Vincent Massey

Charles Vincent Massey (February 20, 1887 – December 30, 1967) was a Canadian lawyer and diplomat who served as Governor General of Canada, the 18th since Canadian Confederation.

Massey was born into an influential Toronto family and was educated in Ontario and England, obtaining a degree in law and befriending future prime minister William Lyon Mackenzie King while studying at the University of Oxford. He was commissioned into the military in 1917 for the remainder of the First World War and, after a brief stint in the Canadian Cabinet, began his diplomatic career, serving in envoys to the United States and United Kingdom. Upon his return to Canada in 1946, Massey headed a royal commission on the arts between 1949 and 1951, which resulted in the Massey Report and subsequently the establishment of the National Library of Canada and the Canada Council of the Arts, amongst other grant-giving agencies. He was in 1952 appointed as governor general by King George VI, on the recommendation of Canadian Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent, to replace the Viscount Alexander of Tunis as viceroy, and he occupied the post until succeeded by Georges Vanier in 1959. Massey was the first Canadian-born individual to serve as Canada's governor general and he proved to be a successful transition for the office away from occupants who had consistently been both members of the peerage and born overseas.

On September 16, 1925, Massey was sworn into the Queen's Privy Council for Canada, giving him the accordant style of The Honourable. However, Massey was later, as a former Governor General of Canada, entitled to be styled for life with the superior form of The Right Honourable. He subsequently continued his philanthropic work and founded Massey College at the University of Toronto and the Massey Lectures before he died on December 30, 1967.

Early life, education, and career
Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, as the son of Anna (née Vincent) and Chester Daniel Massey, the owner of the Massey-Harris Co. (predecessor company to the Massey-Ferguson Tractor Company) and the patriarch of one of the city's wealthiest families. The clan was strongly Methodist and played an important role in supporting local religious, cultural, and educational organisations, including Victoria University, Massey Hall, and the Metropolitan Methodist Church (now the Metropolitan United Church). Massey was thus raised amongst Toronto's elite, which would give him a number of social and familial connections throughout his life, as occurred with his younger brother, Raymond Massey, and his children, Anna Massey and Daniel Massey.

Massey was raised in the family's mansion at 519 Jarvis Street and educated at St. Andrew's College, in Aurora, Ontario, before enrolling in University College at the University of Toronto (UofT), despite his family's close ties to Victoria College. There, he in 1907 enlisted in The Queen's Own Rifles of Canada and joined the Kappa Alpha Society, through which he met his long-time friend and future prime minister of Canada, William Lyon Mackenzie King. After passing matriculation three years later with his Bachelor of Arts degree in history and English, Massey then went on to continue his education at Balliol College at the University of Oxford, earning his Master of Arts in history.

Feeling since his time as an undergraduate at UofT that the institution lacked a facility where its 4,000 students could engage in extracurricular activities, in 1911 Massey donated $16,290 to augment the money students had already raised for building a student centre and thereafter led the endowment and construction efforts. In 1913, he returned to Toronto and became the first Dean of Men at the Victoria University residence his father had recently donated, Burwash Hall, as well as a lecturer on modern history at the college. Then, on June 4, 1915, Massey married Alice Parkin, the daughter of Sir George Robert Parkin, who was a former principal of Upper Canada College (UCC) and secretary of the Rhodes Trust; through the marriage, Massey later became the uncle of George Grant and the great-uncle to Michael Ignatieff. But, he was not with his new bride long before, at the end of 1914, the United Kingdom, and thus Canada along with it, had declared war on Germany. Massey was commissioned as an officer for Military District No. 2 and was called to work for the Cabinet war committee before being discharged at the cessation of hostilities in 1918.

Once again a civilian, Massey started in 1921 as president of his father's business, while simultaneously pursuing philanthropic interests, mostly in arts and education, such as his collecting paintings and sculpture through his Massey Foundation, which he established in 1918. By the next year, UofT's social and athletic facility was complete and dedicated in memory of Massey's grandfather, Hart Massey, as Hart House; there, while he headed Massey-Harris Co., Massey participated as an amateur actor and director in the building's theatre. But, in 1925 he resigned from the corporate life he was unsuited for and, as a friend of Mackenzie King, by then the Prime Minister of Canada, Massey was appointed on September 16, by Governor General the Viscount Byng of Vimy, to the King's Privy Council and was subsequently made a minister without portfolio in the Cabinet. It was desired that Massey, as a minister, hold a seat in the House of Commons, yet he failed to win his riding of Durham in the 1925 federal election, held on October 29. Though he thereafter resigned his cabinet post, Massey was still included in the Canadian delegation to the 1926 Imperial Conference, where was drafted the Balfour Declaration that would ultimately lead to vast constitutional changes in the role of the monarch and his viceroys throughout the former empire.

Diplomatic career


Later in 1926, on November 25, Governor General the Marquess of Willingdon acted on Mackenzie King's advice to appoint Massey as the first Canadian Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the United States for His Majesty's Government in Canada, making Massey Canada's first ever envoy with full diplomatic credentials to a foreign capital. Despite this first in international relations, Massey's time in Washington, D.C., was free of notable events and he returned to Canada in mid-1930, as Mackenzie King had put his name forward for appointment as high commissioner to the United Kingdom. But, merely five days after Massey relinquished his posting to Washington, Mackenzie King's Liberal Party was defeated in the federal election, seeing Richard Bennett appointed as prime minister. The new premier objected to Massey as the government's representative to the UK, on the grounds that, as a former Liberal Cabinet member, Massey did not enjoy the political confidence of the new Conservative government that was needed by the individual occupying the position.

Starting in 1932, Massey became the first president of the newly formed National Liberal Federation of Canada, before which the Liberal Party was a loose and informal association of national, provincial, and regional entities without a permanent central organization. Three years later, the Liberals were again returned to a majority in the commons and Mackenzie King was once more installed as prime minister. Within a month, on November 8, 1935, Massey was appointed as the High Commissioner to the United Kingdom for His Majesty's Government in Canada and arrived at Canada House to find as his secretary the man who would be his future successor as governor general of Canada, Georges Vanier. The two men set about regular diplomatic business, but, throughout 1936, Massey had to contend with the death of King George V and the accession and then—before the proposed Canadian postage stamps even arrived for Massey to pass on for the King's approval —abdication of Edward VIII in favour of his younger brother, Prince Albert, Duke of York.

Throughout his time as high commissioner, Massey used his connections to bring to Canada House a litany of personalities from "the highest quarters." Two such persons were the Viscount and Viscountess Astor, who were both the nucleus of the Cliveden set, which itself was a group of aristocratic individuals rumoured to be Germanophiles not only in favour of the appeasement of Adolf Hitler, but also supporters of friendly relations with Nazi Germany. Though these allegations were historically challenged as exaggerations, Irving Abella and Harold Troper claimed in their book None Is Too Many: Canada and the Jews of Europe 1933-1948 that Massey was an enthusiastic supporter of the Munich Agreement and worked in concert with various elected and non-elected people in government, including Mackenzie King and Ernest Lapointe, to put obstacles in the way of Jewish refugees fleeing Europe for Canada, or even using Canada as a stopover en route to some other country. However, Canadian immigration policy at the time favoured trained farmers, which excluded most Jews, who were largely city dwellers, and the Cabinet of Mackenzie King was already resistant to changes in the law. Seven decades later, these accusations against Massey resulted in a campaign in Windsor, Ontario, to rename a high school that had originally been named in his honour.

Nevertheless, Massey was a Canadian and British patriot and worked not only to maximize Canada's war effort once World War II broke out, but also concurrently served through 1936 as the Canadian delegate to the League of Nations, between 1941 and 1945 as a trustee of the National and Tate Galleries, and additionally as chair of the Tate's board of governors from 1943 to 1945. Though, Massey was honoured for all this work by being inducted in 1946 by King George VI into the Order of the Companions of Honour, upon his return to Canada Massey continued in the same fields. He sat as chair of the National Gallery of Canada from 1948 to 1952 and was selected as Chancellor of the University of Toronto between 1948 and 1953. In 1949, Massey's artistic expertise was of benefit when he was appointed as the head of the Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters and Sciences, which ultimately resulted in the Massey Report of 1951 and from there to the establishment of the National Library of Canada and the Canada Council of the Arts. All this Massey continued despite the death of his wife in July 1950.

Governor General of Canada
Massey's tenure as the Governor General of Canada was notable in that he was the first Canadian-born individual to be appointed to the post; previously, all the viceroys since Confederation had been born in another overseas region of the British Empire and later British Commonwealth. As a widower, he was also the only unmarried person ever to reside at Rideau Hall. Typically, the governor general's wife would be the viceregal consort and act as the hostess and chatelaine of the household. In Massey's case, however, his daughter-in-law, Lilias Massey, fulfilled the role, though she was not accorded the style of Her Excellency, usually given to the viceregal consort.

As governor general-designate
It was on February 1, 1952, announced from the Office of the Prime Minister of Canada that George VI had, by commission under the royal sign-manual and Great Seal of Canada, approved Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent's choice of Massey to succeed the Viscount Alexander of Tunis as the King's representative. Within five days, however, the King was dead and Massey, upon his swearing-in, would thus be the first Canadian-born representative of George's daughter, Queen Elizabeth II. To respect the king's death, there was little fanfare around Massey's appointment; Lord Alexander quietly departed Canada shortly after the announcement of Massey as his successor, leaving Chief Justice Thibaudeau Rinfret as administrator of the government in his place, as Massey was, at the time, in London. As he was a member of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom, he attended the new queen's Accession Council on February 7.

In Canada, there was some commentary about the soon-to-be representative of the new queen. The notion of a Canadian-born governor general, and one also not elevated to the peerage, was viewed as somewhat controversial by traditionalists. Massey, thus, was to be a compromise: while it was known he was closely associated with the Liberal Party, having been the group's chairman during the 1930s, the governor general-designate was a commoner Canadian by birth but he also embodied loyalty, dignity, and formality, as expected from a viceroy. Massey stated that, for his role as governor general, he looked for inspiration to one of his predecessors and a man Massey had known for decades: the Baron Tweedsmuir, whom Massey said he "greatly admired" and had "learnt much from" his tenure as governor general.

Life magazine magazine ran a profile piece on Massey in which the Marquess of Salisbury described Massey as an elegant individual—citing Massey's Oxford schooling and tailored clothing as illustrations—and thoroughly Canadian, though noting that "Vincent's a fine chap, but he does make one feel like a bit of a savage." But the elite demeanour he was sometimes criticised for was not evident in Massey's belief that the Crown belonged to Canadians and that it was his task as viceroy to act as a link between the people and the monarch. He similarly believed that the arts were a way to assert Canadian sovereignty and that the various artistic fields should be accessible to all Canadians.

In office
On February 26, 1952, Massey was sworn in as governor general of Canada in a ceremony in the Senate chamber, where he was presented with the Canadian Forces Decoration (subsequently given to all governors general upon taking office). However, Massey's first months as the viceroy were muted, due to the ongoing 16-week period of official mourning. It was not until the coronation of Elizabeth II on June 2, 1953, that Massey was called upon to take charge of any national celebration. For the occasion, he revived the use of the state carriage when he rode in it, with an accompanying guard of Royal Canadian Mounted Police, from the royal and viceroyal residence of Rideau Hall to Parliament Hill, where he introduced to the gathered crowd the Queen's coronation speech, broadcast around the world via radio. He also gave a silver spoon to each child born on that day.

Massey welcomed the Queen and her consort, the Duke of Edinburgh, to Ottawa on three occasions from 1957 on; when the royal couple were engaged in a cross-country tour, Massey invited them to stay at his private estate, Batterwood, near Port Hope, Ontario. He also hosted a number of foreign heads of state, including United States president Dwight D. Eisenhower on November 13, 1953. As a return gesture, Massey was invited by Eisenhower to Washington, D.C., where, on May 4, 1954, he addressed a joint session of the United States Congress.

It was Massey's intent as governor general to work to unite Canada's diverse cultures. He travelled across the country, using any and all available transportation, including canoe and dog sled, and delivered speeches promoting bilingualism, some 20 years before it became an official national policy. Along with the usual ceremonial duties undertaken by a viceroy, such as opening in 1955 the new home of the Royal Saskatchewan Museum and, with his 1958 Dominion Day speech, inaugurating the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's first national televised broadcast, the Governor General toured the Canadian arctic extensively, journeying to such places as Frobisher Bay and Hall Beach in the Northwest Territories, meeting with local Inuit residents, participating in their activities, and watching their performances. During his governor generalship, Massey also became actively involved with Upper Canada College, donating funds and his time to the school and seeing a number of spaces there named in his honour in return. As part of his effort to unify Canadians, it was Massey's desire to see established an entirely Canadian honours system. Though such a thing was never realised during his viceregal tenure, he helped lay the groundwork for the system that would be implemented by his successor, and in 1967, just months before his death, Massey was inducted as one of the first companions of the Order of Canada.

Legacy
It was said by Claude Bissell in his biography of Massey, The Imperial Canadian, that Massey's most influential years were between 1949 and 1959, when Massey "made his major contribution. More than any other Canadian, he was responsible for the first major movement of the arts and letters from the periphery of national concern towards the centre. It was a notable achievement." In this vein, he created awards for artistic endeavours, such as the Governor General's Medals in Architecture, and promoted the concept of an annual, national arts festival, which eventually led to the founding of the National Arts Centre. Further, Massey initiated in 1954 the Governor General's Gold Medal for the Institute of Chartered Accountants, as well as in 1959 the Massey Medal, for excellence in geographic endeavours for the Royal Canadian Geographical Society.

Post-viceregal life
Upon his final departure from Rideau Hall as governor general, Massey retired to Batterwood House, in the village of Canton, near Port Hope, Ontario. For his service to the Crown, he was awarded from the Queen the Royal Victorian Chain, making him the first Canadian recipient of that honour and today only one of two to ever receive it. Massey continued his philanthropic work, dedicating his time to the stewardship of the Massey Foundation, and its endowment to the University of Toronto, in particular. While Hart House continued as one of the recipients of Massey's attention and funds, Massey also expanded the scope of his donations to U of T with the establishment in 1963 of Massey College, to which Massey's protégé, Robertson Davies, was appointed as the college's first master. In 1961, the Massey Lectures were also initiated, conceived as a focus on important contemporary issues by leading thinkers, and they remain considered as the most important public lecture series in Canada.

At the end of 1967, on December 30, Massey died while on holiday in the United Kingdom. His remains were returned to Canada and he was, as is customary for former governors general, given a state funeral, in early January 1968. He was buried alongside his wife at St. Mark's Anglican church in Port Hope; his was the last burial to take place there.

Titles

 * February 20, 1887 – September 16, 1925: Mister Vincent Massey
 * September 16, 1925 – November 25, 1926: The Honourable Vincent Massey
 * November 25, 1926 – July 23, 1930: The Honourable Vincent Massey, Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the United States of America
 * July 23, 1930 – November 8, 1935: The Honourable Vincent Massey
 * November 8, 1935 – September 1, 1946: His Excellency the Honourable Vincent Massey, High Commissioner to the United Kingdom for His Majesty's Government in Canada
 * September 1, 1946 – February 28, 1952: The Honourable Vincent Massey
 * February 28, 1952 – September 15, 1959: His Excellency the Right Honourable Vincent Massey, Governor General and Commander-in-Chief in and over Canada
 * September 15, 1959 – December 30, 1967: The Right Honourable Vincent Massey

Honours
Appointments
 * 1946 – December 30, 1967: Companion of the Order of the Companions of Honour (CH)
 * 🇨🇦 September 16, 1925 – December 30, 1967: Member of the King's Privy Council for Canada (PC)
 * 🇨🇦 February 28, 1952 – 1955: Knight of Justice, Prior, and Chief Officer in Canada of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem (KStJ)
 * 1952 – September 15, 1959: Bailiff Grand Cross, Prior, and Chief Officer in Canada of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem (GCStJ)
 * September 15, 1959 – December 30, 1967: Bailiff Grand Cross of the Venerable Order of Saint John (GCStJ)
 * 🇨🇦 February 28, 1952 – September 15, 1959: Chief Scout of Canada
 * 🇨🇦 1952 – December 30, 1967: Honorary Member of the Royal Military College of Canada Club
 * 🇨🇦 July 9, 1967 – December 30, 1967: Companion of the Order of Canada (CC)
 * 🇨🇦 Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (FRSC(hon))

Medals
 * 🇨🇦 1935: King George V Silver Jubilee Medal
 * 🇨🇦 1937: King George VI Coronation Medal
 * 🇨🇦 February 28, 1952: Canadian Forces Decoration (CD)
 * 🇨🇦 1953: Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Medal
 * 🇨🇦 1967: Canadian Centennial Medal

Awards
 * July 22, 1960: Royal Victorian Chain
 * December 11, 1963: Augmentation of honour

Honorary military appointments

 * 🇨🇦 February 28, 1952 – September 15, 1959: Colonel of the Regiment of the Governor General's Horse Guards
 * 🇨🇦 February 28, 1952 – September 15, 1959: Colonel of the Regiment of the Governor General's Foot Guards
 * 🇨🇦 February 28, 1952 – September 15, 1959: Colonel of the Regiment of the Canadian Grenadier Guards

Honorary degrees

 * 🇨🇦 1951: Queen's University, Doctor of Laws (LLD)
 * 🇨🇦 May 13, 1955: University of Saskatchewan, Doctor of Laws (LLD)
 * 🇨🇦 May 18, 1954: University of British Columbia, Doctor of Laws (LLD)

Honorific eponyms


Events
 * 🇨🇦: Massey Lectures

Geographic locations
 * Alberta: Mount Massey
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Park, Ottawa
 * Saskatchewan: Massey Place, Saskatoon
 * Saskatchewan: Massey Park, Saskatoon

Buildings
 * British Columbia: Vincent Massey Theatre (later Massey Theatre), New Westminster
 * Ontario: Massey Building, Royal Military College of Canada, Kingston
 * Massey Library, within the Massey Building
 * Ontario: Massey Quadrangle, Upper Canada College, Toronto
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Memorial Centre, Bewdley
 * Ontario: Massey House, Trinity College, Toronto
 * Quebec: Place Vincent Massey, Gatineau
 * Quebec: Massey Building, Collège militaire royal de Saint-Jean, Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu

Schools
 * Alberta: Vincent Massey Junior High School, Calgary
 * Alberta: Vincent Massey School, Medicine Hat
 * Manitoba: Vincent Massey High School, Brandon
 * Manitoba: Vincent Massey Collegiate, Winnipeg
 * New Brunswick: Vincent Massey Elementary School, St. Andrews
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Public School, Bowmanville
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Public School, Cornwall (closed)
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Collegiate Institute, Etobicoke (closed)
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Public School, Etobicoke
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Public School, Etobicoke (closed)
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey School, Hamilton
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Public School, North Bay
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Public School, Oshawa
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Public School, Ottawa
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey School, Ottawa
 * Ontario: Massey College, University of Toronto, Toronto
 * Ontario: Vincent Massey Secondary School, Windsor
 * Quebec: Vincent Massey Collegiate, Montreal
 * Quebec: Vincent Massey Elementary School, Saint-Hubert
 * Saskatchewan: Vincent Massey Community School, Prince Albert
 * Saskatchewan: Ecole Massey School, Regina
 * Saskatchewan: Vincent Massey School, Saskatoon
 * Saskatchewan: Vincent Massey Public School, Saskatoon

Civic structures
 * Ontario: Massey Road, Canton