1965 in Canada

Crown

Head of state (monarch) – Queen Elizabeth II (consort – Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh)

Federal government

Governor general – Georges Vanier (viceregal consort – Pauline Vanier)

Prime minister – Lester B. Pearson

Lieutenant governors

Lieutenant Governor of Alberta – John Percy Page

Lieutenant Governor of British Columbia – George Pearkes

Lieutenant Governor of Manitoba – Errick Willis (until November 1) then Richard Spink Bowles

Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick – Joseph Leonard O'Brien (until June 9) then John B. McNair

Lieutenant Governor of Newfoundland – Fabian O'Dea

Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia – Henry Poole MacKeen

Lieutenant Governor of Ontario – William Earl Rowe

Lieutenant Governor of Prince Edward Island – Willibald Joseph MacDonald

Lieutenant Governor of Quebec – Paul Comtois

Lieutenant Governor of Saskatchewan – Robert Hanbidge

Premiers

Premier of Alberta – Ernest Manning

Premier of British Columbia – W.A.C. Bennett

Premier of Manitoba – Dufferin Roblin

Premier of New Brunswick – Louis Robichaud

Premier of Newfoundland – Joey Smallwood

Premier of Nova Scotia – Robert Stanfield

Premier of Ontario – John Robarts

Premier of Prince Edward Island – Walter Shaw

Premier of Quebec – Jean Lesage

Premier of Saskatchewan – Ross Thatcher

Commissioners

Commissioner of Yukon – Gordon Robertson Cameron

Commissioner of Northwest Territories – Bent Gestur Sivertz

Events

January 1 – Trans-Canada Airlines is renamed Air Canada.

January 9 – The Hope Slide, the largest landslide ever recorded in Canada, kills four.

January 16 – The Canada-United States Automotive Agreement is signed

January 28 – The Queen issues a royal proclamation, effective February 15, making the Maple Leaf flag the National Flag of Canada.

February 15 – National Flag of Canada Day, marked by ceremonies across the Dominion, the Maple Leaf becomes the National Flag.

March 2 – Lucien Rivard escapes from a Montreal area jail

March 7 – Canadian Roman Catholic churches celebrate mass in the vernacular for the first time due to the reforms of Vatican II

March 20 – Peter Lougheed is elected leader of the Alberta Progressive Conservative Party

April 2 – Lester Pearson gives a speech at Temple University in the United States that calls for a stop to the bombing of North Vietnam, infuriating President Lyndon Johnson

May 16 – Cross Country Checkup debuts on radio

June 7 – Navy, army, and air force commands are replaced by six functional commands

July 8 – A crash of a Canadian Pacific Airlines flight in British Columbia kills 52.

September 9 – The Fowler Report is released. It advocates creation of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC)

September 13 - The new Toronto City Hall is opened.

November 8 – Federal election: Lester Pearson's Liberals win a second consecutive minority

November 9 – A failure at an Ontario power station causes the 1965 Blackout that stretches from Florida to Chicago and all of southern Ontario.

November 29 – Alouette 2 is launched.

Full date unknown

Eligibility age for pensions is lowered from 70 to 65

New books

George Grant: Lament for a Nation

John Newlove: Moving in Alone

Robert Kroetsch: But We Are Exiles

Farley Mowat: West Viking

Gilles Archambault: La vie à trois

Hubert Aquin: Prochain épisode

Awards

Gordon R. Dickson's Soldier, Ask Not wins a Hugo Award

See 1965 Governor General's Awards for a complete list of winners and finalists for those awards.

Stephen Leacock Award: Gregory Clark, War Stories

Vicky Metcalf Award: Roderick Haig-Brown

Music

Karel Ančerl replaces Seiji Ozawa as artistic director of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra

Film

October 13 – The Canadian Film Development Agency is formed

Christopher Plummer stars as Captain von Trapp in The Sound of Music

William Shatner stars in Incubus

Sport

March 11 – The NHL admits six new teams and doubles in size.

January to March

January 8

Wendy Fuller, diver

Eric Wohlberg, racing cyclist

January 21 – Brian Bradley, ice hockey player

January 23 – Tim Berrett, race walker

January 27 – Ross MacDonald, sailor and Olympic silver medalist

January 28

Stéphane Bergeron, politician

Tom Ponting, swimmer and double Olympic silver medalist

January 31 – Ofra Harnoy, cellist

March 1 – Stewart Elliott, jockey

March 7 - Alison Redford, politician, and the 14th and current Premier of Alberta

March 15 – Marcel Gery, swimmer and Olympic bronze medalist

March 23 – Daren Puppa, ice hockey player

April to June

April 11 – Chris Pridham, tennis player

April 21 – Ed Belfour, ice hockey player

April 22 – Peter Zezel, ice hockey player (d. 2009)

May 7 – Owen Hart, wrestler (d. 1999)

May 9 – Steve Yzerman, ice hockey player

May 10 – Linda Evangelista, supermodel

May 19 – James Bezan, politician

May 21 – Scott Browning, entrepreneur

June 19 – Gary Vandermeulen, swimmer

June 25 – Julie Daigneault, swimmer

June 26 – Gaye Porteous, field hockey player

July to September

July 26 – Michael Rascher, rower and Olympic gold medalist

August 11 – Marc Bergevin, ice hockey player

August 22 – Patricia Hy-Boulais, tennis player

August 28 – Shania Twain, singer-songwriter

September 8 – Mark Andrews, swimmer

September 9 - Eric Tunney, comedian (Brain Candy) (d. 2010)

September 20 – Peter Loubardias, sportscaster

September 27

Bernard Lord, politician and 30th Premier of New Brunswick

Peter MacKay, lawyer, politician and Minister

October to December

October 5

Mario Lemieux, ice hockey player

Patrick Roy, ice hockey player

October 23 – David Bédard, diver

October 29 – Christy Clark, politician and 35th and current Premier of British Columbia

November 5 – Andrew Crosby, rower and Olympic gold medalist

November 13 - Rick Roberts, actor

November 20 – John Graham, track and field athlete

November 21 – Jon Kelly, swimmer

November 24 – Brad Wall, politician and 14th Premier of Saskatchewan

November 27 – Kathleen Heddle, rower and triple Olympic gold medalist

December 1 – Jamie Pagendam, boxer

December 10 – Jennifer Wyatt, golfer

December 18 – Brian Walton, road and track cyclist and coach

December 29 - Manon Perreault, politician

Full date unknown

Emanuel Jaques, murder victim (d. 1977)

Deaths

January 17 – Austin Claude Taylor, politician (b.1893)

April 1 – Harry Crerar, General (b.1888)

June 7 – John Stewart McDiarmid, politician and Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba (b.1882)

August 23 – George Black, politician (b.1873)

August 28 – Jacob Penner, politician (b.1880)

September 10 – S. E. Rogers, politician (b.1888)

October 8 - Thomas B. Costain, historian (b.1885)

Full date unknown

Fiorenza Johnson, wife of George Alexander Drew, 14th Prime Minister of Ontario