Photography

This 1967 photograph was taken during a meeting between Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, and Jean Drapeau, Mayor of Montreal, on the occasion of Expo 67. The World’s Fair held in Montreal in 1967 was an incredible moment. It drew the whole world to the city and to the province of Quebec. The meeting between the two statesmen was a coup and a consecration. In Montreal’s Black community, in the years leading up to the Second World War, the Emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie, the Lion of Judah”, was seen as the emblematic symbol of African resistance to fascism and colonization. Anti-fascist activities were one of the contentious issues for Black Montrealers at the time. In Montreal’s first black newspaper, The Freelance, blacks and other readers eagerly followed the news of Italy’s pre-emptive war to conquer Abyssinia, now called Ethiopia. In solidarity with Ethiopia’s struggles, Freelance editors led an anti-fascist recruitment drive to enlist volunteers in the Ethiopian armed forces. Dozens of blacks and whites rushed to line up and sign up at the Freelance offices. They are determined to defeat the rising tide of fascism on the African continent. These enthusiastic recruits never left Montreal, but Montreal’s Blacks never ceased to admire the determination and spirit embodied by the Lion of Judah. Expo 67 was an opportunity for all Montrealers to pay tribute to His Highness and the courage of his people.