Viola Desmond, 1914-1965

Viola Desmond, a black Nova Scotian woman, was a successful business owner when she bought a movie ticket at the Roseland Theatre in New Glasgow, NS in 1946. After sitting down, she was told the main floor was “whites only” and her less expensive ticket was only good for the balcony. Desmond offered to pay the difference, and when her offer was declined, she refused to move. Desmond was forcibly removed from the theater and charged — with tax evasion, because of the one-cent difference in taxes between the two tickets. She was fined $20 plus $6 in court costs, and through all her appeals, the courts refused to acknowledge the racist seating policy. Desmond’s case is now considered one of many significant civil-rights cases of the mid-20th century, and in 2010 Lieutenant Governor Mayann Francis granted Desmond Canada’s first posthumous pardon.