|
Wally Klinck recently sent out privately a series
of PDF files reproducing the text of Alf Hooke's autobiographical account of the
development of Alberta "Social Credit", and titled "30+5 ~ I Know, I
Was There."
Hooke was a former Alberta school principal who
played a major role as a long time Member of the Alberta Legislature,
and Cabinet Minister in both Premiers Aberhart and Manning's
governments.
I haven't checked to see if it's been added to the
archives of this list, but if it hasn't it should be.
It is a very readable story, and I'm grateful to
Wally for making it available on-line, since I believe the book itself is
long out-of-print, though doubtless used copies might still be found.
Included in the book are some of the monetary
proposals of Gerry McGeer, the one-time colorful Mayor of Vancouver, BC, and
later a BC Provincial and Federal politician.
Also included is the original
platform that the group led by William Aberhart put before the
Alberta voters in 1935, and a part which I found most
enlightening, a first hand account of "on the ground" conditions in
post-WW II Britain under Clement Atlee's 'socialist' Labour Party
government.
After the war, Hooke had been sent to
England, the land of his birth, to make arrangements for the establishment in
London of "Alberta House", a Provincial 'embassy' similar to the one
long operated there by British Columbia.
His first hand description of the process that this
entailed, and the way the British people were suffering with wholly artificial
shortages of everything, needlessly it would seem in any physical sense,
but obviously vital for the express purpose of re-inflicting on them
the 'necessity' of 'sound finance', by a "People's government" no less,
makes a fascinating read.
I won't spoil the story by relating some of the
other events recounted there, or what I thought, at least, was an indication of
the difficulty of ever properly implementing "social credit" via a political
party supposedly dedicated to that purpose, but it's certainly a book I thought
was well worth reading, and would recommend it to all.
Joe.
| 
Alf Hooke's book ~
Reply to this message
