It’s Canada’s youngest province, its westernmost and, arguably, one of its wackiest. It is way over on the left-hand side of the map and, some might say, it is the most left-leaning.

British Columbia will mark 150 years on Monday, the B.C. Day provincial holiday, with concerts and fireworks celebrating a century and a half of existence.

Canada can thank the westernmost province for artist Emily Carr and renowned athlete Terry Fox. It was the birthplace of Greenpeace with the 1971 voyage of the Phyllis Cormack from English Bay and it boasts the country’s most famous nude beach: Wreck Beach in Vancouver.

B.C. is home to the Spirit, or Kermode Bear, a rare white black bear found around the north coast and it was the first province to grant mothers the same rights over their children as fathers, in 1917.

In 1925, the Victoria Cougars defeated Montreal to win the Stanley Cup, the last time a team from B.C. ever won the coveted hockey crown.

B.C. had its own navy at the start of the First World War, with its own submarine fleet – two American-built subs bought by the province when it grew frustrated with absence of British warships in the face of the impending conflict.

It has the largest pair of cross country skis in the world, in 100 Mile House, B.C., and the largest hockey stick and puck, in Duncan.

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