Revolutions of 1848 immigration, especially from Germany. This, in turn, fuelled the nativist "Know Nothing" movement in the years preceding the American Civil War. The "Know Nothings" were opposed to Catholic immigration, especially immigration of German and Irish Catholics, and held Pope Pius IX responsible for the 1848 revolutions' failure. 1848 in Canada saw the establishment of responsible government in Nova Scotia and The Canadas, the first such governments in the British Empire outside of Great Britain itself. John Ralston Saul has argued that this development is tied to the revolutions in Europe, but described the Canadian approach to the revolutionary year of
It Was a Very Good Year the autumn of his years, and he thinks back on his entire life "as vintage wine". All of these romances were sweet to him, like a wine from a very good (i.e., vintage) year. Ervin Drake's inspiration to write the song was his then wife-to-be, Edith Vincent Bermaine. She was a showgirl, whom he had dated, and eventually married twenty years after the song was written. It Was a Very Good Year "It Was a Very Good Year" is a song Ervin Drake composed in 1961 for and originally recorded by Bob Shane with the Kingston Trio. It was subsequently