Douglas Sadler was born in London, England in 1916. He served in the 7th Armoured Division (Desert Rats) during World War II and with the Queen's Royal Regiment in Holland. He spent six months imprisoned in Oflag 79, Germany. It was during the World War II that Sadler met his future wife, Joan, in England. They were married in 1942. After the War, he served as a Captain in the Army and one of his tours took him to Singapore in 1947. He came to Canada in 1950 to work on Governor-General Vincent Massey's farm near Port Hope, Ontario and later worked for the Port Hope Evening Guide in advertising. This was the beginning of his newspaper career which ultimately led him to the Peterborough Examiner and the City of Peterborough in 1953. Part of his work at the Examiner included writing his now famous outdoor column, "Come Quietly With Me," which he wrote for more than 30 years. Douglas has written close to 1500 columns on every conceivable aspect of the environment. Late in his life, Douglas decided to return to school. He attended the old Peterborough Teacher's College, and upon graduation, began teaching with the Northumberland Board of Education. He later became the vice-principal of Warkworth School in 1969 and worked there for twelve years before taking a job as an outdoor education consultant. He then moved to the Peterborough County Board of Education. When the outdoor education program was cancelled in 1975, Douglas continued teaching at the Bailieboro School. At about the same time, Douglas became a member of the Peterborough Field Naturalists. After two years, he joined the Ontario Federation of Field Naturalists and was a member for sixteen years, two of which were spent as the Federation's president. Douglas has won the Frank Kortright Award twice and is an honorary life member of the Peterborough Field Naturalists. He earned a degree in geography in 1978 from Trent University and, in 1988, he was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree from the same university. In 1987 he authored the book "Reading Natures Clues."
C.E. Cooper Cole was marrried to Sarah Kenwick Tucket. They had four sons and one daughter. His one son is Alfred O.C. Cole, who has played a major role in the history of Trent University.
Dr. J.W. Clemishaw was a medical doctor who practised in Port Hope, Ontario, in the late 1800's.
Deryck M. Schreuder, born in 1942, is a Professor of History who received his Ph.D. from Oxford University. He joined Trent University's History Department in 1970 as an associate professor and he became the Chairman of the Department in 1978. He retained this position until 1981, when he left Trent University. He is the author of several books including "Gladstone and Kruger: Liberal Government and Colonial `Home Rule' 1880-1885", 1969 and "The Scamble for Southern Africa, 1877-1895: The Politics of Partition Reappraised."
F.W. Haultain, the son of Major General Francis Haultain, was born at Brussels, Belgium, November 7, 1821, and was educated at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, England. He was commissioned as Second Lieutenant in the Royal Artillery, March 19, 1839, and after serving many years in Canada, retired as Lieutenant-Colonel in May 1860. He then settled at Peterborough, Upper Canada, in September 1860, and almost immediately became involved in political life. He won the general election of 1861, defeating W.S. Conger by some thirty votes. In 1863, he stood aside while Conger was acclaimed to the seat, but, upon Conger's death in 1864, re-entered the fray to defeat Charles Perry by one hundred and six votes in a rather warm campaign. Haultain died in 1882.
G. Wilson Craw started work at the Peterborough Examiner in 1926 and worked his way, from a cub reporter to Executive Editor. He was interested in municipal affairs and for years reported the City Council and Board of Education news. He took an active part in developing the City's educational system. For 16 years he was a member of the Board of Education and a past Chairman. His articles on the Mayors of Peterborough were compiled by the Examiner in 1967 in a book entitled "The Peterborough Story: Our Mayors 1850-1951". The work is an important chronicle dealing with the major events of the City's history.
Gabriel Switzer was a farmer in Emily Township during the middle to late 1800's.
G.A. Gibson was a farmer in the Lindsay, Ontario who at one time ran a general store on Kent St., Lindsay. His wife was Alice K. Gibson, daughter of James Kerr, and they had at least one son, A.E.M. Gibson.
Dorothy Moir attended University of Toronto in the Faculty of Arts program and was enrolled in the 1st year Household Science course in the 1926-1927 academic year.
Gavin Henderson was born in 1911 and raised in England. In his early twenties he visited Canada with a friend. In 1934 Henderson emigrated to Canada and worked in the Eaton's art gallery in Toronto. He attended monthly meetings of the Toronto Anglers and Hunters Association.
Eventually Gavin came to know Frank Kortright and when a conservation council was established Kortright offered Gavin the position of secretary in 1952. Working in the council enriched Gavin's circle of acquaintances in the conservation and preservation fields. As editor of the Council's Bulletin he read everything he could that pertained to conservation and preservation. Throughout all of this he pushed the concern of conservation to the masses. He wrote articles in the Ontario Naturalist, gave lectures and briefs to government agencies, speeches and seminars to espouse his cause. He left the Conservation Council in 1965.
Henderson was appointed a member on a standing committee advisory to the Minister of Lands and Forests 1959-1970. He was also director of the National and Provincial Parks Association of Canada. (Taken from: Wareki, George Michael. "Protecting Ontario's Wilderness: A History of Wilderness Conservation in Ontario, 1927-1973." Doctoral Thesis, McMaster University, 1989.) He founded the National and Provincial Parks Association of Canada and was the first executive director from 1964 to 1974. He has sat on a number of committees and associations involved in the conservation and preservation of Canada's natural resources. In 1985, he received Parks Canada's National Heritage Award. In 1989 he received the J.B. Harkin Medal from the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society. His leadership helped save Quetico Park from large scale commercial lumbering and prevented massive resort development at Lake Louise. He helped to establish ten new national parks, two of which, the Nahanni and Kluane, were declared UNESCO World Heritage Sites. For this service to Canada Gavin Henderson was recognized and on October 27, 1993 he was invested into the Order of Canada.
Born in Combermere, Ontario, Gary Elwood Nichol was a documentary filmmaker. He lived several years in Toronto and Ottawa before settling in Vietnam where he gave up filmmaking and pursued painting. He was married to Tchu Chin and had three children. Nichol died in Saigon 25 March 2009.
Miriam A. Leith graduated from the Macdonald Institute of Guelph in 1962 before going on to graduate school at Aberdeen University. She returned to Guelph in 1963 and enrolled in Extension Education at OAC. Her interest in ‘Eskimos and Indians’ stemmed from a volunteer position she held with the Indian-Eskimo Association at Broughton Island, Northwest Territories, in 1961. When she finished university, Leith went on to work as an adult educator for the Government of Newfoundland until 1970, and later became an adult educator for the Government of the N.W.T. Leith’s research in the N.W.T. entailed an in-depth look at the life of the Indigenous inhabitants of the north during the 1960s and 1970s.
Edwin Victor McNeill was born in Arran Township, Bruce County, in 1896. He belonged to the 3rd Canadian Company of Royal Engineers during World War 1. He became involved in Ontario Public Service by joining the Ontario Provincial Police at an early age and advancing to Commissioner in 1953. (Taken from: The Canadian Who's Who, 1952-1954. Vol VI. Toronto: Trans-Canada Press, 1954.)
Frederick Thompson was an Innkeeper and Sawyer who resided and had a business in Brunswick, Manvers Township, Canada West, during the mid-1800s. He had dealings with people in Bethany and Port Hope.
Edward A. Partridge (Ed) was born in 1862 at Barrie, Canada West, into a large family with 9 brothers and 4 sisters. Edward, at age 21, and one brother went west where they homesteaded in Sintaluta, Saskatchewan in 1883.
In 1885 Edward taught school in Broadview, Saskatchewan and he participated in the Riel Rebellion of 1885 with the Yorkton Rangers. He was author of "A War On Poverty" and was the founder and first president of the United Grain Growers' of Saskatchewan in 1906. He was the "father" of the co-operative grain growers marketing system and of the Canadian Council of Agriculture. He was also the first editor of the Grain Growers Guide which was later named "The Country Guide". Partridge was honorary president of the United Farmers of Canada.
He and his wife had five children: May (who died while swimming), Edna, Enid, Charles and Harold. Both sons died in France during World War I. In a binder accident Edward had to have one leg amputated which caused him to live in pain for the rest of his life. Shortly after his wife died he moved, with his youngest daughter, to Victoria in British Columbia. Edward A. Partridge died from a room filled with gas August 3, 1931 in Victoria, British Columbia.
In 1962 a portrait of E.A. Partridge was unveiled at the the Royal Winter Fair in Toronto and to be housed later in the Canadian Agricultural Hall of Fame.
Henry Vansittart, Vice-Admiral with the British navy, was born at Bisham Abbey, Berkshire, England, in 1779. He entered the British navy as a midshipman in 1791, and served throughout the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. In 1830 he was promoted Rear-Admiral, and in 1841 Vice-Admiral. In 1834 he bought an estate near Woodstock, Upper Canada, on which he settled; and he died there in 1844.
Henry White was a Barrister who lived in Port Hope, Ontario, at the turn of the century. He acted as an agent, collecting rents, for various estates in the area.
George Campbell was a farmer who lived in Norland, Ontario, during the 1870's.
Colonel George E. Laidlaw was born in Toronto in 1860, the son of George Laidlaw, a railway builder in the Trent Valley (See Encycopedia Canadiana). After graduating from the Royal Military College, Laidlaw became involved in the military. He fought in the west during the 1885 Riel Rebellion, and was an officer in the Lord Strathcona Horse during the Boer War. Laidlaw's other interests included politics and native and Ontario folklore. From the ranch that he and his partner Macdonald operated on Balsam Lake in Victoria County (called the Fort, where they raised beef cattle), Laidlaw found a base for his interests. He was at one time Reeve of Bexley Township, and as such, a member of the County Council. His literary efforts found an audience in small journals. He died at the Fort, in 1927.
George Cobb ( - 2003) was a local historian, who in 1966 was commissioned by Trent University to begin an experimental program in oral history. The tapes in this fonds are the results of his efforts.
Herman Witsius Ryland, clerk of the Executive Council of Lower Canada, was born in Northampton, England, in 1760. In 1781 he came to America as assistant deputy-paymaster-general of the British forces, and served throughout the last stages of the American Revolutionary War. On the evacuation of New York in 1784, he returned to England with Sir Guy Carleton.
When Carleton, as Lord Dorchester, was appointed governor-general of British North America under the Act of 1791, Ryland, in 1793, came out to Canada as his secretary. He was appointed both clerk and civil secretary of the Executive Council, and for many years he exercised a great influence on the government of Canada. He was the confidential adviser of Sir James Craig, but was dismissed from office by Sir George Prevost as civil secretary in 1812. He continued, however, as clerk of the Executive Council until his death; and he was appointed in 1813 a member of the Legislative Council.
He died at Beauport, near Quebec, on July 20, 1838. A selection of his papers is printed in R. Christie, "History of Lower Canada," vol. vi (Quebec, 1854).
Henry Ruttan was born at Adolphustown, Upper Canada in 1792, son of William Ruttan (United Empire Loyalist). Henry was the representative in the Legislative Assembly of Upper Canada for Northumberland between 1820-1824 and 1836-1841. In 1837 he was elected as Speaker of the Assembly. He was Sheriff of the District of Newcastle District from 1827 to 1857. He died July 31, 1871 at Cobourg, Ontario.
Richard Prettie owned property in Vernonville, Haldimand Township, Ontario, and may have been a farmer.