical Society, and Professor Emeritus Queen’s University Geography Department
Mr. Volker Thomsen – President, St. Lawrence College, and
Dr. Henri Habib – Professor Emeritus, Concordia University.