Royal Canadian Mounted Police
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) was formed in 1920 by the merger of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police (RNWMP), founded in 1873, with the Dominion Police founded in 1868. The former was originally named the North West Mounted Police (NWMP), and was given the "Royal" prefix by King Edward VII in 1904. Much of the present-day organization's symbolism has been inherited from its days as the NWMP and RNWMP, including the distinctive Red Serge uniform, paramilitary heritage, and mythos as a frontier force. The RCMP-GRC wording is protected under the Trade-marks Act.
Despite its name, the RCMP is no longer an actual mounted police force, with horses only being used at ceremonial events. The predecessor NWMP and RNWMP had relied on horses for transport for most of their history, though the RNWMP was switching to automobiles at the time of the merger.
North-West Mounted Police
Many popular novels were published about the mounted police from 1885 onwards, and in the 20th century over 250 films were made, along with radio and television portrayals. The police were depicted as courageous, disciplined and chivalrous, displaying a sense of fair-play as they brought their suspects to justice. Historians, working from initially limited public records and chronicles, wrote similarly eulogistic accounts of the mounted police, but as new archives became available in the 1970s, more critical and analytic accounts of the force were produced. The force heavily influenced public perceptions of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, which used the North-West Mounted Police's image and history to help make the modern police a popular Canadian national symbol.