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Elaine Maud Clark was a writer born November 14, 1889 in Bath, England, daughter of Frederick Charles and Annie Matilda (Whittington) Clark. Educated in private schools in Guildford, Surrey, Elaine married Sydney Charles William Catley in December 29, 1915. After he served in the Imperial Forces for four years they settled in Calgary, Alberta, in 1920, where they raised four children.

Elaine began writing verse when just thirteen, and won three prizes from John O'London's Weekly. In Canada her poetry and journalism regularly appeared in the Calgary Herald and other papers. Active in the Canadian Authors Association and the Canadian Women's Press Club, she included Nellie McClung, Laura Goodman Salverson, W.T. Allison and John W. Garvin among her friends. Her six volumes of verse span a career of 58 years. Elaine died in Calgary July 29, 1984.

Lester Paige Breckenridge was an engineer and inventor born in Meriden, Connecticut, on May 17, 1858. He received a Ph.B degree at Yale’s Sheffield Scientific School in 1881. From 1882 to 1891, Breckenridge was a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Lehigh University. He later taught at the Michigan Agricultural College from 1891 to 1893. Until 1909, Breckenridge was a Professor and Director of Engineering for the Experimental Station at the University of Illinois. From September 1, 1909, and onward, he was a professor at Sheffield Scientific School. In 1904, Breckenridge was also the engineer in charge of the boiler division of the United State Geological Survey fuel testing plant in St. Louis, Missouri. He was also an inventor, having created an automatic recording machine in 1901, as well as contriving and equipping dynamometers to cars in 1897 to 1899. Breckenridge was a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and Western Society of Engineers. He also wrote many articles in technical journals, reports, and bulletins.

David Shannon Bowlby was born in Berlin (Kitchener) Ontario January 24, 1874. He attended the University of Toronto graduating with a B.A. in 1895, and an LL.B. in 1896. In 1893 he received his call to the Bar. He was appointed Crown Attorney for Waterloo County in 1917. Bowlby died October 11, 1938.

Frances Kathleen Montgomery was born in Woodstock, Ont., on Feb. 19, 1903, the daughter of Robert D. and Genevieve Montgomery. She received her early education in Woodstock and graduated from Woodstock Collegiate Institute in 1923, winning an entrance scholarship to the University of Western Ontario for French, German and History. During her undergraduate years there, from 1923 to 1927, she continued to excel in her studies, winning several awards and scholarships. She received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1927 and a Master of Arts degree, French and German, in 1928, after which she was awarded a provincial scholarship from the Ontario Dept. of Education for study in France. She studied for two years at the Sorbonne, and received a Doctorat de l'Université de Paris in 1930. Upon her return to Canada, she was hired to teach at the University of Western Ontario, where she remained until retirement in 1963. During those years she continued to study, in Spain, Mexico and again in France. She interrupted her teaching career to join the Canadian Women's Army Corps and served from 1942-1945, rising in rank from private to captain. In 1963 Frances Montgomery was hired by the University of Waterloo to start a Department of French. She was appointed as a full professor in 1963, and was the first Chair of the Dept. of French. She retired to Victoria, B.C. in 1968.
Frances Kathleen Montgomery's interests and activities were many and varied. She was an accomplished musician from an early age, playing both piano and violin. She played tennis and golf and for many years engaged in camping and climbing holidays. As well, she had a reputation as an excellent cook and a witty conversationalist. Many articles and poems written by her were published in newspapers over the years. Her interest in discrimination against female academics led her to submit a brief to the Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada in 1968. Frances Montgomery died on Aug. 22, 1989 at the age of 85.

Arthur Lang emigrated from Scotland to Canada in 1820 to settle in Ramsay Township in what is now Lanark County, Ontario.

The Canadian Women's Press Club was founded in 1904 by a group of Canadian woman reporters returning from a complimentary trip to the St. Louis Exposition. The club was suggested by George Henry Ham, the CPR's publicity director, and the first president was Kathleen Blake "Kit" Coleman. The Toronto Branch was founded in 1909, one of 15 regional branches organized over the years. Established as a "craft club" to help and promote its members in the profession of journalism, the Club remained active until the 1990's, counting as members most Canadian women journalists of note. In 1971 the Canadian Women's Press Club became the Media Club of Canada, and the Toronto Branch of the Club became the Media Club of Canada, Toronto Branch. In 1976 the Toronto Branch became an autonomous group under the name Toronto Women's Press Club, later changed to the Women's Press Club of Toronto. The Toronto Branch ceased in 199? and the Media Club of Canada suspended operations in 199?

By the 1980's the Women's Press Club of Toronto had launched a history project and put Kay Rex, a long-time member, in charge of collecting materials and writing a history of the Canadian Women's Press Club to 1971. Her book No Daughter of Mine: The Women and History of the Canadian Women's Press Club, 1904-1971 was published in 1995 by the University of Toronto Press.

The daughter of academic parents, Nancy-Lou Patterson was born in 1929 in Worcester, Mass. She received her BA in Fine Arts from the University of Washington in 1951, afterwards working for two years as a scientific illustrator at the University of Kansas and at the Smithsonian and then for nine years as a lecturer at Seattle University.

In 1962 she moved to the Waterloo Region with her husband, Dr. E Palmer Patterson, who was to teach at the University of Waterloo. In addition to her position as Director of Art and Curator of the University's art gallery, in 1966 Professor Patterson taught the University of Waterloo's first Fine Arts course, and in 1968 she founded the Department of Fine Arts, twice serving as Department Chair.

As a scholar Nancy-Lou Patterson is well known for her writings in the area of mythopoeic art and literature, with particular focus on the works of C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, George MacDonald, Charles Williams and Dorothy L. Sayers. She has written extensively on the traditional arts of Swiss German and Dutch-German Mennonites of Waterloo County, and also on the art of Native Canadians. Her work includes both book and exhibition reviews, and exhibition catalogues. She has published both poetry and fiction, including her three novels Apple Staff and Silver Crown (1985), The Painted Hallway (1992), and Barricade Summer (1996). Nancy-Lou Patterson's artistic career began in 1953 when she created a mural for an Anglican Church in Kansas, and includes a series of stained glass windows designed in 1964 for Conrad Grebel Chapel at the University of Waterloo. Her liturgical commissions have involved work in textiles, stained glass, wood, metal, terra cotta, and calligraphy.

In 1993 Nancy-Lou Patterson was named "Distinguished Professor Emerita" by the University of Waterloo, and in the same year received an honorary doctor of letters degree from Wilfrid Laurier University in recognition of "a life dedicated to expression."

Patterson died in Kitchener on October 15, 2018.

he Kitchener-Waterloo Record began with the publication of the Daily News of Berlin on February 9, 1878 and was the first daily paper in the area. It was published by Peter Moyer. Over the years it had several names and publishers: in January of 1897 it was purchased by the German Printing and Publishing Company and was amalgamated with that company's Berlin Daily Record to become the Berlin News Record, and later still the News Record, all published by William (Ben) V. Uttley. In 1918 the publishers of the German-language paper the Berliner Journal, William D. Euler (later Senator for North Waterloo) and William J. Motz, purchased the News Record and changed the name to the Kitchener Daily Record. On July 17, 1922 the Record absorbed the other daily, the Daily Telegraph. With that event, the original three daily papers (the News Record, the Berlin Daily Record, and the Daily Telegraph) became one.

The Berliner Journal began in December 29, 1859 by Frederick Rittinger and John Motz, and was located on Queen Street south, Kitchener. Motz remained editor until his death in 1899, at which time his son William acquired his father's interest. When Rittinger died in 1915 his share was acquired by William D. Euler. The weekly Journal ended on May 10, 1924. The Record’s first staff photographer was Harry Huehnergard, who worked for the paper for 49 years before retiring in 1986 as Manager of the Photographic Department.

In 1948 the Kitchener Daily Record was re-named the Kitchener-Waterloo Record, which name it retained until 1994, when it became simply The Record. In 1928 the paper moved from its home at 49 King Street west to a new building at 30 Queen Street north where it was to stay for 44 years until moving in May 1973 to 225 Fairway Road. When William J. Motz died in 1946 his son John E. Motz took over as publisher. The by-then Senator Euler sold his interest to Southam Press in 1953. John E. Motz died in 1975 and the Motz Family continued to own a controlling interest in the paper until 1990, when it was sold to Southam. In 1998, The Record was sold to Sun Media Corporation, and then in March 1999, to Torstar Corporation. In January 2005, the paper moved its offices to Market Square on King Street east in Kitchener's downtown core, and on March 11, 2008, the name was changed to the Waterloo Region Record.

The Schantz Family in North America is large and widespread; alternative spellings of the last name includes variations such as Tschantz, Shantz, Shonts, and Schanz.
The family descended from Jacob Schanz (June 12, 1710-February 5, 1781) who emigrated to the United States of America in 1737 and settled in Pennsylvania. In 1810 Jacob’s son Christian Shantz (July 11, 1769-April 7, 1857) came to Waterloo County and settled at Freeport on the Grand River.

Christian’s son Benjamin Shantz (September 2, 1811-November 9, 1868) was an early Waterloo County inhabitant and one of the founders of Port Elgin, Ontario where he settled in 1854 and established a grist and flour mill. Benjamin married Lydia Kolb (May 13, 1814-November 9, 1862) on April 10, 1842 and together they had ten children; Josiah K. Schantz (December 5, 1834-August 3, 1913), Catharine Schantz (May 17, 1836-February 28, 1917), Hannah Schantz (April 1, 1838-August 20, 1841), Christian Schantz (January 20, 1840-?), Tobias Schantz (April 10, 1842-April 16, 1925), Abraham K. Schantz (September 20, 1844-?), Benjamin K. Schantz (December 5, 1846), Menno K. Schantz (January 31, 1849-July 6, 1888), Lydia K. Schantz (August 17, 1851-July 16, 1900), Sarah K. Schantz (April 1, 1854-April 10, 1878), and Enoch K. Schantz (October 7, 1856-May 25, 1888).

When Lydia died in 1862, Benjamin remarried his housekeeper, Margaret Swinton. Benjamin and Margaret left Port Elgin, Ontario and settled in Dallas County, Missouri. Correspondence in the collection between Benjamin and his son Tobias recount Benjamin’s settler experiences in Dallas County, Missouri.
The Schantz Russell Family Papers centre around Tobias Schantz, his wife Mary Schantz and their descendants, drawing together primary sources relating to several early pioneering families of Waterloo County, primarily the Schantz, Moyer/Meyer and Bowman families, and material relating to descendants of the Moyer pioneers of Lincoln County, Ontario.

Rienzi Crusz was a poet and retired librarian living in Waterloo, ON. Born in Galle, Sri Lanka, Crusz was educated at the University of Ceylon (B.A. Hons.) and was employed as Chief Research Librarian for the Central Bank of Ceylon. After emigrating to Canada in 1965, he attended the University of Toronto (B.L.S.) and the University of Waterloo (M.A.). He worked at the University of Toronto Library and in 1969 was appointed as a reference and collections development librarian at the University of Waterloo, a position he held until his retirement in 1993.
His creative work first began to appear in periodicals and newspapers in 1968, and in 1974, his first collection of poems was published under the title Flesh and thorn. Since then, numerous other collections have been published. Crusz was an active voice among Canadian immigrant poets, and his work depicts the contrasts between South Asian and Canadian life. In 1994, he won the literature award in the Kitchener-Waterloo Arts Awards. He died in Waterloo in 2017.

Thomas Lacey, a voice and trance medium, was born in Glossop, Derbyshire, England on November 4, 1895. Lacey immigrated to Canada in March, 1923. Lacey began conducting séances in Hamilton and the Kitchener-Waterloo region in 1931 and continued throughout the 1960's. He rose to prominence in 1932 when he was noticed as a medium at Lily Dale in New York. A trumpet medium, Lacey would use the spirit of his brother Walter, who died at a young age, as a spirit guide and those at his séances experienced materializations and automatic writing. Thomas Lacey died on June 17, 1966 at age 70.

George Elmore Reaman was an author, educator, lecturer and columnist. Born at Concord Ontario on July 22, 1889, he received his later education at the University of Toronto (B.A. 1911; M.A. 1913), McMaster University (M.A. 1916), Queen's University (B. Paed. 1917), and Cornell University (Phd. 1920). Employment included teaching at Moose Jaw College (1913 14), Woodstock College (1915), Educational Director of the Y.M.C.A., Toronto from 1920 to 1924, editor at the Macmillan Co. of Canada, Superintendent of the Boys Training School at Bowmanville from 1925 to 1932, principal of Glen Lawrence School, Toronto from 1932 to 1939, Head of the English Department, Ontario Agricultural College from 1939 to 1954 and Director of Adult Education at the University of Waterloo from 1957 to his retirement in 1967. In 1967 he was awarded a Centennial medal; in 1969 he received an honourary doctorate from the University of Waterloo.
G.E. Reaman was active in a number of organizations and held office in most of them: first Canadian president of the International Association for Exceptional Children, also first Canadian President of the International Platform Association. He was founder of several historical organizations, among them the Pennsylvania German Folklore Society, the Ontario Ontario Genealogical Society and of the Huguenot Society of Ontario. He also published more than twenty books, the first of which was English for New Canadians, first published in 1919 and re-published over a period of 30 years. His historical publications include Trail of the Black Walnut (1956); Trail of the Huguenots (1963); Trail of the Iroquois Indians and History of Agriculture in Ontario, 1969.
G.E. Reaman married Flora Josephine Green in 1914 and had one daughter, Elaine. He died December 7, 1969.

Children's author and librarian Barbara Classen Smucker was born September 1, 1915 in Newton, Kansas. Barbara began writing in elementary school and would later go on to earn a degree in journalism from Kansas State University in 1936. After university she taught English and eventually returned to her hometown in 1939 to work as a reporter for the Evening Kansas Republican until 1941. In 1939 Barbara married Donovan Smucker who she had interviewed for the paper. Donovan was a Mennonite Minister and the couple moved to Wadsworth, Ohio where he pastored a church. Donovan later took a job at the Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Chicago where Barbara got the idea for her first book, Henry's Red Sea. From 1967-1969 the couple lived in West Point, Mississippi where Donovan was president of Mary Holmes College. In 1969 they moved to Ontario when Donovan accepted an offer to teach at Conrad Grebel College.

Barbara became a children's librarian at Kitchener Public Library (1969-1977) and then head librarian of Renison College (1977-1982). During this time Barbara continued to write, producing some of her most famous works including Underground to Canada (1977) and Days of Terror (1979). In 1993 the couple moved to Bluffton, Ohio where she would continue to write and speak to children about reading. In all, Barbara wrote 12 books which were published in 16 countries and translated into such languages as Japanese, Danish, Swedish, French and German. She and her books received numerous awards including the Canadian Council Children's Literature Prize and an honorary doctorate from the University of Waterloo. Barbara Smucker died in Bluffton in 2003.

Jenny O'Hara Pincock, Canadian spiritualist, author and musician, was born in Madoc, Hastings County, Ontario in 1890, where her great-grandfather had been a settler. She studied music at the Ontario Ladies' College in Whitby, Ont. (ca. 1908) and at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto (ca. 1912). On June 15, 1915 she married osteopath Robert Newton Pincock and moved with him to St. Catharines. Ont. where he maintained a practice. Newton Pincock died in 1928.

Jenny Pincock's sister Minnie O'Hara Maines, married Fred Maines in 1922. Fred Maines was educated at Victoria University, Toronto and was ordained to the ministry while serving with the YMCA overseas during the WWI. After the war he served as Boys' Work secretary for the Hamilton YMCA and as general secretary of the YMCA in Hamilton and Galt. He served during for five years with the YMCA War Services during WWII. He was minister of the Church of Divine Revelation in St. Catharine's, Ont. from 1930 to 1935. In 1935 he and Minnie moved to Kitchener, Ont. to pursue business interests. He died April 13, 1959.

In 1927, together with her sister Minnie and brother-in-law Rev. Fred J.T. Maines, Jenny Pincock began to organize seances with Mr. William Cartheuser, an American medium, in St. Catharines, Ontario. Notes were kept of these seances and much of that material appeared in published form in Pincock's Trails of Truth (Los Angeles: Austin Publishing Co., 1930). In 1930 they founded the Church of Divine Revelation in St. Catharines, Ont., with Fred Maines as ordained minister. In 1932 the Radiant Healing Centre was established. In 1935 Jenny Pincock ceased connection with William Cartheuser and with the Church of Divine Revelation. In 1937 she moved to Kitchener, Ont and in 1942 she purchased and moved to property formerly owned by her grandfather near Madoc. She died in 1948 or 1949.

A book of verse by Jenny Pincock entitled Hidden Springs was published posthumously (Privately printed, 1950) with an introduction by E.J. Pratt.

The Pincock/O'Hara/Maines circle of friends was wide, and included E.J. Pratt and his wife, Viola Whitney Pratt; B.F. Austin, the noted Canadian spiritualist; the widow of Sir Charles G.D. Roberts; Phoebe Watson; William Arthur Deacon; W.W.E. Ross; Mildred Ghent, wife of Toronto Telegram writer, Percy Ghent, and many others interested in spiritualism in Canada and elsewhere.

John Herbert was a Canadian playwright and theatre director. Born and raised in Toronto, Herbert attended Dora Mavor Moore's New Play Society and the National Ballet School of Canada. In 1960 Herbert founded the Garret Theatre with his sister Nana Brundage, and in 1964 wrote his most famous work, Fortune and Men's Eyes, which was in part inspired by his arrest for dressing as a woman and subsequent time spent in a youth reformatory. It was first staged in 1967 in New York and remained his most popular play. Herbert died in 2001.

Padraig O Broin was born in Clontarf, Ireland in 1908. He emigrated with his family to Toronto, Ontario as a child. O Broin was the founding editor of Teangadoir. As a writer and poet he published numerous works including the collections Than any Star (1962) and No Casual Trespass (1967). He was also the editor and publisher of the Gaelic literary magazine Teangadoir worked contributed "Feargus Rua Cecinit" to a historical anthology of Gaelic lyrics.

The Parents' Information Bureau (PIB) was a clinic for family planning and birth control set up by A.R. Kaufman of the Kaufman Rubber Company in the 1930's in Kitchener, Ont. Kaufman became interested in birth control during the Great Depression after determining that seasonal employees with large families were disproportionately impacted by layoffs. He began offering family planning services to his employees, eventually extending them to anyone in Canada with the founding of the PIB. At its peak, the organization employed approximately 50 people in locations across the country who provided services to families in their homes, rather than at clinics. The model allowed families to order supplies by mail, receiving kits that included spermicides, condoms and information about purchasing additional items like diaphragms

Herbert Johnston was the son of John James Johnston and Margaret Beaty and was born at Meaford on April 21st, 1874. He attended the Public and High Schools at Meaford. From 1892 to 1893 he was postmaster, telegraph operator and general merchant in the village of Hollen (?), Ontario. He attended the County Model School at Owen Sound and received the third class certificate of qualification as a public school teacher on Dec. 14, 1895. For several years he taught in schools at Mountain Lake and North Keppel, before studying Civil Engineering at the University of Toronto, graduating from the School of Practical Science in 1903.

He served his apprenticeship with W. M. Davis, O.L.S. at Kitchener and was granted his certificate in February, 1905. Mr. Johnston joined Mr. Davis in partnership from 1904 to 1910, and was also Assistant City Engineer at Kitchener. He was City Engineer at Kitchener from 1910 to 1917. From 1917 on he worked in private practice as a consulting engineer and Ontario Land Surveyor. He was Engineer for Waterloo County, as well as for the towns of Hespeler, Preston, Elmira and New Hamburg, and for the Townships of Waterloo and Wilmot. He was appointed as a member of the Kitchener Road Commission and Kitchener Planning Board. He was an active member of King Street Baptist Church in Kitchener.

Mr. Johnston married Ellen Agnes Clarke, and their children were Ruch (sic) A. Trinier, Alethea M., and Herbert Paul. Herbert Johnston died in Kitchener on June 13th, 1961.

Bertram Rolland Davis was born Bristol in 1897. Financial and familial situations prevented him from attending University, and after high school he began to work for the cable company established by his father, where he would stay for forty years. When not working he spent his free time as an amateur scholar with an interest in the Romantics and their links to Bristol. In particular, his interests tended towards former Poet Laureate Robert Southey and boy poet Thomas Chatterton. He corresponded with many of the leading Romantic scholars and critics of the twentieth century including Raymond D. Havens, E.H.W. Meyerstein, Maurice H. Fitzgerald, and Earl Leslie Griggs, and others. Davis also played an active role in preserving the history of Bristol and its famous residents.
To support his research, Davis purchased as many documents relating to the Romantics as he could afford. He amassed a collection of forty-five manuscript groups comprised of original documents by Southey, Wordsworth, Coleridge, and their contemporaries as well as an extensive library relating to his academic interests. His library is known as the Bertram R. Davis “Robert Southey” collection.
After Davis’ death, his personal library, manuscript groups, correspondence, and research files were by the University of Waterloo.

Milton Acorn was a Canadian poet born on March 30, 1923 in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island. He mainly worked as a carpenter by trade, but also wrote poetry influenced by Marxist ideas as well as experiences from the working-class. Acorn published various collections of his writing and gained recognition from fellow poets for his nationalism and activism. Throughout his life, Acorn lived in various cities across Canada including Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver before moving back to Charlottetown, where he died on August 20, 1986.