Joseph Roberts Smallwood: Masthead Newfoundlander, 1900-1949 9780228007050

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joseph roberts smallwood

Joseph Roberts Smallwood Masthead Newfoundlander, 1900–1949

melvin baker and peter neary

McGill-Queen’s University Press Montreal & Kingston • London • Chicago

© McGill-Queen’s University Press 2021 ISB N 978-0-2280-0631-2 (cloth) ISB N 978-0-2280-0705-0 (eP DF) ISB N 978-0-2280-0706-7 (eP UB) Legal deposit second quarter 2021 Bibliothèque nationale du Québec Printed in Canada on acid-free paper that is 100% ancient forest free (100% post-consumer recycled), processed chlorine free This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, through the Awards to Scholarly Publications Program, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and with the help of a grant from the J.B. Smallman Publication Fund, Faculty of Social Science, University of Western Ontario.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts. Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Title: Joseph Roberts Smallwood : masthead Newfoundlander, 1900–1949 / Melvin Baker and Peter Neary. Names: Baker, Melvin, author. | Neary, Peter, 1938– author. Description: Includes index. Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20200414496 | Canadiana (ebook) 20200414585 | ISB N 9780228006312 (cloth) | IS BN 9780228007050 (eP D F) | I SB N 9780228007067 (eP UB ) Subjects: lc s h: Smallwood, Joseph R., 1900–1991. | l c sh : Politicians Newfoundland and Labrador—Biography. | l cs h: Journalists—Newfoundland and Labrador—Biography. | l cs h: Newfoundland and Labrador—Biography. | csh: Newfoundland and Labrador—Politics and government—1855–1934. | csh: Newfoundland and Labrador—Politics and government—1934-1949. | lc gft: Biographies. Classification: l cc f c2175.1.s63 b35 2021 | ddc 971.8/04092—dc23

This book was typeset in 10.5/13 Sabon.

In honour of Patrick Augustine O’Flaherty (1939–2017) founding editor in 1985 of Newfoundland Studies

Contents

Figures | ix Preface | xi Note on Sources | xv Abbreviations | xvii Map | xix 1 No Ordinary Joe: 1900–1934 | 3 2 Masthead Newfoundlander: 1934–1945 | 56 3 Making a Province: 1945–1949 | 122 Notes | 193 Index | 235

Figures

1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 2.1

2.2 2.3 2.4

2.5 2.6

Joe Smallwood and Tom Clouter. rpa , VA 81-84.1. Joe Smallwood, Camilla Coaker, and Nellie Clouter. rpa , VA 81-84.2. Joe Smallwood. asc , uncatalogued Smallwood collection. Joe Smallwood with a group of Newfoundland labour leaders, c. mid-1920s. Melvin Baker/James Thoms legacy. Members of the Oates family, early 1920s. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. The Oates family house on Crowdy Street in Carbonear. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. Joe and Clara Smallwood and Ramsay MacDonald Coaker Smallwood, 1926. asc , uncatalogued Smallwood collection. Clara Smallwood. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. Clara and children in the garden of the Oates family home on Crowdy Street, Carbonear, 1930s. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. The Barrelman looks out over Newfoundland. The Barrelman (monthly), January 1940, 1. Joe Smallwood as the Barrelman. asc , coll -075, 5.05.015. Joe and Clara Smallwood in the grounds of Government House, St John’s, 17 June 1939. Dale Russell Fitzpatrick/ James Thoms legacy. The Smallwood house on Kenmount Road, St John’s, c. 1944. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. Joe Smallwood and Ellen Carroll. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick.

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2.7 2.8 2.9 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 3.8 3.9 3.10

3.11

3.12

3.13 3.14 3.15 3.16

Figures

Wartime accommodation at Gander. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. Joe and Clara Smallwood, mid-1940s. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. Clara Smallwood on the Kenmount Road farm. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. Gambo Hotel. Collection of Frank Knee, courtesy of Curtis Knee. Joe Smallwood at the National Convention. asc , coll-307, Photo 740. Joe Smallwood’s rental address, 61 Duckworth Street. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. Cartoon. The Independent, 12 April 1948, 3. Cartoon. The Independent, 5 April 1948, 1. Cartoon. The Independent, 19 April 1948, 1. Cartoon. The Confederate, 12 May 1949, 3. Cartoon. The Confederate, 20 May 1948, 3. “Joey” Smallwood wearing emblematic bow tie. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick. Joe Smallwood campaigning in Badger’s Quay, Bonavista Bay, c. 1948. Collection of Frank Knee, courtesy of Curtis Knee. Smallwood signing the Terms of Union between Newfoundland and Canada, Ottawa, 11 December 1948. asc , coll-363, 4.01.037, Photograph Album, 24. Joseph Roberts Smallwood photographed by Yousuf Karsh, 11 January 1949. Library and Archives Canada, 1987-054 npc , 10263-4, e0046655476. The first cabinet of the Province of Newfoundland, 1 April 1949. rpa , B-22-50. Joe Smallwood, Louis St Laurent, Albert Walsh, and Gordon Bradley. asc , coll -307, Photo 749. Canada House, 74 Circular Road, St John’s. asc , coll-075, 5.05.503. Joe and Clara Smallwood, 1950. Courtesy of Dale Russell FitzPatrick.

Preface

Joseph Roberts Smallwood (1900–1991) was, and remains, a man of myth – myth of his own making and myth made by others, both friend and enemy. During his long career in Newfoundland politics – he led the campaign for union with Canada and was then the first premier of the new province, serving from 1 April 1949 to 18 January 1972 – he used his literary, rhetorical, and theatrical skills to create a distinct and celebrated persona. Known, variously, as “Joe,” “Joey,” “J.R. Smallwood,” and “J.R.S./JRS,” he was sometimes referred to in his late years as “the little fellow from Gambo.”1 He told his own story in his impressive 1973 autobiography, I Chose Canada: The Memoirs of the Honourable Joseph R. “Joey” Smallwood. Dashed off immediately following his long premiership and published by Macmillan Canada, it ran to 600 pages and capitalized on his national prominence and on his fluency as a writer. While he was still alive, he became a stage character in a one-man show performed by actor Kevin Noble. In the title of his widely read 1968 biography of the Newfoundland leader, Richard Gwyn dubbed him “the unlikely revolutionary.”2 The satirist Ray Guy, whose career was largely built on attacking Smallwood, mocked him (to great advantage) as “the only living father of Confederation,” a moniker abbreviated as the disparaging “O.L.F.”3 In his 1989 biography Joey, Harold Horwood, who had served in Smallwood’s cabinet only to become an unrelenting and scathing journalistic opponent, described him as “the most loved, feared, and hated of Newfoundlanders.”4 In 1998, the writer Wayne Johnston moved Smallwood into the realm of fiction in his highly successful novel The Colony of Unrequited Dreams (eventually adapted for the stage by Robert Chafe). To Ray Argyle, the author of a brief 2012 life in the Quest biographies series published by Dundurn, Smallwood was a “Schemer and Dreamer.” When John Crosbie was lieutenant-governor

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of Newfoundland and Labrador (2008–13), there was a caricature of Smallwood in public view at Government House, St John’s. Yet another, and very different, Smallwood can be found in his voluminous papers deposited at Archives and Special Collections (asc ), Memorial University Libraries, St John’s; in his extensive early writing (most of it buried in newspapers and magazines); in newspaper reporting about him; in the rich holdings of The Rooms Provincial Archives (rpa ), St John’s; and in various other collections at asc and Library and Archives Canada, Ottawa. It is this Smallwood that we analyze and seek to understand here. There are multiple J.R. Smallwoods, but the aspiring and ambitious figure presented in this biography stands apart. Talented, venturesome, and, above all, remarkably resilient, he was no ordinary Joe. Our purpose in writing this book is to add a documentary basis, both personal and political, to what is known of the first five decades of Smallwood’s long life (to the time when he became premier) and expand knowledge about a big and diverse career. Much is understood about the period of Smallwood’s life that we address from the work of Richard Gwyn and Harold Horwood, but his own papers and his extensive journalistic writing are largely untapped sources. It is these resources that we draw on here to provide fresh insight into both the man and his times. We hope that our work will help other researchers navigate the archival complexity of the many public and private papers we sought out and point the way to a full-scale scholarly biography. In his magisterial 2018 biography of Thomas Cromwell, the Oxford historian Diarmaid MacCulloch observes that “the later stages of any life are usually best understood by what can be gleaned of the earlier.”5 And so it is with Smallwood: his long premiership can be understood only in terms of the events in his life to “immediately before the expiration of the thirty-first day of March, 1949,” the moment when Newfoundland became a province of Canada and time zero in modern Newfoundland and Labrador history.6 We have been assisted in our work by many archivists and librarians, and we are most grateful to them all for their expert help. We thank especially Linda White and Paulette Noseworthy at asc and Melanie Tucker and colleagues at rpa . We thank Jock Bates of Victoria, British Columbia, for editorial assistance; Augustus G. Lilly, qc lld , of St John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, for advice about land and court records; Thomas Telfer, Faculty of Law, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, for information about insolvency law and practice; Adam Kidy, D.B. Weldon Library, University of Western Ontario, for expert reference help; Kamile Abado, Steven Bamford, Jeff Blake, and the deft Richard Cornwall, Social Science Technology Services, Faculty

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of Social Science, University of Western Ontario, for assistance with digital files; Carla Furlong of St John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, for genealogical help; John Steele of London, Ontario, for information about Bishop Feild College; David Bradley of St John’s and Bonavista, Newfoundland and Labrador, for copies of letters from the papers of F. Gordon Bradley; Dr Maynard Clouter of St John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, for information about the Clouter family; and Hilary Bates Neary (Peter) and Elizabeth Ann Archibald (Melvin) for unstinting support and affection. We thank Editor Barry Gaulton for allowing us in this volume to draw on our article “Joseph Roberts Smallwood: A Biographical Sketch, 1900–1934,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies, vol. 33 (2) (Fall 2018): 354–412. At McGill-Queen’s, we thank in particular Jonathan Crago, Kathleen Fraser, Dorothy Turnbull (our editor), and Philip Cercone, executive director. Using readily available sources, we give dates in our index for some, but not all, of the many persons who enter our narrative. Dale Russell FitzPatrick of Roaches Line, Newfoundland and Labrador, generously answered our many questions about the history of the Smallwood family and provided us with choice photographs to illustrate our text. We salute both her knowledge of her family’s history and her support for scholarly enquiry. A busy and productive researcher in her own right, she always found time to address our queries and offer encouraging words. One day Joseph Roberts Smallwood will be the subject of a major entry in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography, the definitive reference source for Canadian lives. We look forward to that time and hope that our work will be of assistance in giving him his rightful place in the Canadian pantheon. Smallwood was arguably the most important public figure that Newfoundland produced in the twentieth century and also one of its leading writers and thinkers. He was both political Pied Piper and literary lion. By definition, knowledge of his life contributes to understanding of the larger history of Newfoundland in his time.

Note on Sources

In writing this book, we drew extensively on the two collections of J.R. Smallwood papers (coll -075 and coll -285) at Archives and Special Collections (asc ), Memorial University Libraries; on the records of the Government of Newfoundland at The Rooms Provincial Archives (rpa ), St John’s; and on Smallwood’s voluminous writing – in books, magazines, newspapers, and radio scripts. He was a master of the letter to the editor, and we have highlighted his many contributions to this literary genre. We also gleaned information from the following additional archival sources: at asc – coll -9 (William Ford Coaker Papers); coll -028 (The Barrelman Radio Program Papers); coll -87 (John Gilbert Higgins Papers); coll -107 (William Galgay/Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland); coll -157 (Bowring Family Collection); coll -213 (George H. Tucker Papers); coll -250 (Richard Anderson Squires Papers); coll -252 (Stella Whelan Collection); coll -307 (Michael Harrington Papers); coll -363 (Gordon A. Winter Papers); coll -486 (Helena Squires Papers); and Leo Moakler Papers (collection number pending); at Library and Archives Canada, Ottawa – MG30 E82 (Charles Alexander Magrath Papers; MG32-B5 (Brooke Claxton Fonds); at the Maritime History Archive, Memorial University – the James Ryan Ltd Fonds; at rpa – MG4 (Baine Johnston & Co. Ltd); MG211 (Sir Leonard Outerbridge Papers); MG293 (Harry A. Winter Papers); MG521

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(Philip Templeman Ltd Papers); MG621 (Newfoundland Ranger Force Association Papers); MG864 (W.J. Browne Collection); MG955 (1000-2000 Series). We likewise accessed two privately held sources: the F. Gordon Bradley Papers and the Melvin Baker Research Collection. We found information on Smallwood’s 1932 insolvency at the Provincial Records Centre, Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, and a record of his property transactions at the Registry of Deeds, Services NL. Useful information about the Smallwood family was provided to us from the Baptismal Register of Gower Street United Church, St John’s. At the Centre for Newfoundland Studies, Memorial University Libraries, we surveyed J.B. McEvoy’s 1974 compilation “Confederation Papers and Correspondence.” Smallwood’s many-layered autobiography, I Chose Canada: The Memoirs of the Honourable Joseph R. “Joey” Smallwood (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1973), was an indispensable source for our work. We also consulted the three book-length biographies of the Newfoundland leader: Richard Gwyn, Smallwood: The Unlikely Revolutionary (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968); Harold Horwood, Joey (Toronto: Stoddart, 1989); and Ray Argyle, Joey Smallwood: Schemer and Dreamer (Toronto: Dundurn, 2012). Beginning with the publication of S.J.R. Noel’s formative and acclaimed Politics in Newfoundland (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1971), a number  of talented scholars have written about the history of Newfoundland in the first half of the twentieth century. We had their work, which commands a broad readership, close at hand as we researched and wrote our narrative of Smallwood’s life during the same period. There is an up-to-date bibliography of Newfoundland and Confederation in Raymond B. Blake and Melvin Baker, Where Once They Stood: Newfoundland’s Rocky Road towards Confederation (Regina: University of Regina Press, 2019).

Abbreviations

asc bcn ccf/c.c.f. clb fcu fpu gn mcli nfbo nofp pc raf/r.a.f. rcaf/r.c.a.f. rpa

Archives and Special Collections, Memorial University Libraries Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland Co-operative Commonwealth Federation Church Lads’ Brigade Fishermen’s Co-operative Union of Newfoundland Fishermen’s Protective Union Government of Newfoundland Methodist College Literary Institute Newfoundland Fish Buyers Organization Newfoundland Organization of Fish Producers Progressive Conservative Royal Air Force Royal Canadian Air Force The Rooms Provincial Archives, St John’s

The Newfoundland and Labrador of Joseph Roberts Smallwood, 1900–1949. Credit: Charlie Conway

joseph roberts smallwood

1

No Ordinary Joe: 1900–1934

b e g in n ings The Smallwood family came to Newfoundland from Prince Edward Island. David Smallwood (1839–1928), a carpenter by trade, moved to St John’s from Charlottetown in 1861 and soon after married Julia Cooper (1839–1916) in his adopted city, the Newfoundland capital.1 They had a large family, and the seventh of their ten children (nine sons, including a twin, and one daughter) was Charles William (1873–1956), who became a lumber surveyor.2 In 1900, he and Mary Ellen Devanna (1880–1963) were married in St John’s. Charles was nominally a Congregationalist, while Mary (known as Minnie) had been brought up as a Roman Catholic, but their nuptials were conducted by the Rev. H.P. Cowperthwaite, a Methodist.3 Charles and Minnie produced another large family, seven girls and six boys, of whom Joseph Roberts Smallwood was the oldest.4 He was born on 24 December 1900 in Gambo, Bonavista Bay, where his father was temporarily employed. He was baptized in May 1901 by the Rev. Charles Lench, a rising figure in Newfoundland Methodism, a religion that would figure prominently in Smallwood’s intellectual life and in his extensive career as a book collector. Smallwood’s given names were apparently suggested by his paternal grandfather – “Joseph” in honour of prominent British politician Joseph Chamberlain and “Roberts” in honour of Field Marshal Lord Roberts, at the time commander of the British forces in the Boer War. His grandfather’s anglophile outlook found many echoes in Smallwood’s own later life. In his political career, Smallwood made much of the fact that he had been born in an outport, as the many small coastal communities spread along the Newfoundland coast and away from the capital of St John’s are called. In fact, though, Smallwood was taken to St John’s at an early age

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Joseph Roberts Smallwood

and grew up there amid many family ups and downs. Charles Smallwood had a drinking problem, moved from job to job, and was an unreliable breadwinner. As his first-born later remembered, “brief times of prosperity” were combined “with long periods of stringency, and sometimes hunger.”5 The family first lived in St John’s over a store at the corner of LeMarchant Road and Lime Street.6 From there, they went to Bond Street and then to Coronation Street, finally settling, around 1907, on Southside Road.7 Their way of life in this enclave – at once part of St John’s but separate from it – was nicely evoked by Reginald Bernard (Reg) Smallwood in his self-published memoir My Brother Joe: Growing up with the Honourable Joseph R. (“Joey”) Smallwood (c. 1995). The Smallwood children learned how to make do – picking berries on the Southside Hills, catching trout, chopping wood, and tending to a vegetable garden – the latter activity stimulating in the young Joe a lifelong interest in farming.8 Nearby was the “romantic, thrilling magnet” of the harbour, the coves and wharves of which Joe came to know inside out as he absorbed the talk and lore of old Newfoundland.9 In the spring of each year, the departure of the sealing fleet for the “front” and its return laden with pelts was an especially stirring time. Joe Smallwood’s memory of the St John’s of his boyhood was of “a paradise of excitement,” and indeed it was.10 Smallwood attended Centenary Hall, a school run by Philip Gruchy Butler, and St Mary’s Church of England school on the Southside; he was also taught by nuns at Littledale Academy, a Roman Catholic school for girls run by the Sisters of Mercy.11 By age ten, he had been in four schools and was known as a bright and promising boy.12 Recognizing this, his well-off uncle, Frederick (Fred) Smallwood, who ran a boot and shoe business started by patriarch David Smallwood, volunteered to pay for him to become a boarder at Bishop Feild College, a rough-and-tumble but well-respected Church of England school for boys and one of the denominational colleges, favoured by parents with means, that stood at the top of the St John’s educational hierarchy. Bishop Feild was modelled on an English public school and had a headmaster, playing fields, corporal punishment, and King and Country ethos; it exemplified muscular Christianity. Small of stature and from the lower orders, Joe was undoubtedly bullied there, but he also advanced academically, read voraciously (a habit that stayed with him), and, influenced by a chance encounter in a dentist’s office with reformist House of Assembly member George Grimes, embraced socialism.13 He was enrolled in the school’s contingent of the Church Lads’ Brigade (an Anglican youth organization) and joined the Boy Scouts, a movement that was new to Newfoundland; in 1914, he accompanied the First Five Hundred of the Newfoundland Regiment

No Ordinary Joe: 1900–1934

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as they marched from their training camp at Quidi Vidi and along Water Street to the SS Florizel, the ship that transported them overseas to the battlefields of the 1914–18 war. At this historic moment, Smallwood carried the officer’s bag of Bishop Feild teacher Adolphe Ernest Bernard, who won the Military Cross at Gallipoli in faraway Turkey.

a p p r e n t i ce Already radically minded, reflecting youthful convictions about unfair distribution of wealth, Smallwood clashed with authority at Feild. He was involved in a protest over the quality of the food being served and led a resistance to punishment meted out to a number of boarders who had skipped evening service at nearby St Thomas’ Anglican Church. In 1915, he left school in a huff over a dispute with a housemaster. Having bolted Bishop Feild, he worked as a printer’s devil14 at The Plaindealer, a St John’s weekly under lay Catholic auspices. After six months there learning the trade, he moved over to the Spectator, founded as a temperance newspaper, where he worked as a typesetter. He next spent two years as a circulation clerk at the Daily News. While in this job, he published letters (writing under the pen name “Avalond”) in the St John’s Evening Advocate, the daily newspaper of the Fishermen’s Protective Union (fpu ).15 Founded in 1908, the fpu was led by William Ford Coaker, who had become Smallwood’s first role model in public life.16 Born on the Southside of St John’s, Coaker worked in outport Newfoundland as a lobster-canning plant operator, farmer, and telegrapher. A gifted speaker and writer, he was inspired to form the union by the adverse circumstances of debt and dependency he observed first-hand in coastal communities. Under the motto Suum Cuique, now usually translated as “To each his own,”17 the fpu sought to improve the lives of exploited independent fishermen through democratic cooperation and state action and in 1913 had ventured into electoral politics under the banner of the Union Party (Grimes, elected to the House of Assembly for Port de Grave, was one of its stalwarts).18 From 1910, the Union published the Fishermen’s Advocate, a well written and widely read weekly.19 The Evening Advocate dated from 2 January 1917 and was commonly referred to as the  Advocate, a designation that will be used here.20  In a January 1918 article in the paper, Smallwood eulogized Coaker as “a man amongst men  ... the super genius, the man who directed the fishermen’s efforts.”21 He admired Coaker for having challenged an economic system that kept fishermen in thrall to a rapacious merchantocracy headquartered on Water Street in St John’s.

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Later that year, Smallwood rounded out his introduction to the risky newspaper business when he became a reporter for the Evening Telegram; in October he caught the Spanish flu that was sweeping through Newfoundland but survived that pandemic, which took a heavy toll internationally.22 He wrote easily and well and was resourceful in the pursuit of stories. Until he had a debilitating stroke late in life,23 words and phrases came to him like capelin rolling on an endless beach. He interviewed British war correspondent Frederick A. McKenzie when he visited St John’s24 and scooped other papers by meeting up with Newfoundland Victoria Cross winner Tommy Ricketts at sea before the ship on which the regimental hero was travelling docked in St John’s.25 Smallwood was also at the fore in covering a crackdown on moonshiners at Flat Islands, Bonavista Bay, and the many takeoffs and landings that put Newfoundland in the limelight at the dawn of transatlantic air travel. He brought his reporting on aviation together in an article first published in Newfoundland Magazine and then reprinted in the 25 and 26 August 1919 issues of the Evening Telegram. He also tried his hand at fiction, contributing a story, “The Power of Attraction,” to the edition of 24 December 1918. This recounted the efforts of two outport men in braving a snowstorm to deliver food to a community that had none. On 27 July 1919, he published an article in which he imagined himself an aide to British Prime Minister David Lloyd George at the recent Paris peace negotiations (the Treaty of Versailles had been signed on 28 June). In the same vein, in “What the Kaiser Said,” he conducted an imaginary interview with the deposed German leader.26 In “Assisting the Press,” he surveyed the work that went into reporting the day’s news and explained how a reporter went about getting information from public and private sources.27 In an article in one of the city’s Christmas annuals, he gave a glowing account of the Marconi Wireless Company’s Mount Pearl station while bemoaning the “continuous pessimism” of Newfoundlanders about “the absence of things unusual in this little country of ours.”28

c au s e s As a writer and reporter, Smallwood emerged as an energetic and inspired publicist for Newfoundland – but for a country reconstructed according to the social and economic reformism of Coaker, the fpu , and a nascent labour movement. In the general election of 1919, which produced a coalition between Liberals led by Richard Anderson Squires and Coaker’s Union Party, the Evening Telegram supported Squires.29 Smallwood, however, helped to produce the Industrial Worker, a paper

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established by the Newfoundland Industrial Workers’ Association; it supported three Workingmen’s Party candidates opposed to Squires.30 Smallwood wrote for this paper, briefly edited it, and pasted its front pages on utility poles and fences around St John’s. Under Newfoundland law at the time, on becoming a cabinet minister, a member of the House of Assembly had to run in a by-election (the Newfoundland legislature also had an appointed Legislative Council). Following the 1919 vote, the two members elected in St John’s West, Squires and Henry Brownrigg, were subject to this requirement, a by-election being called in their district for 22 January 1920. To oppose them, the Workingmen’s Party joined forces with the main opposition LiberalProgressive Party, led by former Prime Minister Sir Michael Cashin. Smallwood was active in the campaign on behalf of labour-backed candidate William Linegar; in a letter to the Evening Herald, which he signed as late editor of the Industrial Worker, he issued a clarion call for workers to have their own representatives in the legislature: “In our opinion the best way of making known the nature and detail of our desired reforms is to have a man from our own ranks, a man who is part of us, sharing our troubles, hopes and ambitions, who will stand fearlessly on the floor of the House and voice those sentiments, desires and wishes.”31 The ideal candidate “must be a workingman himself and know what the workingman knows, see everything from the same angle, and have the same needs. Equipped with such a knowledge, he must be an intelligent man with ability to present, in compelling, arresting words, the demands of the workingmen to the Assemblymen who have in their hands the power to give the workingmen the things which they desire and need.” Linegar, he asserted, was just such a candidate, but in the event Squires and Brownrigg were re-elected. Smallwood was also active in this period – family circumstances may have led to this involvement – in support of the cause of the prohibition of the sale of alcoholic drink. On 4 November 1915, a national referendum had been held on this issue, and those in favour of prohibition had carried the day.32 Legislation followed, and prohibition, which Coaker strongly supported, took effect in Newfoundland on 1 January 1917. From the start, the administration of the ban ran into problems as drinkers sought ways around it. The making of moonshine became a problem, as did a loophole enabling doctors to issue prescriptions (popularly known as scripts) whereby alcohol could be obtained. On 14 March 1920, proponents of better enforcement of prohibition held a public meeting at the Methodist College Hall and elected a Vigilance Committee. Its purpose was to “take cognizance of any violations of the

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Joseph Roberts Smallwood

Prohibition Act and assist the Department of Justice in its rigid enforcement.”33 Smallwood was chosen to serve on the committee, which also had as members a number of prominent Protestant clergymen. Five days later, however, another public meeting, held at the Casino Theatre, came out in favour of a partial lifting of prohibition and the introduction of a rationing system that “would enable reputable citizens to obtain periodically ... limited quantities of alcoholic beverages for their personal consumption.”34 This was the policy eventually adopted by Newfoundland, but Smallwood remained a teetotaler for much of his life.35 To hone his public speaking skills, Smallwood took a great interest in debating clubs and in February 1919 became a member of the most prominent of such organizations in the city, the Methodist College Literary Institute, commonly referred to as the mcli . The club traced its origins to 1866 and drew on the rich heritage of Methodist pulpit oratory.36 Eventually, Smallwood became one of its most prominent enthusiasts and a formidable extempore speaker with a rich vocabulary and a rapier command of verbal thrust and parry. On 18 March 1920, he and young lawyer Leslie R. (Les) Curtis,37 a Methodist clergyman’s son, argued the winning affirmative side in a debate about housing policy in the city of St John’s.38 In addition to being able to write clean, clear, and concise prose, Smallwood was a born storyteller and raconteur.

n e w yo r k In June 1920, he parted company with the Evening Telegram and ventured forth into the larger world. His first port of call was Halifax, where he worked for the daily Halifax Herald and contributed copy to both the weekly Citizen and a local labour paper. Having been asked by the editor of the Sunday Leader to write articles on “Newfoundland and things and men in Newfoundland,” he appealed to Prime Minister Squires (Sir Richard from 1921) for research help, telling him that he was “painfully ignorant” of things about which he should write.39 Squires responded favourably, referred the request to his secretary, William J. Carew, wished Smallwood “abundant success,” and offered this assurance: “In spite of the fact you were associated with my political opponents, our acquaintance of the past few years has from my standpoint developed into a personal friendliness because of my knowledge of your ability in the particular line of work with which you have identified your interests.”40 In a letter to Evening Telegram staff members, published in the paper 10 August 1920, Smallwood stated that his plan was to go to Winnipeg and from there to Vancouver and Seattle; he

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would then make his way back across the United States to New York. His purpose, he explained to a friend in St John’s, was to get enough journalistic experience to be able to bring out “a fairly decent rag in Newfoundland – one which, I mean, will wipe the other Sunday-school journals off the slate. You know, I am really ashamed to get papers from St. John’s, and I always hide them away until I can get a chance to read them unobserved.”41 From Halifax, Smallwood published in the Telegram articles detailing his observations of Canadian life.42 While in the Nova Scotia capital, he also enjoyed hobnobbing with influential figures – another predilection that would persist – including Newfoundland worthy Sir P.T. McGrath and President Roy M. Wolvin of the British Empire Steel Corporation, operator of the iron ore mines at Bell Island, Conception Bay.43 From Halifax, Smallwood went not westward but to Boston, where he spent a few months working at the Herald Traveler. Continuing on to New York, a powerful magnet for Newfoundlanders seeking opportunity, he next worked at The Call, a paper in the vanguard of American socialism. While resident in New York, he went to Brooklyn every week to get news from home on the arrival of the Red Cross liner from St John’s. After arriving back in St John’s, he published, in the 7 January 1921 issue of the Daily Star, an interview with himself about his New York sojourn. He had travelled there by train, so his first impression of the city had been of the vastness of Grand Central Station, where he had been given a rough reception: “Before I had a chance to buy a stick of gum even, I was attacked savagely by a gang of ruffians who seemed to have been waiting for me and I [was] whisked into a closed car and I was just going to yell to a cop with a huge shield on his coat when the driver turns around and asks me where I wanted to go. I was terribly relieved. He was a taxi driver. I gave him an address on West 16th street, about fifteen minutes drive. Four hours and eight minutes later, the shades of night having fallen and the electric lights having blazed on, we made our objective and the drive made me a pauper. Driving is terribly expensive in New York.”44

jo u r n e yman On 12 March 1921, Smallwood launched a weekly, the St. John’s Times, described in the first issue as a “liberal, non-political, literary ... review magazine” and “a publication of wide, general and special interest.”45 He promised “A clean, paper – free and independent, impartial, and liberal.”46 Unfortunately, a printers’ strike disrupted publication

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just as the venture got going, whereupon he abandoned it and worked as a reporter for the pro-Squires Daily Star. On 12 March 1921, the Advocate praised Smallwood as a “newspaperman who in the brief course of three or four years” had “made a name for himself which other members of the profession might well envy.”47 When the Daily Star failed that same month, Smallwood became a reporter for the fpu paper, to which he contributed a column, “Findings” / “Day. By. Day,” a potpourri of observations on local and world events.48 The column extolled the virtues of Coaker in his role as minister of marine and fisheries in the Squires government. The fpu leader had reduced the operating budget of his department by $500,000 while maintaining its efficiency and services. “It only goes to show,” Smallwood gushed, “what can be done when the right man is there to do it. Confederation would never be in the thought of this country if we had a Coaker for every department of the public service.”49 On his return to Newfoundland, Smallwood also re-entered the prohibition debate with a vengeance. In a 31 May 1921 letter to the Evening Telegram – the first of a number of such missives – he asserted that there was “no prohibition in Newfoundland” and that “thirteen thousand gallons of booze” were being consumed annually as a result of bootlegging and the script system.50 Alcohol had to be attacked as if it was typhus: “We must relentlessly and quite without mercy exterminate it ... If we don’t, then booze is going to grow strong again. We must regard booze as a wild beast, stinking of beastiality and brutality, the antithesis of civilization ... and the enemy of culture ... [W]e must stand firmly for its total abolition, extinction, elimination and destruction.” The script loophole favoured people with money, and those advocating a rationing system had the argument of fairness on their side. In order to counter this and to make Newfoundland “bone-dry,” Smallwood called on prohibitionists to adopt a “working program” to rebuild support for their cause.51 The existing legislation was “faultily constructed” and had been approved during the war for sentimental and patriotic reasons.52 What was needed now to rectify matters was an “intense educational campaign against the use of alcoholic poison” followed by a plebiscite to secure a fresh majority vote in favour of out-and-out prohibition. Prohibition had to be based on the “good will of the people” and on public belief that the ban on alcohol was “good and desirable.” Another – and winning – cause he publicly espoused in this same period was that of the enfranchisement of women, a reform that was realized in Newfoundland in 1925.53

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c oa k er In late August 1921, Smallwood made his first visit to Port Union, the model town that embodied Coaker’s utopian vision for outport Newfoundland. Writing from Coaker’s office on the fourth floor of the Union Trading Company (an fpu enterprise), he marvelled at being “actually in the sacred spot which of all places in Newfoundland crystalizes unionism and cooperation, and stands as eloquent testimony of the contention that men united can do almost anything, and certainly what men divided cannot do.”54 All of this was personified in Coaker, about whom Smallwood rhapsodized, “I look through the window and there upon the wharf my eye falls upon the man who has by his vision and imagination, his peerless organizing genius, his indomitable courage, and matchless energy made it all possible. I see him busier than any man on the waterfront ... I see him directing, supervising, helping, giving a hand – where needed – all quite without hesitation, and with an evident zest and keen enjoyment ... The man never seems to tire. He must have a stupendous reserve. He is out of bed and on the wharf and in the store at six in the morning, is here all day, and I have seen him here each night so far this week when I left, late in the night, to retire.” In time, Smallwood became part of Coaker’s inner circle, cultivating a close connection with both Camilla Coaker, his hero’s only child, and Tom Clouter, a protégé the fpu leader treated like a son and heir. Camilla may have been an object of affection for Joe, but this can only be speculated upon. On 2 September 1921, with characteristic flourish, he signed the autograph album of Tom Clouter’s mother, Katherine Clouter (née Tilley), another Coaker intimate.55 Later that month, he further extended his knowledge of outport Newfoundland when he travelled from Placentia along the southwest coast of the island aboard the coastal boat Argyle, recording his impressions in a series of article for the Advocate.56 By November, he was offering Coaker advice on the future of the fpu . In a letter that perhaps revealed much about his own underlying ambition, he cautioned his mentor: “I think one of the drawbacks on you is the fact that you are tied down to the U.T.C. [Union Trading Company], and the other companies. Can’t you get some big man capable of taking care of the companies, and you yourself launch out? History produces a man like you every now and then; history judges that man not so much by his actual achievements as by the extent to which he went in exploiting his opportunities. You are in the rather enviable position of having had thrust into your grasp opportunities for far-reaching good which no

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1.1 Joe Smallwood (left) and Tom Clouter (a William Ford Coaker favourite) examining a book together. Smallwood aspired to be part of Coaker’s inner circle.

Newfoundlander before you possessed or dreamed of possessing. Make no mistake – Newfoundland history will judge you kindly as it is ... If you fail Newfoundland, then she is indeed unfortunate and in sad truth the Cinderella of the Empire. There is but one Coaker, and he has but one lifetime.”57 In December, Smallwood went back to Port Union for the 13th convention of the fpu , which began on the second of the month. On this occasion, he was called upon by Coaker to speak on the subject of nationalization, which for both of them, in the context of the fishing economy, meant not public ownership of the means of production but greater government regulation in the exporting and marketing of salt codfish. This was a cause that Coaker was pushing at the time within the government, and it was a matter about which Smallwood had written extensively in the Advocate. For Smallwood, nationalization meant taking a “national” perspective in solving the problems of the fishery – as opposed to the individualist outlook that typified the dog-eat-dog Water Street business community in St John’s. Smallwood described the convention in two articles published in the Advocate.58 “Before my eyes, about me,” he eulogized, was a “parliament – a parliament of fishermen. Here were delegates from all the bays of the North and from the South. Here were representatives delegated by many local councils to travel to the union capital; and here, at the fishermen’s

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1.2 Smallwood with Camilla Coaker (left) and Nellie Clouter (right), sister of Tom Clouter. Smallwood is holding a volume by Tolstoy.

parliament, they are to express and give voice to the sentiments of the majority of their constituents  ... Here, in short, was a national council representing fishermen, fishermen’s interests, and all that fishermen stand for.” The delegates were “old men and middle-aged and young, representative of all shades of thought – seriously discussing and debating big subjects of grave and vital importance to our country. Where else is this done? This convention represents the most conscious, intelligent and enlightened citizenship that will be found in Newfoundland.” Coaker had more faith in the country “than any other Newfoundlander” and since 1908 had been a beacon of “faith and optimism, coupled with intelligence, [and] honest action.” In January 1922, always the adventurous reporter, Smallwood participated in travel of a different sort when he, along with Albert B. Perlin of the Evening Telegram (a close friend from his Bishop Feild days) and a reporter for the Daily News, flew over St John’s with Major Sidney Cotton in his Martinsyde biplane. An Australian by birth, Cotton was

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in Newfoundland to assist in the seal hunt through aerial spotting of the animals.59 “Advocate Man flies over St. John’s,” the fpu newspaper headlined, following up with “Flying above St. John’s! Two thousand feet above the City! Crashing thru the ether at a speed of ninety or a hundred miles an hour! What does it feel like?” Smallwood’s answer, given in an exhilarating account, caught the magic of first flight: “there is nothing I know of that is like it. That beautiful sensation of elevation, of elation, of moving suspension, is something which frankly, has to be experienced to be understood. There is no explaining it.”60 Throughout his life, Smallwood thus embraced technological advance as an instrument for human progress.

c o s m o p o l itan On 2 June 1922, he departed St John’s aboard the SS Rosalind to again seek opportunity in New York.61 There he met with Newfoundland expatriate Fraser Bond, nephew of former Newfoundland Prime Minister Sir Robert Bond. Fraser Bond was executive assistant to Charles Miller, editor-in-chief of the New York Times, who had himself visited Newfoundland in August 1921 and been interviewed by Smallwood for the Advocate.62 Through this connection, Smallwood was promised a job with the paper, but while waiting for this to materialize (Miller died on 12 July 1922) was reduced to sleeping first on a park bench near the New York Public Library and then in a series of flophouses.63 In the end, he never did work for the New York Times64 because another opportunity now came along that appealed to his instincts as a promoter – another lifelong role. At the suggestion of cinema owner Ron Young, a St John’s friend, he went to see Canadian-born filmmaker Ernest Shipman to follow up on a suggestion that Shipman had made in a letter to Young – news of this was reported in the Advocate – for a movie to promote tourism to Newfoundland. Shipman had been in St John’s more than a quarter century before as a member of a touring Shakespearean theatrical company and had never forgotten his visit: “The impression made on my mind of the great hills surrounding your harbor, and of the harbor itself will never be effaced.”65 Shipman explained to Smallwood that $100,000 would be needed to make the movie and that 60 per cent of this would have to come from local investors. Smallwood bought into the scheme enthusiastically and told readers of the Advocate that the film would “embrace all phases of Newfoundland life ... make the island famous throughout the world and result, possibly, in an influx of tourists and visitors.”66

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On 20 July, he and the Shipmans, husband and wife, arrived in St John’s to find the wherewithal for the venture. Newfoundland Films, Ltd, was soon formed and had on its board of directors some of the most prominent businessmen in the city.67 Shipman’s scriptwriter, Garrett Elsden Fort, who had worked on a film adaption of Ralph Connor’s novel Glengarry School Days, arrived in the Newfoundland capital on 31 July to commence work.68 His script was to be based on the novel Rip Tide by Kenneth O’Hara, and much of the shooting was to be done in and around the harbour of St John’s and at nearby Petty Harbour. In August, Fort went to Halifax to meet with Shipman and O’Hara, and in the same month Shipman and Smallwood went to Prince Edward Island to launch a similar venture there (Smallwood seized the opportunity to visit relatives in the island province).69 In September, Shipman returned to St John’s, and O’Hara came with him. A meeting with the directors of the company followed. With O’Hara “stressing the necessity of fair weather and sunshine for the project,” the directors of the company agreed to postpone shooting until the following July, by which time the whole scheme had fizzled out.70 Smallwood’s reach had exceeded his grasp, an outcome that became a leitmotif of much of his later life. The first Newfoundland motion picture was not the film he had promoted but a joint Newfoundland-Canadian production, Sea Riders, directed by E.H. Griffith. It was made by the Maritime Motion Picture Co., involved local investment, and was first shown in Newfoundland in March 1923.71 In the 1950s, however, Smallwood would return to his cinematic interest through the formation of Atlantic Films Ltd. With the movie escapade behind him, Smallwood worked as a casual labourer in New York until he found a job as assistant editor of a group of trade magazines.72 In this phase of life, he also joined the Socialist Party of America, attended lectures at the Rand School of Social Science, the New School of Social Research, the Cooper-Union Institute, and the Labor Temple (a Presbyterian gathering place run by Rev. Edmund B. Chaffee), and wrote syndicated articles, some of which appeared in the Advocate.73 In the 22 October 1922 issue of The Call Magazine, he published “Why I Am an Imperialist.”74 “I am an imperialist,” he explained, “because I am a Socialist. I believe in industrialist expansion throughout the earth because I am eager to see the Co-operative Commonwealth ushered in.” Though he had previously written “many columns of anti-imperialist denunciation,” he now understood that by spreading capitalism throughout the world, imperialism would “quicken the coming of the Socialist commonwealth.” From afar, Smallwood also continued to spread the gospel of Coaker and the fpu . He wrote anonymously in the Advocate and produced

1.3 Joe Smallwood, young cosmopolitan.

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a panegyric pamphlet – A Sincere Appreciation of Newfoundland’s Greatest Son[:] The Most Brilliant, Original and Romantic Figure Produced by Newfoundland is William Ford Coaker – which was printed by the Advocate Publishing Company, another of the fpu business enterprises. The pamphlet was signed by “An Admirer.” He praised Coaker as orator (“I have to confess that on every occasion when I heard him the tears welled in my eyes and little shivers went down my back”), writer (“He writes like he talks. Not a superfluous word is used ... He is as clear as day. What he means he says, and what he says he means. His words cut and sear like branding irons ... Never does this man write except on behalf of the fishermen toilers of his native land”), and statesman (“Public life, politics, to him are not games”). Coaker was in “public life only to serve, – to serve the thousands of fishermen who sent him there to be their champion.” He had seen “the degradation to which a race of great-hearted men had been levelled” and stood witness “with a vividness and brightness that seared his soul” to the fact that “it was the toil of the fishermen that supported in ease and luxury the handful of men in St. John’s who appropriated their wealth and substance.” In an article published in the January 1923 issue of the Nation, a widely read American weekly, Smallwood explained that Coaker was “not a Socialist – indeed he would hardly know what one was.” Rather, he was “solely a product of Newfoundland and Newfoundland conditions.” He was a man of “practical nature” and “a sincere idealist.” To further the fpu cause, Smallwood contributed a regular column to the Advocate, written in batches “to ensure continuity of publication.”75 Entitled “From the Masthead,” the column was written without remuneration, using the byline “by The Lookout,” a self-description that, adapted to “The Barrelman,” he would later employ to great advantage as a radio personality. In the Coaker tradition, he imagined himself a vanguard figure, finding a way forward for Newfoundland. In January and February 1923, the Advocate published a series of articles in which Smallwood described, in chapters, “What Newfoundland Might Be Fifty Years Hence! A Glimpse at Things in General as They Might Be in the Future in This Country.”76 In this series he sowed seeds that blossomed when he achieved power in later life. He foresaw a modern country of factories, rural electrification, democratic local government, and cultural and educational achievement. Two of the articles dealt with Port Union and the fpu .77 On an imagined 1973 visit to the office of the Advocate, Smallwood was told by the newspaper’s editor that before Coaker’s death, the union had expanded to include, through affiliation, all the labour unions in Newfoundland. Writing

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that it seemed “strange to think of Coaker dead” because it had always seemed “as if he should live forever,” Smallwood highlighted the electrifying impact on the country of his death, which “could not be believed.” “From hundreds of harbors vessels and boats had come” to Port Union where a “pall of deep gloom and sorrow” had hung over the community. “Several thousand men and women” had attended the funeral. “In a very plain coffin the body of the Great Chief” had been carried “tenderly by a dozen, sturdy, full-bearded fishermen, to the top of the highest hill at Port Union, the immense concourse following.” The Port Union of 1973 was envisaged by Smallwood as an outport arcadia, a “wonderful little town – nothing less.” In a passage that suggested much about his own destiny as a political leader, he gave a glowing account of the progress that had been made in Coaker’s utopian outport: “It spread over a considerable area which, when I had last been there, was but open country covered with shrubbery. It was laid out in the most modern manner, in squares and blocks, the streets running parallel one with another, with several small open spaces for parks. The population was ten thousand, and the people were a splendid type of men and women. I saw several big factories and plants in which thousands of men were working. There were clothing factories, boot factories, tobacco factory, a rope factory, and a factory which manufactured marine engines. The shipyard ... had grown to much bigger proportions, and I saw work going ahead on several vessels, so that the air rang with the clang and clatter of industry and I found my heart welling as I remembered the man who had founded the town and its industries.” The town also had a seal oil factory, a seal leather plant, a butter factory, a sugar refinery, and a flour mill. Coaker’s residence, known as the Bungalow, had been “carefully preserved,” and in front of it stood a life-size statue of Coaker with this inscription: “Love and Honor to our Great Friend and Champion.” In sum, the Port Union of the future was a “live, wide-awake progressive town.” Always the dreamer, Smallwood imagined a golden future time for Newfoundland – perhaps with himself at the fore.78 During his second New York sojourn, he was also an avid suitor. His friends in the city included fellow Newfoundlanders Billie Newhook and Cynthia Morgan, a courting couple. When they eventually fell out, Cynthia moved to Melrose, Massachusetts, where she worked at the New England sanitarium and hospital. Smallwood, who lived in the same boarding house as Billie, kept in touch with her, and one of her letters to him asked if he still worshipped “at the shrine of the Goddess, Dorothy?” Her advice to him in this regard was: “‘keep on hoping’ Joe, – you may get her yet.”79 Dorothy remains a mystery figure in Smallwood’s biography,

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but in April 1923 he struck up a close relationship with Sophie Adams, a Jewish New Yorker. She told him that she wanted to be someone “to whom you will pour out all your thoughts, ideas and hopes. In whom you will confide.”80 Their connection, however, proved short-lived because of opposition from her mother and because Sophie felt that Smallwood’s feelings were not strong enough for it to continue. By this time, moreover, he had developed a romantic interest in eighteen-year-old Lillian Zahn, a student at New York University, who was also Jewish. He had met her in early May 1923 at a social gathering at the residence of the radical economist Scott Nearing, who taught at the Rand School. On this occasion, Smallwood took a photograph of Lillian and enclosed it in a letter he sent to her. The picture was of the “group scattered about the grass eating lunch” but unfortunately showed only the back of Lillian’s head. She expressed surprise that Smallwood had taken so much interest in her but was welcoming: “Since you are not a New Yorker, you must be an interesting personality to meet. You see, I am so tired of New Yorkers that it is a relief to meet an outsider.” Apologizing for not having replied to an earlier letter because she was in the midst of doing some college work, she offered to meet with him on Saturday, 2 June, at 7 p.m., in front of the Rand School. This would be an “opportunity to learn each other’s ideas.”81 Their relationship developed during the summer of 1923, with Lillian apparently attempting to teach Joe Yiddish. But when Smallwood did not pass muster with her parents, refugees from eastern Europe, the relationship came to an end.82 Clearly, however, the twenty-two-year-old Smallwood was ripe for romance, which was not long in coming through yet another chance encounter.

u p h e aval In November 1923, still close to Lillian Zahn, Smallwood returned to Newfoundland to attend the annual convention of the fpu that marked the fifteenth anniversary of the founding of the organization. Much had happened politically in his homeland while he had been away, all of which he had followed closely. In a general election held on 3 May 1923, the Squires government, running under the banner of Liberal-Reform, won twenty-three seats to thirteen for the Liberal-Labour-Progressive Party led by John R. Bennett, who was supported by Sir Michael Cashin. Coaker had left the government before the election – replaced as minister of marine and fisheries by fpu stalwart William Halfyard – but was elected to the new House of Assembly. He was, therefore, still active in politics when, in July 1923, a cabinet revolt, brought on by alleged

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misuse of public funds for electioneering purposes, forced Squires’s resignation as prime minister. Squires was succeeded in office by William Warren, with Halfyard serving as colonial secretary and George Grimes as minister of marine and fisheries. The 1923 fpu convention, therefore, was held in very changed government circumstances – and with Coaker in retreat politically. According to the Advocate, Smallwood, who was an honorary member of the fpu , had been commissioned by a “prominent New York labor newspaper” to cover the gathering “of the toilers of the sea” and to write “a number of special magazine articles about the union and other Newfoundland topics.”83 He brought greetings to the convention from Eugene Debs, leader of the Socialist Party of America, and from Frank Hodges, secretary of the Miners’ Federation of Great Britain, whom he had met in the United States. Coaker, he told Lillian, had introduced him as a friend of the union: “I got a good hand as I went to the platform, and rarely have ever – never, in fact – felt in better condition to make a speech. My voice was in good form, and I had perfect control, except that I was slightly emotional, which gave my voice a thrill that enhances its value. I read out Debs address and it got a great hand. The address from Frank Hodges also got warm applause.”84 In an account of the convention published in the Advocate, he heaped praise on the entire proceedings: “It is a wonderful achievement, the getting together, under one roof, of several hundred men who are experienced in life, experienced in the great industry of our country, men of thought, men of intelligence, men who have observed things and have not been slow to form their own judgment  ... Really, I cannot get over it. Here are several hundred plain, honest, blunt men without pretensions to statesmanship, actually coming by steamer and train from all directions to meet in a hall and spend three days talking over and debating the great problems of our country. No more do the fishermen permit House of Assembly representatives to handle the problems which affect the whole people, without having some voice in the solution of those problems.”85 Privately, though, as soon became apparent, Smallwood had come to have grave doubts about the future of an organization he had long admired. During his stay in Port Union, he took a series of photographs of the town and had “many fine chats” with Coaker. Writing on 4 December from 240 Duckworth Street, the St John’s office of the Advocate, he told Lillian that he intended “to write a history of the union, in about four hundred thousand words” and “get it published, if possible, in New York.”86 “I have been meeting all my old friends,” he reported, “meeting

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them at every step I take on the street. I have been out to tea time and again, and have many invitations.” He was also kept busy helping out with a Christmas issue of the Advocate to which he contributed both an article and some fiction he had had written earlier. Not surprisingly, he met readers in St John’s who recognized him through his prose style as the writer of the Advocate’s Masthead column. Smallwood left again for New York on 15 December 1923, stopping in Boston en route to visit with Cynthia Morgan and Billie Newhook, who were now married.87

c o m r a d e tucker He next found work at the New York Leader (the successor to the bankrupt Call). One contemporary remembered him as being “rather quiet and retiring”: “when art and literature were being discussed he hardly spoke at all. But when he got warmed up and started off about Newfoundland and Coaker, he could be quite aggressive.”88 As always, he busied himself with literary and political activities, attending lectures and continuing his work on behalf of the Socialist Party, for which he was a speaker during 1924 on behalf of Progressive Party presidential candidate Senator Robert M. La Follette, Sr, of Wisconsin.89 He also began collecting material in city libraries for an anthology (never completed) on the great political liberators in history. Most strikingly for this narrative, in a remarkable series of letters to St John’s labour leader George Tucker, vice-president of the Newfoundland Industrial Workers’ Association and an official of the Electricians’ Union, he gave a searching critique of the diminished role of the fpu in the wake of Coaker’s exit from government and spelled out ideas and plans for the formation of a Newfoundland labour party. He was inspired in this quest by his admiration for the surging British Labour Party and its brand of socialism.90 The main work of the fpu , Smallwood told “Comrade Tucker,” had now been completed; the union was not “making new progress” and was “resting on its oars.”91 Coaker was no longer young, and it was doubtful whether he was “equal to the task of reorganizing and revitalizing the fpu ,” much as he might understand that this needed to be done. Smallwood predicted that one of three things would happen to the union: it would “die a natural and unspectacular death”; it would “be reorganized anew and rededicated to fresh ideals and committed to a new program”; or “some opportunist adventurer” would supplant it in its northern base and “inevitably come to failure.” While the fpu might die out, its heritage was the “enlightened independence of the fishermen.” As it now existed, the fpu had run out of passion and idealism;

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the moment it had joined with another party to form a government, it had compromised its principles and policies. The underlying problem of the fpu was that while Coaker had definite objectives, there was no “general philosophy or attitude behind them”; “his cut and dried proposals ... were purely topical and temporary.” That, Smallwood explained, was why “you never see the fpu these days agitating for a specific program, with the exception of fish. Instead, it recounts to the point of extreme weariness, its past achievements.” The fpu now had no “passionate ideals, little fight, less enthusiasm, no policies, and therefore ... no mission” and was failing in democratic leadership. Its decline, moreover, was “due largely to ... psychological and other changes” in Coaker himself. He had “burned himself out,” “run out of policies,” and was “largely disillusioned.” He was “tied down” by the fpu ’s business side; “Frankenstein like,” it had come to demand all his time. The fpu had “ceased to be a movement, and [had] degenerated into a party.” As a result, the fishermen were “really leaderless.”92 Hence the need for the new labour party Smallwood envisaged. “Every month spent out of Newfoundland,” he told Tucker, “is punishment for me. My whole heart is in Newfoundland, and my interests are centered there. I regard my time spent out of Newfoundland in the light of training and experience, a period of broadening and the absorption of a cosmopolitan spirit if possible ... My idea is and has been for years that of equipping myself to be useful to the labor movement that I know should someday come to Newfoundland ... and [to] devote myself entirely to it for the rest of my life.”93

c r is is While Smallwood thus mused in New York, party politics in Newfoundland entered a turbulent new phase. In December 1923, the Warren government launched an inquiry, undertaken by Thomas Hollis Walker, the recorder of Derby, England, into the various charges of corruption against the Squires administration. His report, delivered in March 1924, led to the arrest of Squires and three associates, all of whom were charged with larceny. While on bail, Squires voted in a House of Assembly non-confidence motion that led to the defeat, by a majority of one, of the government that had charged him. Early in May 1924, having secured dissolution, Warren joined with opposition members to form a new administration, but this combination proved short-lived: on 10 May 1924, he was succeeded as prime minister by Albert E. Hickman, another businessman. But in a general election held on 2 June, Hickman

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was bested by Walter S. Monroe, a St John’s factory owner, who led a deeply conservative party that styled itself as Liberal-Conservative. In August, the Monroe government pushed through the Alcoholic Liquors Act, which gave the quietus to the prohibition debate by introducing a permit system for the sale of liquor. This change was made following Hollis Walker’s finding that the existing system of liquor administration was in reality a bootlegging operation. Luckily for Squires, the charges against him did not survive grand jury scrutiny. He had had a very close call but lived to fight another day – by which time Smallwood had joined his camp. However, the events leading to his downfall and the legal imbroglio that followed not only permanently scarred his reputation but raised doubts about the ability of Newfoundland to govern itself – doubts that metastasized during the Great Depression of the 1930s. The political upheaval that had occurred in St John’s, George Grimes told Smallwood, had “unmasked a number of men, showing them to be men of straw, devoid of principle, with the jungle spirit of everyone for himself and the devil take the hindmost.” There had been “betrayal after betrayal, with men on the auction mart up to the highest bidder.”94 Disillusioned with politics, Coaker did not run in the 1924 election, preferring, as Smallwood had forecast, to concentrate his energies on the fpu ’s business enterprises; as part of this shift, publication of the Evening Advocate was discontinued. Coaker had quit the “whole dirty business” of politics because the Union Party had lost the support of fishermen and its elected members had degenerated “into an office-loving clique of politicians,” little better, if at all, than the reactionary forces the fpu had set out to replace.95 At the fpu ’s December 1924 annual convention, Coaker, who had been knighted the previous year, called on the organization to elect a new president and to “adopt a new platform in touch with the present day requirements.”96 For the moment, he was persuaded to stay on as leader, but the revival he advocated did not materialize. As Smallwood had correctly discerned, the fpu ’s glory days were now behind it.

l a b o u r o r g ani zer It was against this political backdrop that Smallwood returned to Newfoundland in January 1925, having been engaged by American labour leader John P. Burke to reorganize the troubled Local 63 of the International Brotherhood of Pulp, Sulphite and Paper Mill Workers at Grand Falls, where a pulp and paper mill, owned by the Anglo-Newfoundland Development Company, had been in operation since 1909. The local had

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1.4 Smallwood (seated, far right) with a group of Newfoundland labour leaders, c. mid-1920s.

declined drastically in membership following an abortive 1921 strike,97 and whereas membership had once stood at 1,700, it had now fallen to about 100. To get the organization back on its feet, Smallwood was paid a wage of $46 per week. His return to St John’s was duly noted in the press, and three days after landing he participated in an mcli debate98; on 3, 4, and 27 February, he published articles in the Daily Globe – a new Liberal paper launched in December 1924 following the demise of the Evening Advocate – about his “‘Adventures’ in America.”99 It was a “mournful fact to contemplate,” he wrote, that there were more Newfoundlanders living outside Newfoundland than in Newfoundland.100 Moving on to Grand Falls, he got to work on his union assignment and in April, with the support of local unions, launched the Newfoundland Federation of Labour, which attracted support from a variety of unions in St John’s and from the Wabana Mine Workers’ Union on Bell Island.101 With Squires and Coaker on the sidelines and Monroe in office, Smallwood saw an opening for the labour party he had in mind.102 The platform of the new federation, issued by Smallwood, promised action in favour of unemployment insurance, public health care,

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an end to child labour, insurance for fishermen, and collective bargaining.103 The federation would hire organizers to promote the union cause throughout the country, publish a weekly labour newspaper, maintain an industrial information bureau to keep records of wage trends in various crafts and occupations, and collect, classify, and disseminate information on labour laws, labour conditions, and housing needs. Smallwood looked to Christian clergymen to support organized labour, trumpeting the news that, after “some delightful chats,” Father William P. Finn, the Roman Catholic priest in Grand Falls, had wished him “God-speed.”104 On 2 May, Smallwood announced that the new federation had received an invitation from the British National Committee of the Trades Union Congress and the British Labour Party to send representatives to the Commonwealth Labour Conference to be held in London on 27 July.105 Identifying strongly with the Labour Party and drawing inspiration from its rise (Labour leader Ramsay MacDonald had become prime minister of the United Kingdom in 1924), he foresaw in its success the end of capitalism by peaceful, constitutional means. When Thomas J. Foran, the proprietor and editor of The Searchlight, questioned his credentials to act as a champion for labour and accused him of being a subversive ideologue,106 Smallwood replied vigorously: Dear Mr. Foran, since I was twelve years old I have been deeply interested in labor. I worked in my early youth, worked physically and manually. I drove a horse, Mr. Foran, when you were a reporter at the [Daily] News, and I hauled crush rock, which I crushed myself, to the new Daily News Building on Duckworth Street. Later on I worked in that building as printer’s apprentice and then in the office. I worked in other printing offices. I delivered newspapers for the News. I have also cut wood, and put Editor Foran and myself side by side with an axe each and, providing we did not begin to hack at each other, see who would fell the most and biggest trees. I am a member of the working class, Mr. Foran, and three members of my immediate family are union-men ... Let me say that I am not a Bolshevist or Communist, or Anarchist; that I have no sympathy for them; that further, I have no interest in them; that I have not now, and never had, any connection with them, or interest or belief or sympathy in them.107 In this case, however, rhetoric belied organizational reality. The first national convention of Smallwood’s nascent labour collective was planned for December, but nothing came of this and, like many other

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initiatives at this stage of his life, the project of the federation proved overly ambitious and eventually came to naught, though its passage into history proved eventful. As labour leader, he bombarded the press with correspondence on a wide range of work-related issues, taking a special interest in the wages and working conditions of miners on Bell Island.108

clara In June 1925, Smallwood moved on to Corner Brook, where the Newfoundland Power and Paper Co. had just started up a pulp and paper mill, for which Squires claimed full political credit; the disgraced former prime minister was said to have put “the ‘hum’ in the Humber,” the river that enters Bay of Islands near the site of the new enterprise.109 Paper workers, electricians, and machinists in the now booming town had already organized trades locals, and Smallwood, sometimes holding secret meetings in the mill during working hours, was able to help consolidate them into Local 64 of the International Brotherhood of Pulp, Sulphite and Paper Mill Workers.110 While thus employed, he stayed at a boarding house run by Mrs Serena Baggs in nearby Curling (formerly Birchy Cove), an old settlement in Bay of Islands.111 His choice of accommodation proved fateful, for there he met the visiting Clara Isabel Oates (1901–1996) of Canvas Town, Carbonear, Conception Bay, a first cousin once removed (through her mother) of the landlady. Clara was the daughter of Edwin Dugald Oates and Sarah Jane Ash Oates (née Follett) and had four brothers (one of whom had died in childhood) and two sisters.112 The Oates family was well established in a town that had a strong entrepreneurial and maritime tradition. Her great-great-grandfather Thomas Oates, captain of the Belle, was well remembered as one of the “Vikings of Carbonear” who had “sailed the northern seas” decades before.113 Given the family’s seafaring tradition and material success, the Oates residence on Crowdy Street was well appointed and had fine objets acquired from abroad. In 1920, Clara had visited Canada, where she had a pen pal, and had written enthusiastically about her travels.114 She was personable, outgoing, and eager to discover and learn. Clara and Joe were of marriageable age, and a romance quickly blossomed between them. By the time she returned home they were engaged, but their wedding had to await Smallwood’s next organizing venture. In September, starting out from Port aux Basques, he made his way along the main line of the Newfoundland Railway (publicly owned since 1923), signing up section men and round-house, yard, and wharf-men in the Newfoundland Union of Railwaymen (the first

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1.5 Members of the Oates family in the early 1920s. Front row (left to right), Florence Beulah, Cyrus Taylor, and Emma Louise; back row (left to right), William Thomas, Sarah Jane Ash (mother), and Frederick Douglas.

organizational venture of his ill-fated federation of labour) as he travelled. He proceeded on foot, by handcar, and by train, stopping briefly at Corner Brook to attend to federation business and then moving on. He published an account of his west coast ramble in the Curling Western Star115 and held union meetings at Bishop’s Falls, Clarenville, and Whitbourne. At Clarenville, he took the branch line to Bonavista, addressing a public meeting at Princeton on the topic “Making Newfoundland fit to live in” and visiting Coaker at Port Union.116 Continuing on, he met with former first minister Sir Robert Bond in Whitbourne. He next took the branch line to Heart’s Content and from there proceeded by horse and cart to Carbonear, where he and Clara finalized wedding plans. He then resumed his rail journey until he reached Avondale, where he met with a party of railway officials that included general manager Herbert Russell, an old mcli friend. Threatening to close the railway down, Smallwood was able to convince his interlocutors not to implement a proposed wage cut for the section men he was now representing. Thereafter, while awaiting matrimony, he wrote a series of letters to the editor, two signed as coming from Carbonear, on labour and economic matters.117

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1.6 The Oates family home, Crowdy Street, Carbonear, where Joe and Clara were married on 23 November 1925. This picture was taken on 9 August 1954 on the occasion of the funeral of Sarah Jane Ash Oates (née Follett), Clara’s mother, who had died at Canada House, St John’s.

On Thursday, 19 November, a linen shower was held at the Oates home in Carbonear in honour of Clara.118 Then, on the evening of Monday, 23 November, she and Joe were married at her family residence with the Rev. W.R. Bugden of the newly formed United Church officiating.119 (The United Church of Canada, inaugurated in Toronto on 10 June 1925, absorbed Newfoundland Methodists.) The wedding was “a quiet one” with “only the immediate relatives and friends of the family being present.” The “very prettily attired” bride was given away by her father and was the recipient of “a large number of presents,” said to be indicative of the esteem in which she was held.120 On the day of the wedding, one of Joe’s recent letters to the editor was published in the Daily News.121 In the church register they signed, Joe and Clara were both entered as Methodist (the register had not yet been updated to United Church nomenclature), and he was described as a journalist.122 The witnesses who signed the register were the fathers of the bride and groom, Edwin Oates and Charles Smallwood. On 24 November, the newlyweds,

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both aged twenty-four,123 left by train for St John’s, where they stayed to begin with at the Balsam Hotel on Barnes Road.124 On 1 March 1926, writing from rented rooms, Clara told her sister (Florence) Beulah that she and Joe kept late hours and that he made her “go everywhere with him.”125 Her family belonged to the property-owning Newfoundland planter class: they knew how to put a meal on the table  and keep a roof over their  heads – essentials  for which Clara would  return to them again and again when Joe, often impecunious, could not provide. Unconventional himself, Smallwood was fortunate to marry into a conventional Newfoundland family adept at the business of making a living.

l ib e r al During their first year of marriage, the restless Smallwood busied himself in many directions. In December 1925, he spent a week on Bell Island, where he promoted the work of the Wabana Mine Workers’ Union vis-à-vis the British Empire Steel Corporation, the present operator of the iron-ore mining operation in the Conception Bay community.126 He also published a weekly newspaper, The New Outlook, for the members of the railway union and remained active in the cause of the Newfoundland Federation of Labour. The motto of The New Outlook was “Fearless and Free.” On the front page of the first issue (dated 21 November 1925, two days into his marriage), in keeping with this sentiment, he lashed out at the Evening Telegram for implying of late that there was Bolshevism in Newfoundland and that he was a Red. He challenged the Telegram “to make a statement in plain English” that he was a communist and spelled out what that paper could expect from him in response to its innuendos: [I]n seeking to attach this writer, it will find that it is not dealing with a supine weakling but rather one who never has cringed at an upraised arm, never jumped at the crack of any man’s whip, never allowed anyone to do his thinking for him, never was scared to think and express his views. When we are hit, we will hit back, and we will not mince words in hitting. This holds and holds not with The Telegram alone. We simply do not propose to let anyone to get away with anything in the nature of the Telegram’s cowardly hinting and “digs.” We know precisely what are our rights as a native of Newfoundland and a citizen of the British Commonwealth of Nations, and we have not yet seen one who can deprive us of one jot or tittle of those rights.

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Whereas the Telegram had once had “personality” and “principles” and been “fearless,” it now preferred “to fawn and toady, most particularly to those who might give it advertising patronage.” In short, it put “business first and opinion, if any, last.”127 In January 1926, Smallwood began working for the Daily Globe, which was published from the building that had formerly housed the Advocate and was now edited by fpu veteran and House of Assembly member Richard Hibbs. At this paper, Joe resurrected his column “From the Masthead,” “by The Lookout,” a literary outlet that allowed him to range widely. “Like the cat that came back,” he wrote in his first contribution, “I am again doing business at the old stand. I began this column in the old Evening Advocate, and continued it in The Labour Outlook. From now on I shall give the readers of The Daily Globe the benefit of my great wisdom and mighty pen. The only thing wrong with that sentence is that I don’t write with a pen, but a typewriter.”128 In April and May 1926, the Smallwoods paid rent to E.J. Berrigan, who ran a business at 209 and 211 Gower Street selling “Dry Goods, Millinery and American Novelties.”129 But they subsequently moved in with the Hibbs family, an arrangement perhaps tied to a partnership between Smallwood and Hibbs to publish a Newfoundland Who’s Who. In this period also, Smallwood went through an intellectual metamorphosis by which he reconciled his socialist ideals with the practical realities of Newfoundland public life, emerging as a Liberal in politics and a supporter of Squires, who eventually became his patron. On 7 January 1926, he gave the first of a series of talks organized for city labourers by Dr James S. Tait.130 His topic was the Newfoundland labour movement, and, in keeping with his recent history as a labour activist, he asserted that Newfoundland workers required their own labour party in the manner of their counterparts in Great Britain. The Liberal Party had once been the party of labour in Newfoundland, but it no longer fulfilled this role and was now indistinguishable from the Tory Party.131 One of those present on this occasion was George W.B. Ayre, a controversial lawyer well known to Smallwood. Convicted in October 1922 for breach of trust, Ayre had been sentenced to two years at hard labour.132 But his sentence had been commuted, and he was later allowed to resume professional practice; in the program of a complimentary dinner given in his honour at Smithville on 10 September 1925, he was described as the “Solicitor for the Unemployed.”133 In correspondence with the Daily Globe, the unorthodox Ayre praised Smallwood’s knowledge and ability but insisted that it was the Liberal Party that could still best serve the workingman’s purpose. In effect, he challenged Smallwood to reflect on how Newfoundland

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liberalism could be updated and renewed. Smallwood’s conciliatory response was that if the Liberal Party would “pull itself together, take earnest stock of the situation, and formulate and commit itself to principles and policies of a social reform nature and genuinely advocate them, there need never be a Labor Party in Newfoundland.”134 The exchange triggered a series of lengthy articles by Smallwood in the Daily Globe in which he explained in detail how a revived Liberal Party could transform itself and continue its historic role on the side of the masses.135 Not surprisingly, these articles drew extensively on the plans he had spelled out in his letters to George Tucker calling for the creation of a Newfoundland labour party. Socialism would be the end, but Liberalism would be the means. “I was a Liberal before I was a Laborite,” he told Coaker, “as all Laborites have been.”136 “Laborism” was “an outgrowth of Liberalism,” and “the best hope” for the working class was “to stick to Liberalism” and make it “progressive and comprehensive.” In Newfoundland there was “a good deal of magic” in the Liberal name. (Decades later, Smallwood told a university audience that there were three rules in democratic politics and the exercise of power: the first was to get elected; the second was to get elected; the third was to get elected.137) Though an exact date cannot be put on it, he acquired another useful political credential when he joined the Orange Order, which his grandfather David had helped to launch in Newfoundland in 1863 with the formation of Royal Oak Lodge in St John’s.138 On 8 December 1925, Smallwood and a teammate argued the winning negative side in a debate, sponsored by the Wesley Debating Club, on the proposition “That Newfoundland would be more prosperous under Crown government than under Responsible government”; their opponents were lawyer Raymond Gushue and Hayward Williams.139

london Over the next months though, Smallwood’s immediate concerns were decidedly personal. On 15 July 1926, he and Clara had their first child, a son, born in St John’s and named Ramsay MacDonald Coaker in honour of two of his father’s heroes in life.140 But trouble struck around the same time when the financially strapped Hibbs was forced to stop publishing the Daily Globe (the last known issue was dated 5 June 1926).141 Smallwood’s response to this setback was to set forth for the United Kingdom in search of opportunity there; while he was away, Clara and the baby would live with her family in Carbonear until Joe came up with the money to bring them overseas. It was not uncommon for Newfoundland men to spend long periods away from home working, and

1.7 Joe, Clara, and Ramsay MacDonald Coaker Smallwood, 1926.

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Smallwood’s action should perhaps be understood in this context rather than by present-day expectations about family life. Absence, however, strained relations between husband and wife, and their correspondence was painful. To finance his fresh start, Smallwood sold a collection of books to Hibbs (at some stage he had also given up his partnership stake in the projected Who’s Who, which Hibbs eventually published in 1927).142 Before going abroad, Smallwood dickered with Coaker about writing a full-scale biography of the fpu founder, but when he set sail for Liverpool aboard the Furness Withy liner SS Newfoundland on 27 November, this project remained up in the air. Smallwood travelled steerage to the “Old Country”; others making this particular late-season trans-Atlantic imperial crossing included Lieutenant-General Sir Hugh Tudor (having commanded the hated Black and Tans during the Irish War of Independence, he had retired to faraway St John’s); Lady Cashin (widow of Sir Michael Cashin) and her businessman son Laurence; and Lady Squires and two of her seven children (of whom three sons and two daughters reached adulthood).143 Two days before thus setting forth, Joe had represented Royal Oak Orange Lodge in a debate with Leeming Lodge on the topic “Has trade unionism’s injuries to members been greater than its benefits.”144 Not surprisingly, he and his teammate, Royal Newfoundland Regiment veteran Charles F. Garland, had made the case for the benefits side. Basing himself in London, he reported back to St John’s on his activities in three paid letters, dated 9, 12, and 30 January 1927 and published in the Daily News under the heading “In the Heart of the Empire.”145 As always, Smallwood wrote positively and optimistically about what he was seeing and doing and whom he was meeting. But his accounts belied the harsh reality of a hand-to-mouth existence in England, as detailed in his troubled exchanges with the now hard-pressed Clara. There were many recriminations back and forth; in one missive she told him “I have not got a cent to mail a letter with.”146 The contrast in all this between Smallwood’s public and private selves reveals much about the energy, ambition, tenacity, and daring of a man in search of the main chance but whose sojourn in England was only the latest in a long, continuing series of many reverses in life. By nature a gambler, he took big risks and suffered hard losses – but, with good health, a thick skin, and seemingly boundless energy, was always ready for the next venture in life. Writing on 24 January 1927 from 89 Guilford Street in central London, he told Clara that he had become so thin that she would hardly recognize him: “People remark it to me, and I have to tell them that I have been sick. I have not had enough food, and the worry has been even

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1.8 Clara Smallwood (née Oates) as a young woman.

worse on me. This is Friday, and on Monday I didn’t have a solitary cent, so that I had to go to the Ivanhoe Hotel and take a room, knowing that I would at least get my meals there, and would not have to pay until Saturday” (he was hoping for payment for a collection of thirty photographs he had brought from Newfoundland and was attempting to hock).147 Having got to know the prominent Methodist preacher Rev. Ira G. Goldhart of the nearby Kingsway Mission, Smallwood toyed with the

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idea of a starting a career in the clergy, but this proved a passing fancy.148 By 16 February, he was reduced to hitting up Lady Squires, who had a flat in London (two Squires sons were at Harrow School), for a loan of £5. Telling her that he was in “deep water,” he explained that he had two job prospects – one with the Tottenham Labour Party and the other with the publisher George Newnes Ltd – and needed the money to tide himself over to “some definite point – whether it be jail or the river or a good job, I sometimes have doubts!”149 He was “a lonely Newfoundlander in the most poverty-stricken city in the world” with only his typewriter left to pawn, something he dared not sell. While apologizing for not delivering to date articles for which he had been advanced money in St John’s by Sir Richard, he promised to repay expeditiously the loan he was now seeking or “burst in the attempt.” Writing from Carbonear a few days later, Clara reminded the now-desperate Joe of his promise to her mother that he would send for his wife in February. “We are hoping you will be up to your word,” she bitterly complained, “for the first time since I have known you.”150 With people wondering who was supporting her, she protested, she hardly went out so as not to be talked about.151 The one lasting success of Smallwood’s London sojourn came when Coaker arrived in the city on one of his periodic overseas business trips. He and Smallwood now quickly reached agreement about the publication of the biography of the fpu leader Joe had been itching to see in print and for which he had made a specific proposal to the fpu leader at the end of December 1926.152 By his own account, Smallwood dashed the manuscript off in “three days and nights.”153 The book, which had ninety-six pages, was then published later in the year by the Labour Publishing Company under the title Coaker of Newfoundland: The Man Who Led the Deep-Sea Fishermen to Political Power and with this puckish and presumptuous inscription: “This Book is dedicated to Ramsay Coaker Smallwood by the Author of both.” (There is no mention of Clara.) The small volume incorporated much of what Smallwood had previously written about Coaker and the fpu . He detailed the founding of the union in 1908, Coaker’s early efforts to establish branches, the opposition he had faced from established merchants and Roman Catholic Archbishop Michael Howley, the launching of the Advocate in 1910, the union’s successful foray into politics in 1913, the efforts made by the Union Party thereafter on behalf of sealers and loggers, Coaker’s unpopular decision to support conscription during the Great War, and his achievements and failures as a member of the Squires government between 1919 and 1923 when in the common interest he had had sought to regulate the production and export of dried salt cod (saltfish), the

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country’s main fishery product. Smallwood ended with the bold assertion that Coaker would “go down in Newfoundland history as the first and greatest champion of the fishermen” and would “long be remembered by all as the father of the first attempt to place the fishery in all its phases upon a modern and scientific basis.” In sum, he was “the greatest Newfoundlander since John Cabot.”

c o r n e r b rook Smallwood arrived back in St John’s on 13 April 1927 aboard the Newfoundland, and on the 27th Sir Richard Squires, who was rebuilding his political career, made this revealing entry in his diary: “Smallwood called on yesterday. He had just returned from England and said that my wife had been very courteous to him. Wanted me to understand whereas he had formerly said he would support me if Coaker was with me, he wanted now to say that he would support me in any event.”154 Smallwood meanwhile had reverted to form, writing letters to the editor on the public issues of the day and becoming secretary of an Unemployed Workers’ Committee chaired by James McGrath, a former president of the Longshoremen’s Protective Union.155 Following a gathering of 250–300 unemployed men at Bannerman Park on 10 May, this committee appealed to the legislature for immediate relief for city workers.156 That same month, as correspondent for several foreign newspapers, Smallwood reported on the seaplane passage through Trepassey of intrepid Italian aviator Francesco de Pinedo.157 Soon after he arrived back from England, he also gave a radio talk over 8ERN, a hobby pioneer station run by Ernest Ash. Smallwood’s subject, in what may have been his first radio venture, was “Why I Oppose Communism.”158 Arguing that dictatorship of the sort that existed in “Slavonic and Latin countries” was foreign to the Anglo-Saxon ethos, he celebrated the “constitutional, Christian Socialism” exemplified by the British Labour Party and with which he identified. Communism was the enemy of democratic socialism, but in the United Kingdom it got nowhere because of the “sound good sense of the British people.” Communism had shown its true colours in Russia. “I condemn Communism and the Communists because they imitated the very spirit of the tyrannical Tzarism which they set out justifiably enough to replace.” Later in 1927, with Clara and Ramsay still living in Carbonear, Smallwood moved to Corner Brook, arriving there just before the functional takeover of the mill by the American-owned International Paper Company of Newfoundland Ltd. Through a connection with Royal

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Newfoundland Regiment veteran Major Bertram Butler, he soon found a job with the new owner as a member of a topographical team, led by the company’s chief engineer, that had the job of assessing the Gander River area as a possible site for another pulp and paper mill.159 After the success of the Corner Brook mill, there would now be much talk in Newfoundland about putting “A Gang on the Gander.”160 Butler also held out the possibility of a job editing a company paper, but this did not materialize. In December 1927, returned from the Gander, Smallwood was on hand for registration at a night school that would teach “mostly elementary subjects.”161 As Corner Brook correspondent for the St John’s Daily News, he reported on this and many other events in the life of a growing community in which he assiduously built connections. Meanwhile, through frank and sometimes testy correspondence, he and Clara continued to navigate the shoals of early married life and parenthood in straitened financial and employment circumstances. Writing on 9 September 1927, he told her that her last letter, while “a little better than the one before,” was not exactly “cheerful”: “You seem to be determined to see the dark side of everything, and I suppose you will be like that until things improve. Still, it is peculiar that you take things so badly. One would think that the sky had fallen and that there was absolutely no hope left. If I gave away to that feeling I would be useless. As it is, in spite of reverses I try to keep up my courage, although I have just as much reason as you for being depressed and pessimistic.”162 Having received a letter from Clara enclosed in a missive to her brother Bill, who was also in Corner Brook, Joe again made his feelings known in no uncertain terms: “Your last letter  ... was a hard one – the hardest you have written yet. You don’t seem to realize how brutal your letters are. God knows I’ve suffered as well as you. It hasn’t been sunshine by any means, and I’ve had all I could do to keep up courage in the face of defeat after defeat. But as I’ve said before ‘every dog has his day’ & it’s a long lane that has no turning. I know it’s been hard on you, but all I ask is a little more patience and forbearance for my sake. I hope you got the shoes. I was sorry it was all I could send you. Soon it will be different.”163 When he received “the nicest letter you have written for some time,” he was quick to answer fundamental questions Clara had raised about their relationship: You ask me what place you hold in my future. You hold this place, that without you there would be no future for me. Without you I

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wouldn’t lift a finger to make a future. The future could go to hell. Yes, you are more than necessary to that future, and as for being happier if I never saw you again, the truth is that I could never know happiness in this life if it so happened that I never saw you again. I have not ceased to care for you as I once did – I love you more than I ever did before. It may not be the same impetuous love, but it is more tender and more enduring. You ask me what happiness you brought into my life. The truth is that I have not known much happiness since the first few months of our marriage, any more than you have. But this is also true – that the knowledge that I had you – and baby – and that you loved me has been the one redeeming fact in my life in all the hardships and disappointments. It was because I had you and baby to plan for that I have stuck to it in spite of reverses and failures ... Your last question is really unnecessary – yet I am glad you are interested enough to ask me. Do I really love you? I do. Perhaps more than you love me! The proof that I love you is in the fact that I still write you and am still in Newfoundland. Why should I continue to write you – for the most part patiently – in the face of the brutal letters you have written me? Why didn’t I just skip off and disappear in Canada or the States – where I could have a good time without worry or responsibility? Because I love you. Knowing my feeling toward you it seems like a grim joke to me to have you ask that question. I am afraid that you have been so wrapped up in your own woes that you have never had a chance to realize my side of it, or what pain and added worry your letters have meant to me. Do you realize that anyone not knowing either one of us, who read your letters, would come to the conclusion that I was a worthless scamp who had run off leaving his wife and baby, and was simply having a good time while they were starving and naked? That is the impression you seem to be under. Your mother seems to be under the same impression, to judge by a letter she wrote Will [Bill]. In that letter she referred to me as “Smallwood,” no “Joe” and no “Mr.” Just “Smallwood” as if I were some yellow dog she had happened to hear about. When I consider these things and realize how you and your family must have regarded me, isn’t it a wonder that I didn’t throw up everything and skip off? If I was regarded as a scamp why didn’t I accept the name and live up to it? Isn’t it just as well to be a scamp as to be thought one – especially by those I have a right to think loyally of me? If Will has any regard or respect for me, it is not because of any letters that you or your mother wrote him about me!164

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When Clara sent “perhaps  ... the nicest letter you have written me since we were married,” Joe responded graciously and held out the prospect of getting along in “love and harmony” when they were reunited as a family: My present intention is to try to make up, by my conduct, for all the suffering and unhappiness I have caused you. But you must help me to do this. And the way you can help is by being as nice to me as you can ... I do promise you that when we are together again I will do all I possibly can to make life happier for you, by showing you my love more, acting more tenderly, etc., but all I ask is that you meet me halfway. If we can do that it will be a wonderful thing; and all the misery of past few months will not have been in vain if they taught us both the one great lesson we need to learn – that of mutual understanding, mutual forbearance, mutual compromise. That we have learned this secret is my fondest hope. With this secret revealed to us both, we can so order our lives as to be able in the future to live happily together in the fondest love and harmony. And isn’t it worth doing? We have our lives still before us, and if we are both big enough we can make our future a bright and happy one. You ask me in your letter if it makes me happier to know that you love me. It does. It is the one thing, along with our wonderful little baby, that makes life worth living. That knowledge makes it easier for me to peg away in spite of all adversity. To know that I still have your respect is a great help and of great encouragement to me.165 If they had “all but made a hash” of their marriage, they had “loved each other all the time” and still did. In dynamic Corner Brook, a magnet for Newfoundlanders wanting opportunity and a better life, Smallwood, irrepressible on the outside but vulnerable within, sought to make a fresh start both professionally and personally. In February 1928, ambitious to be the Liberal candidate in dynamic Humber District, he clashed with local notable John R. Barrett of Curling. In a letter dated 10 February to the editor of the Western Star, Barrett cautioned readers to “guard against electing a person who may be looked upon as so much deadwood, driftwood, or any sort of flotsam or jetsam.”166 In the pending general election, there should be no place “for political adventurers or agitators, men who have been in the district scarcely long enough to get a haircut or a shave.” His words, Barrett thundered, had been prompted “by recent utterances of an irresponsible political adventurer in the Humber district, whose principal asset is

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the unlimited amount of unmitigated gall hidden beneath his cranium, and whose object is to foist himself by an ingratiating manner upon an intelligent electorate. To give earnest consideration to his vapourings would tend to lessen our standard of citizenship.” Though Smallwood was not named directly in this blast, there was no doubt that he was the object of the attack, and he answered forthwith: “I suppose I ought to be ashamed of myself, and try and hold all this gall in check. And just as I start to get ashamed, I suddenly remember that ‘gall’ is another word for ‘nerve,’ and that ‘nerve’ is another word for ‘daring,’ and that ‘daring’ is another word for ‘boldness.’ And then I begin to wonder whether Humber District doesn’t need a little more gall, a little more boldness.”167 Answering Barrett’s claim that west coast districts should be represented by men who had their homes in them and therefore “something at stake,” Smallwood rejected the notion that only “local men,” in the narrow sense intended by his adversary, were qualified to run: I think that most people in the District, native-born and new-comers, would spurn and repudiate such a narrow doctrine. I think they are too broadminded for any such small-minded childishness ... They demand a fighter. They are not worrying about his birthplace, and they do not make the snobbish mistake of judging a man by his worldly goods – it is something of greater and truer worth than mere dollars they demand in their future Member. If he be British by nationality, Newfoundland by birth, Humber district by residence; and courageous and intelligent by nature, and a fighter by temperament, then he is absolutely acceptable to the great bulk of the people.168 In a report for the Western Star in April 1928, Smallwood described the progress of the Orange Order in the developing Humber region; noting that the lodge at Deer Lake was the youngest in the country, he wished “All speed to them!”169 Though himself an agent of change, Smallwood well understood the role of such tradition in shaping Newfoundland, even in the booming Humber area. That same month, in a pointed and prophetic letter to the editor of the same paper, he mused on the current state of politics in Newfoundland, examining three panaceas being talked about to address the ills of the country: Confederation with Canada, reversion to “Crown Colony status,” and “Royal Commission rule” (in his disillusionment with party politics, even Coaker had come out in favour of the notion of government by elected commission).170 These schemes had “a common denominator.”

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One source of support was the sincerely held but mistaken belief that Newfoundland was incapable of governing itself. But another driving force was out-and-out Tory hatred of a resurgent Sir Richard Squires. In their desperation, he warned, his opponents “would almost rather sell Newfoundland to the devil” than see the Liberal leader back in the office of prime minister, but the writing was now on the wall for them in this regard. No Tory effort could stop the people from returning Squires to power “with the greatest electoral and parliamentary majority ever witnessed in this Island.” Ironically, in view of his later identification with the cause of union with Canada, Smallwood saw permanent disadvantage for Newfoundland within the Canadian federation: Why should Newfoundland enter ... Confederation with Canada? What possible good would it do us? Politically, it would submerge us underneath a weight of strongly-organized, well-knit Provincial groupings that know what they want and how to get it. In a parliament at Ottawa which is bossed, controlled and dominated by the Western bloc, the Ontario bloc and the Quebec bloc, what earthly chance would Newfoundland have of being heard or of being given any attention? ... I do not mean to say that Newfoundland wouldn’t have big men to send to Ottawa as representatives ... But in a parliament of hundreds of members from the Pacific eastward to Quebec, what could half a dozen voters accomplish? ... Economically we would not benefit. What Newfoundland needs above everything else ... is Capital. It matters little whether it be Canadian or American capital – the dollar knows no flag! If Canadian capitalists desire to invest in Newfoundland they will do so irrespective of whether Newfoundland is governing herself as now, or is a Crown Colony, or under a Royal Commission, or in Confederation with Canada. Newfoundland had the “men of brains” needed to govern and transform the country, and putting them in charge would “very soon silence the calamity howlers and visionless croakers.” It was in Corner Brook that Smallwood saw first-hand what could be achieved by attracting international investment to resource development – a path to progress he would come to personify in the 1950s and 1960s. If Coaker’s legacy to Smallwood was commitment to social and economic uplift, that of Squires was a fixation on deal-making and resource development. In May 1928, Smallwood acquired a new platform from which to campaign when he became editor of a new weekly, the Humber Herald, published in Corner Brook by Humber Publishers Limited, an enterprise

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owned by businessmen J.M. Noel and M.A. Pickering.171 On the first page of volume one, number one, dated 26 May, Smallwood’s name was highlighted and the Humber area characterized as “This NEGLECTED District.” Ultimately, however, Smallwood’s goal of representing the area in the legislature was overtaken by Squires’s decision to run in Humber himself. Smallwood had to content himself with campaigning alongside the Liberal leader, but the outcome of the general election, held on 29 October, was greatly to his satisfaction. The Liberals swept to victory, and on 17 November 1928, the previously disgraced Squires again became prime minister of Newfoundland. For his own efforts on behalf of the party, Smallwood was recommended, on 21 December, to be made a justice of the peace,172 a distinction that allowed him to use the letters jp after his name (he would long be attracted to honours and awards and well understood their place in greasing the wheels of politics). Meanwhile, on 30 September 1928, he and Clara – now reunited in Corner Brook but living in cramped quarters – had had their second child, a brother for Ramsay. Named William Richard Squires,173 he became affectionately known in the family as “Billie.” On 12 August 1929,174 Smallwood left for New York on holiday, sailing to Baltimore on the SS Corner Brook, a newsprint carrier,175 and then travelling on by train. “It has been a beautiful trip,” he wrote the again-pregnant Clara while on the ocean voyage south: “The water has been as smooth as Bay of Islands, and except for two days and nights of dense fog – during which the ship’s whistle blew steadily every three minutes – the weather has been magnificent.”176 His travel companions aboard ship included M.A. Pickering and Corner Brook West shopkeeper Edward Epstein. After the testing early phase of their marriage, life seemed to have settled down for Joe and Clara – but not, it turned out, for long. Soon after his return from the United States, Smallwood ran into legal difficulty when local businessman Edward Barry sued him, as editor of the Humber Herald, and J.M. Noel, as managing director of the paper, for $10,000.177 The basis of Barry’s cause, which was started in the Supreme Court of Newfoundland on 21 September, was an article Smallwood had written in the newspaper on 3 August condemning as unseaworthy the George L., a vessel Barry used for a government-contracted ferry service around Bay of Islands. According to Smallwood, the “boat was a “rattle-trap” – a “tiny, stinking , oily, slow tub that can’t carry enough freight, that travels like a snail, that herds men and women and children passengers up amongst barrels of herring and oil piled high on the blubbery deck, that hasn’t got any toilet arrangements, that isn’t fitted to serve a meal to passengers.”178

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Barry was represented in the action by the St John’s law firm of Winter and Higgins and Smallwood and Noel by Raymond Gushue. In their statement of defence, the respondents denied any libel and made the case that the words being complained about were “true in substance and in fact.”179 They had, moreover, been written “honestly and in good faith and without malice.” But two days before this document was filed with the court, Noel visited Barry and offered to meet the costs of the case, publish an apology in the Humber Herald, disassociate Smallwood from the publication (the Western Star had already reported that he had left his post),180 and not publish any more articles by him in it – if Barry would drop his suit. On this basis, the action was discontinued, Barry having told his solicitors that Smallwood “had no interest in the paper or any money or property which we may attach.”181

s q u ir e s Soon afterwards, on 7 January 1930, the last of the Smallwood children, a daughter, named Clara, was born in Corner Brook (unlike her brothers, she was not named to honour any politician).182 In February, without steady employment and in need of a fresh start, Joe went back to New York, where he met with an editor for Macmillan to pitch his latest book idea, a volume about contemporary Newfoundland.183 While he awaited word from the publisher, he met with Squires, who was also in the city. The prime minister liked what he heard from Smallwood and immediately got behind his book project, giving him $100, offering him more help if he found himself “up against it” pending a commitment from the publisher, and arranging free passage for him back to St John’s on a ship of the Furness Withy line.184 Having got a green light from the publisher, Smallwood stopped in St John’s on his way home to do research for his book.185 He was followed back to Corner Brook by a variety of consumer items – religious statuettes and cards, Easter cards, playing cards, and gramophone records – which he had acquired in the United States with a view to resale locally by brother-in-law Bill Oates.186 Always the unabashed self-publicist, he also brought back photographs he had had taken of himself, describing them to Clara as “beauties.”187 By May, he was back in St John’s working on the Liberal campaign for by-elections held on the 17th of that month to fill vacancies caused by the deaths of three members of the House of Assembly (one of them George Grimes) in 1929. Smallwood published articles in support of the government’s cause in the Liberal Press and the fpu weekly, the Fishermen’s Advocate, and these articles were then reprinted as pamphlets

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for distribution in the districts in play. Squires praised the pamphlets as “the best he ever read.”188 Smallwood bet that the Liberals would win all three seats and won his bet.189 One of the new members returned was Lady Squires, who was elected in Lewisporte, thereby becoming the first woman to sit in the House of Assembly. While in St John’s on this mission, Smallwood sent Clara a baby carriage, a vacuum cleaner, and a gramophone, the latter to stimulate the sale of the records he had imported.190 Returned to Corner Brook and now a well-established Squires operative, he served on a committee that drafted a public address to Governor Sir John Middleton, who visited Bay of Islands with Lady Middleton on 7 June.191 The address was printed and illuminated by the Western Star, and the text was linotyped courtesy of J.M. Noel of the Humber Herald.192 The address exemplified the Newfoundland boosterism to which Smallwood had long been drawn and in the expression of which he excelled: THE Town of Corner Brook, as your Excellency is doubtless aware, is a new community. Less than a decade ago this was a tiny settlement of scarcely more than a few dozen souls. The very ground upon which we now stand, and upon which the Town stands, was then parcelled out into a few gardens and fields. Today, thanks to pioneering British capital and British enterprise, supplemented later by progressive Canadian and American efficiency, Corner Brook stands out not only as the Capital of the Premier District and the country’s second largest town, but as the forerunner in that march to large-scale industrialism which seems destined in the near future to transform Newfoundland into one of the great small countries of the Empire and the world.193 No doubt such sentiments – the words in the address were typical of him – were much in Smallwood’s mind when he headed back to New York on 15 July (sales associate Bill Oates travelled on the Corner Brook with him)194 to advance matters with Macmillan.195 Shortly after he left on this trip, son Billie was knocked down in Corner Brook West by a horse and suffered scalp wounds.196 The toddler was hospitalized overnight, but in the end all was well. As Joe pursued his latest literary quest, Clara clearly had her hands full. Smallwood returned home in October 1930197 and the next month was in St John’s, where a deal was in the making that led him to move permanently to the capital198 (on 17 January 1931, his name appeared in

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a published list of guests staying at the Brownsdale Hotel, St John’s).199 If Smallwood had imbibed idealism from Coaker and his circle, he was now being well schooled by the crafty Squires in the dark arts of patronage and party management. Beginning on 14 February 1931, he brought out a pro-Squires newspaper mischievously called The Watchdog, the opposition’s mouthpiece being labelled The Watchman. Based at the Labour Press publishers and printers, 10 George Street, Smallwood was initially paid $25 a week for his efforts200 but lived in hope that his patron Squires would find him “an additional job.”201 When the principals of The Watchman issued a legal challenge to the name chosen for Smallwood’s new paper, the court ruled against them.202 While thus busily engaged, Smallwood also scrambled to find housing so that he could reunite the family. He hoped for something better than the four rooms they had been occupying in Corner Brook for the previous two years but cautioned the understandably anxious Clara that all this might take time: “I can’t catch a man by the throat and force a house out of him. I have got to wait until there is a house.”203 A limiting factor, moreover, was his inability to take a year’s lease.204 In March, on a visit to her family in Carbonear, Clara told him she had an “empty purse” but had “to buy medicine for the children.”205 Manifestly, the Smallwoods were once more up against it. Soon, though, there came good news when Macmillan brought out Smallwood’s second book, The New Newfoundland: An Account of the Revolutionary Developments Which Are Transforming Britain’s Oldest Colony from “The Cinderella of the Empire” into One of the Great Small Nations of the World. This 272-page volume was dedicated by the author to “My Wife, Little Clara, and Billie”; the preface was signed “New York, August, 1930” and there was a postscript that covered recent events. Smallwood heaped praise on Squires for his success in promoting the economic development of the Dominion, most notably in the launch of the pulp and paper enterprise at Corner Brook. The prime minister, he gushed, had “just that combination of qualities and characteristics to fit him for the job to which he has put his hand.”206 He was “the most versatile and able statesman” Newfoundland had yet produced,207 and he and Lady Squires were a perfect team. In the final chapter, “Prophecy,” Smallwood imagined what Newfoundland would be like in 1955.208 He predicted that it would “be one of the greatest mining countries in the world”; would “be producing 2,000 tons of newsprint paper a day, or 600,000 tons a year”; and would be “one of the great summer playgrounds of North America.” He also imagined that agricultural production would have doubled; the fishery would have been “revolutionized”;

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roads would “span every important part of the Island’; there would be “large broadcasting stations” and general access to radio receivers; aviation would be “of considerable proportions”; education would “be free and compulsory”; there would be “a large university” in St John’s; illiteracy would have been “abolished”; and the population would have grown by 50 per cent. As always, Smallwood was an articulate and informed salesman for his homeland, but the journalist Arthur English panned the book, finding deception on “its every page.”209 Smallwood, he had written elsewhere, had “prostituted his ability” and had produced “certain propaganda disguised as history.”210

in s o lv e nt Sometime as 1931 progressed, the Smallwood family was finally reunited in St John’s, again living in rented premises. But money problems soon forced them into a hasty exit from their latest accommodation (a bookcase and books were seized pending payment of rent owing to landlord Lloyd S. Chancey of 115 Circular Road211). Clara went back to Carbonear with Ramsay and little Clara, and Billie stayed in St John’s with Joe, who looked after him with the help of his mother and other family members.212 Another blow followed when Thomas Gill, who ran a tailoring business and boarding house in Corner Brook, took legal action against Smallwood for $685 owing for board and lodging.213 The outcome was an award of $239 and costs to the plaintiff.214 Smallwood represented himself in this case and, on 6 November, was examined as a “judgment debtor” by John G. Higgins, counsel for Gill.215 Following this reversal of fortune, Smallwood petitioned the Supreme Court of Newfoundland to be declared insolvent.216 He was represented in the matter by Les Curtis, now Squires’s law partner, and on 18 November his petition was considered by Chief Justice William Horwood following due notice in the Evening Telegram217 and the Newfoundland Gazette.218 Horwood ordered that the petitioner be declared insolvent and named Simon Butler, deputy registrar of the court, as trustee of the estate. Smallwood provided this accounting of his liabilities and assets: Liabilities Thomas Gill (Judgment) Costs of same The Macmillan Company of New York S.D. Cook219 W.J. Lundrigan220

$239.00 31.50 1,125.00 50.00 25.00

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George W.B. Ayre L.S. Chancy (Rent) Royal Bank of Canada Estate of J. [S]. Tait221

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100.00 70.00 60.00 95.00 $1,795.50

Assets Household Furniture (2 Beds, Chairs, Kitchen table, etc.) worth about 1 Case Books (Destrained for Rent)

$100.00 100.00 $200.00

The sum owing Macmillan, unexplained in the available documentation, exactly matched a payment Squires had apparently made in support of the publication of The New Newfoundland. Having dispatched the contract for the book, Smallwood had reported to Clara that he would cable $1,125 to the publisher, with the money coming from Squires through Les Curtis.222 On 8 February 1932, having published notice in the Daily News223 and the Newfoundland Gazette224 of his intention to request a certificate of insolvency and final discharge, so informed his creditors, and sworn a required statement before Butler, Smallwood was issued the document in question. He had escaped his creditors but at the cost of bearing the mark of Cain in propertied St John’s. His reputation there, already that of an upstart radical, would henceforth also be of a schemer and mountebank.225 But though he had reached a new public low financially, Smallwood was undeterred politically; when he had told Clara of his impending court petition, he had assured her that all would be well in time for him to be a candidate in the next general election – his current lodestar in life.226 Trouble rolled off Smallwood, who embraced change and was always ready for a fresh start and the next opportunity. As he had philosophized to Comrade Tucker in 1925: “[I]t is inevitable that thorns beset the path of one whose idealism prompts him to interest himself in the work of transforming the social order. A man makes a poor social worker or reformer if he is unable to stand such things. We’re made of poor material indeed if we cannot bear, put aside and forget the various whispers and misrepresentations that are sure to be brought against us.”227

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For all the adversity he faced in 1931, Smallwood still managed to work on a “story,”228 which he eventually sent to Hodder and Stoughton in England, planning to dash off a sequel if his first submission was accepted for publication.229 For this work he used a portable typewriter borrowed from the firm of Kalleem Noah, a Newfoundlander of Lebanese background (the cosmopolitan Smallwood cultivated friendships in Newfoundland’s small Jewish and Middle Eastern communities).230 Les Curtis, who read the carbon copy of the manuscript, thought the work “better than lots he had read,” but nothing seems to have come of this particular effort.231

c a n d idate Smallwood’s insolvency was a sign of the times in Newfoundland. Ironically, when The New Newfoundland panegyric appeared in print, the Squires government was decidedly on the defensive.232 Following the Wall Street crash of October 1929, Newfoundland’s public finances had entered a downward spiral as trade declined, revenue from customs receipts (the main source of government revenue) dropped, and demand for relief soared. (It must be remembered, however, that those with steady jobs and incomes did well during the crisis that became known as the Great Depression because of falling prices.) By 1932–33, with a substantial part of the population living on a miserable dole ration, fully 63.2 per cent of a diminished public revenue was being eaten up by semi-annual interest payments made on the public debt ($98,453,865 on 1 July 1933).233 In short order after 1929, Newfoundland became dependent on British and Canadian help to avoid default. In 1930, assisted by its own banker, the Bank of Montreal, Newfoundland was able to obtain a loan of $5 million, but in 1931 it ran into trouble after the legislature authorized another loan of $8 million. Eventually, the government was able to raise $2 million from a syndicate of four Canadian banks led by the Bank of Montreal. The price for this loan was that the Dominion had to agree to the appointment of a British official – Deputy Chairman of the Board of Inland Revenue Sir Percy Thompson was assigned the task – to investigate its finances. In effect, Newfoundland had passed into a form of receivership and was dependent on British and Canadian help to meet debt payments. On 1 February 1932 (the day before Smallwood’s notice of pending certificate of insolvency was published in the Daily News), Squires’s finance minister, Great War veteran Major Peter J. Cashin, son of Sir Michael Cashin, broke with him, further inflaming an already tense

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situation. On 4 April, by his own account (this could not be verified from other sources), Smallwood addressed an anti-government public meeting at the Majestic Theatre that brought together a mixed bag of Squires haters, rich and poor.234 He defended the prime minister and attacked the Water Street business elite, well represented at the gathering, but was brushed aside. The next day, a mob headed for the Colonial Building, the seat of the two-chamber legislature, invading the premises and forcing Squires first to hide and then run for his life. Again by his own account, Smallwood was on hand for this melee. With order restored but the political situation on a rolling boil, a general election was called for 11 June, whereupon Smallwood ran as a government candidate in Bonavista South. In notes for a campaign speech, he wrote that the “outstanding issue” of the election was “the Mob versus Lawful Government; Lawlessness and Mob Violence, versus British Democracy, British Justice, British Fair Play.” The “Tory Haters of Squires” had seized on the worldwide depression to “kill” the prime minister and had been “willing to have thousands of families feel the pinch of hunger” rather than see the government raise moneyneeded “to tide fishermen over the fall and winter.” In “their insane hatred,” the Tories had “stabbed their country in the back.” But it was the people of Newfoundland who would now judge the prime minister, “not the Tory Merchants and Tory Lawyers of St. John’s, not the lawless hooligans and corner boys, not the toughs and rowdies of the capital city.”235 His words prefigured the language he later used in the cause of Confederation with Canada but in this round were in vain. Smallwood was defeated in Bonavista South by Herman W. Quinton,236 a business manager who had been first elected to the House of Assembly in 1928. The count in the district was Quinton, 3,528, Smallwood, 812. Sir Richard and Lady Squires were likewise personally rejected by the voters, he in Trinity South and she in Twillingate. Only two Liberals – (Frederick) Gordon Bradley in Humber and Roland Starkes in Green Bay – were returned. Smallwood left bills behind him in Bonavista South of $153.50.237 His explanation for his own loss and the Liberal rout was biting – and indicative of his evolving political modus operandi: Why did so many vote Tory? Why did so many fail to vote at all? I think for the following reasons: 1. There had for years been a most persistent campaign of lies about our party – lies, misrepresentation, and twisting of facts; 2. The hard times, small prices for fish, scarcity of labor, which so many people mistakenly thought applied only to Newfoundland; 3. The hope so many people had that a change of

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Government might produce a change in conditions, might get the Gander started, might produce more work, might produce better prices for fish, might produce better times throughout the country; 4. [T]he extravagant and dishonest promises made by the Tory Party, and the high hopes and big expectations that so many people had of a new Government; 5. [T]he campaign of newspaper abuse and brazen misrepresentation of myself, and of my speeches and policies. The Watchman, with complete lack of consistency, brazenly declared at different times that I wanted to tear down the churches, that I wanted to abolish family life, that I was indulging in wild Bolshevik talk, that I was declaring myself an independent in politics, that I was advocating Commission Government, etc., etc. All this twisting of the truth about me, despite the fact that I was waging at least as clean and constructive a political campaign as any candidate ever did in Bonavista Bay, or any other Bay. Above all the reasons that produced my defeat, I place the campaign of sheer intimidation and threat waged by the merchants against the fishermen in the matter of supplies; they were given plainly to understand that they would get no supplies unless they elected a Tory Government; and I cannot count the number of fishermen who came voluntarily and unexpectedly to me afterwards, saying that they had been forced against their consciences and their own inclinations and free will to vote against me. This applied most particularly to illiterate fishermen, as the merchants’ agents were on the spot to see how they did vote. Many hundreds of Liberals refrained from voting on this same account.238 On 11 June 1932, Frederick Alderdice, the leader of the United Newfoundland Party, which had won twenty-four of twenty-seven seats (there was one independent), became prime minister. Born in Northern Ireland, he was a dyed-in-the-wool conservative businessman, the cousin of Walter Monroe, and a firm believer in the imperial connection. As Joe adjusted to the new political reality, he told Clara that the boots he was wearing had “a big hole in them” and that he was “ashamed to go about with them on”; he asked her to send him shoes from Carbonear.239

c o m m is s io n o f g overnment His worn-out boots were emblematic of the state of Newfoundland itself. In office, Alderdice proposed to save the country’s financial position by unilaterally rescheduling debt payments, but the United Kingdom government quickly squashed this idea; British Dominions did not renege on

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contractual obligations.240 At the end of 1932, in return for Anglo-Canadian support to meet end-of-year interest payments, Alderdice agreed to the appointment by London of a royal commission “to examine into the future of Newfoundland and in particular to report on the financial situation and prospects therein.”241 The Scottish Labour peer William Warrender Mackenzie, 1st Baron Amulree, was named chair of the Newfoundland Royal Commission, which had as its other members two Canadians, Charles A. Magrath, chairman of the Canadian section of the International Joint Commission, and Canadian banking veteran Sir William Stavert. Magrath’s name was put forward by Ottawa and Stavert’s by St John’s, but their appointments were made by the United Kingdom government. The secretary of the royal commission was (Peter) Alexander Clutterbuck of the Dominions Office, London, who emerged thereby as the British Government’s leading public service authority on Newfoundland affairs. The royal commission began meeting in St John’s on 16 March 1933 and eventually visited the Canadian capital. The British had good reason to hope that Newfoundland would become part of Canada, but in the circumstances of the enveloping depression there was no interest in this in Ottawa. Earlier, hoping to get rid of its debt load, Newfoundland had made soundings about selling Labrador, the boundaries of which had been determined to her advantage in 1927 by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, to Canada, but this had also proved a non-starter. As Canadian Finance Minister E.N. Rhodes bluntly told Amulree, he “was against Confederation as the Newf[oundlande]rs would really in effect become another Ireland – not in the racial sense, but a nuisance and always grumbling and wanting something. Labrador was not worth possessing [and] default would not make the slightest difference.”242 Against this backdrop and while the royal commission was going about its business, Canada (hard pressed by financial trouble at home, especially in the Prairie West) cut Newfoundland off from further help. This left the British to underwrite what would happen next, a delicate matter that was addressed in a letter Chancellor of the Exchequer Neville Chamberlain wrote to Amulree on 31 August 1933.243 The report of the royal commission was then presented to Parliament in London and released in Ottawa and St John’s on 21 November 1933. It recommended long-term British financial support for Newfoundland. As accepted and implemented, this took the form of a debt guarantee and annual grants-in-aid. For its part, Newfoundland would give up elective self-government in favour of administration by a British-appointed Commission of Government. The commission would remain in office

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until the country was self-supporting again, with self-government to be restored “on request from the people of Newfoundland.”244 The logic behind this drastic proposal was that Newfoundland’s problems were the product of maladministration and reckless spending and that what the country needed was a period of government without wasteful and divisive party politics. The Alderdice government bought the royal commission’s plan, hook, line, and sinker and got legislative approval for it, whereupon the United Kingdom Parliament passed the Newfoundland Act, 1933, which was given royal assent on 21 December. No definition was given to “self-supporting,” and no procedure was spelled out whereby Newfoundland could reclaim responsible government. This left the British government with the last word on how future constitutional change would proceed in Newfoundland and was an outcome that, in the fullness of time, would work to Smallwood’s great political advantage. The Commission of Government, inaugurated in St John’s on 16 February 1934, had both legislative and executive power. Under the commission system, there was a governor, who acted as chairman, and six commissioners, three drawn from the United Kingdom and three from Newfoundland. The commission was accountable to the Parliament of the United Kingdom through the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs (from 1947 through the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations). In the lead-up to this fundamental constitutional change, Smallwood remained politically active in St John’s. On 4 March 1933, while the royal commission was in its organizational phase, an incendiary article, of which he later claimed authorship, was published in The Optimist, an ironically named, short-lived weekly opposed to the Alderdice government.245 The article was triggered by a sensational local report, conveyed to the St John’s press by Roland Starkes, that a Notre Dame Bay married couple in their late thirties had starved to death after applying for relief three times and being refused.246 The abandoned victims, John Mitchell and his wife Hettie (née Rowsell) of Shoe Cove (near Caplin Cove), had left behind them five children, the eldest of whom was said to be in “a starving condition” and “dying.” John Mitchell had been physically disabled; Hettie Mitchell had been “found naked in her house, covered with a boat sail.” Immediately, at the request of the deputy minister of justice, Magistrate Daniel P. Duggan of LaScie conducted an inquiry into the matter. Duggan found “the charge of death by starvation” to be “erroneous.”247 John Mitchell had not been refused relief but had been supplied “with full ration on the proper date, Feb. 2nd.” The couple had “died from the effects of an attack of influenza and pneumonia,” that is to say

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from “natural causes.” Their last monthly dole order had consisted of “One barrel of flour, 16 lbs. pork, 2 gallons molasses and 1lb. 6½ ozs. tea, total value $11.20. They had made “no complaint of hunger” and, along with their children, had been “in their usual health” until they had been taken sick on the 15th and 16th. On 6 March, while this report was pending, Attorney General Lewis Edward Emerson launched a criminal libel action in the Supreme Court of Newfoundland “on behalf of every member of the Executive Government” against the registered “owners and proprietors” of The Optimist, printers John P. Halley (editor of the paper), Leo Dillon, and Charles Shapter.248 In the proceedings that followed, the defendants were represented by Opposition Leader Gordon Bradley, Starkes’s legislature colleague, and by Les Curtis. The lawsuit temporarily derailed the pugnacious paper, but later in the year it was back in circulation.249 In October, the Daily News reported that efforts were afoot in St John’s to organize a Newfoundland Union of Fascists as a branch of Sir Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists, but this was a nonstarter.250 Following the November publication of the report of the royal commission, Bradley and Starkes did not oppose Commission of Government as such but sought, unsuccessfully, to retain some voice for Newfoundlanders at large in their own affairs and to hold Alderdice to an election promise he had made not to effect this constitutional change without going back to the people in another vote. The Optimist, still in print, also campaigned hard to keep Alderdice to his promise.251 Though supportive of some form of commission government, Coaker categorically rejected the specific form recommended by Amulree and his colleagues, making known in a telegram to the Fishermen’s Advocate his views about Alderdice’s intention to proceed by having an address of support passed by the legislature: I can see no hope of general improvement in the country’s position for several years through any recommendations of the [Royal] Commission. The Commission proposal is far different from the one I have advocated. My honest opinion is that under proposed status Newfoundland will become in five years what Ireland was years ago, dissatisfied, disturbed. Turmoil and constant agitation will reduce the population to 200,000, as soon as people can emigrate. The Prime Minister’s pledge of submitting the matter to the electorate, as contained in his Manifesto, and the railroading of the Address through the Legislature, will justify immediate movement, based on treachery, for its repeal and instead of tranquility the country will pass

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through regrettable experiences. Responsible Government will not be enjoyed again for many years. Large settlements should convene public meetings and request their representatives by wire to insist on adjournment of House, to enable a delegation to take matter up with Home Government, for more responsible and definite agreement, and submit to plebiscite.252 Sir Richard Squires, now considered in official circles as the personification of everything that had gone wrong in Newfoundland, predicted trouble ahead when Newfoundlanders realized that a rushed change involved violation of “fundamental principles of British rule.” Subsequently, Smallwood made much of the claim that he was the only candidate in the 1932 election who favoured a changeover to commission rule, but what he had actually said on the hustings in this regard is not documented and he may perhaps have been putting the best face on his record, given the new reality. Looking back, he concluded in his 1973 memoirs that the party politics of the period had “become meaningless except to ruin us – just a continual squabble between the Ins and the Outs.” Both parties had become intellectually “bankrupt.”253

c oa k e r r edux In 1933, as the events were in train that led to Commission of Government, the Smallwood family, living hand to mouth and still geographically separated, struggled on, with the testy issues of money and accommodation, a divisive combination, at the fore. One promising possibility for Joe was a scheme floated by Les Curtis, with whom his life was intertwined, for a company that would cut deals with liquidators to collect debts owing to bankrupt companies. Smallwood would work for the company, and he and Curtis would share the profits equally. “Our company (probably the Legal Finance Company),” Joe explained to Clara, “will approach the liquidators of bankrupt firms and make them a cash offer for all the book debts. Then we will own them and proceed to collect them. Say a bankrupt firm has $5000 or $10000 on its books, and we buy them out for $200 or $300, everything we get over the purchase price will be pure profit. We have four or five bankrupt firms in sight including G. Knowling Ltd., whose debts we plan to buy out.”254 In the end, however, an enterprise whereby an insolvent would have become a debt collector proved yet another non-starter. Instead of going into business in St John’s, Smallwood, urged on by Curtis and Bradley and in fulfilment of a campaign promise he had made,

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moved later in 1933 to Bonavista, where he set out to emulate Coaker (though the fpu founder never acknowledged his ambitious, articulate, and competitive disciple as his heir). Distinctive in thought, speech, and style, Joe Smallwood had found a new cause in life. If Newfoundland was having “a rest from politics”255 – the expectation of the 1933 royal commission in proposing Commission of Government – he clearly wasn’t. In reality, however, he was very much on the fringe of Newfoundland society, a defeated candidate and, like many of his countrymen at the time, a challenged breadwinner. But he was also a gifted writer, speaker, and organizer – well-read, well-travelled, well-rooted in the political culture of Newfoundland and with boundless energy and self-confidence. His many talents had brought him only limited success to 1934, but when opportunity eventually came his way in the remarkably changed circumstances of the 1940s, he did not miss his chance.

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t h e s c r a pes Located in the fpu heartland of yesteryear (Port Union is nearby), Bonavista was staunchly Protestant, and the Orange Order flourished there. Smallwood moved north on his own, leaving Clara and the children to sojourn with her family in Carbonear. Once in Bonavista, he lived in turn with the families of two supporters, first with James A. (Jim) Parsons, who had worked in his unsuccessful 1932 district election campaign, and then with Augustus (Gus) Ayles.1 His goal was to rebuild on what Coaker had achieved by starting first a producer and then a consumer co-operative; it was the failure of the fpu to effect this combination, he would later write, that explained its decline.2 Smallwood had read widely in the literature of the co-operative movement and had corresponded with one of its most notable theoreticians and activists, the American Aaron Sapiro.3 Always the enthusiast, he launched forth on his new cause in life with energy and conviction. The moment was seemingly opportune for what he had in mind. With about a quarter of the population of the country now living on relief, many fishermen were in dire straits and open to change. In December 1932, at a protest meeting of fishermen held in the Orange Hall in Bonavista, resolutions were passed calling for better prices for the grades of saltfish produced locally. These prices should be “the same” or comparable to rates paid in St John’s.4 On 18 May 1933, at a meeting attended by 700–800 fishermen, Smallwood launched the Fishermen’s Co-operative Union of Newfoundland (fcu ), which enrolled more than 100 members then and there. He then set out to recruit in neighbouring settlements, promising the early election of officers to the Bonavista local of the new organization.5

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Ten days later, he reported to Clara that there were now 200 members in Bonavista and that he expected to have 3,000 to 5,000 members on the peninsula within six weeks.6 A member had to pay ten cents to join and annual dues of twenty-five cents, with five cents of the former and ten cents of the latter going to organizing expenses. Because of the poverty of the fishermen, annual dues were not being asked for in advance, and members would have until November to pay. Predicting that the union would “grow to great strength,” Smallwood appealed for Clara’s forbearance in their current family circumstances. Asking her to “keep going a while longer” on her own, he extolled his current project: “It is something I have always wanted to do, and now I have my chance. I am going to make a desperate attempt to make the Union a very positive benefit to the fishermen this year. That will mean our having something to say and do about the prices paid for fish here this year. I am planning to ship 1000 quintals of good shore fish to St. John’s by schooner early in August. That will be enough to settle the prices on all the rest here and around here.” There was “not another man in Newfoundland today,” he boasted, “who would have the courage or daring to tackle the job I am tackling.” On 10 June, Smallwood presided over another meeting in the Orange Hall, this time with the new union flag flying over the building. The pennant featured a “blue ground with the letters fcu in white on one side, and on the reverse two hands pointing upward.”7 According to the report of this meeting in the St John’s Daily News, officers in branch locals of the union were designated “Master Fisherman,” “Deputy Fisherman,” “Fisherman Secretary,” “Fisherman Financial Secretary or Treasurer,” and “Fisherman Guard.”8 Smallwood himself had the title of National Chairman. In the fortnight following, locals were formed in nearby Catalina and, north of Bonavista, at Newman’s Cove, Amherst Cove, and Birchy Cove. Having made this promising start, Smallwood next rented a house for eight dollars per month from Raymond Little, a local man then living in New York. The house had two storeys, with four rooms on each floor, and an attic. There was also a well (complete with well house), a vegetable cellar, and a two-storey barn. The house was located in an area known as “The Scrapes,” and to Smallwood’s eye the property was “one of the nicest looking places in all Bonavista.”9 On 4 August, having received the key to the house in the mail, he and Clara and the children arrived in Bonavista by train.10 With the family thus reunited, he had overcome yet another obstacle in life. In the afternoon of 25 August, by which time the union had nine locals and a membership of about 2,000, Smallwood met with representatives of the three local fish exporters

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– J.T. Swyers & Co., Philip Templeman Ltd, and James Ryan Ltd – to discuss the prices to be paid henceforth for saltfish.11 That evening the exporters produced a joint statement, sent to Smallwood, whereby they agreed not only to higher prices for future purchases but to make those prices retroactive to product already shipped in 1933. To the disgust of absentee owner Dan Ryan, Smallwood had won a round. “All of you,” Ryan scolded his Bonavista manager, “had right to ignore him instead of signing an agreement.”12 On 3 November, members of the fcu presented Smallwood with a supply of recently harvested vegetables to sustain his family, and when he left Bonavista for St John’s by train five days later, a band was on hand to give him a “good sendoff.” Smallwood was riding high – engaging a schooner, he was eventually able to push union membership to 8,000 – but his critics were also active. In June 1933, Daily News editor John S. Currie had written that if the formation of the new fishermen’s union was “for the real benefit of the people,” it was an “excellent move.” But if it was for “the glorification of the promoter,” this would be unfortunate – and Smallwood was “not the type that commands confidence.”13 Coaker’s attitude toward the nascent fcu is not documented, but in July St John’s fish exporter Chesley A. (Ches) Crosbie, with whom Smallwood’s life would soon become intertwined, told Sir William that he agreed with what he had to say about the union leader. It was not his intention, Crosbie proffered, to give Smallwood “anything more than a culler,” but this in itself would be “quite a novelty for the fishermen of Bonavista” (the culling or grading of saltfish was a perennial source of controversy in the Newfoundland fishing industry).14 Beginning in March 1935, the fcu published a fortnightly Co-operative News, which had as its motto “All For One, One For All.”15

c o m m is s ioners It was while Smallwood was thus engaged in Bonavista that the Commission of Government was inaugurated in St John’s. Under commission administration, each commissioner had a portfolio, with financial and economic matters being kept firmly in British hands. The first three United Kingdom commissioners were Thomas Lodge (Public Utilities), Sir John Hope Simpson (Natural Resources), and E.N.R. Trentham (Finance). There was a secretary to the commission as a whole, and the highest-ranking public servant under a commissioner (equivalent to deputy minister under responsible government) was also thus designated. In its initial phase, the commission set out in a reform direction. In August

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1934, Hope Simpson, whose Natural Resources portfolio encompassed fishing, forestry, and mining, the basic industries of the country, submitted to the new government a report by British co-operative expert Margaret Digby on how the cause of co-operation could be advanced in Newfoundland. Newfoundland businessmen had been all for the introduction of Commission of Government, assuming that an administration that was above politics would listen to them. In practice they got a nasty surprise as the British commissioners, Hope Simpson in particular, identified them as an obstacle to progress. Writing to family members in England soon after arriving in St John’s, he described “an extraordinary cleavage between the have and the have-nots”: “There is a crust of wealthy merchants. There is a class of small merchant[s], battening on the people in the outports, which is rapidly becoming more wealthy. Then there are the self-supporting fishing class & small agriculturalist[s], who have a very low standard of comfort. And, finally, there are the real poor, who have nothing and are practically 25% of the whole population.”16 He soon concluded that “decent life” was “impossible with the present system.”17 Obviously, Smallwood and the commission had intersecting agendas, but his attitude toward the new government was mixed, at times supportive but ultimately hostile. Disillusioned, he emerged over time as one of the commission’s most outspoken and dangerous critics.

lobbyist He offered advice to the new government even before it was formed in a missive that could perhaps be read as an unsuccessful job application. Writing from Cape Freels on 6 February 1934, with apologies for the “informality, and possibly the impulsiveness” of his approach, he introduced himself to Governor D. Murray Anderson as one who was ardently convinced of “the soundness and necessity for the Commission form of Government in Newfoundland” and as the only candidate in the general election of 1932 to have “quite unreservedly and enthusiastically, advocated this constitutional change.”18 It was “as a friend of the Commission form of Government” and the “best known advocate of this policy North of Cape Bonavista” that he wrote to make a suggestion. This was the publication periodically of a bulletin or report explaining the work of the commission, “addressed to the people, and posted in every post office, telegraph and telephone office, Court House, etc.” This would be a “cheap and effective medium of ... information.” In his travels on the northeast coast, Smallwood explained, he had found a “lamentable, and pathetic lack of information concerning the Commission.

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Scarcely a man that I meet appears to have any worthwhile knowledge at all of the nature, mission and methods-to-be of the Commission.” As opportunity presented itself, he had “imparted favourable information and done all possible to win the fishermen to the Commission,” such support being “vitally necessary” to prevent its constructive efforts from falling beneath “the dead weight of public apathy or even hostility, caused by sheer absence of knowledge.” Keeping the people informed week by week about the new government’s work, and about the “sympathetic and statesmanlike treatment” they might expect from it, was key to success. In a letter to the editor of the Daily News, written from Newtown, Bonavista Bay, and dated 17 February (the day after the inauguration of Commission of Government), Smallwood made the case that the adoption of uniform culling standards and the appointment of independent cullers were critical to the rehabilitation of the fishing industry: Since last May I have lived, worked and travelled amongst producing fishermen along that great stretch of fishing coast from Carmanville to Trinity. I have in that time addressed hundreds of meetings of fishermen, conversed with thousands of them, been in the homes of hundreds of them, and been on the fishing grounds with numbers of them. I think I may lay claim to having been in more fishing stages and conversed with more fishermen than any other man in Newfoundland during that period. I have heard more talk, more complaining, more grumbling, and witnessed more bitterness amongst the fishermen on the subject of cull than any other one subject ... To put it quite bluntly, I have not met one fisherman yet who did not feel that he was robbed on the culling board. I only state the fact.19 In a subsequent letter to the editor, he made the case that there should be a “course of common training” for cullers, who should be civil servants.20

s u rv e il l ance About 20 March 1934, Smallwood left Bonavista on one of his periodic visits to St John’s, travelling on a “special train which brought hundreds of seal hunters from all parts of the northern coasts.”21 While in the capital, he was drawn into a sealers’ dispute.22 The difference had arisen when sealers from the Eagle, sent to the ice by Bowring’s, a big Water Street firm, refused to unload fat (seal skins) unless the payment of $3.25 per man they had signed on for was increased. On

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2 April, the aggrieved sealers approached Smallwood to act as an intermediary on their behalf. He interviewed Eric Bowring but was told that nothing could be done because the men had made an agreement. When Commissioner Hope Simpson was approached, he likewise stood by the agreement. On 3 April, in a letter to the editor, Smallwood called for an investigation into the sealing industry along the lines of the inquiry into the working conditions of loggers now being conducted for the government by former Opposition Leader Gordon Bradley of Bonavista, with G. Bernard Summers, a future Canadian ambassador, as secretary. Sealers were deeply aggrieved, and only a public inquiry could determine whether they were justified in pressing for an increase in “the proffered price of fat.”23 More trouble awaited Smallwood when he returned to Bonavista by train on 20 April. This time the matter in dispute was a regulation that prevented trawl and trap fishermen, unlike their hook-and-line counterparts, from fishing outside the three-mile limit. Of about 1,000 Bonavista fishermen over the age of eighteen in 1934, 400 were trapmen. They wanted an end to the regulation in question and to be able to work on the same basis as hook-and-line men, who could fish without territorial limit. In response to their complaint, the government dispatched fisheries inspector Samuel R. Winsor to investigate matters. His recommendation was that the trapmen be accommodated. Writing to Hope Simpson on 2 May, Bonavista justice of the peace George Sellars blamed Smallwood for the unrest. “I would hesitate to repose very much confidence in either the Union or its leader,” he cautioned, “until such time as I became fully convinced that it was being conducted solely for the benefit of the fishermen and the public good.”24 In June, when Hope Simpson toured the Bonavista area, he and Smallwood clashed. Writing to family members in England after his visit, the commissioner was unsparing in his estimate of the fcu leader: “They are a Bolshie crowd down there with an âme damnée25 in the person of a self-appointed president of a fishermen’s union. He has developed a severe dislike to myself. He gave out that he was my fidus Achates26 at least. Indeed, I believe he thought that I was his personal assistant. It was also given out that the government had provided him with a schooner. Of course that was quite untrue. He tried to create trouble for me without success.”27 On 3 October, Smallwood was mentioned in a report submitted to St John’s chief of police Patrick J. O’Neill by Constable Michael P. Mahoney, who had been assigned the task of keeping an eye on political activity among the city’s restive unemployed.28 On this occasion, Mahoney reported having seen Smallwood in conversation with John T. Meaney, a known enemy of

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the Commission of Government who would soon launch a newspaper, The Newfoundlander, to lambaste its administration.29 A few days later, Smallwood complained to Governor Anderson after he had been denied a licence by Commissioner Thomas Lodge to operate a shortwave radio station in Bonavista. This refusal, he maintained, muzzled the free speech of a union with 5,000 members.30

planner Writing in the Observer’s Weekly, a publication started in January 1934 by his journalist friend Albert Perlin, Smallwood called for the introduction of profit-sharing between merchants and fishermen, whereby the “amount of ... profit that would go to each fisherman would ... depend upon the amount of goods he purchased from the firm, and the amount of products he turned in to the firm.” The firm would put “its capital, both fixed and liquid, into the enterprise” while the fishermen would contribute “their fixed capital – their boats, engines, gear, flakes, etc. – and their personal labour.” Under the arrangement he had in mind, fishermen would be organized and would have the right to name an auditor or accountant “to check and re-check all the account and transactions of the enterprise.” They would also have the right to name a representative to the firm’s board of directors: “any and all economic systems based upon the profit motive and the balance sheet test must go.”31 In another missive to the same paper, written after Perlin had rebutted his case, Smallwood called for a “living wage” for fishermen, maintaining that this was a “grave social responsibility that rests upon our government and our merchants.”32 He followed up with a stern letter to the Daily News calling for the adoption of a “realistic fishery policy” to prevent Newfoundland from “collapsing into utter economic demoralization.” With some exporters seeing “no gleam of daylight ahead,” a “feeling of fateful despair” had gripped them. Looking back, he observed that the exporting of saltfish had never been “an easy business” to conduct: “The golden era – the war – was followed by an era of greater difficulty and bigger obstacles than ever before known. The period from 1920 to 1933 can only be looked back upon as an especially vicious nightmare.” Iceland and Norway had emerged as strong competitors in European markets, and with Spain and Italy determined to send their own trawlers to the Grand Banks it was time for Newfoundland to get its “own house in order” in the face of the “present chaos.” Newfoundland should approach Iceland and Norway “with proposals for an economic alliance, a joint united front, proposals

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to become allies instead of foes.” But before this could be done, there should be a special commission of investigation into every phase of the fishing industry and trade. The commission’s job would be to “get to the very bottom of the situation, and to lay hands on every pertinent fact.” It would be by far the most important commission ever known in Newfoundland – much more important than the 1933 royal commission because it would concern itself solely with economics. “What are the facts? The commission would find out. Nobody knows all the facts now. No fish merchant knows. The Commissioners do not know. But the facts must be brought to light. It would take the special commission at least six months to do its work.” The government had already appointed such inquiries into logging operations, agriculture, and the postal system, but the need in relation to the fishery was “ten thousand times more”: fishermen had for “several years suffered a hell of poverty and debt. The burden that has crushed them down dare not be added to. They will not acquiesce forever in the present chaos. It is time to get down to brasstacks. The safety of the country demands it. Grave is the responsibility that rests upon the shoulders of government and merchant. Someone had better make a move while there is some social sanity left.”33 In a subsequent letter to the same paper, he gave as an example of the current plight of fishermen that of a man who on a sale of eighty-five quintals of fish stood to earn $85 for the year but faced annual living costs of $193 for a deficit on the year of $108. Either the government would have “to make up some of the difference in the shape of dole” or the fisherman would “have to go deeper in debt to the merchant.” He could, of course, “give up going to church and lodge ... keep his children from school [and] ... keep his house in darkness.” But fishermen could not be expected to “calmly tolerate these conditions” forever.34 Fishermen, Smallwood wrote in a follow-up letter, “cannot calmly tolerate an industry in which Nature does not give every man an opportunity to produce enough to live comfortably and remain free of debt. But beyond cursing Nature, it is difficult to see what can be done about it. Everyone is sympathetic with the unlucky fisherman. No one will deny that there is not room for improvement in the fish industry which will better the producer’s condition, but no one, from the Government down, knows what is the best to do. It must be a matter for experimentation until the right solution is found.”35 This was the case for a sweeping inquiry. Later the same month, writing to the Observer’s Weekly, Smallwood lashed out at the Commission of Government for its “deep silence” in not informing the people of its “attitude toward, or philosophy of the

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fundamental problems of our country”: “What do they really think of Newfoundland? Of Newfoundland’s future? Along what road should they consider Newfoundland should go? What do they think the Newfoundland picture will be when at length their work is done, assuming their efforts to be successful? Is it unreasonable to suppose that they have such a picture in mind?” It was “exasperating, irritating to be treated like children, as children who are to be seen but not heard.” As things stood, all that Newfoundlanders could do was “scrutinize carefully their watery communiques and infrequent speeches in the unrealizable hope that we may, by piecing together the few isolated and unrelated items, be able to form some rough and vague notion of their sympathies, their outlook and their synthetic conceptions.” The time had come for the commission to “take us into their confidence, treat us as grown-ups” and “come out from behind that thick, asbestos-lined, sound-proof screen and meet us frankly, face to face.”36 Smallwood spelled out his own plan for reorganizing the fishing industry in a letter he wrote to the Daily News on 26 November 1934. There were six propositions, he asserted, that nobody could dispute about the state of the industry: that the fisheries were a profitless business for most fishermen; that the indebtedness of fishermen to their suppliers had been increasing annually; that fishermen were “growing despondent while their mistrust of the fish buyers is enlarging constantly”; that the profits fish buyers took out of the fishery were “too small in relation to their outlay of capital”; that marketing difficulties were increasing annually in most markets; and that the fish exporters were not organized as exporters, “whatever they may be as fish buyers.” The answer was to establish separate organizations for producers, buyers and exporters, and government, the three to be federated in a National Fish Council. The producers organization would be called the Newfoundland Organization of Fish Producers (nofp ). Each community would have a local branch with its own elected officers, and the local branches would be grouped geographically into divisional branches. There would also be an annual conference; it would include “several hundred elected delegates,” last for “at least a week and possibly two weeks,” and be the final authority of the organization, which would have an elected National Executive Committee and a president. The nofp would represent fishermen in such matters as price of fish, price of supplies, cull, compilation of statistics, market reports, and technical matters involved in the production and curing of fish. It would also represent fishermen in negotiations with the fish buyers and the government. The fish buyers would be organized in the Newfoundland Fish Buyers Organization (nfbo ). It

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would pool the exporting and marketing of fish in foreign countries, regulate shipments, sell outright for cash wherever possible (thereby eliminating consignment), maintain business agents in the principal foreign markets, eliminate brokerage commissions, acquire or establish cold storage plants abroad as needed, and develop new markets. Some of the nfbo ’s operations would be financed by the fish buyers themselves and some in part by government. The Department of Natural Resources would establish a culling service for all product passing from fisherman to buyer. Cullers would be government employees and therefore independent. The role of the National Fish Council would be to provide a forum where representatives of the nofp , nfbo, and the Department of Natural Resources would meet periodically to discuss issues, with government acting as “third party” and “participating partly as prompter, partly as umpire, partly as common friend.” Organization was the key to success for the industry, and laissez faire was as “dead as the Great Auk, as obsolete as bows and arrows.” Once Newfoundland had put her own house in order and become “a united whole,” it would be possible to talk to and bargain with Norway and Iceland to “mutual benefit.”37 In December 1934, the fcu held a national conference at Port Rexton, which passed resolutions on a variety of topics: old fishing debts, culling practice, prices of supplies and fish, gasoline tax, brokers’ commissions, the need for a state bank, state insurance, an embargo on the export of capital, and matters that should be addressed by the hoped-for government inquiry into conditions in the sealing industry. Above all, the convention called for “a special or even a Royal Commission to conduct a thorough-going investigation into every phase of the fisheries, as well from the industrial as the commercial standpoint.”38 In the months that followed, Smallwood kept up his campaign for such a commission as a preliminary to fundamental restructuring of the industry along the lines he advocated. In February 1935, he fired this salvo at the Commission of Government for what he saw as its timid, do-nothing approach: The government may ... believe that they already know enough to warrant their stating a policy; and indeed they do, if that policy be one of doing nothing. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread, and if the government’s decision not to interfere is prompted by a realization by them that they do not yet know enough about the thing, then indeed are they wise men. A man only approaches wisdom when he realizes how little he knows. I hope from the bottom of my heart that is the true explanation of the government’s announced policy of laissez faire; and if the government will now

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do the logical thing – secure the creation of a Royal Commission of Enquiry into the fisheries – then indeed they will receive and justly merit the acclaim of every thoughtful, forward-looking, well wisher of stricken Newfoundland ... [T]he merchants (who would be among the principal givers of evidence) would welcome the creation of a sensible Royal Commission. I can speak for thousands of fishermen, and do, when I advocate a searching and comprehensive enquiry.39 Existing knowledge of the fishing industry was “scattered, uncollected, uncorrelated, unanalyzed, unpublished,” and a royal commission would bring it together in a comprehensive whole, thereby clearing the way for sweeping reform.40 The fishery was not doomed, as many now believed, but was in a “parlous” state, and the appointment of a royal commission was urgently needed to allow the industry to “speak for itself.”41 “It is unfair to the fishery and to the country,” Smallwood thundered, “to condemn the fishery or even to doubt it unless and until the condemnation or doubt be squarely based upon the facts. Let us have the Commission of Enquiry; and afterwards, if there be any room for debate, let us debate to our hearts’ content.”42

s e a l e rs On the evening of 5 March 1935, Smallwood, along with leaders of the city’s unemployed, spoke at the Majestic Theatre in St John’s to another gathering of dissatisfied sealers. There were about 1,000 persons in attendance, mainly sealers, and Smallwood’s remarks were reported on in detail by the ubiquitous Constable Mahoney.43 According to this undercover operative, Smallwood first spoke for an hour and a half, going over the grievances of the sealers and stating that the collective action of the crew of the Eagle the previous year had petered out because of “a lack of fighting spirit amongst the men.” What was needed, he again stressed, was a searching inquiry into their working conditions along the lines of the investigation Hope Simpson had spearheaded into the adverse employment circumstances of loggers (i.e., the Bradley Inquiry).44 While denouncing the pulp and paper companies and other large employers of labour for not paying “a living wage,” Smallwood singled out entrepreneur Ches Crosbie as having “the welfare of the working men of the country at heart.” After the meeting had heard from Pierce Power, the chairman of the St John’s unemployed committee, Smallwood expostulated on the strengths and weaknesses of Commission of Government.

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Whereas all previous Newfoundland governments had been “merely a false face” for the real government of the merchants on Water Street in St John’s, the commission had “the power and authority to run the country as it should be run.” In practice, however, the commission lacked “the courage and the determination to look after the producers and to give the working man a square deal.” Mahoney’s own estimate of Smallwood was that he was “playing a two-fold game”: on the one hand working “in conjunction with the Fishermen and Sealers” and on the other “not antagonizing the Commission of Government.” On 11 April 1935, the energetic Smallwood participated in an mcli debate. The topic on this occasion was “Resolved, that the future of Newfoundland is assured,” and he argued the case for the affirmative. Looking beyond existing trials and tribulations, he held out hope for the future in remarks summarized in the Daily News: Mr. J.R. Smallwood pointed out that the resolution does not necessarily deal with the immediate future but a period of years. The resolution could not be proved definitely but a reasonable probability would be established. He said the people of Newfoundland are appallingly poor, but this situation is the best indication for future prosperity. There is a definite calling into question [of] old institutions of the past as to their soundness and wisdom. Mercantile interests are considering the future. This is the best sign for now [that] something new and better can emerge. Newfoundland has certain economic essentials and if properly considered every family can live decently. We have the soil-proved ore bodies – forests – hydro electric possibilities – fur and game – salt water surrounding our shores with all sorts of fish, natural wealth forever. Then we have a people, 300,000, sober and industrious and ingenious as any in the world. We have the population and a Government. What else is needed is first the will to do and the vision to face facts and then the capital to carry out projects. If the 10,000 heads of families found work at say $500 per year, it would mean $1,000,000 less expenditure for dole and $2,000,000 paid to the Government for taxation. Never was there such a hopeful outlook for the sale of codfish. The United States with 125,000,000 mouths to feed and Latin America with 70,000,000 more are the logical markets, and new ideas in processing fish will improve conditions.45 The future of Newfoundland depended not “on the government but on the people themselves.”

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e x it In the spring of 1935, Smallwood further advanced his own current cause in life when he organized the Bonavista Co-operative Society as a counterpart to the union he had already formed. He was named president and in practice also looked after fish transactions and kept the society’s books. The society rented two stores from Bonavista Mutual Traders Ltd, an enterprise started in August 1934 by Gordon Bradley, who became the magistrate in Bonavista effective 1 July 1935.46 In August, Smallwood participated in a new venture, a summer school organized in Bonavista by the area’s United Church ministers, which brought together fifty-four young people from the town and from the nearby settlements of Elliston, Newman’s Cove, Port Union, and Birchy Cove. His contribution was a lecture on the life history of a fish, illustrated with slides he obtained from the government fisheries research station at Bay Bulls.47 Seemingly, all was still going well for him in Bonavista, but on 3 September 1935, when he called a meeting to protest the fish prices being paid locally, he ran afoul of Magistrate Bradley over a parade of 500 men he led to the business premises of the Swyers, Templeman, and Ryan enterprises. Bradley reported that the parade had been “sprung” on him and had been “entirely unnecessary except as a display of strength or a bit of advertisement for Smallwood.”48 Potentially serious trouble for Smallwood brewed in November when Commissioner for Justice W.R. Howley heard from fisherman Jacob Yetman of Keels, Bonavista Bay. Yetman alleged that Smallwood had misappropriated $25 from him for provisions that had not materialized. After this matter had been referred to him for action,49 Bradley submitted a scathing report to Howley, dated 15 November.50 He wrote that he had warned Smallwood three times that unless he produced the money owing he might be charged. To date, however, he had received nothing but “empty assurance.” While Smallwood was not “inherently a thief,” he had many other failings: He is utterably lazy, and the duties and tasks of ordinary life mean nothing to him. He simply refuses to perform them, and as a result his wife and three children are at times in pretty desperate circumstances while he fusses about with his hobbies. He is always “broke,” and the possession of funds belonging to others in such circumstances is an irresistible temptation to him. He airily convinces himself that he will be able to replace his appropriations in the near future. That time never comes. And thus he scrapes along – on gifts, voluntary and involuntary. He will make an arrangement today and

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break it tonight without a thought, if it suits his book. He has not the acquisitive faculty, and seldom wants unless he needs – in the latter case he is not over-curious as the means of acquiring. Though he had thought of arresting Smallwood, Bradley admitted the difficulty of proving fraud; accounts probably did not exist, and even if they did, Smallwood would “certainly ... not produce them.” In the circumstances, Bradley promised to keep trying to recover Yetman’s money while keeping “a close eye” on Smallwood. Over the next weeks, Smallwood continued on course. On 28 November, the Commission of Government appointed a wide-ranging inquiry into the fishing industry along the lines he had been advocating. Justice James M. Kent of the Supreme Court of Newfoundland was named to chair the inquiry, which had as its other members businessman Herbert Robert Brookes, chartered accountant Ernest Robert Watson, and schooner captain James Lewis Little, a Bonavista native who had represented the district in the House of Assembly from 1924 to 1928. Arthur Mews was named secretary. The commission was “to enquire into existing conditions in and in connection with the sea fisheries of Newfoundland and Labrador, other than the Sealfishery.”51 “Never for a moment,” Smallwood told Hope Simpson in a congratulatory letter, “did I doubt that you would adopt this course, and if at times in my advocacy of the proposal I appeared to be impatient – or even impertinent – I know that you understand my attitude.”52 In December, while the inquiry was in its initial phase and notwithstanding his negative encounter with Smallwood the previous year, Hope Simpson appointed him to a committee to work with Scottish co-operative expert W.D. Beveridge to promote co-operatives in Newfoundland.53 The same month, Perlin offered this measured assessment as Smallwood approached his thirty-fifth birthday (on 24 December): “A fluent speaker he has shed many of his most radical ideas gleaned in his younger days although it cannot be said that all his present ideas meet with general approval. There is no doubt about his energy and it may also be said that right or wrong, he is one of the most forceful writers in this country.”54 On 30 January 1936, Smallwood argued the affirmative side in an mcli debate in St John’s on whether the Christian religion was “indispensable to the maintenance of high ethical standards today.”55 On 18 February, in another mcli debate, this one broadcast over radio station VOGY in the interest of adult education, he led the negative side in tackling the resolution “that elimination of the profit motive would paralyze initiative” (Les Curtis, his 1931 insolvency lawyer, led the affirmative

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side).56 On the surface, all seemed well. But then, on 16 March, his standing in Bonavista was put in jeopardy when Police Constable Sergeant Samuel Tulk served him with a summons in connection with rent of $152 owing to Raymond Little, the Smallwood family’s landlord. The case was heard by Magistrate Bradley on 18 March, with Samuel Chard acting as agent for Little, who remained in the United States. Judgment was given in favour of the plaintiff, who was also awarded costs of $1.00.57 On 22 March, following this reverse, the Smallwoods hurriedly left Bonavista by train, Clara and son Ramsay retreating to her family in Carbonear – the other children were presumably already with relatives – and Joe heading to St John’s, where he eventually boarded at Mrs Tobin’s Falcon House on Water Street.58 Complicating Smallwood’s rushed exit was something else: serious financial trouble at the Bonavista Co-operative Society. On 25 April, with rumours swirling, Secretary of Justice Brian Dunfield asked Bradley to “let us know, confidentially, what is the present position with regard to this gentleman [Smallwood] and his organizations?”59 On 2 May, in response, Bradley submitted a confidential report that focused on the affairs of the troubled co-operative (he had earlier reported on the fcu).60 In January, he wrote, Smallwood had travelled to St John’s with a train carload of fish to be sold to Ches Crosbie, who was one of the main Newfoundland exporters to the Brazilian market. Smallwood had collected a cheque for some “five thousand dollars” but had stayed in St John’s until 10 March and had not sent the cheque to co-operative headquarters in Bonavista. As a result, “several of the fishermen to whom money was due were practically destitute, and others who were going to the icefields and needed the money to fit themselves out had to go without.” When Smallwood had finally returned to Bonavista, he had “appeared to be no hurry to straighten up the Society’s affairs or pay the fishermen the proceeds of their fish,” announcing that he would soon have to return to St John’s. When, after a few days, he did make up the accounts, it turned out that he had kept no record of the receipt of “wet” (i.e., uncured) fish, which he had continued to accept even after a meeting of fishermen had ordered him to stop doing so. As a result, it was “simply impossible to give each man his due.” Smallwood’s answer was to produce “calculations” a few minutes before the train on which he and his family had left Bonavista pulled out of the station,” with no time for verification. He had also taken the records of the co-operative away with him, and subsequent appeals from the society for him to return to Bonavista and “straighten up his mess” had gone unanswered. “It is,” Bradley concluded, “about the worst case of exploitation for the

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purposes of self-glorification that I have ever seen.” In a long life – he lived to age ninety – March 1936 was surely one of Smallwood’s most trying times, beset as he was by troubles, toils, and snares. He was a man of big ideas but not necessarily of double-entry bookkeeping.

p o u c h cove Hopes and dreams had been shattered in Bonavista but – this was typical of him – Smallwood was undeterred, carrying on as if nothing had happened. In 1934, feeding on discontent among local fishermen, the fcu had established a branch at Pouch Cove, near St John’s in an area of mixed Roman Catholic and Protestant population. The next year, the Cape St Francis Co-operative Society Ltd (“Producers and Packers of Codfish”) had been formed to serve fishermen in Pouch Cove, Flatrock, Bauline, and five trap crews from nearby Torbay. Smallwood was president of the society, and it was to this work that he now devoted himself. Early in 1936, in keeping with its policy of centralizing curing facilities, the Commission of Government gave the society a loan of $3,000, repayable in three years, to erect a building in Pouch Cove to help standardize the cure of locally produced saltfish and thereby enhance its value. The loan was not issued in cash; rather, the society could send bills for building materials to the Department of Natural Resources for payment to the specified total. The loan was also conditional on the society being able to obtain supplies for the approaching fishing season. Smallwood proved adept at this, first getting Crosbie and Company to advance twine to the value of $1,200 for the men to use in repairing their nets and then, again thanks to Ches Crosbie, obtaining 120 casks of gasoline and other supplies from Imperial Oil. The latter company sent its bill to Crosbie and Company, which agreed to be reimbursed by deducting the cost from future payment owing the co-operative for the purchase of fish from it. The sod for the new facility in Pouch Cove was turned on 9 March. Recently arrived Governor Sir Humphrey T. Walwyn visited the workin-progress in April, and Smallwood presided over a grand opening, with several hundred people present, on 25 May. Members of the clergy were on hand for this occasion, but the local Roman Catholic priest, Father William Sullivan, a strong supporter of the co-operative, was kept away by illness. Beginning 1 June 1936, Smallwood received a monthly salary of $40 as manager of the society, which had Les Curtis as its lawyer.61 In August, N. Milton Browne of the Daily News reported that the members of the Pouch Cove co-operative believed that they had “solved the problem of rehabilitating the fishing industry of Newfoundland”

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and looked forward to their example being emulated elsewhere.62 On a visit to the newly constructed processing plant, Browne had found 1,200 quintals of saltfish being readied for shipment to Spain, Brazil, the West Indies, and Malta. Under the slogan “From producer to consumer,” the co-operative members hoped to be “through forever with the old system of supporting a horde of middlemen and others who made fat livings out of the industry while the men who did the work received a mere pittance for their labors.” Browne praised the members of the executive for drawing salaries “scaled to the lowest possible minimum.” Smallwood welcomed the commendation – Browne’s article had come as a surprise – but also urged caution. While the members of the co-op were grateful to Browne “for his good intentions, the picture he had painted was “rather too rosy and optimistic.”63 The society had “no illusions as to the possibility of effecting economic revolutions” or to eliminating “middlemen.” The notion that the society represented “a solution to the fishery problem” was an exaggeration: “In sober fact, the Society represent[s] at the most a tentative experiment on the part of the fishermen of Pouch Cove, FlatRock, Bauline and Biscayan Cove. The experiment is beset by numerous difficulties and obstacles which may or may not be overcome.” It might take years “to determine the precise possibilities of making a success of the experiment, and to determine whether the experiment might be wisely extended elsewhere.” The society should be “permitted to attempt, over a period, to work out its destiny in co-operation with the great supplying and exporting houses” of St John’s, whose assistance had been vital to its success to date. Smallwood had likewise been cautious in evidence he had given in camera to the Kent Commission – which had set up shop in Room 223 of the Newfoundland Hotel – on 27 May (he had made an earlier appearance before the inquiry, but no record of this exists). Challenged that he had run a fish business in Bonavista “without knowing enough about it,” he shot back that the merchants of the town had been doing the same thing for the past forty or fifty years.64 But he followed up his oral testimony with a letter that ended with this sober reflection on his Bonavista experience: “The two great lessons learned by me as a result of last year’s activities were these: that it is fatal to take young or undried fish; and it is of vital importance to have a thoroughly efficient accounting system in effect.”65 Both lessons, he promised, would be “fully applied” to the current operations of the Cape St Francis Co-operative Society. Smallwood had been sorely tested in the fish business and, not surprisingly, soon found his way to more agreeable pursuits.

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t h e b o o k o f n e wfoundland As president of the Cape St Francis co-operative, Smallwood worked out of an office in the Crosbie Building on Water Street, St John’s, and in 1936 Ches Crosbie, who had facilitated the work of the co-operative, agreed to back his latest literary venture. This was for an encyclopedic work that would have many authors. On 13 June, readers of the Evening Telegram were informed in a front-page advertisement that “The Book of Newfoundland” was in preparation and that it would be “An encyclopedia of her people, places, customs, history, resources, industries, trades, literature, folklore, songs, laws, athletics, ships, travel, societies, associations, outdoors and hundreds of other topics.” The work would run to 1,500 pages, have more than 2,000 illustrations, cost $5.00 per copy, have a first printing of 15,000 copies, and be published on 1 December. Listed also were the names of a twenty-man “Board of Editors” and of “A Few of the Contributing Writers,” some forty-five in number, including two women (“Mrs. H.C. Ayre” and “Miss V. Cherrington”). The chairman of the Board of Editors was littérateur Albert B. Perlin, Ches Crosbie’s brother-in-law; his colleagues included a variety of local notables, two of them being Les Curtis and J.T. Meaney. In a subsequent flyer, the work-in-progress was described as “by far the largest most comprehensive best illustrated Newfoundland book ever conceived.”66 On 19 June, the Newfoundland Book Publishers Company Ltd, formed earlier in the year, was incorporated to bring out the projected volume. The company, which had its head office in the Crosbie Building, had nominal capital of $20,000 and 200 shares, each valued at $100. In its 1936 annual report, the directors of the company were listed as Crosbie, Smallwood, and (Frederick) Ross Young, Crosbie’s accountant, who also served as secretary. In 1937, it was reported that Crosbie and Smallwood each had sixty shares in the company, while Young, who was no longer listed as a director but continued as secretary, had twenty. The remaining shares were held, twenty each, by Perlin, lawyer Frederick R. Emerson, and businessman Thomas H. O’Neill, who were now listed as directors of the company. One surviving accounting summary − costed on the basis of a price for the published work of $4 rather than $5 − imagined a profit of $20,160, assuming sales of 10,000 copies, advertising revenue of $15,000, and total expenses of $34,850.67 With his wealth of newspaper experience, Smallwood was a fluid writer and an adept editor. During the summer of 1936, he pushed an ambitious project, extraordinary for the time, forward at breakneck

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speed. He was assisted by Leo Moakler, who later wrote a lively memoir of the period, and by two stenographers, who had temporary help to finish the work, which emerged in two volumes.68 Illustrations and advertisements, which would help to pay for the work, were collected on the run, with Smallwood active in advertising and sales efforts, both in print and on the radio. There is no definitive record of how much contributors were paid, but Moakler remembered receiving $25 for his contribution and the well-known historian and folklorist P.K. Devine was paid $100.69 In a letter to Commissioner for Justice W.R. Howley seeking biographical information, Smallwood offered the assurance that there would be “nothing whatever of a controversial or partisan character in the book.”70 Rather, the ambition was “to produce a book which will offend no one, but one for which anybody in Newfoundland can have nothing but admiration.” Ches Crosbie’s money worked magic, and on 21 August the contents of volume 1 were shipped from St John’s on the Furness Withy liner Nova Scotia to England, where printing and production were undertaken by John Dickinson & Co. Ltd, Old Bailey, London, and Richard Clay & Sons, Ltd, of Bungay, Suffolk, using paper “specially made for the book” in Hertfordshire.71 The Dickinson company was represented in Newfoundland by paper-maker manager Charles W. Iliff, who directed the work its way.72 On 8 September, Smallwood, Clara, and Clara’s sister Beulah sailed for Liverpool in third class aboard the Furness Withy liner Newfoundland. Smallwood carried with him the manuscript of volume 2 in “four cases, as well as numerous boxes and folders.”73 Six days later, a sales campaign was launched in St John’s, with “a crew of 20 salesmen and salesladies” soliciting orders.74 Buyers signed an order form, put $1 down, and promised to pay another $4 on delivery of the book.75 The sales effort was now being coordinated by Oliver L. (Al) Vardy, a native of Channel and another Newfoundlander who had sojourned in the United States, where he had studied journalism at the University of Wisconsin, worked for the Hearst syndicate, and then lectured in political science and economics for the extension division of the University of Wisconsin.76 Expatriate Newfoundlanders – in Canada and the United States – were targeted as another market for the publication and, under Vardy’s direction, various sales pitches were also made to them. Having made their way to London, the Smallwood party stayed first at the Ivanhoe Hotel in Bloomsbury and then at nearby 84 Guilford Street.77 While Clara and Beulah saw the sights and visited with their cousin Beulah Coombs of Aldershot, Smallwood pressed forward with the work at hand.78 He was followed to England by missives from Moakler

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and Vardy, the former writing mainly about editorial and administrative loose ends and the latter about sales. One aggrieved contributor needing to be mollified was Agnes Marion Ayre, who had submitted a lengthy article on the flowers of Newfoundland, along with a three-part account of the St John’s Current Events Club, Woman Suffrage, and the Newfoundland Society of Art. Smallwood, she complained, had not sent her a promised “signed statement” confirming insurance for her flower paintings, ownership by her of the relevant colour plates once the book was published, and the opportunity to read page proofs of her article.79 On 22 September, having seen copies of her work that were “full of mistakes,” she sent a revised text to England of her botanical submission and of her note on the Current Events Club, insisting that she would not be a contributor unless there were “no mistakes” in her work.80 Writing to Smallwood three days later, Vardy expressed himself “extremely disappointed’ with the results to date of the sales campaign: only about 250 copies had been sold.81 Smallwood, he joshed, was fortunate to be enjoying the delights of London and avoiding the “headaches” he had left behind. In a different vein, Vardy now also reported “a very definite and determined effort on the part of certain influential people throughout the city to belittle the book as much as possible”: “A whispering campaign has developed and has assumed tremendous proportion. It is hard to say where it is coming from most, and it is hard to know what to do about it, but it is very evident that a lot of people who, previously, had looked upon the book with favour have for some reason or other experienced a decided change of opinion. Probably by the time the book reaches here, it may have worn off. At any event, we hope so.” No matter what, it seemed, Smallwood continued to be thought of in parts of polite St John’s as the dangerous upstart of the 1920s and the untrustworthy insolvent of 1932. Moakler believed that Vardy was exaggerating, writing to Smallwood in the postscript to a business letter: “It is unnecessary for me to dwell to any great extent on the general atmosphere surrounding the book. While a little more co-operation could be wished for from the general public, I don’t think it is quite as bad as it is painted in Vardy’s communication. I have no doubt whatever, that if a good product is unleashed on the market, where previously there was criticism, this same criticism would bring forth all the more praise in the reaction.”82 Typically, Smallwood seems to have been unfazed, and was in his element dealing with the Dickinson and Clay companies and also with John Swain & Son Ltd (“Photo-Engravers & Art Reproduction By All Processes”), 88–92 Shoe Lane, Fleet St.83 As events unfolded overseas, Clara and Beulah Oates departed for Newfoundland

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on 13 November, travelling from Liverpool, having foregone an offer to voyage home aboard the paper carrier Geraldine Mary from Purfleet wharf, thanks to Associated Newspapers Ltd.84 Smallwood planned to return home on the same voyage of the Nova Scotia, but had to change his booking to 8 December.85 He was, therefore, in England during the abdication crisis and left the country two days before Edward VIII gave up the throne. He arrived back in St John’s from Liverpool aboard the Newfoundland on 15 December and on 17 December showed Perlin “first proofs, fully bound.”86 Writing a few days later in his “Pepys Behind the Scenes” column in the Observer’s Weekly, Perlin (albeit an interested party) gushed that the volumes amazed in their excellence and comprehensiveness. Having seen the proofs, he/Pepys mused, “I cannot believe that there will be any in the country that will wish to be without a sett.”87 Smallwood had hoped for publication in time to capture the Christmas trade, but this objective eluded him. Copies of The Book of Newfoundland finally arrived in St John’s on Friday, 15 January 1937, prompting the Daily News to report that only 1,000 sets remained to be sold and that fifty tons of paper had been used in publishing the work.88 The next day, a half-page advertisement in the Evening Telegram trumpeted “At Last It’s here! / The Book of Newfoundland / Two Glorious Volumes of Entrancing Reading! / The Most Prestigious Publishing Venture in All Newfoundland’s History.”89 Whereas the advance price had been $5, the present price for delivery anywhere in Newfoundland was $6, but sets could also be bought at the publisher’s Water Street offices for $5.50. At the $5 advance price, the publisher made no profit whatever on sales, but this price would be honoured, and city residents who had bought in advance were “urgently requested” to pick up their copies. On Thursday, 21 January, readers of the same paper were informed in another advertisement that the offices of the Newfoundland Publishing Company in the Crosbie Building were now open day and night until Saturday at 11 p.m.90 Excitement was in the air, and clearly many books quickly changed hands. On the front page of the Observer’s Weekly of 26 January, while acknowledging his “personal connection” with the publication but insisting that this was “so small” that comment by him was nevertheless in order, Perlin praised Smallwood for a truly “remarkable accomplishment”: It is only about eight months or so ago that Mr. J.R. Smallwood unfolded the idea he had conceived of a book that would include within its covers everything that was worth knowing about Newfoundland.

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He soon found that what he had thought might be a moderately large undertaking had actually become something far greater than he had imagined. He enlisted the support of Mr. Chesley A. Crosbie who helped with the financing of the undertaking without any desire for or expectation of personal profit. A corps of writers was enlisted. Mr. Smallwood was the driving force keeping their noses to the grindstone, checking and revising their manuscripts, and doing a multitude of other tasks that were essential to the production of the book. Even then, without the extremely cordial co-operation of Mr. Iliff, the Newfoundland representative of the vast paper-making concern of John Dickinson and Company, it is doubtful if the completion of the two large volumes could have been accomplished in so short a space of time. It is a fact that more time might have improved the contents. It is a fact that there are some minor errors, some omissions, and some lack of proportion in the space allotted to certain subjects. But with all this the Book of Newfoundland stands out as the most complete publication of its kind in the history of this country. It is a thorough survey of our national life and it has collected in permanent form many interesting sidelights on Newfoundland life and character that might otherwise have remained unwritten and forever lost to generations to come. It is Newfoundland of the past and Newfoundland of the present, and its success is certain. Equally certain is it, in my opinion, that new editions will be called for from time to time in the future in each of which more and more additions will be made to keep it up-to-date and to keep it the most valuable source book on Newfoundland’s every phase of activity. The Daily News was equally laudatory, praising Smallwood as a man of “fertile and ambitious mind” and an editor “possessed of intelligent discrimination, much energy, and a strong purpose.”91 On 30 January, Newfoundland Book Publishers Ltd advertised that, beginning that day, Harry Bugden and Dick Voisey of Newfoundland Hotel Taxi would deliver books in St John’s cod .92 The two volumes of The Book of Newfoundland were bound in imitation leather and printed on folio pages.93 Volume I ran to 486 pages and had a colour frontispiece, “The Start of the Voyage That Discovered Newfoundland[:] Departure of John and Sebastian Cabot from Bristol 1497.” The title page was followed by lists of the board of

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directors and contributing writers, the latter now numbering an impressive 117, including eleven women.94 An introduction by British newspaper magnate Viscount Rothermere, promoter of the pulp and paper mill at Grand Falls, was followed by Smallwood’s preface. It expressed the hope that The Book of Newfoundland would “restore the faith of Newfoundlanders in their country,” stir pride in their native country in Newfoundlanders living elsewhere, and quicken “the interest of non-Newfoundlanders ... in a country of vast if as yet mostly undeveloped and even unmeasured natural wealth” – a country whose future would be “brighter” than “its tragic past.”95 A photograph section following the preface included pictures of George VI and Queen Elizabeth, Edward VIII, George V, and a variety of Newfoundland notables of church and state. Governor Walwyn and five members of the commission were shown in drawings by Newfoundland artist Ted Drover (Walwyn gave him one hour to sketch this likeness).96 Hope Simpson, who had left the country in September 1936, contributed an article on “The Resources of Newfoundland” and Commissioner for Public Utilities Thomas Lodge one on “Land Colonisation and Markland,” a hopeful enterprise of the Commission of Government. Agnes M. Ayre’s article, “Newfoundland Flowers,” was illustrated with four colour plates, the originals of which had presumably found their way into her hands. In an article that ran for ninety-nine pages and was well illustrated, Captain Leo C. Murphy surveyed “Newfoundland’s Part in the Great War,” drawing on a larger work commissioned by the government.97 Smallwood himself contributed three articles: “Newfoundland To-day,” “Life To-day in Newfoundland,” and “The Co-operative Movement in Newfoundland,” with the first two being the first entries in the table of contents. “After all the bludgeoning of Fate,” he wrote in the first sentence of the main body of the book, “Newfoundland’s head may be bloody, but it is still unbowed.”98 Elsewhere in “Newfoundland To-day,” in a passage that can be read as a populist credo and a reminder of the transience of commission rule, he mused on the course of public administration in Newfoundland: “Governments come and governments go, but the people live on forever, their experience becoming ever more enriched by vicissitudes, failures and successes. The natural resources remain. Governments are artificial and superficial things at best. It is the genius of a people that counts.”99 In “Life To-day in Newfoundland,” he described the imaginary outport of “Brig Cove,” a thinly disguised Bonavista, comparing its ways with life in the pulp and paper towns of Grand Falls and Corner Brook and in the old mercantile seaport of St John’s. “Newfoundland,” he optimistically ventured, “is just now in

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a state of foment, of fertilisation. To him that hath eyes to see and ears to hear, the signs of the times are brilliantly clear. Newfoundland is in actual process of new birth, in the first tentative stages of a renaissance. It is quite conceivable – indeed entirely probable – that even harder times than have prevailed will yet be felt before the turn to a new and more enduring prosperity will actually be seen to have commenced.”100 His account of “The Co-operative Movement in Newfoundland” included an apologia for what he had attempted in Bonavista: “The whole thing was operated on a shoe-string and on the most meagre scale imaginable  ... The whole experiment can be described as a failure except in so far as it taught a number of very practical lessons. No co-operative enterprise could be undertaken in circumstances less favourable than those which faced and harassed the Society at Bonavista last year. As its founder I served the Society gratuitously, and was personally out of pocket when its season ended.”101 Volume II ran to 531 pages and also had a colour frontispiece, “The Discovery of Newfoundland / John Cabot in the Matthew, off Cape Bonavista, 1497.” The first part of the volume was devoted to an eclectic historical compilation that included an essay by the expatriate poet E.J. Pratt, “Memories of Newfoundland.” It then moved on to a series of articles about activities, associations, organizations, institutions, and religious bodies. Included in this section was a “Medical History of Newfoundland” by L.E. Keegan, a medical practitioner. Directories of magistrates and justices of the peace and of company directors followed. Beginning on page 327, the volume was devoted to “Industrial, Commercial and Financial Newfoundland,” an advertising section in which companies got to tell their own stories. The volume concluded with a useful general index to the set. In a review published in the March 1939 issue of the Canadian Historical Review, Newfoundland native Alexander Lacey, who taught French at Victoria College (University of Toronto), praised The Book of Newfoundland for its “vast amount of reliable information,” profuse illustrating, and coverage of Newfoundland’s role in the Great War.102 He was, however, critical of the work for its lack of “a logical plan,” with, for example, the article on “The Newfoundland Dog” juxtaposed between an account of “Aviation in Newfoundland” and one of the fires that razed St John’s in 1846 and 1892. “The general impression,” he wrote, “is somewhat confusing, to say the least.” The “most complete and reliable” sections were those dealing with “religion, education, societies, industries, sports, and the Great War.” By contrast, the sections on folklore and folk music were “of so little value that they were hardly

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worth the trouble of including.” The work also suffered “as a source of information” from its “advertising aspect.” Its picture of Newfoundland left out “most of the less pleasant features.” Nor was Smallwood convincing in the role of optimist, having written in 1931, not long before the report that led to Commission of Government, that Newfoundland was “emerging, ever and ever more rapidly, into the full noonday of enlightenment, development and prosperity.” The available archival record does not contain a summary of the sales history of The Book of Newfoundland, but Leo Moakler, an informed witness to events, remembered “a sizeable quantity” remaining unsold.103 These, he recalled, were eventually taken during the Second World War by visiting American service personnel, who found the volumes “an ideal source of quick knowledge of Newfoundland and a handsome souvenir and gift item for the folks back home.” This account perhaps accords with the fact that the Newfoundland Book Publishers remained in business until March 1948, when it reported itself defunct and asked to be stricken from the roll of the registry of companies.104 Whatever the ultimate financial outcome, the publication of a big and complex work gave Smallwood a new lease on life and enhanced his public standing. His literary achievement would not deter hardened Smallwood naysayers, but his energy and enterprise were hard to ignore. In the course of the year 1936, he moved adroitly from organizing down-and-out fishermen to editing prose emanating from upper-echelon St John’s. He had contacts at every level of Newfoundland society and the ability to work across the entire social spectrum. He could sleep on someone’s daybed or write a formal letter to the governor. After his debacle in Bonavista, fortune smiled on him in the person of Ches Crosbie. In 1937, he got an updated Who’s Who entry (he had first been included in 1930) and served on the publicity committee of the citizen group organizing celebrations to mark the coronation of George VI.105 Sometime that year he also completed a private commission on the history of the Carter family; the next year he completed another such work, this one about the life of the nineteenth-century reformer William Carson, for R.B. Job, a Carson descendant.106 There was no holding Joe Smallwood back.

t h e ba r r e l man On 19 July 1937, Smallwood revived the newspaper column he had written in the 1920s, “From the Masthead,” now styling it “By the Barrelman,” the name given to the member of a ship’s crew who climbed a mast to be a lookout.107 The column was published in the Daily News

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2.1 Clara and children in the 1930s in the garden of the Oates family house on Crowdy Street, Carbonear. Left to right: sons Ramsay and Billie, Clara, and daughter Clara. Emma Oates can be seen standing in the doorway.

Monday–Saturday, and he was paid $20 a week for writing it (he now told Clara, who was still living in Carbonear and dependent on remittances, that he also had the prospect of a job with Ches Crosbie in connection with the development of the Crosbie-controlled St George’s coal fields, which would bring in an additional $50 or more per week).108 As before, the Masthead column was a potpourri of his many interests, historical and contemporary. Two months after resuming publication, he drew on his daily grind of composition to launch a radio program, which he called “The Barrelman.” Radio was becoming more and more popular in the Newfoundland of the time, and his friend Vardy was well established on the airwaves as a news reader; known as the “N.B.C. News Commentator,” he was sponsored by the Newfoundland Butter Company, with his radio identity coming from its initials.109 During the summer of 1937, Vardy appeared in a series of programs sponsored by the government’s Tourist Development Board,

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and these broadcasts, which highlighted Newfoundland history, may have inspired Smallwood to take the plunge. Like Vardy, he was heard on vonf (Voice of Newfoundland), a station owned by the Dominion Broadcasting Company: formed in 1932 and a subsidiary of the Avalon Telephone Company Ltd, it had studios in the government-owned Newfoundland Hotel on Cavendish Square, St John’s. Smallwood’s program was first heard on 21 September and ran for ten minutes.110 He confessed to being nervous during the initial broadcast but quickly adapted to being behind the microphone.111 “The Barrelman,” dedicated to “Making Newfoundland better known to Newfoundlanders,” immediately attracted listeners and in October found a sponsor in the well-known businessman and manufacturer’s agent Francis (Frank) M. O’Leary; an initial written agreement between Smallwood and F.M. O’Leary Ltd was dated 15 December.112 With O’Leary’s backing, the program moved to a fifteen-minute format.113 It was heard every evening except Sunday at 6:45 p.m. and began and ended with the ringing of a ship’s bell six times.114 A single ring of the bell indicated the start of a new segment of the program. Smallwood was expert at producing scripts, resourceful in research, and had the assistance of the talented Moakler, who followed him from The Book of Newfoundland into his radio days. On 30 June 1938, Smallwood signed a further contract with F.M. O’Leary Ltd, “the registered owner of the title ‘the Barrelman’ under the Copyright and Trade Marks Laws of Newfoundland.”115 Under this agreement, for the payment of $1.00, he assigned and transferred to the company all “the right, title and interest” he had in the name, which was the “absolute property” of the O’Leary enterprise. For its part, the company engaged Smallwood for his daily broadcasts in return for a weekly payment of thirty-five dollars. The arrangement thus agreed upon was to run until 1 March 1939 “and thereafter from year to year” at the company’s option; it could be cancelled by either party on one month’s written notice or by the company at any time on the payment of one month’s salary. On the same day he signed this contract, Smallwood published the last column in his “From the Masthead” series.116 In June 1938, he also began editing The Barrelman, a tabloid “published monthly by the Barrelman Publishing Co. for F.M. O’Leary Ltd.”117 It forged links between the radio show and its listeners while providing a useful vehicle for commercial advertising for the O’Leary company and other St John’s businesses. Vol. 1, no. 1, featured a full front-page advertisement in which the Montgomery Ward Co. of Chicago, Illinois, announced that Crosbie and Co., Ltd, would be sole distributors in

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Newfoundland for various lines of its “tried and proven merchandise.”118 Writing in this same issue as “The Barrelman,” Smallwood invited readers to send in their stories for use on his radio program: Tell me of some Newfoundlander living away who has been successful. I like to tell stories of Newfoundlanders who have done something or other worth-while in other lands. You see, I am trying to show that Newfoundlanders are a smart people. I am trying to show that they always succeed, every time they get a decent chance. Help me to prove this, by sending me the cases you know about yourself. I am also very fond of showing that Newfoundlanders are a brave race of people, wherever they live, whether in Newfoundland or out of it. Send me your stories – true stories – showing how brave are the Newfoundlanders; how hardy they are; what hardships they endure. There are some people, you know, who don’t think very much of Newfoundlanders. Let us prove to them that Newfoundlanders have courage, brains, strength, great powers of endurance. Let us show them that Newfoundlanders are witty and smart.119 Readers who responded were promised samples of Palmolive soap, one of the products distributed by the O’Leary company, whether their stories were used on the air or not. Under the terms of his 29 June 1938 contract with F.M. O’Leary Ltd, Smallwood was paid $50 a month for editing this paper. In “The Barrelman” broadcasts – but less so in the related monthly – Smallwood for the most part eschewed “flagrant partisan-political discourse,” but his underlying purpose was nevertheless deeply political: to counter the negative self-image that he believed held Newfoundlanders back.120 The backdrop to this thinking was, of course, the country’s corrosive loss of self-government in 1934 – an event that was characterized in a 1942 Whitehall memorandum as the “only failure in the history of the British Empire of our own people to govern themselves.”121 In sum, Smallwood was engaged in what in a later time would be described as consciousness-raising. As he explained in 1982 to the folklorist Peter Narváez: “my program was very political, every word that I uttered ... I was aimed at stirring and creating and fanning Newfoundland patriotism, a sort of Newfoundland nationalism. I was trying to destroy the horrible inferiority complex that our people had ... I was glorifying every Newfoundlander, trying to make them puff out their chest and be proud and abandon this cursed inferiority complex. That was my purpose. Oh,

2.2 The Barrelman looks out over Newfoundland in The Barrelman monthly, January 1940.

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that was a very political purpose.”122 To this end (our numbers are from Philip Hiscock’s informative doctoral thesis on “The Barrelman” series), Smallwood pumped out radio scripts that ran to about 2,000 words per day.123 Since his program was heard for most of the year (there was a summer break), this added up to “about a half million words each year,” a truly Stakhanovite literary effort. In total, Hiscock writes, Smallwood’s Barrelman scripts ran to “over three million words, or about the equivalent text to a dozen good-sized books,” a veritable tidal wave of prose. As the program evolved, it became an amalgam of Newfoundland history, genealogy, anecdotes, adventure stories, accounts of the lives of Newfoundlanders who had succeeded abroad, discussion of public affairs (“from the standpoint of democracy”), tall tales, and narratives inspired by letters from listeners – all combined with celebrity interviews, advocacy of worthy causes, and creative advertising for F.M. O’Leary Ltd.124 Radio technology advanced during the life of the show, and Smallwood was quick to take advantage of new possibilities in communication. “The Barrelman” program and related activities provided Smallwood with a steady income, made him better known than ever before, and gave him a precious asset for the future – a recognizable radio voice. He was at once a cosmopolitan and a Newfoundland nationalist and was adept at playing both cards. Following his success in bringing out The Book of Newfoundland, he was soon off and running at full speed in a new direction, thanks to another appreciative patron in the person of Frank O’Leary, who sponsored the program to mutual advantage. A born storyteller, raconteur, and entertainer, Smallwood was made for radio, a medium that offered aspiring political leaders new possibilities for moulding public opinion.

n e w f o u n d l a n d w it h the li d off Sometime in 1938, the Smallwoods, who had known many housing ups and downs, entered a new and more secure phase when they began living at 38 LeMarchant Road, a property Smallwood would eventually own. Living next door, at 40 LeMarchant, were Joe’s cousin Walter Reginald Smallwood and his wife Mary Hannah (née Joyce) and family.125 An earlier attempt by Joe to move into a house on Garrison Hill had proved abortive. In that instance, he had imagined the property being purchased by Les Curtis and Water Street investor Maurice (Morris) Sheffman for $2,000 ($1,000 each) and then rented to him, with Crosbie backing a loan of $500 to be used to buy furniture.126 When Sheffman wanted to bid the price down to $1,800, Smallwood feared losing out to another

2.3 Smallwood as the Barrelman at the microphone with bell at hand.

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buyer. Curtis was willing to put up $1,500, provided Smallwood could arrange $500 via Crosbie to complete the deal. But in the end none of this happened, and Smallwood was left hanging until the LeMarchant Road opportunity came along. On 26 October 1938, Sir William Coaker, the political idol of Smallwood’s youth, died in Boston. Smallwood was among the mourners who travelled by special train from St John’s for the funeral in Port Union; he also eulogized Coaker in a Barrelman broadcast127 and in a tribute published in the Fishermen’s Advocate, the celebrated newspaper the fishermen’s leader had founded.128 In a letter in the 2 December Daily News, he spoke out strongly against a proposed deal whereby the Commission of Government would transfer to Bowater-Lloyd, a major British newsprint manufacturer, extensive timber rights in the Gander River area, a part of Newfoundland he knew well from his earlier work on an exploration party while in Corner Brook.129 The timber rights in question were on property owned by the Reid Newfoundland Company, which was in receivership, and were part of that company’s inheritance from its role in building and running the Newfoundland Railway, publicly owned since 1923. After long and complex negotiations, the sale to Bowater’s became part of a larger deal whereby the British company, having acquired the pulp and paper operation at Corner Brook, would expand pulp sulphite production there in return for the Gander rights.130 The proposed action stirred protest in St John’s business and professional circles deeply committed to the goal of a mill being opened on the Gander with all the imagined benefits it would bring. The Commission of Government was accused of a sellout of the country’s resources. For his part, while acknowledging an urgent need for jobs, Smallwood was quick to join the fight: I am so far from being ignorant of the dire need for wage-labor in this country that in fact I regard it as the utmost, the maximum importance. Labor we need, labor we must have. Dole is destroying our people, destroying their magnificent manhood, plunging them to the depths of helpless misery. But the alternative to the present wicked Bowater-Lloyd deal is NOT an idle Gander, is not a continuation of absence of labor for the North-East coast. The Government can kill the present deal, the Government can buy the Gander themselves, the Government can put some big company there cutting wood for export for the next few years. To say that the men of the North-East coast deserve the passing of this present deal is only another way of saying that the facts have been twisted and muddled

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in their presentation to them. They are simply not aware of this patriotic, sound and business-like alternative.131 Three days later, he was one of thirty-eight signatories to a letter that the Daily News published, calling on the government to cease and desist – but to no avail. On 31 December 1938, in a diary he had started three days before and kept until 8 April 1939, Smallwood noted that the governor had signed the bill embodying the Gander deal. The protest had failed, but he had burnished his nationalist credentials. The main focus of the diary entries that followed was on his dayto-day life as the Barrelman and on his literary and business pursuits; family matters get little mention. Many prominent St John’s residents are mentioned in passing, and there are multiple references to close associates Nimshi Crewe and Wilson Horwood. A troubled individual, Crewe had been helped through a family crisis by Smallwood.132 He came from Elliston, had worked for Coaker, and was now a public servant. He shared Smallwood’s passion for Newfoundland history, and during Smallwood’s Barrelman days they would make summer tours of the outports, gathering stories and collecting antiques (Smallwood had a special interest in lustre ware).133 With Wilson Horwood, Smallwood was planning a seed distribution company, which got started but soon flopped. Running through the diary are accounts of Smallwood’s progress in writing a book that would give “the low down on Commission Government in Newfoundland.”134 Once underway, this project became an obsession with him. J.T. Meaney supplied him with newspaper clippings for his work, and by 9 January he had composed 20,000 words. By 26 January, he was tidying up final details, writing in his diary that day: “Worked on book today & tonight till 1 am. It is nearly complete now. Wrote a preface tonight – ‘A Personal Explanation.’ Month not yet up, still I have done a 45,000 word book, with accompanying research, in that time. It has been hard work along with all the other things to be done each day.” Four days later, he sent the manuscript, entitled “Newfoundland with the Lid Off,”135 to Penguin Books in England, his publisher of choice. He then circulated copies of the manuscript to interested parties in St John’s and solicited their financial backing, making this diary entry on 6 February: “Phoned & called on those to whom I gave copies of my MS. Geo. Crosbie said [to] let him know how I got on, then he’d see. Hickman will give $150–200. McEvoy said his figure was $75. Phil Lewis said come again – I don’t think it will be much. Dr. Roberts said he wouldn’t say yes or no. So I’ll be lucky if I get $500.00.”136

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In a handwritten table of contents, lightly edited and numbered here, Smallwood divided his text into these sections: 1. “What This Book Is Written About”; 2. “A Personal Explanation”; 3. “Dramatis Personae and Chronology”; 4. “The Drama Begins”; 5. “Discredited”; 6. “Why This Bitter Disappointment?”; 7. “How the Newfoundland People Took It”; 8. “Actually, What Did We Expect?”; 9. “The British Government’s Promises”; 10. “Blue-Prints for the New Newfoundland”; 11. “Glorious Opportunity”; 12. “Political Holiday”; 13. “What the Government Should Have Done”; 14. “The New Civil Service”; 15. “Graft”; 16. “Newfoundland Now, after 5 Years”; 17; “Whither Newfoundland?”; 18. “A Specific Recommendation”; 19. “What Newfoundland Thinks in 1939.”137 In “What This Book Is Written About,” he explained his multipart purpose boldly and directly: Briefly, this book is written to reveal the tragedy of Newfoundland. The tragedy consists in having had her representative institutions wrested from her, in having been kept for the past five years under the paralyzing domination of the British Dominions Office, with its resultant stagnation of economic enterprise, alarming increase of social poverty, and swelling discontent. It is written to reveal the bleak, unrelieved failure of Dominions Office rule in “Britain’s Oldest Colony,” until five years ago “Britain’s Youngest Dominion,” and to give fair warning that unless the British Government wish to find themselves confronted one of these days by a situation beside which the scandal of Trinidad and Jamaica will appear a mere incident, they had better try now to face the facts, and remedy them while there is yet time. It is written to remind the Dominions Office, the Government of Great Britain, the British public, and the British Empire that, whatever may with impunity be done in Germany or Italy, it is to say the least, unsafe to persist in depriving a 100 per cent white British people completely and absolutely of all representation or voice in the governing of their country. The book is written to show that, whatever chance there might have been, had the Dominions Office–dominated Commission of Government succeeded in governing Newfoundland well, that the Newfoundland people would for any considerable period be content to be denied even the slightest share in the responsibility of Government, there is approaching rapidly a situation in which the suppressed aspirations and profound discontent of the Newfoundland people will find an outlet.

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It tells why and how self-government, exercised for a full century was swept away to make room for Government by a Commission appointed by, and responsible to, the British Dominions Office and no other. Finally, it explains why a highly artificial system and principle of Government superimposed upon us in a moment of grave economic crisis cannot, by its very nature, since the crisis and the emotions arising out of the crisis have passed, have any hope of success.138 The reference to Trinidad and Jamaica highlighted the fact that in both places London was under strong popular pressure to concede greater self-rule, something it soon did, in developments that Smallwood followed closely.139 In “A Personal Explanation,” Smallwood acknowledged having “welcomed the advent of Government by Commission with the greatest fervor.”140 Indeed, he had championed the idea of commission rule for two years before it had become a reality and had campaigned for this change as a candidate in the general election of 1932, “being the only candidate on either side to base his campaign exclusively, or to any degree, on the single issue of whether or not Newfoundland should go under that method of government.” His thinking at the time had had this logic: As a journalist, and on my one adventure as a politician, I had come to the conclusion, as so many others had done, that Newfoundland needed a political armistice, so that without the intervention of the extraneous matters customarily associated with party politics a new Government could devote its time, ability and enthusiasm wholeheartedly and exclusively to the task which I regarded as fundamentally the greatest of all: reconstruction of our existing industries and commerce, construction of new industries, development of our natural resources. Frankly, I had become weary of reading and hearing of those resources. I wanted to see them surveyed, measured and developed, so as to give the people of Newfoundland a standard of physical life which the existing degree of development could never hope to do. In my own defence, I insist that that idea seemed reasonable. I was not unaware of the world trend to fascism, but it never occurred to me that such a sharp break with representative institutions approximated a step toward fascism. It seemed altogether unthinkable that a Commission appointed by the Government of Great Britain would come here with any motive or purpose other than that of

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rehabilitating the economic as well as the governmental system of Newfoundland. My adult life had been one which enabled me to preach and try to practice democratic ideals and methods, but in the circumstances which then existed I felt that we could safely suspend for a limited period those ideals and methods for the sake of the practical help which I was confident government by a Commission, with what I believed would be imaginative and generous British government backing, would surely bring. For its first two years in office, he had supported the Commission of Government, but once he had seen “that it did not contain within it the seeds of success,” he had turned against it and now regretted ever having advocated on its behalf: I admit that I am heartily ashamed of my confidence and faith of those years. And yet, knowing then what I know now, and faced by the circumstances which existed then, I should make the same choice if I could be convinced that Commission Government would truly mean what so many of us thought then it would unquestionably mean: a great drive to develop Newfoundland. My shame arises out of my realisation that I ought to have known then that in sober truth a British Government would need themselves to rule Newfoundland, on the spot, for a very considerable number of years before they could be fit to select men to govern Newfoundland, or have enough understanding of Newfoundland to realise the kind of help their nominees would need [from] them. What I did not realise then was that the British Government was no better equipped to select and nominate men who were to rule Newfoundland than were the Newfoundland Government to select and nominate men to rule Great Britain. I do not think it would be possible for the British Government to select any group of men from among all the 45,000,000 people in the United Kingdom who could successfully, as a Commission owing loyalty and obedience to the Dominions Office, govern Australia or New Zealand or Canada or any other Dominion or Colony populated extensively by a white people who for rather more than a hundred years had been ruling – or, if you like, misruling – their own country. There is little likelihood, and for precisely the same reasons, that such a Commission could successfully govern Newfoundland.

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As in 1932, so now I think that the great unsolved problem of Newfoundland is the economic problem: that of surveying, measuring and developing our natural resources, and of reorganizing our existing industries. The difference is that now I know that if that problem is to be solved at all it will be solved only by a Newfoundland Government elected by the Newfoundland people, both of whom would have so much to gain as to furnish the incentive of real action. It is admittedly due the reader that I should make these personal confessions, so that he be pre-warned about the type of book this is. In the chapter “Whither Newfoundland,” Smallwood argued the case for the restoration of elective self-government in Newfoundland but with continuing British financial help, the latter to fulfil the promises made in the 1933 royal commission report. In “A Specific Recommendation,” he spelled out a course of action to facilitate this changeover. But he also hedged his proposal, writing that an alternative, probably impractical, would be to “start the Commission Government experiment all over again,” with new and specially selected commissioners being given a “free hand” and the financial latitude to develop the country.141 Unfortunately for the author of all this, Penguin didn’t bite, and, for whatever reason, nothing worked out locally either, leaving a truly withering critique of Newfoundland’s administration for the moment in literary limbo. Despite his oppositional outlook, Smallwood served on a publicity committee in connection with the visit to Newfoundland of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth at the end of their 1939 North American tour. On 17 June, he and Clara, formally dressed for the occasion, attended a Government House reception in honour of the royal couple.142 On behalf of the Newfoundland Historical Society, of which he was an active member, he also lobbied in the spring of 1939 to have a portrait of George VI by the Newfoundland-born artist John Vincent, a New York resident, acquired for the country.143 Working with L.E.F. English, he prepared for the Newfoundland Department of Education a collection of readings for use in schools. Entitled Stories of Newfoundland [:] Source Book for Teachers, it bore the imprint of the Newfoundland Gazette.144 For his August 1939 holiday away from his demanding schedule as Barrelman, Smallwood sailed from Humbermouth on the Northern Ranger, one of the ships of the Newfoundland Railway’s coastal boat service, to St Anthony, then made his way down the east coast of the island to Lewisporte and from there travelled back to St John’s by train.145 En route aboard the Northern Ranger, he touched in at Forteau, Labrador,

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2.4 Joe and Clara Smallwood in the grounds of Government House, St John’s, on the occasion of the visit of George VI and Queen Elizabeth to Newfoundland, 17 June 1939. He described the occasion in his Barrelman broadcast of 19 June 1939.

and then went as far north as Battle Harbour, visiting for the first time a region that figured prominently in his later political life. At Change Islands, he met schoolteacher Arthur R. (Art) Scammell, the author (at age fifteen) of the lyrics of the celebrated song “The Squid Jiggin’ Ground.” Nor was all lost in relation to his Commission of Government manuscript. As Newfoundland suddenly and dramatically entered a new time in its history, he was well positioned to use it to mount a vigorous attack on the failings of the country’s current administration.

r e c ov ery Because of its constitutional link to the United Kingdom, Newfoundland was automatically involved when that country went to war against Nazi Germany on 3 September 1939 (Canada joined in the war a week later). In the first five years of its existence, the commission had attempted

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a number of improvements and had formulated a variety of plans for long-term reconstruction, most notably in a ninety-nine-paragraph document it sent to London in December 1936.146 The commission established the Newfoundland Rangers, a police force, to improve contact between the central administration and the outport population; reformed the magistracy; created an innovative network of cottage hospitals and promoted health care generally; raised standards in education (but left the existing denominational system in place); assisted variously both individual fishermen and the fish trade; appointed the Kent commission of inquiry; launched the Newfoundland Fisheries Board to systematize and regulate the export trade in saltfish; inquired into the hard conditions of life in the country’s logging camps; started up land settlement and encouraged resettlement of population in the interest of better services and greater economic opportunity; and marginally improved the unfortunate lot of Newfoundland‘s thousands of relief recipients, in particular by requiring that flour be vitamin-enriched. Overall, though, the record of the commission was mixed. The country was hit hard by the 1938 recession in the North American economy, known to history as the Roosevelt Recession (at the time Franklin D. Roosevelt was in his second term as president of the United States). In the spring of 1939, there were as many people on relief as there had been in 1934, a devastating statistic. This was the context both for Smallwood’s 1939 book manuscript and for a scathing series of articles about the commission’s record published by the London Daily Express following a visit to the island by reporter (William) Morley Richards.147 In May 1939, J.A. Gorvin, who had long experience in the British Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, became commissioner for natural resources, and under his leadership the government set out on a reform of outport life that was more radical than anything it had attempted before. On the eve of the war, Whitehall still had a firm grip on Newfoundland, but there was certainly cause for concern. Newfoundland remained downtrodden and demoralized in 1939, something that was perhaps evident in “the lack of cheering and of visible enthusiasm” during the royal visit in June.148 Under legislation rushed through by the commission, “the indiscriminate firing of guns and fireworks” – an established Newfoundland form of welcome – was forbidden in the presence of the King and Queen.149 In response to the outbreak of war and the costs this would entail, the commission, as a patriotic gesture, lowered its submitted grant-inaid request to London for the fiscal year 1939–40 (1 April–31 March). This in turn led to a cut in expenditure, but this setback was temporary as the country quickly entered a boom period that produced buoyant

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public revenues. Newfoundland’s sudden change of fortune came about because of the country’s strategic location in an age of air and submarine warfare. Early on in the war, the government decided that a regiment would not be recruited for overseas service, as had been done at great expense during the 1914–18 conflict.150 Instead, Newfoundlanders would be encouraged to volunteer for service in the British forces. In the fall of 1939, a forestry unit was hastily recruited for service in Scotland. Buoyed by a defence act that became law on 1 September 1939, the commission also gave high priority to the protection of the country itself, especially St John’s harbour, the iron ore mining operation on Bell Island in nearby Conception Bay, the Newfoundland Airport at Gander (the place name dated from 1940), and the related seaplane base at Botwood. The air bases had been built in the late 1930s as a joint British-Newfoundland effort in connection with experiments looking to the introduction of scheduled transatlantic air service. Having reviewed the situation facing it, the commission quickly concluded that the defence of Newfoundland was beyond its capacity. Accordingly, it urged London to invite Canadian forces into the country to help out, Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King having told the Canadian House of Commons on 8 September that “[t]he integrity of Newfoundland and Labrador” was “essential to the security of Canada.”151 Whitehall at first resisted this advice, but after the fall of France it gave way. On 17 June 1940, five rcaf aircraft arrived at Gander and were followed there by 900 soldiers of the Black Watch. Thereafter, Canada ran the airport. In November 1940, planes manufactured in California were ferried across the Atlantic from Gander, the first deliveries in what became a celebrated wartime operation, run by raf Ferry Command in cooperation with the Gander base authorities. Once established in Newfoundland, Canada soon extended the scope of its effort, building air bases at Torbay, Newfoundland, and Goose Bay, Labrador, and operating a naval base in St John’s on behalf of the British Admiralty. In July 1941, in recognition of a rapidly changing relationship, Canada appointed a high commissioner to Newfoundland, acquiring for its representative a spacious residence, henceforth “Canada House,” at 74 Circular Road, St John’s. The house overlooked Bannerman Park, and its first occupant as high commissioner was Charles. J. Burchell. Following the completion of the air base at Torbay, Trans-Canada Air Lines began regularly scheduled service to nearby St John’s in May 1942. United States forces likewise found their way to Newfoundland in the same period, well before that country entered the war. In September 1940, through an exchange of notes, the United Kingdom obtained fifty used

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American destroyers and the United States the promise of base sites, to be leased for ninety-nine years, in a number of British territories in the western hemisphere, including Newfoundland and Bermuda, where such sites were to be given “freely and without consideration.”152 In Newfoundland, the Americans chose sites in the St John’s area, at Argentia/Marquise, and at Stephenville and were allowed to begin construction before a detailed agreement based on the exchange of notes had been negotiated. In combination, recruitment for wartime service and American and Canadian base construction triggered boom times in Newfoundland. In 1941, the financial relationship between the United Kingdom and Newfoundland reversed itself when a revenue-rich Commission of Government began making annual interest-free loans of Canadian dollars to the now hardpressed British. The base-building boom lifted Newfoundland out of depression and into a period of unprecedented prosperity.

the express Unsurprisingly, economic revival on this scale stirred political embers. “I have no doubt whatever,” Smallwood told his Barrelman listeners on 10 July 1940, “that within a very few months of the end of this war Newfoundland will be governed again by her own elected government.”153 Later that month, the Newfoundland National Association, the brainchild of Frank O’Leary, Smallwood’s current patron, was formed in St John’s, with many veterans of the opposition to the 1939 Bowater’s deal at the fore.154 The association adopted a constitution and elected its officers. Thomas H. O’Neill was elected president, Dr William Roberts vice-president, James M. Howell secretary, and George G. Crosbie treasurer. O’Leary served on the board of governors along with other local notables P.J. Lewis, Ronald H. Ayre, James Baird, James Stowe, and Silas W. Moores.155 In its statement of objects, the new organization, which only “native sons of Newfoundland” could join, committed itself “To organize a cohesive bond of considered opinion ... directed towards the improvement of the science of Government within the country.”156 The association made plain that it was not out “to embarrass the Government in any way” but would “be always ready and willing to co-operate with the duly constituted authorities in the formulating of, and effectuating any policy which has as its object the betterment of the country as a whole.”157 The Daily News welcomed the new body as “A People’s Organization” of a sort that was “long overdue,” while a correspondent to this paper, writing over the signature “Newfoundlander,” saw in it “the first gleam of hope that the day is not far distant when we shall once more be masters in

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our own household.”158 Having burst onto the scene, the association held regular meetings (in the Newfoundland Board of Trade rooms) and busied itself with recruiting members. One constitutional provision “provided for holding an annual convention which would be in effect a parliament of the people where problems affecting their lives and interests could be discussed, and where resolutions could be moved and findings arrived at, solving, if possible, the country’s problems.”159 By October, when O’Neill addressed the elite St John’s Rotary Club, the association had 200 members.160 In November, as part of a speaker series, it heard businessman William White make “the case against Confederation.”161 The Commission of Government was firmly in the saddle, but it had good reason to keep track of what was now afoot in business and professional St John’s. In February 1941, Smallwood began editing The Express, a weekly newspaper that savaged the Commission of Government and backed the cause of the Newfoundland National Association. The paper was published by the Express Publishing Company Ltd, was funded by F.M. O’Leary et al., had as its motto “National Patriotism, National Unity, National Progress,” and highlighted Smallwood’s mastery of the art of political campaigning.162 The first issue appeared on 15 February, and in it he began to serialize his unpublished 1939 critique of the commission.163 Subsequent issues featured a symposium on “The Present Constitutional Position of Newfoundland,” to which Harry A. Winter, Gordon Bradley, and Les Curtis contributed164; a multipart examination by lawyer Eric Cook (later a member of the Senate of Canada) of the 1933 Amulree Report, described here as “Inexact,” “Inaccurate,” and “Misleading”165; and an interview with former prime minister Walter S. Monroe.166 On 1 March, the paper reported that a recent meeting of the Newfoundland National Association had unanimously made the “momentous decision” to call for the restoration of responsible government.167 In the issue of 15 March, news of a proposed liberalization of representative government in Jamaica provoked an admonition (“Let Freedom Ring!”), couched in racial terms of the period – though Smallwood was no racist, believing in “the true homogeneity, the essential oneness, of the people of our earth regardless of national or any other boundaries.”168 He compared citizenship rights on the Caribbean island, where there was an electorate, with the situation in Newfoundland, where nobody could vote: To those Newfoundlanders who have believed that the Newfoundland demand for democracy and self-government should not be voiced for the duration of the present war A DEVASTATING REPLY came this week.

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It came from Jamaica ... Jamaica, only 2% of whose population is white, becomes a democracy! Jamaica gets the vote. Jamaica becomes self-governing. It wasn’t a gift from Britain. It was demanded by Jamaica. The people petitioned Great Britain asking for democracy. What could the home of democracy do but grant the request? The Jamaican people asked for democracy – Britain couldn’t offer them a stone. Two per cent of Jamaica’s people are white. Ninety-nine per cent of Newfoundland’s population is white, native-born, British stock. Jamaica goes democratic – shall Newfoundland remain totalitarian? ... Envy the black Jamaican. He’s a citizen. He’s a voter. He elects his own government. His government must consider his wishes and desires. He helps to shape his own destiny and his country’s. You don’t. You have nothing to do with it. You do as your government tells you. You didn’t put the government there. The government are not answerable to you. They don’t have to tell you anything. They have to tell only the Dominions Office. Ah, but you say, it’s all very fine for Jamaica to demand and get self-government – she’s paying her way. She’s balancing her budget. She’s paying her own way. Jamaica is not paying her own way. Britain is now going to give her a grant-in-aid to help her balance her budget. For Jamaica: self-government and financial aid. For Newfoundland: no self-government, and we pay our own way.169 On the same page, in a parody of an official press release regarding a meeting of the Commission of Government, the paper mocked the “178,293rd Meeting” of the “Ommission of Government,” attended by commissioners for “Natural Reverses,” “Finance and Bust ’em,” “Public Humilities,” “Public Wealth,” “Unknown Affairs and Speculation,” and “Just What.” In an adjoining column, it was reported that the Newfoundland National Association had elected a new executive (Dr Roberts became president) and was considering a new constitution.170 While Smallwood thus thundered in St John’s, Anglo-American negotiations were in progress in London to finalize the leased bases agreement. Newfoundland was represented at the talks by Commissioner

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for Finance J.H. Penson, a British member of the government, and Commissioner for Justice and Defence L.E. Emerson, who had joined the government in September 1937 as one of its Newfoundland members. With the Americans pressing their wartime advantage hard, Prime Minister Winston Churchill appealed to Newfoundlanders in a letter to Emerson, dated 18 March and published in St John’s, to accept the pending agreement “for the sake of the Empire, of liberty and of the welfare of all mankind.”171 In effect, the agreement, which was signed on 27 March and weighted heavily in favour of the United States, made the base sites extensions of the American homeland. As such, it had the potential to trigger trouble in Newfoundland, with the commission being especially wary of the response to its sweeping provisions in The Express and the Fishermen-Workers Tribune (published since 1938 by the Fishermen’s Protective Union and now edited by O.L. Vardy) and by the Newfoundland National Association.172 In fact, whatever may have been thought and said behind closed doors, there was no pushback in St John’s. At a critical juncture, Smallwood fell into line, as did critics of the Commission of Government generally. “Mr. Churchill, prime Minister of the British democracy,” The Express told its readers on 29 March, “asks Newfoundland to make the sacrifice of consenting to the base deal between Britain and the United States. Newfoundland loyally makes the sacrifice, and consents to the deal. Newfoundland is delighted once more to signify her support of the British cause in the war. We have given our sons and our money. Now we give large slices of our own soil to the United States Government because we know it will help Britain.”173 Smallwood’s reading of the bases deal was that it affirmed the commitment of the United Kingdom to return responsible government to Newfoundland, whereupon dealings over the bases would be between St John’s and Washington. In the same spirit, after Emerson had given a speech defending what had been done in London, the Daily News, which had highlighted the activities of the Newfoundland National Association, urged acceptance and forbearance in relation to the leased bases agreement in the interest of the larger war effort: Mr. Emerson has devoted much of his address to argument against the widely- held belief that the United States has acquired sovereign rights within the areas that it will occupy by lease for the next 99-years. The interpretation of the agreement in this particular respect may long be a subject of controversy. There is little that we may do about it and little, perhaps, that we may want to do in all the circumstances.

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Boiled down to its simplest proportions that position is that for the good of the cause we in Newfoundland were asked to make certain sacrifices. If the necessity for these sacrifices had never arisen we would all be much happier to-day. But the necessity does exist and there is no Newfoundlander worth his salt who will say that if what we have been asked to yield is essential to the security of the Empire we should refuse to acquiesce ... We may feel that some special consideration might have been given Newfoundland in view of the fact that our dominion status still exists even if in a state of suspended animation, and because this country was specially dissociated from the destroyer deal which was the basis of the present agreement. But in the final analysis, amour propre must take second place to the cold logic of events.174 In the spring of 1941, with the Luftwaffe bombing the United Kingdom and what became known as the Battle of the Atlantic in progress, there was a fine line in Newfoundland between advocacy of constitutional change and being seen as disrupting the war effort. This was a line that the Newfoundland business and professional class, anxious as it was to get back control of the country, was careful not to cross. On 12 April, the ninth and last issue of The Express appeared (leaving several chapters of Smallwood’s 1939 manuscript awaiting publication), and the Newfoundland National Association soon faded into the background.175 Following the demise of The Express, Smallwood still found opportunity, in his Barrelman broadcasts and related monthly publications, for political commentary, but he was much more circumspect on the now publicly owned vonf (the Commission of Government had established the Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland in 1939) than he had been as a newspaperman. On the radio he was more didactic rather than rabble-rousing, giving civics lessons and encouraging Newfoundlanders to love their country. Beginning in 1939, in his role of Barrelman, he ran an annual “Fish-aMan” fundraising appeal in support of the work of the Newfoundland Patriotic Association.176 Every active fisherman was asked to donate a dried salt cod, with the donations “sold to the highest bidder.”177 The proceeds of the sale, along with cash donations, were used “to buy cigarettes and comforts” for Newfoundlanders serving in military uniform abroad.

p ro p e rt y Early 1941 was also an eventful time for the Smallwood family domestically. On 24 November 1940, Smallwood had bought the house at 8

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Bulley Street from Mary Wadden for $1,050, mortgaging it the next day to medical practitioner Arthur Carnell for a loan of $1,250; on 15 December 1940, he bought the house at 38 LeMarchant Road, where he now lived, from Robert W. Adrian, a resident of New Jersey, for $3,500; and on 15 January 1941, he mortgaged the LeMarchant Road property to merchant Samuel Sheffman (brother of Maurice) for a loan of $2,500.178 By his own account, he bought the Bulley Street property to help out his spinster Aunt Fan (Fanny Smallwood) and bachelor Uncle Sandy (Alexander Smallwood), elderly siblings living on Mount Royal Avenue who had run into financial difficulties and were “threatened and tormented by a lawyer.”179 To save the situation, Smallwood arranged the sale of their house through real estate agent Stan Condon. The sale of their property realized $1,400, less a $70 fee for Condon, but when their debts were all paid, there was only $33 left. To rehouse his relatives, Smallwood bought the house on Bulley Street, using the $33 as a down payment and undertaking to make monthly payments of $20 and a payment of $500 in April 1941. Because the occupants of the Bulley Street house were not ready to move when the Mount Royal Avenue house had to be vacated, Uncle Sandy went to live with Smallwood’s mother and Aunt Fan with him. After moving into 38 LeMarchant Road, Aunt Fan broke her wrist and was then bedridden but eventually recovered. In a frank and moving letter he wrote on 17 March 1941, Smallwood appealed to his Aunt Bert Smallwood (née Roberta Hyde Mutch) to help cover the living costs of the elderly couple once they moved to Bulley Street. Aunt Bert, who died in Prince Edward Island on 7 April 1949, was the second wife and widow of his Uncle Fred, the successful boot and shoe manufacturer who had paid for him to attend Bishop Feild College as a boarding student. The sum he asked for on behalf of the needy relatives was $25 per month ($150 annually), with Aunt Fan intending to write to her sister Jessica for an equal amount. His own circumstances, he explained, did not permit him to cover living costs, which might not be needed for very long,180 but he had had no choice but to act as he did: [S]omething had to be done – they were helpless. Nobody else in the family here (so far as I knew or still know) was prepared to lift a finger. I couldn’t stand by and see them put on the street, or go to the poor house – although, as a matter of fact, having three children of my own I have just about all I can do to make ends meet. I have bought the house in which I live and am paying for it by the month. This is a serious burden on me ... I have my work cut out

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to get along – 3 children at United Church college, all taking music, $10,000 life insurance, paying for two houses. I am not able to save a dollar cash.181 In his professional life, Smallwood mixed with the well-to-do of St John’s, but for all his accomplishments, his own financial situation remained precarious, though he was now, at long last, an owner rather than a renter. He walked with wealth but kept the common touch, living close to the financial edge.

b e r ry p ic k i ng In July 1941, Smallwood brought out the second edition of a Hand Book Gazetteer and Almanac, which he had originally published the previous year.182 This volume, which included paid advertisements, was intended as a replacement for a yearbook and almanac the King’s Printer had published for about forty years until 1931. Smallwood’s compendium featured an alphabetical listing of Newfoundland places, with a brief comment on each one and a notation as to the number of radios at each location. The collection exemplified Smallwood’s interest in everything about Newfoundland and his urge to organize and list. His omnium-gatherum always found purpose and use. On his summer 1941 break from the daily grind of the Barrrelman programs – taken in the lovely month of August – he visited about fifty settlements in Trinity, Placentia, and Conception bays, leaving Clara, who was never part of these summer idylls, to look after family matters. When he returned to the air on 1 September, it was with a panegyric, albeit male-oriented, to Newfoundland outport life, quoted here in extenso as an example of his inviting, intimate, and companionable Barrelman writing. As both writer and speaker, Smallwood had an innate sense of the rhythm of English prose: Seeing that I’ve been away for the past month, and that I had some talk about it before I went, I suppose you’ll be expecting something in the nature of an account of my holiday. Well, when I came off the air at seven o’clock on the night of July thirty-first, I jumped aboard a car, left St. John’s, and went to Newfoundland. I’ve been in Newfoundland for the past month – and arrived back from Newfoundland only today, around one o’clock this morning. I’ve been in Newfoundland many times in the past, but never did I find it more appealing than during the last four weeks. You see, I had been

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living continually in St. John’s for a number of months, and it was a great pleasure to be able to go once more to my native country, to get the feel of Newfoundland, to breathe its air, to bathe in its atmosphere. After that absence of several months from Newfoundland, I found it not only desirable but necessary to get back to Newfoundland, so that the roots of one’s national feeling might be watered, so that one’s faith in the country might be strengthened and renewed, so that one could lay one’s hand on old mother earth and feel the throbbing heart of Newfoundland once more ... Well, it’s been an inspiration. I feel like a Newfoundlander once again. And really, there’s nothing simpler. Just get aboard a car or a bus or a train, and drive fifty or sixty miles, and you’re there. Go down on the stages, and sit on an upturned puncheon-tub and yarn with the fishermen. Or lean over a fence and watch a man mowing hay – better still, peel off your coat and pitch in yourself at the hay. Or seize an axe and chop up some firewood. Or go off over the marshes picking bakeapples for a few days – or over the barrens picking blueberries ... And then for a change find an old graveyard and spend a few hours studying the ancient headstones. If you can, talk with a few old-timers – men of seventy and eighty and ninety and listen to their yarns, and their reminiscences. There’s nothing elaborate in all that, is there? And yet it’s surprising how healing, how soothing, it can be – especially when the roar of the sea is thrown in, and you get the pungent smells of tar and rope and fish and berries and turf and campfires for good measure. I tell you truly for a fact, it renews you – it makes a man of you – it makes a Newfoundlander of you.183 In the same vein, he wrote evocatively here about the joys of berry picking, “one of the most philosophical of all occupations.” It left the practitioner “humble and serene, and clean and clear-eyed and clearminded” – and should be compulsory for members of the Commission of Government: “I think each of the six Commissioners should be compelled to spend at least one week of the year on the barrens, and on the marshes, picking berries – I’m quite sure they’d become better commissioners if they did.”184 On 11 December, the ever-active Smallwood gave a speech to the St John’s Rotary Club on “How Newfoundland Became Settled,” and in a letter published in the Daily News on the 15th he called for the creation of a Newfoundland Department of Defence and the conscription of manpower for home defence: “The protection of the civilian population in all areas likely to be attacked must be organized at once on a professional basis, and subjected to unprecedented drive, and

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paid for without thought of stinting by the Government out of the six million dollars we taxpayers are giving them this year over and above what they actually need for the regular public services.”185

p u b l ic 0 p ini on In his Barrelman broadcast of 4 June 1942, he picked up on the results of an informal questionnaire on current political attitudes in Newfoundland conducted by Albert Perlin (writing under the pen name “Wayfarer”) in the Daily News. Fully 95 per cent of Perlin’s respondents had supported the restoration of responsible government. Unfortunately, Smallwood mused, Newfoundland had been on a “political holiday” since the general election of 1932 with “no discussing, no debate whatever on political subjects or problems.”186 As a consequence, there were “tens of thousands of young Newfoundlanders” who had come of age “almost completely ignorant of the political and constitutional history of their country”187: “It boils down to this: in the first place, having had no personal experience, and thus no way to judge for themselves, younger Newfoundlanders ranging in age today from eighteen and nineteen up to about twenty-eight and thirty have actually no knowledge of politics; in the second place, about the only thing they have ever heard about politics and politicians and political parties is that they were all rotten, putrid, thieving, dishonest, insincere, incapable, and everything that was bad.”188 The Amulree royal commission had made “a clean sweep of the politicians,” taken “all power from the people,” and falsely advertised Newfoundland “before the Empire and the world as a hive of indecent dishonesty and crookery.”189 Continuing the same theme in his next broadcast, he declared that while Newfoundlanders didn’t like the way that Commission of Government had come to them, they were solidly behind the administration for the duration of the war: “They don’t like the falseness of the picture that this Government’s original sponsors painted of themselves and their country – the Amulree Royal Commission. There are many things they don’t like about it – but for all that they are as one man and one woman in supporting the Government for the duration of this present war.”190 But – this from the broadcast of 16 June – there was no doubt where Newfoundland was headed: “One of these days, whether you like it or I like it, or dislike it, this country is going to be fixed with the heavy responsibility of governing herself again. Self-government is coming back to Newfoundland just as surely as the stars shine in the sky. Newfoundland is not taking the gallant part she is in this war for democracy without desiring, demanding and getting democracy for herself.”191

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2.5 The Smallwood house on Kenmount Road, St John’s, c. 1944.

k e n m o u n t road At the end of June 1942, Smallwood began another summer break from the Barrelman, this time for two months. He spent his time away from the microphone on a forty-acre farm192 he was in the process of acquiring off Kenmount Road on the western outskirts of St John’s, where he intended to raise pigs (he recruited his yeoman brother Reg, a Newfoundland jack-of-all-trades, to work there).193 The property was located near the successful dairy farm of the Kelsey family, which supplied milk to St John’s. In launching his new enterprise, Smallwood seems to have had in mind the possibility of the sale of pork at Fort Pepperell, the United States army base at Quidi Vidi, St John’s.194

at t l ee Smallwood was next heard on vonf on 1 September 1942. Soon after he resumed broadcasting, British Labour Party leader Clement Attlee, Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs in

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the United Kingdom wartime coalition government, made a surprise visit to Newfoundland, arriving in St John’s on 14 September.195 The next day, it was reported in the local press that the purpose of his visit was “to discuss current matters relating to Newfoundland with the Commission of Government.”196 But in official correspondence, Governor Sir Humphrey Walwyn had been told that Attlee’s purpose “would be to inform himself of conditions in the Island” and to discuss with him and the commission “the large questions of policy which are likely to arise in relation to the Island as soon as the war is over.”197 Whitehall would next plan for constitutional change in Newfoundland – but on its own terms. Change would come to Newfoundland not through popular demand but through a process manufactured in London. At the end of his visit to St John’s (he made a side trip to Bell Island), Attlee crossed the country by train, stopping in Grand Falls and Corner Brook and leaving for Canada from Port aux Basques. In the wake of his visit, Smallwood quoted approvingly from a front-page editorial by Perlin in the Observer’s Weekly making the case that “the proper course” for the Commission of Government and the Dominions Office was “to recognize the inevitable and seek to plan for representation on a basis that will prevent abuse.”198 When it came to the restoration of self-government in Newfoundland, Smallwood maintained, the burden of proof was on its opponents: “We who demand self-government for Newfoundland haven’t got to do the proving – the burden of proof isn’t on us, it’s on those who oppose democracy. The stand we take is that democracy is right, that it’s sound, that it’s true, that it’s every people’s right. Those who would deny Newfoundlanders democratic rights must prove that we shouldn’t have them. Democracy is our birth-right as British citizens, and anyone who wants to deprive us of those rights has to put up a pretty strong case indeed to convince us that we shouldn’t have them.”199 But in March 1943, when the Newfoundland Board of Trade responded to tax increases with a noisy demand for some form of representative government as a first step back to full self-government, its protest was in vain.200 Whatever his thinking of Attlee’s visit at the time, Smallwood’s eventual view was that the British leader had only been in Newfoundland “long enough to get a few hazy and I’m afraid confused impressions of our country and people.”201 He had not met with “representatives of any large organized public group” and had left “with no clear-cut ideas at all of what Newfoundlanders wanted.” In fact, however, Attlee had written a trenchant memorandum at the end of his stay, which triggered a change of direction in London. In this document, he summed up “the

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attitude of most Newfoundlanders as being that of a man who having had a spell of drunkenness has taken the pledge,  ... is tired of it and would like to be a moderate drinker but does not quite trust himself.”202 The problem for the United Kingdom was this: We can with general assent continue the Commission till the end of the war. There will then be an irresistible demand supported by all the weight of democratic sentiment for a return to self government. If we accede to this we shall probably have a Government which will spend the available balances in an effort to cope with depression with a consequent return to bankruptcy. We can refuse self government with the result that we shall have to meet all the odium of the post-war slump which will be laid to our charge because we refused to let the people run their own affairs. We can try to formulate some system less than full self government keeping the brake in our own hands. We shall then promote irresponsibility and probably get the blame for everything that goes wrong. We can concede self-government now while the going is good and while war conditions impose a certain restraint on the Government. We can try to devise some different form of Government which, while democratic, does not conform to the Westminster model. We can put off the evil day by appointing a commission of inquiry.203 Attlee had been assisted in Newfoundland by (Peter) Alexander Clutterbuck, who had served as secretary of the 1933 royal commission and now became a key player in dismantling what that inquiry had wrought. As a first planning step, Attlee announced in the House of Commons on 5 May 1943 the despatch of a goodwill parliamentary mission to Newfoundland to gather information on the basis of “personal contacts” with “kinsmen” and offer advice unofficially.204 Those named to the mission were  mp s Charles Ammon (Labour – Camberwell), Sir Derek Gunston (Conservative – Thornbury), and A.P. Herbert (Independent – Oxford University). They arrived in Newfoundland on 21 June and were conducted on an extensive tour of Newfoundland and coastal Labrador by William J. Carew, the secretary of the Commission of Government. Smallwood saw in the appointment of the parliamentary mission “a typically British method of doing in an apparently off-handed way what other countries or governments would probably do in a more direct fashion.”205 Looking ahead, he imagined how the conversation would go, once back in London, between a member of the mission and a fellow mp wanting to be informed:

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“Hello, I see you’re back from Newfoundland. Did you have a nice holiday?” “Yes, I had a lovely holiday.” “What kind of country is it?” “Well, that’s a long story, but on the whole I should say a very pleasant place, and a splendid run of people.” “How’s this Commission of Government idea working out?” “Not very well, I’m afraid. It doesn’t seem to meet that country’s needs at all.” “And what do the Newfoundlanders say about it?” “Well, they don’t say very much about it, but there’s no doubt that they’re heartily sick of it.” “What do they want in its place?” “It would be hard to say. You see, the Newfoundland people are not politically organized. There isn’t any organized group that could speak for any sizeable proportion of them. Hence, there isn’t any clear-cut agreement amongst them as to just what they want. But in general they want the Commission system abolished and some kind of popular government put in its place – some kind that will give the people control over them, with the privilege [of] turning them out of office if they don’t measure up. But beyond that I’m afraid they don’t know quite what they want – not in detail anyway.”206 Truth, however, was that mp s at large would not be “a bit surprised” to learn that Newfoundlanders had not “worked out, all cut and dried” exactly what kind of government they wanted.207 They would understand that “forms and systems of government” were not devised that way. The most that could reasonably be expected from the general public was to know “in broad outline” what they wanted. In the case of Newfoundlanders, this meant “a decided preference” to replace the present system of government, in which they had “no say whatsoever,” with a system in which they would have “a very definite share of responsibility and power.”

o n ly c o u n t ry you’ve got During the summer of 1943, Smallwood took another two-month break from broadcasting, once again working on his farm.208 He now owned this property, having bought it on 2 January from Frieda Giannou of St John’s for $3,250 and mortgaging it five days later, along with animals, farm equipment, and vehicles, to Les Curtis for $9,000 at 8 per cent annual interest.209 On 1 September, he returned to the air with his usual vim and vigour and on 11 October sold his LeMarchant Road property to Ray S. Parsons (“Married woman”) for $6,000.210 On 13 October, he optimistically told his audience that the

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minds of Newfoundlanders had “opened and expanded” and that they had become “more national” in outlook: They feel that the government is not doing big things for the country; big things tha[t] need to be done and can be done. They feel that Newfoundland needs a government of progressive, vigorous, determined policies, and their dissatisfaction with the present government is almost entirely along these lines ... The average Newfoundlander today has greater faith than he ever had in his country: greater faith in her possibilities, in her resources. He believes that Newfoundland if she was properly handled, would give every man a decent living, if he was willing to work. He believes that what Newfoundland needs above everything else is good, aggressive, constructive government by men who have ideas in their heads and courage in their hearts.211 Then, on Saturday, 26 November, he gave his last broadcast – number 1,752 – in the Barrelman series. In more than six years on the program, he noted, he had taken some 15,000 telephone calls, received about 12,000 visitors, and toured about 700 settlements, meeting about 50,000 people in his travels.212 In reporting his impending exit from the airwaves (it mistakenly also reported the program itself would be discontinued), the Daily News noted that over the life of the broadcast, more than 60,000 letters had been received from listeners. The highlights of the program included a conversation (20 October 1938) with Ellen Carroll (née Dwyer) of North River, Conception Bay, at the time the oldest living Newfoundlander, on the occasion of her 111th birthday; an interview (17 March 1939) with Newfoundland Arctic exploration hero Captain Bob Bartlett, heard from New York thanks to a recently introduced radio telephone system; and the annual Fish-a-Man campaign, which to date had produced $50,000 for the Newfoundland Patriotic Association.213 A popular “Palmolive Girl” had served the interest of F.M. O’Leary Ltd, Newfoundland agent for the eponymous soap (along with Buckley’s Mixture, Pepsodent Tooth Paste, and Gillette Blue Blades). On its editorial page, the Daily News praised Smallwood for having sustained a program that was “unique” and had fostered “pride in our native land.”214 “If I had one last word to say to you,” Smallwood admonished his listeners as he left the role of Barrelman, “it would be to urge you to try to understand your country more: understand and love her more; be ever more fiercely resentful of injury to her, ever more anxious to seek her true welfare. She’s the only country you’ve got – guard and protect her.”215 His voice was last heard on the program on

2.6 Smallwood in his Barrelman years, with Ellen Carroll. For 19 October 1940, to mark her 113th birthday the next day, he organized a reception in her honour at the North River parish hall, with proceedings carried live in an hour-long program heard over vonf and vonh, St John’s, starting at 9:30 p.m. In his Barrelman broadcast of 18 October 1940, he called Mrs Carroll the “grand old sweetheart of Newfoundland.”

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29 November in a recorded introduction of Michael Harrington, his Barrelman successor, who later became a political opponent.216 On 2 December 1943, just days after Smallwood’s swansong, a decisive announcement was made in the British House of Commons. This was that, soon after the end of the war in Europe, the United Kingdom must provide the people of Newfoundland with machinery to decide their own constitutional future, “having regard to the financial and economic conditions prevailing at the time.”217 The United Kingdom government had “no desire ... to impose any particular solution” and would “be guided by the freely expressed views of the people.” Newfoundlanders would decide their own constitutional future, but, crucially, the British would decide how they would decide – a distinction on which the future of the country would ultimately hinge. With this announcement, and with business and labour pulling in different directions in Newfoundland, the Dominions Office was now firmly in control of events there. Governor Walwyn had hit the mark when he had told a Grand Falls audience in March 1943: “Let us win the war first, the lads over seas do not want representation handed down to them on a platter while they are away.”218

gander Smallwood’s next venture in life was as manager of an raf piggery in humming wartime Gander. In the early days of his own pig-rearing operation, swine farms in the St John’s area had suffered many animal deaths, a circumstance that Smallwood attributed to disease but which, on inspection, the veterinary staff of the Department of Natural Resources put down to unsanitary conditions.219 In a report dated 23 November 1942, Government Veterinarian (William) Ralph LeGrow and Chief Health Inspector Alexander Bishop gave a bleak account of what they had seen on a visit to the Smallwood farm: interior partitions in the barn “were for the most part down,” and “a variety of livestock, such as goats (both male and female) poultry and pigs” had “free access to all parts of the barn floor.” The result was an unsanitary mess. Help was insufficient at the operation, and the owner had never considered that pigs might “become too dirty.”220 When Smallwood questioned the credentials of the Newfoundland experts and pressed for a veterinary expert to be brought in from Canada, Commissioner for Natural Resources P.D.H. Dunn, a British member of the government, noted the irony of such a request coming from “an ardent disciple of Newfoundland uber alles.”221 Nevertheless, he authorized an approach for assistance through the Canadian High Commission in St John’s, but the matter ended when

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the Canadian authorities concluded that a Canadian veterinarian would recommend exactly what the Newfoundland animal health officials had recommended. In the end, Smallwood’s request was denied, and he was told that the answer to the problem faced by local producers was to boil the garbage being fed to their pigs and keep their premises in “as clean and healthy condition as possible.”222 Without these measures, there would “always be a grave risk of hog cholera breaking out.” Evidently, Smallwood was learning the pig business on the job, but he was soon deemed qualified for the Gander post. The piggery at the airport was the brainchild of Group Captain David F. Anderson, who was in command of the raf unit no. 45 (Atlantic Transport Group) based there. On arriving in Gander in 1942 from “food conscious” England, where rationing was a pressing reality,223 Anderson found that kitchen scraps, in the range of two tons per day, were being burnt in order not to feed rats. His answer to this waste was to start a piggery to put the scrap food to good use. To get the operation started, he had sixteen pigs flown in from Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, in November 1942. During the winter of 1942–43, they were housed in temporary quarters and were eventually joined by a pedigree Yorkshire boar, also flown over from Prince Edward Island and known in Gander as “Herman Boarin.”224 Convinced that his pig farming experiment had productive potential but unable to give it the time needed to make it a success, Anderson, who also took advice from the Department of Natural Resources, apparently sought Smallwood out while on a visit to St John’s. Between them they “cooked up a very fine deal”: Anderson needed help, and Smallwood saw a chance to accumulate capital for his own struggling farming venture.225 He was backed in the venture by Ches Crosbie, who gave him “a $10,000 loan at 6 percent annual interest” with “a promise of 40 percent of the profits.”226 The building in which the raf -sponsored piggery that Smallwood subsequently managed was designed by David Jones, the raf ’s superintendent of works and buildings at the airport, who had a farm background and was Anderson’s adviser on construction. The piggery had a capacity of 500 hogs and was the biggest and most modern facility of its kind in Newfoundland. In a 1945 summary of his partnership agreement, Smallwood offered these details: “I manage the piggery, provide the pigs, labour, sell the pigs, supervise the slaughtering and smoking of the hams and bacons and so forth. We divide the profit. The term depends on the duration of Gander as an airport. When the r.a.f. and r.c.a.f. forces move out of Gander, the piggery enterprise comes to an end.”227 For his part, Squadron Leader H.A.L. Pattison, the air representative for the Newfoundland Government at Gander, had given this account on 20 January 1944:

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The r.a.f. Transport Command have made an agreement with a citizen of Newfoundland – Mr. J.R. Smallwood – on a profit sharing basis. The r.a.f. Transport Command have provided the building, which cost, I believe, about $30,000. Mr. Smallwood and his financial backers have provided the pigs – about 500. Mr. Smallwood is in charge and he pays expenses including the staff. After the payment of the building has been made from the profits, the balance is shared equally between Mr. Smallwood and the r.a.f. Transport Command, this latter share being devoted to the Unit’s Welfare Fund. The agreement with Mr. Smallwood can be terminated by three months’ notice after the investment has been paid off. I explained to Group Captain Anderson that the Newfoundland Government has an interest in any arrangement that the r.a.f. Transport Command might make, both on account of our ownership of the land and with regard to an agreement with a third party.228 Smallwood went to Gander in December 1943 without his immediate family; Clara and the children remained on the semi-isolated Kenmount Road property, whence sons Ramsay and Bill and daughter Clara had a long trek to and from school in St John’s, though Clara got to ride the farm workhorse “Frank.”229 But Joe depended on relatives for help with his new venture: when the 1945 Newfoundland census was taken, his brother Reg and family and Clara’s brother Cyrus T. Oates were also listed as residents of Gander (there was a staff cottage adjacent to the piggery).230 According to an informative desk diary he kept in 1944, in January Smallwood visited Buchans, where his sisters-in-law Beulah – now married to postmaster Walter Milley and with a baby also named Walter – and Emma,231 a nurse with whom he was especially close, were living. He made his way back to Gander on a freight train, which had hooked on to it the Terra Nova, the private car of the Newfoundland Railway, with Governor and Lady Walwyn aboard.232 On 22 January, the vice-regal couple inspected the piggery, which thereafter attracted many other visiting worthies.233 On 25 February, Smallwood got a ride to Buchans on an rcaf Norseman, the first of a number of Newfoundland plane rides he took on military aircraft; one of them, authorized by Anderson and with raf Gander maintenance chief Joe Gilmore at the controls, was to promote the local sale of pork and pork products.234 In April, Ches Crosbie visited, arriving via a scheduled Trans-Canada Air Lines daily service that now made travel between St John’s and Gander quick and easy; Crosbie told Pattison “that he had come to look at his pigs.”235 Eventually, Ross Young came out from St John’s to audit the piggery’s books.236

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2.7 Wartime accommodation at Gander. Smallwood lived in the wing of the building on the right.

Smallwood fitted easily into the international milieu of Gander, ate cafeteria food, enjoyed boating, and saw many movies, a daily source of entertainment on the base. Early on in his sojourn there, he started a discussion group and was likewise active in union organizing.237 His desk diary also mentions many telephone calls and letters to and from Clara and various remittances to her. On 16 July, Clara, daughter Clara (Smallwood referred to her affectionately as “Baby”), Beulah, and her son, little Walter, arrived on Trans-Canada from St John’s.238 On 20 August, Smallwood made the first of two business trips to Canada, courtesy of Anderson and raf Transport Command. He flew from Gander to Montreal on a B-24 Liberator bomber – a trip that took five and a half hours – and then continued on to Toronto.239 Following this expedition, he worked out a possible deal with the Canadian authorities for the purchase of 3,000 surplus beds and springs, blankets, and chairs, thereby opening up what he hoped would be a profitable new line of business.240 On 21 September – Clara was on hand at the time – he again flew from Gander to Montreal, this time on a Dakota.241 On this second visit, he made his way first to Toronto and then to Guelph,

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2.8 Joe and Clara Smallwood in the mid-1940s.

a Canadian agricultural hub. On 1 November, the Daily News quoted him as saying that the Gander piggery was “superior to any he had visited in Canada.”242 Hitherto, butchered pork had been “used fresh from refrigeration,” but a newly erected curing building would now facilitate the production of smoked ham and bacon. On 13 December, he made a bank deposit of “just under $7,000,” a sum that was indicative of the better times that had come his way.243 That same month, sons Ramsay and Bill were in Gander (Bill, no longer Billie, for the second time), and on the 22nd Joe made his way to St John’s for Christmas, hitching a ride on a military aircraft.244 On 25 December, he wrote in his diary: “Clara, Mrs. Oates & baby & I to my mother’s for tea.”245 Wartime prosperity and domestic bliss went hand in hand in Newfoundland. In January 1945, Smallwood published in the Fishermen’s Advocate an informative account of the evolution of “The Gander Airport.”246 He praised Anderson, his latest patron, and Gilmore for having “a deep interest and liking for Newfoundland and Newfoundlanders.” This was evident in the fact that the “overwhelming majority” of the aircraft maintenance staff at the Gander raf unit were Newfoundlanders,

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some of whom had made their way through apprenticeships with their employer. Shortly before, Smallwood himself had been the subject of a profile, “Newfoundland’s ‘Barrelman’ Raises Pigs,” written by Sgt Neale Reinitz, an American serviceman stationed at Gander, in the Fall 1944 issue of Propagander, a base publication.247 He described Smallwood as “a wiry alert-looking man of 44” who was “not sorry” that he had transitioned from journalism to his present “fundamental way of making a living.” As diners at Government House, St John’s, ate their “weekly shipment of sausages from the raf piggery,” they might remember with regret that ex-Barrelman Smallwood no longer stimulated “national interest and patriotism throughout Newfoundland.” Politically, Smallwood kept the flame alive during his Gander piggery days with spirited letters to the editor, a genre in which he excelled. In a missive to the editor of the Daily News, published on 3 June 1944 and headed “Awake Newfoundlanders!” he lamented that though “a brave people,” his countrymen had adopted “the most craven attitude in their entire history” in leaving their destiny to the will of others: In ... the past four or five years there have strutted across the Newfoundland stage various English officials, elected and appointed; various American and Canadian officials, civil and military; various journalists from other lands. They have all had their say about Newfoundland. Absent from the picture have been the Newfoundland people. All we have had the strength to do is wonder what “they” intend for us, what plans or decisions “they” may be devising for our country, what shape “they” may have in mind for Newfoundland’s future.248 If Newfoundlanders did not want “to be dumb, driven beasts, wondering dully what outsiders may or not decide for them,” political leadership had to assert itself, and political parties had to be formed forthwith: Let some outstanding Newfoundlander throw his hat in the ring. If he has faith in the country, if he has faith in himself, if he has a record of solid achievement, and is well and favorably known to the people, and is a man of substance, let him announce that he is not only willing but frankly eager to become Prime Minister. Let him surround himself with a considerable number of solid, progressive Newfoundlanders who have faith in the country, in him, and in themselves – let that happen, and he and Great Britain, and Canada,

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2.9 Clara at work on the Kenmount Road farm.

will be astounded by the instantaneous public response he will get in this country. Our people need political leadership ... And in political matters, there can be only one leadership: political parties. To command respect, Newfoundlanders had to deserve it – and this meant action now, not when the war was over. In the same vein, he wrote in January 1945 that “the only means ever devised by the wit of man to enable public opinion to become concerted” was the political party and that Newfoundlanders could expect to be treated more respectfully by the British once they had one or more of them.249 In a letter to the editor dated 1 February 1945, he laid out his ideas about how responsible government could be restored to Newfoundland without opening the way for graft and corruption.250 The end of the war in Europe – ve -Day came on 8 May 1945 – brought Smallwood to another juncture in life. The rcaf would soon return the airport to civilian control, and the raf unit, his partner in business, would soon go home. He had thrived in futurist Gander, an avatar of progress and of the coming age of mass air travel, having made good money and forged many connections there. But his future at the

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airport was now uncertain: the piggery was owned by the departing raf and was built on Crown land. Continued operation, if feasible, would need the permission of the government in St John’s. His business affairs, moreover, were now complicated by the expropriation of three and a half acres of his forty-acre Kenmount Road farm – including two and a half of the six acres of arable land – by the St John’s Housing Corporation, a creation of the Commission of Government.251 The land was taken for the building of a road in connection with a proposed housing development. Evidence about this matter – “Property No. 77” and “Claim No. 63” – was taken before a board of assessors in St John’s on 13 June 1945. Smallwood was represented on this occasion by Les Curtis, his mortgage on the property notwithstanding, and the Housing Corporation by Gerald G. Tessier. In his testimony, Smallwood was categorical about his plans for the future: “Pigs is my business,” he declared.252

c h a n g in g c ours e In fact, a door was about to open in spectacular fashion for his return to electoral politics. The backdrop to this turn of events was complex, much of it hidden away in Anglo-Canadian diplomacy. Following the British announcement in December 1943 that Newfoundlanders would decide their own constitutional future once the war in Europe was over, the Dominions Office gave detailed attention to how responsible government could be returned to the country without triggering another financial crisis. Assuming that a postwar slump was a distinct possibility in Newfoundland, British thinking initially favoured putting in place a long-term economic development plan before self-government was restored. The details of such a plan were worked out with the Commission of Government, but the price tag of $100 million ran into stiff Treasury opposition. When John Maynard Keynes, who was an adviser there at the time, examined the proposed scheme, he quipped that “$100 million must be a misprint for $10 million.”253 “Even if we were stuffed with money,” he advised, “this would seem to be somewhat out of proportion.” The reality was that given its own financial problems, the United Kingdom simply could not underwrite a smooth transition in St John’s. In the circumstances, Whitehall next returned to an old policy objective for Newfoundland: union with Canada – and it now had new cards to play. In the financial crisis of the 1930s, Canada had been able to walk away from the troubles of Newfoundland, but the war had shown that the defence of Newfoundland was vital to the defence of Canada. Moreover, the American presence in Newfoundland for

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ninety-nine years was by definition a source of concern for Ottawa, the more so because after the war Canada would have a small military footprint on the island. In 1944, Canada had secured from Newfoundland a ninety-nine year lease on the base at Goose Bay but not on the sweeping terms the United States had been able to negotiate in the leased bases agreement of 1941. The contrast between the rights of the two countries in Newfoundland was striking and, with political change imminent there, Canada had good reason to seize the moment – or risk making a historic mistake. In September 1945 (Attlee had become prime minister in July), P.A. Clutterbuck went to Ottawa to press the British case vis-àvis Newfoundland and was received sympathetically.254 The outcome of his visit was an understanding between the United Kingdom and Canada that the two countries would work together behind the scenes to steer Newfoundland into Confederation while respecting the 1943 promise that Newfoundlanders would choose their own constitutional future. Next, on 11 December 1945, having made this pact, the United Kingdom government announced that a National Convention would be elected in Newfoundland on a district by district basis, with candidates for election having to be resident for two years in the districts they sought to represent. The districts to be represented were those specified in the Redistribution Act of 1925, modified to take account of population change as indicated in the census recently taken in the country.255 Members  of the National Convention would have as their “duty and function ... to consider and discuss among themselves as elected representatives of the people of Newfoundland the changes that have taken place in the financial and economic situation of the Island since 1934, and, bearing in mind the extent to which the high revenues of recent years have been due to wartime conditions, to examine the position of the country and to make recommendations to His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom as to possible forms of future government to be put before the people at a national referendum.”256 The National Convention, it was calculated in London, would revive Newfoundland electorally and allow its politicians to blow off steam but would be advisory only. At the end of its limited proceedings, the British would decide what would happen next. The National Convention would not be a legislature but a talking shop with a simple purpose: to deliver advice that might or might not be followed. The intention of Whitehall to have authentic local representation was crystal clear and was well understood. In a letter to the editor written soon after the British announced their plan, Gregory J. (Greg) Power of Dunville, a future Newfoundland minister of finance, praised the local

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residence rule envisaged for the forthcoming election. It was, he wrote, “reassuring evidence of the British Government’s sincere desire to give every Newfoundlander, for the first time in his history, a fair opportunity to vote in representatives who have not been foisted on him by political party leaders.”257 In the past, outport voters “had in most cases never set eyes upon ... candidates until they came soliciting votes.” The terms of the National Convention election would finally ground the “bird of passage.” Smallwood was a beneficiary of the two-year residence that elicited this commendation. If he had stayed in St John’s after he had left the Barrelman program, he would have had to run for the National Convention there. One can only speculate on what his election prospects would have been in the capital, where he had long played to mixed reviews, but thanks to good timing, he was a bona fide resident of Gander and was eligible to run in the district in which it was situated. He learned of the National Convention from a newspaper article he read in Montreal while on a business visit to Canada, where he had travelled courtesy of the military.258 Immediately, becoming a member of that body became his priority in life. Never a man to hold back, he did not miss his chance.

o u t s id e r / in s i der In the period 1934–45, Joe Smallwood organized co-operatives, wrote and published extensively, edited The Book of Newfoundland, became a popular radio personality, travelled extensively and mixed across social divides, emerged as the most outspoken Newfoundland critic of Commission of Government, sought to revive his country politically by making Newfoundland better known to Newfoundlanders, imagined a self-governing and economically progressive homeland, acquired property, ran a successful piggery in partnership with the raf unit at cosmopolitan Gander, and cultivated a rich, rewarding family life and friendship network. In a deeply conservative society dominated by cautious small producers who lived from season to season, he was a born promoter and risk taker – a forward-looking masthead Newfoundlander. He aspired to lead, and in 1945 fortune smiled on him. “Political judgment,” the German statesman Otto von Bismarck famously remarked, “is the ability to hear the distant hoofbeats of the horse of history.” In the next phase of his life, as a member of the National Convention, it was Smallwood, at once an insider and an outsider, who heard those hoofbeats, lining up with what the United Kingdom and Canada wanted for Newfoundland and what the United States was willing to accept and reaping the political reward

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for leading Newfoundland into Confederation. He had long been a client – of Coaker, Squires, Curtis, Crosbie, O’Leary, and, latterly, Group Captain Anderson – but his destiny was to be a patron with a hold on power and a largesse at his command never seen in Newfoundland before or since.

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p o s t wa r p ros pects Smallwood returned from Montreal in December 1945 to a rapidly evolving Gander, now a nascent civilian town of which he was a prominent and outspoken resident. In a letter published in the Daily News on 24 December, he claimed that Gander airport could never be operated at a profit by the Newfoundland government, which would be lucky to recover operating costs from airlines using its runways. But Gander should not be regarded “as an end in itself, but only as a means to an end.”1 The end that Smallwood had in mind was tourism, which would take advantage of the many lakes and streams nearby. To attract wealthy sportsmen, he proposed the building of “250 luxury cabins” and the stationing of ten Norsemen aircraft at Gander to fly tourists to and from the cabins, each of which would have “a trained steward-guide.” The capital cost of the venture would be $1,500,000 and the annual operating costs $550,000. Given a rental of $200 per day and occupancy of each cabin for sixty days, annual income would be $3,000,000. To make the scheme work, Newfoundland would have to attract 5,000–10,000 tourists each season. While it was “properly a venture for private enterprise,” in the absence of interested investors the government would itself have to act if it wanted Gander to produce revenue. As often, Smallwood was drawn to the new and the grandiose. Locally, Smallwood made his presence felt by becoming president of the Gander Cooperative Society, which proposed not only to open a shop but to provide recreational and educational facilities for the community. Having inherited 2,000 books from the rcaf , the society intended to run a library “as a public service” and anticipated receiving three to four

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thousand dollars for its community work from the windup of the raf Gander Welfare Fund.2 On 2 April, Smallwood asked H.A.L. Pattison, who was still representing the Newfoundland government in Gander, for a lease to the building known as the Dry Canteen (formerly occupied by the Women’s Division of the rcaf ) to the society to be used as a shop. Membership in the co-operative now numbered about eighty, “[m]ost of them ... family men, having their families in Gander.”3 As he looked to his political future, Smallwood was careful to cultivate this kind of grassroots support. He was also kept busy in the early months of 1946 with pressing business matters. Backed with a loan of $3,000 from Ches Crosbie and now with airport administrator Anthony Mullowney as his partner, Smallwood was able to finalize the purchase of the Canadian war surplus grey woollen blankets (but not apparently the beds, springs, and chairs) he had set out to buy the previous fall.4 Having acquired 3,000 blankets at $1 each, he and Mullowney had the good fortune to quickly sell the lot for $3 each to the woods department of Bowater’s. Half the windfall profit of $6,000 went to Crosbie and half to Smallwood and Mullowney, who got $1,500 each. A potentially risky deal – one of many in Smallwood’s long life – had paid off handsomely. The fate of the Gander piggery, the source of his wartime success, was another story altogether. Before the raf left Gander, Wing Commander Botting, the officer in charge at the time, sold the piggery building to Smallwood, effective 31 March 1946.5 The Newfoundland government subsequently had a survey done of the site, and thereafter Pattison recommended that the land in question should not be leased for more than a year at a time.6 By December 1946, there were no pigs in the piggery, although there were still staff members living in the adjoining cottage.7 In February 1947, Smallwood sought to lease the land on which the piggery building stood, and terms were worked out in response to his application.8 The government’s conditions were that the lease be for one year at a rental of $200 and that the leaseholder pay for water and electricity and assume responsibility for garbage removal and the cleanliness of the premises.9 The “question of swill” was to be worked out between Smallwood and the airport authorities. In May 1948, not having heard further from him on the matter, the government advised Smallwood that it assumed he was no longer interested in the arrangement.10 At the time, he was in arrears of $54 to the airport for services rendered.11 Earlier, a Smallwood relative – possibly his brother Reg – had approached the government about reopening the piggery, but this

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initiative also went nowhere.12 For several years the building stood abandoned, but in 1955, mirabile dictu, the federal Department of Transport bought it for $15,000.13 An unpromising asset had yielded another handsome return.

b o r n - ag a in c o nfed erate Active as he was in business and community affairs in the early months of 1946, Smallwood’s principal interest was the forthcoming National Convention. When he sounded Gordon Bradley out about prospects for the convention, he received a feisty reply (Smallwood, of course, knew nothing of the negative account Magistrate Bradley had earlier given of him in official correspondence). Smallwood’s letter, Bradley wrote, embodied “a voice from the past, bringing pleasant recollections of the days when we moved and were moved as pawns on a chessboard” before “the sluggard sleep” of twelve years of Commission of Government.14 Declaring himself “exceedingly suspicious” of British intentions, Bradley questioned the sincerity of “sackcloth and ashes” speeches in the House of Commons about the events of the 1930s. “If it was wrong to have taken responsible government from us in the first place,” he maintained, “the best way to repair as much of the wrong as possible is to give it back immediately.” There was no reason for Prime Minister Clement Attlee’s “little scheme” of a national convention, and another British betrayal might be in the works: “I can see no reason whatever for this cumbrous and slow scheme of Attlee’s except to make further delay while Britain, America, Canada, Russia and the rest of them make their saw-offs during the next two years. During that period Newfoundland and her assets are international currency in John Bull’s trousers pocket.” Bradley likewise feared that British experts sent to “advise and guide” the convention would “have an eye and a half to the interests of their own country and half an eye to those of Newfoundland.” But he agreed with Smallwood that there “should be a party within this Convention”: “A few men standing on common ground and sufficiently articulate can throw such a monkey wrench in the works as will cause it to develop in a straight demand for [the] immediate return of the status quo ante 1933.” As for the possibility of union with Canada, a matter that Smallwood was now busily investigating and Bradley had long favoured, the topic would have to be avoided in the convention: “I do not see how this convention can discuss the question of Confederation at all. The whole issue is dependent upon terms and I am not willing to have any representative assembly of Newfoundlanders place themselves on record as favouring

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Confederation on mere general principles. It will weaken our hand in making a bargain if one has to be made subsequently. This objection applies with equal validity to a convention vote again it.” Everything considered, Bradley advised his eager correspondent that it might well “be wise to keep out of this Convention.” Smallwood had a more benign view of things to come, writing from Gander on 20 January in a letter to the editor of the Daily News that the National Convention would have to investigate “this whole question of Confederation  ... very thoroughly”: “We will have to discover exactly what we would lose, and exactly what we would gain, by entering Confederation. Would it be a net loss or a net gain? There must be plain facts that will answer that question and these facts will have to be got and studied by all of us.”15 In another letter to the same paper, dated 25 January, Smallwood sought to counter considerable public disbelief “in the whole idea of the forthcoming National Convention.”16 The convention, he wrote, could demand information, engage expert help, appoint delegations of inquiry to London and Ottawa, and “if Britain is willing to help us, and if the terms of Confederation are at all attractive, send a final delegation to London to meet there with a delegation of the Canadian Government, to hammer out the final details and arrangements of our affiliation with Canada.” Two kinds of National Convention could be envisaged: 1 A National Convention comprised of forty delegates who enter it meekly and humbly, without a mandate from the people, without clear-cut ideas, more or less ready and willing to be pushed around by “experts.” or 2 A National Convention which, from the moment it convenes, takes brisk and workmanlike hold of the situation, and boldly moves in any and all directions in which it feels that it may usefully move for the good of Newfoundland. “Is there any doubt,” the ebullient Smallwood asked, “as to which of these two the National Convention should be?” In a follow-up letter, dated 2 February, he mused about how candidates for election to the National Convention might present themselves to the voters, ending with this optimistic account of what the convention would make possible, given the current state of public opinion in the country:

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[T]he majority of the Newfoundland people at the present moment, if they were confronted by that simple question: Commission Government or Responsible Government: would favor Commission Government. They dread the thought of a return to hard times and dole; they dread it with their whole soul. They have confused the mispractices which latterly grew up around the practice of Responsible Government with Responsible Government itself, mistaking one for the other. That is at least one reason why I welcome this National Convention. It means (the Convention) that before being called upon in the referendum to decide on what form of government they shall have for their country, the people will have had a vast new series of facts placed before them. Forty or forty-two men in whom they have some dependence will have sifted a lot of facts for them before they come to the actual voting. By means of the Convention any and every possible, every conceivable, proposal for Newfoundland’s good will get its proper hearing. For this I thank the British Government.17 On 7 February, a letter from Smallwood was read on the Barrelman program. This covered much of the same ground as his letters to the editor, but he reminded listeners that “one good thing” about joining Canada would be that Newfoundland would still have its own House of Assembly and its own government.18 On 14 February, Smallwood participated in the first of three St John’s gatherings “along the lines of the National Convention” sponsored by the mcli .19 These sessions were chaired by businessman and city councillor H.G.R. (Harry) Mews and proved so popular that the second and third events, on 21 and 28 February, were held in the spacious Pitts Memorial Hall on Harvey Road.20 Smallwood’s contribution was to explain the workings of Canadian fiscal federalism and highlight the fact that, in the event of union with Canada, Newfoundlanders would “never cease to be Newfoundlanders.”21 In its report of proceedings on 21 February, the Daily News gave this summary of the views expressed by Les Curtis: “I am sick and tired of hearing about crooked politicians,” said Mr. L.R. Curtis. The local politicians were no worse than those in other countries. We have had honest, interested and reliable men in government. Newfoundland’s government was suspended only, not dissolved, and as far as he could see only one issue was at stake, “Do we want our constitution back?” Confederation cannot be discussed because we are not in a position to make terms. The first thing is to

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get Responsible Government back, and then the people can decide what they want. The people should demand their own government and forget the national convention.22 When a vote was taken at the end of the mcli sessions, the result was: Confederation, 80; Responsible Government, 79; Commission Government, 38; Representative Government, 9.23 In 1968, Richard Gwyn wrote that Smallwood was converted to the cause of Confederation by Newfoundland expatriate Ewart Young, the editor of the popular Atlantic Guardian, which began publication in January 1945.24 This apparently happened during Smallwood’s December 1945 visit to Montreal when the two friends, digesting the news of the calling of the National Convention, had lengthy and lively discussions about the future of Newfoundland. To keep their conversation going, Smallwood apparently dashed off an article on the British announcement for submission by Young to meet a deadline at the Christian Science Monitor.25 But whatever influence his Montreal encounter may have had on him, Smallwood subsequently set out, with characteristic energy and application, to inform himself on the subject of Canadian federalism through extensive reading and research. He may also have toyed with the idea of helping to launch a party in favour of union with Canada to be led by Commissioner for Public Health and Welfare Sir John Puddester, whose career in Newfoundland politics went back to the 1920s. When, toward the end of February, he informed Bradley of this possibility, the latter reacted sharply, describing the news as “a real shock.”26 Bradley rejected as “premature” such an attempt “to line up a party so early in the game,” and he reminded Smallwood that Puddester had been a “principal” in the betrayal of Newfoundland “into the hands of Downing Street, which public crime both you and I publicly and strenuously opposed and still oppose.”

m a k in g t he cas e Nothing more was heard of the projected party, whereas Smallwood’s effort to inform himself about what would be involved in joining Canada soon bore rich fruit in the form of eleven detailed articles, published by the Daily News 1–14 March 1946 as letters to the editor so as not to identify the paper with his point of view.27 In the first letter in the series, Smallwood wrote that his purpose was not to make a case for or against Confederation. Rather, his goal was to explain all the arguments he knew for and against union with Canada, but as the letters progressed

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there was no mistaking his stance as a true believer. In the second letter, he argued that by becoming Canada’s tenth province, Newfoundland would get more than it gave. There would be gains and losses, but the gains would be substantial. The removal of Newfoundland customs duties would lead to a reduction in the cost of living, and Newfoundlanders would enjoy the benefit of Canada’s superior social programs – unemployment assistance, family allowances, veterans’ benefits, and old age pensions. Newfoundland would likewise benefit from the expertise of the Government of Canada in transportation, agriculture, fisheries, training for employment, etc. Newfoundlanders would be able to move freely to any part of Canada where work was available but would remain Newfoundlanders while enjoying the benefits of being Canadian. A Newfoundland member of the Ottawa Parliament “would almost always be Minister of Fisheries” for Canada, “and there would always be the closest liaison between our Fisheries department and that of the Dominion.”28 If Canada took over the operation of the Newfoundland Railway and related coastal boat system, either directly or through Canadian National Railways, there would be “a marked increase of efficiency and public service” without loss to those currently involved in the enterprises.29 Given the sources of public revenue available within Canada, a provincial government in Newfoundland was a viable proposition, and Newfoundland would not “go down” unless the whole of Canada went down.30 As part of a deal for union, moreover, Labrador might be sold to Canada for $200 million, payable in fifty annual instalments of $4 million each, with fishing rights being reserved.31 Newfoundland would have its fair share of mp s and senators, and its mp s “would be no dummies”; rather, they could be expected to play “a part in Dominion affairs much greater than their actual number might suggest.”32 Canada was open to the idea of Newfoundland entering Confederation, and it could be assumed that the United Kingdom was of like mind. As things stood, the Newfoundland people were “not strongly in favour of Responsible Government” unless it could be “strongly fortified and buttressed by help from outside.”33 “I do not believe,” Smallwood argued, “that our people would favour Responsible Government if it means Responsible Government paddling its own canoe, sinking or swimming by its own unaided efforts.”34 Accordingly, the National Convention should appoint a delegation to go to Ottawa to determine “(1) Whether Canada definitely would like to have us; (2) The general nature of the terms Canada would be prepared to offer; [and] (3) the attitude of the Canadian Government toward certain of our special

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problems.”35 The members of the convention who favoured this course of action should say to those who supported Responsible Government, “We will support your demand for Responsible Government if you will support our demand for a full and fair exploration of the Confederation question.”36 Those who wanted “the Confederation question fully and fairly explored must demand that it form part of the work of the National Convention”; otherwise, it might “never be even looked into.”37 The time to act was now, “this year.”38 As he prepared to run for election, Smallwood had both a promising cause and a defensible plan of action. When, however, he sought to make his case in a series of radio broadcasts, he was turned down by the Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland (bcn ), which explained that it intended “to place an equal amount of Free Broadcast Time at the disposal of all Candidates for the National Convention.”39 In follow-up letters to the editor of the Daily News, published on 20 March, he answered questions and addressed points arising from his account of Confederation and countered criticism from his friend Albert Perlin/“Wayfarer.” Writing from Gander on 12 March while his Confederation series was still in progress, he chided “Wayfarer” for being “less than fair” in characterizing his case as being based “mostly upon assumptions and conjectures.”40 “I have indicated unmistakeably,” Smallwood shot back, “where an argument was a conjecture or an assumption, and these arguments are a small minority compared with the arguments that are based upon solid and incontrovertible fact.” In a letter published on 1 April, Smallwood wittily countered the notion that Newfoundlanders would be overtaxed within Confederation by mocking the stiff hidden taxes they already paid through customs duties on the purchase of everyday items. His letter recounted the ad valorem reality – duties varied in percentage terms from item to item – of the mythical Bill Doakes as he started his work day: The alarm-clock (60%) rang noisily at 7:45. Bill Doakes stirred, then woke up. He threw the bed-clothes (40%) off him and the mattress (50%) creaked as he leapt out of bed (50%). Picking up his eyeglasses (65%) from the chair (65%), he put on his slippers (30%) and hurried over to the window. He let the blind (50%) slip up with a whirl and pushed the curtains (50%) aside. He saw as he looked through the glass (45%) that it was a fair morning. Hurrying to the bath (35%) room, he threw off his pyjama (40%) coat and turned on the hot-water tap (50%) into the wash basin (35%). First he washed with soap (40%) and then vigorously

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lathered (40%) up with his shave-brush (65%). Adjusting a new blade (50%) to his razor (50%), he soon had the stubborn stubble off. His face felt cool and clean after he had slapped on some aftershave lotion (65%). Throwing the damp towel (40%) down, he hurried back to his room ... It was exactly 8.30 by his watch (60%) as he sat at his desk (65%) and took up the morning’s Daily News. After he had looked over the paper he settled down to the editorial page and read the letters carefully. Then for the first time that morning he spoke. Addressing the stenographer who already (!) was busily clattering the keys of the typewriter (35%) he said: “I just can’t see where they get the idea that Confederation would help us. Why, we’d be taxed to death!”41 Skilled in the use of irony, hyperbole, and sarcasm, Smallwood was at his satirical best in the fateful spring of 1946. When Nova Scotia resident Robert Thorburn, son of a former Newfoundland premier of the same name,42 wrote in the Evening Telegram that Newfoundland would be “sold out under Confederation, the gem of the Atlantic to be ruled and taxed by the big wigs at Ottawa,” Smallwood issued a rebuttal that was at once witty and well targeted: “All this is pure comic opera. If Mr. Thorburn had added that the Canadians would come down and take our babies for gun-wads it would have been complete.”43 In answer to Thorburn’s reference in support of his case to previous clashes between Newfoundland and Canada – over the 1890 Bond-Blaine agreement (a failed trade deal with the United States), the Bait Act (a late–nineteenth-century assertion of sovereignty), and the long-simmering Labrador boundary dispute (a matter finally settled by judicial decision in 1927) – Smallwood was withering: I fear that Mr. Thorburn fails to curdle our blood with references to the Bond Blaine Treaty, the Bait Act, the Labrador Boundary Award of 1927. These are ancient history. What we are interested in knowing is what benefits we should get NOW by federating with Canada, and what losses we should incur, if any, and whether, on balance, we should gain or lose. Against the Bond-Blaine Treaty affair I place Family Allowances, which would distribute $9,000,000 annually amongst our 115,000 children under 16. Against the Bait Act business I place Old Age Pensions, which would distribute nearly $4,000,000 annually amongst our 10,000 persons of 70 and over. Against the Labrador Boundary Award of 1927 I place the somewhat

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important fact that Confederation would lower our cost of living by perhaps 40 per cent. There are elderly people in Nova Scotia, where Mr. Thorburn lives, who will never lose their ancient prejudice against Confederation. We have some like that in Newfoundland. The rest of us, with most of our lives still before us, are anxious to broaden and fortify the foundation of social welfare; and if we decide that Confederation will do that we shall not be frightened by catch-cries about becoming a slave to Canada, etc. Smallwood had a cause he deeply believed in and was in top fighting form. Bradley was much less buoyant, telling Smallwood on 29 March that as candidates came forward for the National Convention, he grew “more deeply concerned over the political situation in general and this National Convention in particular.”44 The “type of candidate” being seen failed “to measure up to the responsibilities of the work” at hand, and this threatened to undermine public confidence. Two possible forms of government for Newfoundland were “clear cut: (a) Commission government, and (b) Responsible Government.” By contrast, the National Convention would be able to propose “representative government” only if it had a draft constitution to go with its recommendation and Confederation only if it had “definite terms from Canada.” Bradley feared what would happen regarding Confederation if responsible government was restored and the matter became an issue of party politics. At the same time, it was a constitutional reality that “any bargain involving Confederation” would have to “be made between sovereign and independent states.” As his own thinking evolved, Bradley urged Smallwood to not be in a hurry to commit himself “to anyone or anything.”

o n e o f t h e i r own In fact, Smallwood was already out and about, preaching the gospel of Confederation as explained in his eleven March letters on the subject. On 6 April, at the invitation of residents of Dark Cove, Gambo, he spoke to “a full house” at a meeting held in the Orange Hall, Middle Brook.45 He was introduced by Thomas Goulding and following his address “ably answered” questions put to him. At the end of the evening’s proceedings, a “standing vote” showed strong support for Smallwood running for the district in the National Convention election. “The general public,” one newspaper account of this event gushed, would “feel privileged to

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have him represent them at the Convention, as he possesses such a complete knowledge of the different forms of government.” Reg Smallwood attended the Middle Brook meeting with his brother and decades later recalled the occasion vividly: Every seat was taken long before the meeting started. There were people standing wherever they could find a place. A political meeting in these settlements was a solemn affair; the people took their politics very seriously. Eventually, the meeting began. It was a hot night, and the longer Joe talked, the hotter it became. He had been preparing for that meeting for a long time. He always wore a three-piece suit at such functions. After speaking for half an hour, he took off his coat and vest. He spoke for another half hour and took off his collar and tie. He spoke for two and a half hours, then answered questions for another hour. There were no interruptions during his speech. His audience must have counted him as one of their own ... The crowd stayed until the train came to take us back to Gander ... The meeting ... was a great boost to Joe. He returned to Gander, more determined than ever to get Confederation on the ballot paper.46 In other such meetings – at Middle Brook, Dark Cove, Gambo, and Greenspond (where he spoke for four hours) – he likewise swept all before him.47 Lloyd Wicks, born in 1932 and in time a judge, well remembered Smallwood arguing the case for Confederation around the dining room table at the Gambo Hotel, which the Wicks family owned.48 On the campaign trail, as he preached for a call, Smallwood was a formidable presence. Writing from Bragg’s Island in April 1946, fisherman Jonas Glover promised Smallwood his support and hoped that by “coming out” he would open the door to a better tomorrow. “I am a poor family man,” Glover wrote, “with no job or no ways or mean[s] to live. I am a fisherman with no motor boat nor no engine and no way to get one. I am trusting you will do your best for me if you get electe[d].”49 Glover’s perspective was that of many outport Newfoundlanders, who knew exactly what they wanted from the political round that was about to begin. Smallwood gave eloquent voice to their inchoate wishes, and they in return became his core political base. On 26 April, Smallwood was back on the editorial page of the Daily News, this time responding to a letter the paper had published by a Nova Scotia resident who wanted his province to leave Confederation.

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3.1 The old Gambo Hotel where, as a teenager, Judge Lloyd Wicks heard the Confederation table talk of Joe Smallwood. Gambo was on the main line of the Newfoundland Railway.

The letter in question, reprinted from the Halifax Chronicle, had been triggered by a request Smallwood had made to about thirty Nova Scotians, including the editor of the Chronicle, to answer this question: “If the Nova Scotia people were asked whether they preferred to have their Province remain in Confederation or become a separate British Colony, which would their answer be?”50 When the Chronicle had published his missive – which was not Smallwood’s intent – the letter to the editor picked up by the Daily News had followed. From the founding of Canada, Smallwood explained, a minority of people in Nova Scotia had opposed Confederation. Over time, this group, “though often very noisy,” had dwindled into insignificance. It was also the case that Nova Scotia’s entry into Confederation had been “clouded with double-dealing and political skulduggery,” none of which would apply in Newfoundland: “If Newfoundland ever enters Confederation, it must be with the full, free support of the Newfoundland people; and if and when a great majority

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of Newfoundlanders decide that this is the best step, then we may fairly expect the dissident minority to fall in line and cooperate loyally with the decision of the majority. Meanwhile we must be on guard against the silly propaganda of the tiny faction of short-sighted isolationists in Nova Scotia who hate Confederation.” In early May, Smallwood met in Gander with the Canadian High Commissioner to Newfoundland, the Nova Scotia–born J.S. (Scott) Macdonald, who had travelled to the airport to attend a conference on air navigation facilities. Their meeting took place over dinner and continued into the evening. The talk was frank and covered “the forthcoming Convention and the various alternatives open to Newfoundland.”51 Macdonald was impressed with Smallwood’s energy and knowledge and asked Ottawa that he be kept up to date on the Newfoundlander’s extensive correspondence with Canadian government officials. When Smallwood reported to Bradley on this meeting, the latter was quick to reply. Writing on 11 May, Bradley welcomed the news and noted in particular Macdonald’s assertion that Canada would not want to negotiate with the Commission of Government. “I have told you pretty clearly,” he reminded Smallwood, “that is my view. Don’t you realize that association with Commission introduces a jarring element. There are thousands of people in this country who hate Commission, and their entry into any negotiations will immediately cast suspicion upon the whole thing and give the opponents of Confederation a powerful weapon against it.”52 What was needed was a “carefully prepared campaign of education” and secrecy as to tactics “until we get things lined up in the Convention.” At this stage, a “very small slip” would allow vested interests an early opportunity to derail the Confederation enterprise. Turning to local politics, Bradley questioned whether Smallwood’s Gander friend and business associate Anthony Mullowney, a Roman Catholic, should run for the National Convention against fpu president Ken Brown in Bonavista South, where Catholics were a minority (the boundaries of the districts to be contested were now known, but enabling legislation was pending). Signalling denominational differences to come, Bradley, who had been Grand Master of the Orange Order in Newfoundland, offered this assessment: “It is by no means certain that he will get the R.C. vote solid ... And you must not forget that our people do not like the idea of being represented anywhere (as between R[oman].C[atholic] s and Prot[estant]s.) by one of the smaller section. And it is easy to start the sectarian whisper. Once it is started it spreads like a prairie fire.” In the event, Mullowney did not run. Instead, he gave the broad-minded Smallwood his $750 return from their windfall profit on the sale of

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blankets as a contribution to his election campaign. It was a magnanimous gesture that Smallwood never forgot.53 On 16 May, Smallwood rounded out a busy 1946 season of letter-writing with a missive to the editor of the Daily News, again disputing “Wayfarer’s” views on Confederation. “It would be well,” he began, “for  ... Wayfarer to make himself familiar with Confederation before he ventures again to discuss it.”54 Drawing on his own now extensive knowledge of the subject, Smallwood recommended “a course of study” for his journalist colleague, on whom he made a courtesy call the same day.55 As he awaited the announcement of the date of the National Convention election, Joe Smallwood was in top literary and rhetorical form and raring to go, anxious to “broaden and fortify the foundation of social welfare” for the Newfoundland people.56

b o n av is ta centre On 17 January 1946, Governor Walwyn departed St John’s after almost a decade at Government House. His replacement, Sir Gordon Macdonald, a former Labour member of the British Parliament and an Attlee associate, arrived in the Newfoundland capital from Halifax on 2 May aboard the Furness-Withy liner Fort Townsend, accompanied by Lady Macdonald (Mary), son Kenneth, aged twenty-five, and daughter Glenys, aged twenty-three (Kenneth acted as his father’s private secretary in St John’s).57 Macdonald had started work at age thirteen as a miner’s helper, had risen through the ranks of the British Labour Party, and was a seasoned political operative. Soon after he took up residence in Government House, the British plan for deciding the constitutional future of Newfoundland began to unfold in earnest. The first step was the passing of the National Convention Act, 1946 by the Commission of Government on 21 May (the public had been informed in February that legislation was in the works and given some details of what was being planned, and in the first week of April a draft bill had been published).58 A document of ninety-nine pages, the act provided for the return of forty-five members to the National Convention in thirty-eight districts, the boundaries of which were specified in a schedule to the legislation.59 Thirty-three districts would return one member each; Grand Falls, Harbour Main, and Humber would return two members each; and St John’s City (East) and St John’s City (West) would return three members each. By proclamation under the act, the date of the election was set for 21 June and the closing date of nominations for Friday, 31 May. But these dates did not apply in the remote districts of Labrador (to be

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represented in a Newfoundland elected body for the first time), St Barbe, and White Bay, where separate arrangements would follow.60 In three radio addresses following the passage of the National Convention Act, Magistrate Nehemiah Short, who had been named chief electoral officer in February, explained its terms.61 To vote in the election, a person, male or female, had to be a British subject, aged twenty-one, and have been “ordinarily and bona fide resident in Newfoundland” for two years before polling day.62 By extension, to vote in a particular district a person had to be “an ordinary and bona fide” resident in that district, and only a person eligible to vote in a district could be a candidate there.63 Ineligible for voting were returning officers (except in the case of a tie result), election clerks, anyone in jail, patients at the mental hospital in St John’s, and residents of that city’s home for the aged and infirm.64 A nomination paper had to be submitted to the returning officer for a district, and a person nominated had to consent in writing to his or her nomination.65 Nomination in a particular district required the signature of two persons eligible to vote there and the signature of a witness likewise qualified. A witness to a nomination had to appear before the district returning officer and swear an oath of attestation, and a nominee for a district had to swear or affirm a declaration of residence there. On 31 May, having shortly before visited Bonavista66 where he no doubt consulted Bradley, Smallwood was duly nominated to run in the district of Bonavista Centre, which included the Gander area and the sweep of coast running from Newman Sound to Greenspond, where he had been cultivating support.67 Those acting on his behalf as nominators and witness were James Blackwood, a Glovertown businessman; Desmond Daly, the president of the Gander Radio Workers Association; and George W. Turner of Happy Adventure, a fisherman.68 Smallwood’s letter of consent to be nominated was written from Glovertown, where his nomination paper was submitted to district returning officer James Sweetapple.69 Smallwood’s occupation – the nomination paper required this information – was given as “Journalist.” Only one other candidate was nominated for the district, namely, Kitchener Pritchett, a merchant from Middle Brook.70 Acting on his behalf were Carson Stroud and Austin Baird of Glovertown and Chesley Spurrell of Eastport. Spurrell, a teacher, had come to Glovertown hoping to be nominated himself, only to find that he did not qualify under the act.71 Countrywide, 123 candidates were nominated for the 21 June election, seven of whom were elected by acclamation (in the districts of Bay de Verde, Bonavista South, Bonavista North, Fogo, Fortune Bay, Hermitage, and St Mary’s). The list of candidates – a number of whom

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published apologias in local newspapers72 – included only two women – Frances Blaikie Holmes in St John’s City (West) and Martha Hann in Humber.73 Holmes, who had been active in wartime volunteer work in St John’s and awarded the mbe , ran to encourage women to vote.74 Hann gave her occupation as “Housewife.”75 Bradley was nominated in Bonavista East and on 4 June gave a radio address in which he called the Commission of Government a “dictatorship of six individuals” but left the door open as to what course the country should next follow.76 There was, he said, “only one question” facing the voter: “Who is the ablest, best trained, and most experienced candidate? Who is the best qualified to grapple with the involved problems which face the Convention?” Ches Crosbie, Smallwood’s long-standing patron, was nominated in St John’s City (West) (Clara Smallwood, who was still living on Kenmount Road, was eligible to vote in the adjoining, semi-rural St John’s West).77 Speaking on the radio on 17 June, Crosbie made this open-ended commitment: “I am for that form of government which will give us ... the best standard of living, and the greatest opportunity for the development of all our natural resources; that will leave the people of this country free to make, when and if, necessary, advantageous trade agreements with any other country that wishes to make a fair deal with us.”78 Another nominee in St John’s City (West) was former Finance Minister Major Peter J. Cashin, who gave his occupation as “Gentleman”; a fiery speaker with a complex political past, he personified for many the old-style Newfoundland party man. In 1945, he had thundered on VOCM, St John’s, as the Voice of Liberty and had then launched the Restoration League, which campaigned for the immediate return of responsible government to the country. (The Fishermen’s Advocate praised the league for offering people “the opportunity to protest against political slavery”79). From Cashin’s perspective, the National Convention was but a cooked-up scheme to keep the Commission of Government in office.80 Yet another candidate in St John’s City (West) was Michael Harrington, the incumbent Barrelman. In an article in the 26 May issue of the Sunday Herald, a brassy American-style tabloid weekly promoted by Geoff Stirling, which had burst on the Newfoundland scene two weeks before, Harrington had asserted that before Newfoundlanders could “seriously consider Confederation they must be a free, independent people ... represented by a Government ... elected by a majority opinion.”81 There was much “loose talk” – no doubt Smallwood was the target here – about the issue of Confederation and what its place would be in the deliberations of the National Convention:

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The assumption that such body can seek for terms, discuss them, and even go so far as to conduct negotiations, is highly irregular, and even on the face of it somewhat absurd. That the matter of Confederation will be discussed by the National Convention is to be expected, although in the strictest sense, its pros and cons as an alternative form of Government can only be considered by a sovereign government responsible to a majority of the Newfoundland people. For Confederation in the last analysis is not an alternative form of Government per se, but rather an alternative form of Responsible Government. The sooner people realize this, the sooner we will have an end to the “loose talk” … and a saner and more objective view of the much-talked-about but little-understood question. Clearly, stormy days lay ahead in Newfoundland politics.

m e m b e r- in - wai ti ng On 21 June, there were forest fires in the Glovertown area, and many men were away fighting them, but the election in Bonavista Centre proceeded on course: Smallwood won handily, receiving 2,129 votes to 277 for Kitchener Pritchett.82 On a district by district basis, his total, as a percentage of votes cast, was the highest of any candidate elected, but a local critic was later to point out that he had not been supported by a majority of those eligible to vote.83 Bradley was elected in Bonavista East, defeating Edward G. Cook of Port Union, an raf veteran who had won the Distinguished Flying Cross.84 In St John’s City (West), where there were twelve candidates, Crosbie led the poll, and Cashin and Harrington were also elected. In St John’s City (East), the three members elected were King’s Counsel Gordon F. Higgins, prominent businessman Edgar L. Hickman, and R.B. Job, a totemic Water Street business figure. The Newfoundland National Party, a labour grouping, had been formed in St John’s in February 1946, and electrician Frank Fogwill, a member of the party’s executive, was elected in St John’s East.85 Neither of the two women candidates was successful. The election of the National Convention was completed when members were eventually returned for the districts of St Barbe, White Bay, and Labrador, where the vote was held over several weeks from the customs vessel Marvita. In St Barbe, Edgar L. Roberts of Woody Point, a general dealer, was elected by acclamation. In a two-way race, White Bay returned Isaac Newell of St Anthony, a co-operative field worker. In Labrador, Lester Burry, a United Church minister, was elected, defeating four other candidates.86

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Smallwood was triumphant in victory, and in the weeks following the 21 June election cultivated connections among those chosen to sit in the convention and prepared himself for action. Immediately after the vote, he sent a congratulatory telegram – “Congratulations Is My Face Red” – to Harrington, whose defeat he must have expected.87 Calling on High Commissioner Macdonald, he ventured that eight or nine members had been elected who were “well disposed toward Confederation with Canada and ... anxious to get all possible information about how it would affect Newfoundland.”88 On 28 July, Smallwood was featured on the front page of the Sunday Herald – for which Harrington wrote a weekly “Looking Ahead” column – and interviewed inside. Asked to sum up why he was so favourable to Confederation, he gave this reply: “Because I believe in Responsible Government and want to get rid of Commission Government – under Confederation we would have Responsible Government, but with the help necessary to make Responsible Government work successfully. Each of the nine Provinces has Responsible Government – so would we. Secondly, because Confederation would reduce the cost of living very considerably, raise the standard of living for our people, and give our people their first chance in history to breathe freely, without fear.”89 A good example of what Smallwood meant by breathing freely had been brought to public attention in February when Rev. John W. Buckwell and Rev. Eric R. Lawlor, respectively the Church of England and Roman Catholic clergymen in Lamaline on the Burin Peninsula, had written an arresting joint letter to the Evening Telegram pleading for help for the people of the area. During the Great Depression, they reported, the local population had lived “almost exclusively on relief,” and, not surprisingly, many had lost “the will to work.”90 The people wanted to be “independent and have the opportunities of earning an honest living,” but their circumstances were dire: There are families here this winter who have absolutely nothing to eat, except that which their little-better-off neighbours can spare them; there are families practically naked of clothing, sleeping in rooms without windows and on grass bags for mattresses and an old coat for covering. It is true that some of the families living here are no better off this winter than are those living in the recently liberated countries of Europe, except that our people have to look forward to the same thing next year and the year after and so on, unless they can be assisted to independence. It is small wonder if some are tempted to steal food to feed their hungry children, or

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even threaten murder of their families and suicide to end their misery ... With such conditions, remembering, too, the similar conditions which existed here for some twelve years before the war, it is not surprising to find the health of the people poor and Tuberculosis rife. How can we combat bad health when the underlying trouble is malnutrition? If Newfoundland as a whole had bounced back economically during the war and was for the moment fiscally sound, there were manifestly still pockets of persistent distress; in truth, for many Newfoundlanders the wolf was never far from the door, a fact well understood by Smallwood, who had himself tasted the bitter gall of being up against it financially. On 26 July, while Smallwood was out and about, Bradley wrote him a rambling letter surveying the lie of the land in the wake of the National Convention election. Bradley expected “Water Street,” as represented by Crosbie, Job, and Hickman, to exert a powerful influence in the convention.91 Citing the price he himself had paid at the hands of the high and mighty of St John’s – the habitués of the City Club – for his role in the politics leading to Commission of Government, he told Smallwood: “Bradley is still [considered] the unscrupulous political grafter. You are the dangerous and tricky revolutionary.” He cautioned Smallwood about what he might also expect from members of that same class: You cannot be unaware of the brand which has been stamped on you by the intelligentsia. You are a red, a communist, a revolutionary, quite unreliable and so undesirable in any position of public responsibility, though sometimes useful to do spade work ... They envy your ability and fear to give you power. Your early enthusiasm and refusal to walk the chalk mark of vested interests have been exaggerated to damn you with the pious and respectable. They will be smilingly polite to you as occasion warrants but it will be no breach of “honour” to break faith with you. On the contrary a sort of tortured “noblesse oblige” will make a virtue of repressing you, and double crossing you in due season. I have suffered from similar propaganda, and, what is worse, am regarded as uncontrollable. Do you imagine these people will play cricket with you? I know they will not with me. Asserting that he did not intend to get burned again, Bradley advised that Confederation would “need a good case, good campaigners and plenty of funds.” “Joe,” he half-heartedly concluded, “it will be a grand

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battle if handled properly, and I should like to be in it, but – where shall I find myself when the dust of conflict has cleared away?” Smallwood had an ally in Bradley but an ally of very different temperament. If Smallwood’s foot was instinctively drawn to the accelerator, Bradley’s was never far from the brake. In August, using the funds that had come his way from Mullowney (a future chairman of the Newfoundland Board of Liquor Control), Smallwood went to Ottawa, despite having been urged by High Commissioner Macdonald not to make such a visit at a delicate moment in Canada–Newfoundland relations. While in the Canadian capital, he kept a diary.92 He stayed at the Chateau Laurier, sat in the visitors’ gallery of the House of Commons, and met Acting Prime Minister Louis St Laurent (Mackenzie King was overseas at the time) and the Progressive Conservative (pc ), Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (ccf ), and Social Credit leaders. He also spent time with Fisheries Minister Frank Bridges and various officials of his department, R.A. MacKay of the Department of External Affairs, and Jack Pickersgill of the Prime Minister’s Office. During the war, MacKay had left his position as Eric Dennis Memorial Professor of Political Science at Dalhousie University to become a special assistant in the Department of External Affairs. He had visited Newfoundland in 1941 and was arguably Ottawa’s leading authority on Canada’s eastern neighbour. In 1946, he again visited St John’s, this time for an air conference, and in that year edited Newfoundland: Economic, Diplomatic and Strategic Studies, published by Oxford University Press under the auspices of the Royal Institute of International Affairs.93 He knew and corresponded with the prominent St John’s lawyer and Dalhousie graduate John B. McEvoy. MacKay believed that the leaders who emerged in the National Convention would be “the leaders of Newfoundland under any new regime.”94 Pickersgill and Smallwood immediately hit it off, with Pickersgill declaring strong support for Newfoundland’s entry into Confederation. Their meeting launched a friendship that would in time evolve into an impressive federal-provincial partnership. Toward the end of Smallwood’s stay, Ewart Young and trade and purchasing agent Walter H. Thistle, another Newfoundland expatriate, joined him from Montreal, and after dinner they all dropped in on the House of Commons.95 On a visit to the headquarters of the National Film Board, an enterprise that immediately fascinated him, Smallwood, who had long been drawn to cinema, thought of “the propaganda possibilities.”96 He returned to Newfoundland better informed about Canada than ever and now with impressive contacts in official Ottawa.

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p ro c e e d in gs The National Convention sat in the chamber in the Colonial Building formerly used by the House of Assembly. On the morning of Wednesday, 11 September 1946, the members met to sign the roll, and that afternoon they heard an address from Governor Macdonald (the opening session was broadcast by the bcn ).97 The next day they got down to business. The chairman of the convention was Supreme Court Justice Cyril J. Fox, who was appointed by the Commission of Government; the secretary and assistant secretary of the body, also appointed by the government, were, respectively, W. Gordon Warren, a prominent veteran of the Second World War, and lawyer Francis (Frank) Ryan. The convention was advised by Kenneth Wheare of Oxford University, an authority on federalism, and was informed by a British Command Paper, Report on the Financial and Economic Position of Newfoundland, written by G.W. St J. (John) Chadwick of the Dominions Office and Edgar Jones of the Treasury. The convention had no budget of its own, was not a legislature, and was financially the creature of the Commission of Government (members were paid a per diem, and out-of-town members were reimbursed for travel expenses).98 Nor, by a prior understanding between Fox and the government, could members of the commission be required to appear before the convention, though individual commissioners could, at their own discretion, provide information to committees of the convention based on requests that came to them through the chairman. In sum, the convention was not in a position to put the Commission of Government on trial. A number of its members, including for the moment Smallwood, stayed at the Newfoundland Hotel.99 In the Colonial Building they sat behind desks arranged alphabetically according to name of district represented. Smallwood (Bonavista Centre) sat between Wabana Mine Workers’ Union president David Ignatius (Nish) Jackman (Bell Island) and Gordon Bradley (Bonavista East). He immediately made his presence felt, on 12 September, by asking the first questions of the convention and giving notice of a request to the commissioner for public utilities for “a report concerning the cost of construction, cost of maintenance, and all agreements entered into respecting the Gander airport.”100 He also urged that arrangements be made to allow members of the general public to attend convention sessions.101 In its opening phase, the convention worked out how it would proceed, navigating its way via a Rules and Procedures Committee and a Steering Committee. Bradley sat on both and was named as convenor of the Steering Committee; Smallwood served with him on the Rules and

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3.2 Smallwood on his feet in the National Convention.

Procedures Committee.102 It was agreed that meetings of the convention would be held Monday to Friday from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. and that nine investigative committees would be formed (they had ten members each) to examine various aspects of the country’s economy and administration, preliminary to discussion of recommendations regarding constitutional choices to be made to the United Kingdom government. Smallwood was appointed to the committee dealing with transportation and communications, of which Bradley was convenor, but he made a point of regularly attending meetings of the other committees: Agriculture, Education, Fisheries, Forestry, Local Industries, Mining, Public Finance (Financial and Economic Position of Newfoundland), and Public Health and Welfare. Following discussion of the delicate issue of the attendance of members of the Commission of Government, a new understanding was reached whereby individual commissioners would be willing to attend committee meetings of the convention held in private or to receive committees in their own offices. To deal with the flood of questions, many from Smallwood, an arrangement was made with the government whereby all requests for information, including those pending, would be vetted by a committee, which would ensure that only information

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necessary for the work of the convention would be sought. This procedure would avoid placing an undue burden on the government. A verbatim transcript was kept of debates, and Stella Meaney was the main stenographer.103 On 17 September, Smallwood moved a resolution to request the government to appoint a statistician-economist to assist the convention, but his motion was voted down the next day.104 Soon, however, a door opened wide for him when, as an experiment, the bcn arranged to first record and then broadcast the convention proceedings of 28 October.105 On that day, with the microphones on, Smallwood dropped a bombshell: having given due notice in the Steering Committee, he introduced a resolution calling for a delegation to be sent to Ottawa to ascertain the “terms and conditions” on which Canada might agree to federal union with Newfoundland.106 Not surprisingly, with his known Barrelman voice and his understanding of the medium of radio, he seized the moment to speak in support of his resolution over the heads of his convention colleagues to the electorate that would ultimately decide Newfoundland’s constitutional future. So successful was its experimental broadcast that the bcn next scheduled regular nightly broadcasts, heard from 9:15 p.m. to midnight, a development that augured well for Smallwood, a polished performer on the airwaves. In the short run, however, he encountered stiff resistance, his resolution touching off a raucous debate in which he was accused of attempting to railroad the convention and of dangling bribes before members – a trip to Ottawa in the case of Harrington and a senatorship in the case of Malcolm Hollett, the member for Grand Falls. Regarding the Hollett accusation, Smallwood gave this barbed reply: “I did not offer him ... a senatorship, for two very sound reasons. First, because I have no senatorships to offer, and second, because, if I were going to offer him any job, it would be something at a much lower level than a senatorship.”107 On 31 October, amidst the Sturm und Drang, fpu president Ken Brown (Bonavista South) suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and collapsed while speaking, and the next day the convention adjourned until 4 November. When it resumed sitting, Smallwood’s resolution was defeated by a vote of twenty-five to seventeen. Except for Gordon Higgins of St John’s, who had seconded the resolution, all the members who voted in support of Smallwood (Bradley was among them) were from districts away from the Avalon Peninsula (Higgins himself made clear that his support for the resolution had to do with facilitating the gathering of information rather than actually promoting the cause of Confederation).108 Smallwood and his old patron Ches Crosbie were on opposite sides. He had lost a highly publicized round, but, crucially, the

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convention had not ruled out the possibility of sending a delegation to Ottawa later on. High Commissioner Macdonald’s view was that by his “indiscreet action” Smallwood had “dealt a heavy blow to the cause of Confederation here.”109 His motion had been “deplorably ill-timed” and “tactlessly presented.” Writing in the Sunday Herald, journalist Jack A. White began ominously, “Death, as it must come to all men, and causes, came this week to J.R. Smallwood and Confederation.”110 But in reality, as later events would show, Smallwood had positioned himself where he liked to be – at centre stage. Having entered the convention with a cause, he was now de facto the leader of a party. Arguably, for all the criticism of his bold manoeuvre, it was in the 4 November 1946 vote in the National Convention that the political party was born that led Newfoundland into Confederation and then governed the new province for more than twenty years.

d e bat in g on In the weeks that followed, as the convention followed its original plan of action – first committee reports and then constitutional recommendations – Smallwood was a frequent and entertaining contributor to debate and, thanks to the nightly broadcasts, was heard far and wide. His incandescent exchanges with Peter Cashin in particular became the stuff of legend. Cashin viewed Smallwood as a Quisling (i.e., a traitor) and at one Steering Committee meeting lunged at him, causing him to fall off his chair onto the floor (Cashin apologized for the incident).111 On 16 November, events took an unexpected turn when Chairman Fox collapsed while the convention was in session and died soon afterwards. A week later, meeting in informal session, the convention recommended to the government that Bradley be named as his successor. Its recommendation was accepted, and, following amendment of the National Convention Act, Bradley was duly appointed (Smallwood then took his place on the influential Steering Committee and became chairman of the Transportation and Communications Committee).112 Though Bradley had supported Smallwood’s controversial resolution, he had tried to soften it with an amendment whereby the proposed delegation would not go to Ottawa before 1 January 1947; he may therefore have been thought of as being able to rein in his hyperactive Bonavista Centre colleague. Certainly, the two, though allies behind the scenes, had very different credentials: Bradley, aged sixty, was a former leader of the opposition and magistrate, an llb with business experience, a prominent Orangeman, and an outport notable; Smallwood, aged forty-five, was, by contrast, an intellectual engagé known and feared in

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some circles – witness the debate on his resolution – as a demagogic and unscrupulous upstart with sinister motives. In his 8 November report to the State Department in Washington about recent events in the National Convention, George K. Donald, United States Consul General in St John’s, noted that Smallwood was “a much hated man” and had been described in his hearing as “that dirty swine” and “that dirty politician, etc.”113 Donald’s report hit the mark, but hatred washed off Smallwood, “a man in a very great hurry.”114 As he awaited his next opportunity to strike, Smallwood, always a bundle of energy, kept a lively presence in the press. In a letter published in the Evening Telegram on 26 November, he answered in detail various points about union with Canada made in a letter the paper had published from a correspondent in Fortune on the Burin Peninsula. Smallwood ended his own letter with a timely admonition: “This whole question of Confederation should be treated calmly, objectively, always with the good of our Newfoundland people in mind. There is no need for passion or room for prejudice. It is purely [a] matter of cool assessment, of adding and subtracting. There is nothing disloyal to Newfoundland in considering whether federal union of Newfoundland and Canada would be good or bad for Newfoundland. Still less is it a case of ‘selling the country.’”115 Writing in the same paper on 18 December in answer to the “gross inaccuracies” of another correspondent as to what union with Canada would mean, he offered this reassurance: “Ninety-five per cent of the ‘terms’ of Confederation can be figured out by anybody who takes the trouble to read the B[ritish] N[orth] A[merica] Act and to study our own Estimates and Public Accounts. It’s only the five per cent that still needs to be discussed and solved. Can’t that be discussed without bad temper?”116 Earlier, speaking in the National Convention, he had had this to say about the feisty Sunday Herald, a paper with which he traded many punches: “I want to say emphatically that it’s not true that I’m paying that paper to attack me every week, there’s not a word of truth in it. I’m grateful to them for their valuable attack upon me. I hope they keep it up, but I’m definitely not paying them one cent for doing it.”117 Quick off the mark and a gifted and experienced wordsmith, Smallwood, the politician, always gave as good as he got in such journalistic artillery exchanges.

d e l e g at io ns On 4 February 1947, having debated committee reports in extenso, the National Convention again focused on its constitutional business, this time in a complex resolution put forward by R.B. Job. Declaring it

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“essential” that information be gathered forthwith on a variety of matters, including “What would be a fair and equitable basis for Federal Union of the Dominion of Canada and Newfoundland, or what other fiscal, political or economic arrangements may be possible.”118 The first step in the information-gathering envisaged – vis-à-vis the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada – was the appointment of a committee to meet with the Commission of Government to discuss “ways and means.” After Job’s motion had passed, the convention named to the committee Job himself, Crosbie, Higgins, and Smallwood, Bradley being a member ex officio.119 The report of this pivotal committee was given to the convention on 26 February, whereupon two resolutions were passed. The first, carried unanimously, called for the despatch of a delegation to London. The second, introduced by Smallwood and carried by a vote of twenty-four to sixteen, called on the commission to arrange to send a delegation to Ottawa. This delegation would not leave the country until the London delegation had returned, and its business would be to ascertain from the Government of Canada what “fair and equitable basis” might exist for the “federal union of Newfoundland and Canada.”120 Each delegation, it was decided, would be led by Bradley and have six other members. Chosen to go to London with him were Cashin, Crosbie, Hollett, A.B. Butt (St John’s West), W.J. Keough (St George’s), and Pierce Fudge (Humber). Butt was an insurance agent, Keough a co-operative worker, and Fudge the president of the Newfoundland Labourers’ Union. Elected on 1 April to accompany Bradley to Ottawa were Smallwood (who became secretary to the delegation), Job, Higgins, Burry, T.G.W. Ashbourne (Twillingate), and Charles Ballam (Humber).121 Ashbourne was an outport merchant and Ballan an insurance agent who had served as president of the Newfoundland Federation of Labour (not be confused with the organization of the same name that Smallwood had promoted). When, eventually, Job was unable to serve because of an extended visit to England, he was replaced by first elected alternative P. Wellington Crummey, a merchant from Western Bay and the member for Bay de Verde.122 Election to the Ottawa delegation – he placed third in the balloting behind Higgins and Ashbourne – was a breakthrough moment for Smallwood, who was now riding high.123 On 11 April, the convention roundly defeated a resolution, moved by Nish Jackman, that a delegation also be sent to Washington, something that the government had made plain was off-limits.124 The London delegation flew overseas from Gander on 25 April, and four meetings with British officials followed, beginning on 29 April and ending on 7 May, with Governor Macdonald and Commissioner for

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Justice and Defence Albert J. Walsh, a Newfoundlander, on hand for the talks.125 The Newfoundlanders received a correct but frosty reception and were themselves divided, with the signatures of Bradley and Keough missing from a memorandum submitted by the delegation on 6 May.126 The British wanted Newfoundland safely in Confederation but were careful not to say this. Instead, they made clear that no further financial assistance would be forthcoming from London if the country reverted to its pre-1934 system of government. On the crucial matter of what the United Kingdom government would do when it received the recommendation of the National Convention regarding constitutional choices to be put to a vote of the people, the British were likewise careful to keep a free hand: the National Convention had been established as an advisory body only, and so it remained. In a commentary on the talks, Treasury official W. Russell Edmunds wrote that as a group the Newfoundlanders had taken “the petulant attitude of a spoiled child” and had lacked “balanced judgment,” accusing the British of selling out Newfoundland for their own ends in the 1941 Anglo-American leased bases agreement and claiming that restitution was now in order.127 Back in St John’s, the delegation reported to their National Convention colleagues on 19 April. Peter Cashin, a connoisseur of political plots, now claimed that an Anglo-Canadian conspiracy was afoot to railroad Newfoundland into Confederation.128 As for Governor Macdonald and Commissioner Walsh, their role in London had been to sabotage the talks, which indeed had gone very badly.

o t tawa s u m mer The next scene in the unfolding convention drama began with the 19 June departure from St John’s of the Ottawa delegation, which stayed in the Canadian capital at the Chateau Laurier. The delegation was accompanied by secretary Helene O’Keefe.129 On the morning of 25 June, the Newfoundlanders were welcomed by Prime Minister King at a ceremony held in the Railway Committee Room of the House of Commons. The contrast with what had gone on in London was striking. Business meetings began on the afternoon of the 25th: Secretary of State for External Affairs Louis St Laurent was chosen to chair proceedings; a decision was made not to keep a verbatim transcript of what was said; and the Newfoundland delegation proffered a report detailing Newfoundland services that, in the event of union, “would appear to fall in the federal sphere.”130 To say the least, this was a lopsided gathering. The Canadian participants had behind them the resources of a modern

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government and were well ready. In the fall of 1945, anticipating the talks now underway, a cabinet committee on Newfoundland had been formed within the government of Canada.131 It in turn was advised by an interdepartmental committee chaired by MacKay. By contrast, the members of the Newfoundland delegation were on their own, a circumstance that by definition made Smallwood, a keen student of the workings of Canadian federalism and the machinations of official Ottawa, a central figure. On the Newfoundland side, he and Bradley were easily the most informed members of the delegation. Smallwood’s deep reading, research, and writing about Canada now paid off handsomely. He was in his element. At a meeting of the two delegations on 7 July, it was decided to create subcommittees to study various matters that would have to be dealt with “preliminary to considering the question of a basis of union.”132 Ten were formed – on the public debt of Newfoundland, finance, transportation, veterans’ benefits, economic development, unemployment insurance, Maritime freight rates, “Indians and Eskimos” (to use contemporary parlance), housing, and fisheries – and Smallwood sat on every one of them (as chairman of the Newfoundland delegation and St Laurent’s counterpart, Bradley was not involved directly in this aspect of the talks). Along with Ashbourne and Higgins, Smallwood was also named to a drafting committee whose Canadian members were Finance Minister J.L. Ilsley and National Revenue Minister J.J. McCann, who were assisted as required by MacKay, Mitchell Sharp of the Department of Finance, and other officials. The job of this working group was to examine the reports of the other subcommittees and discuss “the means whereby the principal issues involved in union might be met,” leading to a report by the Canadian members to the cabinet committee “regarding a basis for union which might be fair and equitable to both Newfoundland and Canada.”133 Smallwood was at the heart of negotiations, doing business hour by hour and day by day with senior Canadian ministers and public servants. The summer of 1947 was hot in Ottawa and the task before the Newfoundland delegates complex. On 12 July, the Ottawa correspondent of the Daily News quipped that the Canadian approach seemed to be to “make haste slowly.”134 As the talks dragged on, making some of his elected colleagues in St John’s more and more fearful about what was happening, Bradley found himself under mounting pressure to return home and call the convention (which had not met since 26 May) back into session. The hope of the Ottawa delegation was that it could return to St John’s with draft terms of union in hand. But this

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possibility was ruled out on 10 August by the sudden death of Canadian Fisheries Minister Frank Bridges, New Brunswick’s representative in the cabinet. On 2 September, Milton Gregg, another New Brunswicker, succeeded to the fisheries portfolio, but King was unwilling to proceed with an offer to Newfoundland while his new minister was seeking election in York-Sunbury, the seat Bridges had represented. Convinced that New Brunswick was “dead against Newfoundland coming in on any terms,” King worried that Gregg’s Progressive Conservative opponent would be helped “if anything were said which indicated we were keen on having Newfoundland brought in.”135 No assurance of “a specific date” for a Canadian decision on proposed terms could be given to the Newfoundland delegation, which was to be told instead that Canada would act “as expeditiously as circumstances would permit,” following cabinet consideration. In dealings with Newfoundland, King wanted to avoid a false move that would upset existing provinces, and he was unwilling to move forward until every province had an elected member in his cabinet. Instead of returning home with draft terms of union, the Newfoundland delegation left Ottawa with a bulky summary of proceedings during their lengthy Ottawa sojourn. This was agreed to on 29 September at their last meeting with their Canadian interlocutors. The two-part summary had fifteen appendices and an annex and was forbiddingly entitled Meeting[s] between Delegates for the National Convention of Newfoundland and Representatives of the Government of Canada: Ottawa, June 25th– September 29th, 1947, Part I (Summary of Proceedings – Opening Statements[;] Documents Exchanged at Opening of Discussions), Part II (Answers to Questions – Submissions of Sub-Committees [–]List of Documents). It was received by the National Convention on 11 October at a tense session during which Bradley announced his resignation as chairman of the turbulent body. Because of its black covers, the document brought from Ottawa became known in the convention as the Black Books (or Black Book), a practical reference.

b l ac k b o o k / g r ey book With Bradley’s successor, the lawyer J.B. McEvoy, in the chair, debate on the report of the Ottawa delegation continued on 15 October and for many heated sessions thereafter, with the knowledgeable Smallwood always at the fore. While the National Convention talked on and on (heard by the radio public night after night), the way was finally cleared for action in Ottawa by Gregg’s election in York-Sunbury on 20 October.

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On 28 October, the cabinet approved an offer of terms of union, and this was then sent to Governor Macdonald for the attention of the National Convention.136 It had twenty-three sections, four annexes, and an appendix that summarized the talks that had taken place in Ottawa 25 June– 29 September 1947. The thinking behind the Canadian plan was to fit Newfoundland as seamlessly as possible into existing Canadian arrangements and thereby avoid federal-provincial conflict over the creation of a new province. Both Canada and Newfoundland had publicly owned railway systems, and the Newfoundland Railway would become part of the Canadian National system. By the same logic, the bcn would become part of the cbc , etc., etc. Apart from the specific provisions of the terms of union, Newfoundland would be a province comme les autres, with the normal division of powers applying. In a covering letter to Macdonald, Prime Minister King explained that the financial aspect of the offer went as far as Canada could go and change that “would impose larger financial burdens” on the Dominion could not be contemplated.137 On the other hand, with respect to matters “primarily of provincial concern, such as education,” Canada “would be prepared to give reasonable consideration to suggestions for modification or addition.” On 6 November, the National Convention received the Canadian offer, which came in a grey cover and became known as the “Grey Book.” Lengthy, heated debate about its contents followed, with Smallwood, the most knowledgeable member of the Ottawa delegation, in the lead in explaining and defending its provisions. Finally, in January 1948, having digested the reports of its own investigative committees, heard from the London and Ottawa delegations, and pored in granular detail over the Black Books and the Grey Book, the convention turned to the task of making its recommendations to the United Kingdom government regarding the constitutional choices to be next put before the Newfoundland electorate. On the 23rd, Smallwood moved that “Confederation with Canada upon the basis submitted to the National Convention on November 6th, 1947 by the Prime Minister of Canada” be one of those choices.138 Smallwood’s speech introducing this resolution, for which he had worked so long and so hard, was an oratorical tour de force, at once messianic and intensely personal and drawing on Biblical language.139 He began by commending the United Kingdom government for deciding to allow the Newfoundland people to decide their own future at the ballot box. Even though Confederates were outnumbered in the National Convention “almost two to one” and his resolution would therefore probably be voted down, the British government, which had acted democratically, would respect its intent:

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The British Government could have arranged to leave it completely to this Convention as to what forms of Government the people would vote in the referendum. If they had done that, then whatever a majority of the members here recommended would go on the ballot paper and nothing else … The British Government could have arranged it that way, but they did not. Thank God. The British Government knew very well why. They knew very well that a majority of the members here in the Convention might represent a minority of the people. They knew that a minority here in the Convention might well represent a great majority of the population of the country, so the British Government very wisely kept to themselves the right to decide what should go on the ballot and what should not. In this way the democratic rights of the Newfoundland people have been preserved against usurpation, and I am very grateful to the British Government for doing it … There is no doubt about it, Confederation will be on the Ballot paper in the Referendum. Our people will get their chance to vote for Confederation this Spring. The many hundreds of people who have written or telegraphed or telephoned about this matter to me, can be of good cheer, for the British Government will protect the democratic rights of our people against all attempts of a mere majority of this Convention.140 The “first stage” of the “great battle” on behalf of the people – getting the convention to send a delegation to Ottawa, receiving from Canada draft terms of union, and having the convention debate those terms – had been won, but now “a great crusade of the people” must begin. Its object would be “to bring the truth before the people, the truth that we have never had a fair opportunity of bringing before them concerning Confederation”: This time the people are going to know the truth. They are not going to be smothered with the lies and propaganda of 1869.141 It was easy enough in 1869 to bluff the people with lies about their property being taxed, but this time the Anti-Confederates are not going to get away with it, not even if every millionaire, half millionaire and quarter millionaire in the country rallies to the side of the Anti-Confederates. The day is gone when their money-bags will tell our people how to vote. That day is gone, and we live in a different age. Our people are no longer in the mood to bow down and almost worship a man just because he has managed somehow or other to make a great fortune for himself. They no longer measure a man’s

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patriotism or his loyal heart by the money he has in the bank. When we say we have a stake in the country we no longer mean how much money a man has, but how many children he has, what is the size of his family, what is his love for the country. When we talk of “men of substance” today, we include something more than his money. Our people are on the march in their tens of thousands. They have formed great trade unions and co-operative societies, and cannot so easily be bluffed any more. They have learned a lot in the past few years, and they ask questions today, questions that they never dared to ask in the bad old days. They ask questions about our vicious system of taxation. They ask questions about the cruel and oppressive cost of living. They ask questions about a system of taxation and of Government that has held them down and made it impossible for a working man to live decently and rear a family by his honest earnings. Yes sir, our people are in the mood to ask many questions today that they never asked before. They are not so easy to bluff as our forefathers were in 1869, and our Anti-Confederates are going to find that out in 1948 when the Referendum takes place. Newfoundland, he continued – these remarks showed how far he had now moved from his Water Street business patrons Ches Crosbie and Frank O’Leary – was “fast becoming a land of festering monopoly”: A new race of traders has risen in our midst. They have secured exclusive agencies all to themselves – agencies for this and that necessary and desirable article of merchandise ... What do they do, these exclusive agents? Do they add one cent of true value to the things on whose distribution they have a close monopoly in Newfoundland? No, they do not. Do they reduce the price of these articles to our people? No, they do not ... A new race of monopolists has arisen in our country ... I could name them for you. I know their story ... Where did they get their money, sir? Was it by the sweat of their brows? Was it by making two blades of grass grow where one grew before? Was it by starting a new industry? Was it by helping to carry on our fishery or agriculture, our paper mills or mines, or any of our basic industries? No, it was by none of these things. So far as actual production is concerned, these men do not toil, neither do they spin. They are just what the name implies – monopolistic traders, who have managed to grab to themselves a convenient and easy way of skimming off an extra, an additional profit, from the people’s needs. I may add that nearly all of these monopolists are anti-confederates.

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They are nearly all great supporters of anything and everything that opposes Confederation. They sit and shiver in their stylish offices for fear Confederation will come and sweep their monopolies into the ashcan of history. In the words of the poet: “Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, – / Where wealth accumulates and men decay.”142 All this had to be stopped in Newfoundland. Looking back over his own hardscrabble life and the Great Depression of the 1930s, he gave quasi-religious testimony as a witness to Newfoundland history: I know our Newfoundland people. I am one of them. I am blood of their blood, bone of their bone, soul of their soul. I am descended from a family that has lived in Newfoundland for over 150 years. My ancestors were fishermen, farmers, shop-keepers, manufacturers, skilled workmen and artisans. I have dug deep into my country’s history and in so doing I have paid special attention to the story of our people’s labors, their battles against nature and against injustice, the story of their endless search for a square deal. I have travelled my country, North, East, South and West, into a thousand of the 1,300 settlements in it. I have been closely and intimately associated with our people. I have fished with the fishermen, logged with the loggers: I have gone down underground with the miners; held trade union meetings right inside the paper mills. I was never so close to our toilers as during those years of the dole, and always, so long as I live, I will remember those friends of mine, those toilers who were stricken down by beri-beri, those children who felt the pinch of hunger. I saw the heartbreak in the eyes of patient mothers who had not enough to give their little ones. I saw the baffled, sullen rage of fishermen whose greatest toil and endurance could not provide their families with enough to eat or wear. I attended meetings of the unemployed here in St. John’s, but who was I to refuse their invitation to go and speak to them? I saw them in their despairing hundreds waiting around the street corners, waiting for the jobs that never turned up, and around the Dole Office, and helped to gather second hand clothes to distribute to those who were half naked, not for a day or a week or a year, but all through the depression. I saw them, and I swore an oath to myself that never would I be a party to allowing such things to come back to our people again. I would never be a party to any form of government that would make us know that thing again, and

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that’s why I became a Confederate. I became a Confederate, and discovered that Confederation would give our people a half decent chance in life, and wipe away some of the worst obstacles in their life and remove some of the mill-stones that hung around their necks. They don’t expect riches, but only the widest opportunity, by the toil of their hand to earn an honest living. They have no extravagant ambition to become millionaires, but they do ache for justice in their own land. And that was why the people should be allowed to decide the matter and why his resolution to put Confederation on the referendum ballot paper deserved support, the convictions of individual members of the National Convention notwithstanding: Sir, I call upon every member of this Convention to vote for this motion. I call upon even the bitterest Anti-Confederate here to vote for it. Hate Confederation all you like. That is your privilege, but do not vote to deny our people of Newfoundland their right to decide the matter. We here in this Convention have not been given the right to decide what form of Government this country shall have – the people have been given that right, and they will exercise their right in the Referendum. If the Anti-Confederates here in the Convention want Confederation to be defeated let them go out amongst the people, and try to persuade the people to vote against it in the Referendum, but it would be mean and contemptible for them to try here in this Convention, just because they have a majority, to try to cheat the people out of their chance to decide the matter. Since the terms of Confederation arrived here and were debated, new hope has arisen in the hearts of our people. They see in Confederation a new hope for the common man. They see in it a new hope for justice and fair play for themselves and for their children. They see in it the dawn of a new day for Newfoundland. Let no man dare to crush that hope that has arisen in our people’s hearts. He ended a bravura performance with the opening lines of William Blake’s inspirational anthem “Jerusalem,” beloved of the British Labour Party he had long admired, but his words were in vain. When, on 28 January, the vote was called by Chairman McEvoy, his resolution was defeated 29–16.143 Thirteen of those voting in favour had also supported his failed resolution of 28 October 1946. Those voting against included Crosbie, Harrington, Hickman, Cashin – and Higgins and Crummey, both

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3.3 The three-storey house at 61 Duckworth Street, where Smallwood lived in the first floor flat during the National Convention and the referendum campaigns. Landlord Dick Chalker lived upstairs. On one occasion, Smallwood’s wife and daughter were threatened by angry protesters who gathered outside the premises and pelted the house with rocks.

of whom had been in the Ottawa delegation. In the end, the recommendation of the National Convention to London was that the referendum ballot feature a choice between “Responsible Government as it existed prior to 1934” and “Commission of Government.”144 On 30 January, having rendered this advice, the convention was dissolved and its members went home. In Smallwood’s case, this now was to quarters he was renting at 61 Duckworth Street in a property (near the Newfoundland Hotel) owned by Chauncey Richard (Dick) Chalker, a relative of Ches Crosbie and an opponent of union with Canada.145 When he asked to have his rate of pay on his 1947 journeys to and from Ottawa increased, he was turned down by the Commission of Government.146 In its 15 February 1948 issue, the inventive and widely circulated Sunday Herald featured a pair of articles entitled “Why I Hate J.R. Smallwood” by “J.C.P.” of St John’s and “Why I Love J.R. Smallwood” by “J.F.R” of Grand Falls.147 The articles were illustrated by a photo captioned “J.R. Smallwood/Saint or Devil?” “J.C.P.” denounced Smallwood

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for basing his campaign on “hate, the old weapon of Hitler.” Smallwood had preached against “the Water Street merchants,” portraying them as “fat overstuffed capitalists, plundering the country by their immense profits,” while knowing that this was untrue. He had accomplished little in his own life, and his tactics were “Communistic.” He had turned the National Convention into a burlesque, and whether or not he managed to sell Confederation he would be “crushed by a sadly disillusioned people.” By contrast, “J.F.R.” extolled Smallwood for “fighting for the poor man” and getting “his points over by repetition” until even the most uneducated could understand him. Rumours that he was a pawn of business interests in Quebec and that he was out to sell Newfoundland were not believable. Smallwood was “sincere in his convictions that Confederation would honestly be the best thing for Nfld. and her people.” And he was the indispensable agent of the cause he espoused: “He has an uncanny ability to make listeners feel that he is talking directly to them ... We all feel that Mr. Smallwood, more so than Mr. Bradley, is the real brains behind the Confederation issue. In fact, without him, there would be no issue. Mr. Smallwood offers the poor people – and that’s the majority of us – baby bonuses, pensions and the opportunity of a decent living, something we’ve never had in this country.” No doubt he might be sugar-coating the advantages of union with Canada, but clearly the advantages far overweighed the disadvantages. Newfoundlanders had nothing to lose but their chains.

t w e n t y- n in e di ctators Fresh from the National Convention cockpit, Smallwood immediately organized a petition asking the British government to put the choice of Confederation on the ballot anyway. Those who had voted against his motion, he preached, were “twenty-nine dictators” out to deny the Newfoundland people the right to make a choice that was legitimately theirs.148 The petition attracted more than 50,000 signatures. This figure was higher than the total number of votes cast in the National Convention election, a measure of just how much Newfoundland had come back to life politically; the opponents of Confederation, it seemed, had badly misjudged public opinion.149 “Frankly,” Smallwood wrote in his 1973 I Chose Canada, “I do not know of one single step taken in the National Convention by the opponents of Confederation that was sound, or shrewd, or such as to win the support of our Newfoundland people.”150 His barbed observation was astute. The petition drive kept his name in the news and demanded an outcome that both London and

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Ottawa favoured. Not surprisingly, therefore, he got what he wanted. In reality, he was pushing against an open door. Smallwood was not the agent of the United Kingdom and Canada and did not collude with them, but behind the scenes, his cause was their cause. He had chosen well and was on the right side of history. On 11 March 1948, the British government, which had carefully kept the last word to itself, announced that there would be three choices on the referendum ballot: “Commission of Government for a period of five years,” “Confederation with Canada,” and “Responsible Government as it existed in 1933 prior to the establishment of Commission of Government.” The explanation given by Philip Noel-Baker, Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations, for the inclusion of the Confederation option was that the issues involved had been “sufficiently clarified” and that the people were therefore in a position to make an informed choice.151 The addition of the words “for a period of five years” obviously made the Commission of Government option less appealing in that a further decision would have to be made at the end of this period. The reference to 1933 made sense because that was the last full year in which responsible government had been operational, but 1933 had also been the nadir of the Great Depression. Because there were three choices, the British now further ruled, there would have to be a runoff referendum between the top two choices if a majority (i.e., among those who voted) for one of the three on offer was not achieved in the first vote. On 27 April 1948, the Commission of Government passed the Referendum Act, which provided for the vote to be taken in a revised set of twenty-five electoral districts.152 The wording of the ballot-paper choices was specified as “1. COMMISSION OF GOVERNMENT for a period of five years”; “2. CONFEDERATION WITH CANADA”; “3. RESPONSIBLE GOVERNMENT as it existed in 1933.”153 On 7 May, by proclamation issued under this act, the date of the first vote was set for 3 June. Magistrate Short was again named chief electoral officer. For Smallwood, events in the wake of the National Convention could not have gone better. Well read, intelligent, and thoughtful, he had indeed heard the hoofbeats of Bismarck’s horse of history.

r e f e r e n du m c a mpai gns The campaign that followed was fiercely fought. A referendum is not a general election, and this one really was a winner-take-all contest. There was no organized effort on behalf of Commission of Government, but three main groups squared off on behalf of the other two options: the

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Responsible Government League, the Economic Union Party, and the Newfoundland Confederate Association (the Newfoundland National Party remained active but was not in the same league).154 The Responsible Government League had been launched on 11 February 1947 following Smallwood’s October 1946 motion to send a delegation to Ottawa. Frank O’Leary. Smallwood’s Barrelman patron, was the president of the league, which drew its initial membership from St John’s businessmen and professionals and was closely identified with Water Street. It was in effect the heir of the wartime Newfoundland National Association, which had challenged commission rule. Two prominent league members were J.S. Currie, the Daily News editor who had agreed to publish Smallwood’s March 1946 letters laying out the case for Confederation, and Observer’s Weekly editor Albert Perlin, who had a mixed history of dealings with Smallwood but had now turned strongly against him. The league did not campaign while the convention was in progress but prepared itself to act when the time was right. Its objective was to “secure Responsible Government for Newfoundland and to encourage the people of Newfoundland to accept their full, personal and collective responsibilities for the good government of our country.”155 The league had access to O’Leary’s widely distributed Newfoundlander and launched a paper of its own, The Independent, the first issue of which appeared on 22 March and featured pointed cartoons by W.J. Groves. The motto of The Independent was “Where Once Our Fathers Stood We Stand,” words taken from Governor Sir Cavendish Boyle’s “Ode to Newfoundland,” a much loved anthem.”156 In the pages of its paper, the league appealed to anti-tax sentiment, cast suspicion on Canadian motives, and in general made the case that Newfoundlanders would be better off governing themselves. Self-government would bring “a Newfoundland policy formed by Newfoundlanders for Newfoundland.”157 By contrast, Confederation would be a leap into the unknown: You go to bed one night a Newfoundlander, you wake up the next morning and find you are a Canadian ... The night before you felt a certain security for as a Newfoundlander you knew what to expect. Now everything is changed, you are a Canadian, and your feeling of security has disappeared. You don’t know what is going to happen to you. You are governed no longer from St. John’s but from Ottawa. You are no longer in the hands of your own people but strangers who do not know you, do not know your wants, are unfamiliar with your way of living, never heard of the places in which you live and don’t talk your language. And these strangers will not try to

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3.4 One view of Canada’s and Quebec’s true intentions for Newfoundland. The Independent, 12 April 1948.

understand your way of doing things, they will immediately begin to make you conform to their ways. And they will bring their own ideas with regard to taxation – they will bring taxes you never heard of and they will expect you to pay directly out of your own pockets for services that previously your own government paid for.158 It was “a duty and a trust” of present-day Newfoundlanders to restore the “temporarily-lost heritage” of responsible government.159 What became commonly known as the Economic Union Party, launched on 25 November 1947 and led from 20 March 1948 by Ches Crosbie, campaigned for responsible government from a different perspective.160 The restoration of self-government would be a first step toward negotiating a free trade agreement with the United States. This cause had deep roots in Newfoundland history, and two attempts at

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3.5 The Responsible Government League stoked fear that Gordon Bradley (left) and Smallwood (right) would saddle Newfoundland with big taxes. The Independent, 5 April 1948.

reciprocity had been made earlier, one in the 1890s (the Bond-Blaine agreement) and the other in the first decade of the twentieth century (the Bond-Hay agreement).161 Neither had worked out, and both had been opposed by Canada, but the dream had lived on, reinforced in the 1940s by the big American military presence in Newfoundland. American money circulated in St John’s and in the vicinity of the other United States base sites, and many Newfoundlanders had relatives who had made good in Boston, New York, and elsewhere in the United States. If Newfoundland was going to hitch up with another country, why not the United States, a world power? The case for all this was ably made by Geoff Stirling’s Sunday Herald. Crosbie was himself a stiff public performer, but his campaign was able to draw on the talents of Stirling and Don Jamieson, a rising star in Newfoundland advertising and public relations and a Sunday Herald columnist.162 Between them, Stirling

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3.6 A Responsible Government take on what life would be like under Confederation. The Independent, 19 April 1948.

and Jamieson personified the wartime American cultural impact on Newfoundland. They were futurists and gave the responsible government option a younger and more modern face. The Newfoundland Confederate Association, which had its head office in the Lyon Building, 158 Water Street, St John’s, was formed at a meeting held in the Newfoundland Hotel on 21 February 1948.163 Bradley was named president, Smallwood general secretary, and Charles F. Garland secretary-treasurer. Smallwood was also made campaign director, with Greg Power as his assistant. In an inspired move, the association had 101 vice-presidents, ten from St John’s and the rest from Newfoundland places far and wide. In the naming of the vice-presidents, Smallwood was able to dip into the list of those who had supported the mass petition to get Confederation on the ballot.164 The association enrolled members, formed branches, and had teachers’, labour, and veterans’ advisory committees. It announced that its “chief work” was “to

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3.7 A Confederate response to the tax threat. The Confederate, 12 May 1949.

bring information before the people.”165 To finance its efforts – this is a murky subject – it sought cash contributions from the general public, but, according to the young Harold Horwood, who was active in its affairs, it also benefitted from Canadian money directed its way, thanks to the help of Trade and Commerce Minister C.D. Howe and Liberal Senator J. Gordon Fogo, who provided contacts for fundraising by Smallwood associate Ray Petten of the Fishermen’s Union Trading Company.166 On 7 April, the association published the first issue of The Confederate, a paper that drew on Smallwood’s deep experience as a journalist and his gift for punchy writing and that featured inspired cartoons by the Toronto cartoonist Jack Boothe of the Globe and Mail.167 Travelling by land, sea, and air (in a seaplane piloted by the intrepid Captain Eric Blackwood),168 Smallwood picked up where he had left off in the National Convention and was a fearless, formidable advocate for the cause of Confederation he had come to personify. However, disorder was never far beneath the surface in fiercely anti-Confederate St John’s, and he and his family had to watch out for trouble.

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In the give and take between the contending parties, the Newfoundland Confederate Association had decided advantages. Not only did it have a magnetic leader in Smallwood, but it campaigned with a firm offer in hand and a precise plan of action. Canadian social programs – family allowances, old age pensions, unemployment insurance, veterans’ benefits – were operational, and a dollar value could be put on their worth to Newfoundlanders, who, understandably, were anxious for economic security. In a persuasive letter published in the Advocate, Art Scammell, now teaching school in Montreal (he recorded “The Squid Jiggin’ Ground” there in 1943) and a principal of the Atlantic Guardian, spoke for many when he wrote: As I see it Confederation with Canada offers the most constructive hope of the three forms on the ballot paper. Commission of Government deserves a lot of praise for the many fine programs they have inaugurated; all credit to them. But to be linked up with a young growing country like Canada with all her vast resources and influence in world markets and affairs is a prospect not lightly to be disregarded. There are thousands of Newfoundlanders, good Canadian citizens who are playing their part in making Canada strong. They are in Canada for one reason mostly, because they can have a more secure way of life economically than they ever could in Newfoundland. I have talked to hundreds of them in Montreal. Some of them have done exceptionally well. How many of them have said to [m]e, “Yes I’d like to be in Newfoundland but what is there for me or my children to go back to?” As one who spends every summer in the fishing boat, living among fishermen, my concern is chiefly for a brighter tomorrow for them and their families. I cannot see how Confederation with a country with the fishing interest that Canada has will take away or harm the fish markets of Newfoundland when a Canadian province. And the social security benefits resulting from Confederation will be a godsend to countless families. Let those with full bellies and an assured income laugh and scoff at children’s allowances, increased old age pensions, etc. Let them come with me every summer and see children with lacklustre eyes due to lack of proper food; let them see for instance as I saw last summer a young man, a diabetic with his body covered with needle pricks from daily insulin injections to keep him alive, not able to work; trying to exist and to buy nourishing food on the miserable amount of sick relief he received and then let them brand children’s allowances, pensions, etc. as encouragement to laziness, appealing

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to wrong motives, etc. They are concrete examples of what each Canadian province enjoys by being Confederated. It is certain that all the provinces would not be able to give their people such benefits if they were on their own. They are not a bait put forward by Canada to lure Newfoundlanders into Confederation, but part and parcel of the policy of every modern nation which is seeking to give its citizens a greater measure of social security. They know full well this is the path they must follow if democracy is to survive. We deceive ourselves, if we think Canada will be much concerned if Newfoundland doesn’t join up with her; her future is assured, ours is not.169 Scammell captured this spirit of the revolution of rising expectation of the postwar world with which Newfoundland was decidedly in step. Smallwood had an excellent hand – the Canadian offer of terms – and he played it skilfully. He was able to define his opponents not by what they were for but by what they were against: in his writing, stump speeches, and broadcasts, advocates of responsible government and economic union became anti-confederates, which is how they are mainly remembered by history. The Responsible Government League, moreover, was beset with problems. It was not fully convincing in articulating a vision about how Newfoundland could be governed and made better following the restoration of self-government; it failed to escape its adverse identification in outport Newfoundland with Water Street and St John’s; it lacked expertise in the workings of Canadian federalism; it had trouble raising money; and it had a complex relationship with Peter Cashin, always a one-man party, who had a following but whose bombastic, old-style approach to politics sent shudders in conservative circles in the Newfoundland capital.170 The Economic Union Party was likewise compromised. To get to what it wanted, voters would have to choose responsible government and then elect a government that achieved the desired relationship with the United States. The Sunday Herald made much of the responses it received to a survey of American senators, and Stirling made a follow-up visit to Washington, but the government of the United States intentionally stayed far away from the battle royal in Newfoundland.171 The Americans had obtained everything they wanted there in the 1941 leased bases agreement, and the State Department’s only interest was in seeing that agreement honoured. The wartime deal was with the United Kingdom, not Newfoundland, and if the British could no longer guarantee American rights, then Canada, a proven and reliable ally, was an acceptable successor power. There was simply no appetite in Washington

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3.8 Making the case that Responsible Government would advantage the few over the many. The Confederate, 20 May 1948.

for talks with a government in St John’s looking for trading concessions in return for wartime sacrifice. Ironically, in 1987 Ches Crosbie’s son John Carnell Crosbie was a member of the government in Ottawa that negotiated for the whole of Canada the free trade with the United States that his father had wanted for Newfoundland in 1948.

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2 2 j u ly 1 948 The referendum of 3 June 1948 failed to decide the issue. On a turnout of 88.4 per cent, Responsible Government won 69,400 votes (44.6 per cent), Confederation 64,066 (41.1 per cent), and Commission of Government 22,311 (14.3 per cent).172 Because there was no majority, a second vote was needed, with Commission of Government dropped from the ballot. The vote revealed a deep cleavage between the Avalon Peninsula, where St John’s is located, and the rest of the country. Eight of nine districts on the Avalon produced a Responsible Government majority. Confederation commanded majority support in nine districts and headed the poll in eight of the nine districts that did not produce a majority for any option. Because the Roman Catholic population – about one third of the total population – was concentrated on the Avalon Peninsula, there was an obvious correlation between being Roman Catholic and voting for Responsible Government, but away from the Avalon there were two districts with Roman Catholic majorities – Placentia West and St George’s–Port au Port – that gave pluralities to Confederation. It was also the case that two Avalon Peninsula districts with large Protestant majorities – Port de Grave and Carbonear–Bay de Verde – supported Responsible Government. At root, the geographical split that had manifested itself was likely regional rather than sectarian. Writing to an English associate after the 3 June vote, Tom Collingwood of the old St John’s firm of Baine Johnston Ltd reported that Newfoundland was “in the midst of a political turmoil.” Collingwood wanted responsible government restored and condemned the United Kingdom government for giving Newfoundlanders “a raw deal”: “When we surrendered Self Government in 1933 it was on the understanding that Self Government would be restored when the country became self supporting and when the people so desired. Instead the Home Government ordered that a National Convention be held which cost the country a lot of money and proved to be a farce.”173 But time had passed this quintessential elite point of view by, and, as Collingwood acknowledged, events were now in the saddle. The runoff referendum was scheduled for 22 July and was preceded by a bitter, no-holds-barred, bare-knuckle political fight to the finish. Smallwood, now often known as “Joey” and often seen wearing a bow tie, was flying high but attracted strong personal attack as an unscrupulous operator, a ne’er-do-well, and a traitor to his country. Following a 5 July rally at the clb armoury in St John’s that attracted 1,600 people, with hundreds more gathered outside, he was attacked from behind

3.9 “Joey” Smallwood wearing emblematic bow tie: “When I campaigned for Confederation, those who supported me yelled from the fish wharves and meeting places – Hurrah for Joey. They never called – Hurrah for Joseph” (Daily News, 4 April 1949, 3).

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and hit on the head.174 His supporters fought off the assailants, and he escaped in a car but not before an attempt was made to overturn it. Often a polarizing figure, Smallwood was never more so than at this pivotal juncture in his country’s affairs. Complicating matters in the second round was the stirring of the embers of sectarian strife. In November 1947, The Monitor, the newspaper of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St John’s (presided over since 1915 by Archbishop Edward Patrick Roche, who had supported the introduction of Commission of Government in 1934) had published an article entitled “Newfoundland at Parting of the Ways.” The article argued that union with Canada could only legitimately be brought about through the action of “a Newfoundland Parliament”: “The restoration of Responsible Government does not finally reject any other form of future government. It is not irrevocable, but other decisions which may be taken may be irrevocable.”175 In February 1948, in response to an article in the Manchester Guardian, the paper pronounced that it did “not presume to direct or instruct the people how to vote” but “only after full discussion and negotiation by a Parliament elected by, and representative of, the people” should the final decision as to Newfoundland’s future be made.176 In a May 1948 article headed “God Guard Thee Newfoundland,” The Monitor pronounced “the placing of the Confederation issue on the ballot paper at the present time and under the present conditions” as the work of “outside influences” and “a political crime” against a “freedom-loving people”: “the only just alternatives to be decided at the moment” were “whether we shall return to our original and politically proper form of Responsible Government, or whether we should retain provisionally the present form of Government by Commission.”177 At the height of the second referendum campaign, the Provincial Grand Lodge of the Orange Order, in which Bradley was so prominent and Smallwood conveniently a member, shot back with a widely publicized resolution, adopted at a session in Grand Falls and circulated by Grand Master Chesley Fillier of Clarke’s Beach, Conception Bay. The resolution condemned the campaign of The Monitor and the interference of the Roman Catholic Church as “an unwarranted invasion of and an effort to dominate the right of free choice of the individual elector” and called on Orangemen “to use every effort to bring such attempts to naught.”178 How much this helped the cause of Confederation can only be speculated upon, but it undoubtedly added fuel to an already raging partisan fire. Smallwood himself was open-minded, welcomed support from all comers, and was not out to divide people on religious lines.

3.10 Smallwood (right) campaigning in Badger’s Quay, Bonavista Bay, c. 1948. He is shaking hands with local resident Edward B. Sainsbury.

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Another notable development in the lead-up to the second referendum was the decision of a number of prominent business, professional, and government figures to speak out in favour of union with Canada, some of them in radio addresses. The latter group included Smallwood’s lawyer friend Les Curtis; Commissioner for Home Affairs and Education Herman Quinton, who had defeated Smallwood in the 1932 election; and Commissioner for Public Health and Welfare H.L. Pottle.179 Quinton was introduced on the radio by Sir Leonard Outerbridge, a twilight-of-empire pillar of the local establishment. The fight in the second round was really for the Commission of Government votes, and elite support may have been a plus with this conservative group, but again this is only speculation. The Sunday Herald ventured that “millionaires and lawyers” were getting aboard the Smallwood bandwagon in order to be positioned to give him the “bum’s rush” later on.180 The Responsible Government League and Crosbie’s Economic Union Party joined forces for the second referendum campaign and ran a radio campaign that featured Crosbie himself, Jamieson, O’Leary, Perlin, and F.W. Marshall, the president of the Great War Veterans’ Association – none of them, in the view of High Commissioner Macdonald, “of the calibre of the main Confederate speakers.”181 In a turnout of 84.9 per cent of registered electors, the 22 July referendum produced 78,323 votes (52.3 per cent) for “Confederation with Canada” and 71,334 votes (47.7 per cent) for “Responsible Government as it existed in 1933,” with the geographical pattern of the June vote well evident again.182 Responsible Government won in seven of the eight districts on the Avalon Peninsula, and Confederation won everywhere else. Writing to his parents in England the day after the vote, Water Street businessman Derrick Bowring made this comment on the final tally: “[A] s I expected Confederation collected most of the previous Commission votes. This was particularly so in St. John’s where Responsible gov[ernmen]t got roughly the same as last time but Confederation went up quite a bit.”183 The margin of the Confederate victory was razor-thin, but Smallwood and his Confederate associates were justifiably triumphant. In the ranks of their opponents, however, there were many recriminations, which in turn bred a revanchist mentality – a longing for “the old lost land of Newfoundland”184 – that lived on into the twenty-first century. For some diehard anti-confederates, Smallwood was the great betrayer, a charlatan never to be trusted. And hatred of him spilled over into metropolitan contempt for his outport supporters, who were seen as dupes rather than as agents of their own destiny. In the words of one prominent St John’s resident, “ignorant and avaricious outporters” had

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made a “free gift” of Newfoundland to Canada.185 Or, as another would write, Newfoundland’s union with Canada was “a contemptible act of political chicanery perpetrated on a simple people” who “should never have been asked to vote on a matter which was so complicated and so abstruse.”186 For his part, Tom Collingwood predicted that “a bitter anti British Government attitude,” stirred up by the close referendum vote, would remain “beyond the present generation.”187 “Between the first and second referendum,” he privately protested, “members of the Commission of Government took an active part in politics and besides that His Excellency the Governor had worked long and hard in the interests of Confederation and as a result we have been sold out.” Given the “nasty situation” in the country, his company had taken the precaution of getting riot and civil commotion insurance. Smallwood likewise acted in self-defence: on his return to St John’s after a Confederate victory celebration on the Conception Bay shore, he was careful to hole up in the Newfoundland Hotel to avoid trouble.188

t e r m s o f u ni on In a free and fair election – the conduct of the vote was never challenged in court –Newfoundlanders had made their choice, but would Ottawa be willing to proceed on the basis of such a close vote in favour of union? To the great relief of the British, the government of Canada said yes, making its position known in a statement issued by Prime Minister King on 30 July. The same day, Governor Macdonald announced that a delegation, to be chaired by Albert Walsh, since 1947 vice-chairman of the commission, would now be appointed to go to Ottawa to complete negotiations with Canada. On 5 August, Smallwood, Bradley, Crosbie, and McEvoy (whom Smallwood came to intensely dislike) were named to the delegation, along with Philip Gruchy, the general manager of the Anglo-Newfoundland Development Company, Grand Falls, and Gordon A. Winter, the president of T. & M. Winter Company, St John’s, who in 1946–47 had been president of the Newfoundland Board of Trade.189 James. G. Channing was named as secretary to the delegation, which was accompanied to Ottawa by two stenographers.190 The next day, Smallwood and Bradley received a rapturous response when they spoke in Ottawa at the national convention of the Liberal Party of Canada that chose Louis St Laurent as party leader. The Liberal Party was their natural home in Canadian politics. They both had Liberal credentials in Newfoundland, and their Confederation negotiations were with a Liberal administration in Ottawa that was running

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strong. Ideologically, Smallwood had much in common with the ccf , but becoming a left-leaning Liberal in the context of Canadian politics was the logical and realistic course of action for him. He did not miss his chance, telling the convention facetiously of the division of spoils that he and Bradley had agreed upon when they had started their campaign for Confederation: “‘Which do you want, Gordon,’ I said. ‘The Premiership of the Province of Newfoundland or the Prime Ministership of Canada?’ He decided that since he had had a fling in local politics he would like to take over Ottawa. So I was happy because I wanted Newfoundland. So we shook hands on it and here we are.”191 In his first appearance before a Canadian political gathering, the “small, glib Newfoundlander” swept all before him.192 On 25 August, it was back to business when the delegation appointed to go to Ottawa to negotiate final terms of union began a series of preparatory meetings at the Colonial Building, St John’s.193 Over the next weeks, it examined the contents of the Grey Book in detail and heard from a variety of officials and interest groups. The Newfoundland Board of Trade submitted an especially extensive brief for consideration. Crosbie suggested that a rental agreement be made with Canada for the use of Labrador resources, but this went nowhere. Another non-starter was a proposal by Smallwood, always ready with a bright idea, that Canada take over the French islands of St Pierre and Miquelon and transfer control of them to Newfoundland. The delegation completed its meetings on 28 September, having produced a lengthy memorandum that detailed the Newfoundland bargaining position for the forthcoming talks. Early in October, it arrived in Ottawa, for the moment minus Crosbie, who had been injured in a car accident on 1 October. In what followed, it had as advisers Dean Vincent MacDonald of the Dalhousie University law school, J.C. Thompson of Peat Marwick, and two senior Newfoundland officials, Secretary for Finance W.M. Marshall and Secretary for Justice H.G. Puddester; the accomplished Stella Meaney and Mary Goodland provided office support.194 Ottawa prepared for the final round of talks as before: a cabinet committee was advised by an interdepartmental committee, with the under-secretary of state for external affairs as chairman and MacKay, who had made soundings in St John’s immediately after the decisive second referendum, as vice-chairman.195 The formal opening of talks between the Canadian and Newfoundland delegations took place on 6 October 1948, with Secretary of State for External Affairs St Laurent and Walsh as co-chairmen. Early in in the proceedings, the Newfoundlanders presented in two parts the memorandum they had

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prepared in St John’s, the first part dealing with financial matters and the second part with everything else. In the financial negotiations, a term – made much of by Smallwood – was eventually agreed upon whereby a royal commission would be appointed by Ottawa within eight years of the date of union to make recommendations regarding the “form and scale of additional financial assistance, if any” that might be required to fit Newfoundland equitably into Confederation.196 To satisfy denominational school interests – those of Roman Catholics in particular – a term was worked out that went beyond the guarantee of denominational school rights already provided for in Canada by Section 93 of the British North America Act, 1867. But, in keeping with its overall policy of fitting the new province to the extent possible into existing Canadian practice, Canada refused a Newfoundland request to have the benefits of the Maritime Freight Rates Act, 1927 extended not only to rail but to coastal boat service.197 Making the Newfoundland Railway (which Ottawa agreed to take over) part of the Canadian National system had ample precedent in Canada whereas federal subsidy for coastal boat service didn’t and might therefore be expected to arouse regional jealousy. In a deal negotiated separately by W.R. Martin and G. Campbell Eaton, veterans of the First and Second World Wars, respectively, Newfoundland veterans were fitted seamlessly into the Canadian benefit system, which went far beyond what the Commission of Government had on offer.198 Jack Turner, who had led the more than 4,000 Newfoundland foresters who had served in Scotland during the Second World War, went to Ottawa hoping to negotiate a similar arrangement on their behalf, but he died in his sleep in the Lord Elgin Hotel while the matter was pending. At a crucial moment, the Newfoundland foresters were not represented, with the result that they had to fight long and hard within Confederation for equality with their Canadian counterparts. Nor were Newfoundland’s Indigenous peoples specifically mentioned in the negotiated agreement.199 This reflected the fact that there were no treaty or status rights in Newfoundland and Indigenous people could vote. Legally, Canada’s Indian Act would apply to Newfoundland, but in practice no reserve was created in the province until 1987. By a provision agreed upon in relation to the manufacture of oleomargarine, Newfoundlanders would be able to go on eating the coloured product, something that a powerful dairy lobby had long managed to prevent in Canada. A legislature would have to be called together in the new province within four months of union, and representation in Ottawa would be by six senators and seven members of Parliament. The legislature would be constituted as it had been in 1934, but Labrador would now elect a member and there would be no Legislative Council, though Newfoundland

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3.11 Smallwood signing the Terms of Union between Newfoundland and Canada, Ottawa, 11 December 1948.

was empowered to re-establish an upper house as it saw fit. This meant that the first provincial election would be held in twenty-five rather than twenty-four districts. The voters list to be used in the first instance would be the one prepared in 1947. By Term 16, the legislature would have to be called together “not later than four months after the date of Union.” The

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“Province of Newfoundland” (the name was specified in Term 1) would incorporate the “Coast of Labrador” as delimited by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in March 1927.200 The Terms of Union, fifty in number, were signed in the Senate Chamber on 11 December 1948 at a ceremony broadcast in both countries. St Laurent, who had become prime minister on 15 November, signed for Canada, along with National Defence Minister Brooke Claxton.201 All the members of the Newfoundland delegation signed the document except for Crosbie, who declared the financial arrangement inadequate. Smallwood signed with a flourish. The term promising a future royal commission was numbered twenty-nine and would loom large in his later political career. The terms of union were to take effect and the Province of Newfoundland come into existence “immediately before the expiration of the thirty-first day of March, 1949,” subject to approval by the Parliament of Canada and the Government of Newfoundland and the enactment of confirming legislation in the United Kingdom.202 With his opponents still looking for a way to stop what was happening, Smallwood was understandably anxious to avoid making the date of union April Fool’s Day.203 Asked by the Sunday Herald for a comment on the signing of the Terms of Union, he sent this inspirational message from Ottawa: I am happy today to say that it is now beyond all doubt that Confederation will be the best thing that ever came to our Newfoundland people. When Confederation’s great benefits are fully understood no patriotic intelligent Newfoundlander will be able honestly to utter a word against it. I have devoted almost every hour of my time these past three years to bringing Confederation about and I am very happy indeed to see our efforts crowned with victory for the ordinary men and ordinary women – and above all the children – of my beloved native land. Inside of six months after we become a province not 20% of Newfoundland people will be against Confederation. Inside of twelve months not 10%. “They shall know the truth and the truth will set them free.” The Newfoundland people chose Confederation by a demographic majority and nothing now can stop it. Its last few remaining opponents can go ten times across the Atlantic or into the courts but they cannot overturn the will of the people. I give thanks to my creator for the strength he has given me to work in this great cause of the people. I foresee a great and prosperous future for our people under Confederation.204

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When Smallwood and Bradley arrived by Trans-Canada Air Lines at Torbay Airport on the evening of 14 December (Walsh, Channing, Puddester, and Goodland were also on the flight), they were greeted by a cheering crowd while a sound truck played “O Canada.”205 Among the well-wishers was Smallwood’s mother, who greeted him when he got off the plane. “We got much better terms this time,” he told the crowd. “In the first 8 years of union we will get $100,000,000 from the Canadian Government and that’s only 1-3rd of it ... [T]hree months from now we will get a new lease on life. The people made no mistake when they gave a majority to confederation ... [T]ake no notice of the stupid attempts being made to upset the will of the people. The voice of the people is the voice of God, the future for Newfoundland is bright.”206 When Walsh was knighted in the King’s 1949 New Year’s Honours List, the Sunday Herald wondered if “Plain ‘Joe’” would soon be “Sir Joseph Smallwood,” but this didn’t happen and would not have suited Smallwood’s populist message.207 “Clever politician that he is,” the paper later told its readers, “Mr. Smallwood is only too well aware that one reason for his terrific popularity across this country is the fact he is plain ‘Joe’ to thousands upon thousands of Newfoundlanders, and crusading Joe would be somewhat handicapped by a handle like Sir Joseph R. Smallwood.”208

v ic tor In January 1949, Smallwood shifted gears when the distinguished Ottawa-based Canadian photographer Yousuf Karsh and his wife Solange Gauthier arrived in St John’s at the behest of Ewart Young’s Atlantic Guardian. Karsh’s mission was “to record faces of Newfoundland ‘men of destiny’ to mark the consummation of confederation with Canada.”209 Smallwood, but not Bradley (who may have been in Bonavista and sick at the time), was among the elect who posed for Karsh, with the others so honoured including Walsh, Crosbie, Gruchy, Quinton, and the radical medical doctor William Roberts. Eventually, the portraits found their way into a commemorative book, This Is Newfoundland, edited by Young. The attractive volume, which was published by Ryerson Press, had a prologue by the celebrated E.J. Pratt, a long-time resident of Toronto; a historical introduction by the expatriate Newfoundland journalist Brian Cahill (like Young a Montrealer and a promoter of the Atlantic Guardian); photographs by Cyril Marshall; portraits by Karsh; and biographical sketches by Smallwood. Pratt’s stirring poem “Newfoundland Sailors,” handwritten and signed, appeared opposite the title

3.12 Joseph Roberts Smallwood by Yousuf Karsh, 11 January 1949.

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page. In his preface, Young described the book as an “effort to interpret Newfoundland in the light of the problems of the past and hopes for the future.” Karsh’s portrait of Smallwood in the volume, which quickly became a signature image, showed him in a reflective pose, wearing a bow tie and rimless glasses and holding a lit cigarette. In his biographical sketch to go with the portrait, Young wrote that the “many notable achievements” of Smallwood’s “very active” earlier life paled into insignificance beside his “great and historic work” of bringing Newfoundland into Confederation: “He will go down in history as the man who almost single-handedly rounded off the Canadian Confederation by persuading Newfoundland to enter the Union.” Another 1949 portrait by Karsh shows Smallwood in a business suit with wide lapels, bow tie, and rimless glasses and looking very much like the cat that had swallowed the canary, as indeed he had (see Figure 3.12).210 A Smallwood myth, largely orchestrated by Smallwood himself, was in the making even before the union of the two countries was realized. On 13 January 1949, Smallwood, always anxious for a public platform, led the affirmative side in an mcli debate on the adequacy of the Terms of Union, which were actually approved by the Commission of Government on 26 January.211 On 31 January, during another visit to Ottawa (this time Clara and son Ramsay joined him and were well feted), Smallwood stated publicly that there would be “only one course open” to the first lieutenant-governor of the Province of Newfoundland: to call on him to be premier “as the man who [had] most recently appealed to the people.”212 He predicted that Sir Leonard Outerbridge would be named to the vice-regal post and that a provincial election would be held in late May or early June. On 7 February, Smallwood, Peter Cashin, and P.A. Clutterbuck, an unlikely trio, were present in the visitors’ gallery when legislation to approve the Terms of Union was introduced into the Canadian House of Commons.213 Since 1946, Clutterbuck, who was knighted the same year, had been British High Commissioner to Canada, and he had good reason to be pleased by this latest development in Newfoundland’s long road to Confederation. Cashin, however, was still ranting and roaring against union, a lost cause after unsuccessful court action and the despatch of another delegation to London. For his part, Smallwood was now riveted on the political prize that he believed, with good reason, was rightly his.214 High Commissioner Charles Burchell, who had succeeded Macdonald at Canada House, St John’s, in September 1948, had his own ideas on the delicate subject of how the political transition in Newfoundland should be handled. In a despatch dated 21 February 1949, he wrote that

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he anticipated “some difficulty” in the selection of a lieutenant-governor before 31 March.215 Moreover, a vice-regal representative appointed before that date would have trouble “in the selection of a man to head the Executive Council during the interim period between March 31st and the election for the Provincial Legislature.” Such a selection “would be looked upon with disfavour” because of the absence of political parties in the country. In the circumstances, Burchell’s recommendation was that a lieutenant-governor not be appointed until after the first provincial election and that in the meantime the vice-regal duties be carried out by Chief Justice L.E. Emerson, a course of action consistent with the Terms of Union.216 Burchell’s scheme would have denied Smallwood the prize of immediate office and the advantage of fighting the first provincial election as premier, but his advice was not taken in Ottawa. Instead, a plan was worked out whereby Walsh would become lieutenant-governor for a period of five months and would then be succeeded by Leonard Outerbridge, who was anxious to float above the political fray.217 In an exchange of letters between St Laurent and Walsh, an understanding was reached whereby Smallwood would be invited to form a government, suitably balanced denominationally, immediately after Confederation took effect. Walsh was not told what to do, but there was no doubt about what the outcome would be. “From everything I hear,” St Laurent wrote to him, “the Lieutenant-Governor, whoever he is, will probably feel that Mr. Smallwood should be invited to form the provincial Executive Council pending the election.”218 For his part, having met with visiting Liberal mp Walter Harris in St John’s, Walsh told the prime minister that Smallwood was “the leader of the only party in Newfoundland prepared to form a government to seek popular approval.”219 At the same time, “the formation of a government which would not go to the polls would be entirely without precedent and difficult to justify.” Further to this arrangement, St Laurent told the high commissioner on 25 March that Bradley had agreed to join the federal cabinet – manifestly the lesser of the two prizes.220 The same day, Burchell reported that Walsh had volunteered the information “that [the] only practical course for him to follow was to call upon Smallwood to form a Government as he is [the] only person ready to form a Cabinet and this he intends to do.”221 And so the way was cleared for Smallwood, who continued to push hard to fight his first provincial general election as premier of the province. Earlier in March, when asked by the Sunday Herald, “What are your plans if you do not receive the Premiership?” Smallwood had replied, “It has never occurred to me that I would not be appointed.”222

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On 26 March, while he waited for destiny’s door to open to him (he was on a south coast tour at the time), Smallwood published a lengthy article in the Star Weekly (Toronto), illustrated by the artist George Paginton and headed “To Make Newfoundland Great.”223 Though Confederation, he reasoned, would raise the standard of living of Newfoundlanders, it would not solve their “basic problem,” which was “the development of a more diversified economy.” Union with Canada would not automatically do this, but it at last made progress possible. Newfoundlanders did not want to live in “a glorified Canadian poorhouse” but wanted to be “self-supporting as a province of the Canadian family.” Fisheries remained “the life-blood” of the Newfoundland economy, but fishing was a “hazardous” enterprise, subject to the vagaries of weather and the ups and down of external market conditions. The way forward lay through resource development and the creation of “alternate sources of income and employment,” without which there would be “no security”: “We can no longer afford to put all our eggs in one basket. Like the Canadian prairies with their wheat economy, we must develop new basic and secondary industries and lessen our dependence upon the fisheries. Only then can we hope to establish anything like a stabilized economy.” As always, Smallwood, full of plans and ideas, was ready and raring to go.

p r e m ie r On 23 March 1949, the amendment to the British North America Act required to give effect to the union of Newfoundland and Canada was given assent in the United Kingdom; then, on 28 March, Prime Minister Attlee gave a valedictory radio address to the Newfoundland people.224 Arguably, in their long postwar retreat from Empire, the British made one of their smoothest and most constructive exits from Newfoundland. But in deference to the strong feelings in St John’s against Confederation, no formal celebration was held there on 1 April 1949 by the Government of Canada to mark the actual completion of the union. Instead, a carefully scripted ceremony, broadcast nationally, was held in the ballroom of Government House beginning at 1.35 p.m.225 When the local broadcast was over, those present listened to a national broadcast from Ottawa to mark the happy occasion. Walsh was sworn in as lieutenant-governor by Chief Justice L.E. Emerson, who had been serving as administrator since the departure, on 6 March, of Governor Macdonald. Following his swearing-in, Walsh was presented by federal cabinet minister Colin Gibson with a certificate of Canadian citizenship, which covered all Newfoundland British subjects coming within the meaning of

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the Canadian Citizenship Act, who were accorded all the “rights, powers and privileges” of “natural-born” Canadians. After polite socializing, Walsh, along with Smallwood and his ministers-to-be made their way to another part of the handsome residence, where Walsh invited Smallwood to form a government, an invitation that was but a formality. Smallwood and nine others, all men, were then appointed to the Executive Council (cabinet), Smallwood, aged forty-eight, as premier. They were chosen with “geological and ideological” considerations in mind to represent “the east, west and south of Newfoundland.”226 Les Curtis, Smallwood’s old patron-cum-consigliere, became minister of justice. In an appointment perhaps intended to reassure Water Street, Gordon Winter became minister of finance. W.J. Keough, who had supported Smallwood’s cause in the National Convention, became minister of natural resources. Two former commissioners, Herman Quinton and H.L. Pottle, also joined the new government, ensuring continuity of administration. Yet another cabinet appointee was Philip Forsey, who had funded the first issue of The Confederate.227 According to Smallwood, all those sworn in on 1 April had been Confederates except for Winter (who had, however, signed the Terms of Union) and Samuel J. Hefferton, a former president of the Newfoundland Teachers’ Association.228 On the same day, Bradley succeeded Gibson as secretary of state for Canada. After so much political uproar, Confederation had come “in a pair of soft-soled shoes.”229 But the depth of the change was not to be underestimated: the Barrelman had moved to the wheelhouse and was now in full command of the good ship Newfoundland. “Our government,” Premier Smallwood told a radio audience on 2 April, “are not archangels and we are not supermen. I think I can say that we are an average bunch of Newfoundlanders who are determined to do our best for the toiling masses of this country.” His own motto now was “make Newfoundland fit for Newfoundlanders,” and in keeping with this sentiment he called on “all persons, regardless of their feelings about Confederation, to ‘pitch in’ to develop the country.”230 The new government, funded with an appropriation carried forward from the Commission of Government, was referred to as being “interim” in nature, but Smallwood gave a broad definition to this term. Daily, he received dozens of callers, leading the Sunday Herald to advise that anyone who wanted to see him should bring a lunch.231 His indispensable office gatekeeper was Muriel Templeman (née Page), who had worked as his personal assistant during the referendum campaigns; she joined his staff on his first day in office and remained with him through his premiership.232 She was said to know “more about Smallwood’s personal life, his moods and idiosyncrasies than any other person alive.”233 From

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3.13 The first cabinet of the Province of Newfoundland, 1 April 1949. Front row (left to right): William J. Keough, Joseph R. Smallwood, Herman W. Quinton; back row (left to right), Gordon A. Winter, Leslie R. Curtis, Herbert L. Pottle, Charles H. Ballam, Samuel J. Hefferton, Philip S. Forsey, Michael J. Sinnott.

28 to 30 April 1949, the founding convention of the provincial Liberal Party was held at the clb Armoury, St John’s, decorated for the occasion with bunting scavenged from the 1948 national Liberal convention in Ottawa.234 On the last day of the convention, Smallwood was unanimously chosen as party leader. He also seized the occasion of the gathering to announce that the province would go to the polls on 27 May. By this time, the Liberals had a competitor in the newly formed provincial wing of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada. In February 1949, pc national president J.M. Macdonnell and national director R.A. Bell had visited St John’s to show the flag.235 Subsequently, pc Leader George Drew received a lengthy internal report, replete with scuttlebutt about Smallwood (“a demagogue par excellence”), on how the party

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3.14 Smallwood (right) and Louis St Laurent (left) shake hands across the table, with Albert Walsh (standing, left) and Gordon Bradley (standing, right) looking on. With Jack Pickersgill as go-between, Newfoundland became a bastion of support for the Liberal Party of Canada.

might go about organizing itself in the province, the first job being to find a suitable leader.236 Newfoundland Fisheries Board Chairman Raymond Gushue, Crosbie, and prominent businessman Calvert C. Pratt were thought of as possible candidates for this role, but in the end the job went to St John’s city councillor Harry Mews, who had opposed Confederation. Following his selection, Drew, whose paternal grandmother had come from Port de Grave, Conception Bay, visited St John’s and made it known that while he was not opposed to the union of Newfoundland and Canada, he objected to the procedure by which it was being brought about.237 This was in keeping with the position his party had taken in parliamentary debate on the Terms of Union when it had called unsuccessfully for the existing provinces to be consulted on the matter.238 No doubt Drew’s message played well in anti-Confederate St John’s, but it also set the provincial party on course to be the voice of the disappointed, disaffected, and defeated. In effect, the Liberal Party became the heir of the successful Newfoundland Confederate

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Association and the Progressive Conservative Party the heir of the failed Responsible Government League.

e l e c t ions In the campaign leading to the 27 May election, the Liberals asked the voters to “Let Joe Finish the Job” (photo by Karsh), and that is exactly what they did.239 This time, wife Clara also took to the public platform with her own stump speech.240 In one advertisement, the Progressive Conservatives held up the spectre of life “Under the Iron Heel of Socialism,” which, the party charged, was what both the Liberal Party and ccf , one and the same, stood for.241 The result of the vote was decisive and followed the regional pattern established in the 1948 referenda.242 The Liberals elected twenty-two members and the Conservatives five, all of them on the Avalon Peninsula.243 Smallwood was elected in Bonavista North, a Confederate stronghold, where he defeated Progressive Conservative candidate James M. Way by 4,215 votes to 637.244 In the new district of Labrador, Harold Horwood, the feisty Confederate, littérateur, and future Smallwood biographer, was returned. Peter Cashin, fuming against what had befallen Newfoundland, was elected as an independent in Ferryland, an anti-Confederate stronghold.245 Mews and Michael Harrington, who also ran as a Progressive Conservative, were defeated in the two-member district of St John’s West, but in November 1949 Mews was elected mayor of St John’s, a position he then held until 1965. John G. Higgins (St John’s East), who in 1931 had successfully represented Corner Brook landlord Thomas Gill in legal action against Smallwood, became the first post-Confederation leader of the opposition in the House of Assembly. In the federal election that followed on 27 June 1949, the Liberal Party of Canada, which won handily, carried five Newfoundland constituencies and the Progressive Conservatives two, both of them in St John’s and vicinity.246 (Not until 1968 did the pc s win a seat away from the Avalon Peninsula.) St Laurent visited Newfoundland during the campaign, and he and his party had good reason to be grateful to Smallwood – and vice versa. But after Brooke Claxton visited the province of Newfoundland 1–12 July 1949 and met Smallwood, he sent St Laurent a memorandum that revealed an underlying wariness of the Newfoundland leader at the highest levels of the Government of Canada: I met the members of Smallwood’s Cabinet and by and large they are not impressive ... No one had much to say for Smallwood or his administrative capacity. But everyone regarded his selection as leader

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of the party as inevitable, as was his election ... Characteristic of Smallwood’s inflated attitude, I found him even critical of Bradley. As you know, they have been very close and during the negotiations they were inseparable, supporting each other and benefitting from their work together. Smallwood, however, now says that Bradley was not taking the side of Newfoundland (implying that he had gone over to the other side, that is, the Canadian side) and that he was not energetic or forceful and did not take a stand about anything ... Smallwood’s own personal popularity with the people is tremendous. He knows exactly how to appeal to them and he does not hesitate to pull out all the stops. He is a person of tremendous ambition. The fact that he is already thinking of becoming Prime Minister of Canada may keep him lined up with us but my own feeling is that he will find that it will pay to attack the federal government for not satisfying his rapacious demands and he may find in the long run that it will be better to do this as a member of the c.c.f. or some other left wing group than as a member of the Liberal Party. Like everyone else, I view the future of his administration with extreme alarm and it is small satisfaction for us to observe that it was inevitable.247 An audacious political chameleon, Smallwood was always his own man and could never be taken for granted. In an early act of provincial assertion, the new government of Newfoundland decided that 1 July, celebrated as Dominion Day elsewhere in Canada, would for 1949 at least continue to be a day of remembrance in the province248; on that date in 1916, the Newfoundland Regiment, whose departure from St John’s the schoolboy Smallwood had witnessed, had suffered devastating losses in France on the first day of the Battle of the Somme.

c l u t t e r b u c k calls Smallwood was more than a provincial premier; he was also a post-colonial leader and should be understood as such. For their own purposes, the British had arranged for the National Convention, but it was Smallwood who had seized the moment and led the cause of Confederation in thought, word, and deed. In short order after 1945, he went from being a man with a checkered past and an uncertain future to being a man with a mission and a growing following among what he liked to call the “toiling masses.”249 Along the way, he was aided and abetted by miscues and miscalculations on the part of his opponents, who misread the deep international and aspirational forces that were shaping the

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future of Newfoundland. As he predicted, the union of the two countries proved a great success. Canadian administration quickly took hold in Newfoundland, and the social welfare benefits it brought commanded broad support and were truly transformative in places like the Lamaline of pastors Buckwell and Lawlor and the Bonavista Bay of Art Scammell.250 Smallwood was also fortunate in the timing of Newfoundland’s union with Canada. Between 1950 and 1960, the gross national product of Canada doubled in dollar value, and economic growth on this scale made much innovation possible.251 In Newfoundland, Smallwood was the political beneficiary of a series of federal programs – housing renewal and slum clearance, unemployment insurance for fishermen, the funding of the Trans-Canada Highway, hospital insurance, etc. – and a decade after union the battles that had led to Confederation had faded into memory, though Joey-hating had taken on a life of its own.252 Ches Crosbie, an inept politician but an astute businessman, was quick to see which way the wind was blowing, leading him to support Smallwood in the 1949 provincial election campaign.253 Over the years, many others followed his lead, disavowing their anti-Confederate past and finding in Smallwood qualities heretofore unrecognized. As a party manager, Smallwood had sharp elbows, but he was always open to reconciliation and always on the lookout for opportunities to build support in the spirit of big-tent Liberalism. He was wont to say of late converts to his cause that “while the lamp holds out to burn, the vilest sinner may return.”254 As premier, he achieved an extraordinary grip on power and quickly became a national celebrity. There were certainly downsides to Confederation – centralized fishery management from Ottawa, tussles with Quebec over Labrador power, ownership of offshore resources, etc. – but they would only become apparent in the fullness of time. After 1949, Smallwood took to the politics of the federation avidly. Through diligent study and negotiating experience, he had acquired an excellent understanding of the Canadian federal system and in this regard was without peer in Newfoundland politics. In power, he made much of being a Father of Confederation but was also quick to beat the provincial drum as circumstances required. Smallwood wrote the script for future premiers of Newfoundland (from 2001 Newfoundland and Labrador) in their dealings with Ottawa and the other provinces. From 20–30 August 1950, British High Commissioner Sir P.A. Clutterbuck made his fourth visit to Newfoundland (he had been there in 1933, 1938, and 1942) and naturally called on the busy provincial leader.255 Their tête-à-tête brought together two figures who had been at the forefront of Newfoundland affairs since the dark Depression days

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of 1933. Smallwood was in an expansive mood, and Clutterbuck afterwards reported on their get-together with accustomed professionalism: Mr. Smallwood towers above the rest of his colleagues. His varied career as a free-lance journalist, editor and pig-breeder did not prevent him from making an intensive study of the constitutional framework of Canada, and the knowledge which he gained has stood him in good stead during the last two years. He has earned a considerable reputation on the mainland as a result of a recent coast-to-coast tour, and his popularity is unquestioned in Newfoundland itself, where he is looked on as a tireless and honest worker for the good of the country, even though his optimism sometimes gives rise to doubts. Only the Minister of Finance Mr. Quinton,256 has had any previous experience of administration and his cautious attitude to the Premier’s development schemes has acted as a brake on the wholesale melting away of the surplus balances.257 Unfortunately, however, Mr. Quinton is no longer in the best of health, and rumour has it that he expects shortly to be nominated to the Senate. It is difficult to see who will be able to take his place, since the remaining Ministers are not an impressive lot and mostly owe their position and continued existence solely to Mr. Smallwood’s drive and energy. An example of the way in which the Premier carries his colleagues on his back occurred when I was myself talking to him. The Minister of Public Works, an ex-bricklayer, telephoned in evident confusion to say that one of his inspectors had questioned the soundness of a brick wall built recently at a Government hospital in the capital.258 What action should he take? Mr. Smallwood told him to go to the hospital “not as a Cabinet Minister, nor as a bricklayer, but as a private citizen” and make up his own mind on the spot. Then, putting down the receiver he turned to me with a wry smile, saying that he doubted whether Mr. Attlee would be able to do much serious work if plagued with similar colleagues. On the other hand, Mr. Smallwood obviously enjoys his position as the head of a “one-man Government” and commented to me on the benefits of “democratic dictatorship” which he said was only possible in a small place like Newfoundland.259 Smallwood would have well understood the role that Clutterbuck, a mandarin’s mandarin, had played in shaping the course of recent Newfoundland history and must have relished the post-colonial role reversal their meeting highlighted. He often played to mixed reviews both at home and away, but there was no doubting his political durability. He

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was just getting started when Clutterbuck dropped by and held office until 18 January 1972. When Sir Richard Squires died in March 1940, Smallwood had eulogized him in one of his Barrelman broadcasts as “brilliant-minded” and a “human power-house,” a leader of “boundless energy” and “iron-will” with a “dynamic and mesmeric personality.”260 In this tribute to Squires he might well have been speaking of his own later political self. Arguably, in the young Smallwood “the spirits of Coaker and Squires struggled for control,” and Squires “came out on top.”261 The selection of senators to represent the new province in the Parliament of Canada showed the extent of Smallwood’s evolving post-Confederation political reach. One of the first three Newfoundland appointees to the Red Chamber was Ray Petten, who had been so active in greasing the financial wheels of the Newfoundland Confederate Association.262 When Smallwood heard that the appointment of J.B. McEvoy was being considered in Ottawa, he made his opposition known in no uncertain terms. “I have already told you in conversation,” he admonished St Laurent, “of my reaction to the suggestion that Mr. McEvoy be appointed to the Senate as a representative Roman Catholic. I can only add that his appointment would be thoroughly obnoxious and would go a long way toward bringing the Federal Government into widespread disrepute in Newfoundland. I could never be a party to his appointment. I am willing to have the correctness of my view tested in any way that may occur to you in Newfoundland, and I am completely confident that such a test would sustain the soundness of my judgment.”263 In the event, McEvoy was not appointed, an outcome that was indicative of the commanding political position Smallwood had now achieved. For long a client, as premier he became a patron extraordinaire. In 1953, Gordon Bradley moved on to the Senate, his retirement assured.

r e t ro s pect Three points of debate have arisen about the events leading to Newfoundland’s union with Canada.264 Were Newfoundlanders really given a choice? Our answer to this question is an unequivocal yes. It was the United Kingdom that put the option of Confederation on the referendum ballot, but this was done only after Canada had produced draft terms of union and the matter had been thoroughly debated in Newfoundland. The British undoubtedly wanted Newfoundland to join Canada, but they could not dictate this outcome. In the end, only Newfoundlanders and Labradorians could vote, and cast ballots they did in large numbers.

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They had real choices before them that were well understood, and they made a democratic decision. Second, it has been suggested that the counting of the ballots in the decisive 22 July 1948 referendum was somehow rigged. This is a big claim indeed, but we have yet to see the evidence behind it. Unless sound and sustainable evidence is produced, we trust that this version of events will not go into the history books as truth. That would be a great disservice to young Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, who need to be told the facts of history and nothing but the facts of history. Magistrate Nehemiah Short, who was given the Order of the British Empire (Civil List), was an honourable man and deserves to be remembered as such for his careful electoral administration.265 Third, and more subtly, it is sometimes suggested that the right thing – Confederation – happened but in the wrong way. In this version of events, the resumption of self-government by Newfoundland would have quickly led to union with Canada in happier circumstances. All of this is, of course, highly speculative. It also flies in the face of the strong antiCanadian rhetoric of many of the advocates of “Responsible Government as it existed in 1933” and the nervousness of the Government of Canada about making a deal with Newfoundland that would stir the envy of established provinces. In our view (again speculative), Newfoundland could not have become part of Canada in any circumstances without a big political fight, so the battle that occurred and the scars that it left should not surprise. The good news is that the scars quickly healed as Newfoundland prospered and readily adapted to the realities of federal-provincial relations.

c a n a da h ouse In the summer of 1949, Smallwood moved into Canada House, which was still owned by the federal government, taking over both office and residence used by the now defunct High Commission.266 The property was leased by the provincial government from the federal government for $100 per month, and Smallwood, in his private capacity, leased the domestic quarters from the province for $50 per month; overnight, Clara, who had grown up in comfort and style in Carbonear, became chatelaine of thirty-two rooms.267 The house is one of the loveliest in St John’s and is steeped in history (Prime Minister Sir Michael Cashin once also lived there). It is but an easy stroll from the premises to Bannerman Park and then a hop and a skip across to the Colonial Building: where Joe Smallwood had witnessed a riot in 1932, where he had fought relent-

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3.15 Canada House, 74 Circular Road, St John’s.

lessly in the National Convention to get Confederation with Canada on the referendum ballot paper, and where he now had pride of place on the government side of the House of Assembly. The Smallwood family had risen in the world, and Newfoundland’s compass pointed to radical change, with a daring, irrepressible visionary and risk-taker in charge. The unexpected and unimaginable had come true, and the wild card of Newfoundland politics was in play. Premier Smallwood was the product of both his own ingenuity and “the whirligig of time” – a force that, he once mused, could throw up “some queer things.”268 Joe Smallwood stood apart and had about him the touch of destiny. He took to power like a fish to water and in office sought to build the new Newfoundland of his dreams.

3.16 In 1950, Joe and Clara were feted at the Old Colony Club, St John’s, in honour of their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary (23 November). After many ups and downs together, they had entered the uplands of life. Joe told the assembled well-wishers that he had “to borrow $50 with which to get married” (Twillingate Sun, 9 Dec. 1950, 3). The portrait above the mantelpiece, by the Austrian-born artist Frederick Steiger, is of their daughter Clara.

Notes

p r e fac e 1 In 1970, the National Film Board of Canada released A Little Fellow from Gambo – The Joey Smallwood Story, directed by Julian Biggs. 2 Richard Gwyn, Smallwood: The Unlikely Revolutionary (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968). A revised edition was published in 1972. 3 See Rick Salutin, “Canada’s Best Columnist Wasn’t Canadian,” Toronto Star, 13 Aug. 2015, https://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/ 2015/08/13/canadas-best-columnist-wasnt-canadian-salutin.html. 4 Harold Horwood, Joey (Toronto: Stoddart, 1989), 3. 5 Diarmaid MacCulloch, Thomas Cromwell: A Life (London: Allen Lane, 2018), 5. 6 The words quoted are from Term 50 of the 11 December 1948 Terms of Union between Newfoundland and Canada, https://www.heritage.nf.ca/ articles/politics/pdf/terms-of-union.pdf.

c ha p t e r o n e 1 Joseph R. Smallwood, I Chose Canada: The Memoirs of the Honourable Joseph R. “Joey” Smallwood (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1973), 17. 2 In birth order, the offspring of David Smallwood and Julia Cooper were Fanny (1863–1941), Frederick/Fred (1864–1917), John/Jack (1866–1928), Alexander/Sandy (1868–1947), David James (1870–1948), Haviland Clarke (1870–1889), Charles William (1873–1956), Duncan Buchanon (1875–1940), Walter Reginald (1878–1881), Joseph Cooper (1880–1893). In some sources, Fanny’s year of birth is incorrectly given as 1868. We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for the information in this note.

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Notes to pages 3–5

3 For the genealogy of the Smallwood family, see David A. Pike, “A Look at the Ancestry of Joseph R. Smallwood,” Newfoundland Ancestor 27 (2) (2011): 55–62. 4 In birth order, his siblings were: Maria Julia (1902–1990), Ida May (1903–1987), David Haviland (1906–1987), Isabella Margaret (1908–1991), Charles Edward (1909–1987), Sadie Frances (1912–1965), Alexander William (1913–1980), Alice Mary (1916–1988), Reginald Bernard (1918–2005), Dorothy Jean (1920–2007), Augustus (1921–2015), and Maxine Dorcas (1924–2001). We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for this information. 5 Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 31. 6 Ibid., 58. 7 Ibid., 60. 8 Ibid., 55–70 (chapter entitled “Apprentice Newfoundlander”). 9 Ibid., 56. 10 Ibid., 57. 11 Daily News, 4 May 1925, 7. P.G. Butler was later principal of Springdale High School, St John’s. He was known for his promotion of vocational and business education (Daily News, 24 Apr. 1947, 11). 12 Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 61. 13 Ibid., 78, 88. 14 An apprentice in a printing establishment. 15 Evening Advocate, 7 July 1917, 4; 9 Oct. 1917, 5. 16 For Coaker’s life, see Melvin Baker, “Coaker, Sir William Ford,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/ coaker_william_ford_16E.html. 17 It was also translated as “Let each have his own” (Fishermen’s Advocate, 19 Feb. 1910, 1) and “To Every Man His Own” (Evening Advocate, 10 Jan. 1917, 4). 18 Grimes wrote about the Union Party’s initial political involvement in “Newfoundland Labor in Politics,” Cotton’s Weekly (Cowansville, Québec), 4 Dec. 1913, 1. In this article (the weekly was a Canadian socialist publication), he described himself as the “first Socialist elected in Newfoundland, though I regret to say not on a Socialist ticket.” For the 30 Oct. 1913 general election, see Melvin Baker and Peter Neary, “Sir Robert Bond (1857–1927): A Biographical Sketch,” Newfoundland Studies, 15, 1 (1999), 22–5. 19 From 12 February to 19 March 1910, the paper was published in Coakerville, located on an island in Notre Dame Bay and named by Coaker (he lived and farmed there for a time). From 26 March 1910 to

Notes to pages 5–8

20 21 22

23 24

25

26 27 28

29

30

31 32

33 34 35

195

30 August 1924, the paper was published in St John’s; from 5 September 1924 to 22 May 1980, it was published in Port Union. For the origins of the paper, see Melvin Baker, “Plaindealing and the Fishermen’s Protective Union, 1908–10,” Newfoundland Quarterly, 105, 4 (Spring 2013), 43–51. The Evening Advocate had a morning counterpart that ran from 2 Jan. 1917 to July 1917. Evening Advocate, “Off to Victory!”18 Jan. 1918, 5. Evening Telegram, 18 Oct. 1918, 9; W. David Parsons, “The Spanish Lady and the Newfoundland Regiment,” http://www.vlib.us/medical/parsons. htm. In September 1984, not long before his eighty-fourth birthday. For McKenzie’s visit, see Evening Telegram, 17 Dec. 1918, 4. His later Newfoundland involvements are detailed in Melvin Baker and Peter Neary, “‘A Real Record for All Time’: Newfoundland and Great War official history,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 27, 1 (2012), 5–32. Evening Telegram, 8 Feb. 1919, 5; Archives and Special Collections (asc ), Memorial University Libraries, coll -285 (J.R. Smallwood Papers), 2.06.005, tape 15, side 2, 01746/94, “Twice I Saw Tommy Ricketts,” 34. Evening Telegram, “What the Kaiser Said,”19 Aug. 1919, 11. Evening Telegram, “Assisting the Press,”16 Aug. 1919, 9. “The Mount Pearl Wireless Station,” Commercial Annual, Christmas 1919, 81–2, http://collections.mun.ca/cdm/compoundobject/collection/ cns_period/id/28923/rec/64. For Squires’ career, see S.J.R. Noel, Politics in Newfoundland (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1971), 137–48, and the account of his life by James K. Hiller in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography (http://www. biographi.ca/en/bio/squires_richard_anderson_16E.htm). For the history of the Newfoundland Industrial Workers Association, see Peter S. McInnis, “Newfoundland Labour and World War I: The Emergence of the Newfoundland Industrial Workers’ Association” (ma thesis, Memorial University, 1987). Evening Herald, 30 Dec. 1919, 4. For the history of prohibition in Newfoundland, see Melvin Baker, “1921 Report of the Commission on the Prohibition Plebiscite Act,”Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 27, 2 (2012), 267–79. Evening Telegram, 15 Mar. 1920, 4. Ibid., 20 Mar. 1920, 9. In late years, he imbibed lightly, drinking wine and sherry with a meal but avoiding “hard liquor.” We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for this information.

196

Notes to pages 8–14

36 Melvin Baker Research Collection, Gill to Baker, 17 Feb. 1993; Ruby Gough, Robert Edwards Holloway: Newfoundland Educator, Scientist, Photographer, 1874–1904 (Kingston and Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2005), 113. 37 Minister of justice and attorney general of Newfoundland, 1949–66. 38 Evening Telegram, 19 Mar. 1920, 7. 39 Melvin Baker Research Collection, Smallwood to Squires, 27 July 1920. 40 Melvin Baker Research Collection, Squires to Smallwood, 2 Aug. 1920. 41 asc , coll -285, 1.11.001, Smallwood to Bill, 2 Aug. 1920. 42 See Evening Telegram, 14 Aug. 1920, 10; 31 Aug. 1920, 8. 43 asc , coll -285, 1.11.001, Smallwood to Bill, 2 Aug. 1920. For McGrarth’s career, see the account of his life by Melvin Baker in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography (http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/ mcgrath_patrick_thomas_15E.html). 44 Daily Star, 7 Jan. 1921, 9. 45 Ibid., 12 Jan. 1921, 5; Evening Telegram 12 Mar. 1921, 4. 46 Evening Telegram, 12 Mar. 1921, 4. 47 Evening Advocate, 12 Mar. 1921, 8. 48 Ibid., 21 July 1921, 8. 49 Ibid., 1 Aug. 1921, 8. 50 Evening Telegram, 1 June 1921, 3. 51 Smallwood to Evening Telegram, 4 June 1921, 5; 27 June 1921, 7. 52 Smallwood to Evening Telegram, 27 June 1921, 7. 53 For the history of this reform, see Margot I. Duley, Where Once Our Mothers Stood We Stand: Women’s Suffrage in Newfoundland, 1890–1925 (Charlottetown: Gynergy Books, 1993). 54 Evening Advocate, 2 Sept. 1921, 4. 55 Reference courtesy of Dr Maynard Clouter, St John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador. Katherine Tilley (1860–1946) and Horatio Clouter (1859–1925) were married on 17 Jan. 1884. 56 Evening Advocate, 22 Sept. 1921, 8; 30 Sept. 1921, 6; 21 Nov. 1921, 5–7. 57 asc , coll -9 (William Ford Coaker Papers), 1.11.002, Smallwood to Coaker, 5 Nov. 1921. Smallwood wrote in this letter that he was working on a book about “Some Newfoundland Problems.” 58 Evening Advocate, 6 Dec. 1921, 6; 7 Dec. 1921, 7. 59 For the Newfoundland phase of his career, see James E. Candow, “Sidney Cotton and the Origin of Aerial Spotting in the Newfoundland Seal Hunt,” Newfoundland Quarterly 82, 3 (Winter 1987), 22–31. 60 Evening Advocate, 24 Jan. 1922, 1. 61 Ibid., 2 June 1922, 8.

Notes to pages 14–18

197

62 Ibid., 13 Aug. 1921, 1, 4. 63 Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 127–8. 64 He did, however, publish in the paper. See Evening Advocate, 15 Sept. 1923, 6, for his article “Fought for the Fishermen,” reprinted from the New York Times. 65 Evening Advocate, 2 Feb. 1922, 8. 66 Ibid., 11 July 1922, 6. 67 Evening Telegram, 24 June 1922, 9; 11 July 1922, 8; 20 July 1922, 6; Daily News, 25 July 1922, 5; 31 July 1922, 5; 1 Aug. 1922, 5; Evening Advocate, 26 July 1922, 6; 31 July 1922, 4; 24 Aug. 1922, 3; 22 Aug. 1922, 7. The directors were E.A. Bowring, W.G. Gosling, A.E. Hickman, James J. McKay, David Baird, J.C. Hepburn, R.B. Job, and C.A.C. Bruce. 68 Evening Advocate, 31 July 1922, 4. 69 Ibid., 11 Aug. 1922, 6; Evening Telegram, 26 Aug. 1922, 4. 70 Evening Advocate, 2 Sept. 1922, 6. 71 Daily News, 20 Mar. 1923, 3; Evening Telegram, 19 Mar. 1923, 5; https:// novascotia.ca/archives/nsfilm/history.asp. The previous year, this company had made Port aux Basques, a promotion film about industries and sport fishing along the route of the railway between Port aux Basques and St John’s. See Agnes Norman, Gervase Gallant, and Derek Norman, eds, Film in Newfoundland and Labrador, 1904–1980 (St John’s: Newfoundland Independent Filmmakers Co-operative, 1981), 5, 46. 72 Evening Advocate, 20 Nov. 1923, 6. 73 Daily News, 4 May 1925, 7; asc , coll -213 (George H. Tucker Papers), 1.05, Smallwood to Tucker, 23 Mar. 1924. 74 Joseph R. Smallwood, “Why I Am an Imperialist,” The Call Magazine, 22 Oct. 1922, 7, 9. 75 The Nation, 10 Jan. 1923, 36–7; asc , coll -213, 1.01, Smallwood to Tucker, 17 Jan. 1924. 76 See Evening Advocate for 1923: 22 Jan., 4; 23 Jan., 4; 25 Jan., 4; 26 Jan., 4; 27 Jan., 4; 29 Jan., 4; 30 Jan., 4; 31 Jan., 4; 1 Feb., 4; 2 Feb., 4; 3 Feb., 4. 77 Ibid., 27 Jan. 1923, 4; 29 Jan. 1923, 4. 78 See Melvin Baker and Hans Rollmann, “Joey Smallwood – He Didn’t See Confederation, but ... He Did See a ‘Socialist’ Utopia by 1971!” in James R. Thoms, editor-in-chief, Fifty Golden Years: The Illustrated Story of Newfoundland and Labrador’s Union with Canada (St John’s: Stirling Communications International, 1999), 78–9. 79 asc , coll -285, 1.01.004, Cynthia to Smallwood, 7 May 1923.

198

Notes to pages 19–25

80 asc , coll -285, 1.01.008, Sophie to Smallwood, 7 Apr. 1923. See also in the same file her letter to him of 29 May 1923. 81 asc , coll -285, 1.01.005, Smallwood to Zahn, 26 May 1923; Zahn to Smallwood, 30 May 1923. 82 Richard Gwyn, Smallwood: The Unlikely Revolutionary (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968), 30–1. 83 Evening Advocate, 20 Nov. 1923, 6. 84 asc , coll -285, 1.01.005, Smallwood to Zahn, 21 Nov. 1923. 85 Evening Advocate, 30 Nov. 1923, 4. 86 asc , coll -285, 1.01.005, Smallwood to Zahn, 4 Dec. 1923. 87 asc , coll -285, 1.01.005, Smallwood to Zahn, 4, 15, 21 Dec. 1923. 88 Gwyn, Smallwood, 26. 89 Smallwood to Daily News, 6 May 1925, 7. 90 Writing of the success of the British Labour Party, he told Tucker in one letter that he could “think of little else” (asc , coll -213, 1.01, Smallwood to Tucker, 17 Jan.1924). 91 asc , coll -213, 1.02, Smallwood to Tucker, 17 Feb. 1924. 92 asc , coll -213, 1.06, Smallwood to Tucker, 5 Apr. 1924. 93 asc , coll -213, 1.05, Smallwood to Tucker, 23 Mar. 1924. 94 Quoted in asc , coll -213, 1.14, Smallwood to Tucker, 13 June 1924. 95 asc , coll -213, 1.09, Smallwood to Tucker, 2 May 1924. For Coaker’s political denouement, see Melvin Baker, “Coaker, Sir William Ford,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/ coaker_william_ford_16E.html. 96 W.F. Coaker, ed., Twenty Years of the Fishermen’s Protective Union of Newfoundland (St John’s: Advocate Publishing Company, 1930), 228. 97 Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 152–3. He travelled to St John’s on the SS Rosalind, arriving on 26 Jan. 1925 (Daily Globe, 29 Jan. 1925, 6). 98 Evening Telegram, 30 Jan. 1925, 11; Daily News, 30 Jan. 1925, 4. 99 Daily Globe, 3 Feb. 1925, 5; 4 Feb. 1925, 6; 27 Feb. 1925, 3. 100 Ibid., 3 Feb. 1925, 5. 101 Ibid., 13 Apr. 1925, 6. See also ibid., 24 Apr. 1925, 8; 28 Apr. 1925, 3; 7 May 1925, 3; 13 May 1925, 4; Daily News, 2 May 1925, 4; 8 May 1925, 9; 9 May 1925, 9. This organization should not be confused with the present-day Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Labour, which has separate origins. 102 For his evolving views on labour politics, see also his letters to the editor of the Daily News, 7 May 1925, 8; 15 May 1925, 8; and 8 and 19 Nov. 1925, 10. 103 See Smallwood letter to Daily News, 11 May 1925, 6.

Notes to pages 25–9 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112

113 114 115

116

117

118 119 120 121 122 123

124 125 126

199

Daily News, 11 May 1925, 9. Ibid., 23 May 1925, 7. T.J. Foran to Daily News, 4 May 1925, 7. Smallwood to Daily News, 4 May 1925, 7. See also his letter to the Daily News, 6 May 1925, 7. Daily Globe, 1 May 1925, 3; Smallwood to Daily Globe, 10 Nov. 1925, 4. Humber Herald, 16 June 1928, [2]. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 154. For the history of Curling, see http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/curling_ joseph_james_13E.html. In birth order, her siblings were: William Thomas (1904–1977), Ernest Harold (1905–1908), Frederick Douglas (1907–1981), Florence Beulah (1909–1983), Cyrus Taylor (1912–1966), and Emma Louise (1915–2002). Clara always referred to her mother as “Sarah Jane Ash” (née Follett). We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for the information in this note. Daily News, 26 Nov. 1925, 7. See her letter, dated 6 Aug. 1920, to her mother in asc , coll -285, 1.03.004. Western Star, 7 Oct. 1925, [1] and [5]; 14 Oct. 1925, [5]; and 21 Oct. 1925, [1]. Beginning in November 1941, the Western Star was published in Corner Brook (https://www.library.mun.ca/cns/nlnews/title/s-w/). Daily News, 3 Nov. 1925, 5. For his reception in Princeton, where he spoke at the fpu Hall on the evening of Friday, 23 Oct., see Fishermen’s Advocate, 30 Oct. 1925, 10 (“Princeton Notes”). Daily News, 4 Nov. 1925, 9 (“British Labor and ‘Liberalism’”); 10 Nov. 1925, 10 (“Labor Party Not Bolshevistic”); 12 Nov. 1925, 2 (“Tariff and Living Costs”); 23 Nov. 1925, 2 (“The Tariff Question”). Daily News, 26 Nov. 1925, 7. For details of the wedding, see Daily News, 25 Nov. 1925, 3; 26 Nov. 1925, 7. Evening Telegram, 26 Nov. 1925, 6. Daily News, 23 Nov. 1925, 2. The letter was dated 20 Nov. 1925. We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for a copy of the relevant entry in the wedding register. Clara had turned twenty-four on 23 Oct. 1925; Joe would turn twentyfive on 24 Dec. 1925. The marriage register incorrectly gave his age as twenty-five. asc, coll-285, 1.03.009, Beulah to Clara, 25 Nov. 1925. asc, coll-285, 1.03.009, Clara to Beulah, 1 Mar. 1926. Daily News, 17 Dec. 1925, 5.

200

Notes to pages 30–1

127 Labour Outlook, 21 Nov. 1925. The copy we saw of this paper is in the National Archives, United Kingdom, CO532/310, enclosure in Allardyce to Amery, 7 Dec. 1925. There is a microfilm of the paper in the Dominions Office collection of the Centre for Newfoundland Studies, Memorial University Libraries. 128 Daily Globe, 25 Jan. 1926, 8. 129 asc , coll -285, 1.06.001, receipts. 130 Daily Globe, 8 Jan. 1926, 8. 131 The term “tory” was used in Newfoundland to describe the party – it had many names over time – of wealth and privilege, i.e., the party beholden, first and foremost, to the merchantocracy that, with headquarters on Water Street, St John’s, ran the fisheries economy. 132 Daily News, 5 Oct. 1922, 2. 133 asc, coll-250 (Richard Anderson Squires Papers), 1.01.017, “Complimentary Dinner in honour of G.W.B. Ayre, LL.B., Solicitor for the unemployed, Smithville, September 10th, 1925” (program); Evening Telegram, 11 Sept. 1925, 6; Fishermen’s Advocate, 11 Sept. 1925, 3. Labour leader Julia Salter Earle (1878–1945), who ran unsuccessfully for councillor in the St John’s City election held later in the year, chaired the dinner. 134 For his letters, see Daily Globe, 14 Jan. 1926, 4; 22 Jan. 1926, 4. 135 For the letters, see Melvin Baker and James Overton, eds, Introduction to “J.R. Smallwood on Liberalism in 1926,” Newfoundland Studies 11, 1 (1995), 75–126. 136 asc , uncatalogued Smallwood files, Smallwood to Coaker, [1926], “I suppose you have seen that I am now at the Globe.” 137 Remembered by Peter Neary and Hugh Samson (of Mont-Tremblant, Québec), who were present on the occasion at the University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, 23 Oct. 1973. For Smallwood’s own reference to the event, see asc , coll -285, 1.10.009, Daily planner, 1973. He was on a book tour following the publication of I Chose Canada. 138 In 1965, in connection with the opening of a cancer hostel by the Loyal Orange Association, Smallwood wrote: “I have been an Orangeman for thirty-five years now and I am proud of it” (asc , coll -075, J.R. Smallwood Papers, 3.20.138, remarks by Smallwood beginning “The Orange Order has always stood for freedom”). For David Smallwood’s place in the history of the Orange Order in Newfoundland, see E.G. Pomeroy, comp. and ed., Souvenir Book of the 100th Anniversary of Orangeism in Newfoundland (St John’s: Loyal Orange Association of Newfoundland, 1963) and http://swahsociety.com/genealogy/profiles/ george-warren.

Notes to pages 31–6

201

139 Daily News, 9 Dec. 1925, 3. Gushue was president of the Memorial University of Newfoundland, 1952–66. 140 asc , coll -285, 1.02.003, Smallwood to Clara, 21 Jan. 1927; 1.02.005, telegram from Smallwood to Clara, 15 July 1927. His full name is included in the Baptismal Register of Gower Street United Church, St John’s, No. 4652, 15 July 1957. We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for this reference. 141 See Suzanne Ellison, ed., “Historical Directory of Newfoundland and Labrador Newspapers,” https://www.library.mun.ca/cns/nlnews. 142 Under the title Who’s Who in and from Newfoundland 1927. For an advertisement for the proposed volume, see Evening Telegram, 8 July 1926, 1. 143 For details of his travel overseas, see Daily News, 27 Nov. 1926, 4, 6; asc , coll-285, 2.06.005, “Memories, Tape 1, Side 1, 206/94, ‘We sailed Steerage.’” Lady Squires (née Helena E. Strong) was a native of Little Bay Islands. Lady Cashin (née Gertrude Clare Mullowney) came from Witless Bay. 144 Daily News, 25 Nov. 1926, 3. 145 Daily News, 1 Feb. 1927, 5; 2 Feb. 1927, 5; 18 Feb. 1927, 2. 146 asc , coll -285, 1.02.002, Clara to Smallwood, 19 Dec. 1926. 147 asc , coll -285, 1.02.003, Smallwood to Clara, 14 Jan. 1927. For the photograph collection, see ibid., 1.02.002, Smallwood to Clara, 25 Dec. 1926. 148 asc , coll -285, 1.02.003, Smallwood to Clara, 12 Feb. 1927. 149 asc , coll -486 (Helena Squires Papers), 1.03.001, Smallwood to Lady Squires, 16 Feb. 1927. 150 asc , coll -285, 1.02.003, Clara to Smallwood, 22 Feb. 1927. 151 Ibid. 152 asc , coll -9, 10.03.069, Smallwood to Coaker, 30 Dec. 1926. 153 Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 172. 154 The Rooms Provincial Archives (rpa ), St John’s, MG 864 (W.J. Browne Collection), file MG864.111. For the provenance of this source, see Bob Benson, “A Peek at Squires’ Diary,” Telegram, 9 April 2000, 15. 155 See Robert Cuff, Melvin Baker, and Robert D.W. Pitt, eds, Dictionary of Newfoundland and Labrador Biography (St John’s: Harry Cuff Publications, 1990), 209. 156 Daily News, 14 Apr. 1927, 6; 13 May 1927, 11; rpa , gn 2.5.485, Colonial Secretary (Arthur Mews) to James McGrath, Chairman, and J.R. Smallwood, Secretary, Unemployed Workers’ Committee, 19 May 1927. 157 Daily News, 26 May 1927, 4.

202 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171

172 173

174 175 176 177

178 179 180 181 182

Notes to pages 36–43

There is a copy in asc , coll -075, 7.02.001. asc, coll-285, 1.02.005, Smallwood to Clara, 9 Sept. 1927. For this phrase, see The Liberal Press, 4 Oct. 1928, 1. Daily News, 27 Dec. 1927, 3. asc, coll-285, 1.02.005, Smallwood to Clara, 9 Sept. 1927. Ibid., Smallwood to Clara, 20 Sept. 1927. Ibid., Smallwood to Clara, 24 Sept. 1927. Ibid., Smallwood to Clara, 29 Sept. 1927. Barrett to Western Star, 15 Feb. 1928, [4]. His letter was dated 10 Feb. 1928. Smallwood to Western Star, 22 Feb. 1928, [4]. His letter was dated 16 Feb. 1928. Western Star, 7 Mar. 1928, [4]. Ibid., 11 Apr. 1928, [2]. Smallwood to Western Star, 25 Apr. 1928, [6]. Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, Services NL, Registry of Deeds, vol. 106, “Canadian Linotype Ltd to Humber Publishers Ltd,” 338–42. rpa , gn9, Ledger # 9.33 (Office of the Executive Council 1928–1929), Proceedings of the Executive Council, 21 Dec. 1928, 82. His full name is included in the Baptismal Register of Gower Street United Church, St John’s, No. 4653, 15 July 1957. We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for this reference. Western Star, 14 Aug. 1929, 7. See ibid., 25 Nov. 1931, 7. asc, coll-285, 1.02.009, Smallwood to Clara, 16 Aug. 1929. There is an account of the case in Christopher Curran and Melvin Baker, eds, “Kevin Barry’s ‘Outport Opinion’: A Memoir of Corner Brook in the 1940s,” in Christopher English, ed., Barrels to Benches: The Foundations of English Law on Newfoundland’s West Coast (St John’s: The Law Society of Newfoundland and Labrador, 2010), 103–40. Humber Herald, 3 Aug. 1929, 2. There is a copy of this issue in asc , coll-87 (John Gilbert Higgins Papers), 1.01.007. asc, coll-87, 1.01.007, Defence Statement, 3 Oct. 1929, Supreme Court Case, 1929, No. 254. Western Star, 25 Sept. 1929, 3. asc, coll-87, 1.01.007, Barry to Winter & Higgins, 5 Oct. 1929. See http://www.inmemoriam.ca/view-announcement-230177-clara-russellnee-smallwood.html and https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/

Notes to pages 43–6

183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194

195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206

207 208 209

203

national/clara-smallwood-russell-was-an-eye-witness-to-history/ article579683. asc, coll-285, 1.02.011, Smallwood to Clara, 1 Mar. 1930. Ibid. asc, coll-285, 1.02.005, Smallwood to Clara, Wednesday, [1930], “I knew the bridge ...” (written aboard SS Silvia, Wednesday [1930]). Ibid. asc, coll-285, 1.02.011, Smallwood to Clara, 1 Mar. 1930. asc, coll-285, 1.02.011, Smallwood to Clara, Sunday, [1930], “The letter that I wrote to catch the last mail ...” Ibid. Ibid. Western Star, 11 June 1930, 2. Ibid. Ibid., 1. See ancestry.com, “List of Alien Passengers for the United States,” SS Corner Brook, sailing from Corner Brook, Newfoundland, 15 July 1930. Smallwood and Oates were both approved for one-month visas for entry to the United States. Western Star, 23 July 1930, 7. Ibid. Ibid., 8 Oct. 1930, 5. asc, coll-285, 1.02.012, Smallwood to Clara, 16 Nov. 1930. Daily News, 17 Jan. 1931, 3. Ibid. asc, coll-285, 1.02.013, Smallwood to Clara, 23 Feb. 1931. The Watchdog, 28 Feb. 1931, 1. asc, coll-285, 1.02.013, Smallwood to Clara, Wednesday night, [1931], “The express that should have got here Monday ...” asc, coll-285, 1.02.013, Smallwood to Clara, 23 Feb. 1931. asc, coll-285, 1.02.013, Clara to Smallwood, 17 Mar., 1931. J.R. Smallwood, The New Newfoundland: An Account of the Revolutionary Developments Which Are Transforming Britain’s Oldest Colony from “The Cinderella of the Empire” into One of the Great Small Nations of the World (New York: Macmillan, 1931), 11. Ibid., 12. Ibid., 250–2. Daily News, 10 Aug. 1931, 4. The second part of English’s review is in Daily News, 27 Aug. 1931, 5.

204

Notes to pages 46–8

210 Daily News, 10 Aug. 1931, 4. 211 Centre for Newfoundland Studies, Memorial University Libraries, List of Electors, District of St. John’s (City) East, 1928, 213. 212 asc , coll -285, 1.02.013, Smallwood to Clara, 13 Nov. 1931; 1.02.014, Smallwood to Clara, 22 Jan. 1932. 213 rpa , gn 5/2/A/1, Supreme Court, Central, Minutes, box 59, Supreme Court of Newfoundland (Central): Minute Book (1930–1932), 314, 330; Minute Book (15 Mar. 1930 to 28 Jan. 1932), 331. 214 Ibid. 215 Supreme Court of Newfoundland, Minute Book (1930–1932), 314. 216 Our account of Smallwood’s insolvency proceedings is based on Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, Provincial Records Centre, Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador (Central), Court Registry, box 9209 96, file 1931-0680, Joseph R. Smallwood; and rpa , gn 5/2/A/1, Supreme Court of Newfoundland, Minute Book (1930–1932), 8. For Newfoundland insolvency law in this period, see Charles E. Hunt, “Insolvency Laws of Newfoundland,” Journal of the National Associations of Referees in Bankruptcy (July 1934), 156–7. 217 Evening Telegram, 10 Nov. 1931, 7. 218 Newfoundland Gazette, 10 Nov. 1931, 1. 219 A Corner Brook general merchant. 220 A Corner Brook businessman. William J. Lundrigan was a passenger aboard the SS Caribou when that ship was torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine in the Cabot Strait in 1942. Numbered among the survivors, he became one of Newfoundland most prominent and successful businessmen. During Smallwood’s premiership, an expanded Lundrigan enterprise worked extensively for the provincial government. His son Arthur Lundrigan, who served on the board of the Bank of Montreal, became one of Smallwood’s closest and most lasting friends. 221 St John’s medical doctor who had died in 1928. 222 asc , coll -285, 1.02.025, Smallwood to Clara, [1931], “Just a note. I am sending ...” 223 Daily News, 2 Feb. 1932, 1. 224 Newfoundland Gazette, 2 Feb. 1932, 1. 225 As late as 1967, in private correspondence, one St John’s grandee recalled Smallwood’s “‘red’ tendencies.” See rpa , MG293 (Harry A. Winter Papers), box 1, file “Correspondence between H.A. Winter and Ira Wild from November/66–May/69,” Winter to Wild, 7 Feb. 1967. 226 asc , coll -285, 1.02.013, Smallwood to Clara, 13 Nov. 1931. 227 asc , coll -213, 1.08, Smallwood to Tucker, 25 Apr. 1924.

Notes to pages 48–53 228 229 230 231 232

233

234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246

247 248 249 250

251

205

asc, coll-285, 1.02.013, Smallwood to Clara, 13 Nov. 1931. Ibid. Ibid. asc, coll-285, 1.02.014, Smallwood to Clara, Monday, [1932], “Am enclosing $3.” For a general history of the period, see Peter Neary, Newfoundland in the North Atlantic World, 1929–1949 (Kingston and Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1988). Peter Neary, “‘With Great Regret, and after the Most Anxious Consideration’: Newfoundland’s 1932 Plan to Reschedule Interest Payments,” Newfoundland Studies 10, 2 (1994), 250–1. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 182–5. asc, coll-250, 15.02.010. Quinton later served under Smallwood as minister of finance and then became a member of the Senate of Canada. For his 1932 campaign arrears, see asc , coll -250, 15.02.010, Parsons to Squires, 29 June 1932. asc, coll-250, 15.02.013, memo entitled “Smallwood.” asc, coll-285, 1.02.014, Smallwood to Clara, Monday, [1932], “Am enclosing $3.” Neary, “‘With Great Regret, and after the Most Anxious Consideration,’” 251–2. United Kingdom, Cmd. 4480, Newfoundland Royal Commission 1933 Report, ii (Royal Warrant). Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 20. Neary, “‘With Great Regret, and after the Most Anxious Consideration,’” 255–9. Newfoundland Royal Commission 1933 Report, 224. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 194–5. Evening Telegram, 27 Feb. 1933, 4. The article in The Optimist, “Starved to Death under Tory Government!” was written under the byline “Canaille” (the name of a Bonavista neighbourhood). Ibid., 20 March 1933, 6. Daily News, 7 March 1933, 3. Twillingate Sun, 16 Sept. 1933, [4]. rpa , gn1/3/A, box 154, despatch 244/33, Anderson to Thomas, 4 Jan. 1934. See also The Optimist, 14 Oct. 1933, 8 (“What Fascism Stands For”). See clippings in Library and Archives Canada, MG30 E82 (Charles Alexander Magrath Papers), vol. 15.

206

Notes to pages 54–8

252 Fishermen’s Advocate, 24 Nov. 1933, 4; rpa , gn 1/3/A, box 154, despatch 244/33, Anderson to Thomas, 4 Jan. 1934. See also Fishermen’s Advocate, 1 Dec. 1933, 4; 15 Dec. 1933, 4; Gene Long, Suspended State: Newfoundland before Canada (St John’s: Breakwater, 1999), 72–115. For the views of Sir Alfred B. Morine (1857–1944) on the royal commission report, see Fishermen’s Advocate, 15 Dec. 1933, 12. The population of the country as recorded in the 1935 census was 289,588. 253 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 37; Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 187. 254 asc , coll -285, 1.02.016, Smallwood to Clara, “Monday Evening,” [1933]. 255 Newfoundland Royal Commission 1933 Report, 195.

c h a p t e r t wo 1 Joseph R. Smallwood, I Chose Canada: The Memoirs of the Honourable Joseph R. “Joey” Smallwood (Toronto: Macmillan, 1973), 189. 2 J.R. Smallwood, “The Co-operative Movement in Newfoundland,” in J.R. Smallwood, ed., The Book of Newfoundland, vol. 1 (St John’s: Newfoundland Book Publishers, 1937), 277. 3 Daily News, 4 March 1935, 4. 4 Ibid., 17 Dec. 1932, 12. 5 Ibid., 25 May 1933, 6. 6 Archives and Special Collections (asc) , Memorial University Libraries, coll-285 (J.R. Smallwood Papers), 1.02.017, Smallwood to Clara, 28 May 1933. 7 Daily News, 22 June 1933, 3; 24 June 1933, 6. The officers of the Catalina local were William J. Gullage (Master Fisherman), Victor Manuel (Deputy Fisherman), Baxter King (Secretary), and Thomas Lane (Treasurer). The local held Saturday night meetings in the Orange Hall. 8 Daily News, 20 June 1933, 3. 9 asc , coll -285, 1.02.017, Smallwood to Clara, 28 May and 25 July 1933. 10 Daily News, 8 Aug. 1933, 5. 11 Ibid., 4 Sept. 1933, 7. The Templeman company was in receivership at the time and was being run by English brokers Holmwood and Holmwood. Their Newfoundland representative was St John’s resident LieutenantGeneral Sir Hugh Tudor. For the history of the company, see https://www. mun.ca/mha/holdings/findingaids/templeman.php. For Tudor’s role in its affairs, see The Rooms Provincial Archives (rpa) , St John’s, MG521 (Philip Templeman Ltd Papers), box 2, file “Correspondence 1926–1927, E to L,” Estate of Philip Templeman to Holmwood & Holmwood,

Notes to pages 58–62

12

13 14 15 16

17 18

19 20 21 22 23 24

25 26 27

28

29 30

207

15 Aug. 1927; Evening Telegram, 25 Nov. 1925, 7. For an obituary of Tudor, see Evening Telegram, 27 Sept. 1965, 4. Maritime History Archive, Memorial University, James Ryan Ltd Fonds, box 17, 1.43.206, Ryan to McCarthy, 9 Sept. 1933; 1.43.232, Fox to Swyers, 10 Feb 1933. Daily News, 20 June 1933, 4. asc, coll-9 (William Ford Coaker Papers), 10.03.025, Crosbie to Coaker, 2 Aug. 1933. There is a collection of the paper in the Provincial Reference Library, Arts and Culture Centre, St John’s. Peter Neary, ed., White Tie and Decorations: Sir John and Lady Hope Simpson in Newfoundland, 1934–1936 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997), 60. Ibid., 222. rpa , gn38 (Commission of Government, Secretary of the Commission, Public Utilities – General Administration), box S1-2-7, file 19, “Fishermen’s Co-operative Union,” Smallwood to Anderson, 6 Feb. 1934. Smallwood to Daily News, 5 Mar. 1934, 5. Daily News, 21 Mar. 1934, 5. asc, coll-285, 2.06.002, chapter 1, 5. Daily News, 24 Mar. 1934, 6; 29 Apr. 1934, 7. He returned to Bonavista by train on 20 Apr. Smallwood letter to Daily News, 4 Apr. 1934, 8. rpa , gn5/3/P/16 (Magistrate’s Court – Bonavista Office Files), box 826, file 29, “Codfishery Regulations,” Sellars to Hope Simpson, 2 May 1934; Rogerson to Winsor, 31 Mar. 1934; memorandum by Winsor, 10 Apr. 1934. A zealot. Devoted follower. Neary, ed., White Tie and Decorations, 100. In I Chose Canada, Smallwood wrote (189) that Les Curtis “lent” him a “few hundred dollars” to buy the schooner. Mahoney rose to the rank of inspector in the Newfoundland Constabulary. For biographical information about him, see Daily News, 18 March 1955, 1, and Gary Browne, To Serve and Protect: The Newfoundland Constabulary on the Home Front World War Two (St John’s: drc Publishing, 2008), 237–9. rpa , gn13/1/B (Department of Justice – General Administration), box 238, file 45, Mahoney to O’Neill, 3 Oct 1934. rpa , gn1/15 (Governor’s Local Correspondence, 1934–37), Smallwood to Anderson, 9 Oct. 1934.

208

Notes to pages 62–8

31 Smallwood to Observer’s Weekly, 13 Oct. 1934, 9, 12, 20. In an editorial, Perlin refuted Smallwood’s argument, whereupon Smallwood replied in the 20 Oct. 1934 edition of the paper. 32 Observer’s Weekly, 20 Oct. 1934, 13, 14. 33 Daily News, 3 Nov. 1934, 5; 1 Dec 1934, 7. 34 Ibid., 13 Nov. 1934, 5. 35 Ibid., 14 Nov. 1934, 4. 36 Smallwood to Observer’s Weekly, 24 Nov. 1934, 11, 12. 37 Daily News, 28 Nov. 1934, 4. 38 For the resolutions passed at the Port Rexton convention, see letter of National Secretary Augustus Ayles to the editor of the Daily News, 29 Dec. 1934, published in the paper on 7 Jan. 1935, 7. 39 Smallwood letter in Daily News, 22 Feb. 1935, 5. 40 Ibid. 41 Smallwood letter in Daily News, 20 Mar. 1935, 8. 42 Ibid. 43 rpa , gn 13/1/B (Department of Justice – General Administration), box 155, file 14, Mahoney to O’Neill, 5 Mar. 1935. 44 Bradley had submitted an explosive report on 22 Aug. 1934, but it was not made public. Hope Simpson believed that publication would place Bradley “in the position of champion of the workers as against a reactionary Government, whose interest was in favour of foreign capital.” This was unacceptable. See Peter Neary, “The Bradley Report on Logging Operations in Newfoundland, 1934: A Suppressed Document,” Labour/Le Travail, 16 (Fall 1985), 193–232. 45 Daily News, 12 Apr. 1935, 3. 46 rpa , gn 13/1/B (Department of Justice – General Administration), box 233, file “J.R. Smallwood, 1935–1936,” Bradley to Dunfield, 2 May 1936. 47 Daily News, 27 Aug. 1935, 8. 48 rpa , MG621 (Newfoundland Ranger Force Association Papers), file 70, Bradley to Dunfield, 3 Sept. 1935, and gn 13/1/B (Department of Justice – General Administration), box 467, file “F, 1930–1936.” 49 rpa , gn 5/3/P/16 (Magistrate’s Court – Bonavista Office Files), box 823, file 34, Howley to Bradley, 13 Nov. 1935. 50 rpa , gn 5/3/P/16 (Magistrate’s Court – Bonavista Office Files), box 823, file 34, Bradley to Howley, 15 Nov 1935, and gn 13/1/B (Department of Justice – General Administration), box 233, file “J.R. Smallwood, 1935–1936,” Bradley to Dunfield, 8 Nov 1935 and 2 May 1936.

Notes to pages 69–74

209

51 Report of the Commission of Enquiry Investigating the Seafisheries of Newfoundland and Labrador Other Than the Sealfishery (St John’s: Newfoundland Government, 1937), iii. 52 rpa , gn 31/3/A (Department of Natural Resources, Departmental Files, Single Alphabetical Series), box 8, file B9/8, #2, Smallwood to Hope Simpson, Nov. 1935 (on letterhead of Co-operative News, 365 Water Street). 53 Evening Telegram, 7 Nov. 1935, 6. Others appointed were Clyde Lake, Raymond Gushue, Joe Long, Calvert Pratt, and Fishery Research Head Dr Harold Thompson. 54 Observer’s Weekly, 17 Dec. 1935, 3. 55 Daily News, 31 Jan. 1936, 3. 56 Ibid., 18 Feb. 1936, 3. With Smallwood were Ross Young and H. Garland; with Curtis were J. Austin and Gordon Pushie. 57 rpa , gn 5/3/B/1 (Proceedings of the Bonavista Magistrate’s Court, 1933–1938), box 341, 18 Mar. 1935, 71–2. 58 Daily News, 2 Apr. 1936, 6, and Leo P. Moakler, “Reminiscences of Volumes I and II,” in J.R. Smallwood, ed., The Book of Newfoundland (St John’s: Newfoundland Book Publishers [1967] Ltd, 1967), vol. 3, 600. 59 rpa , gn 5/3/P/16 (Magistrate’s Court – Bonavista, Office Files), box 823, file 34, “Fishermen’s Meeting,” Secretary for Justice to Bradley, 25 Apr. 1936. 60 Ibid., Bradley to Dunfield, 2 May 1936. 61 asc , coll -075 (J.R. Smallwood Papers), 7.01.001, list of staff employed May 1936. For Curtis’s role, see Daily News, 24 Aug. 1936, 7. 62 Daily News, 4 Aug. 1936, 3. 63 Ibid., 6 Aug. 1936, 4. 64 rpa , gn 127 (Royal Commission of Enquiry Investigating the Seafisheries of Newfoundland and Labrador Other Than the Sealfishery), box 1, Smallwood evidence, 27 May 1936, 393. 65 asc , coll -075, 7.02.001, Smallwood to Commission, 29 May 1936. 66 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004. 67 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, “5,000 Copies.” 68 Moakler, “Reminiscences,” 600–2. 69 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, P.K. Devine, 3 Sept. 1936. 70 rpa , gn 13/1/B (Department of Justice – General Administration), box 233, file 10, Smallwood to Howley, n.d. 71 Evening Telegram, 22 Aug. 1936, 14, and 26 Aug. 1936, 5; Daily News, 12 Sept. 1936, 3; Smallwood, ed., The Book of Newfoundland, vol. 1, 486.

210

Notes to pages 74–8

72 asc , coll -285, 7.04.004, Iliff to Newfoundland Book Publishers Ltd, 11 Nov. 1936. 73 Evening Telegram, 7 Sept 1936, 4; Daily News, 12 Sept. 1936, 3. 74 Daily News, 12 Sept. 1936, 3. 75 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, Order Form. 76 For Vardy’s background, see rpa , gn 2.5.645 (Appointment Public Relations Officer for government – 18 Jan. 1939–15 Feb. 1944), note regarding Mr O.L. Vardy, H.A.E, 9-’39, 17 Feb. 1939, with confidential report to Secretary of Commission of Government by J.A. Winter, Commissioner for Home Affairs and Education, 16 Feb. 1939. 77 asc , coll -285, 7.07.004. For addresses, see, in this file, Passenger Department, Furness Withy to Smallwood, 14 Sept. and 11 Nov. 1936. 78 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, Coombs to “My dear Cousins,” 2 Nov. 1936. 79 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, Ayre to Ismay, 22 Sept. 1936. 80 Ibid. 81 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, Vardy to Smallwood, 25 Sept. 1936. 82 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, Moakler to Smallwood, 24 Sept. 1936. 83 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, Everett to Smallwood, 17 Dec. 1936. 84 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, Jones to Smallwood, 9 Nov. 1936. 85 asc , coll -075, 7.07.004, Passenger Department, Furness Withy, to Smallwood, 11 Nov. 1936. 86 Evening Telegram, 16 Dec 1936, 4; Observer’s Weekly, 22 Dec. 1936, 4. 87 Observer’s Weekly, 22 Dec. 1936, 4. 88 Daily News, 16 Jan. 1937, 3. 89 Evening Telegram, 16 Jan. 1937, 5. 90 Ibid., 21 Jan, 1937, 1. 91 Daily News, 19 Jan. 1937, 4. 92 Evening Telegram, 30 Jan. 1937, 1. 93 Daily News, 12 Jan. 1937, 1. 94 The female contributors were Edith Alderdice, A.M. Ayre, Margaret Burke, Violet Cherrington, Nancy Frost, Alice B. Garrigus, Mrs A.G. Gosling (née Nash), Edna Potts, Louise M. Saunders, Isabel Scott, and Blanche C. Turner. 95 Smallwood, ed., The Book of Newfoundland, vol. 1, xv. 96 rpa , gn 1.15 (Office of the Governor Fonds. Little Books: correspondence, 1936), file 3, Drover to Schwerdt (Private Secretary), 6 June 1936, and Schwerdt to Drover, 19 June 1936. Drover’s dates are 1907–1980. 97 For Murphy’s place in the historiography of Newfoundland’s participation in the Great War, see Melvin Baker and Peter Neary, “‘A Real Record for

Notes to pages 78–82

98 99 100 101 102

103 104

105

106

107 108

109

110 111

211

All Time’: Newfoundland and Great War Official History,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 27, (1) (2012) 5–32. Smallwood, ed., The Book of Newfoundland, vol. 1, 1. Ibid., 3. Ibid., 23. Ibid., 277. There is a handwritten memoir of his Bonavista days in asc , coll-285, 2.06.002. Canadian Historical Review 20, (1) (March 1939): 79–80. Formerly of Botwood, Lacey had studied at the Methodist College, St John’s. After teaching for a time in Newfoundland, he had continued his education in Toronto and New York. See Atlantic Guardian 1, (3) (March 1945): 5. Moakler, “Reminiscences,” 601. Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, Services NL, Registry of Companies, File Drawer No. 19, Young to Registry of Companies, 10 Mar. 1948. Who’s Who in and from Newfoundland 1937, 187–8. For a list of committee members, see rpa , gn 1/3/A (Governor’s Office – Local and Miscellaneous Correspondence), box 194, file 915. asc, coll-285, 2.07.003, “The History of the Carter Family in Newfoundland” (1937); 2.07.004, “Dr. William Carson[:] His Life, Letters, Speeches” (1938). In 1978, Newfoundland Book Publishers (1967) Ltd brought out his Dr. William Carson: The Great Newfoundland Reformer – His Life, Letters and Speeches. The published work was based on his 1938 manuscript. His work on the Carter family found its way into his Newfoundland Miscellany (St John’s: Newfoundland Book Publishers [1967] Ltd, 1978), 13–39. Daily News, 19 July 1937, 5. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 205; asc, coll -285, 1.02.024, Smallwood to Clara, “I didn’t write yesterday because I expected to have some money today.” Philip D. Hiscock, “The Barrelman Radio Programme, 1937–1943: The Mediation and Use of Folklore in Newfoundland,” unpublished p hd thesis, Memorial University of Newfoundland, 1994, 63, https://research. library.mun.ca/10659/3/Hiscock_PhilipD.pdf. For the history of radio in Newfoundland in the period, see Jeff A. Webb, The Voice of Newfoundland: A Social History of the Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland, 1939–1949 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008). Hiscock, “The Barrelman Radio Programme, 1937–1943,” 66–7. Ibid., 65–6.

212

Notes to pages 82–5

112 Ibid., 66. The 15 Dec. agreement is referenced in the agreement signed between Smallwood and F.M. O’Leary Ltd, 30 June 1938. See asc , Leo Moakler Papers, 92-128, box 6, file “F.M. O’Leary.” The Moakler Papers, a recent acquisition, have not yet been assigned a reference designation. For the history of the Barrelman programme, see Jeff A. Webb, “Constructing Community and Consumers: Joseph R. Smallwood’s Barrrelman Radio Programme,” Journal of the Canadian Historical Association 3, (1) (1997): 165–86. For the slogan “Making Newfoundland better known to Newfoundlanders,” see Leo Moakler, “The Barrelman: Making Newfoundland Better Known to Newfoundlanders,” in James R. Thoms, ed., Call Me Joey (St John’s: Harry Cuff Publications Ltd, 1990), 19–27. The Barrelman monthly for Dec. 1938 expressed the hope on its front page that the paper would “Make Newfoundland Better Known to Newfoundlanders.” 113 Hiscock, “The Barrelman Radio Programme, 1937–1943,” 67. 114 Peter Narváez, “Joseph R. Smallwood, ‘The Barrelman’: The Broadcaster as Folklorist,” in Peter Narváez and Martin Laba, eds., Media Sense: The Folklore-Populist Culture Continuum (Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1986), 50. 115 There is a copy of the agreement in asc , Leo Moakler Papers, 92-128, box 6, file “F.M. O’Leary.” 116 Daily News, 30 June 1938, 5. 117 The Barrelman 1, (1) (June 1938): 1. 118 Ibid., 1. 119 Ibid., 3. 120 Hiscock, “The Barrelman Radio Programme, 1937–1943,” 326. For examples of political advocacy in The Barrelman monthly, see Aug. 1940, 5; Dec. 1940, 3–4; and May 1941, 3–4. In Feb. 1943, The Barrelman was renamed The Newfoundlander. In the renamed paper, see Mar. 1943, 3–4; Apr. 1943, 3–4; and Oct. 1943, 3–4. 121 Joe Garner, The Commonwealth Office 1925–68 (London: Heinemann, 1978), 251. 122 Narváez, “Joseph R. Smallwood, ‘The Barrelman’: The Broadcaster as Folklorist,” 52. 123 Hiscock, “The Barrelman Radio Programme, 1937–1943,” 75. 124 For Smallwood’s account of the making and purpose of the program, see asc, coll-028 (The Barrelman Radio Program Papers), 1.01.063, Barrelman script, 11 June 1943, 1–5. 125 This Walter Reginald (he had had an uncle of the same name) was the son of Frederick (Fred) Smallwood and his first wife, Elizabeth Emma Earle

Notes to pages 85–92

126

127 128 129

130 131 132 133 134 135 136

137 138 139

140 141 142

213

Smallwood (née Chancey). We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for this information. See also Evening Telegram, 5 Nov. 1947, 3. asc, coll-285, 1.02.022, Smallwood to Clara, n.d., 1937, (1) “Have been looking at a house – a nice one – on Garrison Hill ...” and (2) “I still don’t know definitely about the house.” For the Sheffman family, see Robin McGrath, Salt Fish and Shmattes: The History of the Jews in Newfoundland and Labrador from 1770 (St John’s: Creative Book Publishing, c. 2006), 208. asc, coll-028, 1.01.012, Barrelman script, 27 Oct. 1938. Fishermen’s Advocate, 11 Nov. 1938, 7. For the history of the Gander deal, see Peter Neary, Newfoundland in the North Atlantic World, 1929–1949 (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1988), 85–95. Bowater’s Newfoundland enterprise was called Bowater’s Newfoundland Pulp and Paper Mills Limited. Daily News, 2 Dec. 1938, 11. asc, coll-285, file 1.02.024, Smallwood to Clara, n.d., “I didn’t write yesterday because I expected to have some money today.” See Joseph R. Smallwood, “Collectors and Collections,” Canadian Collector 10, (2) (March/April 1975): 36–7. asc, coll-285, 1.10.001, 1 Jan. 1938. For his title, see asc , coll -285, 1.11.01, A.M. Heath & Co. Ltd to Smallwood, 25 Oct. 1939. asc, coll-285, 1.10.001, 1 Jan. 1938. George C. Crosbie and Edgar L. Hickman were prominent businessmen; John B. McEvoy and Philip J. Lewis were lawyers; and William Roberts was a medical practitioner. Lewis later served as a cabinet minister under Smallwood. The draft is in asc , coll -285, 2.07.017. The Express, 15 Feb. 1941, 7. For contemporary political events in the British Caribbean, see Howard Johnson, “The British Caribbean from Demobilization to Constitutional Decolonization,” in Judith Brown and Wm. Roger Louis, eds, The Oxford History of the British Empire, vol. 4, The Twentieth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 597–622. The Express, 15 Feb. 1937, 7. asc, coll-285, 2.07.017. rpa , gn1/3/A (Governor’s Office – Local and Miscellaneous Correspondence), box 212, despatch 927/38, “Report of Proceedings of the First Three Meetings of the Central Committee,” list of members of committees.

214

Notes to pages 93–7

143 See asc , coll -285, 1.11.012, and rpa , gn 1/3/A (Governor’s Office – Local and Miscellaneous Correspondence), box 212, despatch 927/38, draft minutes of the sixth meeting of the controlling committee, held on 26 Apr. 1939. 144 There is a copy in the holdings of the Centre for Newfoundland Studies, Memorial University Libraries. 145 asc , coll -028, file 1.01.022, Barrelman scripts, 4, 5, 11 Sept. 1939. 146 See Peter Neary, ed., “The Commission of Government on Reconstruction, December 1936,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 26, (2) (2011): 151–98. For the general history of the commission period, see Neary, Newfoundland in the North Atlantic World, 1929–1949. 147 See Peter Neary, ed., “P.A. Clutterbuck on Morley Richards and the Record of the Commission of Government, 1939,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 27, (1) (2012): 79–98. 148 Peter Neary, “‘Like Stepping Back’: Newfoundland in 1939,” in Norman Hillmer et al., eds, A Country of Limitations: Canada and the World in 1939 (Canadian Committee for the History of the Second World War, 1996), 174. 149 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 109. 150 For a contemporary account of Newfoundland’s role in the war effort, see Peter Neary and Melvin Baker, eds., Allan M. Fraser’s History of the Participation by Newfoundland in World War II (St John’s: Centre for Newfoundland Studies Publications, Digital Archives Initiative, 2010), http://collections.mun.ca/PDFs/cns_publish/FraserManuscript.pdf. 151 Canada, House of Commons, Debates, 1939, Fifth (Special War) Session, Eighteenth Parliament, 35; Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 116. 152 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 135. 153 asc , coll -028, file 1.01.032, Barrelman script, 10 July 1940, 4. 154 Daily News, 27 July 1940, 1; 25 Oct. 1940, 12. 155 Ibid., 27 July 1940, 1. 156 Ibid. 157 Ibid. 158 Ibid., 27 July 1940, 4; 30 July 1940, 4. 159 Ibid., 25 Oct. 1940, 12. 160 Ibid. 161 Ibid., 23 Nov. 1940, 5. 162 Smallwood’s amanuensis Leo Moakler recalled the origins of The Express as follows: “Its backers were Mr. O’Leary, Eric Cook ... and some others whose names I forget. John Murphy, present owner of the Arcade stores in St. John’s, was hired to look after the office end of the publication”

Notes to pages 97–100

163

164 165 166 167 168

169 170 171 172 173 174 175

215

(see his “The Barrelman: Making Newfoundland Better Known to Newfoundlanders,” in Thoms, ed., Call Me Joey, 24. See “What This Book Is Written About” and “A Personal Explanation,” 15 Feb. 1941, 7; Chapter 1, “The Drama Begins,” 22 Feb. 1941, 7, and 1 Mar. 1941, 7; Chapter 2, “Discredited,” 8 Mar. 1941, 7–8; Chapter 3, “Why This Bitter Disappointment?” 15 Mar. 1941, 7–8; Chapter 4, “How the Nfld. People Took It,” 22 Mar. 1941, 7–8; Chapter 5, “Actually, What Did We Expect?” 29 Mar. 1941, 7–8; Chapter 6, “The British Government’s Promises,” 5 Apr. 1941, 4, 7; Chapter 7, “Blue-Prints for the New Newfoundland,” 12 Apr. 1941, 4, to be continued. The Express, 27 Feb. 1941, 3; 1 Mar. 1941, 3. Ibid., 22 Feb., 1941 5; 1 Mar. 1941, 5; 8 Mar. 1941, 5. Eric Cook’s dates are 1909–1986. See “Newfoundland as Seen by Newfoundlanders,” in The Express, 15 Feb. 1941, 4. The Express, 1 Mar. 1941, 2. Daily News, 2 Nov. 1940, 5 (“The Real Purpose of Education”). In June 1936, Sir Richard Squires had stated in Montreal (en route to New York) that native Newfoundlanders had “less constitutional importance than the negro populations of many of Britain’s overseas possessions.” Newfoundland was being governed according to “the absolute theory of autocratic control.” “One thing which Newfoundland must have,” he said, “to balance her budget and tide the country over the period of unemployment is further industrial development, modernization of fish producing and marketing, and the further development of the mines and forests” (ibid., 30 June 1936, 3). The Express, 15 Mar. 1941, 3. For Roberts’s election, see The Express, 29 Mar. 1941, 1. Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 146. Emerson was knighted in 1944 and became chief justice of Newfoundland the same year. Ibid., 149. The Express, 29 Mar. 1941, 1. Daily News, 26 Apr. 1941, 4. In 1978, long after the events described in this paper, Smallwood published an extract from his 1939 manuscript with an explanatory introduction. See “The Government (Commission) Was a Great Failure,” in Joseph R. Smallwood, Newfoundland Miscellany (St John’s: Newfoundland Book Publishers [1967] Ltd, 1978), 91–122. The Bulley Street Property was transferred to Clara Smallwood in 1970, and in 1977 she sold it to Leander Squires for $1,000. See Government of

216

176 177 178

179

180

181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192

193

Notes to pages 100–5

Newfoundland and Labrador, Services NL, Registry of Deeds, vol. 2298, 28 June 1977, 198–9. For the house address on Bulley Street, see Alternate Press, St John’s, 1 (1) (27 May 1971): 5. Daily News, 29 Nov. 1943, 5; Narváez, “Joseph R. Smallwood, ‘The Barrelman’: The Broadcaster as Folklorist,” 54. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 207–8. For these transactions, see Registry of Deeds, vol. 155, Mary Wadden et al. to Joseph R. Smallwood, 30 Jan. 1941, 438–9; Joseph R. Smallwood to Arthur Carnell, 30 Jan. 1941, 439–40; Robert W. Adrian to Joseph R. Smallwood, 31 Jan. 1941, 450; Joseph R. Smallwood to Samuel Sheffman, 31 Jan. 1941, 451; and vol. 164, Samuel Sheffman to Joseph R. Smallwood, 7 Oct. 1942, 455. asc, coll-285, 1.04.001, Smallwood to Aunt Bert, 17 Mar. 1941. The account that follows is based on this source. Alexander and Fanny were offspring of David and Julia Smallwood. Fanny Smallwood died (at 38 LeMarchant Road) on 3 Nov. 1941 and Alexander Smallwood on 2 Nov. 1947. After Fanny died, Sandy, who had suffered frostbite on the Canadian prairies before the Great War and become an invalid, ended up in the Government Infirmary (Poor Asylum). We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for this information. See also Daily News, 4 Nov. 1941, 10 (where Fanny is called Frances); Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 33–4. asc, coll-285, 1.04.001, Smallwood to Aunt Bert, 17 Mar. 1941. For these publications, see http://collections.mun.ca/cdm/ref/collection/ cns_tools/id/19417. asc, coll-028, 1.01.046, Barrelman script, 1 Sept. 1941, 1–2. Ibid., 4–5. Daily News, 12 Dec. 1941, 7; 15 Dec. 1941, 9. asc, coll-028, 1.01.042, Barrelman script, 4 June 1942, 1. Ibid. Ibid., 2. Ibid., 3, 5. Ibid., 1.01.053, Barrelman script, 5 June 1942, 1. Ibid., 16 June 1942, 4. For the area, see Melvin Baker and Peter Neary, “‘Pigs Is My Business’: Joe Smallwood on Himself, 1945,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 29, (1) (2013): 125. For Reg Smallwood’s role, see his My Brother, Joe: Growing up with the Honourable Joseph R. (“Joey”) Smallwood (St John’s: published by the author, c. 1995), 16–35.

Notes to pages 105–9

217

194 Neale Reinitz, “Newfoundland’s ‘Barrelman’ Raises Pigs,” Propagander (Fall 1944), 7. 195 The British coalition government, with Winston Churchill as prime minister, dated from May 1940. 196 Peter Neary, “Clement Attlee’s Visit to Newfoundland, September 1942,” Acadiensis 13 (2) (1984): 101. 197 Ibid. 198 asc , coll -028, 1.01.054, Barrelman script, 30 Sept. 1942, 2. 199 Ibid., 5. 200 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 186–7. 201 asc , coll -028, 1.01.063, Barrelman script, 30 June 1943, 1–2. 202 Neary, “Clement Attlee’s Visit to Newfoundland,” 106. 203 Ibid., 109. 204 Neary, Newfoundland ...1929–1949, 216. 205 asc , coll -028, 1.01.063, 1.01.064, Barrelman script, 30 June 1943, 1. 206 Ibid., 2–3. 207 Ibid., 3. 208 asc , coll -028, 1.01.064, Barrelman script, 1 Sept. 1943. 209 For these transactions, see Registry of Deeds, vol. 165, Joseph R. Smallwood, 9 Jan. 1943, 463–7, and vol. 182, Frieda Giannou, 3 Oct. 1945, 592–3. By the terms of his mortgage with Curtis, Smallwood undertook to keep the animals, farm equipment, and vehicles insured for $8,000. If he defaulted, Curtis had the right to sell the animals, farm equipment, and vehicles and apply the proceeds to the outstanding debt. The mortgage did not give Curtis any express right to sell the farm itself in the event of default, but that power was already conferred by law under the Conveyancing Act. The Giannou family ran confectionery stores on Water Street and at Rawlins Cross, St John’s (see Baker and Neary, “‘Pigs Is My business,’” 124). On 25 July 1966, Smallwood sold the Kenmount Road property to Royal Trust for $110,000 (see Registry of Deeds, vol. 834, 600–3). 210 Registry of Deeds, vol. 171, Joseph R. Smallwood to Ray S. Parsons, 15 Oct. 1943, 381–2. 211 asc , coll -028, 1.01.065, Barrelman script, 13 Oct. 1943, 2. 212 Ibid., 26 Nov. 1943, 3. 213 Daily News, 25 Nov. 1943, 5; 26 Nov. 1943, 1. For Ellen Carroll’s appearance on the show, see Daily News, 21 Oct. 1938, 3. She died 6 Dec. 1942 (Daily News, 8 Dec. 1942, 1). 214 Ibid., 26 Nov. 1943, 4. 215 asc , coll -028, 1.01.066, Barrelman, script, 26 Nov. 1943, 5.

218

Notes to pages 111–13

216 Ibid., 29 Nov. 1943. The program continued to 1956. 217 See https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1943/dec/02/ dominion-affairs#S5CV0395P0_19431202_HOC_386. 218 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 214. 219 rpa , gn 31/3B (Department of Natural Resources), box 5, file A/P2, “Pigs (Outbreak of Diseases),” draft letter to Smallwood. 220 Ibid., “Report of the Investigations into an Alleged Outbreak of Infectious Disease Affecting Pigs, Reported to the Department of Natural Resources.” 221 Ibid., Dunn notation, 15 Dec. 1942. 222 Ibid., Dunn to Smallwood, 23 Jan. 1943. 223 Observer’s Weekly, “r.a.f. Piggery a Promising Enterprise,” 2 May 1944, 8. 224 The name mocked Hermann Göring, commander of the Luftwaffe. 225 Baker and Neary, “‘Pigs Is My Business,’” 129–30. For Crosbie’s involvement, see rpa, gn 4/5 (Board of Works/Department of Public Works – Aviation), box 9, file “Piggery, NA.50,” Pattison to Secretary for Public Works, 24 May 1944. Jottings on Smallwood’s Barrelman scripts dated 9 and 16 Oct. 1943 hint at a deal in the making (asc, coll -028, 1.01.065). 226 Michael Harris, Rare Ambition: The Crosbies of Newfoundland (Toronto: Viking, 1992), 178. 227 Baker and Neary, “‘Pigs Is My Business,’” 121. 228 rpa , gn 4/5 (Department of Public Works – Aviation), box 9, file “Piggery, NA.50,” Pattison to Secretary for Public Works, 20 Jan, 1944. 229 We are grateful to Dale Russell FitzPatrick for this information. 230 See http://ngb.chebucto.org/C1945/45-gander-bon-n.shtml. For Clara’s listing in the same source, see http://ngb.chebucto.org/C1945/45-pages-f37-39-42-sjw.shtml. The cottage is referred to in rpa , gn 4/5 (Department of Public Works – Aviation), file “Piggery. NA.50,” Pattison to Secretary for Public Works, 24 March 1947. 231 Known as Emmie or Emmy. 232 asc , coll -285, 1.10.002 (Daily planner, 1944), 21 Jan. 1944. 233 Ibid., 22 Jan. 1944. 234 Ibid., 25 Feb., and 2 and 5 July 1944. Gilmore and raf Squadron Leader Frank Ratcliffe were killed in the crash of a Norseman about twelve miles east of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island on 1 May 1945 (Daily News, 3 May 1945, 3). 235 asc , coll -285, 1.10.002 (Daily planner, 1944), 15–18 Apr. 1944; rpa , gn4/5 (Department of Public Works – Aviation), file “Piggery. NA.50,” Pattison to Secretary for Public Works, 24 May 1944. 236 asc , coll -285, 1.10.002 (Daily planner, 1944), 30 Dec. 1944.

Notes to pages 114–23 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244

245 246 247

248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258

219

Ibid., 30 Jan. 1944; Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 221.

asc, coll-285, 1.10.002 (Daily planner, 1944), 16 July 1944. Ibid., 20–30 Aug. 1944. Ibid., 2 Sept. 1944. Ibid., 21 Sept.–5 Oct. 1944. Daily News, 1 November 1944, 1. asc, coll-285, 1.10.002 (Daily planner, 1944), 13 Dec. 1944. Ibid., 7 Aug. and 14 and 22 Dec. 1944. Ramsay Smallwood worked in Gander for the raf , first as a cleaner and then as an apprentice mechanic. After the war, he worked at the airport as a mechanic for Trans World Airlines. We are grateful to Darrell Hillier of Mount Pearl, Newfoundland and Labrador, for this information. Ibid., 25 Dec. 1944. Fishermen’s Advocate, “The Gander Airport,” 19 Jan. 1945, 2. We are grateful to Neale Reinitz of Colorado Springs, Colorado, for providing information about his article, which appeared on pages 7, 29, and 33. Reinitz contributed to Propagander in 1944–5 and was editor for a couple of issues. His later career was as professor of English at Colorado College. Daily News, 3 June 1944, 4. Ibid., 10 Jan. 1945, 4. Ibid., 7 Feb. 1945, 4, 9. For the area taken, see Baker and Neary, “‘Pigs Is My Business,’” 125. Ibid., 130. Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 228. Ibid., 229–32. Another redistribution act had been passed in 1932 before the election of that year. Daily News, 12 Dec. 1945, 1; Newfoundland, Acts, 1946, 115. Daily News, 27 Dec, 1945, 4 (letter signed “G.J.P.”). See also Evening Telegram, 5 Jan. 1946, 6. asc, coll-285, 2.06.012, “autobiography manuscript,” 333–41; Richard Gwyn, Smallwood: The Unlikely Revolutionary (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968), 58–62; Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 225–6.

c h a p t e r t h re e 1 Daily News, 24 Dec. 1945, 4. 2 The Rooms Provincial Archives (rpa ), St John’s, gn 4/5 (Board of Works/ Department of Public Works – Aviation), box 11, file NA/113/9,

220

3 4

5

6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

15 16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23 24

Notes to pages 123–7

“Newfoundland Airport, Gander – lease Gander Co-op Society, 1946–1948,” Smallwood to Neill, 30 March 1946. Ibid., Smallwood to Pattison, 8 April 1946. Smallwood, Joseph R., I Chose Canada: The Memoirs of the Honourable Joseph R. “Joey” Smallwood (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1973), 230–1. rpa , gn4/5 (Board of Works/Department of Public Works – Aviation), box 9, file NA/50, “Piggery,” Pattison to Secretary for Public Works, 24 March 1947. Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., Middleton to Secretary for Public Works, 20 Feb. 1947. Ibid., Secretary for Public Words to Smallwood, 14 Apr. 1947. Ibid., Secretary for Public Works to Smallwood, 10 May 1948. Ibid., Director of Civil Aviation to Secretary for Public Works, 1 May 1948. Ibid. Richard Gwyn, Smallwood: The Unlikely Revolutionary (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968), 71. Archives and Special Collections (asc ), Memorial University Libraries, coll-285 (J.R. Smallwood Papers), 8.06.001, Bradley to Smallwood, 5 Jan. 1946. Daily News, 24 Jan. 1946, 5. Ibid., 28 Jan. 1946, 4. This letter was reprinted in the Fishermen’s Advocate, 2 Feb. 1946, 8. Daily News, 16 Feb. 1946, 5. asc, coll-28 (The Barrelman Radio Program Papers), box 8, file 1.01.091. Barrelman script for 7 Feb. 1946. His letter, dated 29 Jan., was published in the March 1946 issue of The Newfoundlander, 17–18. Daily News, 13 Feb. 1946, 1. Ibid., 22 Feb. 1946, 5; 2 Mar. 1946, 7. Ibid., 15 Feb, 1946, 5. Ibid., 22 Feb. 1946, 5. Ibid., 1 Mar. 1946, 3. Gwyn, Smallwood, 60–2. Young was born in Change Islands and was the son of an itinerant United Church minister (Atlantic Guardian 2 (1), [Jan. 1946]: 2). The academic Alexander Lacey published three articles in the Atlantic Guardian on the subject of Newfoundland and Confederation: “The Case for Confederation”; “The Confederation Question – Its Historical Background”; and “Canada’s Tenth Province.”

Notes to pages 127–32

221

25 See “Newfoundland Heads Back to Self-Government/Islanders Face Difficult Task,” Christian Science Monitor, 12 Dec. 1945, 1, 7. 26 F. Gordon Bradley Papers (private collection), Bradley to Smallwood, 28 Feb. 1946. 27 Daily News, 1 Mar. 1946, 4, 5; 2 Mar. 1946, 4, 5; 4 Mar. 1946, 4, 7; 5 Mar. 1946, 4, 7; 6 Mar. 1946, 4, 5; 8 Mar. 1946, 4, 9; 9 Mar. 1946, 4, 5; 11 Mar. 1946, 4, 5; 12 Mar. 1946, 4, 7; 13 Mar. 1946, 4, 7; and 14 Mar. 1946, 5. The first letter in the series was dated “Gander, Feb. 22, 1946.” The letters were reprinted in Joseph R. Smallwood, ed., The Book of Newfoundland, vol. 3 (St John’s: Newfoundland Book Publishers [1967] Ltd, 1967), 38–62. 28 Daily News, 5 Mar. 1946, 4. 29 Ibid., 11 Mar. 1946, 4. 30 Ibid., 9 Mar. 1946, 5. 31 Ibid., 8 Mar. 1946, 9. 32 Ibid., 12 Mar. 1946, 4. 33 Ibid., 14 Mar.1946, 5. 34 Ibid. 35 Ibid. 36 Ibid. 37 Ibid. 38 Ibid. 39 asc , coll -107 (William Galgay/Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland), box 1, file 40, “Instructions from the Board, 1943–46,” General Manager to Smallwood, 1 Apr. 1946. 40 Daily News, 20 Mar. 1946, 4. For his letter answering questions and points arising from his Confederation series, see in the same issue, 4, 9. 41 Ibid., 1 Apr. 1946, 7. 42 Sir Robert Thorburn was premier of Newfoundland 1885–89. For the family connection, see Daily News, 23 Sept. 1942, 4. 43 Evening Telegram, 22 Mar. 1946, 6. See also Thorburn letters in the same paper, 20 Mar. 1946, 4; 24 Apr. 1946, 6. 44 asc , coll -285, file 8.06.001, Bradley to Smallwood, 29 Mar. 1946. 45 Western Star, 3 May 1946, 5. 46 Reg Smallwood, My Brother, Joe: Growing up with the Honourable Joseph R. (“Joey”) Smallwood (St John’s: published by the author, c. 1995), 67. 47 Daily News, 9 May 1946, 3. 48 See https://www.thetelegram.com/obituaries/lloyd-lw-wicks-5138. 49 asc , coll -285, 8.06.003, Glover to Smallwood, 14 Apr. 1946.

222

Notes to pages 133–7

50 Daily News, 26 Apr. 1946, 5. 51 Paul Bridle, ed., Documents on Relations between Canada and Newfoundland (Department of External Affairs, 1984), vol. 2, part 1, 241. 52 F. Gordon Bradley Papers, Bradley to Smallwood, 11 May 1946. 53 Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 231. 54 Daily News, 16 May 1946, 4. 55 Observer’s Weekly, 21 May 1946, 2 (“Pepys behind the Scenes”). 56 Evening Telegram, 22 Mar. 1946, 6. 57 For coverage of their arrival, see ibid., 3 May 1946, 1, 3; Western Star, 3 May 1946, 1; Advertiser (Grand Falls), 4 May 1946, 1. For Kenneth Macdonald’s appointment, see Newfoundland Gazette, 14 May 1946. 58 Evening Telegram, 22 Feb. 1946, 3; 6 April, 14–17. 59 Commission of Government, Acts, 1946, 108–206. 60 Newfoundland Gazette, 11 June and 19 July 1946. 61 For his appointment, see Evening Telegram, 12 Feb. 1946, 3. 62 Daily News, 30 May 1946, 7. 63 Ibid., 6 June 1946, 7. 64 Ibid. 65 Ibid., 30 May 1946, 7. 66 Fishermen’s Advocate, 25 May 1946, 8. 67 See List of Electors: District of Bonavista Centre 1946 (St John’s: King’s Printer, 1946). There is a copy in the Centre for Newfoundland Studies, Memorial University Libraries. Smallwood, his brother Reginald, and Reg’s wife, Lily M., are listed on page 69. 68 Daily News, 1 June 1946, 1. 69 Newfoundland Gazette, 21 May 1946; asc , coll -285, file 8.04.001. 70 Daily News, 1 June 1946, 1. 71 Ibid. 72 See, for example, Twillingate Sun, 8 June 1946, 1 (J.M. Manuel), and 15 June 1946 (Thomas G.W. Ashbourne); Bay Roberts Guardian, 15 June 1946, 1 (Capt. L.T. Stick); 15 June 1946, 1–2 (Allan Augustus Keefe); and 22 June 1946, 1, 4 (Wilfred Dawe). 73 For an interview with Holmes, see Sunday Herald, 16 June 1946, 2. 74 Sunday Herald, 16 June 1946, 2. 75 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 253. 76 For the text of his speech, see the Fishermen’s Advocate, 29 June 1946, 2–3. 77 See List of Electors 1946: District of St. John’s West (St John’s: King’s Printer, 1946), 108 (Freshwater Valley). 78 Daily News, 18 June 1946, 10.

Notes to pages 137–42

223

79 Fishermen’s Advocate, 6 Apr. 1946, 4. 80 Sunday Herald, 19 May 1946, 5. For Cashin’s point of view, see also Edward Roberts, ed., Peter Cashin A Memoir: My Fight for Newfoundland (St John’s: Flanker Press, 2012), 105–60; and Christopher English, “The Judges Go to Court: The Cashin Libel Case of 1947,” in Christopher English, ed., Essays in the History of Canadian Law – Two Islands: Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005), 357–89. 81 Sunday Herald, 26 May 1946, 8. 82 Western Star, 26 July 1946, 6. For the fires, see asc , coll -107, box 2, file 79, “National Convention,” Smallwood telegrams, 17 June 1946. Smallwood had cancelled a scheduled campaign radio broadcast because of the forest fire menace. 83 Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 241–2; Evening Telegram, 13 Nov. 1946, 6. 84 Fishermen’s Advocate, 1 June 1946, 4. 85 Daily News, 23 Feb. 1946, 3; Sunday Herald, 16 June 1946, 7. 86 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 275; Daily News, 10 Sept. 1946, 3, and 11 Sept. 1946, 3. 87 asc , coll -307 (Michael Harrington Papers), file 5.08.001. 88 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 262. 89 Sunday Herald, 28 July 1946, 7. 90 Evening Telegram, 8 Feb. 1946, 7. 91 asc , coll -285, file 8.06.001, Bradley to Smallwood, 26 July 1946. 92 See Joseph R. Smallwood, The Time Has Come to Tell (St John’s: Newfoundland Book Publishers [1967] Ltd, 1979), 166–71. 93 For MacKay’s 1941 visit to Newfoundland, see Daily News, 2 Oct. 1941, 1. 94 J.B. McEvoy, “Confederation Papers and Correspondence,” compiled 1974, MacKay to McEvoy, 19 Feb. 1946. There is a copy of McEvoy’s compilation in the Centre for Newfoundland Studies, Memorial University Libraries. 95 For Thistle, see Atlantic Guardian 2 (1) (Jan. 1946): 40, 57–58, http:// collections.mun.ca/cdm/compoundobject/collection/guardian/id/5983/rec/1. 96 Smallwood, The Time Has Come To Tell, 171. 97 The debates, reports, and papers of the National Convention were edited by James. K. Hiller and Michael F. Harrington in a two-volume collection published in 1995 for Memorial University by McGill-Queen’s University Press. The title of the edition is The Newfoundland National Convention 1946–1948. Vol. 1 includes the Debates and vol. 2 the Reports and Papers.

224

Notes to pages 142–5

98 For payments made to Smallwood, see rpa , gn 10/C (National Convention 1946–1948. Reports of the National Convention Committees), box 8, file “National Convention Documents – Salaries and Travelling Expenses of members.” 99 Evening Telegram, 28 Sept. 1946, 15. 100 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 277–8. 101 rpa , gn 10/A (National Convention – Proceedings), box 1, file 2, 12 Sept. 1946. 102 Ibid., 17 Sept. 1946. 103 See http://collections.mun.ca/cdm/landingpage/collection/nconvention. For Meaney’s role, see https://www.heritage.nf.ca/articles/politics/ stella-maris-meaney-confederation.php. Her father was the journalist J.T. Meaney, a prominent critic of the Commission of Government. asc has a collection about her (coll -252), listed under her married name – i.e., Stella Whelan. 104 rpa , gn 10/A (National Convention – Proceedings), box 1, file 4, 17 Sept. 1946; file 5, 18 Sept. 1946. 105 For the history of the broadcasting of convention proceedings, see Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 253–4; Jeff A. Webb, The Voice of Newfoundland: A Social History of the Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland, 1939–1949 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2008), 156–60; and http://collections.mun.ca/cdm/landingpage/collection/ nconvention. The 28 Oct. 1946 proceedings can be heard at http:// collections.mun.ca/cdm/singleitem/collection/nconvention/id/2/rec/1. 106 rpa , gn 10/C (National Convention 1946–1948. Reports of the National Convention Committees), box 6, file Secretary’s Office, Correspondence of the Steering Committee, Smallwood to Steering Committee, 25 and 28 Oct. 1946; file Steering Committee, Minutes of Meetings October 1, 1946–October 27, 1947, minutes of 25 and 28 Oct. 1946; Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 308. 107 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 318. 108 Ibid., 321; Daily News, 29 Oct. 1946, 5, 10; Fishermen’s Advocate, 2 Nov. 1946, 1, 3; Evening Telegram, 29 Oct. 1946, 2, 3, 6. 109 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 316. 110 Sunday Herald, 10 Nov. 1946, 9. Vidkun Quisling (1887–1945) headed a Nazi collaborationist government in Norway during the Second World War. His surname became part of the pejorative vocabulary of the English language. 111 Ibid., 23 Nov. 1947, 1, 6; Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 734–5.

Notes to pages 145–8

225

112 rpa , gn 10/C (National Convention 1946–1948. Reports of the National Convention Committees), box 6, file Steering Committee, Minutes of Meetings October 1, 1946–October 27, 1947, minutes of 10 Dec. 1946; box 8, file “National Convention Documents – Governor’s Office Correspondence, Undated and 11 September 1946–20 December 1946,” Warren to Smallwood, 7 Dec. 1946. 113 Peter Neary, Newfoundland in the North Atlantic World, 1929–1949 (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1988), 290. 114 Daily News, 29 Oct. 1946, 4. 115 Evening Telegram, 26 Nov 1946, 15. 116 Ibid., 18 Dec. 1946, 16. 117 Sunday Herald, 17 Nov. 1946, 6. 118 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 385. 119 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 296. 120 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 402. 121 For the choice of Smallwood as secretary, see rpa , gn 10/B (National Convention Delegation to Ottawa), box 4, file “National Convention Delegation to Ottawa – Letter from Governor, Minutes of Delegation and List of Delegates,” minutes, 19 Apr. 1947. 122 Ibid., file “National Convention Documents, Memoranda and Correspondence – Newfoundland Delegation to Ottawa,” Job to Bradley, 29 May 1947.  123 Ibid., file “National Convention Delegation to Ottawa – Letter from Governor, Minutes of Delegation and List of Delegates,” minutes, 19 Apr. 1947. 124 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 299. 125 Walsh was appointed commissioner for home affairs and education in Sept. 1944 (Daily News, 26 Sept. 1944, 3). He succeeded Harry A. Winter as commissioner for justice and commissioner for defence in Dec. 1946 (Newfoundland Gazette, 31 Dec. 1946, 1). 126 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 300. 127 Ibid., 301. 128 Ibid., 302. 129 rpa , gn 10/B (National Convention Delegation to Ottawa), box 4, file “National Convention Documents – Memoranda and Correspondence,” Memorandum for the Information of the Newfoundland Delegation prepared by the Canadian Government [undated]; gn 10/C (National Convention 1946–1948. Reports of the National Convention Committees), box 8, file “National Convention Documents – Allowances,

226

130 131 132

133 134 135 136

137 138 139 140

141 142 143 144 145

146

147 148

Notes to pages 148–57

etc. of the Newfoundland delegation to Ottawa,” financial statement, 18 Sept. 1947. Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 535–8. Ibid., 171–2. Meeting between Delegates for the National Convention of Newfoundland and Representatives of the Government of Canada: Ottawa, June 25th–September 29th, 1947, Part I (Summary of Proceedings – Opening Statements [;] Documents Exchanged at Opening of Discussions), 6. Ibid., 9. rpa , MG955 (1000-2000 Series), box 9, file 13, “Confederation,” Warring to Currie, 12 July 1947. Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 648. Proposed Arrangements for the Entry of Newfoundland into Confederation: Terms Believed to Constitute a Fair and Equitable Basis for Union of Newfoundland with Canada Should the People of Newfoundland Desire to Enter into Confederation, October 29, 1947 (Ottawa: King’s Printer, 1948). Ibid., 3. Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 784. The speech can be heard at https://rigolet.mun.ca/articles/politics/ confederation-debate.php. rpa , gn10/A (National Convention – Proceedings), box 7, file 115, 23 Jan. 1948 (including Orders of the Day); box 7A, file 130, 23 Jan. 1948. Newfoundland voters had rejected Confederation in the general election of that year. From Oliver Goldsmith’s poem, “The Deserted Village.” Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 312. Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 793–9. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 250; rpa , gn 43/7 (Voters Lists), List of Electors: District of St. John’s East, 1948 (Office of the Nfld. Gazette), 200. rpa , gn10/C (National Convention 1946–1948. Reports of the National Convention Committees), box 8, file “National Convention, Secretary’s Office, January 2, 1948–February 1948,” Secretary to Smallwood, 17 Feb., 1948. Sunday Herald, 15 Feb. 1948, 4. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 283; Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 314.

Notes to pages 157–69 149 150 151 152 153 154 155

156 157 158 159 160

161

162

163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174

227

Harold Horwood, Joey (Toronto: Stoddart, 1989), 100–1. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 273. Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 840. Newfoundland, Acts, 1948, 44–57. Ibid., 49. For the Newfoundland National Party, see Daily News, 17 Dec. 1947, 3. Jeff A. Webb, “The Responsible Government League and the Confederation Campaigns of 1949,” Newfoundland Studies 5 (2) (1989): 205. The Independent, 22 March 1949, 1. Ibid. Ibid., 3 May 1948, 7. Ibid., 22 Mar. 1948, 1. For the history of this party, originally the Union with America Party, see David Sorensen, “The Economic Union with America Party and the Referenda of 1948,” ma research paper, Department of History, Memorial University, 2004, 15–16; Daily News, 8 Dec. 1947, 1; Sunday Herald, 23 Mar. 1948, 3. See Peter F. Neary and Sidney J.R. Noel, “Newfoundland’s Quest for Reciprocity, 1890–1910,” in Mason Wade, ed., Regionalism in the Canadian Community, 1867–1967 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1969), 210–26. For an account by Jamieson of the events of the period, see his “I Saw the Fight for Confederation,” in Smallwood, ed., The Book of Newfoundland, vol. 3, 70–104. Evening Telegram, 23 Feb. 1948, 3. Horwood, Joey, 101. Evening Telegram, 26 Feb. 1948, 9. Wade, Regionalism, 250–1. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 288–9. Ibid., 290–1. Fishermen’s Advocate, 21 May 1948, 16. For details, see Webb, “The Responsible Government League and the Confederation Campaigns of 1949.” Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 320. Ibid., 320–1. rpa , MG4 (Baine Johnston & Co. Ltd.), box 2A, file “Sir Ralph A. Newman 1948,” Collingwood to Newman, 9 July 1948. Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 2, 924–5; Evening Telegram, 6 July 1948, 3. The Economic Union Party was quick to dissociate itself from the

228

175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182

183 184

185 186 187 188 189

190

191 192 193

Notes to pages 169–73

attack (Daily News, 6 July 1948, 1). For this and other events of Smallwood’s campaign, see Herb Wells, “Some Memories of the Confederation Campaign,” in James R. Thoms, ed., Just Call Me Joey (St John’s: Creative Printers and Publishers, c. 1969), 37–47. The Monitor 14 (11) (Nov. 1947): 1. Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 826. The Monitor 15 (5) (May 1948): 1. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 311. Successor to Sir John Puddester, who had died on 22 April 1947. Sunday Herald, 25 July 1948, 4. Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 924. Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 323–4; Raymond B. Blake and Melvin Baker, Where Once They Stood: Newfoundland’s Rocky Road towards Confederation (Regina: University of Regina Press, 2019), 284–8. asc, coll-157 (Bowring Family Collection), box 1, 1.01.014, Derrick Bowring to Cyril and Clara Bowring, 23 July 1948. The novelist Wayne Johnston’s lovely phrase in the title of his The Old Lost Land of Newfoundland: Family, Memory, Fiction & Myth (Edmonton: NeWest Press, c. 2009). Webb, “The Responsible Government League and the Confederation Campaigns of 1949,” 214. Ibid. rpa , MG4, box 2A, file “Sir Ralph A. Newman 1948,” Collingwood to Newman, 24 Aug. 1948. Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 315. For Smallwood’s opinion of McEvoy, see Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 2, 1,561; Observer’s Weekly, 13 Nov. 1951, 5 (“Smallwood Lashes out at McEvoy Statement”). Channing was the son-in-law of Commission of Government secretary W.J. Carew. In 1979, the Institute of Public Administration of Canada published his The Effects of Transition to Confederation on Public Administration in Newfoundland. Daily News, 9 Aug. 1948, 3. Ibid. The account of the work of the delegation that follows is based on Melvin Baker and Peter Neary, “Negotiating Final terms of Union with Canada: The Memorandum Submitted by the Newfoundland Delegation, Ottawa, 13 October 1948,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 33, (2) (2018): 459–506. See also David MacKenzie, Inside the Atlantic Triangle: Canada and the Entrance of Newfoundland into Confederation, 1939–1949

Notes to pages 173–7

194

195 196

197

198

199

200 201 202 203

204 205 206 207 208

229

(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1986), 28–9; Raymond B. Blake, Canadians at Last: Canada Integrates Newfoundland as a Province (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994), 24–39. rpa , gn38.8 (Commission of Government Minutes), 2092 (17 Sept. 1948); Evening Telegram, 15 Dec. 1948, 3. Under Commission of Government, “secretary” was the equivalent of “deputy minister.” For his 24–8 July 1948 visit to St John’s, see Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 1, 978–91. Term 29 of the final Terms of Union (see https://www.heritage.nf.ca/ articles/politics/pdf/terms-of-union.pdf). For the history of this term, see Raymond Blake, Lions or Jellyfish: Newfoundland-Ottawa Relations since 1957 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2015), 21–57. Peter Neary, “The Newfoundland Railway, Freight Rates, and the Terms of Union between Newfoundland and Canada,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 34 (1) (2019): 104–6. For the negotiations regarding veterans benefits, see Peter Neary, “How Newfoundland Veterans Became Canadian Veterans: A Study in Bureaucracy and Benefit,” in James Hiller and Peter Neary, eds, TwentiethCentury Newfoundland: Explorations (St John’s: Breakwater, 1994), 195–237. See Peter Neary, “The First Nations and the Entry of Newfoundland into Confederation, 1945–1954,” Newfoundland Quarterly 105 (2) (Fall 2012): 36–42, part 1; (3) (Winter 2012/13): 41–9, part 2. In 2001, by constitutional amendment, the name of the province was changed to “Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.” Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 328–9. See Term 50, https://www.heritage.nf.ca/articles/politics/pdf/terms-ofunion.pdf. Term 50 did not specify a time zone for “the expiration of the thirty-first day of March, 1949,” but in Newfoundland this was understood to mean local time (see Western Star, 29 Mar. 1949, 1; Daily News, 31 Mar. 1949, 30). For the efforts of the opponents of Confederation to block the union, see Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 337–9, and William C. Gilmore, “Law, Constitutional Convention, and the Union of Newfoundland and Canada,“ Acadiensis 18 (2) (1989): 111–26. Sunday Herald, 19 Dec. 1948, 2. Evening Telegram, 15 Dec. 1948, 3. Ibid. Newfoundland Gazette, 4 Jan. 1949, 6; Sunday Herald, 20 Feb. 1949, 2. Sunday Herald, 10 Apr. 1949, 2.

230

Notes to pages 177–82

209 Observer’s Weekly, 18 Jan. 1949, 5. 210 We are grateful to Julie Grahame, Senior Representative, Estate of Yousuf Karsh, for permission to publish this portrait. 211 Daily News, 13 Jan. 1949, 3, and 14 Jan. 1949, 7; Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 331. 212 Daily News, 1 Feb. 1949, 3; Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 2, 1,574–5. For his report on the reception accorded Clara Smallwood in Ottawa, see Daily News, 24 Feb. 1949, 3. 213 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 331. In the debate that followed in the House of Commons, St Laurent indicated that Newfoundland senators would be appointed on a denominational basis – two Anglicans, two Roman Catholics, and two adherents of the United Church of Canada or other denominations represented in the general population (Canada, House of Commons, Debates, 1949, vol. 1, 356, 394; Daily News, 9 Feb. 1949, 3). 214 For his continuing campaign on his own behalf, see, for example, Observer’s Weekly, 22 Feb. 17; Daily News, 25 Feb. 1949, 3. 215 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 2, 1,576. 216 See Term 8 (2), https://www.heritage.nf.ca/articles/politics/pdf/terms-ofunion.pdf. 217 For Outerbridge’s recollection of the events of the period, see rpa, MG211 (Sir Leonard Outerbridge Papers), box 1, Outerbridge to Pickersgill, 28 Aug. 1968, with attached notes dated 9 Aug. 1968. 218 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 2, 1,584. 219 Ibid., 1,593. 220 Ibid., 1,594. 221 Ibid., 1,597. 222 Sunday Herald, 13 Mar. 1949, 4. 223 Pages 1 and 4. For Smallwood’s south coast tour, see Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 2, 1,599. 224 Observer’s Weekly, 5 Apr. 1949, 19. 225 For this event, see Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 2, 1,602, 1,690–2. See also Sunday Herald, 3 Apr. 1949, 3. 226 Daily News, 4 Apr. 1949, 3. 227 Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 288. 228 Daily News, 4 Apr. 1949, 3. 229 Bridle, Documents, vol. 2, part 2, 1,692. 230 Daily News, 4 Apr. 1949, 3. 231 Sunday Herald, 8 May 1949, 20.

Notes to pages 182–5

231

232 Her dates are 1900–1984 (Evening Telegram, 12 Apr. 1984, 2). For her appointment as “Clerk in the Office of the Premier,” see rpa , gn 38.8 (Executive Council Minutes, April 1949–February 1951), microfilm box 2, minutes of 4 April 1949. See also Wells, “Some Memories of the Confederation Campaign,” 45–6. For her own account of her years with Smallwood, see her “No Better Man to Work For,” in Thoms, ed., Just Call Me Joey, 149–51. She was married to Alfred M. Templeman, son of prominent Bonavista fish merchant Philip Templeman (Daily News, 3 June 1926, 4; Evening Telegram, 23 Dec. 1930, 7). 233 Walter C. Carter, “Never a Dull Moment,” Newfoundland Herald, 17 Aug. 2008, 40. 234 asc , coll -075 (J.R. Smallwood Papers), 4.03.001, “InformationPremier”/“Literature Sending by: National Liberal Federation,” 18 Apr. 1949; Evening Telegram, 29 April 1949, 3 (Rupert Jackson, “SpotLight”). 235 Daily News, 25 Feb. 1949, 5. 236 asc , coll -307 (Michael Harrington Papers), file 5.08.001, “Confidential Report to Hon. George Drew Newfoundland 6 Mar. 1949.” The words quoted are on page 5. Smallwood’s campaign leading to the 22 July 1948 referendum is described on page 7 of this report as “a classic of political shrewdness and energy, a classic of low punches, unscrupulous appeal, and patent half-truths and untruths.” Looking back at Smallwood’s start as an advocate of Confederation, the same document had this to say about how his subsequent effort had been financed: “Smallwood had a great idea – but, as usual, he had no money to develop it. Somewhere at this stage – the evidence is incontrovertible – the Liberal Party of Canada (or the Liberal Government) decided to finance ‘Joe.’ His trips to Ottawa (via tca), his own personal maintenance and that of his embryo ‘Confederate’ organization were NOT financed by Islanders. His supporters never were the monied people of Newfoundland – and they are not so to-day” (4–5). 237 For Drew’s family connection to Newfoundland, see Gerald W. Andrews, Heritage of a Newfoundland Outport: The Story of Port de Grave (St John’s: Jesperson Publishing, 1997), 69–70; Daily News, 8 Feb. 1949, 5; Observer’s Weekly, 26 Apr. 1949, 4 (“Ottawa Opposition Leader Pays Visit to Port de Grave”); Atlantic Guardian 6 (7) (July 1949): 14–16 (http://collections.mun.ca/PDFs/guardian/AG_V06N07.pdf). 238 Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 331–2. 239 For the slogan and photograph, see Liberal advertisement in the Sunday Herald, 22 May 1949, 27. Smallwood was described as “The People’s Leader.”

232

Notes to pages 185–7

240 Twillingate Sun, 9 Dec. 1950, 3. 241 Sunday Herald, 15 May 1949, 21. 242 For the political history of the immediate post-Confederation period, see Peter Neary, “Party Politics in Newfoundland, 1949–71: A Survey and Analysis,” in James Hiller and Peter Neary, eds, Newfoundland in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries: Essays in Interpretation (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1980), 205–45. 243 Under the redistribution act in force at the time, the districts of Harbour Main–Bell Island, St John’s East, and St John’s West each elected two members. 244 Newfoundland Gazette, 28 June 1949, 2. 245 For Smallwood’s opinion of Cashin, see Observer’s Weekly, 2 Aug. 1949, 6. 246 Greg Power, who had been personal assistant to Premier Smallwood, ran unsuccessfully for the Liberals in St John’s West, where William J. Browne was elected (Observer’s Weekly, 19 July 1949, 7). For Power’s appointment as personal assistant to Smallwood, effective 1 April 1949, see rpa , gn38.8 (Executive Council Minutes, April 1949–February 1951), microfilm box 2, minutes of 4 April 1949. 247 Library and Archives Canada, Ottawa, MG32-B5 (Brooke Claxton Fonds), vol. 117, file “Newfoundland: Miscellaneous 1948–1949,” Memorandum to the Prime Minister, 21 July 1949. 248 rpa , gn 38.8 (Executive Council Minutes, April 1949–February 1951), microfilm box 2, minutes of 27 June 1949. 249 For this phrase, beloved of Smallwood, see Sunday Herald, 12 June 1949, 34. 250 For the inclusion of Newfoundland as a province, see Raymond B. Blake, Canadians at Last: Canada Integrates Newfoundland as a Province (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004). 251 For a survey of the history of the decade in Canada, see William Kilbourn, “The 1950s,” in J.M.S. Careless and R. Craig Brown, eds, The Canadians 1867–1967 (Toronto: Macmillan, 1967), 309–43. 252 For one of many big improvements made with federal investment in the 1950s, see John Phyne, “On a Hillside North of the Harbour: Changes to the Centre of St. John’s, 1942–1987,” Newfoundland and Labrador Studies 29 (1) (2014): 5–46. 253 Sunday Herald, 8 May 1949, 1. 254 From Hymn 88 by Isaac Watts. 255 For his 1938 and 1942 visits, see Fishermen’s Advocate, 9 Sept. 1938, 4; Daily News, 15 Sept. 1942, 3.

Notes to pages 188–91

233

256 He had succeeded Gordon Winter in the portfolio in Aug. 1949. 257 In an early action, Smallwood had requested and had returned the interest-free loans of Canadian dollars that Newfoundland had made to the United Kingdom during the war (see Neary, Newfoundland ... 1929–1949, 341–3). 258 The minister of public works at the time was Edward S. Spencer. 259 Peter Neary, “‘A More Than Usual Interest’: Sir P.A. Clutterbuck’s Newfoundland Impressions, 1950,” Newfoundland Studies 3 (2) (1987): 257–8. 260 asc , coll -028 (The Barrelman Radio Program Papers), 1.01.028, Barrelman script, 26 March 1940. 261 Peter Neary, ed., The Political Economy of Newfoundland, 1929–1972 (Toronto: Copp Clark, 1973), 217. 262 He was appointed on 17 Aug. 1949 along with Great War veteran Major Alexander Boyd Baird and businessman George J. Penny. See Smallwood, I Chose Canada, 288; Observer’s Weekly, 23 Aug. 1949, 3. For the circumstances of Penny’s appointment, see Horwood, Joey, 288–9. Also on 17 Aug. 1949, St Laurent announced the appointment of Outerbridge as lieutenant-governor and Walsh as chief justice of the Newfoundland Supreme Court. 263 asc , coll -075, file 3.10.013, Smallwood to St Laurent, 7 Nov. 1949. 264 For a fuller account of what follows, see Peter Neary, Convocation Address, Sir Wilfred Grenfell College, Corner Brook, 5 May 2000, https:// www.mun.ca/president/report/1999-2000/honor/honorary_neary.html. 265 For his obe, see rpa , gn 1/3/A (Governor’s Office – Local and Miscellaneous Correspondence 1948), box 290, file 411/48, Crawford to Dalaute, 20 Sept. 1949. 266 Sunday Herald, 31 July 1949, 3. 267 Newfoundland, House of Assembly, Proceedings, 1949, 17 (13 July), 26 (14 July); Twillingate Sun, 9 Dec. 1950, 3. 268 asc , coll -075, 7.01.001, Smallwood to Weldon, 20 June 1936. He wrote as an agent (“rather a new role for me”) seeking out a buyer for timber limits in Bay of Islands owned by Wilfred Dawe.

Index

Adams, Sophie, 19 Admiralty, 95 Adrian, Robert W., 101 “Adventures in America,” 24 Advocate. See Evening Advocate Advocate Publishing Company, 17 Alcoholic Liquors Act, 23 Alderdice, Edith (1900–1976), 210 Alderdice, Frederick (1871–1936), 50–3 Aldershot, 74 Amherst Cove, 57 Ammon, Charles (1873–1960), 107 Amulree, 1st Baron. See Mackenzie, William Warrender Amulee report. See Newfoundland Royal Commission 1933 Anderson, David F.: and courtesy flights, 114; and piggery 112–13; Anderson, D. Murray (1874–1936), 59, 62 Anglo-American Leased Bases Agreement, 148, 161 Anglo-Newfoundland Development Company, 23, 172 April Fool’s Day, 176 Argentia, 96 Argyle, 11

Argyle, Ray, xi, xvi Ash, Ernest (1894–1975): operates 8ERN, 36 Ashbourne, T.G.W. (1894–1984), 147, 149 “Assisting the Press,” 6 Atlantic Films Ltd, 15 Atlantic Guardian, 127, 164, 177 Attlee, Clement (1883–1967): memorandum of, 106–7; radio address of, 181; visits Newfoundland 105–6, 108, 119, 124, 188 Austin, J., 209n56 Australia, 91 Avalon Peninsula, 144, 167, 171, 185 Avalon Telephone Company Ltd., 82 “Avalond,” 5 Avondale, 27 Ayles, Augustus (1892–1966), 56 Ayre, Agnes, Marion (1890–1940), 73–5, 78 Ayre, George B. (1874–1945), 30, 47 Ayre, Ronald H. (1898–1967), 96 B-24 Liberator, 114 Badger’s Quay, 169 Baggs, Serena (1875–1960), 26

236

Index

Baine-Johnson Ltd, 167 Baird, Alexander Boyd (1891–1967), 233n262 Baird, Austin, 136 Baird, David, 197 Baird, James (1877–1959), 96 Bait Act, 130 Ballam, Charles (1901–1981), 148, 183 Balsam Hotel, 29 Baltimore, 42 Bank of Montreal, 48, 204 Bannerman Park, 36, 95, 190 Barnes Road, 29 Bartlett, Robert A. (1875–1946), 109 Barrelman (monthly), later Newfoundlander: advertising in, 82–3; contract for, 83; and radio broadcasts, 83 “Barrelman” (radio program): advertising on, 109; celebrity interviews on 109–10; content of, 85; contract for, 82; F.M. O’Leary sponsorship of 82; first broadcast of, 82; format of, 82; origins of, 81–2; political content of, 83–5, 100, 104–5; popularity of, 109; purpose of, 82; scripts of, 82, 85, 218n225; Smallwood exit from, 109; wartime fundraising on, 100 Barrett, John R. (1872–1955), 39–40 Barry, Edward (1882–1974), 42–3 Battle Harbour (Labrador), 93 Battle of the Atlantic, 100 Battle of the Somme, 186 Bauline, 71–2 Bay de Verde, 136, 147, 167 Bay of Islands, 26, 42, 44, 233n268 Bell, R.A. (1913–1988), 183 Bell Island, 9, 24, 26, 29, 95, 106, 142, 232

Belle, 26 Bennett, John R. (1866–1941), 19 Bernard, Adolph Ernest (1880–1937), 5 Berrigan, E.J., 30 berry picking, 102–3 Beveridge, W.D. (1892–1955), 69 Birchy Cove (Bonavista Bay), 57, 68 Birchy Cove. See Curling Biscayan Cove, 72 Bishop, Alexander (1895–1954), 111 Bishop Feild College, xiii, 4, 101 Bishop’s Falls, 27 Bismarck, Otto von (1815–1898), 120, 158 Black and Tans, 33 Black Book(s), 150–1 Black Watch, 95 Blackwood, Eric (1921–2007), 163 Blackwood, James, 136 Blake, William (1757–1827), 155 blankets, 114, 123, 135 Boer War, 3 Bolshevism, 29 Bonavista, xiii, 27, 55–8, 60–2, 68–72, 78–80, 136, 177, 205, 207, 211, 231 Bonavista Bay, 3, 6, 50, 60, 170, 187 Bonavista Centre, 135–6, 138, 142 Bonavista Co-operative Society, 68 Bonavista East, 137–8, 142 Bonavista Mutual Traders Ltd, 68 Bonavista North, 136, 185 Bonavista South, 49, 134, 136, 144–5 Bond, Fraser (1891–1965), 14 Bond, Robert (1857–1927), 14, 27 Bond-Blaine agreement, 130, 161 Bond-Hay agreement, 161 Bond Street, 4 The Book of Newfoundland: announcement of, 73; board of editors of, 73; content of, 77–80;

Index contributors to, 73, 78–9; delivery of, 76; financing of, 73, 76; and Newfoundland Book Publishers Company Ltd, 73; price of, 73, 76; production of, 74–5; reception of; 76–7; sales of, 74, 80; whispering campaign against, 75–6 Boothe, Jack (1910–1973), 163 Boston, 9, 21, 87, 161 Botting, Wing Commander, 123 Botwood, 95, 211 Bowater-Lloyd. See Gander timber rights Bowring, Derrick (1916–2009), 171 Bowring, Eric (1884–1959), 61, 197 Boyle, (Charles) Cavendish (1849–1916), 159 Bradley, (Frederick) Gordon (1886–1966): and Bonavista East, 137–8; and Commission of Government, 53, 124, 127, 134, 137; and Confederation, 124–5, 131, 140–1, 144; and Express, 97; leads delegations, 119, 147; attends Liberal convention,172; and logging inquiry, 61, 63, 66, 94; as magistrate, 68–9, 70; and Mullowney, 134; and Mutual Traders Ltd 68; as National Convention chairman, 145, 150; and Newfoundland Confederate Association, 162; as opposition leader, 61; and Optimist defendants, 53; and Orange Order, 134, 169; becomes Secretary of State, 182; appointed to Senate, 189; on Smallwood, 68–9, 70–1; and postwar British intentions, 124–5; and Terms of Union, 172; and Water Street, 140

237

Bragg’s Island, 132 Brazil, 72 Bridges, Frank (1902–1947), 141, 150 “Brig Cove,” 78 British Commonwealth of Nations, 29 British Empire Steel Corporation, 9, 29 British Union of Fascists, 53 Broadcasting Corporation of Newfoundland: and Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 151; establishment of, 100; and National Convention, 142, 144; refuses Smallwood request for air time, 129; stations of, 100, 110 Brookes, Herbert Robert (1881–1960), 69 Brooklyn (New York), 9 Brown, Ken (1887–1955), 134, 144 Browne, N. Milton, 71 Browne, William J. (1897–1989), 232 Brownrigg, Henry (1874–1945), 7 Brownsdale Hotel, 45 Bruce, Charles A.C. (1863–1936), 197 Buchans, 113 Buckley’s Mixture, 109 Buckwell, John W. (1908–1954), 139, 187 Bugden, Harry, 77 Bugden, W.R., 28 Bulley Street, 101, 215n175 Bungalow (Port Union), 18 Burchell, Charles J. (1876–1967): as high commissioner; 95, 179; and transition to province, 179–80 Burin Peninsula, 139, 146 Burke, John P. (1884–1966), 23 Burke, Margaret, 210

238

Index

Burry, Lester (1898–1977), 138, 147 Butler, Bertram (1890–1970), 37 Butler, Philip Gruchy (1877–1947), 4, 194 Butler, Simon (1875–1950), 46–7 Butt, A.B. (1904–1989), 147 Cabot, John, 36 California, 95 Call, 9 Call Magazine, 15 Camberwell, 107 Canada House: lease of, 190; purchase of, 95 Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (cbc ), 151 Canadian Citizenship Act, 182 Canvas Town, 26 Cape Bonavista, 59 Cape Freels, 59 Cape St Francis Co-operative Society Ltd, 71–2 Caplin Cove, 52 Carbonear, 26–8, 31, 35–6, 45–6, 50, 56, 70, 81, 190 Carbonear–Bay de Verde, 167 Carew, William J. (1890–1990): and parliamentary mission, 107; as secretary of Commission of Government, 228n190; as secretary to Squires, 8 Carmanville, 60 Carnell, Arthur (1882–1950), 101 Carroll, Ellen, (1827–1942): as “grand old sweetheart of Newfoundland,” 110; interviewed on “Barrelman,” 109; reception for, 111 Carson, William (1770–1843), 80 Cashin, Gertrude Clare (1863–1950), 33, 201

Cashin, Laurence V. (1891–1963), 33 Cashin, Michael (1864–1926), 7, 19, 33, 48, 190 Cashin, Peter J. (1890–1977): on British scheming, 137; opposes Confederation, 155; and London delegation, 147–8; as Minister of Finance, 48; elected to National Convention, 137; political perspective of, 165; and provincial election, 185; and Responsible Government League, 165; and Smallwood, 145; and Terms of Union, 179 Casino Theatre, 8 Cavendish Square, 82 ccf/c.c.f . See Co-operative Commonwealth Federation Centenary Hall, 4 Chadwick, G.W. St J., 142 Chafe, Robert, xi Chaffee, Edmund B. (1887–1936), 15 Chalker, Chauncey Richard (1901–1961), 156 Chamberlain, Joseph (1836–1914), 3 Chamberlain, Neville (1869–1940), 51 Chancey, Elizabeth Emma Earle. See Smallwood, Elizabeth Emma Earle Chancey, Lloyd S. (1891–1978), 46 Change Islands, 93, 220n24 Channel, 74 Channing, James G. (1913–1982), 172, 177, 228n190 Chard, Samuel, 70 Chateau Laurier, 141, 148 Cherrington, Violet (1886–1956), 210n94 Christian Science Monitor (Boston), 127 Chronicle, 133

Index Church Lads’ Brigade, 4 Church of England, 4, 139 Churchill, Winston (1874–1965), 99, 217 Circular Road, 46, 95, 191 Citizen, 8 City Club, 140 “Claim No. 63,” 118 Clarenville, 27 Clarke’s Beach, 169 Claxton, Brooke (1898–1960); on Smallwood, 185–6; and Terms of Union, 176 clb. See Church Lads’ Brigade clb Armoury, 167, 183 Clouter, Horatio (1859–1925), 196n55 Clouter, Katherine (1860–1946), 11, 196n55 Clouter, Maynard, xiii, 196n55 Clouter, Nellie Genevieve (1902–1990), 13 Clouter, Thomas Edgar (1895–1974), 11–13, Clutterbuck, (Peter) Alexander (1897–1975): and Attlee visit, 107; as high commissioner to Canada; and Newfoundland Royal Commission; Newfoundland visits of, 187; Ottawa mission of (1945), 119; on Smallwood,188; and Terms of Union, 179 Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, 141, 173, 186 Co-operative News, 58, 209n52 Coaker of Newfoundland, 35 Coaker, Camilla (1902–1978), 11, 13 Coaker, William Ford (1871–1938); background of, 5; and Commission of Government, 53–4; supports conscription, 35; death of, 87;

239

forms fpu , 5; knighthood of, 23; as Minister of Marine and Fisheries, 10, 19; abandons party politics, 23; backs Smallwood book, 35; and Union Party, 5, 6 “Coast of Labrador,” 176 Collingwood, Tom (1878–1969), 167, 172 Colonial Building, 49, 142, 173, 190 Colony of Unrequited Dreams, xi Colorado Springs, 219n247 Commission of Government: achievements of, 94; establishment of, 52; genesis of, 40–1; organization of, 52; and referendums, 156, 158, 167 Commission of Enquiry Investigating the Seafisheries of Newfoundland and Labrador other than the Sealfishery: membership of, 69; purpose of, 69; report of, 209n51 Commonwealth Labour Conference, 25 Comrade Tucker. See Tucker, George Conception Bay, 9, 26, 29, 95, 102, 109, 169, 172, 184 Condon, Stan (1906–1998), 101 Confederate, 163, 166, 182 Connor, Ralph. See Gordon, Charles William Cook, Edward G., 138 Cook, Eric (1909–1986): and Express, 97, 214n162; as senator, 97 Cook, S.D., 46 Coombs, Florence Beulah (1909–1983): in Buchans, 113; in Gander, 114; marriage of, 113; siblings of, 27, 199n112; visits England, 74–6 Cooper, Julia. See Smallwood, Julia

240

Index

Cooper-Union Institute, 15 Corner Brook, 26–7, 36–7, 39, 41–6, 78, 87, 106, 185, 199n115, 204n219 Corner Brook West, 42 Coronation Street, 4 cottage hospitals, 94 Cotton, Sidney (1894–1969), 13 Cotton’s Weekly, 194n18 Cowansville, 194n18 Cowperthwaite, H.P. (1838–1924), 3 Crewe, Nimshi (1901–1971): background of, 88; summer tours of, 88 Crosbie, Chesley A. (1905–1962): backs The Book of Newfoundland, 73–4; assists Cape St Francis Co-operative, 71; leads Economic Union Party, 160, 171; on fish culling, 58; Karsh photograph of, 177; and National Convention, 137–8, 144, 147, 153, 155; and 1948 delegation, 172–3; invests in piggery, 112–13; backs purchase of war surplus, 123; and St George’s coal fields, 81; supports Smallwood in provincial election, 187; declines to sign Terms of Union, 176 Crosbie, George C. (1907–1984), 88, 96 Crosbie, John Carnell (1931–2020), xi–xii, 166 Crosbie and Co., Ltd, 71, 82 Crosbie Building, 73, 76 Crowdy Street, 26, 28, 81 Crummey, P. Wellington (1891–1960), 147, 155 Curling, 26–7, 39, 199n111 Currie, John S. (1877–1956), 58, 159 Curtis, Leslie R. (1895–1980): background of, 8; and The Book of Newfoundland, 73; and Cape St

Francis Co-operative, 71; supports Confederation, 171; on constitutional future, 126; and Express, 97; and Garrison Hill property, 85, 87; and Legal Finance Company, 54; legal practice of, 46; and mcli , 8, 69, 209n56; and Optimist defendants, 53; as provincial Minister of Justice, 182–3; loan for schooner, 207; as Smallwood mortgagee, 108, 217n209; represents Smallwood in insolvency, 46, 47; represents Smallwood in land expropriation, 118; on unpublished Smallwood manuscript, 48; and Squires, 46–7 Daily Express, 94 Daily Globe, 24, 30–1 Daily News, 5, 13, 25, 28, 33, 37, 47–8, 53, 57–8, 60, 62, 87, 99, 116, 129, 132, 135 Daily Star, 9–10 Dakota (aircraft), 114 Dalhousie University, 141, 173 Daly, Desmond (1915–1977), 136 Dark Cove, 131–2 Dawe, Wilfred (1892–1963), 222n72, 233n268 Debs, Eugene (1885–1926), 20 Deer Lake, 40 Department of Defence, 103 Department of External Affairs (Canada), 141 Department of Finance (Canada), 149 Department of Natural Resources, 65, 71, 111–12 Department of Transport (Canada), 124 de Pinedo, Francesco (1890–1933), 36

Index Derby, 22 “The Deserted Village,” 226n142 Devanna, Mary (Minnie) Ellen. See Smallwood, Mary (Minnie) Ellen Devine, P.K. (1859–1950), 74 Digby, Margaret (1902–1985), 59 Dillon, Leo, 53 Doakes, Bill, 129 Dominion Broadcasting Company, 82 Dominion Day, 186 Dominions Office, 51, 89–91, 98, 106, 111, 118, 142, 200n127 Donald, George K., 146 Dorothy, 18 Downing Street, 127 Drew, George (1894–1973): and report on Newfoundland politics, 183, 231n236; visits Newfoundland, 184; Port de Grave connection of, 184, 231n237; and Terms of Union, 184 Drover, Ted (1907–1980), 78, 21n96 Dry Canteen, 123 Duckworth Street, 20, 25, 156 Duggan, Daniel P. (1871–1950), 52 Dunfield, Brian (1888–1968), 70 Dunn, P.D.H. (1892–1965), 111 Dunville, 119 Dwyer, Ellen. See Carroll, Ellen Eagle, 60, 66 Earle, Julia Salter (1878–1945), 200n133 Eastport, 136 Eaton, G. Campbell (1920–1994), 174 Economic Union with America Party: background of, 160–2; founding of, 160; and referendum campaigns, 165, 171; and attack on Smallwood, 227–8n174

241

Edmunds, W. Russell, 148 Edward VIII (1894–1972), 76, 78 Electricians’ Union, 21 Elizabeth (consort of George VI), 78, 92–3 Elliston, 68, 88 Emerson, Frederick R. (1875–1972), 73 Emerson, Lewis Edward (1890–1949): as Commissioner for Justice and Defence, 99; as chief justice and administrator, 180–1, 215n171; Churchill’s letter to, 99; knighthood of, 215n171; and leased bases, 99; and Optimist, 53; swears in Walsh as lieutenantgovernor, 180 enfranchisement of women, 10 English, Arthur (1878–1940), 46 English, L.E.F. (1887–1971), 92 Epstein, Edward, 42 Evening Advocate, 5, 23–4, 30, 195n20 Evening Herald, 7 Evening Telegram, 6, 8, 10, 13, 29, 46, 73, 76, 130, 139, 146 Express: contents of, 97–8; funding of, 97, 214n162; issues of, 97, 100; and leased bases, 99; motto of, 97 Express Publishing Company Ltd, 97 F.M. O’Leary Ltd: sponsors “Barrelman” broadcasts, 82; and copyright of “the Barrelman,” 82; publishes Barrelman, 82–3 Falcon House (Mrs Tobin proprietor), 70 “Fearless and Free,” 29 Fillier, Chesley, 169 “Findings”/”Day By Day,” 10 Finn, William P. (1879–1953), 25

242

Index

First Five Hundred, 4 “Fish-a-Man” campaign, 100, 109 Fishermen’s Advocate, 5, 43, 53, 87, 115, 137 Fishermen’s Co-operative Union of Newfoundland, 56 Fishermen’s Protective Union: and Advocate Publishing Company, 17; conventions of, 12, 19–20, 23; founding of, 5; motto of, 5; newspapers of, 5, 23, 43; and Port Union, 11; purpose of, 5; and Union Party, 5–6, 23, 35; and Union Trading Company, 11 Fishermen-Workers Tribune, 99 Flat Islands, 6 Flatrock, 71–2 Florizel, 5 Fogo, 136 Fogo, J. Gordon (1896–1952), 163 Fogwill, Frank (1902–1974), 138 Follett, Sarah Jane Ash. See Oates, Sarah Jane Ash Foran, Thomas J. (1879–1928), 25 Forsey, Philip (1912–1965), 182–3 Fort, Garrett Elsden (1900–1945), 15 Fort Pepperell, 105 Fort Townsend, 135 Forteau, 92 Fortune, 146 Fortune Bay, 136 Fox, Cyril J. (1889–1946), 142 “Frank,” 113 “From the Masthead” (“by the Lookout”), 17, 30, 80, 82 Frost, Nancy, 210n94 Fudge, Pierce (1899–1967), 147 Furness Withy, 33, 43, 74, 135 G. Knowling Ltd, 54 Gallipoli, 5

Gambo, xii, 3, 131–2 Gambo Hotel, 132–3 Gander, 37, 50, 87, 95, 111–17, 120, 122–3, 125, 129, 132, 134, 136, 142, 147, 213n129, 219n244 “The Gander Airport,” 115 Gander Cooperative Society, 122 Gander Radio Workers Association, 136 Gander River, 37, 87 Gander timber rights, 87–8 “A Gang on the Gander,” 37 Garland, Charles F. (1893–1965), 33, 162 Garland, H., 209n56 Garrigus, Alice B. (1858–1949), 210n94 Garrison Hill, 85, 213n126 Gauthier, Solange (1902–1961), 177 George L., 42 George Newnes Ltd, 35 George V (1865–1936), 78 George VI (1895–1952), 78, 80, 92–3 Geraldine Mary, 76 Giannou, Frieda (1898–1968), 108, 217n209 Gibson, Colin (1891–1974), 181–2 Gill, Thomas, 46, 185 Gillette Blue Blades, 109 Gilmore, Joe (1900–1945), 113, 115, 218n234 Glengarry School Days, 15 Globe and Mail, 163 Glover, Jonas, 132 Glovertown, 136, 138 “God Guard Thee Newfoundland,” 169 Goldhart, Ira G., 34 Goldsmith, Oliver (1728–1774), 226n142 Goodland, Mary, 173, 177

Index Goose Bay, 95, 119 Gordon, Charles William (1860–1937), 15 Göring, Hermann (1893–1946), 218n224 Gorvin, J.A. (1886–1960), 94 Gosling, Mrs A.G. (1900–2002), 210n94 Gosling, W.G. (1863–1930), 197n67 Goulding, Thomas, 131 Government House, xii, 92–3, 116, 135, 181 Gower Street, 30 Gower Street United Church, xvi, 201n140, 202n173 Grand Banks, 62 Grand Central Station, 9 Grand Falls, 23–5, 78, 106, 111, 135, 144, 156, 169, 172 Great War, 35, 48, 78–9, 210n97, 216n180, 233n262 Great War Veterans’ Association, 171 Green Bay, 49 Greenspond, 132, 136 Gregg, Milton (1892–1978), 150 Grey Book, 150–1, 173 Griffith, E.H. (1888–1975), 15 Grimes, George, (1877–1929) 4–5, 20, 23, 43, 194n18 Groves, W.J., 159 Gruchy, Philip: and AngloNewfoundland Development Company, 172; Karsh photograph of, 177; and Terms of Union, 172, 177 Guelph, 114 Guilford Street, 33, 74 Gullage, William J., 206n7 Gunston, Derek (1891–1985), 107 Gushue, Raymond (1900–1980), 31, 43, 184, 201n139, 209n53

243

Guy, Ray (1939–2013), xi Gwyn, Richard (1934–2020), xi–xii, 127 Halfyard, William (1869–1944), 19–20 Halifax, 8–9, 15, 135 Halifax Herald, 8 Halley, John P., 53 Hand Book Gazetteer and Almanac, 102 Hann, Martha, 137 Happy Adventure, 136 Harbour Main, 135 Harbour Main–Bell Island, 232n243 Harmsworth, Harold, 78 Harrington, Michael (1916–1999): as Barrelman, 111; and National Convention, 137–8, 144, 155; and provincial election, 185; and Sunday Herald, 137, 139 Harris, Walter (1904–1999), 180 Harrow School, 35 Harvey Road, 126 Hearst syndicate, 74 Hefferton, Samuel J. (1896–1980), 182–3 Hepburn, J.C. (1862–1939), 197n67 Herald Traveler, 9 Herbert, A.P. (1890–1971), 107 “Herman Boarin,” 112 Hermitage, 136 Hibbs, Richard (1876–1941), 30–1, 33 Hickman, Albert E. (1875–1943), 22, 67 Hickman, Edgar L. (1907–1996), 88, 138, 140, 155, 213n136 Higgins, Gordon F. (1905–1957), 138, 144, 147, 149, 155 Higgins, John G. (1891–1963), 46, 185

244

Index

Hiscock, Philip, 85 Hodder and Stoughton, 48 Hodges, Frank (1887–1947), 20 Hollett, Malcolm (1891–1985), 144, 147 Hollis Walker, Thomas (1860–1945), findings of, 23; inquiry of, 22 Holmes, Frances Blaikie (1897–1967), 137, 222n73 Holmwood and Holmwood, 206n11 Hope Simpson, John (1868–1961), 58–9, 61, 66, 69, 78, 208n44 Horwood, Harold (1923–2006): elected in Labrador, 185; and Newfoundland Confederate Association, 163; on Smallwood, xi–xii Horwood, William (1862–1945), 46 Horwood, Wilson, (1895–1945), 88 House of Assembly, 44, 49 Howe, C.D. (1886–1960), 163 Howell, James M., 96 Howley, Michael (1843–1914), 35 Howley, W.R. (1875–1941), 68, 74 Humber District, 39–40, 42, 49 Humber Herald, 41–4, 202n178 Humber Publishers Ltd, 41 Humber River, 26 Humbermouth, 92 Hyde, Roberta (Aunt Bert) Mutch. See Smallwood, Roberta (Aunt Bert) Mutch I Chose Canada, xi, xvi, 157, 200n137 Iceland, 62, 65 Iliff, Charles W. (c.1880), 74, 77 Ilsley, J.L. (1894–1967), 149 Imperial Oil, 71 “In the Heart of the Empire,” 33 Independent, 159–62

Indian Act, 174 Industrial Worker, 6–7 International Brotherhood of Pulp, Sulphite and Paper Mill Workers: Local 63, 23; Local 64, 26 International Joint Commission, 51 International Paper Company of Newfoundland Ltd, 36 Ivanhoe Hotel, 34, 74 J.T. Swyers & Co., 58, 68 Jackman, David Ignatius/Nish (1902–1967), 142, 147 Jamaica, 89–90, 97–8 James Ryan Ltd, 58, 68 Jamieson, Don (1921–1986), 161–2, 171, 227n162 “Jerusalem,” 155 Jewish community, 48 Job, Robert Brown (1873–1961); and William Carson, 80; and National Convention, 138, 146; and Newfoundland Films, Ltd, 197n67 “Joey,” xi, 168 John Dickinson & Co. Ltd, 74, 77 John Swain & Son Ltd, 75 Johnston, Wayne, xi, 228n184 Jones, David, 112 Jones, Edgar, 142 Joyce, Mary Hannah. See Smallwood, Mary Hannah Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, 51, 176 Karsh, Yousuf (1908–2002): Newfoundland portraits of, 177; photographs of Smallwood by, 178–9, 185; visits St John’s, 177; and This Is Newfoundland, 177 Keefe, Allan Augustus, 222n72 Keegan, L.E. (1859–1940), 79

Index Keels, 68 Kenmount Road, 105, 113, 117–18, 137, 217 Kent, James M. (1872–1939), 69 Kent Commission, 72, 94 Keough, William J. (1913–1971): as co-operative worker, 147; and National Convention, 147–8; as provincial minister of natural resources, 182 Keynes, John Maynard (1883–1946), 118 King, William Lyon Mackenzie (1874–1950): on defence of Newfoundland, 95; and National Convention delegation, 148, 150; and referendum result, 172; and offer of Terms of Union, 151 King’s Printer, 102 Kingsway Mission, 34 La Follette, Robert M. (1855–1925), 21 Labour Party (United Kingdom), 21, 25, 35–6, 105, 135, 155, 198n90 Labrador, 51, 69, 92, 95, 107, 128, 135, 138, 173–4, 185, 187 Labrador boundary dispute, 130 Lacey, Alexander, 79, 211n102, 220n24 Lake, (Harold Bertram) Clyde (1884–1965), 209n53 Lamaline, 139, 187 Lane, Thomas, 206n7 LaScie, 52 Lawlor, Eric R. (1914–1998), 139, 187 Leader, 21 Leeming Orange Lodge, 33 Legal Finance Company, 54 Legislative Council, 7

245

LeGrow, (William) Ralph (1909–1972), 111 LeMarchant Road, 4, 85, 87, 101, 108, 216n180 Lench, Charles (1860–1931), 3 “Let each have his own,” 194n17 “Let Joe Finish the Job,” 185 Lewis, Philip J. (1900–1985): as cabinet minister, 213n136; and Newfoundland National Association, 96; and Smallwood fundraising, 88, 213n136 Lewisporte, 44, 92 Liberal-Conservative Party, 23 Liberal-Labour-Progressive Party, 19 Liberal Party of Canada: 1948 convention of, 172; extension of to Newfoundland, 184–5 Liberal Party of Newfoundland: founding convention of, 183; inherits mantle of Newfoundland Confederate Association, 184–5; wins 1949 provincial election, 185 Liberal Press, 41 Liberal-Progressive Party, 7 Liberal-Reform Party, 19 Lime Street, 4 Linegar, William (1871–1951), 7 Little, James Lewis (1870–1967), 69 Little, Raymond, 57, 70 Little Bay Islands, 201n143 Littledale Academy, 4 Liverpool, 33, 74, 76 Lloyd George, David (1863–1945), 6 Lodge, Thomas (1882–1958), 58, 62, 78 London (Ontario), 200n137 Long, Joseph J. (1891–1945), 209n53 Longshoremen’s Protective Union, 36 “Looking Ahead,” 139

246

Index

Lundrigan, Arthur (1922–2000), 204n220 Lundrigan, William J. (1901–1986), 46, 204n220 Lyon Building, 162 Macdonald, Glenys, 135 Macdonald, Gordon (1885–1966): background of, 135; becomes governor of Newfoundland, 135; opens National Convention, 142; departs St John’s, 181 Macdonald, J.S. (1896–1985): as high commissioner, 134; on Smallwood, 134, 141, 145 Macdonald, Kenneth, 222n57 Macdonald, Mary, 135 MacDonald, Ramsay (1866–1937), 25 MacDonald, Vincent, 173 Macdonnell, J.M. (1884–1973), 183 MacKay, R.A. (1894–1979): background of, 141; and interdepartmental committees, 149, 173; and McEvoy, 141; visits to Newfoundland of, 141, 223n93; edits Newfoundland: Economic Diplomatic and Strategic Studies, 141 Mackenzie, William Warrender/1st Baron Amulree (1860–1942), 51 Macmillan (New York), 43–7 Macmillan Canada, xi Magrath, Charles A. (1860–1949), 51 Mahoney, Michael P. (1908–1955), 61, 66–7, 207n28 Majestic Theatre, 49, 66 “make Newfoundland fit for Newfoundlanders,” 182 “Making Newfoundland better known to Newfoundlanders,” 82, 120, 212n112

Malta, 72 Manchester Guardian, 169 Manuel, J.M., 222n72 Manuel, Victor, 206n7 Marconi Wireless Company, 6 Maritime Freight Rates Act, 1927, 174 Maritime Motion Picture Co., 15 Marquise, 96 Marshall, Cyril (1921–2011), 177 Marshall, F.W. (1891–1959), 171 Marshall, W.M. (1905–1981), 173 Martin, W.R. (1896–1974), 174 Martinsyde biplane, 13 Marvita, 138 McCann, J.J. (1886–1961), 149 McEvoy, John B. (1902–1972): as chairman of National Convention, 150, 155; connection of with MacKay, 141; and Senate, 189; and Smallwood fundraising, 88, 213n136; and Terms of Union, 172 McGrath, James (1857–1934), 36 McGrath, P.T. (1868–1929), 9 McKay, James J., 197n67 McKenzie, Frederick A. (1869–1931), 6, 195n24 mcli. See Methodist College Literary Institute Meaney, John T. (1871–1943), 61, 73, 88, 224n103 Meaney, Stella (1910–1998), 144, 173, 224n103 Melrose (Massachusetts), 18 Methodism, 3 Methodist College Hall, 7 Methodist College Literary Institute: debates of, 24, 67, 69, 179; sponsors discussions of constitutional future, 126–7; origins of, 8 Mews, Arthur (1864–1947), 69

Index Mews, H.G.R./Harry (1897–1982): career of, 126; chairs sessions on constitutional future, 126; defeated in 1949 provincial election, 185; as mayor of St John’s, 185; becomes provincial pc leader, 184; Middle Brook, 131–2, 136 Middle Eastern community, 48 Middleton, John (1870–1954), 44 Miller, Charles (1849–1922), 14 Milley, Walter (father and son), 113 Miners’ Federation of Great Britain, 20 Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, 94 Miquelon, 173 Mitchell, Hettie (1897–1933), 52 Mitchell, John (1895–1933), 52 Moakler, Leo (1910–1992): and the “Barrelman” (radio), 82; and The Book of Newfoundland, 74–5, 80; and the Express, 214–15n162 Monitor, 169 Monroe, Walter S. (1871–1952), 23–4, 50, 97 Montgomery Ward Co., 82 Montreal, 114, 120, 122, 127, 141, 164, 215n168 Moores, Silas W. (1901–1962), 96 Morgan, Cynthia, 18, 21 Morine, Alfred B. (1857–1944), 206n252 Mosley, Oswald (1896–1980), 53 Mount Pearl, 6, 219n244 Mount Royal Avenue, 101 Mullowney, Anthony (1900–1988): as chairman of Board of Liquor Control, 141; donation to Smallwood of, 134–5, 141; and National Convention election, 134; and war surplus, 123

247

Mullowney, Gertrude Clare. See Cashin, Gertrude Clare Murphy, Leo C. (1892–1956), 78 My Brother Joe, 4 Nárvaez, Peter (1942–2011), 83 Nash, Laura (“Jane”) M.E. See Gosling, Mrs A.G. Nation, 17 National Convention: act regarding, 135; announcement of, 119; chairmen of, 142, 145, 150, committees of, 142–3; delegations of, 147–50; election of, 138; opening of, 142; purpose of, 119; recommendation of, 156; secretary of, 142 National Film Board of Canada, 141, 193n1 National Fish Council, 64 Nearing, Scott (1883–1983), 19 “N.B.C. News Commentator,” 81 New Brunswick, 150 The New Newfoundland, 45, 47–8 New Outlook, 29, 200n127 New School of Social Research, 15 New York Public Library, 14 New York Times, 14, 197n64 New York University, 19 New Zealand, 91 Newell, Isaac (1919–1977), 138 Newfoundland Act 1933, 52 Newfoundland Airport, 95 “Newfoundland at Parting of the Ways,” 169 Newfoundland Board of Liquor Control, 141 Newfoundland Board of Trade, 97, 106, 172–3 Newfoundland Book Publishers Company Ltd, 73, 77, 80 Newfoundland Butter Company, 81

248

Index

Newfoundland Confederate Association: publishes Confederate, 163; executive of, 162; formation of, 162; funding of, 163; vicepresidents of, 162 Newfoundland: Economic, Diplomatic and Strategic Studies, 141 Newfoundland Federation of Labour, 147 Newfoundland Federation of Labour (Smallwood’s organization): launch of, 24; organizational effort of, 26–7, 29; platform of, 24–5 Newfoundland Films, Ltd, 15 Newfoundland Fish Buyers Organization, 64 Newfoundland Fisheries Board, 94, 184 Newfoundland foresters, 174 Newfoundland Gazette, 46–7, 92 Newfoundland Hotel, 72, 82, 142, 156, 162, 172 Newfoundland Hotel Taxi, 77 Newfoundland Industrial Workers’ Association, 7, 21, 195n30 Newfoundland Labourers’ Union, 147 Newfoundland Magazine, 6 Newfoundland National Association: executive of, 96, 98; and Express, 97; formation of, 96; and leased bases, 99; objectives of, 96; and restoration of self-government, 97 Newfoundland National Party, 138, 227n154 Newfoundland Organization of Fish Producers, 64 Newfoundland Patriotic Association, 100, 109 Newfoundland Power and Paper Co., 26

Newfoundland Railway, 26, 87, 92, 113, 128, 133, 151, 174 Newfoundland Ranger Force, 94 Newfoundland Royal Commission 1933: members of, 51; purpose of, 51; report of (Cmd. 4480), 51–2 “Newfoundland Sailors,” 177 Newfoundland Society of Art, 75 Newfoundland Union of Fascists, 54 Newfoundland Union of Railwaymen, 26 “Newfoundland with the Lid Off”: contents of, 89; and Express, 97; fundraising for, 88; and Penguin Books, 88, 92; provenance of, 88; purpose of, 89–90 Newfoundlander (former Barrelman), 220n18 Newfoundlander (John T. Meaney paper), 62 Newhook, Billie, 18, 21 Newman Sound, 136 Newman’s Cove, 57, 68 Newtown, 60 Noah, Kalleem (1864–1952), 48 Noble, Kevin, xi Noel, J.M., 42–4 Noel, S.J.R., xvi Noel-Baker, Philip (1889–1982), 158 Norseman, 113, 218n234 North River, 109–10 Northern Ireland, 50 Northern Ranger, 92 Norway, 62, 65, 224n110 Notre Dame Bay, 52, 194n19 Nova Scotia, 9, 130–4 Nova Scotia, 74 O Canada, 177 O’Hara, Kenneth (1891–1935), 15 O’Keefe, Helene, 148

Index O’Leary, Francis (Frank) M. (1884–1963): and “Barrelman” (radio), 82, 85; and Barrelman/ Newfoundlander (monthly), 82, 159; and Express, 214n162; and Newfoundland National Association, 96; and Responsible Government League, 159, 171 O’Neill, Patrick J. (1883–1944), 61 O’Neill, Thomas H. (1869–1956), 73, 96–7 Oates, Clara Isabel. See Smallwood, Clara Isabel Oates, Cyrus Taylor (1912–1966), 27, 113, 199n112 Oates, Edwin Dugald (1874–1946), 26, 28 Oates, Emma Louise (1915–2002): in Carbonear, 81; as nurse, 113; siblings of, 27, 199n112 Oates, Ernest Harold (1905–1908), 199n112 Oates, Florence Beulah. See Coombs, Florence Beulah Oates, Frederick Douglas (1907–1981), 27, 199n112 Oates, Sarah Jane Ash (1870–1954), 26–7, 199n112; funeral of, 28 Oates, Thomas, 26 Oates, William Thomas (1904–1977), 27, 37–8, 43 199n112; visits United States, 44 Observer’s Weekly, 62–3, 76, 106, 159 Ode to Newfoundland, 159 Old Colony Club, 192 “only living father” (“O.L.F.”), xi Optimist, 52–3, 205n246 Orange Halls: Bonavista, 56–7; Middle Brook, 131 Orange Order: in Bonavista, 57; in Catalina, 206n7; in Deer Lake, 40;

249

formation of in Newfoundland, 31, 200n138; in Middle Brook, 131; 1948 letter of, 169; Provincial Grand Lodge, of, 169 Outerbridge, Leonard (1888–1986): and Confederation, 171; as lieutenant-governor, 179, 180, 230n217, 233n62 Oxford University, 107, 142 Oxford University Press, 141 Page, Muriel. See Templeman, Muriel Paginton, George (1901–1988), 181 “Palmolive Girl,” 109 Parliament (United Kingdom), 51–2, 135 Parliamentary Mission, 107 Parsons, James A. (1894–1941), 56 Parsons, Ray S., 108 Pattison, H.A.L., 112–13, 123 Peat Marwick, 173 Penguin Books, 88, 92 Penny, George J. (1899–1949), 233n262 Penson, J.H. (1893–1979), 99 Pepsodent Tooth Paste, 109 “Pepys.” See Perlin, Albert B. Perlin, Albert B. (1901–1978): and Bishop Feild College, 13; and The Book of Newfoundland, 73, 76–7; and constitutional future. 104, 106; publishes Observer’s Weekly, 62; as “Pepys” (pen name), 76; and Responsible Government League, 159, 171; on Smallwood, 69; rebuts Smallwood’s fishery plans, 62, 208n31; as “Wayfarer” (pen name), 104, 129, 135

250

Index

Petten, Ray (1897–1961): fundraising efforts of, 162; as senator, 189 Petty Harbour, 15 Philip Templeman Ltd, 58 Pickering, M.A., 42 Pickersgill, John Whitney (1905–1997): meets Smallwood, 141; and Newfoundland politics, 184 “Pigs is my business,” 118 Pitts Memorial Hall, 126 Placentia, 11, 102 Placentia West, 167 Plaindealer, 5 Port aux Basques, 26 Port de Grave, 5, 167, 184 Port Rexton, 65, 208n38 Port Union, 11–12, 17–18, 20, 27, 56, 68, 87, 138, 195n19 Pottle, Herbert L. (1907–2002): as cabinet minister, 182–3; as Commissioner for Public Health and Welfare, 171; supports Confederation, 171 Potts, Edna, 210n94 Pouch Cove, 71–2 Power, Gregory (Greg), J. (1909–1997): as minister of finance, 119; and National Convention election, 119–20; and Newfoundland Confederate Association, 162; as assistant to Smallwood, 232n246; and St John’s West, 232n246 Power, Pierce (1910–1941), 66 “The Power of Attraction,” 6 Pratt, Calvert C. (1888–1963), 184, 209n53 Pratt, E.J. (1882–1964), 79, 177 Prince Edward Island, 3, 15, 101, 112, 218n234

Princeton, 27, 199n116 Progressive Conservative Party: establishment of in Newfoundland, 183–5; and 1949 federal election in Newfoundland, 185; and 1949 provincial election, 185; and Responsible Government League, 185; and Terms of Union, 184; and York-Sunbury byelection, 150 Progressive Party, 21 Prohibition, 7–8, 10, 23, 195n32 Propagander, 116, 219n247 “Property No. 77,” 118 Province of Newfoundland (name), 173, 176, 179, 183, 185 Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, 229n200 Pritchett, Kitchener (1915–1985), 136, 138 Puddester, H.G. (1905–1989), 173, 177 Puddester, John (1881–1947), 127, 228n179 Purfleet, 76 Pushie, Gordon (1915–1995), 209n56 Quebec, 41, 157, 160, 187 Quidi Vidi, 5, 105 Quinton, Herman W. (1896–1952): elected in Bonavista South, 49; as Commissioner for Home Affairs and Education, 171; supports Confederation, 171; Karsh photograph of, 177; as cabinet minister. 182–3; as senator, 188, 205n236 Quisling, Vidkun (1887–1945), 145, 224n110

raf: Ferry Command, 95; Transport Command, 113–14

raf Unit 45: Gander Welfare Fund of, 123; piggery of, 112–13, 123

Index Railway Committee Room, 148 Rand School of Social Science, 15, 19 Ratcliffe, Frank, 218n234 Rawlins Cross, 217n209 rcaf , 95, 113, 117, 122–3: library of, 122 Red Cross line, 9 Referendums 1948: act governing, 158; ballot choices, 158; 3 June vote, 167; 22 July vote, 161 Reid Newfoundland Company, 87 Reinitz, Neale (1923–2012), 116, 219n247 Report of the Commission of Enquiry Investigating the Seafisheries of Newfoundland and Labrador other than the Sealfishery (Kent Enquiry), 209n51 Report on the Financial Position of Newfoundland, 142 Responsible Government League: and Peter Cashin, 165; formation of, 159; publishes Independent, 159; and Newfoundland National Association, 159; perspective of, 159–61; problems of, 165 Restoration League, 137 Rhodes, E.N. (1877–1942), 51 Richard Clay & Sons, Ltd, 74 Richards, (William) Morley (1905–1974), 94 Ricketts, Thomas R. (1901–1967), 6 Rip Tide, 15 Roberts, Edgar L. (1901–1971), 138 Roberts, Frederick Sleigh, 1st Earl Roberts (1832–1914), 3 Roberts, William (1877–1955); Karsh photograph of, 177; and Newfoundland National Association, 96; and Smallwood fundraising, 88, 213n136

251

Roche, Edward Patrick (1874–1950), 169 Roman Catholic, 3–4, 25, 35, 71, 134, 139, 167, 169, 174, 189, 230n213 Roman Catholic Archdiocese of St John’s, 169 Roosevelt, Franklin D. (1882–1945), 94 Roosevelt Recession, 94 Rosalind, 14, 198n97 Rotary Club, 97, 103 Rothemere, 1st Viscount. See Harmsworth, Harold Rowsell, Hettie. See Mitchell, Hettie Royal Bank of Canada, 47 Royal Institute of International Affairs, 141 Royal Newfoundland Regiment, 33 Royal Oak Orange Lodge, 31, 33 Royal Visit, 94 Russell, Clara (1930–2011): mob threatens, 156; portrait of, 192 Russell, Herbert (1890–1949), 27 Russell FitzPatrick, Dale, ix–x, xiii, 193n2, 194n4, 195n35, 199n112, 199n122, 201n140, 202n173, 212–13n125, 216n180, 218n229 Russia, 36, 124 Ryan, Dan (1852–1934), 58 Ryan, Francis (1926–1997), 142 Sainsbury, Edward B. (1881–1971), 170 St Anthony, 138 St Barbe, 136, 138 St George’s, 81, 147 St George’s–Port au Port, 167 St John’s: elite of, 49, 97, 138, 167, 171; harbour of, 4; politics in, 7, 49, 120, 159, 167, 185; and

252

Index

Southside, 4; unemployment in, 30, 36, 61, 66, 154, 200n133; and Water Street business interest, 5, 12, 67, 138, 140, 153, 157, 159, 165, 182, 200n131 St John’s Current Events Club, 75 St John’s East, 185 St John’s Housing Corporation, 118 St John’s West, 185 St Laurent, Louis S. (1882–1973): campaigns in Newfoundland, 185; becomes Liberal leader, 172; and 1947 negotiations with Newfoundland, 148–9; and Newfoundland Senate appointments, 189, 230n213, 233n262; becomes prime minister, 176; meets Smallwood, 141; and appointment of Smallwood as premier, 180; and Terms of Union, 173, 176 St Mary’s, 136 St Mary’s School, 4 St Pierre, 173 St Thomas’ Anglican Church, 5 Salutin, Rick, 193n3 Samson, Hugh, 200n137 Sapiro, Aaron (1884–1959), 56 Saunders, Louise M. (1893–1969), 210n94 Scammell, Arthur Reginald (1913–1995): and lyrics of Squid Jiggin’ Ground, 93; teaches in Montreal, 164; on union with Canada, 164–5 Scott, Isabel, 210n94 “The Scrapes,” 56–7 scripts, 7, 10 Sea Riders, 15 sealers, 35, 60–1, 66–7 Searchlight, 25 Seattle, 8

Sellars, George, 61 Senate of Canada, 97, 205n236 Shapter, Charles, 53 Sharp, Mitchell (1911–2004), 149 Sheffman, Maurice, 85, 213n126 Sheffman, Samuel, 101 Shipman, Ernest (1871–1931), 14–15 Shoe Cove, 521 Short, Nehemiah, (1897–1970): as chief electoral officer, 136, 158; awarded Order of the British Empire, 190; radio addresses of, 136 A Sincere Appreciation of Newfoundland’s Greatest Son, 17 Sinnott, Michael J., 183 Sisters of Mercy, 4 Smallwood, Alexander/Uncle Sandy (1868–1947), 101, 193n2, 216n180 Smallwood, Alexander William (1913–1980), 194n4 Smallwood Alice Mary (1916–1988), 194n4 Smallwood, Augustus (1921–2015), 194n4 Smallwood, Charles Edward (1909–1987), 194n4 Smallwood, Charles William (1873–1956): background of, 3, 193n2; denomination of, 3; family of 3, 194n4; signs marriage register, 28; problems of, 3–4 Smallwood, Clara (daughter of Joseph and Clara). See Russell, Clara Smallwood, Clara Isabel (1901–1996): background of, 26, 190; in Bonavista, 57, 70; and Bulley Street property, 215n175; visits Canada, 26; in Carbonear,

Index 31, 36, 45–6, 50, 56, 81; children of, 31–2, 42–3, 81, 192; in Corner Brook, 42, 44; visits Curling, 26; visits England, 74–6; visits Gander, 114; on husband, 29, 33, 35; on Kenmount Road, 113, 117, 137; mob threatens, 156; and mother’s name, 199n112; in Ottawa, 179, 230n212; pen pal of, 26; and royal visit, 92; siblings of, 199n112; meets Smallwood, 26; campaign speeches of, 185; wedding of, 27, 29, 192, 199n123; as young woman, 34 Smallwood, David (1839–1928): background of, 3; business of, 4; family of, 3, 193n1, 216n179; and Orange Order, 31, 200n138 Smallwood, David Haviland (1906–1987), 194n4 Smallwood, David James (1870–1948), 193n2 Smallwood, Dorothy Jean (1920–2007), 194n4 Smallwood, Duncan Buchanon (1875–1940), 193n2 Smallwood, Elizabeth Emma Earle (1866–1894), 212n125 Smallwood, Fanny (1863–1941), 101, 193n2, 216n179, 261n180 Smallwood, Frederick (1864–1917): benefaction of, 4; business of, 4; family of, 101, 212n125 Smallwood, Haviland Clarke (1870–1889), 193n2 Smallwood, Ida May (1903–1987), 194n4 Smallwood, Isabella Margaret (1908–1991), 194n4 Smallwood, John/Jack (1866–1928), 193n2

253

Smallwood, Joseph Cooper (1880–1893), 193n2 Smallwood, Joseph Roberts (1900–1991): attacks on, 9, 167, 169; on Attlee visit, 106; travels on B-24 Liberator, 114; background of, 3–4; and Barrelman, 17, 80–5; and Barry lawsuit, 42–3; and Bell Island, 9, 24, 26, 29; on berry picking; 103; biographies of, xi; boards with Mrs Tobin, 70; in Bonavista, 56–60, 62–6, 68–71; and Bonavista Centre, 138; and Bonavista North, 185; and Bonavista South, 49–50; books and pamphlets by, xi, 17, 35, 43–5, 47–8, 76, 92, 102, 211n106, 223n92; boots of, 50; in Boston, 9, 21; and Bradley, 54, 97, 124–5, 127, 131, 134, 136, 140–1, 144–6, 157, 161, 173, 184, 186; business ventures of, 43–4, 54, 88; and Canada House, 190; character and personality of, 3–5, 19, 25, 29, 47, 55, 71, 80, 102, 120–1, 135, 154–7, 185–7, 191; and Clutterbuck, 179, 187–9; on Coaker, 5, 10–13, 17–18, 20–2, 35–6, 56, 87; and commission of government, 40, 50, 54, 59–60, 63–4, 65, 66–7, 87–92, 97–9 103–4, 106, 108, 120, 126, 139; and communism, 25, 29, 36, 140, 157; and pros and cons of Confederation, 10, 41, 125–34, 139, 146, 152–5, 176; and cooperatives, 56, 58, 68–9, 71, 78, 122–3, 153; in Corner Brook, 26, 36–43; courtship and marriage of, 26–9; on Crosbie, 66; dedications of, 35, 45, 82; and Ottawa delegation (1947), 144–50; dictums of, 31,

254

Index

187; domestic life of, 29–36, 42, 44–8, 50, 56–7, 70–1, 74–6, 81, 85, 87, 100–2, 113–15, 120, 156, 190–1; education of, 4–5; and enfranchisement of women, 10; and excursion across Newfoundland, 26–7; and Express, 97, 100; and federal election (1949), 185; film project of, 14–15; sells fish to Crosbie, 70; forenames of, 3; in Gander, 111–18; opposes Gander timber agreement, 87–8; and Gander River expedition, 37–7; and Gander tourism, 122; in Halifax, 8–9; and Harrington, 111, 139, 144; and Hibbs, 30–1, 33; and Hope Simpson, 61, 66, 69; and Humber Herald, 41–3; on imperialism, 15; insolvency of, 46–7; journalistic career of, 5–11, 13–14, 17, 21, 24, 29–30, 33, 40–1, 45, 52, 82, 97; judgments against, 46, 70; appointed Justice of the Peace, 42; and Karsh, 177, 178–9; and Kent Commission, 72; and Labrador, 92–3; and leased bases, 99; and letters to Clara, 37–9; and letters to the editor, xv; as Liberal leader, 183; and Liberal Party of Canada, 172–3, 185–6; on liberalism, 30–1; in London, 31, 33–6; and lustre ware, 88; and McEvoy, 88, 172, 189; and mcli , 8, 24, 27, 67, 69, 126–7, 179; memoirs of, xi; and Mitchell family, 52–3; and National Convention, 120, 124–9, 131–2, 135–57; and National Film Board, 141; and nationalization, 12; and The New Newfoundland, 45–6; in New York, 9, 14, 18–19;

and Newfoundland Federation of Labour, 25, 27, 29; and Newfoundland Labour Party. 21–2, 24, 31; backs Newfoundland National Association, 97; writes “Newfoundland with the Lid Off,” 88–92; newspaper columns by, 10, 17, 21, 30, 120; and Orange Order, 31, 40, 200m138; on outport delights, 103; on Parliamentary Mission, 107–8; patrons of, 30, 45, 85, 96, 115, 121, 137, 144, 153, 159, 182; and 1948 petition, 157–8; and Pickersgill, 141, 184; and pig farming, 105, 111–13, 115–18, 123–4; police surveillance of, 61, 66–7; and Port Union, 11–12, 17–18, 20, 27, 56, 68, 87; becomes premier 182; visits Prince Edward Island, 15; and prohibition, 7, 195n35; properties of, 85, 100–1, 105, 108, 123, 214n175; in Pouch Cove, 71–2; wins 1949 provincial election, 185; on raf , 115–16; and referendum campaigns, 158–66; reputation of, xi–xii, 35, 38, 47, 61, 68–71, 75–7, 80, 120, 140, 179; and royal visit, 92–3; and St Pierre and Miquelon, 173; meets Scammell, 93; and Senate appointments, 128, 144, 189; siblings of, 3, 194n4; and socialism, 4, 9, 21, 31, 36; beseeches Helena Squires, 35; and Richard Squires, 8, 41–5, 47, 49, 121, 189; and Star Weekly, 181; summer tours of, 88, 102; and Terms of Union, 172–7; and Tottenham Labour Party, 35; tours south coast, 181; and Unemployed Workers’ Committee, 36, 201n156;

Index and union organizing of, 23–7, 56–7, 62, 114; unpublished manuscript of, 48; and war surplus, 114, 123; and Watchdog controversy, 45; on Water Street, 67, 157; wedding anniversary of, 192; and Yiddish, 19; and Ewart Young, 127, 141, 177; and Zahn, 19–20 Smallwood, Julia (1839–1916), 3, 193n2 Smallwood, Maria Julia (1902–1990), 194n4 Smallwood, Mary (Minnie) Ellen (1880–1963), 3 Smallwood, Mary Hannah (1893–1982), 85 Smallwood, Maxine Dorcas (1924–2001), 194n4 Smallwood, Ramsay MacDonald Coaker (1926–2011): family life of, 31–2, 35–6, 46, 70, 81, 113, 115; visits Ottawa, 179; works for raf , 219n244; works for Trans World, 219n244 Smallwood, Reginald Bernard (1918–2005), 194n4, 222n67; and Gander piggery, 123–24; and Kenmount farm, 105, 216n193; memoir of, 4; and Middle Brook, 132 Smallwood, Roberta Hyde Mutch/ Aunt Bert (1868–1949), 101 Smallwood, Sadie Frances (1912–1965), 194n4 Smallwood, Walter Reginald (1878–1881): son of David and Julia, 193n2 Smallwood, Walter Reginald, (1890–1947): son of Frederick and Elizabeth, 85, 212n125

255

Smallwood, William Richard Squires (1928–2001): family life of, 42, 45–6, 81, 113; visits Gander, 115; injury to, 44 Social Credit, 141 Socialist Party of America, 15, 20 Southside, 4–5 Spain, 62, 72 Spectator, 5 Spencer, Edward S. (1893–1973), 233n258 Springdale High School, 194n11 Spurrell, Chesley (1905–1959), 136 Squid Jiggin’ Ground, 93 Squires, Helena E. (1879–1959): background of, 201n143; family of, 33; elected in Lewisporte, 44; London flat of, 35; defeated in Twillingate, 49 Squires, Leander, 215n175 Squires, Richard Anderson (1880–1940): career of, 6, 19–20, 22, 41–2, 44, 48–9; on Commission of Government, 54, 215n168; and Corner Brook mill, 26; death of, 189; elected in Humber, 42; knighthood of, 8; charged with larceny, 23; reputation of 54; on Smallwood, 36; backs Smallwood book, 43 Star Weekly, 181 Starkes, Roland G. (1890–1950), 49, 52–3 State Department, 146, 165 Stavert, William (1861–1937), 51 Steiger, Frederick (1899–1990), 192 Stephenville, 96 Stick, Leonard T (1892–1979), 222n72 Stirling, Geoff (1921–2013), 137, 161, 165

256

Index

Stories of Newfoundland, 92 Stowe, James, 96 Strong, Helena E. See Squires, Helena E. Stroud, Carson (1919–1987), 136 Sullivan, William, 71 Summers, G. Bernard (1906–1993), 61 Sunday Herald, 137, 139, 145–6, 156, 161, 165, 171, 176–7, 180, 182, 231n239 Sunday Leader, 8 Supreme Court of Newfoundland, 42, 46, 53, 69 Suum Cuique, 5 Sweetapple, James (1890–1971), 136 T. & M. Winter Company, 172 Tait, James S. (1849–1928), 30, 47 Telfer, Thomas, xii Templeman, Muriel (1900–1984), 182, 231n232 Terms of Union, 149–52, 172–3, 175–6, 179–80, 182, 184, 189, 193n6, 229n196 Terra Nova (Newfoundland Railway private car), 113 Tessier, Gerald. G. (1915–1998), 118 This is Newfoundland, 177 Thistle, Walter (1914–1979), 141, 223n95 Thompson, Harold (1890–1957), 209n53 Thompson, J.C., 173 Thompson, Percy (1872–1946), 48 Thorburn, Robert (1836–1906): premier, 221n42 Thorburn, Robert, 130–1 Thornbury, 107 Tilley, Katherine. See Clouter, Katherine

Times, 9 “To each his own,” 5 “To Every Man His Own,” 194n17 “To Make Newfoundland Great,” 181 Tolstoy, Lev Nikolayevich (1828–1910), 13 Torbay, 71, 95, 177 Toronto, 28, 114, 163, 177, 181, 211n102 “tory,” 49–50 Tory Party, 30 Tottenham Labour Party, 35 Tourist Development Board, 81 Trades Union Congress, 25 transatlantic air travel, 6, 95 Trans-Canada Air Lines, 95, 113–14, 177, 187 Trans-Canada Highway, 187 Treasury, 118, 142, 148 Treaty of Versailles, 6 Trentham, E.N.R. (1888–1963), 58 Trepassey, 36 Trinidad, 89–90 Trinity, 60 Trinity Bay, 102 Trinity South, 49 Tuberculosis, 140 Tucker, George (1882–1942), 21–2, 31, 47, 198n90 Tudor, Hugh (1871–1965), 33, 206n11 Tulk, Samuel (1886–1965), 70 Turner, Blanche C., 210n94 Turner, George W., 136 Turner, Jack (1887–1948), 174 “twenty-nine dictators,” 157 Twillingate, 49, 147 Unemployed Workers’ Committee, 36 Union Party, 5–6, 23, 35 194n18

Index Union Trading Company, 11, 163 Union with America Party. See Economic Union with America Party United Church of Canada, 28, 230n213 United Newfoundland Party, 50 United States, 9, 20, 42–3, 67, 70, 74, 94, 96, 99, 119–20, 130, 147, 160–1, 165–6, 203n194 United States Consul General, 146 University of Wisconsin, 74 Vancouver, 8 Vardy, Oliver L. Al (1906–1980): background of, 210n76; and The Book of Newfoundland, 74–5; and Fishermen-Workers Tribune, 99; as radio personality, 81–2 ve-Day, 117 Vigilance Committee, 7 “Vikings of Carbonear,” 26 Vincent, John (1885–1965), 92 vocm, 137 Voice of Liberty, 137 vonf, 82, 100, 105, 109 vonh, 109 Vosiey, Dick, 77 Wabana Mine Workers’ Union, 24, 29, 142 Wadden, Mary, 101 Walsh, Albert J. (1900–1958): as Commissioner for Home Affairs and Education, 225n125; as Commissioner for Justice and Defence, 225n125; Karsh photograph of, 177; knighthood of, 177; as lieutenant-governor, 180–1; and London delegation, 147–8; swears in Smallwood, 182; and Terms of

257

Union, 172–7, 184; as vice-chairman of Commission, 172 Walwyn, Humphrey T. (1879–1957): and Attlee, 106; and The Book of Newfoundland, 78; inspects Gander piggery, 113; as Governor, 71; in Grand Falls, 111; in Pouch Cove, 71; departs St John’s, 135; travels on Terra Nova, 113 Warren, William (1879–1927), 20, 22 Warren, (William) Gordon (1910–1990), 142 Washington, 99, 146–7, 165 Watchdog (St John’s), 45 Watchman (St John’s), 45, 50 Water Street. See St John’s Watson, Ernest Robert (1872–1945), 69 Watts, Isaac (1674–1748), 232n254 Way, James M., 185 “Wayfarer.” See Perlin, Albert B. Wesley Debating Club, 31 West Indies, 72 Western Star, 27, 39–40, 43–4 “What Newfoundland Might be Fifty Years Hence!,” 17 “What the Kaiser Said,” 6 Wheare, Kenneth (1907–1979), 142 Whelan, Stella. See Meaney, Stella Whitbourne, 27 White, Jack A. (1921–2001), 145 White, William (1878–1941), 97 White Bay, 136, 138 Whitehall, 83, 94–5, 106, 118–19 Who’s Who, 30, 33, 88, 201n142 “Why I Am an Imperialist,” 15 “Why I Oppose Communism,” 36 Wicks, Lloyd (1932–2018), 132–3 Williams, Hayward, 31 Winnipeg, 8 Winsor, Samuel R. (1872–1951), 61

258 Winter and Higgins, 43 Winter, Gordon A. (1912–2003): as minister of finance, 182–3; and Terms of Union, 172, 182 Winter, Harry A. (1889–1969), 97, 225n125 Witless Bay, 201n143 Wolvin, Roy M. (1880–1945), 9 Woody Point, 138 Workingmen’s Party, 7

Index Yetman, Jacob, 68–9 York Sunbury, 150 Young, Ewart (1913–1968): edits Atlantic Guardian, 127; and Smallwood, 127, 141, publishes This is Newfoundland, 177 Young, (Frederick) Ross (1907–1970), 73, 113, 209n56 Young, Ron, 14 Zahn, Lillian, 19–20