1896 in Canada

Crown

• Monarch – Victoria^[1]

Federal government

• Governor General – John Hamilton-Gordon
• Prime Minister – Mackenzie Bowell (until April 27) then Charles Tupper (May 1 to July 8) then Wilfrid Laurier (from July 11)
• Chief Justice – Samuel Henry Strong (Ontario)
• Parliament – 7th (until 24 April) then 8th (from 19 August)

Provincial governments

Territorial governments

Full date unknown

• A plan to populate the western prairies with immigration from eastern Europe is unveiled.
• The first Canadian blast furnace opens in Hamilton, Ontario.

January to June

• March 8 – Charlotte Whitton, feminist, politician and mayor of Ottawa (d.1975)
• March 16 – Harry Banks, soldier
• March 21 – Errick Willis, politician (d.1967)
• April 11 – Léo-Paul Desrosiers, journalist, writer (d.1967)
• April 20 – Wilfrid R. "Wop" May, World War I flying ace and pioneering bush pilot (d.1952)
• May 2 – Elmore Philpott, journalist and politician (d.1964)
• May 18 – Brock Chisholm, doctor and first Director-General of the World Health Organization (d.1971)
• June 22 – Leonard W. Murray, naval officer (d.1971)

July to December

• July 2 – Prudence Heward, painter (d.1947)
• July 4 – Frederick Cronyn Betts, politician (d.1938)
• July 10 – Thérèse Casgrain, feminist, reformer, politician and Senator (d.1981)
• July 13 – John Henry Cates, businessman and political figure (d.1986)
• July 27 – Anne Savage, painter and art teacher (d.1971)
• August 12 – Mitchell Hepburn, politician and 11th Premier of Ontario (d.1953)
• August 18 – Jack Pickford, actor (d.1933)
• August 30 – Raymond Massey, actor (d.1983)
• August 31 – Alice Strike, Canada's last surviving female World War I veteran (d.2004)
• November 3 – Madeleine Fritz, paleontologist (d.1990)
• November 7 – Henry Botterell, World War I fighter pilot (d.2003)

Full date unknown

• Jean Baptiste Paul, Canadian First Nations wrestler (d. 1966)