Joan O'Malley

Joan O'Malley (née Donovan^[1]) is a retired Canadian public servant who, on November 6, 1964, sewed the first Canadian flag. She is sometimes referred to as Canada's Betsy Ross.^[2][3]

During the 1963 federal election campaign, Prime Minister Lester Pearson promised that Canada would have a new flag within two years of his election. Three designs were chosen from a list of more than 3,500 entries.^[4][5] The designs included the current Canadian flag, the “Pearson Pennant”, and a third design that resembled the current flag, but with a Union Jack and three fleurs-de-lis.^[3]

On November 6, 1964 – a Friday – Pearson requested that prototypes of the three flag designs under consideration be delivered to 24 Sussex Drive so that he could see them displayed at his summer residence at Harrington Lake that weekend.^[4][6] The request came to Ken Donovan, O'Malley's father, who was the assistant purchasing director with the Canadian Government Exhibition Commission.^[4]

The flags had to be entirely “Canadian content”.^[7] However, the request had come after normal business hours and the only company that could supply the material – S.E. Woods – had no overtime staff to sew the flags.^[3] Donovan contacted O'Malley, then 20 years old, and explained his dilemma.^[4] A secretary at the Indian Affairs Branch of the Department of Citizenship,^[2] O'Malley did not consider herself a professional seamstress and, at the time, her sewing experience was limited to sewing her own clothing.^[8] Nevertheless, she agreed to prepare the prototypes. She packed up her Singer sewing machine and drove to the Exhibition Commission office shortly after 7:00 pm.^[3]

O'Malley completed the six flags – two flags of each design – shortly after midnight. They were delivered to 24 Sussex in the middle of the night and hoisted at Harrington Lake the next morning.^[8]

O’Malley was initially told to keep her role in creating the Canadian flag secret and she did not speak of her experience for 10 years.^[7] In recent years, however, she has increasingly become an ambassador for the flag and has attended dozens of flag-related events.^[3]

At a ceremony on Parliament Hill on November 14, 2014, O'Malley was presented with the flag that had been flown on the Peace Tower on November 6 of that year, exactly 50 years after she had sewn the first prototype.^[5] At the ceremony, she noted that while she was never paid to create the flags,^[9] she considered the recognition she received to be payment enough.^[4]

The Singer sewing machine that O'Malley used to create the six prototypes was displayed at the Canadian Museum of History's Canadian History Hall from 2017 to 2019.^[3] The whereabouts of the prototypes themselves is unknown.^[7]

O'Malley is sometimes compared to Betsy Ross, an American upholsterer who, according to legend, created the first American flag. However, she rejects the comparison, noting that much of the story surrounding Ross is more myth than fact.^[2][3]

O'Malley continued to work for the federal government and eventually took a job with the Ontario Attorney General's office in Ottawa. She retired in 1996.^[2]

O'Malley was born in Dauphin, Manitoba. She and her husband, Brian, raised two children. They reside in Ottawa South.^[2][3]