Charles H. Ballam (May 10, 1901 – December 12, 1981) was a Canadian union leader, officeholder and delegate at

Newfoundland National Convention The Newfoundland National Convention of 1946 to 1948 was a forum established to decide the constitutional future of Newfoundland. Nominations On 11 December 1945 the British Government announced that there would be an election to a national c ...

. Ballam was born in 1901 in

Curling Curling is a sport in which players slide stones on a sheet of ice toward a target area which is segmented into four concentric circles. It is related to bowls, boules, and shuffleboard. Two teams, each with four players, take turns sliding ...

Newfoundland Colony Newfoundland Colony was an English and, later, British colony established in 1610 on the island of Newfoundland off the Atlantic coast of Canada, in what is now the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. That followed decades of sporadic English ...

, son of Alice and Manoah Ballam. He was educated at Curling high school, became an apprentice in the electrical department of the Anglo-Newfoundland Development Company, operators of the pulp and paper mill in Grand Falls. When

Bowater Bowater Inc. was a paper and pulp business headquartered in Greenville, South Carolina. It merged with Abitibi-Consolidated in 2007, and the combined company went on to become Resolute Forest Products. History The North American assets of Bow ...

's constructed a pulp and paper mill in

Corner Brook Corner Brook ( 2021 population: 19,333 CA 29,762) is a city located on the west coast of the island of Newfoundland in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Corner Brook is the fifth largest settlement in Newfoundland and Labrador. ...

in the mid-1920s, Ballam moved there to be close to his former home in Curling. In 1940, his career changed when he became a representative for Sun Life Assurance Company. Ballam, elected president of Local 64 of the Pulp and Sulphite Workers Union in Corner Brook in 1935, had also attended the founding convention of the

Newfoundland Federation of Labour The Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Labour is the Newfoundland and Labrador provincial trade union federation for the Canadian Labour Congress. It was founded in 1937, and has a membership of 65,000. The Newfoundland and Labrador Federat ...

in 1937. In 1939, he relinquished his leadership role with Local 64 to become president of the new federation, a position he held until the following year when he left the Corner Brook mill to enter the insurance business. Ballam decided to offer himself for one of the two delegate positions assigned to Humber district at the National Convention, that was set up by the

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on December 11, 1945 to determine the political fate of Newfoundland and Labrador. He had won the position with 1,624 votes, second to Pierce Fudge, another well-known and popular labour leader. At the convention, Smallwood felt he could count on Ballam for support for the motion he planned to introduce early in the convention calling for a delegation to

Ottawa Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...

to discuss potential terms of union between Canada and Newfoundland. Ballam, in his speech to the convention on Smallwood's resolution, clearly states that he is :''not a Confederate and not supporting any particular form of government; but in the interests of the whole country I would like to see something definite done on this question once and for all.'' Even though Smallwood failed in his first attempt to have such a delegation appointed, he was successful later in the convention. Ballam voted in favour of both resolutions, and was elected as one of the delegates to go to Ottawa to explore terms in June 1947. The delegation's report, tabled at the Convention in November, was rejected by a majority of its members. Confederation did eventually make it as one of the ballot options presented to the people of Newfoundland in a

referendum A referendum (plural: referendums or less commonly referenda) is a direct vote by the electorate on a proposal, law, or political issue. This is in contrast to an issue being voted on by a representative. This may result in the adoption of a ...

held on June 3, 1948. By then, Ballam was a committed Confederate. He was one of the leading campaigners for the Confederate forces in Corner Brook and the surrounding area for that referendum and for a second referendum held on July 22. Ballam was selected by Joseph R. Smallwood, the interim premier, to be a part of his cabinet when it was sworn into office on March 31, 1949. That cabinet held office until the first post-Confederate

House of Assembly House of Assembly is a name given to the legislature or lower house of a bicameral parliament. In some countries this may be at a subnational level. Historically, in British Crown colonies as the colony gained more internal responsible governme ...

was elected on May 27, 1949, after which a new cabinet was sworn in from the elected MHAs. Ballam won his seat and once again was given the portfolio the Department of Labour. He held that portfolio for the next 17 years. Re-elected in the district of Humber in 1951 and, following redistribution, of Humber West in 1956, 1959 and 1962, in 1966 he announced his retirement from politics, following which he was appointed a member of the board of the

Newfoundland and Labrador Power Commission Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro (NL Hydro), commonly known as Hydro, is a provincial Crown corporation that generates and delivers electricity for Newfoundland and Labrador, as well as portions of Quebec and the north-eastern areas of the United ...

. He died on December 12, 1981. Ballam and his wife E. Maria Bagg established a scholarship in memory of their son Ulric, who was killed in an accident at the Corner Brook pulp and paper mill on July 27, 1945, at the age of 17, to be awarded annually to a term 2 engineering student at

Memorial University of Newfoundland Memorial University of Newfoundland, also known as Memorial University or MUN (), is a public university in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, based in St. John's, with satellite campuses in Corner Brook, elsewhere in Newfoundland and ...

References

External links

The Ottawa Delegation 1947Royal Commission on Renewing and Strengthening Our Place in Canada
pdf file. {{DEFAULTSORT:Ballam, Charles H. 1901 births 1981 deaths Newfoundland National Convention members Members of the Executive Council of Newfoundland and Labrador Liberal Party of Newfoundland and Labrador MHAs

See also

References

External links