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Some in-branch programs require registration with your library card. Please log in with your library account or follow this link to apply for a card online. You can also apply for a card in person at any of our 33 locations.

  • Workers in area destroyed by Halifax explosion / Ouvriers dans zone détruite par explosion d'Halifax

    Saturday Oct 05, 2024 at 1:00pm
    120 minutes

    On December 6, 1917, the Belgian relief vessel Imo struck the munitions-laden freighter Mont-Blanc in Halifax Harbour. The Mont-Blanc exploded in a devastating 2.9 kiloton blast, killing 2,000 people and injuring 9,000. More than 6,000 people were made homeless, and an additional 12,000 left without shelter. 

    Join Michael Dupuis, author of The Woman reporter and the Halifax explosion, to live the story of this disaster through the eyes and words of more than twenty journalists who reported the magnitude of the blast to the rest of the world.  

  • Société Historique d'Ottawa: La Patente

    Saturday Oct 05, 2024 at 1:00pm
    60 minutes

    Comme les catholiques irlandais, avec les Chevaliers de Colomb, et les protestants anglais, avec leurs loges maçonniques et l'Ordre d'Orange, le Canada français avait sa propre société secrète : l' Ordre de Jacques-Cartier .

    Communément appelé « La Patente », l'Ordre fut établi en 1926 dans l'est d'Ottawa et deviendra, pendant cinq décennies, l'épée et le bouclier de tout le Canada français.

    Conférencier invité: Hugues Théorêt ,  Auteur de La Patente l'Ordre de Jacques-Cartier, le dernier bastion du Canada français

    Organisé par la Société d'histoire d'Ottawa

    Présentation en français, aucune inscription requise

  • Tuesdays, Oct 08, 2024 - Dec 17, 2024
    2:00pm
    60 minutes

    6 sessions remaining

    Want to learn more about your family history or getting stuck working on your family tree?  

    Drop-in to work on your family tree, share research strategies, and discover what resources are available for your research. Sessions are held every other Tuesday at 2:00pm in the Genealogy area. 

    Specialists from the Ontario Genealogical Society Ottawa Branch and the Ottawa Public Library will answer questions and help you get the most from library resources.  

    Bring your laptop, tablet, or borrow a Chromebook from the library.  

    All welcome! 

  • Photo historique du Chateau Laurier à Ottawa

    Saturday Nov 02, 2024 at 1:00pm
    60 minutes

    À Ottawa, juste à côté des écluses du canal Rideau qui se déversent dans la rivière des Outaouais, se trouve un trésor architectural. Depuis plus d'un siècle, il accueille les riches et célèbres, les politiciens et même les bureaux de radiodiffusion de la radio de la CBC. Si les murs du Château Laurier pouvaient parler, quels secrets pourraient-ils révéler?

    Conférencière invitée: Dominique Lajoie, historienne

    Organiser par la Société d'histoire d'Ottawa

    Présentation en français. Aucune inscription requise

  • Monday Nov 04, 2024 at 1:30pm
    120 minutes

    Want to learn more about your family history or getting stuck working on your family tree?  

    Drop-in to work on your family tree, share research strategies, and discover what resources are available for your research.  

    Specialists from the Ontario Genealogical Society Ottawa Branch and the Ottawa Public Library will answer questions and help you get the most from library resources. (Bring your laptop or tablet!)

  • NFB logo on pink and purple backdrop

    Saturday Jan 25, 2025 at 2:30pm
    90 minutes

    In A Quiet Girl, adopted Montreal filmmaker Adrian Wills commits, on camera and in real time, to unravelling the mystery of his complex beginnings in Newfoundland. Spurred on by a meager clue in his adoption documents, Wills spends two years travelling from the spare beauty of Canada’s most eastern coastline to the red heat of Arizona in search of answers. What Wills finally uncovers pierces into the meaning of family, revealing disquieting parallels between his own life and that of the birth mother he never knew. This moving feature documentary combines 16mm footage and contemporary images with deeply personal conversations, transforming an urgent search for identity into a quest to give a quiet girl her voice. Ultimately, Wills honours his birth mother’s resilience and, in doing so, reveals his own. 

    2023. 86 minutes. English. 
    Courtesy of the National Film Board. 

    Drop-in