Vince Byfield and Jonathan Van Maren discuss the life and career of Ted Byfield, who died at the age of 95, and the impact he had on the culture wars that were raging in Alberta at the time of his death.
00:00:00.000Good evening, Western Standard viewers. I'm Nigel Hannaford, and welcome to The Hannaford Show.
00:00:22.720It would be hard to exaggerate the impact that the late Ted Byfield had on the life and politics of Alberta for the last 30 years, I would say.
00:00:36.920The man was incredibly industrious, pushing out his point of view through the report magazines and through various publications.
00:00:45.080I knew him a little in the last years of his life, and even at the age of 90, he was still publishing books.
00:00:52.080He thrust this into my hand just before I saw him for the last time.
00:00:57.160The time is now, and it was an examination of the culture wars that were raging in Alberta and continue to do so.
00:01:05.540We are very pleased to have with us tonight Vince Byfield.
00:01:18.420Gosh, you're so hard to get on the phone.
00:01:20.720This is what we do to have to get you, is it?
00:01:23.480Also, I'm glad to welcome Jonathan Van Maren, who is a columnist who will be familiar to many of our readers through his own bridgehead postings.
00:01:33.960You have just, I think, completed this little book here, The Prairie Lion, a biography of Ted Byfield.
00:01:44.880It's a great read, and I'm going to come to you first.
00:01:49.240Actually, Jonathan, let me start with you.
00:01:53.700You've had a good look at the life of Ted Byfield.
00:01:56.240Stephen Harper said that Ted Byfield's magazines, the reports, Alberta, BC, Western, were key to nurturing the conservative movement in Western Canada.
00:02:14.180Completely. I think it was probably best put by publisher Peter Stockland, who said no Alberta report, no Reform Party as it was, no Reform Party as it was, no PC collapse, no PC collapse, no conservative majority in 2011.
00:02:31.900It's shorthand history, but fair shorthand history.
00:02:35.720Many people don't know that it was actually Ted who wrote the first column in 1986, proposing the idea for what a Reform-type party would look like.
00:02:45.440He did the keynote speech in 1987 in Vancouver, announcing that the West wants in.
00:02:51.320That conference was an incredibly momentous conference for Canadian conservatism because it was hosted by Preston Manning.
00:02:58.140And at that conference, a young Stephen Harper handed Preston Manning a paper on taxes that landed him a job as chief policy analyst.
00:03:05.940Ted would never take credit for all of the things that followed, but Preston Manning insisted on giving it to him.
00:03:11.220And almost everybody I interviewed said that we simply would not have seen politics unfold the way they did without Alberta report, without Ted Byfield.
00:03:19.940Well, that's all the recommendation we need.
00:03:23.260Coming now to you, Vince, one of the, I think, one of the very, very sad things that we all Western conservatives had to contend with was that when your father passed on,
00:03:36.060he did so in the middle of the COVID epidemic, and we were never really able to have that kind of a Viking funeral that he so richly deserved.
00:03:46.500I sort of remember that grave-sized ceremony at 30 below in Edmonton, and the interment followed, and I've never heard the liturgy chanted so quickly and so compellingly.
00:04:01.560But that was the fact, the fact was that even though the former premier, Jason Kenney, did show up, there were an awful lot of people who would have wanted to say something as he said goodbye to your father.
00:05:13.600And he said, you know, if you do decide, even at this stage of the game, to do something, some kind of occasion or event, I would be honored to speak at that.
00:06:39.300And so this will be in the style of that.
00:06:41.780This will be an echo of a well-tried routine for bringing people together.
00:06:46.780But I think this one's going to be a lot bigger.
00:06:49.380And if you don't move quickly, you are probably going to miss out.
00:06:53.860So how do people get their hands on a ticket?
00:06:57.020Well, the best way is to go to our website, which is toastingted, all one word, toasting, like T-O-A-S-T, toastingted.ca.
00:07:07.960And the very first thing you see at the top is a big red button that says reserve your spot.
00:07:13.920And what that does is gives you a form.
00:07:17.140You're not actually buying a ticket just yet.
00:07:19.760What you are doing is filling out your interest, and you are then in the queue for a spot at the table for this event, which will be an amazing event.
00:07:29.560And so we're doing it in that fashion rather than giving out ticket prices because we want very much the – you'll recall that I said it's an evening to remember Ted, but it's also an evening to honor Ted.
00:07:44.500And by honor, Dad gave the last 20 years of his life at least to the creation of what he believes is his most important work, which was the 12-volume history book series that is entitled The Christians, Their First 2,000 Years.
00:08:06.160And it's that series that we are trying to raise funds for with this event to get them into as many high school as possible.
00:08:17.140Well, I think that's a wonderful project, and I am somewhat familiar with it, having worked on it myself in the – or not on the preparation of the books, but in the use of them later as teaching aids.
00:08:30.160So I wish you very well with that, so it's a good cause, but I think the – tell us again, you have Premier Smith speaking.
00:09:02.160He was trying to get his schedule readjusted, but he won't be able to attend, so he is trying to make a video for the evening.
00:09:09.160And we are working with Pierre Polyev as well and with Jason Kenney to have them provide speaking.
00:09:16.160There are other people – there are a lot of other people that are coming, politicians from the Reform days, politicians, current politicians from the United Conservative Party days.
00:09:26.160We have alumnus coming from – alumni from all of the Report magazines.
00:09:32.160We have people coming from his days from St. John's School.
00:10:54.160But some of the most prominent names in Canadian journalism started off in your father's office and there with your mother as proofreading and have stories to tell.
00:11:08.160Look, there's one other thing that I want to bring forward here, Vince.
00:11:12.160This is a very significant moment for us at the Western Standard because having acquired the rights to the Alberta Report name, we are very proud – very proud – to be carrying this name forward within the context of the Western Standard.
00:11:29.160And so what readers have already discovered is that to pick up the latest Alberta news, they go to that section of our website called Alberta Report.
00:11:39.160Everything that is tagged Alberta goes into there.
00:11:42.160And Vince, our goal is to continue the promotion of conservatism in the way that your father did for so many years and so effectively.
00:11:57.160And I like what Jonathan had said just now about how they – how your father had actually laid out the blueprint that happened.
00:12:05.160Get a regional party going, morph onto the national scene, you know, bring the old parties together and take over the government.
00:12:13.160So, I mean, that was incredibly ambitious for 1986.
00:12:18.160Here at the Western Standard we have our own ambitions and we're very pleased to think that that name, the Alberta Report, to which we're sentimentally attached as well as in a business way, is going to be part of it.
00:12:32.160So it's a new era for both of us, Vince.
00:12:38.160And I would say that Western Standard is doing an admirable job in maintaining that independent voice that Alberta Report became so famous for.
00:12:50.160There are many, many people through the years who've come to DAD and voiced their – expressed their appreciation for that time during the NEP years, the National Energy Program years, when virtually the entire established media was not saying anything at all.
00:13:14.160In contradiction to this huge power grab that was taking place.
00:13:22.160But DAD spoke up and by doing so earned the appreciation and loyalty of Albertans everywhere, especially in the oil industry.
00:13:33.160And I believe that the Western Standard is absolutely continuing in that fashion.
00:13:40.160So it is exceptionally appropriate that you take on and become, as we say, this event could very – will signal a changing of the guard from Alberta Report to the Western Standard.
00:14:02.160You know, our publisher, Derek Fildebrandt, will be speaking at your event.
00:14:06.160And I'm sure he'll have more to say on this subject.
00:14:09.160But that's very much the way that he sees it as a continuation of a mission, a continuation of a very well-beloved and well-respected name in Alberta journalism.
00:14:22.160So the project that you are engaged on, Vince, is distributing these books.
00:14:33.160I get the impression that your father never lost his interest in politics but became increasingly towards the end of his life very conscious of wanting to take on a project that would honor God.
00:14:47.160Is that where that series of books came from?
00:14:52.160Dad – one of the things that Dad recognized with Alberta Report, and I think it kind of depressed him a little bit, is that he would put a lot of work into making every issue.
00:15:08.160The readership reached at one point in the neighborhood of 500,000 Albertans.
00:15:14.160And this was at a time when Alberta was two to two and a half million people.
00:15:18.160So that would be one in five Albertans.
00:15:21.160We're reading the magazine on a regular basis.
00:15:23.160And people like Ted Martin, who will also be at this event and speaking.
00:15:29.160He said that at one point, this is pre-internet days, Nigel.
00:15:36.160And in rural Alberta, when the next issue of Alberta Report came out, people were talking about it.
00:15:43.160But nonetheless, after a few weeks and months, all that work would wind up in a bin.
00:15:50.160And Dad wanted to have a more lasting impact.
00:15:56.160So he started a series of books called Alberta in the 20th Century.
00:16:02.160And I believe that Alberta, he completed that 12 hardcover, beautifully illustrated volumes of the history of our province, Alberta.
00:16:14.160And I don't know of any other province or state in North America, or the world for that matter, that has 12 full volumes dedicated to their history for one century.
00:16:30.160And some very well-known writers contributed to that.
00:16:34.160I do recall, I know that you had Paul Bunner there editing it at one time.
00:16:39.160Paul Bunner would become the speechwriter for the Prime Minister Harper.
00:16:43.160So, you know, the connections there are very close and very intense.
00:16:49.160Paul Bunner then morph into the Christian history.
00:16:53.160Paul Bunner Well, so after those books were completed, Dad also, I'll just say it, he was concerned about the rise of a resurgence of Islam.
00:17:08.160And so he had started to write copious notes on the influence of Islam in the Western civilization and in the modern world.
00:17:22.160But he wanted people to know the history, the background, and why it was a very serious threat.
00:17:28.160Paul Bunner And so he began initially with that, but then as he started to do it more and more, he realized that this was only one segment of our history that most young people do not know.
00:17:46.160Paul Bunner And so dad realized that there was actually a very pressing need for a complete history of everything that has transpired in Christendom or the Western.
00:18:01.160Paul Bunner When you and I went to school in university, there was a course called Western civilization.
00:18:09.160Paul Bunner It's now very rarely available now in universities.
00:18:14.160Paul Bunner But these books essentially comprise that.
00:18:19.160Paul Bunner It's the history of Christianity.
00:18:24.160Paul Bunner And so dad did an exceptional job with this set of books because he went out of his way to recruit writers from all the main denominations of Christianity.
00:18:40.160Paul Bunner And so he had Catholic writers, various Protestant denominations involved, and also Orthodox Christian writers.
00:18:46.160Paul Bunner And so he brought on academics so that the contents of these books are agreed upon by all the major academics from all the major denominations.
00:18:59.160Paul Bunner And so that has now taken on a life of its own.
00:19:21.160Paul Bunner But anyway, that's what the dad was driven to do those books next.
00:19:27.160Paul Bunner And that took, that was an enormous task involving hundreds of people contributing and millions of dollars to make.
00:19:40.160Paul Bunner It is indeed an incredible project.
00:19:44.160Paul Bunner I have my own set there and it's remarkable.
00:19:48.160Paul Bunner Look, we're almost out of time.
00:19:50.160Paul Bunner Jonathan I think it would be remiss of me if I did not point out that through your own Bridgehead publication, you are very much on the same mission as Ted Byfield was.
00:20:03.160Paul Bunner Fighting the Culture War, maybe not the political war, but the culture war.
00:20:07.160Paul Bunner And I have read a lot of your work.