William Lyon Mackenzie King
Plot L, Section 46, Lot 21
Birth:     Dec. 17, 1874
Death:     Jul. 22, 1950
Born in Kitchener (then called Berlin), Ontario on December 17,1874, King was the son of John King (d. 1916) and Isabel Grace Mackenzie (d. 1915), daughter of William Lyon Mackenzie, the “fiery rebel” and leader of the Rebellion of 1837 in Upper Canada. He attended public and high school in his hometown before enrolling at the University of Toronto where he graduated with a B.A. in 1895, LL.B. in 1896 and M.A. in 1897. He also won fellowships at the University of Chicago and Harvard. When Mackenzie King wasn’t attending university, he worked as a newspaper reporter and frequently wrote about social problems and conditions.  He was offered the position of deputy minister in Prime Minister Laurier’s new Labour Department which the young man accepted. In 1908, Mackenzie King was elected to parliament for the first time as the Liberal member for Waterloo North and was subsequently appointed minister of labour. In 1911, both Mackenzie King and his party were defeated and he soon left for the United States where he became director of industrial research for the Rockefeller Foundation. In 1917,  Mackenzie King returned to Canada and ran unsuccessfully as the Liberal candidate in the riding of York North. Following the death of Sir Wilfrid Laurier in 1919, Mackenzie King became the new leader of the national Liberal Party. He won a seat in a by-election in Prince County, Prince Edward Island and in the general election of 1921 decided to run again in York North where he had been defeated four years earlier. This time he won and was now able to sit in parliament as the country’s tenth prime minister.  In 1925, another election was called, but this time the outcome was indecisive. The Liberals tried to carry on, but the balance was too precarious and parliament was dissolved. The Conservatives, under Arthur Meighen, formed a government only to be defeated in the general election of 1926 (having been in power a mere eighty-eight days) and Mackenzie King once again took over, this time remaining in the prime minister’s office until defeated by R.B. Bennett in 1930. Five years later, Mackenzie King and his Liberals were again returned to power, as they were following elections in 1940 and 1945.  In total, William Lyon Mackenzie King held the office of Prime Minister of Canada for more than 21 years, a record that still stands. He relinquished the party leadership and prime ministership in 1948, though he retained his seat in Parliament until the general election held on June 27, 1949. A little more than one year later, on July 22, 1950 Mackenzie King passed away and was laid to rest with his mother (with whom he is said to have communicated after her death) and father, both of whom are in this plot.     Mackenzie King’s mother was the youngest daughter of William Lyon Mackenzie, Toronto’s first mayor, who is buried in the Necropolis. His father, John King, was a talented lawyer who was elected to the senate of the University of Toronto and later in life became a lecturer in criminal law at Osgoode Law School. Also buried in the King plot is his namesake Surgeon-Lieutenant William Lyon Mackenzie King who was killed when his destroyer, HMCS St. Croix, was torpedoed by a German U-Boat in September, 1943. In total, nine people are interred in this plot. and his Cabinet ignored reports from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Canadian military that most of the Japanese were law-abiding and not a considered a threat. In 1943 he hosted the First Quebec Conference with British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill, the Earl of Athlone (Alexander Cambridge, the 16th Governor General of Canada) and US President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the following year, he hosted the Second Quebec Conference with the same principals. In 1945 he won the Canadian federal election with a minority, but formed a functioning coalition to continue governing. The same year, he helped found the United Nations and attended the opening meetings in San Francisco, but he became pessimistic about the organization's future possibilities. After the war, he quickly dismantled wartime controls and began an ambitious program of social programs and laid the groundwork for Newfoundland and Labrador's entry into Canada, which did not take place until 1949, the year after he retired. In January 1948 he called on the Liberal Party to hold its first national convention since 1919 to choose a leader. In the August convention that year, they chose Louis St. Laurent as the new leader of the Liberal Party. Three months later, he retired after 22 years as Canada's Prime Minister. In private life he was highly eccentric, with his preference for communing with spirits, including those of Leonardo da Vinci, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, his dead mother, and several of his Irish Terrier dogs. He also claimed to communicate with the spirit of the late President Franklin D. Roosevelt. He sought personal reassurance from the spirit world, rather than seeking political advice. After his death, one of his mediums stated that she had not realized he was a politician. His occult interests were kept secret during his years in office, and only became publicized later. In 1953 "Time" magazine stated that he owned and used an Ouija board and a crystal ball.  He died of pneumonia in Kingsmere, Quebec, Canada, at the age of 75.