Today in Regina, Sask., Canada Post unveiled its fifth Canada 150 stamp, this honouring the 8,000-kilometre Trans-Canada Highway.
Country music star Dean Brody, who was in town for a stop on his cross-country Beautiful Freakshow tour, participated in the unveiling, which was held at Brandt Customer Support Centre. Madeline Merlo—the opening act on the Beautiful Freakshow tour—also attended the unveiling.
“I’m just really excited to be a part of this. I’m a proud Canadian,” said Brody at today’s unveiling, adding he lived abroad for six years. “It took—for me, anyways—going away and coming back to really appreciate my country, and one of the big things was the highway. As soon as I crossed from Maine into New Brunswick, it was like, ‘Man, I’m home.’ There was something special about that road—that road taking me ultimately to my physical home. I’m really happy to be involved in this campaign. It’s an exciting time to be involved in Canadian history, so thank you for that.”
The stamp displays the familiar Trans-Canada Highway white-on-green maple leaf route markers.
When Prime Minister John Diefenbaker officially opened the highway in 1962 at Rogers Pass, B.C., he said: “This highway, may it serve to bring Canadians closer together. May it bring to all Canadians a renewed determination to individually do their part to make this nation greater and greater still.”
Today, Canada’s coast-to-coast highway runs through all 10 provinces and has multiple routes joining nearly every major city in Canada. It also connects to roads heading north into the Yukon and Northwest Territories as well as south into the U.S.
BRANDT GROUP OF COMPANIES
The Brandt Group of Companies chairman Gavin Semple built what was once a small agriculture equipment business into one of the largest private companies in Canada.
UNVEILING SCHEDULE
The official first-day cover for today’s Trans-Canada Highway release.
The first stamp of the Canada 150 series was unveiled in Montréal on April 27 by Habitat 67 architect Moshe Safdie in commemoration of Expo 67. The second stamp, this in celebration of the Constitution and Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, was unveiled on May 3 on Parliament Hill. The following day, the series’ third stamp was unveiled by Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Jeremy Hansen. The fourth stamp, this honouring the 2005 passing of the Civil Marriage Act, was unveiled May 8 in Toronto.
The remaining unveilings are slated for:
- May 25 in St. John’s, Nfld.;
- May 30 in Iqaluit, Nunavut;
- May 31 in Winnipeg, Man.; and
- June 1 in Vancouver, B.C., where the program’s final two stamps will be unveiled.
The entire set will be available for purchase in post offices across the country as well as online on June 1 (although pre-ordering is open now).
For more information about each release, visit canadapost.ca/canada150.