This week, the new Lotta56sparks.ca blog has received its 1,000th visitor!
Sincere thanks to those who have dropped by to reminisce or learn something new about Lotta Hitschmanova, and special appreciation for those who have shared their own “Lotta stories” so others can learn about this inspiring refugee to Canada and the unique part she played in Canadian social history.
In case you missed them, here are the 5 most popular blog posts to date: Continue reading
For me, one of the more surprising results of the Bank of Canada’s survey on 12 “bank-notable” women was how few people (29%) recognized Lotta Hitschmanova’s name.
When the Bank of Canada’s cross-country survey of 2,000 Canadians asked which of 12 “bank-notable” Canadian women had “left a lasting legacy”, humanitarian Lotta Hitschmanova came out on top: Continue reading
When the Bank of Canada announced its short list of 5 women candidates to appear on a Canadian banknote, I was a bit surprised to read that Lotta Hitschmanova (1909-1990) wasn’t on the list. I wondered, perhaps I had been mistaken, and Lotta’s story no longer resonated with Canadians to the degree I thought it did.
Recently the Bank of Canada has published the full details of the cross-country survey of 2,000 Canadians who voiced their opinions about the women (including Lotta) who had made it onto the long list of 12 “bank-notable” Canadian women.
In my upcoming series of Lotta56sparks.ca blog posts, I will highlight some of the results of this cross-Canada survey. Here is today’s key finding: Continue reading
After 4 years of wandering around Europe as a refugee, Lotta Hitschmanova applied for a visa to immigrate to America.
She was rejected, but in January 1942, she received the following message in a telegram, as related by Lotta’s biographer, Clyde Sanger:
“Hitschmanova Canadian duration visa granted.”
“To be a refugee, to be without a home, to be without country, to be without friends … you have no more roots, you have no one to turn to.”
Lotta Hitschmanova (1909-1990) became one of Canada’s most beloved humanitarians and a role model and champion for women’s rights.
Before this, however, Lotta experienced the extreme pain of being uprooted, from her beloved Czech homeland, wandering across Western Europe as a refugee from 1938 to 1942. Continue reading
‘The smell was enough to give you the DTs.”
Lotta Hitschmanova inspired thousands of USC Canada supporters from coast to coast, many of whom packed clothing for shipment to those in need overseas. Sometimes they volunteered in unusual circumstances, as Lotta’s biographer Clyde Sanger has noted:
Lotta Hitschmanova, Cyprus, 1950s
“It seems to have been an instinctive desire on her part to bring out the leadership qualities she knew were in so many talented women she met, and an intuition that their ideas on human development would match her own.”
As millions of women and men around the world march to the cry of “women’s rights are human rights” – amid calls for greater tolerance, social justice, dignity and respect – a tiny candle of remembrance lights itself in honour of our women’s rights pioneers of times passed.
Lotta Hitschmanova (1909-1990) was one of those early pioneers.
From the 1940s to the 1980s, Lotta Hitschmanova inspired thousands of Canadians to empty their pockets to support USC Canada‘s work with the needy in far off lands.
Teenagers were by no means immune to Lotta’s appeals for help, as this small nugget from Clyde Sanger’s biography of Lotta indicates:
Mike Myers, Shelagh Rogers, CBC radio photo
“What does it mean to be Canadian? Well, for one thing, if you’re of a certain age (Mike Myers is 53), it means you have stored away in your memory banks one of Canada’s most famous addresses, 55 Sparks Street, Ottawa 4 – or was it 56 Sparks?” Continue reading