Robert Louis Rogers
For many of us who joined the Foreign Service a decade after the end of the war, Louis Rogers was something of a legend in his own time; certainly in ours. Combining all the professional virtues for which “The Department” had become…
Donald Anthony Moorman
Je désire rappeler avec beaucoup de ferveur et d’amitié le souvenir de Donald Moorman qui s’est taillé une juste réputation de 1954 à 1990 au sein du ministère. Né à Ottawa et y ayant fait ses classes, il passe le concours d’admission…
Cooper’s Snoopers and Other Follies
There is a big disappointment, for which you should prepare yourself, when you get to page 164 of this little book: it ends. And it ends far too soon. To be fair, the author has subtitled it “Fragments of a Life” and…
Uncle Joe Who? Understanding Khrushchev and Forgetting Stalin
One of the more remarkable careers in Canadian diplomatic history was the one which took John Watkins (1902-1964) from the family farm near Norval Station, Ontario, to the senior ranks of the Department of External Affairs, with two postings in Moscow (including…
David Bryce Wilson
David Wilson and I joined the Department of External Affairs in1947. We first met that summer in the then Political III Division (later American and Far Eastern). Thus began a friendship that lasted for more than 50 years and came to an…
Day One
Day One for me was August 30, 1993, and I joined the Department as a vision of sartorial safety; a bureaucratic fashion plate for the ’90s. My steel blue, round-around-the-middle Sears suit ensured I would blend into my surroundings, as if I…
Keith William MacLellan 1920-1998
Born in Aylmer, Quebec on November 30, 1920, Keith grew up in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, Montreal. He left McGill without a degree to join the Royal Montreal Regiment in 1942, and in 1944-45 served in Britain’s famous “1st Special Air Service Regiment” (SAS), where…
Examination and Selection for the Foreign Service of Canada
The following article is extracted from “Recruiting Tomorrow’s Ambassadors: Examination and Selection for the Foreign Service of Canada, 1925-1997”, which will appear in a collection of essays edited by Robert Wolfe entitled Diplomatic Missions: the Ambassador in Canadian Foreign Policy. The book…
The Lester B. Pearson Building: A Silver Jubilee
In September 1972, I took over the newly-created branch of the Department of External Affairs called the Bureau of Communications and General Services — identified for short as ACP — reporting to Larry O’Toole, the assistant undersecretary for administration. By far the…
Envoys Extraordinary — Women of the Canadian Foreign Service
The following two excerpts are taken from Margaret Weiers’ Envoys Extraordinary: Women of the Canadian Foreign Service, Dundurn Press, 1995, $29.99.
