Civil rights pioneer Viola Desmond will be the first Canadian woman to be featured on the ten dollar bill. I doubt most Canadians have ever heard of Viola, although she was featured on a stamp in 2012. On November 8, 1946, she went to the Roseland Theatre in Nova Scotia to see a movie. Black people could only
sit in the balcony of the theatre but Viola sat in the downstairs section which was only for whites.She was removed, taken to jail, and charged with defrauding the Province of a penny because she had not paid the 1 cent extra to sit downstairs. Viola appealed and her court case was the first known legal challenge against racial segregation brought forward by a black woman in Canada.
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Other stories and bios of Viola (Davis) Desmond:
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