The new globe commissioned by the Royal Canadian Geographic Society on display before the unveiling at the headquarter building in Ottawa on Thursday.Photography by James Park/The Globe and Mail
A handcrafted new globe that disregards President Donald Trump’s edicts, and overtly differentiates Canada from the U.S. by depicting the country in deep “imperial” pink, is the latest addition to the Royal Canadian Geographical Society’s collection.
The Canada Globe, unveiled on Friday, follows Mr. Trump’s assertions that he would like to annex Canada and turn it into the 51st state of America.
It also ignores the President’s executive orders renaming geographical features.
The globe differentiates Canada from the U.S. by showing the country in deep 'imperial' pink.
In an executive order soon after taking office, Mr. Trump renamed the highest peak in North America as Mount McKinley, after former U.S. president William McKinley, who never visited Alaska, where the mountain is located.
The society’s globe refers to the mountain as Denali, or “the high one,” a name bestowed by Indigenous people who have lived in the region of Alaska for centuries.
Former U.S. president Barack Obama’s administration officially changed the name of Mount McKinley to Denali as a symbolic gesture to Indigenous peoples on the eve of a visit to Alaska to highlight climate change.
In addition, the globe does not rename the Gulf of Mexico, despite Mr. Trump’s executive order directing U.S. federal agencies to refer to the oceanic basin, which borders the U.S. and Mexico, as the Gulf of America.
The globe doesn't rename the Gulf of Mexico, despite Donald Trump's executive order directing U.S. federal agencies to refer to the oceanic basin as the Gulf of America.
John Geiger, chief executive of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, said globes typically represent continents − including North America − in the same colour. But the society instructed the globe maker to ensure Canada was a different colour than the United States. It chose imperial pink, used historically to represent Commonwealth countries and those in the British empire.
“It’s been designed specifically to emphasize Canada, Canada’s place in the world, and to stand out relative to its enormous, enormously powerful neighbour,” Mr. Geiger said. “I could not imagine a scenario in which Canada and the United States were the same colour.”
He said the society was concerned by Mr. Trump’s utterings about redrawing the map and assertions that “without some sort of imagined massive subsidy that Canada ceases to exist as a viable country.”
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“Those are pretty hair-raising words from the leader of the free world and I think, underscores the importance of an organization like the Royal Canadian Geographical Society.”
The globe includes the society’s coat of arms and its motto Ducit Amor Patriae – Love of country leads me.
The Canada Globe was hand-crafted − including hand-painted − by British globemakers Bellerby & Co. It was commissioned by Canada’s Oughtred family as a gift to the society. Bespoke Bellerby globes of this size sell for about $122,250.
The huge globe − which is five feet across − is the largest globe produced since the U.S. Army commissioned globes from a cartographer for Churchill and Roosevelt during the Second World War.
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The commissioning of the globe follows another symbolic gesture asserting Canada’s sovereignty earlier this year. In May, to mark the 100th anniversary of the site of the Canadian High Commission in Trafalgar Square, London, a gigantic map of Canada provided by the Royal Canadian Geographical Society was laid out on the floor.
Ralph Goodale, Canada’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, and Perry Bellegarde, former national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, toured the map with King Charles, pointing out Canada’s national parks and other notable sites.
The map had been folded up in a hockey bag and flown over by the society.
The globe is the largest one produced since the U.S. army commissioned globes from a cartographer for Churchill and Roosevelt during the Second World War.James Park/The Globe and Mail
Peter Bellerby, founder of Bellerby & Co, said the colouring of Canada on the globe accentuated that it “is an independent country.” He added that the many tiny islands off the coast of Canada were a challenge for his company’s colourists.
The globe also includes recent official updates to country names, including the African kingdom of Eswatini (previously Swaziland), which was renamed in 2018 to mark its 50th year as an independent state.
But Turkey, which officially changed its name to Türkiye after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government requested the change in May, 2022, remains Turkey.
Hans Island, a tiny barren rock in the Arctic that was the focus of a decades-long territorial dispute between Canada and Denmark, was too small to feature. In 2022, it was amicably divided between Nunavut and Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory, at a ceremony in Ottawa at the Royal Canadian Geographical Society’s headquarters.
The society, which has a large collection of older globes and historic maps, plans to create a map reading room later this year where scholars and interested members of the public can come and view them. The oldest map in its collection dates to 1598 and is one of the earliest extant maps of Newfoundland.
The Dutch copperplate engraving of Terra Nova, which features a sea monster, is among the first to depict the terrain, which is now Newfoundland, as an island.