Benns: Give us a hint about two or three things you write about in Cold Fire that may surprise Canadians and Americans alike.

Boyko: Many readers will be surprised to learn of the enormous pressure President Kennedy exerted on Prime Ministers John Diefenbaker and Lester Pearson to ignore Canadian interests in the adoption of his policies. This attitude led to Kennedy’s interference in two Canadian elections that contributed to the government’s defeat. Readers will be surprised to see that while Canadians at the time were enthralled with the young president, he was treating Canada more like a satellite than ally.

Some have argued that the bad relations between Canada and the United States during the Kennedy years were due to the president and Diefenbaker disliking each other. However, many will be surprised to learn that while the personal enmity was real, it was based more on the two leaders pursuing very different and equally legitimate goals. Kennedy was more than the charming leader people loved and Diefenbaker was much more than the dithering anachronism that people rejected.

I think Canadian and American readers will be surprised by military matters at the time. For example, they may be shocked to learn of the role that Canada’s military played in the Cuban Missile Crisis for while the world was focussed on Cuban waters, the Canadian navy and air force was playing a key role in the defence of the American Atlantic seaboard. Readers will also be surprised that while Kennedy urged Canada to place American nuclear weapons with its Canadian-based missiles, that he saw them as mere decoys, there only to draw Soviet fire away from the United States.

If I can add a fourth, I believe readers will be surprised to see how much that happened in those years and the lessons that can be derived from the issues addressed continues to resonate today.

Benns: To my knowledge, this is your second book (Blood and Daring being first) that indelibly links Canada and the U.S. in ways that haven’t been fully tapped before. Is this a theme you are interested in continuing to explore – the political and historical connections between our nations? If so, why?

Boyko: Canadian Social Credit leader Robert Thompson once said in the House of Commons, “The Americans are our best friend whether we like it or not.” The United States is Canada’s neighbour and the world’s most powerful country and so every fad it follows, war it wages, and political or economic rabbit hole into which it descends, affects Canada. Canadians can fight it but can’t deny it.

This reality fascinates me and so for my last two books I have explored the relationship, first in the 1860s and then in the 1960s. My next book will explore an equally influential decade between the two.

Benns: Why do you think Kennedy holds such fascination for Canadians? Do you see any parallels as you watched Justin Trudeau rise to power in Canada?

Boyko: Kennedy did not invent the celebrity politician but he was the first to exploit looks, charisma, and a photogenic family in the TV age. The 1960 campaign swung when he beat the more experienced but less-media savvy Richard Nixon in TV debates. Kennedy confessed that he would not be an effective president or possibly even have become president without television.

A journalist once wrote of Canada’s 1968 “Trudeaumania” election: “Canadians had enviously watched the presidency of John Kennedy, and continued to wish for a leader like him.” Last year, Canadians watched Trudeau’s son ride a wave of Kennedyesque celebrity while Nixon-like opponents attacked his appearance and gaps in his policies and resume, all the while forgetting Kennedy’s lesson. And now Trudeau commands, Donald Trump confounds, and Kevin O’Leary considers.

A question that is asked throughout Cold Fire is whether our leaders must now also be celebrities?

Stephen Harper once joked that even his friends don’t like him. Despite his having been prime minister for nearly a decade, Mr. Harper left the public stage as much an enigma as when he first strode upon and then commanded it.

With his legacy now being written, perhaps the best way to seek an understanding of a man who was among our most inscrutable prime ministers is to recall three others with whom he shared policies, principles and personalities.

Mr. Harper’s control of his cabinet, caucus, and senior bureaucrats knew few bounds. All appearances, speeches and press releases were vetted to ensure that the government spoke with one voice – his voice. The prime minister’s own remarks were seldom extemporaneous while reporters’ questions were always limited and often ignored. In this way, Mr. Harper reminds one of R. B. Bennett.

Like Harper, Bennett was an easterner who represented a Calgary riding. Like Mr. Harper, Bennett enjoyed a reputation as a skilled political strategist and nearly every member of his caucus rode to Ottawa on his coat tails. Bennett held a similar lock on his colleagues, disdain for the press, and a reputation for running a one-man show.

A popular joke had a Parliament Hill tourist query a guide about the well-dressed man walking alone and talking to himself and being told that it was the prime minister conducting a cabinet meeting. Bennett used to speak of “his” government like Harper’s PMO referred not to the Canadian government, but to the Harper government. Bennett’s iron control, like Mr. Harper’s, rendered all errors his and all opposition personal.

Mr. Harper also reminds one of Joe Clark. Like Mr. Harper, Clark called Alberta home and was a career politician who entered the profession quite young. They both earned reputations as astute policy wonks. While both exuded obvious intelligence and political acumen they also appeared uncomfortable in their own skin, walked to podiums as if to gallows, and often read speeches like they couldn’t wait for them to end. Many Canadians grew uncomfortable with both, perhaps because they seemed so uncomfortable with themselves.

The ice in Clark’s manner seemed even colder when contrasted with the fire of Pierre Trudeau for whom magnetism came as naturally as breathing. Alas, another Trudeau radiated heat around the icy Harper who, like Clark, was an introvert in an extrovert’s game.

The most similar prime minister was John Diefenbaker. Like Harper, Diefenbaker was born in Ontario but became a transplanted westerner who voiced the alienation of his adopted region. Both behaved as outsiders even after becoming the ultimate insider. Both perceived politics as a war waged with enemies.

There are other similarities. One of Diefenbaker’s goals was to open the north. Mr. Harper sought to protect Canada’s Arctic sovereignty while spurring economic development in the vast part of the country that, with climate change changing everything, holds more potential than Diefenbaker could have imagined.

Diefenbaker also fought for imperial ties long after the empire was gone, including keeping the Red Ensign as our flag. He would have saluted Mr. Harper’s re-hanging pictures of the Queen and putting the Royal back into our military while reviving old ranks and insignia. Diefenbaker spoke of nationalist unity and sought to end hyphenated Canadianism. He called his vision One Canada. Harper held a similar view of the country.

While Diefenbaker rejected and largely ignored Quebec’s ethnic-nationalism, Harper emasculated it by having a bill passed that recognized “the Québécois” as forming a nation within a united Canada. That is, Quebec is not a nation, just those French-speaking people who self-identify as Québécois. The Harper bill channelled Diefenbaker’s pan-Canadian, One Canada nationalism.

Harper’s relationship with the United States was as tricky as Diefenbaker’s but their motivating ideas were similar. Throughout the difficult 1963 campaign in which he was accused of being anti-American, Diefenbaker said that his fight was for Canada and not against the United States. He repeated the point in his memoirs: “It was simple logic that Canada could not maintain its independence if we continued existing Liberal policies. Recognition of this implied no hostility to the United States. It was a case, as it was for many of my government’s policies, of being pro-Canadian, not anti-American.”

Two generations later, on November 19, 2012, Prime Minister Harper answered questions before the Canadian-American Business Council. He echoed Diefenbaker by offering, “We are strong Canadian nationalists who value what is distinctive and unique about this country and think in our own modest way that this is actually a better country. What we’ve tried to do and tried to tell Canadians is there’s no need for true Canadian nationalism to have any sense of anti-Americanism.”

Diefenbaker would not have agreed with everything Harper did or how he did it. Diefenbaker was a man of the House and so would have risen in outrageous anger at the prorogations and other parliamentary parlour tricks through which Harper bent the rules. Further, like Bennett and Clark, Diefenbaker was a Red Tory and so would have been orphaned in Harper’s party that purged the word Progressive and had the Conservatives become more conservative. The similarities nonetheless remain.

That Harper recognized his link to Diefenbaker was seen in the ways he saluted him. Harper’s government provided money to update and upscale Saskatoon’s Diefenbaker Canada Centre. When Ottawa’s old city hall was renovated to house government departments it was renamed the John G. Diefenbaker Building. A new Coast Guard icebreaker will be called the John G. Diefenbaker.

Prime Ministers Bennett, Clark, Diefenbaker and now Mr. Harper continue to serve Canada by inviting us to glimpse the road ahead not by peering through the windshield but, rather, glancing in the rear view mirror.

— John Boyko is the author of five books addressing Canadian history and politics including Blood and Daring: How Canada Fought the American Civil War and Forged and a Nation. Penguin-Random House will release his next book, Cold Fire: Kennedy’s Northern Front, in February 2016. Follow John at www.johnboyko.com

Conrad Black, author of the recently acclaimed Rise to Greatness: The History of Canada, as well as biographies of Franklin Roosevelt, Richard Nixon and Maurice Duplessis, has agreed to host this public event on September 29, starting at noon, to support a Kingston scholar’s research into Sir Wilfrid Laurier.

“Lord Black’s Sir John A. Macdonald walk will allow participants the rarest of opportunities to learn about all facets of Canadian history from a master public historian,” said event organizer Arthur Milnes, editor of the forthcoming Canada Always: The Speeches of Sir Wilfrid Laurier.

“The tour will wind its way through historic downtown Kingston and Mr. Black will share his unparalleled knowledge of Sir John A. Macdonald, Sir Wilfrid Laurier and so many others who have defined our nation.”

There is limited space and tickets. Contact Arthur Milnes for more information at (613) 536-5771 or at [email protected].

Leading up to the 150^th anniversary of Canada, Trent University has launched a new School for the Study of Canada.

Arising from the collective desire of scholars and students to understand Canada in its local, regional, national, and international contexts, The School for the Study of Canada will engage students in wide ranging projects and dialogues about Canada.

Led by over 40 scholars at Trent who study Canada across multiple programs and disciplines, many of them national and international experts in their field, students will be challenged to explore issues of relevance to Canada, and what it means to be Canadian. Issues facing critical examination at the new school will include themes such as sovereignty, nationalism, health and aging, the environment, indigeneity, regionalism, multiculturalism, immigration, labour, and peacekeeping.

“Essentially, the creation of the school is to recommit Trent to the study of Canada as a distinctive feature of the university,” says Christopher Dummit, who is undergrad chair of Canadian Studies at the university.

“Trent played a huge role in establishing Canadian studies as a field across the country – founding the Journal of Canadian Studies, creating innovative undergraduate and graduate degrees in Canadian Studies – and long before anyone else was doing so,” he tells Leaders and Legacies.

Dr. James Conolly, professor of Anthropology at Trent was recently named director of the new school. He says the news school “confirms Trent as ‘the’ place for the study of Canada.”

“The school will build on Trent’s existing leadership in Canadian Studies and draw upon Canadian-focused scholarship from other disciplines including Geography, Sociology, Anthropology and Environmental and Resource Studies, reinforcing the study of Canada as a central part of Trent’s broader mission,” he adds.

The School brings under one umbrella all existing Canadian Studies programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels: the Bachelor of Arts in Canadian Studies; the Masters in Canadian and Indigenous Studies; and the PhD in Canadian Studies under one umbrella. At all levels, the school will facilitate exchange programs that will allow students to study across borders, promote forms of community-based research and develop summer internships for students in the humanities and social sciences. The school also plans to offer public lectures, seminars and themed symposiums.

National Online Dialogue to Set Stage for Conversation about Canada

One of the first initiatives of the School for the Study of Canada will be supporting the Canadian Difference, a project between Trent and the philanthropic leadership of Ontario-based executives William A. Macdonald and William R.K. Innes. The project is set to evolve into a bilingual online community dedicated to encouraging open and thoughtful discussion about “What makes Canada work?” and “What could make Canada work?” Centered on a number of topical issues, and with Mutual Accommodation as an underlying theme, it will seek to crowdsource a wide range of perspectives and understanding from a diverse audience of engaged Canadians. Grad students at Trent will both moderate the forums and work behind the scenes to evaluate the discussion.

A Canadian First

“It was Tom Symons at the outset who headed up the Royal Commission on the idea of Canadian Studies in the 1970s making Trent the first to have a Canadian Studies department in Ontario and the second in the country. It’s only fitting that Tom Symons is the honorary director of the new School,” says Dummit. 

To learn more, visit the School for the Study of Canada.

The plaza outside Union Station has a new identity, renamed for Canada’s first Prime Minister, John A. Macdonald.

The newly renovated space was officially christened Sir John A. Macdonald Plaza at a recent ceremony, which was attended by dignitaries and representatives of Toronto’s Friends of Sir John A. Macdonald.

A plaque was also erected in honour of Macdonald’s many accomplishments, from Confederation, to the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway, to the creation of the North-West Mounted Police (today’s RCMP.)

A new sculpture depicting Macdonald as a young, teenage lawyer has been unveiled in Picton, Ontario.

Daryl Kramp, Member of Parliament for Prince Edward-Hastings, took part in the unveiling of a bronze statue of Macdonald that depicts him at the beginning of his career.

Macdonald called the Quinte region his home for 11 years, living in Hay Bay, Napanee, Glenora and Picton before moving finally to Kingston in 1835.  John A.’s family and cousins lived in the region. He travelled constantly but his family home was a small clapboard house on Hay Bay near Adolphustown followed some years later in the Miller’s House at the Stone Mills of Glenora, where his father was a miller and magistrate.

“I am very pleased to see this project initiated by the community where Sir John A. Macdonald spent an early part of his career honing his skills as a lawyer,” says Kramp. “I applaud the objective of the Macdonald Project, which is to shine a light on the early life of a man who, through hard work, determination and genuine affection for people, rose to become Canada’s first prime minister.”

Historians believe Macdonald probably stayed with his cousins, the Macphersons, in Picton during the two years he lived here. But he spent a great deal of time with his family Hugh, Helen, Margaret and Louisa at Glenora, below Lake on the Mountain. He said later that these were the happiest days of his life.

According to David Warrick, the chair of the steering committee of the Macdonald Project of Prince Edward County, the young Macdonald was already displaying leadership qualities and civic mindedness, even in his teenage years. Macdonald volunteered as secretary of the first public school board, organized a young men’s debating society, volunteered as a polling clerk for the election of the 12th legislature of Upper Canada in the Picton Courthouse in 1834, and he signed a petition to rename Hallowell (which later became Picton.)

The sculpture, created by Ruth Abernethy, captures a moment in time when Macdonald appeared in court for the first time before a judge and jury in Picton, Upper Canada in 1834.  He won the trial and four months later became an attorney while still living in Picton.

Warrick notes the sculpture “will remind Canadians that the nation’s first prime minister began his career in law and public administration in Picton.”

“He rose from humble beginnings as the son of an immigrant shopkeeper and miller in the Quinte region to become the principal architect of Canada,” Warrick says.

Quick Facts

• Sir John A. Macdonald lived in the Bay of Quinte region and Prince Edward County for about 11 years and began his law practice there.
• The sculpture is located in Picton’s historic downtown. It depicts Sir John A. Macdonald as he would have appeared presenting and winning his first court case before a judge and jury in the Picton Courthouse on Oct. 8, 1834.
• The Macdonald Project will develop educational materials to accompany the statue. Walking tours will also be planned, and new media will be used to promote the project.

Cassius Lubisi, South Africa’s chancellor of national orders, announced the recipients on the weekend. He noted in a statement that Mr. Mulroney is receiving the award “for his exceptional contribution to the liberation movement of South Africa.”

“His steadfast support for the release of Nelson Mandela and for imposing sanctions on South Africa’s apartheid regime led to a free, democratic, non-sexist and non-racial South Africa.”

Mr. Mulroney will be the first Canadian to receive this award.

The prime minister’s advocacy on this issue – which put him at odds with both America’s Ronald Reagan and Britain’s Margaret Thatcher – also earned him the Companion of the Order of Canada in 1998, this country’s highest honour.

A ceremony will be held on Freedom Day in South Africa on April 27 where President Jacob Zuma will bestow the awards.

The Vimy Foundation is dedicated to creating opportunities for young Canadians to learn about our First World War legacy, as symbolized with the victory at Vimy nearly 100 years ago. That’s why they develop education programs to help youth learn more about the sacrifices made by an entire generation 100 years ago – a time when Canada came of age and was recognized on the world stage for its contributions.

The Montreal-based Beaverbrook Canadian Foundation has recently announced that they will be contributing $300,000 to the Vimy Foundation over the next three years to support the Beaverbrook Vimy Prize. Through this program, high school students from Canada, France, and Britain travel to Europe for two weeks each August to study firsthand the intertwined history of the three countries during the First World War.

“We are pleased to continue our support for this important program,” says Vincent Prager, Board Governor of the Beaverbrook Canadian Foundation. “By educating young people about their history, and forging relationships between students from these three countries, the Beaverbrook Vimy Prize works to build a new generation of inspired citizens.”

There were 16 winners of the 2015 Beaverbrook Vimy Prize, chosen from hundreds of outstanding candidates based on their submitted essays, motivation letters, and reference letters. Interest in the program is growing significantly, with a three-fold increase in applications this year.

Established in 2006, the prestigious Beaverbrook Vimy Prize continues to be an outstanding opportunity for students, who are able to walk in the footsteps of history. By participating in this life-changing program, the students are inspired by what they learn and in turn develop a more profound connection to their countries’ history.

Seventeen-year-old Nicholas Johnson of Montreal, QC, a 2014 Beaverbrook Vimy Prize winner, writes that “thanks to the Beaverbrook Canadian Foundation, I have had the opportunity to better understand the history of Canada, England and France as well as the bravery and sacrifice of those who served in the war through first hand experiences. Every single day of the journey was a highlight in its own right and I find it very hard to express what the experience truly meant to me through mere words.”

1) Where did your interest in prime ministerial history begin?

Perhaps the more interesting question is ‘when’. I was a high school student when I came across a book by Joseph Nathan Hale called Facts About the Presidents: From Washington to Johnson, which I still have. You can see that I’m dating myself here. My thought at the time was “Why isn’t there a book like this about Canada’s Prime Ministers?” That’s when I started collecting ‘facts’, a project that has continued on and off – mostly off – for 50 years.

2) Tell me about the fact book. What led you to take this approach with our leaders and how do you see the end product?

Certainly I was influenced by Kane’s book. I like the idea of a quick, but comprehensive, resource that brings all 22 of our top leaders together in one place. Rather than bury them in too much narrative, the book would be full of bite-size pieces of information designed to portray the leaders’ personalities and their governments. My hope is that the end product will not only be a very accessible way to learn more about the men and woman who have served as PM, but will also convey a sense of fun. Of course, it isn’t necessarily imperative that we know Tupper was related to Franklin D. Roosevelt and Sarah Palin.

3) Tell us 2 or 3 of your favourite anecdotes from your research about some of the PMs.

I particularly like connections that bring different Prime Ministers together. My favourite takes place in December 1965. MP John Turner, who has just been appointed to his first cabinet position, is vacationing in Barbados when he ends up saving someone from drowning. The victim turns out to be former PM John Diefenbaker who is staying at the same hotel. Maybe it’s not total serendipity since the two of them coincidently stayed at the same hotel in Tobago while vacationing 12 months earlier. That’s when they first struck up a friendship. Another Turner connection is a bit more indirect: His mother dated R.B. Bennett.

In 1920, Bennett, an Alberta lawyer, introduced Quebec lawyer Louis St. Laurent as a speaker at the Canadian Bar Association convention. Nine years later, Bennett was the CBA president and St. Laurent one of his vice-presidents. It’s those benign collisions that can be fascinating in hindsight. There are lots of wonderful visual stories, too. Mackenzie would walk across the lake ice from Wolfe Island to Kingston to visit his fiancée Helen, until he fell through the ice on one trip, making a sodden impression when he arrived. I find it hard to picture Abbott as a champion grower of orchids. Or Harper sitting in the minor hockey stands with NDP MP Paul Dewar. Harper’s son played left wing while Dewar’s was on right wing. It’s tough to make this stuff up.

4) Broadly, what have you learned about the 22 people who have led this country? Is there a common theme outside of the office they held?

They’re all so very different. There is no common theme or personality to be found. That’s what makes each one interesting. A fresh new portrait every time. Some of them hungered to be Prime Minister; others dreaded being coerced into it.

5) Will you be shopping it around to a Canadian publisher once it’s complete?

I freely admit that I quite enjoy the research and the leisure pace that go with this project. But yes, I do hope to find a publisher for the end result.