Showing 855 results

Authority record

Mutart, Robert Jack

  • RC0930
  • Person
  • 1923-1962

Robert Jack Mutart was born on 7 May 1923 to Reginald and Carrie Mutart. Following the death of his father in 1929, his mother remarried a man named A. Lebert. Robert enlisted for service in the Second World War on 25 March 1942, and served in the Royal Canadian Naval Volunteer Reserve. Attaining the rank of Leading Signalman, Robert would serve in the Atlantic Theatre on minesweeping and convoy missions. He was honourably discharged on 25 October 1945, but continued to serve as a reservist until 1957. On 12 May 1945 he married Anne Mattiuz, with whom he had three children: Donna, Bobby, and Jimmy. After the war, Robert would become a dentist in Hamilton. Robert died on 3 February 1962 in Detroit, Michigan, at the age of 38.

Mutart, Reginald Francis

  • RC0930
  • Person
  • 1897-1929

Reginald Francis Mutart was born on 7 June 1897 in Mimico, Ontario to Charles and Augusta Mutart, and worked as a clerk prior to the First World War. On 22 May 1916 he enlisted in the Canadian Overseas Expeditionary Force, and was assigned to the 64th Battery Canadian Field Artillery, 2nd Division French Mortars. During his service in the war, he saw action in France, including at the Battle of Vimy Ridge. He was honourably discharged on 19 August 1919, having attained the rank of Gunner. Following the war he would work for the Canadian National Railways as a clerk. He would marry a woman named Carrie, with whom he had at least one child, a son named Robert Jack Mutart. Reginald died on 2 August 1929 in Niagara Falls, Ontario following injures sustained in a gas explosion in the cellar of his home.

Gerstenzang, Rachel Lili

  • RC0929
  • Person
  • 1918-2019

Rachel Lili Gerstenzang, known as Lili, was born on July 25, 1918 in Harbin, China. Her father, Aaron Tunik was a businessman in the Export Import business. Her mother was Raisa Tunik, née Levin.

Lili Gerstenzang moved to Tientsin in 1921, where she was educated at the British Tienstin Grammar School until 1933. The family moved to Shanghai, where she attended the Shanghai Public School for Girls. She was active in entering art contests and won notable mention in local newspapers.

She married Leon Gerstenzang in 1938. With her husband, Leon Gerstenzang, she left northern China upon the Chinese Communist occupation. They moved to Hong Kong in July 1949.

They moved to Sydney, Australia and lived there from Nov 1950 to Feb 1953. Lili Gerstenzang attended the East Sydney Technical College, studying Art from 1950 to 1952 and moved to Toronto, Canada in late 1952, becoming and immigrant in 1953. Lili Gerstenzang attended the Ontario College of Art from 1955 to 1956 and 1963-1964.

She died 9 February 2019.

Gerstenzang, Leon

  • RC0929
  • Person
  • 1913-2005

Leon Gerstenzang was a journalist and manufacturer. He was born in 1913 in Warsaw, Poland to Anczel (Edward) Gerstenzang, a dental surgeon, and Sara née Krinkevich. As an infant he was evacuated to Irkuta, Siberia, by his mother upon the outbreak of the First World War. Upon the outbreak of the Russian Revolution, he was taken by his mother to Harbin, China. His father had been imprisoned in Warsaw, and joined the family in Tientsin (now Tianjin), China in 1920.

Gerstenzang entered British Tientsin Grammar School in 1921 and graduated in 1929 with a Cambridge School Certificate. In 1930, he joined the British daily newspaper, Peking & Tientsin Times as proof-reader and cub reporter. In 1932 he left the for the United States. as a student and entered Columbia Grammar and Preparatory School in New York city. He was accepted by New York University’s School of Journalism. Owing to the Depression of 1932 he could not maintain student status and finish college. He returned to Tientsin in late 1932 and rejoined the editorial staff of the newspaper, where he established a Sunday edition of the Peking & Tientsin Times. He married Rachel Lili Tunik in 1938. In 1939 he joined Reuters Ltd. in Tientsin as News Editor and Correspondent.

From the end of 1935 to the end of 1941, Gerstenzang served as a senior Lance Corporal in the British Municipal Emergency Corps during the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War. Together with other Reuters staff, he was imprisoned by the Japanese during the occupation of Tientsin, for 100 days. At the close of the war, he resumed work as Manager for Reuters in 1945 until the Chinese Communists entered the city in January 1949 and banned foreign correspondents’ operation of news agencies which resulted in the Reuters office being closed. In mid-1949, Gerstenzang moved to Hong Kong and resided at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club. He left Hong Kong in late 1950 for Sydney, N.S.W., upon receiving Australian immigration, where he covered under his own name for Reuters and Australian Associated Press.

In 1952, Leon and Lili Gerstenzang travelled to Toronto, Canada, and received their Landed Immigration status in 1953. They continued to live in Toronto until their deaths.

Gerstenzang worked in various manufacturing businesses and Real Estate in Canada after 1953. He joined the Ripley Manufacturing Co., Toronto, and subsequently became the President of the Canadian branch of the Q-Tip Corporation.

He died in Toronto in 2005.

Macfarlane, John Edward

  • RC0074
  • Person
  • 1942-

John Edward Macfarlane, editor and publisher, was born in Montreal on 28 March 1942. He was educated at the University of Alberta. As an undergraduate he began to work for Canadian University Press and has stayed close to the world of Canadian newspapers and magazines ever since. At the age of 23 he became an editorial writer for the Globe and Mail, and he was subsequently appointed Entertainment Editor for the Toronto Star, Associate and later Executive Editor of Maclean's, Editor of Toronto Life, Weekend Magazine, Saturday Night and Financial Times. Macfarlane has also been the President of a public relations agency, and the Managing Director of C.T.V News Service. With Jan Walter and Gary Ross, John Macfarlane founded the publishing house Macfarlane, Walter & Ross, in 1988. MW&R specialized in non-fiction. It was purchased by McClelland & Stewart in 2000 and closed in 2003.

Newman, Peter Charles

  • RC0065
  • Person
  • 1929-2023

Peter C. Newman, author, journalist, and editor, was born in Vienna, Austria on 10 May 1929 as Peta Neumann to Jewish parents who lived in Czechoslovakia. The family left Breclav just before the Nazi take-over in 1938 and he moved to Canada in 1940 and became a citizen in 1945. He was educated at the University of Toronto. As a journalist he has worked for the Financial Post, Toronto Star and Maclean's magazine. He was editor-in-chief of the Toronto Star from 1969 to 1971 before moving on to Maclean's, transforming it into a weekly news magazine.

After eleven years of running Maclean's, he decided to stay on as senior contributing editor. He has written biographies of Prime Minister John Diefenbaker, the Bronfman family, and a history of the Hudson Bay Company. He often challenged the establishment, while also being a chronicler of it. Including A Nation Divided: Canada and the Coming of Pierre Trudeau (1969), The Establishment Man: Conrad Black, A Portrait of Power (1982), The Secret Mulroney Tapes: Unguarded Confessions of a Prime Minister (2005), and When the Gods Changed: The Death of Liberal Canada (2011). In 2004 he published his autobiography, Here Be Dragons.

He died 7 September 2023 at the age of 94, in Belleville, Ontario, from complications suffered from a stroke the previous year and Parkinson's.

Colin Smythe Limited, Publishers

  • RC0019
  • Corporate body
  • 1966-

Colin Smythe, the founder of Colin Smythe Limited Publishers, was born in Berkshire, England. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin. He returned to England and in 1966 established Colin Smythe Limited, in Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire. The firm specializes in Anglo-Irish literature. In 1987 he was presented with an award from the Association of Anglo-Irish Literature in Dublin.

Clingan family

  • RC0624
  • Family
  • 1894-2009

George Francis Clingan (1894-1964) of Virden, Manitoba joined the Canadian military in October 1915. He remained in the military, serving with the Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa during World War II. He was Commanding Officer in 1942. He rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. His daughter Peggy married Lt. Colin Murray who served with the 27th Canadian Infantry Brigade at the time it was based in Hannover, Germany as part of Canada's contribution to NATO.

Feit, Harvey

  • RC0910
  • Person
  • 1941-

Harvey Feit is professor emeritus in McMaster University’s Department of Anthropology. A major focus of Feit’s research is his work with Eeyou (Cree) peoples in Eeyou Istchee (primarily Northern Québec), particularly around the creation and implementation of the James Bay and Northern Québec Agreement (JBNQA).

Feit was born in 1941. He pursued graduate studies in anthropology at McGill University, receiving an M.A. in 1969 and a Ph.D. in 1979. Feit’s research on Eeyou hunters led him to work closely with Eeyou communities on various ethnographic projects and, eventually, the negotiation and implementation of the JBNQA, which was the first major land claim agreement and treaty between the Crown and Indigenous peoples in Canada since the early 20th century. From 1972-1987, Feit served as expert witness in the court case preceding the signing of the JBNQA (Chief Robert Kanatewat et al. vs. JBDC, JBEC et al. in Québec Superior Court, 1973) and worked as a researcher, program and policy developer, and advisor with Eeyou negotiators and government bodies. A project of particular significance that Feit contributed to during this time was an income security program to sustain Eeyou families living on the land.

Feit was assistant professor at Carleton University (1972-1975) and McGill University (1975-1978). In 1981, he took up a full-time position at McMaster. In 1992, he assisted in founding the Indigenous Studies Program at the university. Feit also became a member of the adjunct graduate faculty in the Chanie Wenjack School for Indigenous Studies at Trent University. In 2001, he was named a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.

Feit’s research has appeared in two co-edited volumes and over 75 book chapters, journal articles, reports, and expert affidavits and testimonies. Major themes in his research include colonialism and its effects, Indigenous self-governance, the basic income program for Eeyou families, and subsistence hunting.

Musgrave, Susan

  • RC0025
  • Person
  • 1951-

Susan Musgrave was born on March 12, 1951 in Santa Cruz, California. She has lived in Hawaii, Ireland, England and Columbia and presently resides in Sidney, British Columbia. She is married to Stephen Reid whose fonds is also at McMaster. She has published novels, children's books, collections of essays and poetry. Her published works include Entrance of the Celebrant (1972), Selected Strawberries and Other Poems (1977), The Charcoal Burners (1980), The Dancing Chicken (1987), Great Musgrave (1989) Forcing the Narcissus (1994), The Situation in Which We Are Both Amateurs (1997), Things That Keep and Do Not Change (1999) and Cargo of Orchids (2000) and Origami Dove (2011), A Taste of Haida Gwaii (2016), More Blueberries (2019) (Chldren’s book) and Kiss Tickle Cuddle Hug (2010) (Children’s book).

Robinson, Judith

  • RC0918
  • Person
  • 1899-1961

Judith Robinson was born in Toronto, Ont. on Victoria Street on April 6, 1899. She was the daughter of Jessie and John Robinson Robinson (nicknamed “Black Jack Robinson”), who was the editor of the Toronto Telegram until his death in 1929. She attended Toronto Model School until age 12, when she contracted a childhood illness which stopped her schooling. Self-taught in journalism and literature, she also developed an interest in architecture.

Known as ‘Brad’ to her friends, Robinson became a reporter at the Toronto Globe in 1929. Under Globe President George McCullagh, she wrote a Page One feature column daily beginning in 1936. She resigned in 1940 over a political disagreement with the Globe’s coverage of World War II. With her brother John and Oakley Dalgleish, she clandestinely printed advertisements under the name “Canada Calling,” criticizing Mackenzie King government’s slow response to the war effort. In May 1941, she and Dalgleish founded NEWS, a national weekly newspaper whose editorial office was her home at 63 Wellesley St. NEWS closed in 1946. During the war she was also was active in the Women’s Emergency Committee which petitioned the Canadian government to close the Christie Street Veteran’s Hospital in Toronto. Those efforts helped result in the opening of Sunnybrook Military Hospital in 1946. Beginning in 1953, she wrote a daily column for the Toronto Telegram until her death on December 17, 1961.

Robinson authored three non-fiction books: Tom Cullen of Baltimore (1949), As We Came By (1951), and This Is On the House (1957). She edited John Farthing’s political treatise, Freedom Wears a Crown, and helped publish the medical memoir Days of Living: The Journal of Martin Roher, for which she wrote the introduction.

McNairn, Ruthven

  • RC0929
  • Person
  • 1914-1946

Ruthven Colquhoun McNairn served in the Second World War with the Algonquin Regiment. Born in Toronto on 24 August 1914, to William Harvey McNairn, a professor at McMaster University and Hester (Wilson) McNairn. He was the third of four brothers, with Robert and Norman proceeding him, and Ian following. The family relocated to Hamilton in 1930 when the University did.

In February 1933, after finishing high school, McNairn hitchhiked to travel to California and travelling around before being jailed on a charge of vagrancy. His father bailed him out and McNairn made his way home by June.

He began his studies at McMaster University, beginning in Mathematics and Physics, and then transferring to General Arts. He enjoyed being part of the Dramatic Society and appeared in a number of plays. He also was part of the literary society. He graduated in 1938, and did some more travelling before returning to Hamilton.

On 1 November 1940, he began military training with McMaster’s COTC and part time militia with the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. He completed his training in 1941 and hoped to join the Navy, which his younger brother also hoped to join. With no offers forthcoming, he formally enlisted 11 May 1942, and was sent for training at Gordon Head, BC. He would join the Algonquin Regiment in 1943 and shipped to Europe in early summer.

He was part of the operation to attempt to closed the ‘Falaise Gap’ and would then carry on towards Belgium, the Netherlands, and finally into Germany. Throughout this time he kept his own diary, as well as helping to write the regiment’s war diary when the official diarists were busy. He would carry on this work and though he died before the official history was published, he is credited with doing much of the work on Warpath.

Returning home, McNairn had aspirations of writing, either as a journalist or in longer form. Unfortunately, in June 1946, he was diagnosed with an especially virulent form of TB, tuberculous empyema. Likely contracted while still in Europe, he was transferred to Hamilton’s Mountain Sanatorium for care, but would never recover. McNairn died 5 September 1946 and was buried in Grove Cemetery, in Dundas.

Nickle, Samuel C.

  • RC0926
  • Person
  • 1913/14-1994

Samuel Nickle was born in Winnipeg in 1913/14 to Olga and Sam Nickle. The family moved to Calgary in 1917. In 1935 he started the Nickle Map Service Ltd. In 1935 in response to the Turner Valley oil boom. During the Second World War he served in the Calgary Highlanders and was commissioned in the Intelligence Corps in 1943.

Following the war he resumed his mapping business working in the oil and gas industry. He continued to support the Calgary Highlanders and was appointed to Honorary Colonel. He passed away on 26 January 1994.

Barwin, Gary

  • RC0927
  • Person
  • 1964-

Gary Barwin is the author of twenty-six books of poetry and fiction, as well as works for children and teens. He is also a composer, multidisciplinary artist, and owner and operator of Serif of Nottingham Editions, a Hamilton-based small press. Through Serif of Nottingham and other small presses, Barwin has also published numerous chapbooks, broadsides, and pamphlets.

Barwin was born in 1964 in Northern Ireland. His family immigrated to Canada in the 1970s. In 1985, Barwin graduated from York University with a BFA in music and a BA in creative writing. He went on to complete a PhD in music composition at SUNY Buffalo.

Barwin has taught creative writing at several colleges and universities, including King’s University College (Western University), McMaster University, and Mohawk College. He has also participated in writer in residence programs at Toronto Public Library, Western University, London Public Library, McMaster University, Hamilton Public Library, Wilfrid Laurier University, and others. In addition, Barwin has taught creative writing to at-risk youth through Hamilton’s ArtForms program.

Barwin’s novel Yiddish for Pirates was a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award and the Scotiabank Giller Prize. The novel also won the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour, the Canadian Jewish Literary Award, and the Hamilton Literary Award. Barwin is also a four-time recipient of the Hamilton Book of the Year award and a co-winner of the bpNichol Chapbook Award.

Barwin lives in Hamilton, Ontario.

Patrick, Keith

  • RC0925
  • Person
  • 1918-2021

Keith Patrick was born on Sept 22, 1918, in Saint John New Brunswick. He was the son of Hugh and Lily Patrick, and had six brothers: W.E. Robinson, Ronald, Edmond, Raymond, Kenneth Roland, and Murray. He received an elementary and high school education in Saint John, West Haven, Connecticut, and Lynn, Massachusetts. He was employed by American News Co. in Lynn at the outbreak of war, prompting him to return to New Brunswick to enlist. Keith served in the R.C.A.F. from 1940 to 1945 as a Wireless Operator/Air Gunner. He received training at Wireless School in Calgary and Bombing and Gunnery School in Macdonald, Manitoba. His overseas postings included Operational Training Units and Ferry Command in England; in Egypt with the RAF 108 Squadron; and in France with the 427 Lion Squadron.

He was on his second tour with the RCAF 427 Squadron when his Halifax bomber was shot down in Pas-de-Calais, France, on the night of June 12, 1944. Seriously injured, he and his pilot, Don Fulton, were sheltered by members of the French Resistance. They were liberated in September 1944. Keith retired from the RCAF in February 1945 at the rank of Flight Lieutenant.

After the war, he had a successful career as a Purchasing Manager with Ford Motor Co. in Saint John, Canadair in Montreal and Fleet Manufacturing and Horton-CBI in Fort Erie.

Keith married Phyllis Taylor on June 29, 1946. They had three children, Charmian, Janet, and Philip. Keith self-published his memoirs, To the Stars, with his daughter Janet Lee MacNeil in 2014. Keith passed away in 2021, in Kitchener, Ontario.

Manley, Rachel

  • RC0924
  • Person
  • 1947-

Rachel Manley is an author of poetry, non-fiction, and fiction, and member of a prominent Jamaican political family about whom she has written several lauded memoirs. She is the daughter of Michael Manley, a Jamaican politician who served three terms as prime minister (1972-80, 1989-92). Her paternal grandparents are Edna Manley, a sculptor and arts educator, and Norman Manley, co-founder of the Jamaican People’s National Party and the first Premier of Jamaica.
Rachel Manley was born in Cornwall, England in 1947 to Michael Manley and his second wife, Jacqueline Kammelard. At the age of two, she was sent to Jamaica, where she was raised by her paternal grandparents in their home, Drumblair. In 1969, Manley receive a Bachelor of Arts degree in English (Special Honours) from the University of the West Indies.
Throughout the 1970s and 80s, Manley published three volumes of poetry and contributed to several magazines and literary journals, including The Jamaica Journal, Caribbean Quarterly, and Focus. She also worked in a variety of roles, including as a high school teacher and member of the radio advertising department of the Caribbean Broadcasting Corporation in Barbados (1980-1986). In 1979, she received the Jamaica Centennial Medal for poetry.
In 1986, Manley immigrated to Canada, where she would eventually settle in Toronto. In 1989, Manley edited a version of her grandmother’s diaries, published by Andre Deutsch under the title Edna Manley: The Diaries.
Manley began writing family memoirs in the 1990s, publishing Drumblair, a book about her childhood with her grandparents, in 1996. The book was critically acclaimed, winning the 1997 Governor General’s Award for English language non-fiction. This volume was the first in a memoir trilogy; it was followed by Slipstream, about Michael Manley (2000), and Horses in Her Hair, about Edna Manley (2008).
These works were followed by two additional novels, The Black Peacock (2017) and The Fellowship (2019). The Black Peacock was shortlisted for the 2018 Amazon First Novel award.
Manley has received many writing fellowships over the years, including the Mary Ingraham Bunting Fellow (Literature) from Radcliffe College, the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center Fellowship; and a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship.
Poetry: Prisms (1972) Poems 2 (Coles Printery, 1978) A Light Left On (Peepal Tree, 1992)
Non-fiction: Drumblair: Memories of a Jamaican Childhood (Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 1996) Slipstream: A Daughter Remembers (Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 2000) In My Father’s Shade (UK version of Slipstream) (BlackAmber Books, 2004) Horses in Her Hair: A Granddaughter’s Story (Key Porter Books, 2008)
Fiction: The Black Peacock (Cormorant Books, 2017) The Fellowship (Cormorant Books, 2019)

Walker, Alan

  • RC0107
  • Person
  • 1930-

Alan Walker, Doctor of Music, F.R.S.C., university professor and writer, was born in Scunthorpe, Lincolnshire, England on 6 April 1930. He was educated at the Guildhall School of Music and at Durham University, where he specialized in piano, theory, harmony and counterpoint. In his early career, he lectured at the Guildhall School of Music from 1959 to 1961, and at London University from 1954 to 1970.

Walker was a producer at the British Broadcasting Corporation from 1961 to 1971, and has contributed to programmes at the BBC and Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. He served as Distinguished Visiting Professor of Music at City University in London from 1984 to 1987 and has been a Professor of Music at McMaster University since 1971, where he was Chairman of the Department from 1971 to 1980 and again from 1990 to 1993. Walker is the recipient of numerous honours, including the Hungarian Liszt Society Medal in 1980, the American Liszt Society Medal in 1984, and the Pro Cultura Hungaria Medal in 1995. He was awarded an honorary doctorate, D. Litt (honoris causa), from McMaster University in 2002. In January 2012, he received the Knight's Cross of Merit of the Republic of Hungary, one of Hungary's highest honours.

He is the author of A Study in Music Analysis, 1962, An Anatomy of Musical Criticism, 1968, Franz Liszt, 1971, Robert Schumann, 1976, Franz Liszt: Volume One, 1983, (for which he won the James Tait Black Award in 1983, and Yorkshire Post Music Book of the Year Award in 1984), Franz Liszt: Volume Two, 1989, Franz Liszt: Volume Three, 1996, and The Death of Franz Liszt, 2002. He co-authored, with Gabriele Erasmi, Liszt, Carolyne, and the Vatican: The Story of a Thwarted Marriage, 1991, and was the editor of Symposium on Chopin, 1967, Symposium on Liszt, 1970, Symposium on Schumann, 1972, The Diary of Carl Lachmund: An American Pupil of Liszt, 1995, and Hans von Bülow: a life and times, 2009. He has written over 100 articles for learned journals including a major entry on Franz Liszt for the latest edition of Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2001. His biography, Fryderyk Chopin, was launched in October 2018 to much acclaim and has subsequently been translated into numerous languages.

Spenser, Ian D.

  • RC0390
  • Person
  • 1924-2022

Born in 1924, Dr. Ian Spenser received his undergraduate training from the University of Birmingham. He completed his postdoctoral work at the University of London, King's College in 1952 and went on to complete his D.Sc in organic and biochemistry at the University of London in 1969. Dr. Spenser began his academic career at McMaster as an Assistant Professor of Biochemistry in the Chemistry Department in 1957. He is currently a professor emeritus in the Chemistry Department. He has served the university in numerous capacities including terms on the McMaster Board of Governors and the Senate. Dr. Spenser has received numerous honors throughout his long and distinguished career. These honors include: the FRIC (Fellowship, Royal Institute of Chemistry, 1957), the FCIC (Fellowship, Chemical Institute of Canada, 1957), the FRSC (Fellowship, Royal Society of Canada, 1980), and the FRSC (UK) (Fellowship, Royal Society of Chemistry, 1980). He died in Dundas, Ontario on December 28, 2022.

Madison Avenue Inc.

  • RC0923
  • Corporate body
  • 2004-

Founded in 2004 by Stuart McLean, Madison Avenue Inc. is a Canadian production company that manages CDs, books, live entertainment and all other productions connected with Stuart McLean’s radio program, the Vinyl Cafe, which aired on CBC from 1994 to 2016. This includes an extensive touring show across North America, which took place annually until 2015; recording of live concerts; the production of audio collections of Vinyl Cafe stories released in various formats (cassette, CD, vinyl and digital); and Vinyl Cafe books.

Biderman, Morris

  • RC0908
  • Person
  • 1908-2013

Morris Biderman was born in 1908 in Chenchine, a small town near Kielce, Poland. He was the youngest of five sons; his father immigrated to Canada when he was four years old. Morris’s childhood memories of Poland include the Russian and German troops fighting in his town during the Great War, and the 1918 Kielce Pogrom, which prompted his family to join his father in Toronto. The family emigrated to Canada in 1920, living on Leonard Avenue, then later Bellevue Avenue, in Toronto; he attended Ryerson Public School until he dropped out at age 16. Morris then entered the trades as a needle worker and became involved in Leftist politics. He joined the Freedom Choir (Freiheit Gesang), which was held at Alhambra Hall, 450 Spadina Avenue, which housed the Labour League (a Toronto-based, Communist-led secular Jewish organization) and in 1927 he joined the Young Communist League. He worked as an under presser and was later hired as an operator for sportswear at Eaton’s, where he worked until 1937.

In 1937, Morris joined the Labour League and became manager of Der Kamf, the Communist weekly Yiddish newspaper, later renamed Der Vochenblatt. When the Communist party was briefly outlawed during the Second World War, Der Kamf was closed, and Morris returned to work in the sportswear industry. In 1942, he became president of the Labour League. In 1945, he was elected as the first national secretary to the newly founded United Jewish People’s Order. In 1955, Morris was one of eight delegates in a delegation chosen by the Canada-Soviet Friendship Society who visited the Soviet Union. Following the revelations of Khrushchev’s Secret Speech in 1956, Morris broke with the Communist Party and resigned from the UJPO at their annual conference held in December 1959 at Toronto’s Union Station. He later co-founded a new organization, the New Fraternal Jewish Association. In 2000, he wrote his memoir, A Life on the Jewish Left: An Immigrant’s Experience (Toronto: Onward Publishing).

Morris married Minnie Usprich (1909-2001) in September 1929. Morris’ older brother Dave Biderman is the father of Ruth Borchiver.

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