50th birthday plans for Mississauga only weeks away and include city’s own anthem

Mississauga officials seem to be borrowing from The Beatles and their timeless hit “Birthday” when they talk about Canada’s seventh-largest city hitting the half-century mark in 2024.

“We’re gonna have a good time” might as well be their theme because that’s what, albeit not in those exact words, they keep telling residents lies ahead as celebrations for Mississauga’s 50th anniversary/birthday will soon unfold.

In fact, the big bash has already begun — at least in one way: Mississauga-based musicians and songwriters were invited this fall to try to leave their mark on music history in the city by creating an original anthem about Mississauga.

The “Mississauga’s 50th Anthem” contest set out, organizers say, to find “the best anthem incorporating the word Mississauga and reflecting the spirit and diversity of our dynamic city and its promising future.”

The decision is now in the hands of the judges and the winner will be announced in January. The winner, as chosen by a jury comprised of those with ties to the Mississauga music community, will receive a recording and mixing session from world-famous Metalworks Studios in Mississauga and have their song forever named “Mississauga’s 50th Anthem.”

Prior to that, City of Mississauga officials are planning to include a significant 50th anniversary component in Mississauga’s annual New Year’s Eve party at Celebration Square in the downtown core.

They’ve been saying all year that the New Year’s Eve bash will serve as the kickoff to numerous 50th birthday celebrations planned for throughout 2024 across the city.

Mayor Bonnie Crombie, who plans to leave the city in January to take up the full-time role of leader of the Ontario Liberal Party, said earlier this year that Mississauga’s 50th birthday celebration in 2024 will be a “party for the ages.”

“A lot of plans…are well underway and we are going to create so many new initiatives and events,” said Crombie, noting that new public art, city-wide street banners, a commemorative Mississauga Library card and a wide array of anniversary-themed programming and events are just a few things planned for the city’s year-long 50th anniversary bash.

A time capsule is also included in the plans as Mississauga prepares to mark a half-century of existence.

In all, more than 50 initiatives throughout the entirety of 2024 are in place to mark the milestone, city officials said earlier.

In 1974, the townships of Streetsville, Port Credit and Mississauga amalgamated to form the City of Mississauga.

At that time, popular Canadian country singer Tommy Hunter, now 86, wrote and performed a song at the request of Mississauga’s new mayor to mark Mississauga’s birth as a city (see below).

Hunter was living in the Lorne Park area at the time and the song he penned is called, simply enough, “Mississauga.”

“In 1974, the year of City of Mississauga’s incorporation, the great country singer-songwriter and Mississauga resident Tommy Hunter wrote and recorded ‘Mississauga,’ a song to celebrate and uplift the newly formed city,” Mississauga Arts Council officials said earlier.

(Cover photo: City of Mississauga)