American Reacts to Heritage Minutes: Mona Parsons, Governor Frontenac & "Boat People" Refugees 

There is a famous photo of a young girl in Vietnam running in terror down a street with all of her clothes burned off. She now lives in Canada.

In 1979 a boat people family moved in two doors away from us. We shared dinners back and forth numerous times and helped the family improve their almost non-existent English. They were so courageous to face a culture so different from their own. It was a privilege to know them.

I was a Young teenager during the Vietnamese influx. They adapted the Canadian culture so fast and showed so much respect in assimilating while keeping there roots, it's impressive.

Frontenac was more than 70 years old at the time. He managed to tour the settlements of all First Nations allies of the French in the region, often performing war dances and chants with them. This old man was truly made of steel.

About 10 years ago I was playing video games with someone online, they where from southern california. I told them I was from Canada and they asked the obligatory "do you know this person" Turns out I did and was going to highschool with them. Freaked both of us out equally.

"I shall reply with my cannons!" Is the best real life "Come at me bro!" ever said

Tyler seems to not know that the Americans were British until 1776.

The last one was indeed dubbed. And Frontenac was indeed a bad ass, with his reply: ''I shall answer with the mouth of my canons.''

I used to work with a "boat person" She was among the first wave (pardon the pun) to arrive. She was 13 at the time. She went alone as her Mom stayed behind to look after the younger children who weren't allowed to go. The last time she saw her father was when he dropped her off to begin her journey. He was killed as a civilian by the North Vietnamese Army. Her Mom and sisters all live in Canada now.

Trivia: Mona is played here by celebrated Canadian actress Sonja Smits

We know about her here in Nova Scotia Canada where she died the year before I was born. My parents live in Wolfville Nova Scotia where she was from. Wolfville is a small community especially back then

Hey Tyler thanks for shoutout I’m JOHN from 🇨🇦 Canada…

Montreal canadiens hockey also known as Habs hat for the ones from Asia

The sad thing is they missed the WHOLE story about that meeting with Frontenac. First the Acadians were seiged so a runner of the woods was on his way to Fort Quebec to warn them and stopped at a small village near the mouth of the St. Lawrence called Rivier Ouelle to warn those people too Capt Phipps with 6 or 9 chips were on the way. So 32 fighting men lead by the village priest lead an ambush on Captain Phipps ships that were now nearing thier coast. Soon the ships docked and about 2000 men started rowing to shore in small rowboats the Rivier Ouelle men lay in wait in the woods on the banks, and when most came to shore thats when the priest yelled Tiroir! or Fire and they successfully ambushed and killed a good 1200. So they quickly retreated and rowed back to thier main ships and kept going toward Quebec, but another runner of the woods made it to Fort Quebec with that new news and so when Phipps arrived thats when the French knew they could overt take him, so they answered him with the mouth of thier cannons and he left with like 3 remaining ships, Imagine getting back to Boston harbour with I think it was one of 2 ships because they'd met a storm at the mouth of the St. Lawrence that downed a few more LOL!

🇨🇦 Give us your tired, your hungry, your oppressed, your poor. We're here we will help 🇨🇦 🍁 🇨🇦 🍁 🇨🇦

6500 refugees was the first wave.

I like that you are watching these. As, a Canadian I am watching some for the first time as well. Thank you.

Before 1776 the British from New England considered themselves to be "American" since they were from a British colony.

Canadians were the most honourable, hardest fighting, and proudest soldiers in the European Theater. We made it the furthest into France on D-Day, led the fight to liberate the Netherlands, and were among the last fighters to leave the battlefields in 1945, making sure no injured soldiers were left behind. When the world needed us, we stepped up. Canada is filled with refugees that fled harsh homelands, and it only has added to the broad mosaic of nations and cultures that make up the Maple Leaf Quilt

You may not be aware but south-east Asia was known as French Indo-China for several decades. French was spoken commonly and was the second language for many who lived there. That is one of the reasons many of them immigrated to Quebec as there would be less of a language barrier.

One thing I've noticed about Americans is you've lost all subtlety. If they're not shouting "EFF YOU!" they're not getting their point across. Miss Parson's "Good morning" was a big, fat, middle finger to the man who just tried to steal her life in the only terms she had. To this day a Canadian can say "Blow me!" with a simple "Sorry."

As a social member of the UU Church in Montreal, I helped settle two "boat people" families into apartments in our city. Looking back, I feel fortunate to have been able to help them.

I remember that very well. I worked in a day care and we had a boat people family come. They were the kindest sweetest gentlest people i had ever met. Their little boy would be brought to day care along with the grandmother whose job was to take care of the baby. So grateful to be safe and sound. After their son graduated from day care into elementary school we didnt see them for a few years but one day the father brought his then 7 year old son back to the day care to show him where he spent his first years in Canada. Also to meet all of us, his teachers. Its a moment I will never ever forget. He is probably in his 40s now and I hope doing well along with his very brave parents.

At the time the frontenac film was made, most canadians took the details in school and already knew what was going on. Also there was a tv series called frontenac , so he wasnt unknown

Maybe after you watch all the heritage minutes, you should watch some of the National Film Board clips

So happy you are still doing these and glad you love them and excited to watch them

In the Battle of Quebec, the Americans were still British at the time, it was before your war of independence.

"Frontenac beat them off" gives me a different view of Canadian history than the one I learned in school.

I am going to be sad when Tyler runs out of Heritage Minutes to watch!

Tyler, I much appreciate your featuring these snippets of Canadian history, each week on your channel. Thanks. Sometimes your reactions (not this type) aggravate me because of your faux naïvité, but these are little gems. Merci. 🇨🇦

"... but Frontenac beat them off ..." 💀😂 I've seen the Fairmont Le Château Frontenac in person, he must've done a lot of beating. 😅 I'm kidding ofcourse.

There were multiple waves of Vietnamese refugees. An old boyfriend told me he remembers being on the boat even though he was very young.

The Montreal Canadiens. They've won the most Stanley Cups of any team in the NHL and were one of the original 6 teams.

many Hollywood actor's fought in WW2 . Audrey Hepburn Also worked with the Dutch Resistance - The original Capital of New France(Quebec) Was Loisburg in what is now Nova Scotia, some of which were called Acadian's and refused to Swear alligience to England, so they were deported, many to New Orleans where the name Acadian eventually became Cajun

Governor Frontenac explanation...the ships attacking were from New England. The envoys that were sent to demand surrender were blindfolded and lead through rioting mobs of people in the streets to make it seem that the French had more people than they actually did. The French man who was provoking them got them to tell him how many ships etc they had while they were fighting. The famous declaration that his only reply would be by "the mouth of my cannons." After this the French did realize that their city needed more defenses and strengthened them significantly.

Mona Parsons home town of Wolfville NS has a monument in front of the Post Office and there is now a stamp commemorating her

Maybe it was Mona’s politeness that saved her life? 😊

In middle and high school in the 1980's, there were always a few boat people refugees in my class. My dad had stories about WW2 refugees from Poland in school with him.

The Netherlands were occupied by the Germans. There was no Dutch army at that point - only a resistance movement. There was a show - X Company - about Canadian spies during WWII. You have to be a Habs fan in Quebec. The three Canadian MPs of Vietnamese ancestry all came from Quebec. Jean-Emery Gagnon is the actor who played the taunter / swordfighter

First clip, proof that we Canadians do know everyone in the country.🤣😂🤣😂

Although the Count Frontenac video says they were Americans they were more likely American Reserves in the British military. The same would occur during the War of 1812 when Canadian reserve troops and Indigenous allies fended off an attack by American forces then launched their own assault, burning down many of the American government buildings.

The Thirteen Colonies, later known as the United States of America, were a British colony for another one hundred years after the Battle of Quebec. I can only assume the British soldiers depicted in this heritage minute were from the Thirteen Colonies.

@Tyler Bucket Remember, at that time, the Americans weren't "American" yet. They were still a British colony.

Coincidentally, not far from where Mona rests is Hendrikus Vanderwal who was in the Dutch resistance who also was captured and sent to a labour camp in Strasbourg France named Natzweiler. This camp was the POC camp for Auschwitz. He met Dirk DeVries there who also lays to rest in Willowbank. After 2 miserable years in this camp they were 2 of only 5 people to ever escape the camp. They attempted to get to Switzerland but were again captured by the Nazis and sent to another camp in Nordhausen Germany named Mittelbau Dora. This is where the V2 rockets were manufactured toward the end of the war. They were there for 2 years as well and escaped when it was bombed and leveled by the allies. Then Henk and Dirk also treked by foot back to Holland. Henk married Willy, whose sister married a Highlander, which initiated the family moving to Wolfville. Henk started a business in Wolfville that allowed him to sponsor Dutch people to Canada and employ them. I have spent a lot of my life attempting to gather more information about their story which is equally significant.

I've never heard of Mona Parsons. This must be a newer heritage minute.

I smell burned toast/do you smell burned toast? Was a meme before there were memes. This was an entire nations inside joke in regard to someone acting like a space cadet.

Great uploads man, love the channel. Canadian viewer here, I am tempted to mail you an empty clean tim hortons cup and a little packet of tim hortons coffee so you can pour it in the cup and feel canadian for a moment lol

I think that seen with Governeur Frontenac in The Heritage Minute, was taken from a Quebecois film that's been dubbed, and the English-Canadian actor who did the voiceover, using the exaggerated voice was being a "ham" using his best Monty Pythonesque French accent as a bit of a joke. Very funny!🤣

If you grew up in the same small town you would know eachother. Everyone from Bell Island in Newfoundland seems to know everyone else from the island. So it's not impossible that someone from her town would have recognized her.

On a recent walk in Calgary I discovered a small park with memorials that recorded this event. I met up with an older Vietnamese man who told me the story and explained the symbols of the monument. Many other counties were involved and it is inspiring to see how the kindness of people and their countries offer safe homes for those less fortunate.

There’s so many heritage minutes I haven’t seen, or forget. Thanks Tyler, the production of this one’s funny 😊

So great that Tyler recognized that it was a hockey logo. Yes, it's the Montreal Canadiens

Hi average American! Just wanted to mention that as a person that has always lived in Canada, I have seen and tasted ketchup flavoured ice cream more than once in my teenage life…….. you heard me right btw. WELCOME TO CANADA 🇨🇦

Not all Canadians know each other, but most Maritimers do. Being the chatty outgoing sort, it’s nothing for two Maritimers to get into a conversation in a grocery line and find out they have some close connection in common. “Six degrees of separation” may apply in other part of the world; in the Maritimes it’s more like two degrees of separation.

Actually, we do know one another.... we just don't let on to the World that we're that well connected with each other.... trade secrets, you know...

The movie Ru (can watch it with English subtitles) is about a Vietnamese girl and her family in rural Quebec.

Thanks for showing us many of those heritage minutes... I might have seen about 25 of them and really enjoy seen more of them, as part of my history.

it's because of the referent: "I will answer you through the mouth of my canons" it's a sentence that we learn in primary school and which was always in the exams.

You don't get your honourary degree until you watch "Canada: A People's History"

My kindergarten teacher's family fled America just a few years before the boat people heritage minute, to save their two teenage boys from The Draft. And yes, they were welcomed to our village.

Mona Parsons was an actress in Canada who joined Zigfield's Follies in New York. So many Canadian soldiers might have recognised her. But Harry Foster had been her childhood friend in small-town Nova Scotia. So, it was quite a coincidence that he came across her path, in Europe, near the end of The War.

Canadians are human and we have our dark history too but we are/have been always pushing for a better country. Except for our native people the majority of Canadians are not three generations living here. We are all neighbours in the second largest house in the world, we disagree & argue but we need each other for Canada to prosper !

So a Canadian Military Training Camp was and still exists on the outskirts of Kentville NS. Kentville is just down the road from Volfville. The soldiers training at Camp Aldershot would spend many an evening or weekend seeing the sights of Kentville Wolfville and meeting the people.

The story at the time was that no country wanted the 'boat people', so Canada took them in. I remember that time quite well, as I was a teenager then and it was on the news steady. The knitted hat (toque) has the Montreal Canadians Hockey team logo.

I did not Know the first story at all. This is something new that I learned about my country. Cool. Concerning the Vietnamese boat people, I was quite young and it was all over the news at the time, We saw the boat people who were being stopped at gun point in the water by other countries and boat people with their boats flooding and no food and starving and many died on their journey. And at the time growing up in Vancouver, British Columbia. I think most of Canada felt deep empathy for the plight of the vietnamese people and welcomed them with open arms. Boat people was not a derogatory term. And later it kind of became one. But it started out to mean somebody that just stepped off the boat of whom knew nothing about the new culture, which in itself should not be an insult. When I think of the boat people, and because I was there and I saw it live on the news, I don't think of it as a derogatory term at all. Thank you for all your hard work. I love your Canada series the best. Because "I am a canadian!" ( that's a Joe Canadian Reference From the I am a Canadian commercials, which you have studied)

1690, the colonies were still British. Royal Navy, the troops were a regiment from the Massachusetts colony

well it did mention she was an actress , so i doubt there was many canadian actresses back in the day , she would of been recognized eventually by another canadian for sure . and yes i do know John from canada , he lives 3 igloos down from me lol .

Mona Parsons was from the same area I’m from , some of the senior officers might of known of her if she was spying for them , Wolfville is the home of Acadia University

The famous Frontenac saying is "I will reply by the mouth of my canons" in French being "Je vais répondre par la bouche de mes canons", and you an still find old canons everywhere in Quebec city, the last fortified city in the american continent.

Some of my uncles were boat people. Super thankful they came to Canada, can't imagine living anywhere else. Marion Dewar, Mayor of Ottawa between 1978 to 1985, let Project 4000. Ottawa sponsored 4000 Vietnamese refugees. Every April 30, the Vietnamese flag is raised at Parliament, as a way to acknowledge the experiences of Vietnamese boat people and thanking Canada for accepting so many Vietnamese people. Ottawa has so many pho restaurants now

The boat people were brought into Canadian Forces Base Montreal/Longueuil. When I was at Orleans they had several of us restationed there to process them. I wasn't one but the guy beside me was sent.

Canada's population was very low at that time. In 1967 Canada's population was only about 13 million.

My mom used to tell me stories of when the 'boat people' came to town. I thought that was just a local term for them, not something officially used to describe them

Nguyễn is now the second most popular family name in Montréal.

Sonia Smits was depicting Mona Parsons .She was on TanZanian series Street Legal for years.

In the Maritime provinces (like Nova Scotia) a lot of people know each other, or know people who know each other etc. I when I was in university in Nova Scotia two of my roommates discovered that they were 3rd cousins years after they started rooming together.

The tuque is the Canadian Habitants (the Habs, for short)

American did try to take Quebec, str8 in the middle of a winter storm.

6:00 I did not know that story but it’s a cute heart warming story none the less!

There's a statue of Mona Parsons in Wolfville, Nova Scotia. It's true that her story is not well known but it certainly deserves to be. I'm from western Canada and I only learned about her on a visit to Nova Scotia.

As the date of this event the US was a British colony and quebec was a French colony

Re: the 'all Canadians know each other' stereotype: We actually had a famous ad for a Canadian beer, Molson Canadian, where a guy's up on stage doing what seems like a stand-up routine/speech, but based entirely around refuting the American stereotypes of Canadians, including that one. "My name is Joe! And I! AM! CANADIAN!" Which I see you did a video about Canadian beer commercials, which going by the thumbnail appears to include that one, but I have seen you forget things from your older videos in less time that it's been since that (for example the Halifax Explosion, you learned about it in a video 6 months ago, and then when you did the video about the Heritage Minute about that event just 3 months ago you were all "I never heard of this! What's this all about? I have to look this up!", meanwhile the beer commercial video was almost a year ago).

Look about Kim Thuy, she's a "boat people" arrived in Quebec in 1978 when she was 10 years old; she became a lawyer and a famous author ! She received mutiple prizes in Quebec and in France ! Look about "la bataile des plaines d'Abraham" (in Quebec city), it will tels you everything about this historical part of our history !

Just watched the Sail GP in Halifax Canada! Canada finished shy of the finals but at least not last place like the USA!!;)

I actually looked this up. 60,000 refugees came to Canada from Vietnam between 1979 and 1980!

Tyler, you need to review Hinterland Who's Who vignettes, created to teach Canadians about our flora and fauna.

They were probably accusing her of being a spy.

Yes Tyler, every question you asked, is yes. Heritage Minutes are very accurate and Canada is full of amazing stories and people. Vote blue and join democracy.

The Frontenac heritage minutes was inspired by the French movie name Cyrano de Bergerac with Gérald Depardieu (1990)

People escaping the Vietnam war also came from the U.S. A lot of American "draft dodgers" came to Canada to avoid conscription.

We had a family of "boat people" In my small home town in 1980. One of the children was in my 4th or 5th grade class.

You need a PO box so we can send you stuff

the CH tuque=Canadian Hockey club, or Montreal Canadians in short form, our hockey team in the NHL since the early 1900's. Common gift for newcomers (or citizens) in Montreal & Québec in general. My older cousin gave me mine when I was 6 or 7 y. old. And you nailed it close to the end: some of the Heritage minutes were made in english, and others in french. some with subtitles, some only dubbed. Over the years, I've watched them all, & I'm one of the lucky canadians who is fully bilingual, so I can watch them in both languages. And yes, keep doing these heritage minutes, you have less than half of them to watch. Keep on doing them, as well as anything else you can find. And change your intro, man. You're no longer an average american who know nothing about Canada. We're about to give you honorary citizenship & maybe a medal. Have a nice day.

You should watch the youtube video of Shane Koyczan from the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. He did an amazing Canadian based slam poetry performance during the opening ceremonies.

My friend Kim I attended private Catholic school with was one of the refugees from Vietnam. 🏫 😊❤

Dramatizations of past events need to be taken with a big pinch of salt.

The Frontenac one was about when Boston Attacked Quebec and lost. The Brits would attack again 100 years later from Halifax and succeed in taking Quebec.

You have to remember that until 1776 the 13 colonies were British. Eventually Quebec would fall in 1759. Many American leaders thought the French inhabitants would be pushed out and the area would be open for American settlement. However Britain greatly angered the Continental Congress in 1775 with the passage of the Quebec Act. The Act guaranteed the people rights to their French Language, their Catholic faith, the continuation of French Civil Law and protection under British Criminal Law. The main reason Quebec stood with Britain when Americans invaded during the Revolution and again a second invasion during the War of 1812.

The famous quote of Frontenac "I will answer you with the mouth of my canons" is famous in Quebec province. In french, "Je vous répondrai par la bouche de mes canons" is, surely, the only big and significant win for the french colony in the war between France and England. They said American in the video because most if not all of the soldiers were coming from the english colony and I think they were already started to be refered to as American even in those days.

I notice the English Lieutenant was in Legend of the Black Pearl