The Great Library

House of Bills: A Weekly Update on Ontario Bills

After taking a few days to get our ducks in a row, we will be catching up on House of Bills posts for those sitting dates we have missed due to COVID-19 interruptions. Here is the post for the sitting week of March 9-March 12. Stay tuned for the next post which gathers all progress made to Ontario bills in the third and fourth weeks of March during the COVID-19 emergency sitting sessions.

March 9 – March 12
42nd Parliament, 1st Session

Bill 141, Defibrillator Registration and Public Access Act, 2020

Third Reading (March 10 & 11)

Bill 156, Security from Trespass and Protecting Food Safety Act, 2020

Discharge the Order of referral to Committee (from Standing Committee on Justice Policy) (March 9)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on General Government (March 9)

Bill 159, Rebuilding Consumer Confidence Act, 2020

Second Reading (March 10-12)

Bill 161, Smarter and Stronger Justice Act, 2020

Considered by Standing Committee on Justice Policy (March 12)

Bill 171, Building Transit Faster Act, 2020

Considered by Standing Committee on Social Policy (March 10)

Bill 174, Ditch the Switch Act, 2020

Second Reading, carried (March 12)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Regulations and Private Bills (March 12)

Bill 175, Connecting People to Home and Community Care Act, 2020

Second Reading, carried on division (March 9 & 10)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Social Policy (March 10)

Bill 177, Sikh Genocide Awareness Week Act, 2020

Second Reading, carried (March 12)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Justice Policy (March 12)

Bill 180, Somali Heritage Week Act, 2020>

First Reading (March 10)

Bill 181, Supply Act, 2020

First Reading (March 10)
Second Reading, carried on division (March 11 & 12)
Third Reading, carried on division (March 12)

Bill 182, Franco-Ontarian Emblem Amendment Act, 2020

First Reading (March 10)
Second Reading, carried (March 12)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Regulations and Private Bills (March 12)

Bill 183, Strengthening Human Rights in Ontario Act, 2020

First Reading (March 11)

Bill 184, Protecting Tenants and Strengthening Community Housing Act, 2020

First Reading (March 12)

Bill 185, Vision Zero Strategy Act, 2020

First Reading (March 12)

Ephemera in Rare Books

Nowadays, when someone leaves something in a book, it is usually in the form of a bookmark or something that can be used to mark a page. Often librarians find unconventional items left in books or used as bookmarks; items such as tissues, q-tips, and receipts just to name a few. These little scraps left in books can sometimes provide clues about the person who used a book last.

This can get even more interesting when these items are left by someone from the past. While going through our rare book collection, we have found many interesting items left behind in books.

While items left in books do not have a specific term, the closest term to use would probably be ephemera. Maurice Rickards, who wrote the Encyclopedia of Ephemera, defines the term as “the minor transient documents of everyday life”. These documents tend to be either printed or handwritten. Most of the items that we have found in our rare books fit this description, though we have expanded this definition for our purposes to also include other transient items such as dried flowers. Below we have collected some of the more interesting ephemera we have found in our rare books so far:

Letters: Letters can provide insight into why a particular book might have been added to someone’s book collection. A good example of this is a letter written to William Renwick Riddell from Sir Wilfrid Laurier, the 7th Prime Minister of Canada. It is obvious that Wilfrid Laurier and William Riddell exchanged letters before this particular one, which mentions donating the book “Statement concerning Red River Settlement” to which this letter is attached.

Notes: We have found a variety of notes in many of our rare books, both handwritten and typed, but the note below has to be our favourite. We aren’t quite sure whether this note is a poem or perhaps a grocery list. It’s up to you to decide.

Newspaper Clippings: Newspaper tends to be flimsy even when first printed, so it is no surprise that it becomes quite brittle as it ages. This makes it hard to preserve, though we do have some good examples from the early 20th century in a book written by Mr. Riddell titled The Legal Profession in Upper Canada, published in 1916. This volume is actually filled with various ephemera, from handwritten notes to typed letters and newspaper clippings.

Dried Flowers: Occasionally, what you find in books might not be something that was ever meant to be left there. The dried flowers found in an 1815 book is a good example of this. While the book was used to flatten and dry the flowers, presumably it was the owner’s intention to remove them at some point. These flowers were also in the same book where the “poem” was found.

Advertisements: Ads are usually tailored towards a certain population in a specific time period, so it is definitely interesting when ads from the late 1800s survive to this day. It tells us something about everyday life during that period of time. The ad shown below is from The Ontario Law Directory for 1880 and is an example of an advertisement that you wouldn’t see in 2020.

There are many more examples of ephemera inserted into our rare books, these are just a selection of those that we found the most interesting.

So the next time you come across a piece of paper left in a book, take the time to wonder why the document was left there in the first place.

House of Bills: A Weekly Update on Ontario Bills

March 2 – March 5
42nd Parliament, 1st Session

Bill 145, Trust in Real Estate Services Act, 2020
Royal Assent (March 4)

Bill 156, Security from Trespass and Protecting Food Safety Act, 2020
Second Reading, carried on division (March 4)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Justice Policy (March 4)

Bill 159, Rebuilding Consumer Confidence Act, 2020

Reported as amended (March 2)
First Reading, Ordered for Second Reading pursuant to Standing Order 77(b) (March 2)
Second Reading (March 5)

Bill 161, Smarter and Stronger Justice Act, 2020

Second Reading, carried on division (March 3 & 5)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Justice Policy (March 5)

Bill 162, Public Accountability and Lobbyist Transparency Act, 2020

Discharge the Order of referral to Committee of the Whole House (March 3)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Justice Policy (March 3)

Bill 166, Great Lakes Protection Amendment Act, 2020

Second Reading, carried (March 5)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Regulations and Private Bills (March 5)

Bill 171, Building Transit Faster Act, 2020

Second Reading, carried on division (March 3)
Ordered referred to Standing Committee on Social Policy (March 3)

Bill 175, Connecting People to Home and Community Care Act, 2020

Second Reading (March 2-5)

Bill 178, Black Mental Health Day Act, 2020

First Reading (March 2)

Bill 179, Assessment Amendment Act (Areas in Transition), 2020

First Reading (March 3)