Suchergebnisse

. Raleigh Parkin was born in Toronto, the fifth child and only son of George and Annie Parkin who were from New Brunswick. His father was headmaster of Upper Canada College and well known in Canada and Britain as a progressive educationist. The son received most of his education in England where the family settled when George Parkin became the first administrator of the Rhodes Scholarships Trust. . in August 1914, he joined the British army as one of "The First Hundred Thousand" and took part in the landing at Gallipoli. . On returning to Canada to join Sun Life Assurance Company, he specialized in foreign investments, particularly in the Commonwealth and the United States. From the early nineteen-thirties he was for forty years a governor of the Institute of Current World Affairs (Crane Foundation) of New York, for most of this time being the only Canadian so honoured. He played an influential role in the Foundation's awarding of overseas fellowships to young men. The establishment of the Arctic Institute of North America at Montreal in 1944 was to a considerable degree due to his initiative, and to his skill as a catalyst in bringing together scientists, academics and businessmen from the United States, Newfoundland, Canada, and Denmark. His name is one of the four appearing in the Act of Parliament that incorporated the Institute in 1945 and in the corresponding Act of the New York State Legislature. He was a member of the Board of Governors of the Institute and later served it for several years as a senior consultant. It was on his initiative that a collection of documents recording the activities of the Institute from its formative years until the present was deposited in the Public Archives of Canada in Ottawa. .

Philip A. Chester, former head of the Hudson's Bay Company in North America, who died in Winnipeg on 23 August 1976 at the age of 80, was a founder of the Arctic Institute of North America and a member of its original Board of Governors. He was a firm believer in the importance of scientific research in the North and his Company was the first to support the new Institute financially. He took his responsibilities as a Board member seriously, providing wise counsel to its early officers and assistance to its members working in the field, at a time when government services in the North were few and far between. . Recognizing that modernization of the fur trade depended for its success on transportation and communication, Philip Chester introduced the use of Company aircraft at a time when there were no aids to navigation and precious few maps. He equipped the trading posts with radio and employed progressive architects to design buildings suited to the special problems of northern construction. He cared very much for the welfare of his employees and provided better housing, special fringe benefits, and such humanizing touches as prizes for the best post gardens. Young Canadian apprentices were recruited for the first time, and the personnel, wherever they might be, soon understood that Mr. Chester not only required good performance but also took a direct interest in them. The Hudson's Bay Company was not alone in changing with the times. Reform of northern government was also on the way, though slower in getting started and uncertain in its direction. When in the nineteen fifties education, health, housing, transportation, and much more were at last acknowledged to be public responsibilities, the old Company did not, as it might well have done, stand in the way of change. When the history of the Canadian North in the present century comes to be written, the name of Philip Chester of the Hudson's Bay Company will stand high among those who led in reforming its administration and improving the conditions of those who live there.