RB Bennett: The Calgary Years

Gerald J. Stortz is an assistant professor of history at the University
of Waterloo.

In recent months The Globe and Mail has regularly run a rather
sophomoric feature that lists books that have been received by the
newspaper but will not be reviewed. This title was among the first so
designated—a pity, because many Globe readers may thus remain unaware
of an excellent book.

Gray is among Canada’s most widely read popular historians, the
author of such titles as Booze, Red Lights on the Prairies, and The
Winter Years. This is a much more academic endeavor, in collaboration
with Dalhousie University historian emeritus Peter Waite. This volume
deals with the period up to Bennett’s acceptance of the leadership of
the federal Conservative party; the second volume will deal with his
prime ministership and subsequent life.

Previous biographers have portrayed Bennett as a dull, arrogant, even
unfeeling individual. In Gray’s incredibly detailed portrait, he
becomes a passionate, caring individual of considerable complication and
seeming contradiction. To cite but one example of many, Bennett, on the
basis of his handling of the On to Ottawa Trek, is often portrayed as
having been antilabor, yet several times in his career he affirmed the
right of Canadians to organize and to expect decent wages and working
conditions.

One certainly gets the impression that the publishers believe they have
a winner here. The volume is handsomely bound and profusely illustrated.
This is a book well worth purchasing.