Yellowknife and town hall. The first mayor of Yellowknife was Jock McNiven. In September 1967, Yellowknife officially became the capital of the Northwest Territories. This important new status sparked what has been coined as the third boom in Yellowknife. New sub-divisions were established to house an influx of government workers. In 1978 the Soviet nuclear-powered satellite Kosmos 954 crashed to Earth near Yellowknife. There were no known casualties, although a small quantity of radioactive nuclear fuel was released into the environment, and Operation Morning Light—an attempt to retrieve it—was only partially successful. A new mining rush and fourth building boom for
Garden of the Provinces and Territories of Public Works and Government Services Canada, officially renamed the park. In December 2015, the federal government requested that the National Capital Commission approve the garden as the site of the proposed Memorial to the Victims of Communism rather than its previously approved site, a plot of land by the Supreme Court of Canada building. One quarter of the site is composed of formal terraces, with the flags of the provinces and territories in the order of their entry to Confederation. Bronze plaques include the floral emblems for each of the provinces and territories. A tall fountain symbolizes a tree.