James Thomas Milton Anderson made history on this date in 1929, taking office as Saskatchewan’s first Conservative Premier. He came to high office shortly after the province’s general election that year. While the Liberals had won more seats and exercised their right to meet the Legislature, they were soon defeated on a motion of non-confidence and Anderson and his team then took office.
Premier Anderson and his team would govern Saskatchewan for the next five years as the Great Depression battered the province. The Tories were then, not surprisingly, defeated in the 1934 campaign. Then had been dogged by accusations they had worked covertly with the KKK, which Anderson had denied.
The former Premier passed into history in 1946. He was 68.
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.