Liberal star John Turner was campaigning in British Columbia on this date in 1972 as that year’s federal election campaign continued. He was much in demand as a speaker and Liberal candidates eagerly requested his presence at their events that fall. He was introduced by Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau’s father-in-law, legendary St.-Laurent cabinet minister Jimmy Sinclair, at a Vancouver speech while on the trip. Sinclair, whose daughter Margaret had married Trudeau the year before, called Turner “the next Prime Minister of Canada,” in his introduction. For his part, Turner, who would become Prime Minister, 14 years-later, in 1984, said it was impossible to predict the future.
Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.