William Kilbourn
William Morley Kilbourn OC FRSC (18 December 1926 – 4 January 1995) was a Canadian author, historian, professor, and politician. Kilbourn wrote on various topics in Canadian history, including economics, religion, and biography. After studying at Oxford and Harvard during the 1950s, in 1962 Kilbourn joined the faculty at York University. From 1962 to 1967 he served as the chairman of its humanities division. In 1969, Kilbourn was elected to Toronto City Council and remained an alderman until 1976. Along with his academic activities, Kilbourn was an active member of the Liberal Party of Canada.
Biography
William Morley Kilbourn was born in Toronto on 18 December 1926 to Kenneth Morley Kilbourn (1898–1985) and Mary Rae Fawcett (1900–1997). From 1937 to 1944 he attended Upper Canada College. Kilbourn entered Trinity College, University of Toronto and graduated bachelor of arts in 1948. He then went to Harvard University, where in 1949 he graduated Master of Arts. In the fall of 1949, Kilbourn moved to England to study at Oxford, and in 1952 he earned a second bachelor's degree. From 1951 to 1953, he served as a lecturer in the history department at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. Kilbourn returned to Harvard in 1953 as a doctoral student, and from 1953 to 1955 was also a teaching fellow. In 1955 he was appointed a professor of history at McMaster. Kilbourn earned a second master's at Oxford in 1956, and completed his PhD at Harvard in 1957.
In 1962, Kilbourn joined the history faculty at York University. Kilbourn served for five years as the first chairman of humanities.
In the 1969 Toronto municipal election, Kilbourn was elected to Toronto City Council for Ward 10. He was reelected in the 1972 Toronto municipal election and 1974 Toronto municipal election, and chose not to run in 1976. From 1973 to 1976 he served on the City Executive Committee and the Metropolitan Council.
He was also founding chairman of the Toronto Art Therapy Institute and the Toronto Distress Centre, a member of the Toronto Historical Board, the boards of the Toronto General Hospital and Young People's Theatre, and served as chairman of the Toronto Arts Council. Kilbourn was also a member of the executives of the Canada Council and the Canadian commission for UNESCO. Kilbourn was elected to the Royal Society of Canada in 1980.[1]
On 10 September 1949 in Thorold, Ontario, Kilbourn married Mary Elizabeth "Betsy" Sawyer (1926–2023), the daughter of the Rev'd Philip Sawyer (1890–1980) and Violet Hill (1895–1975). The ceremony took place at the Church of St John the Evangelist and was conducted by the Philip Sawyer.[2] The Kilbourns had five children: Philippa, Hilary, Nicholas, Timothy, and Michael. Kilbourn died in Toronto on 4 January 1995 at age 68.
Works
Monographs
- The Firebrand: William Lyon Mackenzie and the Rebellion in Upper Canada (1956)
- The Elements Combined: A History of the Steel Company of Canada (1960)
- The Making of the Nation: A Century of Challenge (1966)
- Religion in Canada: The Spiritual Development of a Nation (1968)
- Pipeline: TransCanada and the Great Debate (1970)
- C. D. Howe: A Biography (1979, with Robert Bothwell)
Edited volumes
- The Restless Church: A Response to The Comfortable Pew (1966)
- Canada: A Guide to the Peaceable Kingdom (1970)
Toronto
- The Toronto Book: An Anthology of Writings Past and Present (1976)
- Toronto in Pictures and Words (1977, with Rudi Christl)
- Toronto Remembered: A Celebration of the City (1984)
- Toronto Observed: Its Architecture, Patrons, and History (1986, with William Dendy)
- Intimate Grandeur: One Hundred Years at Massey Hall (1993)
External links
- William Kilbourn fonds
References
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How to use archival material |
- ^ Kilbourn, William; Toronto Remembered; Stoddart Publishing, Toronto; 1984.
- ^ "Married by father, to live in England," Toronto Daily Star (21 September 1949), 29.
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- Thomas Beattie Roberton, TBR: Newspaper Pieces (1936)
- Stephen Leacock, My Discovery of the West (1937)
- John Murray Gibbon, Canadian Mosaic (1938)
- Laura Salverson, Confessions of an Immigrant's Daughter (1939)
- J. F. C. Wright, Slava Bohu (1940)
- Emily Carr, Klee Wyck (1941)
- Bruce Hutchison, The Unknown Country (1942)
- Edgar McInnis, The Unguarded Frontier (1942)
- E. K. Brown, On Canadian Poetry (1943)
- John Robins, The Incomplete Anglers (1943)
- Dorothy Duncan, Partner in Three Worlds (1944)
- Edgar McInnis, The War: Fourth Year (1944)
- Ross Munro, Gauntlet to Overlord (1945)
- Evelyn M. Richardson, We Keep a Light (1945)
- Frederick Phillip Grove, In Search of Myself (1946)
- Arthur R. M. Lower, Colony to Nation (1946)
- William Sclater, Haida (1947)
- Robert MacGregor Dawson, The Government of Canada (1947)
- Thomas Head Raddall, Halifax, Warden of the North (1948)
- C. P. Stacey, The Canadian Army, 1939-1945 (1948)
- Hugh MacLennan, Cross-country (1949)
- Robert MacGregor Dawson, Democratic Government in Canada (1949)
- Marjorie Wilkins Campbell, The Saskatchewan (1950)
- W. L. Morton, The Progressive Party in Canada (1950)
- Frank MacKinnon, The Progressive Party in Canada (1951)
- Josephine Phelan, The Ardent Exile (1951)
- Donald G. Creighton, John A. Macdonald, The Young Politician (1952)
- Bruce Hutchison, The Incredible Canadian (1952)
- J. M. S. Careless, Canada, A Story of Challenge (1953)
- N. J. Berrill, Sex and the Nature of Things (1953)
- Hugh MacLennan, Thirty and Three (1954)
- Arthur R. M. Lower, This Most Famous Stream (1954)
- N. J. Berrill, Man's Emerging Mind (1955)
- Donald G. Creighton, John A. Macdonald, The Old Chieftain (1955)
- Pierre Berton, The Mysterious North (1956)
- Joseph Lister Rutledge, Century of Conflict (1956)
- Thomas H. Raddall, The Path of Destiny (1957)
- Bruce Hutchison, Canada: Tomorrow's Giant (1957)
- Pierre Berton, Klondike (1958)
- Joyce Hemlow, The History of Fanny Burney (1958)
- [No award] (1959)
- Frank Underhill, In Search of Canadian Liberalism (1960)
- T. A. Goudge, The Ascent of Life (1961)
- Marshall McLuhan, The Gutenberg Galaxy (1962)
- J.M.S. Careless, Brown of the Globe (1963)
- Phyllis Grosskurth, John Addington Symonds (1964)
- James Eayrs, In Defence of Canada (1965)
- George Woodcock, The Crystal Spirit: A Study of George Orwell (1966)
- Norah Story, The Oxford Companion to Canadian History and Literature (1967)
- Mordecai Richler, Hunting Tigers Under Glass (1968)
- [No award] (1969)
- [No award] (1970)
- Pierre Berton, The Last Spike (1971)
- [No award] (1972)
- Michael Bell, Painters in a New Land (1973)
- Charles Ritchie, The Siren Years (1974)
- Marion MacRae and Anthony Adamson, Hallowed Walls (1975)
- Carl Berger, The Writing of Canadian History (1976)
- F. R. Scott, Essays on the Constitution (1977)
- Roger Caron, Go-Boy! Memories of a Life Behind Bars (1978)
- Maria Tippett, Emily Carr (1979)
- Robert Bothwell and William Kilbourn, C.D. Howe (1979)
- Larry Pratt and John Richards, Prairie Capitalism (1979)
- Jeffrey Simpson, Discipline of Power: The Conservative Interlude and the Liberal Restoration (1980)
- George Calef, Caribou and the Barren-Land (1981)
- Christopher Moore, Louisbourg Portraits: Life in an Eighteenth- Century Garrison Town (1982)
- Jeffery Williams, Byng of Vimy: General and Governor General (1983)
- Sandra Gwyn, The Private Capital: Ambition and Love in the Age of Macdonald and Laurier (1984)
- Ramsay Cook, The Regenerators: Social Criticism in Late Victorian English Canada (1985)
- Northrop Frye, Northrop Frye on Shakespeare (1986)
- Michael Ignatieff, The Russian Album (1987)
- Anne Collins, In the Sleep Room (1988)
- Robert Calder, Willie: The Life of W. Somerset Maugham (1989)
- Stephen Clarkson and Christina McCall, Trudeau and Our Times (1990)
- Robert Hunter and Robert Calihoo, Occupied Canada: A Young White Man Discovers His Unsuspected Past (1991)
- Maggie Siggins, Revenge of the Land: A Century of Greed, Tragedy and Murder on a Saskatchewan Farm (1992)
- Karen Connelly, Touch the Dragon (1993)
- John Livingston, Rogue Primate: An Exploration of Human Domestication (1994)
- Rosemary Sullivan, Shadow Maker: The Life of Gwendolyn MacEwen (1995)
- John Ralston Saul, The Unconscious Civilization (1996)
- Rachel Manley, Drumblair: Memories of a Jamaican Childhood (1997)
- David Adams Richards, Lines on the Water: A Fisherman's Life on the Miramichi (1998)
- Marq de Villiers, Water (1999)
- Nega Mezlekia, Notes from the Hyena's Belly (2000)
- Thomas Homer-Dixon, The Ingenuity Gap (2001)
- Andrew Nikiforuk, Saboteurs: Wiebo Ludwig's War Against Big Oil (2002)
- Margaret MacMillan, Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World (2003)
- Roméo Dallaire, Shake Hands With the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda (2004)
- John Vaillant, The Golden Spruce: A True Story of Myth, Madness and Greed (2005)
- Ross King, The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism (2006)
- Karolyn Smardz Frost, I've Got a Home in Glory Land: A Lost Tale of the Underground Railroad (2007)
- Christie Blatchford, Fifteen Days: Stories of Bravery, Friendship, Life and Death from Inside the New Canadian Army (2008)
- M. G. Vassanji, A Place Within: Rediscovering India (2009)
- Allan Casey, Lakeland: Journeys into the Soul of Canada (2010)
- Charles Foran, Mordecai: The Life and Times (2011)
- Ross King, Leonardo and the Last Supper (2012)
- Sandra Djwa, Journey with No Maps: A Life of P.K. Page (2013)
- Michael John Harris, The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection (2014)
- Mark L. Winston, Bee Time: Lessons from the Hive (2015)
- Bill Waiser, A World We Have Lost: Saskatchewan Before 1905 (2016)
- Graeme Wood, The Way of the Strangers: Encounters with the Islamic State (2017)
- Darrel J. McLeod, Mamaskatch: A Cree Coming of Age' (2018)
- Don Gillmor, To the River: Losing My Brother (2019)
- Madhur Anand, This Red Line Goes Straight to Your Heart (2020)
- Sadiqa de Meijer, alfabet/alphabet: a memoir of a first language (2021)
- Eli Baxter, Aki-wayn-zih: A Person as Worthy as the Earth (2022)
- Kyo Maclear, Unearthing (2023)