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Governor-in-Chief of British North America and Lord High Commissioner, 1838.
John George Lambton Durham, 1st Earl of, politician, diplomat, colonial administrator (b at London, Eng 12 Apr 1792; d at Cowes, Eng 28 July 1840). Scion of a wealthy Northumberland family, Durham was educated at Eton, briefly held an army commission, was elected to the Commons in 1813 and raised to the Lords in 1828. Affiliated with the liberal wing of the Whig party, "Radical Jack" was lord privy seal in 1830 in the Cabinet of his father-in-law, Lord Grey, and played a significant part in drafting the great Reform Bill of 1832. He was a difficult colleague and, suffering from poor health, he resigned in 1833 but was ambassador to Russia 1835-37.
Primarily to appease the radicals, Prime Minister Lord Melbourne persuaded him to become governor general and high commissioner to British North America with responsibility for preparing a report on the Canadian Rebellions of 1837. On 29 May 1838 Durham landed in Lower Canada. His administration was warmly endorsed by the English minority in Lower Canada, the moderate reformers in Upper Canada and the American government, as well as the authorities at home.
But when the British government refused to sanction an illegal ordinance exiling a handful of political prisoners to Bermuda, Durham submitted his letter of resignation 29 Sept 1838 and sailed from Québec 1 Nov 1838 to England where in Jan 1839 he completed his famous Report on the Affairs of British North America. His major recommendation was to reunite the Canadas in order to accelerate the assimilation of the French Canadians, whom he characterized as a people without a history or a culture; the union was brought into effect in 1841. He also recommended a reorganization of the system of colonial government, but the British government refused to accept the principle of Responsible Government (a term for which Durham refused to accept paternity because of its ambiguity) because it was not prepared to accept the inevitability of a form of party government in the colonies.
Although Lord Sydenham and his successors in the United Province of Canada and Lord Falkland in Nova Scotia in practice did accept the necessity of governing through a majority in the assembly, the principle of responsible government was not formally recognized by the British government until 1847, and the first avowedly party governments were admitted to power in 1848, in Nova Scotia by Sir John Harvey and then in Canada by Durham's son-in-law Lord Elgin.
Recent historiography has tended to be more critical of Durham's behaviour and skeptical of his accomplishments, and he remains a hated figure in French Canada, but he was pre-eminent among the founders of the modern Commonwealth.

John (Jack) Hornby was an English explorer best known for his expeditions in the Arctic region, notably in the Northwest Territory of Canada. Hornby was born to a wealthy family in England and migrated to Canada in 1904.

Hornby's first trip to the Arctic was to the Great Bear Lake region in 1908 and he developed a strong fascination with the Canadian Arctic wilderness. Apart from occasional trips to Edmonton and service in World War I, Hornby spent the rest of his life in the Arctic region of northern Canada.

He became known as the "hermit of the north" for his efforts to live off the land with limited supplies. In 1923, Hornby teamed up with an Englishman James Critchell Bullock (1898-1953) in efforts to spend an entire year in the Arctic near Hudson Bay living off the land without supplies except for weapons. The pair barely survived and Critchell Bullock's diaries formed the basis of Malcolm Waldron's book Snow Man: John Hornby in the Barren Lands first published in 1931.

In 1926, Hornby tried to spend a year in a spot by the Thelon River with his 18 year old cousin Edgar Christian and another young man Harold Adlard. Unfortunately, the trio missed the caribou migration southward and therefore lacked sufficient food to survive the winter. Hornby died of starvation along with his companions in 1927. The graves of the three men can be found by the Thelon River.

Hornby recommended in a report following his expedition with Critchell-Bullock that the areas near the Thelon and Hanbury Rivers be created as a wildlife sanctuary. The Thelon Game Sanctuary was established in 1927, renamed Thelon Wildlife Sanctuary in 1956, and this area remains the heart of the largest area of wilderness in North America. The publication of Waldron's book proved successful and sparked further interest in the Northern wilderness.