GATINEAU, Quebec (AP) — A black woman often described as Canada's Rosa Parks for her 1946 decision to sit in a whites-only section of a Nova Scotia movie theater will be the first woman to be celebrated on the face of a Canadian banknote.
Finance Minister Bill Morneau said Thursday that Viola Desmond will grace the front of the $10 bill when the next series goes into circulation in 2018.
A businesswoman turned civil libertarian, Desmond built a business as a beautician and mentored young black women in Nova Scotia.
It was in 1946 when she rejected racial discrimination by sitting in a whites-only section of a New Glasgow movie theatre. She was arrested and fined. Her actions inspired later generations of black people in Nova Scotia and the rest of Canada.