Rare Canadian honour rolls circa 1919

[John Gilinsky]

Does anyone have any information or copies of any parts(?) for the following Canadian publication, viz.:

"National Memorial Album of Canadian Heroes A Tribute and a Lasting Remembrance"

Military District No. 2, Part I [ Hamilton, Ontario at end presumably makes up Part II but this is not indicated in the volume ]

Toronto: Natioanl Progress Publishing Co. Small Folio 191 pages Decorative front card covers (blue with gold lettering/design)

This book is full of Toronto and Hamilton men's photos. Moreover opposite the individual pages of photos are many Canadian corporate and company honour rolls.

Were any OTHER parts/volumes/ bound volumes of this work ever produced?

Did this publishing company produce any other works?

What institutions own copies of this book ( I checked AMICUS, Library of Congress,British Library, CRL but NO one seems to own a copy! - Perhaps it was seen as too ephemeral(?)?

Thanks,

John

Toronto

[Jim Clay]

John

As far as its possibly ephemeral nature is concerned, from your description, and from my knowledge of the legal deposit rules applying to the British Library (British Museum Library, as it then was), if this had been a UK publication, the BM Library would I'm sure have expected to receive a copy. I don't know what rules might have applied to the Canadian equivalent of the BM Library/BL. If it was privately published and on a very small scale, it's quite possible that any 'legal deposit' rules in force may have been missed...

Jim

[John Gilinsky]

Thanks. Of course considering the vast scale of publishing we know that the farther back we go even when legal deposit generally did work that some publications never did make it "in." There are surprisingly NO copyright statements whatsoever on the book. Most of the individual photos appear to be from newspaper photos. The company honour rolls are great though and quite rare to see so many together! I think I remember seeing one reference somewhere to this company and perhaps even this book a few years back but that is all. The title page has a large drawing of a Canadian soldier firing his rifle from a trench.

[John Gilinsky]

Thinking about the absence of such a significant publication NOT having any copyright information on it: the book itself might have infringed copyright (say of the photographers' photos(?) and as such it might have been withdrawn soon after publication with most copies being destroyed(?)?

Possibly a neat idea for a short story here eh?

John

Toronto

[nhclark]

John, the only publication that I could find of a simialr nature was this (from Abebooks):

Canadians Our Heroes - 1950 1953 - korean War / Korean Veterans Association of Canada Unit 26 Hamilton, Ontario (ISBN: 0973573104 / 0-9735731-0-4)

Jones, Hoojung and Tom Somers / Korean Veterans Association of Canada Unit 26 Hamilton, Ontario

Prima facie there might be a remote connection? Possibly worth a telephone call?

Noel

[John Gilinsky]

Sorry but the date and timing as well as the nature preclude this. The book while invaluable can be further faulted (besides a lack of any copyright even being applied for?) since several namees are not fully given NOR are the units frequently. Thus soldiers looking for a loved one would have to go through alphabetically but then not even know if it was that SMITH (remember Oh! What A Lovely War?) they were looking at! While the book thus might have sold a few copies I strongly suspect it along with the company (that might have been threatened with copyright infringement lawsuits) went under (no that far down to Aussieland !).

Thanks though for looking.

John

The book though is still invaluable for localized comprehensive commemoration right after the war ended and for especially I think the company corporate honour rolls of many Canadian companies that no longer exist.

[Canadawwi]

The Montreal Star produced a souvenir newspaper (newspaper size on better quality paper) magazine in 1919 which was a combination advertising feature and company Honour Roll for employers across Canada. Most companies bought a full page ad promoting their services, and included a Roll of Honour of staff who served in the war. The newspaper then sold the magazine as a souvenir edition. It also include around dozen unit photos, but unfortunately they are not labelled with names.

I have scanned all these and have already put about half of them on the Canadian Virtual Memorial after researching each name listed. They include Bell Telephone, Birks, Bank of Hamilton, and various tobacco, grain, manufacturing, munitions, insurance, and other companies across Canada. Generally the ROHs included here listed all the men in the company who served in the war with a few marked as killed, wounded, etc.

As for the book referred to in the original post. I feel that books including photos are very rare, and that even though you might find faults with it in terms of editing and quality, it is better to have the photograph of a soldier than none at all. Many of the soldiers who fought in the war have no photo available that can be found. When I post the photos to the CVM I include a note explaining the errors in the biography that I have noticed, and I also sometimes include the statement that these older ROHs were prone to include errors, and that any researcher should double check the facts given against other sources. I would hope that anyone researching a soldier would realize that any newspaper article or other such information that they find may always contain errors. I would rather have the article posted to the CVM than keep it to myself as there are always bit of information and leads which would be of great interest to a family member.

I have the Ottawa publication "Our Heroes in the Great War" which is somewhat similar in concept. It was sold to the relatives of the men photographed in the book. It is full of typos and many obvious errors. I can compare this book to others in my collection such as University rolls of honours. These tended to have better editing and fewer errors. I was able to sort out a lot of the errors and get the photos to the Canadian Virtual Memorial, however, there are still an outstanding 30 photos of men who died in the war, that appear to include errors making it difficult to link them to a man on the CVM. I am slowly tracking down each man. These books relied upon following up with surviving relatives. There is frequently a note in the introduction of the ROHs that I have in my collection where the editor explains that he did not hear back from many families when working on the project. This could also explain how errors crept in.

[John Gilinsky]

Canadawwi: Thanks for your thoughtful repsonse. I also have the Ottawa book and essentially the idea for these commercial publications was to cash in for commemorative memorial souvenirs by and for the troops and their families in Canada for the hundreds of thousands of men and some women returning especially in 1919. I agree that some information that is accurate combined with inaccurate information is better than NO information!

John

Toronto

[Canadawwi]

John,

I have sent you an email regarding your questions.

I will also post the source data here as it may be useful to others who are researching:

The Standard / Canada's Aid to the Allies and Peace Memorial. Edited by Frederick Yorston. Published by the Montreal Standard Publishing Co., Ltd., Montreal. This large Souvenir Edition magazine included the Rolls of Honour for various prominent Canadian businesses.

This is a glossy oversize magazine the size of an open newspaper. It may be held in some special collections or archives, but I have not seen it anywhere else. The copy I have is falling apart and it is far too large for a scanner. I have photographed the pages. The pages peel away easily from the spine. This may have been on purpose so that the prints could be framed.

The centre spread has a two page photo of the 1st Contingent at Valcartier. There are also full size pages of portraits of the Royal Family, military leaders, politicians, etc., plus unit photos (unidentifed individually) plus group photos and double page spreads on all the training camps in Canada (Sarcee, Borden, Niagara, etc.)

A typical example of a full ROH page that I have posted is entered on this Corp. W. R. Vohman's (75 BN, M.M., killed Apr. 9, 1917) account. Photographs 2 and 3 at this page show the employer's ROH and a detail of Vohman's photo:--

http://www.vac-acc.gc.ca/remembers/sub.cfm...asualty=2955074

[John Gilinsky]

Thanks Marikka. I am sure others will appreciate this information.

John

Toronto

CANADA

[John Gilinsky]

News Flash!

ANOTHER (publicly accessible institutional) copy in better condition even is found!

The University of Toronto, Thomas Fisher Rare Books Library has a good condition copy of this book AND it is currently on display (until January 16/09) at the library in Toronto. Afterwards persons may during Monday to Friday standard business hours consult the book.

John

Toronto

[Ken S.]

The first thing that comes to mind when I see the publisher's name is "Progress Books," a Communist/Socialist publishing house from Toronto. Since there are "corporate" honour rolls, it would appear that the book is labour related, so it's possible there's a connection.