Social Studies 11
Canada: A People’s History
Companion Readings
Episode 13
Hard Times
1929-1940
I. Introduction: Canadians Suffer
Desperate times settle over Canada during the Great Depression
"I landed in Canada, a refugee from unemployment and want in England with the
youthful naïve idea of finding work and prosperity in the new country ... It soon
became apparent that here also there were no jobs and for a couple of days I hung
around the CPR depot, dozing on benches." - Ron Liversedge
October 24, 1929 went down in history as "Black Thursday". On that day, stock
prices plummeted on the New York Stock Exchange, creating a domino effect on
world stock markets. It signaled the beginning of the Great Depression.
Canada was one of the hardest hit by the economic crisis. The country relied heavily
on its exports. Pulp and paper, wood and wheat represented two-thirds of Canadian
exports and accounted for much of the country's prosperity. With the onset of the
global Depression, countries adopted protectionist measures to defend their own
markets.
Jobless army
The crisis hit every economic sector in Canada including agriculture, industry,
commerce and services. By 1933, three in ten Canadians were out of work. With few
government assistance programs, thousands of men criss-crossed the country,
looking for work, which didn't exist, and food and shelter, which was increasingly
scarce.
Those with jobs were desperate to keep them. Textile mills took advantage cheap
labour, and adult workers were replaced by girls as young as 15, who would do the
job for about half of what the men earned.
The Dust Bowl
The Canadian prairies experienced some the toughest times. In the first three years
of the Depression, the price of wheat tumbled from $1,23 a bushel to 29 cents in
1932. And in 1929, an unprecedented decade of drought set in on parts of the
prairies. The once-lush fields dried up and the cropped burned in the sun
In 1937, the world economy began to straighten out even though the international
markets were less active. In 1938-1939, industrial countries resumed their economic
development but Canada remained behind the others. It would take Canada two
more years to pull of the Great Depression. And this was at a high cost. By 1940,
Canada transformed from an economy in crisis to an economy of war.
1. Jobless Army
Thousands of young men roam the country in a desperate search for work
during the Great Depression
During the Great Depression, Ron Liversedge joined thousands of men who criss-
crossed the country in search of work, food or some relief from their dismal lives.
"I learned of the life of the transient unemployed," Liversedge wrote in his
published memoir. "I learned of freight riding, of life in the jungles, cooking
mulligan stew with a chunk of bummed meat, and stolen potatoes, of being
hounded by police from town to town. The freight trains, the long, cold, hungry
rides on box cars, oil tankers, lumber cars, any place that was available. We were
not professional hoboes, but unemployed men, many recent immigrants, the
beginning of a mighty army."
Nearly one hundred thousand men made up this jobless army at the height of the
Depression. In 1933, the unemployment rate was 30 per cent and there was no
national unemployment assistance program. The men moved across the country,
looking for work, which didn't exist, and food and shelter, which was increasingly
scarce.
Most of these transients were young, single men. Some of the men, like Liversedge,
arrived in Canada near the start of the Depression to escape the harsh times in
Europe.
"I landed in Canada, a refugee from unemployment and want in England with the
youthful naive idea of finding work and prosperity in the new country. It soon
became apparent that there were no jobs and for a couple of days I hung around the
CPR depot, dozing on benches."
In Sudbury, Ontario, Liversedge and other recent arrivals were confronted by the
harsh surprise of the Canadian winter, and by the crowded conditions of the local jail
when they were picked up for vagrancy.
After serving 30 days, they sought refuge in the city's only soup kitchen. It was in a
dimly lit basement and the men stood around tables to eat.
"The atmosphere was like that in a chilly mouldy crypt. The tables were covered with
ice and beans and pieces of wet bread. The meals were always the same. The
exception was the shooting of a bear by a Sudbury businessman who gave the bear
to the city who then sent it to the soup kitchen with the result that a few hundred
men suffered violent diarrhea."
Liversedge continued west. He took a train to Winnipeg, but couldn't find work there.
In Saskatchewan, he found a farm job for the summer then went on to Calgary.
As the Depression deepened, unrest grew among this jobless army. The federal
government seemed indifferent to their plight. And financially strapped local
governments refused aid single homeless men between 1932 and 1936.
Prime Minister R.B. Bennett became so concerned about their mounting anger that
he established a system of voluntary work camps in 1932. Liversedge ended up in a
work camp in northern British Columbia. But the camps only fuelled the flames of
frustration and soon Liversedge and thousands of other jobless transients would
organize and demand the government's attention.
2. The Dust Bowl
Prairie farmers suffer nature's wrath and economic crisis during the 1930s
As a child in the 1920s, Anne Bailey remembered golden days on the Saskatchewan prairie
when wheat was king and harvest time was the highlight of the year.
"I loved every minute, especially when I was allowed to haul the wheat to the elevator. It
was worth working and waiting for all summer."
By the end of the decade, Bailey was a newlywed, working her own farm. Soon, she
watched dark days descend on the breadbasket of Canada. Wheat prices plummeted and the
world became mired in economic crisis. Then nature turned on the prairie farmers as well.
In 1929, an unprecedented decade of drought set in. The once-lush fields dried up and the
cropped burned in the sun
Within a year, most of the crops were destroyed by drought and eventually Bailey's husband
joined a parade of other farmers seeking work in the city.
"I have the dubious honour of belonging to the 43% of farm wives who have kept things
going while the boss was elsewhere, working for some cash to improve the farm."
Thousands of families simply abandoned their farms altogether.
Bailey's family had worked the land for generations and she had no plans to budge. Until
one day she and her children were alone against nature's wrath.
"My son came running into the house greatly excited," Bailey wrote. "'Come quick, Mom,' he
shouted, 'there's a big black cloud coming in the sky.' He ran out ahead of me and pointed to
the western sky where sure enough there was the blackest most terrifying cloud I have ever
seen on the horizon. It was moving very quickly and the edge of it was rolling along."
The rain would provide much needed relief for the parched fields. But it wasn't a rain cloud, it
was the dried topsoil of a hundred farms lifted into the air.
"Panic rose in me. What should I do? Where should we go? The house was sure to be blown
away and our nearest neighbour was a mile away. At the rate the cloud was moving I could
never make it as I would have to carry the baby. I shut the door tight, picked up the baby
and yelling at the other two to follow, I ran for the dug out barn. Already the shadow of the
cloud was upon us."
When it was light enough for me to see the forms of the cattle I knew it was safe to open the
door, so once again I looked outside. ...Everything-land, air, sky-was a dull grey colour ... our
feet sank in sand and we breathed and tasted sand. Such a mess."
Hundreds of millions of tons of parched top-soil were blown by the wind. Black clouds moved
across prairies and continued east leaving residue on the ledges of skyscraper in New York.
In the wake, clouds of grasshoppers came in millions, eating whatever was left: crops,
gardens even clothes left on line to dry. The cloud of locust passed with a mechanical hum.
Reporter John Gray described the scene in Saskatchewan.
"Anybody who lived in Regina that summer and could not get over being squeamish about
walking on wall-to-wall grasshoppers stayed indoors ... Clouds of the insects obscured the
sun."
Bailey and other farmers found little relief from nature during the 1930s. There were small
gestures of help from other parts of the country; Maritimers sent salt cod and Torontonians
sent money. But as the Dust Bowl continued for most of the decade and wheat prices plunged
to the lowest in recorded history, two-thirds of Saskatchewan farmers were forced to line up
for monthly aid.
3. Exploiting Hard Times
Sweatshops thrive but workers and the government fight back
Irene Duhamel once dreamed of a higher education and a better life. Then the Depression hit.
Soon, the Quebec schoolgirl was forced to exchange her dreams for a job in a sweatshop.
Duhamel lived with her large family in St. Hyacinthe, a factory town near Montreal. Never
well off, Duhamel's father had cobbled together the money to send his daughter to school
by working double shifts at the local pulp mill. When hard times hit, two-thirds of Quebec's
pulp workers lost their jobs.
Fifteen-year-old Irene Duhamel saw her hopes vanish.
"I planned to be a nurse when I grew up. My best friend and I were going to enroll together.
But now it was my turn to help out the younger kids in the family. There were fifteen mouths
to feed and we needed my salary. My heart was heavy. I cried so many tears. I cried enough
for the rest of my life."
As the Depression deepened, the textile mills took advantage of cheap labour, and adult
workers were replaced by girls as young as 15, who would do the job for about half of what
the men earned.
A slight girl, Duhamel weighed just 68 lbs. when she went to work at a textile mill that
supplied cloth to department stores.
"Because I was small I had to climb into the needles and go between the threads with a little
brush to lift the cotton debris. My hands were full of blood. There was no break. It was so hot
in the factory. All the windows were closed to keep in the humidity so the cotton would stay
soft. It could get as hot as 105 degrees. You worked mindlessly without stopping. The
company hired a nurse to give us salt pills if we fainted."
Duhamel worked 11 hours a day earning eight dollars a week, two dollars below minimum
wage. But these kinds of jobs were in demand because the factory paid slightly more than
other places. Workers were closely monitored, and if an employee missed a day of work, her
job was in jeopardy.
"It was so strict that one employee had her baby in the factory bathroom to avoid missing a
day of work," remembered Duhamel.
Workers like Duhamel found an unlikely champion in federal Minister of Labour H.H. Stevens.
In 1934, he talked Prime Minister Bennett into forming a commission to investigate the
country's biggest companies, suspecting that they were exploiting workers.
"The law has holes big enough for millionaires to crawl through, and company laws that
permit the fleecing of the public on one hand and the sweatshops on the other."
Under Stevens' direction, a panel of MPs interviewed workers across the country. An Eaton’s
seamstress named Annie Wells told them she was paid 9 1/2 cents for a dress that Eatons
sold for a $1.69.
"You were badgered, harassed, and worried," she testified at the commission. "You were told
to work and work and work so hard at these cheaper rates ... and you were threatened [that]
if you didn't, you would be fired. You felt insecure with your job. You had to sit at your
machine from a quarter to eight until twenty minutes to one and go as hard as you could. You
had not time to get up and have a drink of water or powder your nose or look at anybody.
You just went on working."
Hit by bad press, Eaton’s reformed its labour practices. But its suppliers continued to treat
their workers as poorly as they always had - and life didn’t change one iota for Irene
Duhamel.
As the Depression continued, Duhamel joined a social action organization called the Jeunesse
Ouvrières Catholique (JOC). She and other members lobbied unsuccessfully for education
subsidies for working youth.
Near the end of the Depression, Duhamel became engaged and finally quit working at the
textile mill. She never realized her dream to become a nurse
4. No Place to Turn
Victims of the Depression get little help from the Canadian government
Before the Depression, James Gray was achieving the middle-class dream. In 1926, he had
saved enough money to buy a mini-golf course - the latest fad among Winnipeg's growing
leisure class.
Then the Depression hit and Gray's business collapsed.
"I was not yet twenty-five," he wrote in a memoir, "but I could look back on ten years of
psychopathic concentration on getting ahead in life. Then my number came up and I was
confronted with the ego-shattering discovery that there wasn't a single employer in all
Winnipeg who would give me a job. It was my own fault. I couldn't feed my family."
By 1933, a quarter of Canada's labour force was unemployed. And there were
few places to turn for those who lost their jobs.
Canada had a rudimentary social welfare system. There was no national unemployment
program, a small old age pension scheme and little for the sick or destitute.
The responsibility for assisting the needy was placed on the provinces and municipalities.
Help was haphazard at best and many provincial and local governments verged on
bankruptcy during the bad times. Private charities filled some of the void.
As the Depression deepened and starting taking a toll on the middle class, Conservative
Prime Minister R.B. Bennett finally stepped in and gave province 20 million dollars for relief
in 1932.
Among the first Canadians to go on the dole was James Gray.
"We received no cash. Vouchers covered food, fuel and rent. But we needed other things-
many other things like tobacco and cigarette papers-toothpaste, razor blades, lipstick, face
powder, the odd bottle of aspirin, streetcar fare...We could have cleaned our teeth with
soap, But there was such a thing as morale even for the destitute."
Gray’s food rations ran out half way through every month and he had few job prospects in
sight.
Bennett's government did little during the first years of the Depression to stimulate the
economy or the job market. Like many leaders in industrialized countries, Bennett believed
in the free-enterprise system - government had no place tinkering with the economy. Even
if the economy was in chaos.
"The closest any of us on relief ever got to socially useful labour was sawing cordwood,"
remembered James Gray. "But we were drafted periodically for all the make-work projects,
like raking leaves, picking rock, digging dandelions, and tidying up back lanes ... It was all
justified on the grounds that exercise would be good for us, that working would improve
our morale, and that, by providing us with a token opportunity to work for our relief, we
would be freed of the stigma of accepting charity. None of these propositions had much
validity."
Subsistence living took its toll on Gray. He visited a doctor assigned to people on the dole
and was diagnosed with tuberculosis. Gray remembered his encounter with the doctor:
"It must have been quite some time since he had encountered such a walking skeleton. I
was five feet eleven inches tall and weighed 118 pounds with most of my clothes on. I got
the bad news. The doctor was completely off hand about it."
Gray was one of nearly 100,000 Canadians diagnosed with tuberculosis during the
Depression.
James Gray survived the disease and eventually found work as a reporter for the Winnipeg
Free Press at what was then the princely sum of 20 dollars a week. He drove across the
prairies, reporting how others were trying to survive the Depression-era West.
5. All That Jazz
Avant garde music provides escape from tough times
During the height of the Great Depression, jazz was considered a little avant garde, a little
dangerous and was flourishing in Montreal.
Nights in Montreal were a sinful pleasure for those with money to spend. Rich
Montrealers came in to the jazz clubs with their girlfriends and gave the band $50 dollars
to keep playing after the bar had emptied and closed.
The city had a booming red light district with jazz hotspots like the Hollywood Club and the
Terminal Club with its bare floors and pot-bellied stove.
Myron Sutton was an alto sax player and came to Montreal from Niagara Falls to be at the
centre of the action.
"The Terminal Club was the kind of place where anything could happen. I saw Johnny
Hodges come in there and blow his horn. I saw that puff-jaws Dizzy Gillespie come in
there. Duke Ellington came in and sat behind the bar. Anybody's liable to come in there. It
was just a joint, but it was a well-known joint."
Black Americans developed jazz at the turn of the century. The improvised music combined
elements of ragtime, blues, spirituals, and band music. By the 1920s, jazz had migrated
across the border and during the 1930s, Montreal attracted some of the jazz greats. While
most North American clubs were segregated, black musicians found greater integration in
Montreal clubs and other incentives to come to the city.
"You have to give the French Canadian white woman all the credit in the world," one black
musician said, "because she was the nicest woman to all the black musicians. If it wasn't
for the French Canadian women, all the black musicians who came from anywhere, and
stayed, would have starved to death."
The 1930s saw the start of the Swing-era, a big band form of jazz. Alto sax player Myron
Sutton had a swing band called the Canadian Ambassadors, the first organized black jazz
band in the country. They played Connie's Inn on St. Catherine Street in Montreal for nine
months in 1933 and wore custom-tailored suits.
"Our band was strictly a swing band," Sutton said. "And we just swung, that's all."
As jazz thrived in Montreal during the 1930s, a local boy honed his musical skills in quieter
venues around the city. Oscar Peterson performed publicly in the family band at churches
and community halls. By the end of the decade a teenage Peterson had his own radio show
in Montreal and was primed to dominate the city jazz scene in the decade to come.
The jazz pianist and composer subsequently became one of Canada's most famous
musicians.
Montreal's jazz legacy continues today. Each summer the city hosts the Festival
International de Jazz de Montréal. Established in 1980, the festival is now one of the
premier jazz events in the world. It attracts up to 400,000 people a year.
II. Introduction: Calls for Help
Canadians turn to Ottawa for help during an economic crisis
"Never will I or any government of which I am part put a premium on idleness." - Prime
Minister R.B. Bennett
When Canada and the world plunged into an economic free-fall in the late 1920s, nobody
was prepared for the intensity or the duration of the crisis, certainly not the political
leaders.
Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King had led the country through the prosperous
1920s. At the onset of the Great Depression, he did little to acknowledge the growing
economic crisis. King's government believed that market forces would bring back
prosperity in short time.
R.B Bennett, the Conservative opposition leader and a tough-talking millionaire, seemed to
offer Canadians more hope. He defeated King in the 1930 election and faced a nation in
crisis.
Passive leader
Once in office, Bennett had little vision for drawing Canadians out of the Depression. True
to conventional political theory of the time, he believed governments should interfere as
little as possible in the free enterprise system.
By 1932, almost a quarter of workers were jobless and Bennett was forced to adopt less
traditional economic measures. The federal government gave the provinces $20 million for
relief programs. Bennett also created labour camps to provide unemployed single men with
a subsistence living. Men lived in bunkhouses and were paid 20 cents a day in return for a
44-hour week of hard labour.
Canada's new deal
In 1935, Bennett shocked Canadians when he proposed a socially progressive "new deal"
program. Though less ambitious than U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal,
Bennett's plan still promised more progressive taxation, unemployment insurance, health
insurance, closer regulation of working conditions and social reforms.
Bennett’s new program did not impress the voters and Mackenzie King won the 1935
election with a large majority. The Supreme Court of Canada later found the most
important parts of Bennett's new deal were unconstitutional.
Radical economics
But Bennett's "new deal" did signal a change in government thinking. At the time, the
economic theories of British economist John Maynard Keynes were gaining popularity.
According to Keynes, a government had to play an active part in the management of the
economy.
The Second World War eventually brought Canada out of the Depression. From the start of
the war, the country quickly went from an economy in crisis to an economy of war.
But the Great Depression demonstrated the failing of liberalism, and the incapacity of the
capitalist system to correct itself. State intervention as a regulatory agent for the economy
began to take hold in Canada and around the world.
1. Blaming the Prime Minister
Canadians focus their anger on R.B. Bennett as he leads the country during the
Great Depression
Richard (R.B.) Bennett was a tough-talking millionaire whom Canadians turned to as a
beacon of hope during the first years of the Great Depression. He soon became the focus
of a nation's anger as hard times intensified.
Bennett, the Conservative opposition leader, ran against Liberal Prime Minister William
Lyon Mackenzie King during the 1930 federal election. King had led the country through
the prosperous 1920s but did little to acknowledge the growing economic crisis. Bennett
seemed to offer more hope.
"The Conservative Party is going to find work for all who are willing to work, or perish in
the attempt," he told a Moncton audience while on the campaign trail. "Mr. King promises
consideration of the problem of employment. I promise to end unemployment. Which plan
do you like best?"
Canadians elected Bennett with a commanding majority.
Once in office, Bennett had few concrete visions for drawing Canadians out of the crisis.
Basically, he believed governments should interfere as little as possible in the free
enterprise system. His few efforts to regulate the economy involved traditional policies.
Bennett raised tariffs to unprecedented levels in an effort to protect Canadian markets and
convinced Britain to offer Canada some preferential trading opportunities.
But these efforts did not stop the economic hemorrhage.
By 1932, almost a quarter of workers were jobless. Bennett was forced to adopt less
traditional economic measures and the federal government gave the provinces $20 million
for relief programs. Bennett also created labour camps to provide unemployed single men
with a subsistence living. Men lived in bunkhouses and were paid 20 cents a day in return
for a 44-hour week of hard labour.
The camps were very unpopular and so was Bennett. His initiatives offered Canadians no
concrete ways to get back to work.
Canadians looked at the portly bachelor who lived in style at the Château Laurier Hotel in
Ottawa and wondered how he could ever understand their misery. The Prime Minister
became the target of endless jokes. Cars which were towed by horses because there was
no money for fuel were called "Bennett buggies."
After four years in office and with an election looming, Bennett finally took some radical
action. He borrowed ideas from American president Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal and
developed a Canadian version of the plan to combat the Depression.
At the start of 1935, Canadians turned on their radios and were shocked to hear Bennett
outlining a new deal for Canada. In a complete departure from his free enterprise beliefs,
Bennett called for government control and regulation in Canada's social and economic
arenas.
"In the last five years great changes have taken place in the world," he told his listeners.
"The old order is gone. We are living in conditions that are new and strange to us. Canada
on the dole is like a young and vigorous man in the poorhouse ... If you believe that things
should be left as they are, you and I hold contrary and irreconcilable views. I am for
reform. And in my mind, reform means government intervention. It means government
control and regulation. It means the end of laissez-faire."
Bennett’s new deal promised more progressive taxation, unemployment insurance, health
insurance, closer regulation of working conditions and social reforms.
But time had run out for Bennett. By now his party was too closely associated with the
hardships of the Depression and Bennett did not have popularity like Roosevelt’s to sell the
plan. An election was called for October 1935. His opponent, Mackenzie King offered the
choice of "King or Chaos." Canadians chose King and handed him a majority government.
Although he was out of office, Bennett's new deal legislation was challenged at the
Supreme Court. The Court found the most important parts unconstitutional.
Bennett remained opposition leader until 1938. Bitter and disillusioned by his election
defeat and conflicts within his Conservative Party, R.B. Bennett abandoned Canada and
immigrated to England. He died there in 1947.
2. Relief Camps
Jobless men become militant when the government shuffles them off to work in
the Canadian wilderness
At the height of the Great Depression, thousands of jobless men were shunted off to
federal relief camps in the Canadian wilderness. The camps became a focal point for a
generation’s anger and a lasting legacy of a government's ineffectiveness during the era.
Ron Liversedge ended up in a labour camp in northern British Columbia.
"The Tory government of R.B. Bennett had decided a role for the single unemployed.
They were to be hidden away to become forgotten men, the forgotten generation. How
naïve of Mr. Bennett."
Like Liversedge, thousands of young, single men had few options during the economic
crisis of the 1930s. Many of them criss-crossed the country by train looking for work or a
decent meal.
By 1932, there were an estimated 70,000 unemployed transients. Many of the men
congregated in cities and frustration was growing among their ranks.
As the number of jobless transients grew, the federal government feared they could
threaten public order. Bennett's military chief, General Andy McNaughton, warned that the
unemployed could launch a Communist revolt.
"In their ragged platoons, here are the prospective members of what Marx called the
'industrial reserve army, the storm troopers of the revolution.'"
McNaughton suggested that the men be sent to rural relief camps where they could
neither vote nor organize. The camps were voluntary, but those who resisted could be
arrested for vagrancy.
Run by the Department of Defence, the camps were located in remote areas such as
northern Ontario and interior B.C. The men cleared bush, built roads, planted trees,
erected public buildings in return for room, board, medical care and 20 cents a day. They
were paid one-tenth of what an employed labourer would make doing the same work.
While the Bennett government hoped the camps would ease the unrest, they became a
focal point for the men's anger. The young men were frustrated that the government could
not provide them with meaningful work.
Militancy increased in the camps.
"In those bunkhouses," Liversedge wrote, "There were more men reading Marx, Lenin and
Stalin than there were reading girlie magazines."
Bennett had unwittingly provided basic training camps for the army of unemployed.
In April 1935, the men's unhappiness boiled over. Fifteen hundred men from the British
Columbia relief camps went on strike and congregated in Vancouver. The move launched
months of cross-country protests, which culminated in a riot in the streets of Regina.
A year later, with a change of government, the unpopular relief camps were shut down.
Some of the men found temporary work but most returned to their wasted lives in the
cities.
In all, 170,248 men had stayed in the camps.
3. Dear Mr. Prime Minister
R.B. Bennett personally answers hundreds of letters from desperate Canadians
during the Depression
As Canada’s economic crisis deepened in the early 1930s, Prime Minister R.B. Bennett
appeared to show little sympathy for the plight of his fellow Canadians. Bennett’s
government failed to come up with any far-reaching policy to alleviate the suffering caused
by the Great Depression.
But the tough-talking bachelor had a far different private face. Bennett was a kindly and
generous man who donated $25,000 a year to numerous charities. And during the
darkest days of the Depression, Bennett’s compassion and humanity shone through.
The Prime Minister received hundreds of letters from desperate Canadians requesting help.
Alone in his seventeen-room suite at the Chateau Laurier Hotel in Ottawa, Bennett worked
through the night, trying to keep up with an endless chorus of heartbreak and despair.
Here are samples of letters to R.B Bennett exactly as written:
Dear Sir,
I am writing to see if their is any help I could get.
As I have a baby thirteen days old that only weighs
one pound and I have to keep in cotton Wool & Olive Oil,
and I haven’t the money to buy it, if their is any help I could get
their will be two votes for you next election
Hoping to hear from you soon
Yours Truly,
Mrs. Jack O’Hannen
Murray Harbour, PEI
Her letter to the Prime Minister was Mrs. Jack O’Hannen’s last hope. When he received it,
Bennett opened his wallet and sent the young mother five dollars - enough money to cover
groceries for about a month..
Dear Mr. Bennett,
I believe you to be good as well as a great man
therefore I am appealing to you to save my home.
Picture yourself, through no fault of your own,
homeless with sons willing, but unable to provide for you.
Please help me or tell me what I can do.
Yours Sincerely and hopefully, Laura Bates.
Toronto Sept 3, 1933
Dear Madam,
I am certainly willing to help you and if you will be good enough to let me know what
company holds the mortgage on your home I will look into the matter and see if anything
can be done to straighten out your difficulties.
yours faithfully,
R.B. Bennett
Dear Sir,
Three little baby boys were born to Mr. and Mrs. Samuels in our vicinity.
Like many others they have had some very bad luck.
The parents are a very fine type, not the kind with the hand out for help.
We hope you will feel toward these unfortunate people the way we do.
Yours truly,
Elizabeth Ratray
Welsley Ont,
Sept. 27,1933
Dear Mr. and Mrs Samuels,
I am enclosing herewith a 20 dollar bill, which I trust may be of some little service to you
during the Christmas season.
I learned the other day that one of the triplet boys had passed away and I extend to you
my sincerest sympathy,
With best wishes, believe me I am
yours faithfully
RB Bennett Ottawa
Oct 13, 1933
Dear Prime Minister RB Bennett,
It is with a very humble heart that I take the opportunity of writing this letter to ask you if
you will please send for this underware for my husband from the Eaton catalog. I can
manage but my husband has arthritis very bad at times in his arms and shoulders. I have
patched and darned his old underwear for the last two years, but they are completely done
now. If you can’t do this I really don’t know what to do.
Mrs. Thomas Perkins
Kingdom Saskatchewan
Sept 28, 1933
Prime Minister RB Bennett
dear Sir received your kind favour of underware for my husband. We wish to thank you
very much for it. We sure are thankful for your kindness
Mr and Mrs. Thomas Perkins
Kingdom, Saskachewan
Nov 15 1933
Dear Mr. Bennett,
I am a litte boy eight years old and I’m in Grade III at school. I’ve wanted a littel red
wagon to hich my dog to for so many year, but daddy has no money. Please, Mr. Bennett
would you send me enuff money to buy my wagon. Thank you so much.
Your very good friend,
Maurice Stanley
Dear Mr. Bennett,
Thank very much for the money. I’m going to get the wagon. Mamma said I could.
Ardath Sask
Aug 31, 1935
R.B Bennett personally answered many of the hundreds of letters he received during the
Great Depression, often giving money from his own pocket to needy Canadians. The Prime
Minister received little public recognition for his private kindness.
III. Introduction: Striking Back
Social unrest and new political visions emerge during the Great Depression
"I shall not forget the denunciations of capitalism hour after hour and the raging
thunderous applause afterwards" - Frank Scott, a CCF founder
The Great Depression called the established order into question. Everywhere people
searched for answers to resolve the anxiety and the problems of the times.
Saskatchewan socialists
The political landscape in the prairies underwent the most profound change. The Canadian
west was one of the hardest hit areas in the worldwide economic crisis. Two-thirds of
Saskatchewan families received relief after the Dust Bowl left prairie farmers with parched,
dead fields.
But from the prairie dust, two new political parties emerged. On July 31, 1932 labour and
socialist groups and political activists gathered in a Calgary legion hall and formed the Co-
operative Commonwealth Federation, Canada first socialist party. In the years to come, the
CCF, later the New Democratic Party, would plant the seeds of Canada's social welfare
system.
"Bible Bill"
In Alberta, a Baptist minister named William "Bible Bill" Aberhart was also planting seeds
of change. Aberhart was one of the first preachers in Canada to use the radio to spread the
word of God. His Sunday afternoon broadcasts were a beacon of light for Albertans in the
first grim years of the Depression.
In 1932, Aberhart began combining salvation with economics when he was inspired by an
obscure monetary theory called "social credit." The doctrine argued that capitalist
governments should distribute money or "social credit" to increase spending and stimulate
economies.
The grassroots movement grew into the Social Credit Party. In 1935 the party won the
provincial election and Aberhart became premier.
During the darkest days of the Great Depression, an established political party was also
finding more converts. The Communist Party of Canada represented salvation to some
Canadians. Communism was an alluring idea because it spoke of dignity and equality for
the working class.
Rising tensions
Indeed, Communist Party members helped organize one of the biggest protests of the
Depression. In April 1935, one thousand, five hundred jobless men went on strike and
congregated in Vancouver.
By early June, discouraged by their lack of progress, strike leaders decided to move the
protest to Ottawa. One thousand strikers peacefully commandeered freight trains and
began the "On to Ottawa Trek"<
The "On to Ottawa Trek" eventually culminated in the Regina Riot on July 1. When it was
over, one policeman was dead, 40 protesters and five citizens were wounded, and 130 men
were arrested.
1. Co-operative Commonwealth Federation
Canada's first socialist party emerges from the prairie Dust Bowl
The roots of Canada's social welfare system were planted when a new political party, the
"Co-operative Commonwealth Federation" (CCF) emerged from the prairie dust during the
darkest days of the Great Depression.
The year was 1932 and the Canadian west was one of the hardest hit areas in the
worldwide economic crisis. Two-thirds of Saskatchewan families received relief after the
Dust Bowl left prairie farmers with parched, dead fields.
In the mist of the catastrophic times, labour and socialist groups as well as political
activists gathered in a Calgary legion hall on July 31, 1932 and formed the Co-operative
Commonwealth Federation.
The CCF became Canada's first socialist party. As its name suggested, its founders wanted
a political party that promoted universal cooperation for the common good. Members
believed capitalism led to inequality and greed and they wanted to make governments
responsible for social and economic planning to even out the playing field.
The leader of the new party was James Shaver Woodsworth, an outspoken member of
parliament. The social activist and former Methodist minister declared that unemployment
wasn't the fault of the individual; it was the system that was to blame. He explained the
Depression in a way that lifted the burden from the jobless and placed it on the
government.
"A severe condemnation still rests upon indifference ... We have tried to provide for the
poor. Yet, have we tried to alter the social conditions that lead to poverty?"
In 1933, hundreds of farmers, labourers, preachers, trade unionists, socialists and
academics including Baptist Minister Tommy Douglas and Montreal lawyer/poet Frank
Scott met in Regina to hammer out the goals and structure of the political movement.
The convention voted for universal pension, health and welfare insurance, unemployment
insurance, a minimum wage and farm security. The party doctrine was a radical departure
from free-market economics and it became known as the Regina Manifesto.
Frank Scott found the convention one of the most exhilarating times of his life.
"I shall not forget the denunciations of capitalism hour after hour and the raging
thunderous applause afterwards."
For some Canadians, a socialist party was a terrifying idea. The mayor of Vancouver, Gerry
McGeer, saw it as proof that Soviet Communism had entered Canada through the back
door.
"If you elect those people, they'll take away your home, they'll take away your car, and
burn down your churches. Furthermore, they'll nationalize your women"
In fact, the CCF was firmly against Communism and believed in achieving socialism
through democratic elections rather than revolution.
In 1935, five CCF MPs were elected to Parliament including Tommy Douglas, who later
became the first CCF Premier, elected in Saskatchewan in 1944.
The CCF became the New Democratic Party in 1961. Although the Party never held power
nationally, its policies were adopted and implemented by federal governments over the
years. Those CCF initiatives include unemployment insurance, family allowance, Medicare
and universal old age pensions.
2. Social Credit Party
William "Bible Bill" Aberhart combines salvation with economics - and a new
political party is born
In the depths of the Depression, a radio evangelist with a golden tongue preached a new
economic gospel. His words inspired the people of Alberta and a new political party was
born: the Social Credit Party.
William "Bible Bill" Aberhart was a stout, earnest-looking Baptist minister and one of the
first preachers in Canada to use the radio to spread the word of God. His Sunday
afternoon broadcasts were a beacon of light for Albertans in the first grim years of the
Depression.
In 1932, Aberhart began combining salvation with economics when he was inspired by an
obscure monetary theory called "social credit." The doctrine - first espoused by a British
engineer named Major C.H. Douglas - argued that capitalist governments should distribute
money or "social credit" to increase spending and stimulate economies.
Aberhart modified and popularized the doctrine proposing each citizen be given $25-a-
month by the provincial government. The plan was simple; Albertans could buy their way
out of the economic crisis.
"You remain in the depression because of a shortage of purchasing power imposed by the
banking system," Aberhart told his followers. "Social Credit offers you the remedy. If you
have not suffered enough, it is your God-given right to suffer more. But if you wish to elect
your own representatives to implement the remedy, this is your only way out."
The charismatic Aberhart used his radio show and his popular Bible Institute Baptist Church
to spread his message of deliverance.
"He had a voice that made the pilot lights on your radio jump," one listener said. "You
simply had to believe him. Sometimes when I heard him, I used to say to my wife, 'This
man seems to be in direct contact with the Supreme Being.'"
The grassroots movement grew into the Social Credit Party when other Alberta political
parties showed little interest in adopting Aberhart's ideas.
The new party's timing was impeccable. Alberta was mired in the Depression. In 1931,
Edmonton had over 14,000 people on relief - almost 20% of the population. At the same
time, the ruling provincial party, the United Farmers of Alberta, was caught up in a sex
scandal involving Premier John Brownlee and a 22-year-old government stenographer.
In September 1935, Social Credit took 56 of 63 seats in the Alberta legislature and swept
the United Farmers of Alberta from office.
Once in power, political reality confronted Premier Aberhart. There wasn't enough money in
the treasury to meet that month's government payroll, let alone pay 400,000 people $25
each in social credit.
Aberhart's solution was to have Alberta print its own money, a move that was denounced
in the press as dictatorial. "The spirit of Christ has gripped me," Aberhart responded. "I am
only seeking to feed, clothe and shelter starving people. If that is what you call a dictator
then I am one."
Aberhart took other drastic steps to deal with his province's economic problems. He passed
the Accurate News and Information Law, which gave him control of the press. He also
restricted banking activities and debt collections on farms.
His schemes didn't work. Provincial employees were paid with "prosperity certificates" but
even the beer stores, which were owned by the province, wouldn't accept them. The
Supreme Court declared that the certificates weren't legal tender and that the banking
laws were unconstitutional.
Aberhart's "social credit" solutions might have failed but he emerged as a politician willing
to fight for his constituents during the tough times. He remained premier until 1943 when
he died in office.
His successor Ernest C. Manning, buoyed by massive oil revenues to provincial coffers, won
nine successive elections for Social Credit and governed the province until 1971. William
Aberhart's original Social Credit Party doctrine was replaced with Manning's more
conservative financial and social politics.
3. Communist Canada
Ottawa clamps down when Canadians find hope in the Communist movement
During the Great Depression, the spread of communist ideas in Canada represented
damnation to some Canadians and salvation to others.
Like many Canadian politicians at the time, Prime Minister R.B. Bennett feared a
communist revolution on home soil.
"We know that throughout Canada this propaganda is being put forward by organizations
from foreign lands that seek to destroy our institutions. And we ask that every man and
woman put the iron heel of ruthlessness against a thing of that kind."
While Bennett denounced communism, he was cited as the chief cause of its rise in
Canada.
Bill Knight was the mayor of Blairmore, Alberta, Canada's first communist-declared town.
"Red is a state of mind," explained Knight. "Back in 1929 there were no Reds. Things were
prosperous, everyone was well fed. It is different today. You talk about Communists, the
Communists in Canada were made by Bennett."
Indeed, the communist movement in Canada found more converts as Bennett failed to
provide any concrete solutions to the overwhelming economic crisis. By 1933, a quarter of
the workforce was unemployed and those who found jobs faced exploitation in the
workplace. For many, communism was an alluring idea because it spoke of dignity and
equality for the working class.
The 1930s became a heyday for the Communist Party of Canada, which was founded in
1921.
Many of the members of the Party were leaders in the trade unions and during the
Depression successfully unionized a number of industries. Leaders also worked for the
unemployed. Arthur "Slim" Evan organized a massive protest known as the "On To Ottawa
Trek" in 1935. Thousands of single, unemployed men joined the protest demanding jobs
from Ottawa. The Communist Party also recruited about 1,300 men to fight for the
Communist-backed Republicans in the Spanish Civil War.
As communist activities increased, Bennett's fear rose. He also found its leaders and
supporters a convenient scapegoat for growing social unrest.
In 1931, Bennett enforced Article 98 of the Criminal Code, which outlawed communist
agitation, and required the accused to prove his innocence. Communist Party leader Tim
Buck and seven others were convicted under the Code.
The play "Eight Men Out" was created to catalogue in an entertaining manner the injustices
done to Buck and his colleagues. It was performed nightly at a Toronto theatre until police
interrupted the show and shut it down.
Tim Buck spent over two years at Kingston Penitentiary. Released in 1934, he was
welcomed at a rally at Maple Leaf Gardens that drew 17,000 people, more than any Leaf
game had drawn. Eight thousand more were turned away.
Bennett tried other means to deal with the growing social unrest. Believing that
immigrants, particularly those from Eastern Europe, had brought alien and dangerous ideas
with them, Bennett's government expelled nearly 30,000 people.
Among those deported without the right of appeal were;
Edward Reinkanen-born in Finland deported in 1931 after attending a
demonstration.
Sophie Sheinan born in Russia. Involved in illegal assembly. Deported November
1932.
Hans Kist born in Germany. Married. Labour organizer. Deported in 1932. Died after
being tortured in a Nazi concentration camp.
In Quebec, Premier Maurice Duplessis, like Bennett, seized onto the spectre of Communism
as a scapegoat to distract Quebecers from the province's $31 million debt. He encouraged
anti-Communist rallies that sometimes became violent and racist. In 1937, he passed the
Padlock Law, which dictated that anyone who promoted Communism could have his home
and/or office padlocked.
But by the end of the decade, Canadian politicians were turning their attention to another
threat from across the sea. As Hitler began his march through Europe, the perceived threat
of Communism at home took a back seat for a time.
4. “On to Ottawa Trek"
Thousands of jobless protesters head to Ottawa and become part of the worst riot
of the Depression
On July 1, 1935, the simmering tensions of the Great Depression boiled over in Canada as
police and jobless protesters clashed in the streets of Regina.
When it was over, one policeman was dead, 40 protesters and five citizens were
wounded, and 130 men were arrested. The city was a ruin, the sidewalks covered in
broken glass.
It was Canada's worst riot during the Depression.
The Regina Riot was the culmination of months of protests as thousands of unemployed
men moved across the country in what became known at the "On To Ottawa Trek." The
men wanted to coerce the federal government into finding them jobs.
The trek originated on the West Coast as a local demonstration. In April 1935, fifteen-
hundred men from British Columbia relief camps went on strike and congregated in
Vancouver.
The men resented the federal work camps set up at the height of the Depression to offer
jobless single men subsistence living. Men earned 20 cents a day for a 44-hour workweek
in the remote camps spread around the country.
"The Tory government of R.B. Bennett had decided a role for the single unemployed,"
striker Ron Liversedge noted. "They were to be hidden away to become forgotten men, the
forgotten generation. How naive of Mr. Bennett. Never were forgotten men more in the
public eye."
In Vancouver, strikers held demonstrations and elicited support from other citizens.
Vancouver women held a picnic to raise money for the strikers - 20,000 people attended.
It was a signal to Prime Minister Bennett that it was time to take care of Canada’s poor.
But the Prime Minister was blind to the message and virtually ignored the protests.
By early June, discouraged by their lack of progress, strike leaders decided to move the
protest to Ottawa. One thousand strikers peacefully commandeered freight trains and
began the "On to Ottawa Trek."
There was a growing militancy along the way. In Calgary, the strikers demanded three
days of relief assistance from the city. A meeting with the mayor had the air of
intimidation, as the mayor and government officials were pinned in city hall by the crowd
of desperate men.
"We told him we wouldn't let him out," Liversedge wrote. "That we were prepared to wait
as long as he was prepared to go hungry. And we reminded him that we could outlast him
since we'd been hungry a lot more often than he had."
They received three days worth of meal vouchers and were joined by hundreds of Alberta
men.
The protesters seemed unstoppable; everywhere they went, momentum grew as the
strikers picked up hundreds more recruits. They made stops in Calgary, Medicine Hat, Swift
Current and Moose Jaw and by the time they reached Regina their numbers had doubled to
2,000.
In Regina, the federal government forbadethe railways to take the men any further.
Prime Minister Bennett finally agreed to meet with a delegation of strikers but the meeting
ended badly as both sides exchanged words. The delegation returned to Regina having
decided to disband the trek.
Meanwhile Bennett was determined to arrest the leaders
On July 1 several hundred strikers were meeting in Regina's Market Square to discuss
strategy when they were suddenly interrupted.
"A shrill whistle blasted out a signal," Liversedge remembered, "The backs of vans were
opened and out poured the Mounties, each armed with a baseball bat. In less than four
minutes Market Square was a mass of writhing, groaning forms, like a battlefield."
The strikers erected barricades and threw stones, and the Mounties retaliated with their
.38 revolvers.
The "On to Ottawa Trek" was over. The men dispersed, were jailed or slowly returned to
the work camps. Bennett had won, but his reputation suffered. Within months his
government would be voted out of office.
IV. Introduction: Rise of the Fascists
Hitler rises to power and draws Canada closer to another world war
"His eyes impressed me most of all. There was a liquid quality about them which indicated
keen perception and profound sympathy." - Mackenzie King describes Adolph Hitler
In the 1930s, fascism thrived in Europe and the world moved closer to war.
In 1933, Adolph Hilter was elected German Chancellor and immediately began
transforming the German economy into a war machine. By the late 1930s, Germans led
other countries in Europe in their forces of destruction. Germany's submarine force
surpassed England's fleet . And its airforce and army were formidable.
Hilter's vision
Hitler's goal was to make Germany the most important power in Europe. His envisioned a
society centered on the superiority of the Aryan race and the elimination of the Jewish
people.
In 1937, Hitler annexed Austria on March 13, 1938 and a year later completed a takeover
of Czechoslovakia.
European and North American leaders, including Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King
supported the policy of "appeasement" of Germany. Leaders accepted Hitler's increasingly
aggressive moves hoping Germany would be satiated once it had consolidated the
German-speaking areas of Europe.
Then on September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland and it was finally clear to world
leaders that Hitler could not be appeased. Two days later, Britain and France declared war
on Germany.
Canada at war
On September 10, 1939 Canada entered the Second World War. At this point, Prime
Minister Mackenzie King's wanted to limit Canada's role in the war. More than half of the
country's citizens had no ties to Britain and Canada was reassessing its colonial obligations.
But less than a year later, it was apparent that Canada was in for a long, hard fight. In
spring 1940, Hitler’s army moved easily through the Low Countries of Belgium,
Netherlands and Luxembourg and into France. With its army of six million, France was one
of the most powerful military forces in the world, and expected to be the bulwark for
western democracy. But on June 14, ten days after engaging the French army, the Nazis
walked into Paris unopposed.
Canada geared up for a full war effort. The Prime Minister commanded factories to begin
round-the-clock production of war supplies. By the end of 1940, 200,000 Canadians had
volunteered to fight in Europe.
1. Rise of Hitler
Mackenzie King visits Hitler and appeases Germany on the brink of the Second
World War
In June 1937, Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King journeyed overseas to meet with
German Chancellor Adolph Hitler. Germany’s increasing aggression concerned world
leaders and King wanted to assess the situation for himself.
In Germany, King was given a tour of the orderly splendour of the Third Reich, viewing
its dramatic architecture and the thousands of Hitler Youth on parade.
King recorded his meeting with Hitler in his diary.
"He smiled very pleasantly, and indeed had a sort of appealing and affectionate look in his
eyes. My sizing up of the man as I sat and talked with him was that he is really one who
truly loves his fellow man and his country ... his eyes impressed me most of all. There was
a liquid quality about them which indicated keen perception and profound sympathy (calm,
composed) - and one could see how particularly humble folk would come to have a
profound love for the man."
King wasn't alone in being seduced by Hitler's charm and rehearsed simplicity. One British
diplomat compared him to Gandhi. The Canadian Prime Minister left Germany convinced
Hitler didn't pose an imminent military threat to the world.
King's apparent naiveté suited his political goals well. Canada’s national unity was his main
concern. King was determined to avoid drawing Canada into overseas conflicts that could
upset the country’s fragile harmony. He had a vivid memory of the conscription crisis of
the First World War that had bitterly divided French and English Canada.
On an international level, King believed like other leaders like Britain’s Neville Chamberlain
that a stable Germany served as an important counterweight to Stalin's Soviet Union.
Along with European and North American leaders, King supported the policy of
"appeasement" of Germany. Leaders accepted Hitler's increasingly aggressive moves
hoping Germany would be satiated once it had consolidated the German-speaking areas
of Europe.
King and other leaders turned a blind eye when Hitler annexed Austria on March 13, 1938
and they remained quiet a year later when Germany completed its victory over
Czechoslovakia.
But King was also a pragmatist. While he supported "appeasement," the Prime Minister
positioned the country in case war erupted. In 1936, Canada began a modest program of
rearmament. In 1937, King told British leaders that Canada would support the Empire in a
war in Europe.
Despite King’s cautious politics and fondness for Hitler, Canada was primed when Germany
invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. Finally it was clear that Hitler could not be
appeased. Two days later, Britain and France declared war on Germany.
King called a special session of Parliament to vote on the question of Canada's participation
and on September 10, 1939 the country was once again at war.
2. Hate at the Top
Jews face powerful prejudice in Canada as they try to escape Nazi Germany
On November 9 1938, anti-Semitism exploded in Berlin when young Nazis went on a
rampage in the Jewish quarter, killing 90 people and destroying hundreds of businesses,
homes and synagogues. The riot dubbed "Crystal Night" was the turning point in the fate
of European Jews.
Desperate Jews turned to Canada for help as they struggled to escape the horrors of
Nazi Germany. Instead they came face-to-face with Canada’s own powerful anti-Semitic
forces embodied in Frederick Blair, the country’s top immigration bureaucrat. And as
director of immigration, he wielded huge power in setting the policy of who got into
Canada.
"I often think that instead of persecution it would be far better if we more often told them
frankly why many of them are unpopular," said Blair. "If they would divest themselves of
certain of their habits I am sure they could be just as popular in Canada as our
Scandinavians."
Anti-Semitism was rife among Canada's ruling elite, reflecting a deep-rooted prejudice in
Canadian society. Indeed, anti-Semitism was a way of life in Canada. Many industries did
not hire Jews, and Jewish professionals were routinely excluded from jobs at universities,
hospitals and law firms. Clubs, resorts and beaches also barred Jewish Canadians.
Canada's immigrations laws had always been ethnically selective - Jews, Orientals and
blacks were on the bottom of the list. By 1938, as anti-Semitism erupted in Germany,
Canada began to actively restrict Jewish immigration.
Blair raised the amount of money immigrants had to possess to come to Canada from
$5,000 to $15,000. As well, immigrants had to prove they were farmers, which Blair hoped
would further sift out the Jewish applicants, as most were coming from cities. Blair followed
the immigration regulations - many written by himself - to the letter and then boasted
about his success in keeping Jews out of the country.
"Pressure on the part of the Jewish people to get into Canada has never been greater than
it is now and I am glad to be able to add, after thirty-five years experience here, that it
was never so well controlled."
In desperation, Canadian Jews held large demonstrations in the late 1930s pleading with
their government to help. In Ottawa, Canada’s first female senator also fought for the
admittance of Jewish refugees. Cairine Wilson, a former Ottawa socialite, was one of the
country's leading voices against fascism and one of the few non-Jews lobbying for the
refugees.
"We must be big enough and courageous enough to admit to Canada a fair share of the
unfortunate persons involved," she said in a speech.
The Stein family of Vienna wrote to their cousins in Montreal that their business had been
shut down and they were forbidden to earn a living. They were homeless, stateless and
penniless with two young children.
"Our distress increases daily and there is nothing left for us but suicide. Our only hope for
survival is admission to Canada."
Despite Wilson’s efforts, the Steins were rejected along with many others. Around the
world, countries like Australia had already accepted thousands of Jewish refugees.
In desperation Cairine Wilson turned to Prime Minister Mackenzie King and begged him to
force Blair to let in 1,000 refugees. She has no idea that Mackenzie King had bought all the
land around Kingsmere, his country house, so that no Jew could move in near him. Nor did
she know his real views about refugees, a secret he shared with his diary.
"We must seek to keep this part of the continent free from unrest and from too great an
intermixture of foreign strains of blood."
Receiving no help from King, Wilson tried other tactics but faced the same results. Wilson
finally tried to have 100 Jewish orphans admitted to Canada, but Blair's regulations banned
all but two of them. Most of the others died in the Holocaust.
The Ottawa Journal called Wilson the mother of lost causes.
Through government inaction and Blair’s bureaucratic anti-Semitism, Canada emerged
from the war with one of the worst records of Jewish refugee resettlement in the world.
Between 1933 and 1939, Canada accepted only 4,000 of the 800,000 Jews who had
escaped from Nazi-controlled Europe.
In November 2000, Rev. Doug Blair apologized for his great-uncle, Frederick Blair, at a
reunion for Holocaust survivors from all over the world who had been turned away by
Ottawa.
"I stand before you in great fear for I understand that my name is not one dear to your
heart," the Baptist pastor from Sarnia, Ontario told 25 survivors. "That which was done to
you was so wrong. To the extent that my family was party of that, I’m sorry."
3. Canada Goes to War
The country decides what role it will play as Hitler's army sweeps through Europe
On September 10, 1939, Canada joined Britain and France in the war against Germany.
But questions remained. What role would the Canada play and what price was it willing to
pay?
At this point, Prime Minister Mackenzie King's plan was to ensure that Canada played
only a limited role in the war. More than half of Canada's citizens had no ties to Britain
and Canada was reassessing its colonial obligations.
A limited war seemed possible in the autumn and winter of 1939/1940. It was a period
called the "Phony War" because the fighting had come to a temporary halt.
King pursued a program of "limited liability" during this time. Canada provided pilot
training programs, war supplies and raw materials to the war effort. The country sent
volunteer soldiers overseas but King maintained there would be no conscription.
There was no shortage of Canadian volunteers; thousands of single unemployed young
men - English and French - with no prospects welcomed the offer of a coat, new boots,
three meals and $1.30 a day. In the first four months of the war, more than 58,000
Canadians volunteered for the armed services.
The phony war came to an abrupt end on April 9, 1940 when Hitler's army marched into
Denmark and Norway, meeting with no resistance. King realized his dreams of a limited
war had ended.
In May, Hitler’s blitzkrieg, his sudden military offensive. moved easily through the Low
Countries of Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg and into France. With its army of six
million, France was one of the most powerful military forces in the world, and expected to
be the bulwark for western democracy. But on June 14, ten days after engaging the French
army, the Nazis walked into Paris unopposed.
The Axis Powers - Germany, Italy, and Japan - suddenly seemed unstoppable.
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill faced tremendous pressure to surrender.
Germany controlled most of Europe and many believed that if Britain put down her guns,
Hitler would spare her. Churchill's position was delivered in a memorable speech on June
4, 1940.
"We shall never surrender and even if this island or large part of it were subjugated and
starving, then our empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British fleet, would
carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time the new world with all its power and might
steps forth to rescue and liberate the old."
Churchill carried the day. There was no longer any talk of surrender. Nor was there any
question of Canada’s role. With France under occupation and the Americans maintaining
neutrality, Canada was now Britain’s leading ally.
In spring 1940, King spoke to Canadians,
"Fellow Canadians, the brutal domination of Holland, the tragic invasion of Belgium, the
surrender of France, the capture of the Channel Ports has happened in such quick
succession that the world has hardly had time to breath. One crisis has not passed before
another has arisen in its place. Peril has been heaped upon peril. Who will say on what new
horizon destruction may not loom tomorrow?"
Only a few months earlier, King had tried to limit Canada’s commitment. But now the
country geared up for a full war effort. In June 1940, King ordered a national registration
for home defense but maintained his position about no overseas conscription.
But by the end of 1940, two hundred thousand Canadians had volunteered to fight in
Europe. The Prime Minister commanded factories to begin twenty-four hour a day, seven-
day a week production of war supplies.