Forrest Pass
forrestpass.bsky.social
Forrest Pass
@forrestpass.bsky.social
Historian, curator, heraldist, vexillologist, collector of arcane and eclectic Canadiana. All opinions my own. Likes, reskeets =/= endorsement.
Not gonna lie, this is precisely the highly niche and confidently confrontational content that I have come to expect - and crave - on Bluesky...
Sorry to the man who came into my store looking for a Peters Projection world map. I stand by my words but you didn't deserve the tone of voice I used to say "absolutely not because I'm not a hack."
December 27, 2025 at 9:06 PM
The counterchanged circle represents the Arctic sun but also an iceberg, half-hidden beneath the surface, quietly waiting to sink hubristic schemes... #vexillology #HandsOffGreenland
Erfalasorput, the flag of Kalaallit Nunaat / Greenland is one of the finest flag designs in the world. Posting for no reason (except, just maybe, #HandsOffGreenland). #vexillology
December 24, 2025 at 1:34 PM
Seymour Martin Lipsett put it best when he remarked that two nations, not one, came out of the Great Treason of 1776. And one of those (and I'm not saying which one) exists principally to make the other look silly. #cdnhist #canpoli
The Atlantic suggesting, without evidence, that Canada's Global TV broadcasting the '60 Minutes' segment on CECOT that CBS distributed to it may have been an act of "treachery."

🔗: www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2025/1...
December 23, 2025 at 8:48 PM
Also predicting the flag and coat of arms of the year. Here's the blazon.

Sable.

Thank you, that is all.

#heraldry #vexillology
Early prediction for 2026 Pantone color of the year #redacted
December 23, 2025 at 2:39 PM
Erfalasorput, the flag of Kalaallit Nunaat / Greenland is one of the finest flag designs in the world. Posting for no reason (except, just maybe, #HandsOffGreenland). #vexillology
December 23, 2025 at 2:25 PM
A dock worker loads cargo on board a Canada Steamship Lines vessel, using a mover to load boxes through a hatchway, c. 1955. Edward O. Clark, SSHSA Archives.
December 23, 2025 at 1:39 PM
Reposted by Forrest Pass
In this spirit:

His Majesty the King, by and with the consent of the Senate and House of Commons of Canada, enacts as follows:

(1) A letter of marque shall come from the King;

(2) To the scummiest vessel you've ever seen;

(3) Notwithstanding the foregoing, God Damn Them All!

#cdnhist #cdnpoli
S.3567
A bill to authorize the President of the United States to ...

SPONSOR: Sen. Mike Lee (R), UT
№ CO-SPONSORS: 0

STATUS: Introduced

LATEST ACTION: Senate - 2025-12-18 Read twice and referred to the Committee on ...

#Republicans

Details at congress.gov
December 22, 2025 at 7:50 PM
In this spirit:

His Majesty the King, by and with the consent of the Senate and House of Commons of Canada, enacts as follows:

(1) A letter of marque shall come from the King;

(2) To the scummiest vessel you've ever seen;

(3) Notwithstanding the foregoing, God Damn Them All!

#cdnhist #cdnpoli
S.3567
A bill to authorize the President of the United States to ...

SPONSOR: Sen. Mike Lee (R), UT
№ CO-SPONSORS: 0

STATUS: Introduced

LATEST ACTION: Senate - 2025-12-18 Read twice and referred to the Committee on ...

#Republicans

Details at congress.gov
December 22, 2025 at 7:50 PM
I stopped for coffee on a drive from Osoyoos to Vancouver this summer and am pleased to report it hasn't really changed that much #bchist #cdnhist
downtown princeton bc in the 1930s or 1940s, showing bridge street plus bridges over both the tulameen (foreground) and similkameen (background) rivers.
#bchist #cdnhist
December 22, 2025 at 4:52 PM
Reposted by Forrest Pass
As the Red Ensign and variants appear prominently in this group's display, it seems a good time to reshare my brief history of the Ensign's use by extremists. British Israelism, fluoride, and the Rothschilds - oh my! #cdnhist #vexillology #cdnpoli

activehistory.ca/blog/2023/02...
December 21, 2025 at 11:00 PM
As the Red Ensign and variants appear prominently in this group's display, it seems a good time to reshare my brief history of the Ensign's use by extremists. British Israelism, fluoride, and the Rothschilds - oh my! #cdnhist #vexillology #cdnpoli

activehistory.ca/blog/2023/02...
December 21, 2025 at 11:00 PM
December 18, 2025 at 8:06 PM
The Gatineau Village des Valeurs is, oddly, a good source of vintage British Columbiana, including this seasonal offering today. Taking its place in my painstakingly assembled set of Sound Heritage, including @djduffy.bsky.social's "Imagine Please" #cdnhist #bchist #ThriftingThursday (a day early)
December 17, 2025 at 11:58 PM
If you need a copperplate of a capybara eating a banana today (I know I did...)
A break from Christmas content to enjoy this capybara eating a banana. From François Froger's 'A relation of a voyage ...' (London, 1698).
December 17, 2025 at 5:59 PM
Not often that Kitchener, BC, a tiny community east of Creston, gets a shout out. I wonder how this ended up in Nebraska? #cdnhist #bchist #archives

(Photo of the Kitchener Hotel, about 1940, from BC Archives, and a street view of downtown Kitchener today, just because..)
December 16, 2025 at 8:03 PM
#OTD in 1964, the House of Commons voted to adopt the current National Flag of Canada. Some MPs, though, were a little unclear on the official design, as the b&w photo in this post shows. #cdnhist #vexillology
Latest #vexillology #ephemera find: a Jan 1965 magazine with the new Cdn flag on the cover. Or a version thereof, and a curious one: not quite Alan Beddoe's Oct 1964 model, but same as the flag used by Lib MPs to celebrate in Dec 1964. A flag-maker's error? More in alt-text. #cdnhist
December 15, 2025 at 5:10 PM
Reposted by Forrest Pass
I don't care what they "claim" they've "done": I'm not sending my shirts there. Found on rhe back of a clipping, Montreal, about 1910. #cdnhist #laundry #archives
December 14, 2025 at 1:26 PM
I don't care what they "claim" they've "done": I'm not sending my shirts there. Found on rhe back of a clipping, Montreal, about 1910. #cdnhist #laundry #archives
December 14, 2025 at 1:26 PM
Reposted by Forrest Pass
I do not understand this holiday.
December 13, 2025 at 9:13 PM
Anyone in #bookhistory or #paperhistory familiar with a paper maker (presumably British) called (or using the mark) "Lansdown"? Watermarks ound in the bylaws book of a rural Canadian Masonic lodge, mid-1860s. #FreemasonryFriday #CdnHist
December 12, 2025 at 6:46 PM
He's coming soon, and He wants fill, people! #YuletideTomfoolery
Going through some old photos and chuckling at this one I took on Manitoulin Island in 2015. Forget gold, frankincense, and myrrh, guys: He's coming soon, and He wants fill!
December 12, 2025 at 4:47 PM
Going through some old photos and chuckling at this one I took on Manitoulin Island in 2015. Forget gold, frankincense, and myrrh, guys: He's coming soon, and He wants fill!
December 12, 2025 at 2:56 PM
The Religious Goods Department at Honest Ed's in Toronto used to sell these.. #cdnhist

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honest_...
December 10, 2025 at 1:34 PM
One could say that after this date in 1917, @pmbowell.bsky.social moved no more... #cdnhist
On this day in 1917, Sir Mackenzie Bowell died. He had served in the House of Commons and the Senate since 1867, including as Prime Minister from 1894 to 1896.

Learn more in my Deep Dive 👇
buff.ly/7goIa9z
December 10, 2025 at 12:21 PM
Sharing with some cheering beaver-related news!

www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/ar...
December 9, 2025 at 2:04 PM