Robertson Davies (1913-1995) was a writer, journalist, and university professor. Educated at Upper Canada College, Queen's University and Balliol College, Oxford, he returned to Canada in 1940 as literary editor of Saturday Night. Two years later, he became the editor of the Peterborough Examiner. At the beginning of his career Davies earned his reputation as a journalist, dramatist and the alter ego of the cantankerous diarist, Samuel Marchbanks. In 1951 Davies published his first novel, Tempest Tost. Altogether he wrote a dozen novels, but he was equally prolific as an essayist, book reviewer, short story writer, and satiric commentator of his age. Davies taught literature at the University of Toronto from 1960 to 1981, and it was also during this period that he was named the first Master of Massey College. He was the recipient of many honours, including the D.Litt conferred upon him by McMaster University in 1959.
Christian Darnton was born in Leeds, England, on 30 October 1905 and educated at Caius College, Cambridge. He was appointed music master at Stowe School in 1929 and became the assistant editor of the Music Lover. He composed vocal and orchestral works and published one book, You and Music. He died in 1981.
Antonio D'Alfonso was born in Montreal in 1953. He attended English and French schools and studied at Loyola College where he earned a B.A. in Communication Arts in 1975. He completed an M.Sc. in Communications Studies from Université de Montréal. D’Alfonso completed a Ph.D. in 2012. He received an Honorary Doctorate from Athabasca University in 2016.
In1978 he founded Guernica Editions, where he edited 450 books by authors from around the world. The company is dedicated to the bridging of cultures in Canada and publishes both original works and translations in three languages: English, French, and Italian. In 1982 in collaboration with three writers he founded the trilingual magazine Vice Versa and in 1986 they founded the Association of Italian-Canadian writers. As an author himself, he has published over 20 books in French and English. He has won the Trillium Award for his novel, Un vendredi du mois d'août in 2005. He is also an independent filmmaker and scriptwriter. In 2010 his film Bruco won the Best Foreign Film and Best International Director of a Feature Film at the New York International Film and Video Festival (Los Angeles). He has lived in Mexico City, Rome and Toronto. He has taught at University of Toronto and University of California, San Diego and presently teaches film in the French Department at McGill University.
The newspaper was first published by Lord Northcliffe and was the first paper to produce articles aimed at women. It continues to publish today.
Dr. Allan Roy Dafoe (29 May 1883 – 2 June 1943) was a Canadian obstetrician, best known for delivering and caring for the Dionne quintuplets, the first quintuplets known to survive early infancy. Before modern fertility treatments, multiple births were a rare event and, when they did occur, the babies were not likely to survive. The 1934 birth of the Dionne Quintuplets in isolated Callander, Ontario (near North Bay), was regarded as a medical miracle and the country doctor who ensured their survival became an international celebrity. This collection consists of a small group of photographs of Dr. Dafoe basking in the fame which the births brought him. The images show Dafoe being honoured at various events in Washington (a meeting with President Roosevelt), New York City and Atlantic City between 1934 and 1941. There are no photographs of the famous quints.
The Canadian poet John W. Curry (jw curry) created the Curvd H&z Press in Toronto in 1979. Curvd H&z Press continues the tradition of such 1960s Canadian poetry presses as Gronk, Ganglia and Blewointment. It is particularly interested in offbeat, experimental, concrete and sound poetry. The writers include such well-known poets as bp nichol and Steve McCaffery, and lesser known ones like Peggy Lefler, William Maki and John Curry himself.
The Canadian poet John W. Curry (jw curry) created the Curvd H&z Press in Toronto in 1979. Curvd H&z Press continues the tradition of such 1960s Canadian poetry presses as Gronk, Ganglia and Blewointment, and is particularly interested in offbeat, experimental, concrete and sound poetry. The writers include such well-known poets as bp Nichol and Steve McCaffery, and lesser known ones like Peggy Lefler, William Maki and John Curry himself. In addition to the finding aid, see also David Uu, Curvd H&z: A Catalogue ([1993?]), Mills Research Collections Ref Z232.C977U8 1993.
Claire Culhane (née Eglin) was born on 2 September 1918 into a Russian-Jewish immigrant family in Montreal. She later married Gerry Culhane, a member of the Communist Party and trade-union activist but the marriage did not last. In 1967-1968 Culhane worked as an advisor and hospital administrator with the Canadian Anti-Tuberculosis Hospital in Quang Ngai, South Vietnam. Upon her return to Canada, she became very involved in peace activism. In 1976 she was appointed a member of the Citizens Advisory Committee for British Columbia Penitentiaries. An author, one of her books was titled Why Is Canada in Vietnam? She died on 28 April 1996 in Vancouver.
Sir Charles Haukes Todd Crosthwaite (1835-1915), a career civil servant, was born at Donnybrook in Ireland on 5 December 1835. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School and St. John's College, Oxford. He joined the Indian service in 1857. He served as chief commissioner of Burma from March 1887 until 1890. While in Burma, he cleared the province of rebels and set down the roots of British administration. In 1893 he became lieutenant-governor of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh. He wrote several books in retirement, including The Pacification of Burma (1912). He died on 28 May 1915 at Long Acre, Shamley Green, Surrey.
P.F. Cronin, a journalist, came to Canada in 1887 from Ireland in 1887. He first worked for the Toronto Empire and later on for the Catholic Register. Edward Blake (1833-1912) was a Canadian lawyer and politician, who became premier of Ontario in 1871 before moving on to federal politics. In 1892 he abandoned Canadian politics for British, serving as the Nationalist member for South Longford in the British House of Commons until 1907. He died in Toronto in 1912.
FCB Crompton served with the Army Service Corps as a Lieutenant. He was demobilized on 13 April 1919. After the war, Crompton wrote Glimpses of Early Canadians: Lahontan (1925).
The Crombie family, still resident in Brant county, has antecedents in England, the Isle of Man and in Ireland. Some of their earliest ancestors were active in the British military service: Richard Hedges Cradock (married in 1767) served in America, Spain, Portugal, France and the West Indies and his son, Adam Williamson Cradock, established himself in Canada for a time before returning to Dublin. One of the primary unifying links in this collection of family papers covering more than two centuries is Agnes Georgina Cradock (1839-1916) who was born in Dublin and died in Canada, dividing her life between the two countries, first marrying Henry Archdall Wood (1861) and after his death in 1874, marrying George Thomas Atkins in 1877. The Atkins family were neighbours of the Cradocks; George's father, Major Thomas Atkins, served in India before purchasing a property in West Flamborough in 1840. The elder daughter of Agnes and George, Hilda Isabelle Georgina Atkins (1878-1949), married into the Crombie family. Edward Rubidge Crombie (1874-1937), Hilda's husband, was a farmer and writer whose literary efforts form a significant part of this fonds. Their son Edward B. H. Crombie (1909-1994) married Margaret C. Reynolds (1918-2003), daughter of V. Ernest Reynolds and Estella M. Craig.
The Crombie family, still resident in Brant county, has antecedents in England, the Isle of Man and in Ireland. Some of their earliest ancestors were active in the British military service: Richard Hedges Cradock (married in 1767) served in America, Spain, Portugal, France and the West Indies and his son, Adam Williamson Cradock, established himself in Canada for a time before returning to Dublin.
One of the primary unifying links in this collection of family papers covering more than two centuries is Agnes Georgina Cradock (1839-1916) who although being born in Hamilton, Ont. lived in Ireland as a young girl, going back and forth to Canada with her family. She married Henry Archdall Wood in1861 and after his death in 1874, she married George Thomas Atkins in 1877. She died in Paris, Ont. The Atkins family were neighbours of the Cradocks; George’s father, Major Thomas Atkins, served in India before purchasing a property in West Flamborough in 1840. The elder daughter of Agnes and George, Hilda Georgina Isabella Atkins (1878-1949), married into the Crombie family. Edward Rubidge Crombie (1874-1937), Hilda’s husband, was a farmer and writer whose literary efforts form a significant part of this fonds. Their son Edward H. Crombie (1909-1994) married Margaret C. Reynolds (1918-2003), daughter of V. Ernest Reynolds and Estella M. Craig.
Stelio Cro was born in Rome, Italy, on 7 April 1936. He was educated in Rome up to the junior high school years; he finished his secondary school at the Scuola Cristoforo Colombo, the Italian school run by the Italian Government in Argentina. In 1963 he obtained a Licenciatura en Letras at the Facultad de Filosofia y Letras of the University of Buenos Aires; in 1966 he obtained a Doctorate at the Facolta de Lingue e Letterature Straniere of the University of Venice, Italy.
After teaching at the University of Buenos Aires and at Florida State University, he joined McMaster University in 1972. He retired from the Department of Modern Languages in June of 1996, as Professor Emeritus. In 1995 he was awarded the McMaster Student Union Teaching Award for the Humanities. Cro is the author of nine books.
Rupert Crawshay-Williams, author and humanist, was born in London in 1908 and educated at Queen's College, Oxford. He worked for Gramophone Records and High Fidelity Reproduction until 1939 and was a regular reviewer for the periodical Gramophone Records. He was a founding member of the Classification Society and an honorary associate of the Rationalist Press Association. In the 1940s he moved to Portmeirion, Wales where he met Bertrand Russell. He published a memoir, Russell Remembered, in 1970, as well as two books of philosophy. He died on 12 June 1977.
William Cowper, English poet, was born at his father's rectory at Great Berkhampstead on 15 November 1731. He was educated at Westminster College and called to the bar in 1754. Following a spell of mental instability, bouts of which were to plague him for the rest of his life, he went to live at Huntingdon with the Revd. Morely Unwin, his wife, Mary (b. 1724) and their son William, who by then was away from home. On the death of Unwin, Mary moved to Olney in Buckinghamshire with Cowper. The curate in Olney, John Newton, collaborated with Cowper in the writing of the Olney Hymns (1779) after which he moved to London. Under Mrs. Unwin's influence, Cowper wrote a series of moral satires, published in 1782 as Poems. Mrs. Unwin died on 17 December 1796 while William Cowper lived for a few more years, dying on 25 April 1800.
John Coulter, playwright, was born on 12 February 1888 in Belfast, Northern Ireland. He was educated at the School of Art in Belfast and at the University of Manchester. He taught English and art from 1913-1919 before moving to London to become a drama critic and playwright for sixteen years. In London, he met his Canadian wife, the poet, Olive Clare Primrose, and moved with her to Canada in 1936. In later years they divided their time between Ireland and Canada. His most famous work is his trilogy of plays about Louis Riel, published 1950-1960. He died on 1 December 1980. There is a much more comprehensive biography available in Library Research News 6, no. 2 (Autumn 1982).
Elsie J. Corrigan wrote an M.A. thesis, titled "Naomi Mitchison's Treatment of the Historical Novel", at the University of Toronto in 1951. She died in the late 1970s, probably 1979.
Alfred Edgar Coppard, clerk, editor, poet, and short story writer, was born on 4 January 1878 in Folkstone, Kent. He began his working life as a clerk and professional athlete before turning to writing in 1919 using the pen name A. E. Coppard. He is best known for his short stories, "The Higgler" being the best-known. It was published in a pirated, limited edition of thirty-nine by The Chorcua Press, of Chelsea, New York, each copy containing one page of the manuscript, except for copy 1 which contains 2 pages. Coppard published his autobiography, It's Me, O Lord!, in 1955. He died in London on 13 January 1957.
