One of Canada’s most versatile politicians took office as BC’s Premier 125 years-ago today. Joseph Martin, a Liberal would serve less than a year in his province’s top political job. But he had already enjoyed a successful political career and more was on the way.
Martin had been elected to the Manitoba Legislature in 1883, and would also serve that province as a federal MP. Later, he moved to British Columbia and would, in turn, be sent to Victoria as a MLA. Martin would serve as BC’s Attorney General before forming his own government. And if all this experience wasn’t enough, he would later move to England and was elected a British Liberal MP, serving eight years at Westminster.
You can read more about this fascinating man at his entry in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography at this link: https://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/martin_joseph_15E.html
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.