“Friday, March 8, 1968

events of which there were 317 during the calendar year 1967—celebrations, per— formances and other events, among which were the Lighting of the Flame; Religious Services; Receptions; Historical Addresses; Art Shows; Seasonal Sport Competitions; Theatre Performances; Parades; Recognition of Centennarians; Carnivals; Music and Drama Festivals. All these and more were Centennial Events activities.

I am not suggesting, of course, that all these were initiated in Centennial Year, but many of them were involved and had Centennial programs of either a Provincial, Community or National flavour. Among the many committees was the Committee on the Performing Arts whose aim was to guide the people of Canada to a better un-

derstanding of each other’s culture and heritage through a broadening interest in raising standards and stimulating new ideas.

A ticket assistance plan was devised by the Federal Government, which was agreed to by the Provincial government by contributing 60% to share assistance of tickets, with the Federal contributing 40%. Among the performances which were seen on this basis which provided people of Prince Edward Island with admission prices which could be reached by all were: The National Ballet, Stratford Players, Holiday Theatre, Laval University Choir, Gordie Lightfoot, Ian and Sylvia, One Hun- dred Years of Musical Comedy, The Travellers, and The Best of Barkerville.

The communities celebrated Centennial Year with the opening of such centen- nial projects as: community rinks, hall, playgrounds, swimming pools and other per- manent projects. To assist this was a shared-cost program with the Federal and Provincial governments of one dollar per capita. For every dollar paid by the com- munity one dollar was paid by Canada and one dollar by the Province. The total

amount spent on these permanent projects was approximately $600,000 in the Prov- ince during Centennial year.

The Confederation Caravan arrived in Prince Edward Island during the first week in July, beginning in Murray River on the 30th June, and leaving at Borden on the 10th of July. There were ten communities at which the Caravan called and two at which the Train called—Summerside and Charlottetown—between October 20th and 24th. The attendance at these historical views in the Caravan and the Train was exceptional in Prince Edward Island. There was a total of 118,000 who viewed these Caravans and the Train in the three counties; 33,600 in Kings County, 38,900 in Queens, 45,700 in Prince. That is, 108% of our population saw the Caravans and the Train. It certainly created a lot of interest and I am sure the people benefited by seeing these displays.

Another program was the Expo Student Travel program. This was through our Department of Education and enabled students from Grade V to Grade XII to take advantage of the opportunity to visit Expo at a very reasonable cost. A com— mittee was appointed to co-ordinate the travel from the homes of the students to Expo and return, arranging accommodation and meals to Montreal and Expo, the collection and administration of funds and the overall supervision of each group to and from Expo. One hundred and forty—five, including Monitor and students, went in May, and 1,404 in September—ea total of 1,639 from the Province during Centen- nial Year.

Decorations Committee was under the chairmanship of Justice Tweedy and, as you recall, Province House, Provincial Administrative Buildings, Business Houses and Institutions, and Civic Public Buildings were all encouraged to decorate their premises. Excellent co-operation were received, and the smaller centres were sup- plied with suitable decorations for all the celebrations.

Student Involvement under the chairmanship of Mrs. Ross, was a very in- volved program and was a very excellent program. This very ambitious project in- volved 27,000 school children in Prince Edward Island. The program was designed to provide a project for all schools for each month of the year. Competitions were held and awards given. For instance there was an Essay Competition in March; Flag Days; Arts and Letters and Science Days in April; Citizenship Projects; Science Fair; Modelling Competition; History Competition; Junior Art Competition, and at the end of the year they were all rewarded for their efforts in the different competitions. One project in Prince Edward Island that I think made the headlines

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