"Ottawa - The Capital of Canada" a Ottawa Travel Page by mim95

Ottawa is Canada's capital city, which was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1857. The decision was met with outrage at first, but it was a wise choice afterall. Ottawa was a small lumbering village at the time, compared to Toronto, Kingston and Montreal, which were already large towns. All of them wanted to be the capital of Canada, and there were lots of debates. The Queen did not want to stir up tensions between the English and French, the two major language groups at the time. Also Ottawa is situated far away from the US border, so it is safer from the possible American invasion.

Nowadays, Ottawa is a beatiful city with lots of parkland. With the federal government as the largest employer, many of its residence are bilingual in English and French.