Collard, Edgar Andrew, 1911-2000 : Edgar Andrew Collard, journalist and author, was born in Montreal on 6 September 1911, the son of Gilchrist Collard and Florence May Luttrell. The Collards were Huguenots who had come to Canada in the 1870s and the Luttrells had arrived in Canada from Ireland about fifty years earlier. Collard began his journalism career by sending the "Montreal Gazette" occasional pieces on the historical background of the city of Montreal and on current events. He was hired full-time in the newspaper's library in 1942 and continued to write historical sketches for the newspaper. A year later he became an editorial writer and his weekly column began on 14 August 1944. In 1953 he was named editor-in-chief of the "Gazette" and served in that position until his nominal retirement in 1971. However, he continued to write his column until a month before his death in September 2000.
Collard's columns appeared in the "Gazette" for 56 years and he was known for his emphasis of the human dimension in his historical articles. In 1949 he won the first of four National Newspaper Awards for editorial writing. Collard wrote a number of books based on his research and writing for the "Gazette", among them being the following: "Montreal: the days that are no more", illustrated by John Collins (1978); "The McGill you knew: an anthology of memories", 1920-1960, (1975); "Prime ministers of Canada, 1867-1967" (1967); "A tradition lives: the story of The Gazette, Montreal, founded June 3, 1778" (1953); "Montreal yesterdays" (1962); "Oldest McGill" (1946); "The story of Dominion Square: Place du Canada" (1971); "All our yesterdays: a collection of 100 stories of people, landmarks and events from Montreal's past" (1988); "Montreal yesterdays: more stories from All our yesterdays" (1989); "Passage to the sea: the story of Canada Steamship Lines" (1991); "The Montreal Board of Trade, 1822-1972: a story" (1972); and "The Irish way: the history of the Irish Protestant Benevolent Society" (1992).
Collard married Henrietta Elizabeth Forde, daughter of Rev. and Mrs. George Henry Forde in 1947. In 1962, McGill University awarded Collard an honorary doctorate; Carleton University and Concordia University followed suit in 1981 and 1993 respectively. In 1976, Edgar Andrew Collard was awarded the Order of Canada. He died in Ottawa, Ontario 9 September 2000.
Collard, Elizabeth, 1917-2001 : Henrietta Elizabeth Forde was born in Sawyerville, Quebec on 20 October 1917. She was the daughter of Rev. George Henry Forde (1877-1932), a Methodist and later United Church minister, who served at several charges in Quebec and Ontaro, including: Sawyerville (1914-1918), Cobden, Ontario (1918-1919), Stanbridge East, Quebec (1921-1922), Dunham, Quebec (1924-1927), Kenogami, Quebec (1927-1929), and Cookshire, Quebec (1929-1932).
She started writing when she was still in grade school and her first story was published in "Saturday Night" when she was eleven years old. She went to St. Helen's School in Dunham, followed by the University of Toronto, but she obtained her Bachelor of Arts from Mount Allison University in 1939. She taught Latin for two years at St. Helen's before joining the "Montreal Gazette" in 1942 as education editor. She married Edgar Andrew Collard in 1947.
Elizabeth Collard was one of Canada's leading authorities on Canadian porcelain, earthenware and pottery. She wrote two books on antique Canadian pottery: "Nineteenth Century Pottery and Porcelain in Canada", (1967); and "The Potters View of Canada: Canadian Scenes on Nineteenth Century Earthenware", (1983). She was awarded an honorary doctorate from Mount Allison University in 1971 and received the Order of Canada in 1987 for her ceramics research. She lectured extensively and her expertise was sought by museums across Canada, such as the McCord Museum, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, and Canadian Museum of Civilization, to which she acted as a consultant. Elizabeth Collard died on 31 December 2001 of cancer.
