"Ronnie Douglas is an Ojibway from the Chippewas of Rama First Nation, (located near the City of Orillia) and has been performing in clubs and on festival stages throughout Southern Ontario since the early 1990’s. A roots vocalist/guitarist in the blues tradition, he cites Howlin’ Wolf as a primary influence. Since forming the group in the mid nineties, notable festival performances include the Great Canadian Blues Festival, the Mariposa Folk Festival, the Southside Shuffle, and the Orillia Spring Blues Festival, in addition to appearances on the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN)." https://culturedays.ca/en/events/e4de90a4-3934-42f5-a2ec-6dd750f9f6ad
(from Wikipedia entry)
George John Romanes FRS (20 May 1848 - 23 May 1894) was a Canadian-born English evolutionary biologist and physiologist who laid the foundation of what he called comparative psychology, postulating a similarity of cognitive processes and mechanisms between humans and other animals.
He was the youngest of Charles Darwin's academic friends, and his views on evolution are historically important. He invented the term neo-Darwinism, which is still often used today to indicate an updated form of Darwinism. Romanes' early death was a loss to the cause of evolutionary biology in Britain. Within six years Mendel's work was rediscovered, and a whole new agenda opened up for debate. George Romanes was the last born in a line of three children in 1848, into a wealthy, well educated family. During his early life he aspired to involve himself with religion by becoming a clergyman. During Romanes's adolescent years he was influenced by extensive travel and intellectual environments. His parents soon moved from his birth place in Kingston Ontario to Cornwall Terrace in United Kingdom. This had set Romanes on the path to develop a fruitful and lasting relationship with Charles Darwin. During his youth, Romanes often traveled to and shortly resided in Germany and Italy, cultivating his fluency in both languages along the way. When Romanes decided to take up his study in science, abandoning his prior ambition to be a clergyman, he began his work on evolution. Romanes's friend, Charles Darwin, had a great influence on his studies and served as a mentor. Forging a relationship with Darwin was not difficult for Romanes with his inherited “sweetness of temper and calmness of manner” from his Father, reported in his book The Life and Letters of George John Romanes. Romanes's early education was inconsistent and was often in the public schools. Consequently, he was home schooled for half of his education. At this time he developed a love for pottery and music which he excelled at. However, his true passion resided elsewhere; he soon began his study of medicine and physiology at Cambridge University(1867-1873). Romanes was not fully educated and struggled to flourish. This did not hinder his university experience as a whole because he still remained heavily involved in extracurricular activities such as boating and debate club. Romanes was born in Kingston, Ontario, the third son of George Romanes, a Scottish Presbyterian minister. When he was two years old, his parents returned to England, and he spent the rest of his life in England. Like many English naturalists, he nearly studied divinity, but instead opted to study medicine and physiology at Cambridge University. Although he came from an educated home, his school education was erratic. He entered university half-educated and with little knowledge of the ways of the world. He graduated from Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge with the degree of BA in 1871, and is commemorated there by a stained glass window in the chapel.
It was at Cambridge that he came first to the attention of Charles Darwin: "How glad I am that you are so young!" said Darwin. The two remained friends for life. Guided by Michael Foster, Romanes continued to work on the physiology of invertebrates at University College London under William Sharpey and Burdon-Sanderson. In 1879, at 31, Romanes was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society on the basis of his work on the nervous systems of medusae. However, Romanes' tendency to support his claims by anecdotal evidence (rather than empirical tests) prompted Lloyd Morgan's warning known as Morgan's Canon:
"In no case is an animal activity to be interpreted in terms of higher psychological processes, if it can be fairly interpreted in terms of processes which stand lower in the scale of psychological evolution and development".
As a young man, Romanes was a Christian, and some, including his religious wife, later claimed that he regained some of that belief during his final illness. In fact, he became an agnostic due to the influence of Darwin. In a manuscript left unfinished at the end of his life he said that the theory of evolution had caused him to abandon religion.
Romanes founded a series of free public lectures - still running today - the Romanes Lectures. He was a friend of Thomas Henry Huxley, who gave the second Romanes lecture.
Towards the end of his life, he returned to Christianity. Romanes's and Darwin's relationship developed quickly and they became close friends. This relationship began when Romanes became Darwin's research assistant during the last eight years of Darwin’s life. The association Romanes had with Darwin was essential in Darwin's later works. Therefore, Darwin confided volumes of unpublished work which Romanes later used to publish papers. Like Darwin, Romanes's theories were met with skepticism and were not accepted initially. The majority of Romanes's work attempted to make a connection between animal consciousness and human consciousness. Some problems were encountered during his research that he addressed with the development of physiological selection. This was Romanes's answer to three questions raised about Darwin’s isolation theory. The questions were: species characteristics that have no evolutionary purpose, the wide spread fact of inter-specific sterility, and the need for varieties to escape the swamping effects of inter-crossing after permanent species are established. At the end of his career the majority of his work was directed towards the development of a relationship between intelligence and placement on an evolutionary tree. Romanes believed that the further along an organism was on an evolutionary standpoint, the more likely that organism would be to possess a higher level of functioning. Romanes was the last child born of three children from George Romanes and Isabella Gair Smith. The majority of his immediate and extended family were descendant from Scottish Highland tribes. His father, Reverend George Romanes, was a professor at Queens College in Kingston, Canada and taught Greek at the local university until the family moved back to England. Romanes and his wife Ethel Mary Duncan were wed on February 11th, 1879. Both Romanes' mother and father were involved in the Protestant and Anglican Church during his childhood. Romanes was baptized Anglican and was heavily involved with the Anglican teachings during his youth, despite the fact his parents were not heavily involved with any religion. Speculated by Elizabeth J. Barns in the paper The Early Career of George John Romanes, Darwin may have been viewed as a father figure to Romanes. Darwin did not agree with the teachings of the catholic church because of the fundamental teachings were not supported by his scientific findings at the time. This could explain Romanes' conversion to agnosticism. Surely this is not the only reason for Romanes altered belief, for Romanes had to poses some element of free thinking. When Romanes attended Gonville and Caius College Cambridge, Ontario, he entered into an essay contest on the topic of “Christian Prayer considered in relation to the belief that Almighty governs the world by general laws". Romanes didn't have much hope in winning, but much to his surprise he took first place in this contest and received the Burney prize. After winning the Burney prize, Romanes came to the conclusion that he could no longer be faithful to his Christianity religion due to his love and commitment for science. This is interesting due to the fact that when Romanes was growing up, his father was a Reverend. Therefore, Romanes went into great detail about religion and how all aspects of the mind need to be involved to be faithfully committed to religion in his book Thoughts on Religion. He believed that you had to have an extremely high level of will to be dedicated to God or Christ. Romanes tackled the subject of evolution frequently. For the most part he supported Darwinism and the role of natural selection. However, he perceived three problems with Darwinian evolution:
The difference between natural species and domesticated varieties in respect to fertility. [this problem was especially pertinent to Darwin, who used the analogy of change in domesticated animals so frequently]
Structures which serve to distinguish allied species are often without any known utilitarian significance. [taxonomists choose the most visible and least changeable features to identify a species, but there may be a host of other differences which though not useful to the taxonomist are significant in survival terms]
The swamping influence upon an incipient species-split of free inter-crossing. [Here we strike the problem which most perplexed Darwin, with his ideas of blending inheritance. It was solved by the rediscovery of Mendelian genetics, and later work showed that particulate inheritance could underlie continuous variation: see the evolutionary synthesis]
Romanes also made the acute point that Darwin had not actually shown how natural selection produced species, despite the title of his famous book (On the origin of species by means of natural selection). Natural selection could be the 'machine' for producing adaptation, but still in question was the mechanism for splitting species.
Romanes' own solution to this was called 'physiological selection'. His idea was that variation in reproductive ability, caused mainly by the prevention of inter-crossing with parental forms, was the primary driving force in the production of new species. The majority view then (and now) was that geographical separation is the primary force in species splitting (or allopatry) and secondarily was the increased sterility of crosses between incipient species.
For more information, see Wikipedia entry at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Romanes .
George James Rogers, public relations promoter, was born in Rock Terry, Cheshire, England in June 11, 1905. He emigrated to Canada as an adult prior to 1941 at which time he joined Canadian General Electric as a promotions man and editor of in-house publications. In 1949 he removed to New York and became assistant to the chairman, American Economic Foundation. He was very active in promoting the Foundation's educational programmes and films such as In our hands, Its your decision, Backfire, and Let's face it. In 1953 Rogers formed his own public relations firm in the Midwest, American Free Enterprise Productions and began to provide corporations and the general public with media shows, such as Our job security and The Milwaukee Baby, promoting the 'American way of life' (capitalism and representative government). In addition, he provided in-house publications, annual reports and training sessions for private clients. In 1962 he moved to Canada and formed the Canadian Economic Foundation before returning to New York in 1968. Both of Rogers' enterprises proposed to alleviate labour-management conflicts through a programme of economic education directed at workers and the general public. Their message was based on an attack of government spending and socialism in North America. The Canadian Economic Foundation sought to broaden out beyond the shop floor to have its material taught in community centres and public school systems. The Canadian Economic Foundation was a profit-taking organization which also relied substantially on donations from corporations to pursue its work.
Garnet Rogers is a Canadian country-folk singer-songwriter from Hamilton, Ontario.
Virginia Jeanne Rock, writer, advocate and educator, was born in Michigan in 1923. Rock received her bachelor's degree in English from the University of Michigan in 1944. After teaching for two years at a high school in Michigan, Rock returned to earn a master's degree in English, but changed her field to American Studies and began teaching university-level students. After receiving her degree, Rock accepted a full-time position at University of Louisville, where she taught English from 1948 to 1950. Requiring a doctoral degree to continue teaching, Rock studied English and American literature at Duke University for a year before deciding that University of Minnesota would be better suited for her doctoral research. Rock received an American Association of University Women scholarship for her studies at Minnesota, and started her doctoral degree in 1954. Rock was teaching an introductory American culture course when she first read the collection of essays titled, "I'll take my stand : the South and the Agrarian tradition," written by the Twelve Southerners in 1930. Having grown up on a farm, Rock connected with the Southern Agrarians on both a personal and academic level, choosing to write about all twelve for her doctoral dissertation, as no one had succeeded in writing about the entire group. Rock corresponded with Donald Davidson, a Southern Agrarian and "keeper" of the group's archives, and arranged to meet him in 1956 at the Fugitives' Reunion at Vanderbilt University. Davidson supplied Rock with materials he had collected that were not available elsewhere, providing the basis for Rock's primary research about the Southern Agrarians and their symposium. Rock corresponded with other Agrarians and traveled to Princeton, Yale, Harvard, Texas and Vanderbilt University to access letters, documents and other archival material. She studied the Agrarians' personal, family and regional histories, their ideas on social issues, and drew on their novels, essays, and literary and social criticisms, resulting in her dissertation, "The making and meaning of 'I'll take my stand' : a study in utopian conservatism, 1925-1939." At the time of its completion in 1961, Rock was teaching at Michigan State University but accepted an invitation to teach at Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland, for the following year as a Fulbright professor. She was invited to stay in Poland for another year, returning to Michigan State in 1964. She then moved to Toronto to teach at York University in 1965.
Rock helped found the Canadian Association for American Studies and planned its first conference in 1965. In 1969, she became the first woman to be appointed Master of Stong College, where she served until 1978. As both a professor and an advocate, Rock focused on the literature of the southern United States, but also introduced the work of female writers to a male-oriented curriculum, actively supported and promoted the Canadian Women's Studies Association, designed and instructed courses that helped define the Women's Studies program at York University and encouraged students to present their research in public -- some of the many factors that led to Rock receiving the Constance E. Hamilton Award from Toronto City Council in 2006.
Rock is the author of "The Twelve Southerners : biographical essays" in "I'll take my stand" (1962), "The fugitive-Agrarians in response to social change" (1967), "Agrarianism" in "A bibliographical guide to the study of southern literature" (1969), "They took their stand: the emergence of the Southern Agrarians" (1976), and other articles related to her research and work that took her across North America and Europe.
Rock died in Toronto on 17 November 2015 at the age of 92.
Robert O'Dell Roche (1915-1988), politician and salesman, was an Alderman for North York, Ward 8 (1970-1976), and a campaign manager, fundraiser and administrator for the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario. He served as vice-president of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario (1964-1968) and was a campaigner and fundraiser for several Ontario provincial politicians including Dalton Bales and Bette Stephenson. In private business, Roche was a representative for Zippo lighters.
(from Wikipedia entry)
Louis Robinson was a 19th Century English physician, paediatrician and author. An ardent evolutionist, he helped pioneer modern child medicine during the later Victorian era, writing prolifically in journals on the emerging science of paediatrics. Active in scientific debate, Robinson was critiqued in some parts of the press for his outspoken evolutionary views in the wider debate between scientific theories of human origin and the religious view. Born 8 August 1857 to a Quaker family in Saddlescombe near Brighton, Robinson was educated at Quaker schools in Ackworth and York. His younger sister was the English novelist Maude Robinson. He went on to study medicine in London (at St Bartholomew's Hospital) and Newcastle upon Tyne, before graduating top of his class in 1889. He was married the previous year to Edith Aline Craddock, with whom he went on to have four children. Drawing on his extensive research, Robinson's interest in evolution was expressed in a series of articles, which led to an appearance before the British Association at Edinburgh to present his paper "The Prehensile Power of Infants". A keen practitioner as well as theorist, Robinson was one of the first doctors of his era to conduct experiments with young babies, testing over sixty subjects immediately after birth on their power of grip. This echoed the approach of the pioneering German physician Adolph Kussmaul. Following a series of lectures at Oxford on vestigial reflexes, he was sought after to teach in both British and American universities, and increasingly noticed by prominent scientists like Huxley, Burdon-Sanderson and Flower. However, Robinson opted to focus on his work as a doctor in Streatham. Nonetheless, he continued his research, employing several assistants, and leading to his publication of a volume on evolution that focused on animal behaviour.
For more information, see Wikipedia entry at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Robinson .
Bill Morgan Robinson, pseudonym of William Robert Robinson (1917?-), was born in Toronto and married in 1943. Robinson was a dance band leader in the Toronto area from the mid-1940s through the mid-1950s, including a club called The Music Box. Born into a Mennonite family, Robinson's family objected to his using the family name for the band, thus he named it the Bill Morgan Band. From 1 July 1996 to 31 October 1999, Robinson operated a small publishing company called Melodic Releases with a view to record and sell a few of his compositions.
(from Wikipedia entry)
Elizabeth Robins (August 6, 1862 - May 8, 1952) was an actress, playwright, novelist, and suffragette. Elizabeth Robins, the first child of Charles Robins and Hannah Crow, was born in Louisville, Kentucky. After financial difficulties, her father left for Colorado, leaving the children in the care of Hannah. When Hannah was committed to an insane asylum, Elizabeth and the other children were sent to live with her grandmother in Zanesville, Ohio, where she was educated. It would be her grandmother who armed her with The Complete Works of William Shakespeare and her unconditional support on her endeavor to act in New York City. Her father was a follower of Robert Owen and held progressive political views. Though her father was an insurance broker, he traveled a lot during her childhood and in the summer of 1880, Robins accompanied him to mining camps and was able to attend theatre in New York and Washington along the way. Because of her intelligence, Elizabeth was one of her father's favorites. He wanted her to attend Vassar College and study medicine. At the age of fourteen, Robins saw her first professional play (Hamlet) which ignited her desire to pursue an acting career. From 1880-1888, she would have an acting career in America. After arriving in New York, Robins soon met James O'Neill, who helped her join Edwin Booth's theatre and by 1882, she was touring. She soon grew bored and irritated playing "wretched, small character parts" and in 1883 joined the Boston Museum stock company. It would be here that she met her future husband, George Parks, who was also a member of the company. In 1885 Robins married Parks. Although her husband struggled to get acting parts, she was soon in great demand and would be on tour throughout their marriage. Her refusal to leave the stage may have caused Parks to kill himself in 1888 by jumping off a bridge into the Charles River, stating in his suicide note, "I will not stand in your light any longer." Later that year, on September 3, 1888, Robins moved to London. "Her move to London represented a rebirth after personal tragedy in America." Except for extended visits to the U.S. to visit family, she remained in England for the rest of her life. At a social gathering during her first week in England, she met Oscar Wilde. Throughout her career, he would come see her act and give her critiques, such as in one of her roles in Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Real Little Lord Fauntleroy in 1889. Wilde’s comment was “you have definitely asserted your position as an actress of the first order. Your future on our stage is assured.”
Early in her time in London, she became enamoured of Ibsen's plays. In 1891 a London matinee revival of A Doll's House put Robins in contact with Marion Lea. Together they would form a joint management, making this the “first step toward the theatre that Robins had dreamed of… a theatre of independent management and artistic standards." Finding work in “ ‘women’s plays’ written by men like Ibsen,” Robins and Lea brought strong female characters to the stage. George Bernard Shaw noted “what is called the Woman Question has begun to agitate the stage." Together Elizabeth Robins and Marion Lea brought Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler to the stage, for the first time ever in England. A Doll’s House “marked an important step in the representation of women by dramatists” and Hedda marked an important step for Elizabeth Robins, becoming her defining role. “Sarah Bernhardt could not have done it better,” wrote William Archer in a publication of The World. From then on, Hedda became synonymous with Robins on the English stage. Robins and Lea would go on to produce a handful of Ibsen’s other ‘New Woman’ plays, before they split. “The experience of acting and producing Ibsen’s plays and the reactions to her work helped transform Elizabeth over time into a committed supporter of women’s rights." In 1898, she joined forces with her new lover, William Archer, to create the New Century Theatre and again, they produced non-profit Ibsen plays. She became known in Britain as "Ibsen's High Priestess."
In 1902 she was Lucrezia in Stephen Phillips's Paolo and Francesca at the St. James's Theatre, London. Ending her acting career at the age of forty, Robins had made her mark on the English stage as not only an actress but an actress-manageress. Robins realised her income from acting was not stable enough to carry her. While Robins was busy being a successful actress, she had to leave England to look for her brother in Alaska, who had gone missing. Her experiences searching for her brother led her to write her novels, Magnetic North (written in 1904) and Come and Find Me (1908). Before this, she had written novels such as George Mandeville’s Husband (1894), The New Moon (1895), Below the Salt and Other Stories (1896) and several others under the name of C. E. Raimond. She explained her use of a pseudonym as a means of keeping her acting and writing careers separate but gave it up when the media reported that Robins and Raimond were the same. She enjoyed a long career as a fiction and nonfiction writer.
In her biography of Elizabeth Robins, Staging a Life, Angela John says, “It is possible to trace in Elizabeth’s writing from 1890s onwards an emerging feminist critique, clearly, but only partly, influenced by the psychological realism of Ibsen, which would find most confident expression in 1907 in her justly celebrated novel The Convert”. Robins’ main character, Vida, speaks to “male politicians and social acquaintances”, something very different from what the women of Robins’ time did - something very reminiscent of one of Ibsen’s ‘new women.’ Adapted from this novel is, Elizabeth Robins’ most famous play, Votes for Women! The first play to bring the “street politics of women’s suffrage to the stage”, Votes for Women! led to a flourish of suffrage drama. Elizabeth Robins first attended “open-air meetings of the suffrage union” when the Women’s Social and Political Union moved its headquarters from Manchester to London in 1906. It was then that she “abandoned” the current play she was writing and worked to complete the very first suffrage drama. “The more Robins became immersed in the work, the more she became converted to the cause”. She became a member of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies, as well as the Women's Social and Political Union, although she broke with the WSPU over its increasing use of violent militancy. She remained a strong advocate of women's rights, however, and used her gifts as a public speaker and writer on behalf of the cause. In 1907 her book The Convert was published. It was later turned into a play that became synonymous with the suffrage movement. Robins remained an active feminist throughout her life. In the 1920s she was a regular contributor to the feminist magazine, Time and Tide. She also continued to write books such as Ancilla's Share: An Indictment of Sex Antagonism, which explored the issues of sexual inequality. She collected and edited speeches, lectures, and articles dealing with the women’s movement, some of which had never previously appeared in print (Way Stations, published by Dodd, Mead and Company, New York, 1913).
Robins was involved in the campaign to allow women to enter the House of Lords. Her friend, Margaret Haig, was the daughter of Viscount Rhondda. He was a supporter of women's rights and in his will made arrangements for Margaret to inherit his title. This was considered radical, as women did not normally inherit peerage titles. When Rhondda died in 1918 the House of Lords refused to allow Margaret, now the Viscountess Rhondda, to take her seat. Robins wrote numerous articles on the subject, but the House of Lords refused to change its decision. It was not until 1958 that women were first admitted to the House.
Frederick Pethick-Lawrence, 1st Baron Pethick-Lawrence credited Robins with explaining to him the difference between a suffragette and a suffragist. A beautiful woman, Robins was pursued by many men. She admitted to a deep attraction to her close friend, the highly respected literary critic and fellow Ibsen scholar, William Archer. As a married man Archer was unavailable, however. Except for her brief marriage to George Parks, she remained a fiercely independent single woman. Highly intelligent, she was welcomed into the cream of London's literary and artistic circles, enjoying friendships with George Bernard Shaw, Oscar Wilde, and Henry James, as well as a tempestuous romantic (but probably non-physical) relationship with the much younger future poet laureate John Masefield.
In 1900 she travelled alone to the gold rush camps of Alaska in search of her favorite brother Raymond Robins whom she feared was lost in the Yukon. After a long and arduous journey, she located Raymond in Nome. She shared his life in wild and lawless Alaska throughout the summer of 1900. Her adventures were not without cost - the typhoid fever she contracted at that time compromised her health for the rest of her life. Robins's tales about Alaska provided material for a number of articles she sent on to London for publication. Her best selling book, The Magnetic North, is an account of her experiences, as is The Alaska-Klondike Diary of Elizabeth Robins.
Although she rejected her father's plans for her to be educated as a doctor, she retained a strong interest in medicine. In 1909 she met Octavia Wilberforce, a young woman whose fervent desire to study medicine was thwarted by a family that felt intellectualism and professional careers were 'unsexing' for women. When Wilberforce's father not only refused to pay for her studies, but disinherited her for pursuing them, Robins and other friends provided financial and moral support until she became a physician. While some have conjectured that Robins and Wilberforce were romantically involved, such insinuation has never been supported by the considerable scholarly material available about both women, nor is it born out in their own copious written material. All evidence points to Robins and Wilberforce enjoying a relationship much like that of mother and daughter. In her declining years she developed a friendship with Virginia and Leonard Woolf. Dr Wilberforce, the great-granddaughter of William Wilberforce, the British emancipator of slaves, looked after Robins until her death in 1952, just months shy of her 90th birthday.
For more information, see Wikipedia entry at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Robins .
“Louis-Philippe is a young Franco-Ontarian singer-songwriter who launched his first solo album in January 2010. [...] In January 2009, at the Contact Ontarois event in Toronto, he was given the Ontario Folk Festivals Council award for his performance in his musical showcase entitled “Festives inquiétudes”. In April 2010, he participated in the “Francouvertes” and earned a place in the semifinals. During the same period, he also participated in the “Festival vue” on the next generation and he launched his very first video”Réflexions d’un bon citoyen”. In May 2010, he travelled again to the south of France where he gave a series of street shows and where he made inspiring encounters. Back home in June 2010, he was part of Montreal’s Francofolies program and the Franco-Ontarian Festival in Ottawa.” https://francophonie-en-fete.com/en/speaker/louis-philippe-robillard-2/
Ray Robertson, author, was born and raised in Chatham, Ontario. He graduated from the University of Toronto (B.A. Hon., Philosophy) and Southwest Texas State University (Master of Fine Arts, Creative Writing), and has taught creative writing and literature at the University of Toronto and York University. He wrote the novels "Home movies" (1997), "Heroes" (2000, republished in 2015), "Gently down the stream" (2005), "Moody food" (2006 in the United States, 2010 in Canada), "What happened later" (2007, translated into French in 2012), "David" (2009), and "I was there the night he died" (2014). His non-fiction includes "Mental hygiene : essays on writers and writing" (2003), "Why not? Fifteen reasons to live (2011, translated into German in 2012), and "Lives of the poets (with guitars)" (2016), as well as book reviews for "The Globe and mail."
(from Wikipedia entry)
George Croom Robertson (10 March 1842 - 20 September 1892) was a Scottish philosopher.
He was born in Aberdeen. In 1857 he gained a bursary at Marischal College, and graduated MA in 1861, with the highest honours in classics and philosophy. In the same year he won a Fergusson scholarship of £100 a year for two years, which enabled him to pursue his studies outside Scotland. He went first to University College, London; at the University of Heidelberg he worked on his German; at the Humboldt University in Berlin he studied psychology, metaphysics and also physiology under Emil du Bois-Reymond, and heard lectures on Hegel, Kant and the history of philosophy, ancient and modern. After two months at the University of Göttingen, he went to Paris in June 1863. In the same year he returned to Aberdeen and helped Alexander Bain with the revision of some of his books.
In 1864 he was appointed to help William Duguid Geddes with his Greek classes, but he devoted his vacations to working on philosophy. In 1866 he was appointed professor of philosophy of mind and logic at University College, London. He remained there until he was forced by ill-health to resign a few months before his death, lecturing on logic, deductive and inductive, systematic psychology and ethics.
He left little published work. A comprehensive work on Hobbes was never completed, though part of the materials were used for an article in the Encyclopædia Britannica, and another portion was published as one of Blackwood's "Philosophical Classics." Together with Bain, he edited George Grote's Aristotle, and was the editor of Mind from its foundation in 1876 till 1891. Robertson had a keen interest in German philosophy, and took every opportunity to make German works on English writers known in the United Kingdom. In philosophy he was principally a follower of Bain and John Stuart Mill. He and his wife (a daughter of Mr Justice Crompton) were involved in many kinds of social work; he sat on the Committee of the National Society for Women's Suffrage, and was actively associated with its president, John Stuart Mill. He also supported the admission of women students to University College.
For more information, see Wikipedia entry at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Croom_Robertson .
Mary Roberts was an English author, who predominantly wrote about natural history and the countryside around her.
John Ritter is a Canadian songwriter and performer.
(from Wikipedia entry)
David George Ritchie (1853 - 1903) was a Scottish philosopher who had a distinguished university career at Edinburgh, and Balliol College, Oxford, and after being fellow of Jesus College and a tutor at Balliol College was elected professor of logic and metaphysics at St Andrews. He was also the third president of the Aristotelian Society in 1898. Ritchie was born at Jedburgh on 26 October 1853. He was the only son of the three children of George Ritchie, D.D., minister of the parish and a man of scholarship and culture, who was elected to the office of moderator of the general assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1870. His mother was Elizabeth Bradfute Dudgeon. The family was connected with the Carlyles, and early in 1889 Ritchie edited a volume of Early Letters of Jane Welsh Carlyle.
Ritchie received his early schooling at Jedburgh Academy. Not allowed to make friends with other boys of his own age, he never learned to play games, and lived a solitary life, concentrating his mind rather too early on purely intellectual subjects. He marticulated in 1869 at Edinburgh University, where he made a special study of classics under Professors William Young Sellar and J. S. Blackie, while he began to study philosophy under Professor Campbell Fraser, in whose class and in that of Professor Henry Calderwood (on moral philosophy) he gained the highest prizes. After graduating M.A. at Edinburgh in 1875 with first-class honors in classics, Ritchie gained a classical exhibition at Balliol College, Oxford, and won a first-class both in classical moderations (Michaelmas 1875) and in the final classical school (Trinity term, 1878). In 1878 he became a fellow of Jesus College, Oxford and in 1881 a tutor. From 1882 to 1186 he was also a tutor at Balliol College. At Oxford Ritchie came under the influence of Thomas Hill Green and Arnold Toynbee, and it was there that the foundations were laid both for his interest in idealistic philosophy associated with the name of Hegel, and also of his strong bent toward practical politics; his political philosophy was dominated by the belief that practical action must be derived from principles.
Ritchie married twice. His first marriage was in 1881 to Flora Lindsay, daughter of Col. A. A. Macdonell of Lochgarry, and sister of Professor A. A. Macdonell of Oxford. Flora died in 1888. He was married a second time in 1889 to Ellen Haycraft, sister of Professor John Berry Haycraft. He had a daughter by the first marriage and a son by the second.
In 1894 Ritchie left Oxford on being appointed professor of logic and metaphysics at the University of St. Andrews. At this time the university was in the midst of a turmoil of conflicting interests which involved litigation and much partisan feeling. In this conflict Ritchie supported the side of progress, which ultimately prevailed. He remained at St. Andrews until his death on 3 February 1903.
D. G. Ritchie was a founding member, and the third President (1898-1899), of the Aristotelian Society, an influential academic organization that is still very much in active existence. Both at Oxford and at St. Andrews, Ritchie wrote mostly on ethics and political philosophy. One of his earliest writings was an essay on The Rationality of History, contributed to Essays in Philosophical Criticism, written in 1883 by a number of young men influenced by Hegel and his interpreters. He was very much one of the generation of thinkers who were sometimes referred to as the Young Hegelians.
Of a simple and unaffected nature, Ritchie pursued the truth he set himself to seek with an entire devotion. Despite his retiring manner, he had many friends. He held strongly that questions of ethics and politics must be regarded from a metaphysical point of view. For him the foundation of ethics necessarily rested on the ideal end of social well-being, and keeping this end in view, he proceeded to trace its history at different times, the manner in which it shapes itself in the mind of each individual, and the way in which it can be developed and realized. Ritchie was an advanced liberal with socialist leanings. He considered that the ultimate value of religion depended on the ideal it set before mankind when it represented its highest form.
For more information, see Wikipedia entry at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_George_Ritchie .
Thomas Ring was a German artist, an expressionist painter and graphic designer, philosopher, parapsychologist (collaborator of H. Bender), cosmologist, professional astrologer and published astrological author.
Walter Alexander Riddell (1881-1963), diplomat and scholar, served as Canadian delegate to the International Labour Organization in Geneva (1920-1925) and as Canadian Advisory officer at the League of Nations (1925-1937). Subsequent to his League work, Riddell was counsellor to the Canadian Embassy in Washington (1937-1940), and completed his diplomatic work with a posting as high commissioner in New Zealand (1940-1946). Riddell later taught International Relations at the University of Toronto. Prior to his international service, Riddell had served as deputy minister of the Department of Labour in Ontario and had played a role in drafting the provincial Mother's Allowance Act and the Minimum Wage Act (1920). He was the author of several works on international affairs, including "World Security by Conference" (1947).
Author of "The philosophy of faith and the Fourth gospel", "Christian economics", and "An essay on personality as a philosophical principle ".
"Anthony (Tony) Richmond, professor emeritus at York University and one of the founders of York’s Department of Sociology. Richmond was born in Ilford, England. At the age of 18, he earned a scholarship to the London School of Economics (LSE), which he deferred until the end of the war. He joined the Friends Ambulance Unit in 1943 and served in hospitals and citizens’ advice bureaux in London, as ill health prevented him from serving abroad. After earning his BA at the LSE, Richmond began a master’s degree at Liverpool University, studying the city’s community of West Indian workers.
His first job was as a lecturer in social theory in the Department of Social Study at the University of Edinburgh, during which he published his first book, The Colour Problem (1955). The second edition of this book, published in 1961, included a new chapter on apartheid in South Africa, and brought him his first international recognition, stirring considerable controversy. His critical account had him and the book banned in South Africa until the country’s first free elections in 1994.
After a short spell at the Bristol College of Advanced Technology, he received his PhD from the University of London in 1965, and moved to Toronto with his wife, Freda, and young daughter, Catriona, and became a founding member of York’s Department of Sociology. Shortly afterward, he established the department’s graduate program and served as its first director. He also served as the director of York’s Institute of Behavioural Research (now the Institute of Social Research) from 1979 to 1983. In 1980, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. He was active in recruiting the next cohort of young sociologists to the department from Britain, the U.S. and Canada.
At York University, he pursued studies of immigration and immigration policy, ethno-cultural assimilation and the comparative study of immigrant and ethnic communities. He was the author of 10 books and 17 book-length monographs, over two dozen book chapters, more than 60 referred articles, and many other invited papers and commentaries.
Richmond served on many departmental and university committees, especially in York’s formative years, including a President’s Task Force on the Role & Development of Research and the Faculty of Arts Academic Planning & Policy Committee. He retired in 1989. The Blishen-Richmond Award, named for two of the Department of Sociology’s distinguished retirees, is presented annually to outstanding honours sociology graduates.
Richmond was a deeply committed public intellectual. His work on immigration and immigrant assimilation influenced the revisions of Canadian federal immigration policy in the 1960s and early 1970s. He had a lifelong commitment to research on racism, publishing pioneering studies, and placing racialization at the centre of his research on immigrant and refugee diasporas. His last book, Global Apartheid: Refugees, Racism and the New World Order(1994), returned to themes that ran throughout his work, arguing that late 20th century mass migrations and refugee movements were being met with a form of global apartheid as North America, Europe and Australasia instituted repressive policies to restrain the movements, largely treating them as threats to their territorial integrity and privileged lifestyles. He was a founding member of the York Centre for Refugee Studies in which he actively participated after his formal retirement, publishing several articles, including his last in 2008 in the journal Refuge."
Ivor Armstrong Richards was an influential British literary critic and rhetorician.
“Alejandra Ribera is a Canadian pop and jazz singer-songwriter, who performs material in English, French and Spanish. Of mixed Argentine and Scottish descent, Ribera was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, and has been professionally based in Montreal, Quebec. She released her debut album, Navigator/Navigateher, in 2009, and followed up with La Boca in 2014. NPR's Alt.Latino referred to La Boca and her voice as Alt.Latino's favorite of 2014. In 2014, Ribera's song "I Want" won the SOCAN Songwriting Prize, an annual competition that honours the best song written and released by 'emerging' songwriters over the past year, as voted by the public.“ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alejandra_Ribera
Rhombus Media Inc. was formed in 1978 at the York University Film Department, when Barbara Willis Sweete and Niv Fichman created, Opus One, Number One, a documentary short that established the company's musical direction. Larry Weinstein joined soon after, and the trio have since produced and directed numerous television programs, and they are known as one of Canada's leading independent producer of television programs on the performing arts. Rhombus Media has received nominations for many international awards and has won two International Emmys, for 'Le Dortoir' in 1991, and for 'Pictures on the Edge' in 1992, and several Canadian Genie Awards, including Best Motion Picture in 1993 for 'Thirty-Two Short Films about Glenn Gould' and for 'The Red Violin' in 1999. 'The Red VIolin' also garnered an Oscar for best musical score in 2000. Rhombus also produced the award-winning television series 'Slings & Arrows'. In recent years Rhombus projects have been internationally co-produced with many of the major European television networks.
Pauline Elizabeth Rhind, poet and publisher, founded the Kakabeka Press in Toronto in 1971 as a vehicle for publishing Canadian writers who could not find outlets for their work. The press appears to have ceased operations sometime late in the 1970s. Rhind was a free-lance journalist for many years prior to the establishment of Kakabeka, writing for the 'Hamilton spectator,' the 'Windsor star,' the 'Winnipeg free press,' and several community newspapers. As a poet she published several titles with Kakabeka, and was the author of 'Tell them about the real me,' concerning the life of Pauline Johnson.
“RéVeillons! is a wellknown quartet involving crowd with arrangements simmered in the authentic Quebec’s culture, a resolutely urban, assumed and scouring traditional music, with its rush hours and its traffic jam, its terrace and its barbecue. Music made in Quebec, traditionnal with a crude energy.” https://soundcloud.com/reveillons
"Reuben and the Dark are a Canadian indie folk band from Calgary, Alberta. Led by singer and songwriter Reuben Bullock, the band also currently includes Sam Harrison (guitar/keys/vocals) Brock Geiger (guitar/keys/vocals), Nathan da Silva (bass/vocals), and Brendan 'Dino' Soares (drums)." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reuben_and_the_Dark
During the late 1940s and early 1950s, small groups of retired women teachers began meeting in various parts of Ontario for fellowship, and to discuss issues of mutual concern. A group in Toronto known as the Rendezvous Club organized the inaugural meeting of the Ontario Association of Superannuated Women Teachers of Ontario in April 1956 for the purpose of persuading the provincial government to raise the level of pensions for retired women teachers to the same amount as that of male teachers. The organization grew steadily over the next 20 years, introduced a unique post-hospital insurance plan in 1963, and won the government's agreement to raise the pension rates for retired women teachers in 1967. The Provincial Office was established in Peterborough in 1971, when Cora Bailey was appointed the association's first Executive Secretary. Major changes were made to the constitution in 1999, when the name of the organization was changed to the Retired Women Teachers of Ontario. It continues to operate as a support system for the special interests and well being of over 5,700 retired women teachers. Meetings, excursions and other events organized by more than 50 branches throughout Ontario provide a forum for networking, socializing, and sharing information about health, hobbies and emerging issues such as telephone fraud. The branches also support numerous charitable causes such as food banks, women's shelters, the homeless, sick children, the Salvation Army and the Canadian Cancer Society, and provide support to members who are ill, home bound or have suffered a loss in their families. In addition, the RWTO commemorates the contributions of women teachers through published profiles, donations in memory of deceased teachers, and entries in a book of remembrance.
“Artist, Musician, Singer/Songwriter from the Haisla Nation in Kitamaat BC, is currently based in Toronto. Arthur plays slide on a DoBro, while hitting a stomp, plays harmonica and sings his own songs along with some obscure covers. Besides performing solo, Renwick performs with Sean Pinchin as a duo called LOS DoBROS, and with D'Arcy Good in a duo called COWBOY CRASHING. Renwick's influences include Tom Waits, Bob Dylan and Lucinda Williams. Arthur has performed at various Festivals (Mariposa Folk Festival, Eaglewood Folk Festival, Come Together Festival) as well as performed shows in France and Brazil.” https://soundcloud.com/arthur-renwick
The Rendezvous Club of Toronto, a social club for retired teachers, was formed in 1937. The goal of the organization was to provide a way for members to maintain friendships made during the teaching years through social activities. The group's constitution details the duties of the executive, including liaising with the Women Teachers' Association of Toronto, and maintaining and documenting the history of the organization.
Ernest Renan (February 28, 1823 - October 2, 1892) was a French philosopher, historian, and scholar of religion, a leader of the school of critical philosophy in France.
The Quakers, formally known as the Religious Society of Friends, was founded by George Fox (1624-1691) in 1647. The Friends rejected any form of organized structure to worship or any hierarchy of ministers and are renowned for their systematic and thorough record keeping. The Society of Friends was organized into a hierarchical system. The Preparative Meeting was the basic unit, where adherents met for worship. Representatives attended the Monthly Meetings, and representatives from the Monthly Meeting would attend a Quarterly Meeting four times a year.
Timothy Escott Heriott Reid is an executive, economist, management consultant, educator and public servant. He was born in 1936 and educated at the University of Toronto (B. A. Hons.), Yale University (M. A.), Oxford University (Rhodes Scholar, M. Litt.) and Harvard Business School (A. M. P.). After playing Halfback for the Hamilton Tigercat Football Team in 1962, Reid served as the Liberal M. P. P. for the riding of Scarborough East (1967-1971). In 1972 he accepted a posting with the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. Reid also served as assistant to the president and lecturer in economics, York University, 1963-1972. He was an unsuccessful candidate for the House of Commons in the 1965 general election. Following his service with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (1972-1974), Reid joined the Canadian civil service and held many positions dealing with economic matters. In 1989 Reid became the president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, and in 1998 he became President and CEO of ReMan Canada, Inc. He is the son of Escott Reid who served as the first principal of Glendon College, York University.
George E.A. Reid (b. 8 August 1921 in Edmonton, Alberta; d. 25 February 1977 in Toronto, Ontario) was a graphic designer, artist, illustrator and musician, born to parents Reverend Edward Reid and Bessie Ellis Reid. After his birth, the Reid family moved to the Anglican Parish of Verdun in 1922. Reverend Reid served as Incumbent of North Clarendon until 1926 in Charteris, Quebec. In 1927, Reverend Reid died of cancer, leaving his wife to care for their sons. George showed his aptitude for the fine arts at a young age through scrap-booking, drawing and sketching, and by playing and creating original musical compositions. George completed high school in 1940 while living in Shawville, Quebec. His ambitions at the end of high school were to follow a career in music and become a band leader. However, once war began, George moved to Ottawa, finding a job as a clerk with the government while trying to enlist in the Royal Canadian Air Force. After being rejected due to poor vision, Reid enrolled in signalman training in Montreal from June to October, 1942, going by train the following month to Fort Nelson, British Columbia. During the war, George served as a cameraman with the Royal Canadian Air Force, making 8mm films, painting and sketching extensively until his honourable discharge as Corporal. Across the Ottawa River, Olive Reid (née Wilson), born in 1923, was the daughter of lumberman Wilbert Wilson, whose father founded the Ottawa South Lumber Company. George and Olive were married later on 15 September 1945. After briefly living in Prince Edward Island and Ottawa, George and Olive moved to Toronto in January 1946. George began working for Veterans Affairs and enrolled to study commercial art at the Ontario College of Art (OCA) that September, while Olive worked as a registered nurse. In February 1947, the couple moved to Scarborough and George found a part-time job playing trumpet in a band. In the late summer, they moved to Scotia Avenue, where they raised their children, Peter and Dianne. George soon found temporary work at Rous and Mann, a job that led to a full time position offer that convinced him to discontinue his schooling at OCA. In the 1950s, the Reid family was involved in art and music; George and Olive participated in the culture of Toronto by attending ballets, the theatre, and concerts and their children studied piano. By 1959, George had left Rous and Mann to become the art director and, later, vice president at Commercial Studios under artist Bill Burns. After the birth of George and Olive's daughter Stephanie in 1960, George began painting again, even illustrating an animated cartoon film "Life with Cecil." In 1966, George accepted a position as art director at C. F. Haughton, working with more salesmen than artists. In 1973, his position was redirected to sales, causing George to resign and move to a position at Brigdens Limited. Between 1973 and 1977, George also worked freelance and completed about thirty magic realist paintings in acrylics, in what was the last phase of his artistic career. In June 1976, George was diagnosed with cancer. He passed away on 25 February 1977.
The Regent Park Film Festival is Toronto's longest running free-of-charge community film festival, dedicated to showcasing local and international independent works relevant to inner-city life. In 2003, Chandra Siddan, a filmmaker and student in the York University’s “Regent Park Community Education Program”, founded the RPFF as an alternative educational setting for an assignment with support from her instructor Jeff Kugler, principal of Nelson Mandela Park Public School, who offered his school as the venue for the event, and Prof. Harry Smaller who garnered broadly-based support from the University.
For seven years, the festival screened at the Nelson Mandela Park Public School before moving to the Lord Dufferin Public School for 2010 and 2011. On the tenth anniversary in 2012, the festival and its offices moved into the Daniels Spectrum cultural hub and started delivering year-round programming such as workshops and community screenings.
In 2007, a year after RPFF incorporated, Siddan stepped down as Festival Director and was replaced by Karin Haze until 2010, Richard Fung in 2011, Ananya Ohri from 2012 to 2018, and Tendisai Cromwell as of 2018.
In 2017, the RPFF embarked on a three-year home movie archive project titled “Home Made Visible” after receiving funding from the Canadian Council for the Arts New Chapter. The three-part nationwide project digitized home movies from the Indigenous and visible minority communities and donated a selection of clips for preservation, commissioned six artist films, and exhibited the artworks and selected home movie clips across Canada to encourage discussions around diverse histories and futures.
Winnipeg blues-rock musician
Henry Reeve (September 9, 1813 – October 21, 1895) was an English journalist, translator, and writer. He was also the editor of the Edinburgh Review from 1855 to 1895.
Graham Reed (1923-1989) educator and author, was born and educated in the United Kingdom, receiving his PhD from Manchester University in 1966. After a brief teaching career in England, he emigrated to Canada in 1969 and joined the Psychology Department at Atkinson College, York University as chairman. He later served as dean of Graduate Studies (1973-1981), chair of the Department of Psychology, Glendon College (1982-1988), and was made a University Professor in 1984. Reed was the author of several scholarly works in the field of psychology, including 'The psychology of anomalous experience,'(1972) and 'Obsessional experience and compulsive behaviour,' (1985). He was also author of the novel, 'Fisher's Creek,' (1963), and the posthumous 'Walks in Waziristan,'.
(rom Wikipedia entry)
Dr Cecil Reddie (10 October 1858 - 6 February 1932) was a reforming educationalist. He founded and was headmaster of the progressive Abbotsholme School
He was born in Colehill Lodge, Fulham, London, the sixth of ten children. His parents were James Reddie from Kinross, an Admiralty civil servant and Caroline Susannah Scott. He spent four years at Goldolphin School in London until his parents' deaths. He attended Birkenhead School (1871-1872) as a day-boy and he then was a boarder at Fettes College, Edinburgh (1872-1878). He studied medicine, physics, mathematics and chemistry at Edinburgh University (1878-1882) before obtaining his doctorate in chemistry at Göttingen University (1882-1884).
He had been unhappy at boarding school and was bored by the classical curriculum. While in Göttingen he was greatly impressed by the progressive educational theories being applied there. In 1883 he joined the radical Fellowship of the New Life in England and decided to establish a school for boys based on socialist principles. He agonised over his homosexuality and he sought emotional guidance. He was influenced by fellow teacher Clement Charles Cotterill, polymath Patrick Geddes, the romantic socialist poet, Edward Carpenter and John Ruskin. He rejected corporal punishment and substituted the principles of self-discipline and tutoring. Other influences came from German naturists and Walt Whitman who believed in 'the love of comrades' and in 'guiltless affection between men'.
He returned to Fettes to teach science and then moved to Clifton College in Bristol until 1888. His clash with the college over his ideas, particular on sex education caused him to leave after a breakdown in health. Reddie lived with Carpenter 1888-1889 who helped him found Abbotsholme School in Derbyshire in 1889 with the financial support of Robert Muirhead and William Cassels. The school opened with six students. He made the school his life's work. Apart from two years in the US on sick leave (1906-1907), he ran the school until he retired in 1927.
Abbotsholme was never specifically socialist; its curriculum emphasised progressive education. Not only was there intensive study and personal supervision, there was also a programme of physical exercise, manual labour, recreation and arts. Modern languages and sciences were taught. Religious instruction was non-sectarian and covered other religions and philosophies such as Confucianism He ran the first sex education course at a British school. Reddie believed that being close to nature was important and so the boys worked on the estate providing practical experience on raising animals and vegetables, haymaking, digging, wood-chopping and fencing. Pupils were given great freedom to walk in the country. Reddie devised a uniform of comfortable clothes (soft shirt, soft tie, Norfolk-type jacket and knickerbockers) at a time when boys at public schools wore stiff collars and top hats.
There were conflicts with the founders, until Reddie was in sole charge of the school. He bought the other founders out with borrowed money. Among the teachers was John Badley, who one of the first masters appointed. In 1893, after two and a half years Reddie's increasingly autocratic temperament - and the fact that Badley wanted to marry and Reddie said he could not - gave Badley the impetus to leave and start Bedales School. Badley said: "Reddie taught me everything I needed to do and what not to do". By 1900 the Abbotsholme had 60 pupils, many from Europe and the British Empire.
He often engaged foreign teachers, who learned its practices before returning home to start their own schools. Abbotsholme was particularly influential in Germany. Hermann Lietz a German educational progressive and theologian, taught at Abbotsholme and founded his five schools (Landerziehungsheime für Jungen) on Abbotsholme's curriculum: modern languages, science, sports and crafts, de-emphasising rote learning and classical languages. Other people he influenced were Kurt Hahn, Adolphe Ferrière and Edmond Demolins. His personality clashes with strong-minded teachers caused the standards to fall because he started employing 'yes-men', and the numbers dropped to 30 in 1906. He changed his ideals from romantic socialism to a more authoritarian policy. His pro-German attitudes were unpopular during the First World War. When he retired in 1927 the number of pupils had dwindled to two from its 1900 peak. He retired to Welwyn Garden City and he died in St Bartholomew's Hospital in February 1932.His successor, Colin Sharp, quickly recovered the situation, though Abbotshome became a more traditional college. Although his fame diminished in England, Cecil Reddie was one of the founders of progressive education throughout the world especially in Europe, Japan and the United States.
For more information, see Wikipedia entry at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_Reddie .